Sweden is one of those longitudinal oddities, where everlasting sun and everlasting night box back and forth in tune with the seasons, and the country’s biggest music acts have a similar double nature. The Cardigans sounded like fluff and sang about wrist-slashing, and the Hives sound like daggers and sing…
The following is an excerpt from the book All Over The Map: True Heroes of Texas Music (UT Press), which will be released on Friday, November 18, at AllGood Café from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. There, the Dallas Observer’s Robert Wilonsky will host a Q & A session, and…
When you’re My Morning Jacket, and two of your long-standing members decide they want off the ride for good, you try to soldier on. Worse, the near-breakup comes after three achingly beautiful albums, a half-decade of paying your dues and tours at increasingly large venues for growing crowds, and it…
“Introspection!” Such is guitarist Huw Bunford’s pithy reply to a question about the theme of Love Kraft, the new album by his band, Wales’ Super Furry Animals. A bit later, discussing the album’s surf-rockish instrumental, Bunford will add, pretty much apropos of nothing, “Don’t fear bird flu!” For an expert…
Does the bad news for Deep Ellum ever stop? The official problems–Chapter 11 bankruptcy filings by the Entertainment Collective (owners of Gypsy Tea Room and Trees) and the Curtain Club–haven’t done much to help the not-so-official problems in the downtown music district. Parking is more difficult than ever, local music…
Summer time: Colleyville’s Bryce Avary, better known to screaming emo fans across the world as The Rocket Summer, needs your help. The one-guy-who-plays-everything band that makes Conor Oberst look like a geezer in comparison headlines a concert at The Door on Friday, November 18, but before heading back on the…
Proof that Madonna’s handlers have given up on her: Nobody stepped in and slapped the gap-toothed smile off her face when she insisted on rhyming the words “York” and “dork.” Well, at least she isn’t trying to sound smart this time. On Confessions on a Dance Floor, Madonna makes progress…
The unforgiving and unsentimental damn him as the Dim Beatle, the Dull Beatle, the Dung Beatle; he’s no John or George, after all, magical, mythical martyrs who always appeared to be sharpening the edge Paul dulled at every turn. Of course, such scorn is occasionally warranted; for every “Maybe I’m…
How strange–in a musical climate that gives a new Neil Diamond CD all the promotion in the world, the newly released soul-throwback I Believe To My Soul is already collecting dust. Maybe it’s just that this music doesn’t yell, “Look at me, I’m important!” but these 13 grooveful tunes are…
Let’s get this one out of the way: On Thursday, the Drams didn’t play a single Slobberbone song. In fact, during the group’s first full-blown, 19-date national tour a few weeks ago, the three former Slobberbone members (along with Budapest One’s songwriting duo of Keith Killoren and Chad Stockslager) didn’t…
The best rock show of the week starts early at the Cavern, when Detroit’s Hard Lessons open the night like a Pabst. Agostino Visocchi’s guitars and howls are loud and foaming, but the synthesizers and cooing vocals from organ player Korin Cox make the trio’s garage-infused bite go down smoothly…
Blessed with a commanding voice reminiscent of Chrissie Hynde, Kansas City native Michelle Anthony offers a bluesy take on alt-country, full of cynical wit and post-relationship regret. Now residing in Austin and finishing up her sophomore effort, Anthony’s mix of urban soul and rural twang should appeal to fans of…
On March 25, 2003, Scott H. Biram was severely injured in a head-on collision with an 18-wheeler, his truck run over by a careless driver talking on his phone. For a guy so enamored with trucker culture, it would have been a fitting way to go, but miraculously, he was…
Honus Honus may be on the brink of genius–if not on the brink of a first-grade temper tantrum. Either way, he’s bringing back the handlebar mustache–and the Beefheart that goes with it. As the Barnum (and maybe the Bailey, too) of the four-ring circus that is Man Man, Honus’ gravel-pit…
In our September review of Broadcast’s third album, Tender Buttons, we insisted that the British band’s recent reduction to two members has done nothing but emboldened the daydreamy, electronically fused French-bistro-in-Mars sound of the group, and the same can be said for the duo’s live shows. Live drums have been…
When one of your parents owns one of the most legendary venues in the world, breaks aren’t hard to come by. Hell, how do you think Pauly “Comedy Store” Shore even got a career? But rich genealogy doesn’t have to be a burden–just ask Tall Paul. Because his father owned…
On her new Timeless, a self-produced collection of covers of classic country tunes, Martina McBride pays tribute to the music of her (and older people’s) past without trashing the present–a real accomplishment in C&W, where somebody’s notion of authenticity is always getting in the way of a good time. (Even…
DJ Jazzy Jeff is two decades deep into a music career that has seen him produce multiplatinum records, snatch Grammies and gain fame on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, but he’ll always be a DJ at heart. He’s been on the road nonstop since the release of soulful beat opus…
The increasingly combative File-Sharing Wars have come to this: Record companies now assume you have criminal intent whether you buy CDs honestly or not. Recent releases from Foo Fighters, My Morning Jacket, Velvet Revolver and Neil Diamond have placed new, unexpected limitations on your ability to rip, store, copy and…
This week, I’ve caught myself taking more than a few bitter glances at Reunion Arena. You might think this has something to do with the political goings-on surrounding Ray Hunt and the possibility of the building crumbling to make room for a parking lot, and I could try to sound…
Rev. Run (aka Joseph Simmons) is a founding member of hip-hop legend Run-D.M.C., and his new disc, Distortion–a collection of rap-rock hybrids not unlike the vintage tracks he created with his former group–was released on October 18. Additionally, Run now stars in a “reality-based” TV series (co-produced by his brother…
My old buddy Thom–yeah, I mean Thom Yorke from Radiohead–finally wrote me again. I was getting worried. What? Yeah, we don’t hang out much, him living in England, but I e-mail him about the band’s progress on their latest album, and he posts responses on the band’s Web site. You’re…
