Dallas Comic Con, that annual ode to pop-culture nerdery, arrives at the Irving Convention Center this weekend. If it’s anything like last year’s, it will be glorious. But for noobs and vets alike, it’s easy to get lost in the shuffle. So we’ve created a simple-to-follow-if-you-know-your-A-B-Cs glossary, to give you…
The beatmakers, producers and DJs in Dallas are busting the local music scene wide open. We here at the Observer wanted to showcase that talent through mixes made by the best in the business, especially for DC9 at Night. So stream, download and share the mix with your friends. Relive…
A man stands alone in the first-floor hallway of the Fairmont Hotel in downtown Dallas. His lanky arms hang behind his back, hands clasped. His fedora sits low between his eyes, obscuring his unflinching gaze at the glass encasement filled with large-scale, Renaissance-style oil paintings. Tony Bennet, the hotel doorman,…
Electro-dance outfit Ishi, celebrated the release of their sophomore LP, Digital Wounds, this weekend at the Granada Theater. Frontman John Mudd (One of two remaining original members, along with producer Brad Dale) says they wanted to make a new record that captured the energy from the dance-floor numbers of the…
Sometimes things are only “underground” out of ignorance. The poetry scene in Dallas is an established one, home to both talent and venues, each with its own style. To develop this guide, I spoke with some of the city’s most prolific and involved poets, to find which venues had the…
Killa MC, the brash, proud and highly skilled member of Denton hip-hop collective Brain Gang, enters from behind the curtain in full military regalia and takes his place at the front of the stage inside the Prophet Bar. “I want to be all over Instagram with this outfit on, so…
As we approach the halfway mark of 2013, it’s time to recap the five most interesting local hip-hop music videos released so far. There were plenty of releases to choose from, so to keep things diplomatic, I kept it to one per artist. Although lyrical content and beat played a…
The moment I became a believer came at 9:45 pm. The sticky, simmering sun had long since lowered, giving way to a clear night filled with cool gusts of wind. I had just sat through a few horrible sets at the Phoenix Rising Stage, deflated at how the festival had…
WWF legend The Ultimate Warrior stands in front of a U.W. branded background, shirtless and in full guise. His chest is wet with sweat, muscles flexed to full suspension and nipples sharp enough to gouge the canvas mat. What was probably a reactionary response to an interviewer’s mention of arch-nemesis…
Last week’s Not Waiting For Permission, the 2nd Annual State of the Emerging Arts at UTD’s CentralTrak, continued the out-in-the-open conversation that’s forcing people to take notice, and perhaps sides, in their support of local art. For too long it seemed the conversations dictating the fate of independent galleries and…
Front-woman Ally Play-Nice of the Atomic Tanlines once told me, “Punk isn’t about what you wear or how many patches you have on your vest. It’s a fucking lifestyle.” The genre’s ethos alive and well in DFW. Most bands couldn’t give me a definitive release date, album title or track…
I remember a few years ago my car ran out of gas on I-35. I hopped down the bridge and started walking, in the dead of night, on Colorado toward Beckley. I’d left Oak Cliff a few years before, but the corner boys and gang bangers were right where I…
The best band names play upon the pop cultural lexicon, using reference to convey attitude or sound. The best ones do so subtly or unexpectedly, turning injustices or misconceptions in on themselves. I’ve gathered the 10 most intriguing and kick-ass of the rowdy and reckless DFW band names as an…
If the Dallas curator scene had a cypher, Kevin Rubén Jacobs would be Riff Raff, refusing to stay on beat, dropping obscure references, making meta-mash potatoes out of the other MCs and showcasing his deep knowledge of the pop culture and art world. His Oliver Francis Gallery has already kicked…
“Deep Ellum’s back” has been vomited out and up ad nauseum. The truth is it never left. Changed perhaps. Got its face kicked in a few times, then touched up with a lil plastic surgery, and now exists as an amalgamation of its roots and reanimations, with a strong neighborhood…
My laundry list of life regrets is full of squandered chances, like when I missed Justin Timberlake at Gypsy Tea Room in 2005. Still, none sits higher than the time I passed on a lecture by Nikki Giovanni. The poet, activist and educator stopped by Mountain View College to perform…
Imagine you’re chillin in the Cliff, strolling down Jefferson street, sucking face with a paleta. You got margaritas to your left, tapas to your right, and European sci-fi trash showing at the Texas Theatre. You’re about that life, huh? I mean, what more could you want? How about a little…
Named for Stephen King’s 1986 film, Maximum Overdrive the exhibition, which opens today at UT Dallas, picks up where the apocalyptic survival movie leaves off, with humor, gore and machismo. The movie is a cult classic for its depiction of electronic devices taking over the world, accompanied by a totally…
After stops in Fort Worth and Denton, British artist, culture critic and broadcaster Matthew Collings ends his North Texas tour at the Nasher Sculpture Center tonight. Not sure whether he’s worth your mind’s precious time? Here are five reasons. 1. He’s a tastemaker And even though he surely finds that…
At one point or another, it happens to all of us: We look at art and we just don’t “see it.” For Stephen Lapthisophon, artist and art history professor at the University of Texas at Arlington, it’s these moments he enjoys most. “There are works of art that I love…
Houston-based artist and activist Rick Lowe was in downtown Dallas last night, delivering a sort-of inaugural address for a new series of design-focused lectures for the buildingcommunityWORKSHOP, a non-profit that works to remake struggling communities through design. To which you might say, “Great, another week-night lecture by a dude I’ve…
“It takes a village,” goes the saying. But what if the village is under-developed, infested with violence and depleted of resources from years of neglect and misappropriation? That’s the question Rick Lowe has been addressing since he founded Project Row Houses in Third Ward, a neighborhood that’s been pondering those…
