Your daily dose of national music news for Monday, March 16, 2009… The former Dentonites in The Riverboat Gamblers were named in Rolling Stone writer David Fricke’s “Fricke’s Picks” this week. Modest Mouse will soon release the Heath Ledger-directed video for their b-side, “King Rat”. Alan W. Livingston, the man who signed…
Well, for all the folks who were complaining that NX35 featured too many local acts, you can’t really complain about tonight. There’s Monotonix (Tel Aviv, Israel), Casiotone for the Painfully Alone (Chicago), Beep Beep (Omaha), Sybris (Chicago), Black Gold (Brooklyn), Sugar & Gold (San Francisco) and The Botticellis (San Francisco)…
A boom box, lamp, L-shaped chair (a hipper version of Martin Crane’s recliner on “Frasier”) and a tall glass of orange juice set the Fine Arts Theater stage for a casual discussion with Harvey Pekar. Known as the confrontational, famed author of the autobiographical comic book series, American Splendor, the…
BAND: Sarah Jaffe VENUE: Hailey’s Club TIME: 11:45 p.m. OK. I know that there were a bunch of people from Dallas at Hailey’s last night. How do I know this? Because the back half of the room was too busy chatting about their new hairdos and taking group pics on…
BAND: The Boom Boom BoxVENUE: The Boiler RoomTIME: 10:30ish… Born from the ashes of Baboon and Pleasant Grove, among other well-respected area acts, the players in The Boom Boom Box are no doubt talented players. And at the band’s incredibly loud performance at the Boiler Room on Saturday night, its…
BAND: Matthew and the Arrogant Sea VENUE: Hailey’s Club TIME: 9:50ish p.m. By the time I got to Hailey’s, two songs into Matthew and the Arrogant Sea’s 11-song set, the venue was teeming with people. Somewhere around 250 people were packed into the main room watching the show, and, for…
BAND: FebrifugeVENUE: Rubber Gloves Rehearsal StudiosTIME: 9:45 p.m. On record, Chris Day’s music is equally lush and perplexing. But, most of all, it’s impressive–thanks, at least in part, the to fact that Day recorded nearly all of his debut release, A Short Instance of Separation, on his own. Live, however, the…
BAND: The Uptown BumsVENUE: Andy’s BarTIME: 8:30ish p.m. It was quite fitting to see Ian MacDougall, rhythm guitarist for the Riverboat Gamblers, overlooking The Uptown Bums’ set at Andy’s Bar last night, the first performance at the venue in the third of four NX35 dates. Sure, MacDougall and the Gamblers…
The weather was playing nice last night. And, for the first time, NX35 truly had the crowds to match that dynamic festival-feeling that had been in the air on Thursday night. The whole night–from the little clusters of people milling around the sidewalks and streets to the folks watching Billy…
BAND: New Science Projects VENUE: Rubber Gloves Rehearsal Studios TIME: 9:50-ish p.m. Watching Dale Jones, it’s hard not to drink the Kool-Aid. As New Science Projects, he’s confrontational. He’s unsettling. He’s pacing the room yelling and frantically strumming his acoustic guitar. He’s ranting. He’s convulsing on the floor. He’s covered in…
BAND: Possesses by Paul JamesVENUE: Rubber Gloves Rehearsal StudiosTIME: 10:45-ish. Sure, there’s another one-man band playing on the Square this weekend. But, entertaining as Billy Roy is, he comes nowhere near the raw energy of Possessed by Paul James’ Konrad Wert. Wert’s raw intensity is fascinating–his head shaking and body flailing…
BAND: Possessed by Paul James VENUE: RGRS TIME: 11:00 p.m. Konrad Wert leans back under the stage lights, seated above a duct-taped stomp box with a wilting bow extended above a fiddle. “Oh mother, oh mother!” he shouts, hyping the crowd. Convulsing from the bottom up, he whirs his face…
Blame the rain. Blame the cold. Blame a competing Denton house show. Blame the traffic accidents on Interstate 35 that pushed the commute from Dallas to nearly two hours. Blame whatever you want, but, in the early evening hours Friday night, the venues participating in NX35 were noticeably, jarringly empty…
Denton is a pretty weird cross-section of the world, and people are starting to notice–even the New York Times. But the cold and constant rain didn’t keep some of Denton’s most eclectic weirdoes from showing up at the Denton Civic Center yesterday. Their conversation was centered on the necessity of…
Conferettes sound fun and all. That is, until the schedule is released. That’s when neurosis, the likes of which only my poor wife has seen, begins to take over. Thursday was easy. Friday night proved to not be as smooth. With bands that I had hoped to catch at four different…
The Internet thinks your Interstate 35E sucks. Constant rain and two major wrecks in the 45-mile stretch of highway between Dallas and Denton made the drive an absolutely miserable mess. I was feeling sorry for myself that my trip took an hour and a half–more than twice the usual time–until…
Obviously, we’re really excited about NX35 this weekend, in case you couldn’t tell. But there are other shows going on too. First, there are the shows we’ve already mentioned. On Saturday, celebrate the Greatest Holiday Of Them All at the Dallas Observer’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade Afterparty at Energy Square…
BAND(s): Spooky Folk and The Baptist GeneralsVENUE: The Hydrant Café TIME: 9:30 & 10:30 p.m. Having already raved about the living-room-vibe of The Hydrant’s upstairs room, I’ll leave that alone–other than mentioning that, as far as intimate performance spaces in Denton (not including DIY house venues), I can’t think of…
Born in the tradition of the Toadies and Baboon, Here Holy Spain is out to prove (at least locally) that punk–or rather, that the form of music that passes for punk nowadays–isn’t dead.The trio’s debut full length, Manic, hits the streets April 7th, but since Here Holy Spain plays the…
Bravo Max is a very recent entry on the Dallas music scene. Consisting of Johnny Beauford, Daniel Beauford, Steve Vanderheide and Ben Gastright, the quartet is just now getting out of the rehearsal space and hitting the area clubs.Bassist (and former CD Source employee) Ben Gastright was nice enough to…
Check out our accompanying slideshow for more images from this week’s installment of Echoes and Reverberations.Sly Stone was born there. Roy Orbison and Don Henley went to school there. Pat Boone and Dr. Phil even made the scene. But enough about all that: Let’s talk about skronk monkeys trippin’ balls…
Oh, the weather outside is weather, but thankfully, tomorrow’s forecast looks a little drier, which is certainly good news if you’re heading to our official St. Patricks’ Day Parade After-Party on Greenville tomorrow afternoon to see The O’s, The Drams, Eleven Hundred Springs and Old 97’s.And here’s some good news…
