Over the last five years, Brooklyn’s TV on the Radio has succeeded in making weird sounds relatively accessible, garnering that much-coveted “art-rock” designation. Yet seemingly cognizant of how “played” that distinction may be, the band’s third full-length, last year’s Dear Science, is a noticeable shift away from driving guitars to…
The Bellrays have been around for a long time, yet still have a lot of life to live. Led by vocalist Lisa Kekaula and guitarist Bob Vennum, the four-piece has its own distinct blend of Stax Records soul and garage rock. Hard-driving but not abrasive or whiny, the band’s music…
Lady Sovereign was the Asher Roth of 2006, the subject of a tremendous marketing blitz preceding the U.S. release of her debut, Public Warning. Like the suburban stylings of Roth, there was some question whether the public was ready for a white, British grime rapper’s fairly exotic flow. Turns out…
On her 2007 debut, Marry Me, Annie Clark, a former Dallasite who cut her teeth as a backing musician for The Polyphonic Spree (and, later, for Sufjan Stevens), created her St. Vincent moniker and established herself as a singer whose vocals exceed her diminutive frame and a songwriter whose playground…
In a sly turn of self-deprecation, Greenville’s The Southern Sea launches its first full-length with a track called “These Things Always End Badly,” which lyrically bemoans the faulty set-ups of a local stage while the band admits that, as the crowd wants punk rock, “We play quietly/Our set’s too short…
Brooklyn singer/songwriter Kevin Devine delicately walks the line between the personal and the political, and his nearly decade-long career has seen him signed and dumped by a major label while still maintaining a dedicated following. And Brother’s Blood, Devine’s recently issued fifth effort, may well be his best yet, offering…
I spent way much of the wee small hours of this very morning listening to Elvis Costello’s Secret, Profane, and Sugarcane, his country record due June 2 and one produced by Fort Worth’s own T Bone Burnett. It’s more or less Almost Blue 2, though a wee bit more hushed…
In this week’s print edition of the Observer (at some newsstands already, but on your Internet now), you’ll find a review of The Southern Sea’s Theoretically, Yes. Honestly, No. in our Home Grown CD review section, which, really, despite the thoughts of one quick-to-comment reader, is meant as quite the…
According to the press release that just popped up in my inbox, St. Vincent’s Actor had quite the nice debut last week, assuming Billboard numbers are still a fair way to judge release successes. In its first week on the charts, the album debuted at No. 90 on the Top…
The GS Boyz and their still-huge “Stanky Legg” song got some major love on last night’s episode of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, as Fallon not only talked about the song before delving into a segment called the “Late Night Dance Challenge,” but also ended the segment by doing the…
You hear the Play-N-Skillz name dropped at the start of the Lil Wayne song “Got Money,” sure–which makes sense, as the local products produced the beat for the song–but word today is that, despite all the talk we heard in the past year about how much producing the track would…
Your daily dose of national music news for Wednesday, May 13, 2009… When you go to a karaoke bar to belt out drunken tunes, most people don’t expect to get one upped by Rick Astley. The Flaming Lips will release a double album follow-up to At War With The Mystics…
“I Do Not Hook Up,” the second single from Burleson’s own Kelly Clarkson’s latest album, All I Ever Wanted album, is indeed a catchy little gem (written by Katy Perry, who stopped through town last night, dontchaknow). But unlike the first single, “My Life Would Suck Without You” which, along…
The Lek Brothers made it a triple shot Saturday night last weekend. First up, they hit Plush for San Francisco-based Kaskade’s DJ set. Later, it was off to the Lizard Lounge for Hot Pink Delorean, an experienced drum and bass production team from Boston. And the last stop? The local…
Talking Heads mastermind David Byrne has created a sound installation at the Roundhouse arts venue in London called Playing The Building which is exactly what the name implies. Visitors can use a modified pump organ that uses wind, vibration and striking against the 160-year-old building’s structure to create tones. Using…
(Post updated at 4:34 p.m…see after jump)There’s a lot of interesting things you can learn while following Rhett Miller on his Twitter account. For instance, a few weeks back, Miller said it was likely that the summer’s upcoming Old 97’s tour is going to be an “An Evening With…” kind…
Music fans of all stripes got a real treat last night at the House of Blues, where Katy Perry played to a packed house. Really, though, you’ve read enough already. Here are our photos from the show, from photographer Mattie Stafford…
Yesterday afternoon, Good Records announced that, tonight, it would be hosting Elvis Perkins in Dearland for a 7:30 p.m., free in-store performance before the band heads over to the Pontiac Garage at the House of Blues for a gig later tonight.And, late notice aside, it should be worth your while…
Your daily dose of national music news for Tuesday, May 12, 2009… NBC Nightly News host Brian Williams can now add indie music video blogger to his resume. Seems some, uh, very private images of Rihanna have leaked onto the Internet. They’re just “alleged” to be Rihanna at this point, but…
If there’s one–and, I think, justifiable–problem that I have with local NPR affiliate 90.1 KERA-FM, it’s that there isn’t enough music on the station’s regular programming schedule (Paul Slavens aside). As stands, only two of the station’s weekly 168 programmed hours are regularly about music (big ups to Terry Gross…
RTB2, Slider Pines, Macon Greyson and plenty more bands filled out an all-day bill at City Tavern last Saturday, a fundraiser show for the Dallas SPCA.While bands played upstairs, the bar had a crawfish boil outside in front of the bar, and an SPCA Adopt-A-Pet RV was parked nearby. Check…
I just spent way too long on Youtube searching for videos from this past weekend in area concert-going (apparently our spring semester interns’ last days have come and gone), and all I came up with were videos from Edgefest 19 up at Pizza Hut Park this past weekend.But beggars can’t…
