The Best Concerts in Dallas This Week, 8/18 – 8/24

It seem hard to believe, but it’s already that time again: school is just around the corner. (Granted, if you’re reading this there’s a good chance that school isn’t really at the forefront of your mind, but whatever.) That means that there are only so many more summer nights left…

Nine Inch Nails, Soundgarden at Gexa Energy Pavilion, 8/17/14

Nine Inch Nails With Soundgarden and Cold Cave Gexa Energy Pavilion, Dallas Sunday, August 17, 2014 While some folks may have been attending religious services this Sunday evening, I found myself wandering around Fair Park in need of some classic alternative rock of the ’80s and ’90s variety. Seeing that…

Oaktopia Is Back, and It’s Way Bigger

Last year, first-time Denton festival Oaktopia delivered on content but not so much on attendance. As Aaron Ortega reported in November, the largest crowd was 200 or so, for the mighty Del the Funky Homosapien. You might suppose a festival that drew such a modest crowd last time would scale…

The Best Concerts in Dallas This Weekend, 8/15 – 8/17

Hey, you’re really close to surviving Shark Week. This means you won’t have to listen to that weird guy at the office talk about whatever last night’s special was, and him swearing all of the footage was real. Your water cooler chat can move to other things, like the awesome…

Good Luck Karaoke Revives Autotune Karaoke Tonight at Twilite Lounge

From the ashes, Good Luck Karaoke rose out of Twilite Lounge, having lost its long-time home at the Doublewide last spring. But its new Deep Ellum base is, according to host Josh Hammertimez, a perfect fit. Tonight, Good Luck will be offering another unique layer to their eclectic shows: all…

Death Cab for Cutie Turn a New Page as They Headline KXT’s Summer Cut

Hooking up on the phone Tuesday afternoon, Nick Harmer is happy to report that life as the bassist for Death Cab For Cutie remains “a gravy train with biscuit wheels”. Harmer is an animated conversationalist, and rattles off his rationale without pause. “We’re still getting along, we’re making music we…

Two Bronze Doors Is a Pillar of Dallas’ DIY scene

The thing about house venues is that they’re always more interesting than public ones. Idiosyncrasies are the décor. Little trinkets here, deliciously askew lighting there — tonight it’s horror film reds and greens, like watermelons and glow sticks. The colors spill through the windows, out onto the creaky deck and…

Gas Monkey Live Makes Play For Mid-Size Dallas Venue Gap

The weird entertainment complex loop at the corner of I-35 and Northwest Highway is one of northwest Dallas’ stranger places to visit. Not quite Bachman Lake, not quite Harry Hines, and not quite Irving, it’s in a vortex all of its own. Technology Boulevard, as this loop is called, is…

Skrillex to Headline Lights All Night Fest in 2014

Okay, then. Not bad, guys. A few months back, the folks at Lights All Night Fest, the Dallas dance and electronic music extravaganza that caps off the year at the end of December, teased us with the dates and ticketing information for this year’s festival. They made us wait, however,…

Numero Group to Release Pioneering Bedhead Box Set

In the world of film and DVD, the Criterion Collection is the king of digging up deserving films and offering them to the public. Each of their releases gets the deluxe treatment, filled with extras that highlight why the movie is worthy of such royal massaging. For music buffs, there…

DC9 at Night Mixtape with M.Parks

Houston ex-pat M. Parks has been making the rounds of area DJ nights as one of the only proper techno DJ’s on the Dallas scene. Techno is often thrown around as a catch word to describe all dance music when it is actually a very specific genre. If you ever…

The Both at Kessler Theater, 8/12/14

The Both With Lemura Kessler Theater, Dallas Tuesday, August 12, 2014 To be completely honest, I have been an Aimee Mann fangirl since I first heard her work for the Magnolia soundtrack years ago. When the news broke last year that she was planning to join up with Ted Leo…

Somebody’s Darling Grow Up Together on Adult Roommates

On “End of the Line,” the bluesy, smoky fifth track from Adult Roommates, the newest album from Dallas’ Somebody’s Darling, lead singer and songwriter Amber Farris sums up the heart and soul of the new record with a few simple words. “This is the oldest we have been, this is…

13th Floor Music Announces First-Ever Festival

In the scheme of local music promoters, Ken Welker’s 13th Floor Music is a relative upstart. The company itself, based in North Dallas, is barely a year old, and Welker himself has only been working as a promoter for the past couple years. But already 13th Floor has built up…

Ride for Dime Revs Up Its 10th Installment This Weekend

This year’s Ride for Dime marks the 10-year anniversary of the benefit show and the untimely passing of “Dimebag” Darrell Abbott, Nathan Bray, Jeff Thompson and Erin Halk. Inevitably, it’s a bittersweet occasion, given the tragic events that spurred the event’s founding. And yet a decade in, Ride for Dime…

A.Dd+ Chronicle Their Nawfside Love on New Nawf EP

Dallas ‘Nawfsiders’ Paris Pershun and Slim Gravy, known together as A.Dd+ (pronounced ‘ay-dee-dee’), have had the local hip-hop scene on lock for years now. Today, North Texas’ favorite hip-hop duo will drop their first release since DiveHiFlyLo, a five-song EP titled Nawf. The project started coming together back in April, when the…