Though many of us are too young to remember it, the shockwaves from the 1960s integration of DISD are still being felt in our community, and while race relations in our city are certainly more cordial these days, they’re certainly no less complicated. To see just how far we’ve come…
“Sunday living/Seven days a week”–so goes one chorus on the debut of Austin’s Brothers and Sisters, Texas’ newest and brightest purveyors of easygoing ’60s-style country-rock. In concert, the band more than lives up to their name, mixing the family-style harmonies of the Mamas and the Papas with the chiming guitars…
“Won’t need no shadow man runnin’ the government/Won’t need no stinkin’ war!” From the first lines of “After the Garden,” the first track on Living With War, it’s clear that we’re dealing with a Neil Young we haven’t heard from in some time–angry, loud and ferociously vital, old age and…
Endure a few run-throughs of Pomp and Circumstance, make sure your tassel is on the correct side of your cap and ready your flask for the after-party at the rich kids lake house. Its a graduation, baby. Most years, the theme of the Dallas Observer Music Awards is an afterthought,…
The newly restored Belmont Hotel has quickly become one of the trendiest hangouts in Dallas, drawing in a diverse crowd of Oak Cliff hipsters and well-to-do art aficionados with its stunning bluff-side views of downtown and the Trinity (not to mention the neon signs and street hookers of Fort Worth…
The promo photo for Zero, a one-man play starring Danny O’Connor, features two shots of the actor in a strange illustrated environment. If Morgan Spurlock followed some paw prints to the Mad Dog 20/20 display at Centennial on an episode of Blue’s Clues, it might end up looking something like…
You might have seen comedian George Lopez on his hit ABC sitcom (the cleverly titled George Lopez) or in the Robert Rodriguez film The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl 3-D. You might have also caught him on the stand during last year’s infamous Michael Jackson trial. You see, Mr. Lopez…
According to his Web site, pop artist Peter Max was born in Germany and grew up in Shanghai, where he lived in a “pagoda-style house situated amidst a Buddhist monastery, a Sikh temple and a Viennese cafe.” When he was 10, Peter and his family “traveled across the vast expanse…
According to his Web site, pop artist Peter Max was born in Germany and grew up in Shanghai, where he lived in a “pagoda-style house situated amidst a Buddhist monastery, a Sikh temple and a Viennese cafe.” When he was 10, Peter and his family “traveled across the vast expanse…
If you live in Grand Prairie and are rudely awakened Saturday morning by what sounds like an earthquake or a crashing jetliner, don’t be afraid. That’s just the sound of morons revving their motorcycle engines (They’re trying to tell you how big their ding-dongs are). And these aren’t your average…
Jana Hunter’s otherworldly voice isn’t exactly what you’d expect to hear coming from a girl raised in Arlington. After appearing on the Devendra Banhart-curated Golden Apples of the Sun compilation, the enigmatic Hunter teamed with the freak-folk king to release both a vinyl split and a full length LP on…
Neil Simon’s Rumors would be a hell of a lot cooler if he had just added a ‘u’ to the title and written it about Fleetwood Mac. Now there’s a play I would see. Messy break-ups. Rock and roll excess. Stevie Nicks practicing witchcraft while a roadie blows the devil’s…
Native Americans make some damn fine storytellers. I mean, when you go through the type of crap they have as a people, it’s hard not to end up with a juicy tale or two. Choctaw author and storyteller Tim Tingle has told one such tale with Crossing Bok Chitto, the…
With the recent uproar about immigration and other issues on the U.S./Mexico border, the timing couldn’t be more perfect for the new album by Calexico, the multinational collective (members hail from both the United States and Germany) founded by Tucson residents Joey Burns and John Convertino. However, Garden Ruin sees…
It’s pretty rare for an artist to make children’s music that doesn’t make adults reach for their imaginary revolvers, but that’s exactly what Dan Zanes has been doing for more than half a decade. After fronting the Boston roots-rock band the Del Fuegos in the 1980s, Zanes settled down in…
I first heard Ladysmith Black Mambazo performing “Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes” with Paul Simon on a Saturday Night Live repeat I caught on Comedy Central. That was also the last time I knowingly heard them, but it’s not because I wasn’t impressed—they certainly danced better than Chevy…
Oak Cliff’s Kessler Park may just be the most beautiful neighborhood in Dallas. Full of rolling hills, giant shade trees and unusual architecture, the area consists mostly of developments built between the ’20s and the ’60s, as well as the city-run Stevens Park golf course. Named after Dallas city planner…
Short films always get the corresponding end of the stick come Oscar time, struggling for any attention while the people that toiled to make them have to dress up and endure the speeches of actors and actresses who, more often than not, shouldn’t be allowed to talk without a script…
One of the worst (or best, depending on your point of view) things about riding in an elevator or shopping in a grocery store is hearing Muzak versions of your favorite tunes. There’s nothing quite as disturbing as an angry and energetic rock tune mutilated and neutered by some douche…
When I read that Texas Discovery Gardens was hosting an event called Flying Wild: Songbirds to Raptors, I nearly fainted out of excitement. Finally, Michael Crichton’s dream of a dinosaur theme park had come true! And it wasn’t on an island off the coast of Costa Rica! It was in…
The 1992 TV movie T Bone N Weasel starred Gregory Peck and Christopher Lloyd, who along with Peck’s “T Bone” spends most of the movie driving across South Carolina in a stolen car. Considering Lloyd’s character in Back to the Future (Dr. Emmett Brown) was a scientist who owned a…
The only reason to listen to Dallas FM radio, other than KERA and The Ticket, is 95.3 The Range. These guys, who started broadcasting in 1997, are the answer to the absolute shit mainstream country music has become (I’m talking to you, Kenny Chesney, you puka-shelled, barefooted, NASCAR-loving son of…
