Last year, the skinny white English dude Mike Skinner convinced lots of skinny white American dudes that Eminem wasn’t the only skinny white rapper dude worth lending an ear; on his potent debut as the Streets, Original Pirate Material, Skinner countered the widespread American idea that Brits can’t rap with…
Though Smog’s Bill Callahan has gradually progressed to a higher-fi sound and properly synchronized arrangements, he still tosses off unusual lines that ache with an off-center Midwest beauty. In “Our Anniversary” he sings of “clipping the wings of your morning flight,” and the gorgeous “Driving” echoes with an equally spare,…
With riffs as thick as their skulls, Godsmack is a band of unabashed metal meatheads. Which doesn’t necessarily invalidate their music; like Jean-Claude Van Damme films, there’s something to be said for mindless kicks. But after three albums of crushing, monster-truck rock, Godsmack’s Dirt-simple approach is growing exceedingly monotonous. Initially…
Last year at some point, we forget when, we heard rumors that NextStage, the 5,000-or-so-capacity concert venue in Grand Prairie, was on the verge of bankruptcy, on its way out. Millions and millions spent to get the joint up and running, we were told, and not a dime in return…
Cursive front man Tim Kasher recites the incident clinically. “It ended up being one of those really unusual life and art reflecting each other coincidences that we had already named the album The Ugly Organ,” Kasher says dryly. He’s describing the collapsed lung and resulting surgery that landed him in…
In conversation, Nicola Kuperus and Adam Lee Miller of electro-rock duo Adult. come across as a modular unit, the modern update of American Gothic’s catatonic Midwestern archetypes. They break away from their daily routine of running their own record label, Ersatz Audio, to answer the interviewer’s questions succinctly and sparingly…
When Stephen Malkmus walks into the conference room at Matador Records’ New York offices, he’s wearing these enormous eyeglasses, like something someone working in an airplane hangar would wear to protect his or her eyes from flying debris. And he’s got this piece of napkin-sized fabric that he keeps rubbing…
Shame Maria McKee couldn’t lift the name of Madonna’s label for her own upstart; seven years since Geffen made an orphan of its once-beloved daughter by abusing her Life is Sweet, she returns as the real renegade of this twosome, who came of age and stardom at roughly the same…
If you’ve chosen this weekend as the one to abandon all goodhearted indie revivalism–and, if so, let me be the first to congratulate you for quite an accomplishment–be sure to steer clear of Gypsy Tea Room on Saturday night: Brainy arena-rock dorks OK Go and flowery ’60s-pop naïfs the Essex…
Look, I’m as big an Avril Lavigne supporter as the next ninth-grade girl for whom Christina Aguilera has ceased to be a positive role model; I mean, I’ve never hung out in a dingy Singaporean brothel with oversized stuffed animals and lubed-up bodybuilders running around either, so I can certainly…
We here at the Dallas Observer have been griping for years about downtown Dallas, about the need for more entertainment options in the area, not to mention the need for more people to stick around to enjoy the ones that are already there. So far, that means a handful of…
There are a few tempting, all-but-mandatory questions for the Faint you are really much better off not asking, should you happen to engage one of the Omaha band’s members in either casual or professional conversation. No one warns you about this in advance–there’s no PR heavy standing by with a…
Gomez is one of those bands that, like a cat being forced into a pet carrier, struggles against being placed in any one category. Is Gomez a blues act? Space rock? Prog rock? Latin-tinged alt-country? Somehow, the answer to all of the above is yes. Yet despite this crazy-quilt approach…
With a face as pretty as his songs, former Lemonheads front man Evan Dando earned a reputation as the Mazda Miata of rock: sexy and utterly lightweight. Seven years after the Lemonheads ended with a whimper, Dando’s long-awaited solo debut, Baby I’m Bored, forces a reappraisal: It makes you want…
The last several releases by former Spacemen 3 guitarist Jason Pierce’s psychedelic-gospel outfit Spiritualized–Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space, Royal Albert Hall October 10 1997 Live and 2001’s Let It Come Down–have been as much about Pierce’s tendency toward staggering production costs as his desire to capture in…
Back in the late ’70s, Ron Howard bolstered his film career with such art-house gems as Eat My Dust! and Grand Theft Auto. These cult classics relied largely on big cars, girls in short-shorts and redneck policemen who always ended car chases by driving into barns. Good stuff. But Howard…
Nashville is a soul-sucker and O brother thank God I found you and blah blah blah stick a needle in my eye. But you know what’s truer than a blind two-dollar hen with no teeth (or whatever)? That what I’m not getting right now from the neo-traditionalist set is a…
First things first: Even if you’ve never heard of Les Savy Fav, you must go see them live. If you’ve heard the band’s recordings and been underwhelmed, you must go see them live. If you’ve experienced their show already, then I know you’ll say it along with me: Everyone must…
Remember indie rock? Every once in a while, in a momentary clearing of the perpetual cloud cover provided by Ashanti and the White Stripes and Cannibal Ox and Kid Rock featuring Sheryl Crow, I realize that bands like Silkworm and the New Year, both of whom will hit Gypsy Tea…
Already seen Rob Zombie’s House of 1000 Corpses but still got a hankering for twisted trash-culture worship Antiques Roadshow’s just not providing? You’re in luck, my probably-makeup-wearing friend: Creepy garage-rock legends the Cramps turn up Thursday at Deep Ellum Live, and they’re bringing Detroit’s the Gore Gore Girls with them…
Living in Dallas and not checking out the strip clubs is like living in Telluride and never skiing: a waste of natural (and augmented) resources. On the other hand, the Dallas “adult entertainment” industry, besides La Bare, doesn’t particularly cater to women. And La Bare is, how-you-say, gross, in a…
Everyone who frequents the Curtain Club knows that Craig DePoi, who mans the upstairs bar, is one of the nicest guys around, which is important in a good bartender. If you’ve gotten to know DePoi at all, you might also be aware that he has an extensive collection of autographed…
