Nothin’ much to report at present, but I thought I’d pass off a couple of truly scary things. For the strong-stomached among you, The 6 Most Terrifying Foods in the World. For the, uh, equally strong-stomached, there’s also this. I cannot freakin’ believe my ugly mug now graces the (Web) pages of SPIN. That’s disturbing, […]
Dammit. I was all set to slap a just-in-time post up about this afternoon’s Radio Session with the very cool Laura Veirs & the Saltbreakers on KPFT (90.1FM) when, right as I was about to click “Post,” the network connection died. Completely. For nearly two freakin’ hours. As in, “I got zero done this afternoon, […]
Crap. I really wish my Wednesday nights weren’t pretty much already spoken for, especially after finally checking out the tracks up on Say Hi’s Myspace page… The Prolo’s got a good one tomorrow evening (10/24, for the chronologically-impaired), one I’d highly recommend checking out. I was totally unfamiliar with Seattle-bred headliners Say Hi (formerly known […]
Ah, man. You may’ve already heard, but Lance Hahn, longtime fixture on the pop-punk scene both in Austin and San Francisco, passed away this past Sunday after a long string of health problems. Hahn was one of those people who always made/make me feel inadequate just by the sheer amount of cool stuff they managed […]
I’m fairly sure I’ve waxed eloquent before in these (digital) pages about the wonder that was Silkworm — simply put, they were one of the bands that truly formed my musical universe back in the college days, and one of the first to make me realize that songs don’t have to go verse-chorus-verse to work […]
Don’t worry, no long-term commitment or anything — I know how much people hate that crap. Just wanted to mention two little areas where good local scenester folks have asked for help recently & see if anybody’s down: First off, the ever-awesome Steven G. of punk heroes Something Fierce has sent out a call for […]
Dang. Y’know how sometimes you keep meaning to mention something, but something else always comes up, so you forget that first thing over and over and over again? I sure as hell do (come to think of it, that pretty much describes my life; what the hell was I talking about, here…?). Like with this: […]
I think one of the best things about the whole Myspace thing, at least w/regards to bands & music, is that it brings me back to the experience of actively looking for new music that knocks me on my ass. When I was a kid I’d scour tape bins for that ultra-obscure band (mostly cheesy […]
Okay, so this is a little weird. When I was a wee musical tadpole back in college, there were a handful of bands that really smacked me sideways, music-wise, and made me realize that hey, maybe there really was all this incredibly cool music out there on the edges where the radio didn’t go. Superhunk, […]
Regular readers might remember that back at the end of July yours truly got to play a bloodthirsty, mindless creature of the night in a video for emo-indie guy Jonah Matranga’s new track “Not About A Girl Or A Place”, filmed by SCR bud Mel House. Well, I missed the big-screen premiere, sadly, but naturally, […]
Yep, I’m dragging my sorry ass out of the house this evening to catch The Rentals (Myspace) up at Warehouse Live (with Copeland and Goldenboy, neither of which I know a damn thing about; sorry…). And I’m really, truly looking forward to it; believe it or not, Matt Sharp & co. are one of those […]
Well, I hadn’t planned on posting about tonight’s Times New Viking show over at DiverseWorks — nothing against DW (who I like quite a bit), but I just hadn’t heard Times New Viking and didn’t think I’d have time to check ’em out before the show hit. Here I am, though, with a wee bit […]
It’s been an odd few days, that’s for sure… I dragged the wife out to the Houston Press Music Awards this past Sunday in downtown, and although we got there late (right at 8PM), we still managed to catch some darn good bands. First we saw part of The Scattered Pages’ set at Venue (they […]
Okay, so this makes me feel a bit better — got my very own copy of the new Something Fierce/The Hangouts split-7″ (out on Manic Attack!!! Records) yesterday in the mail. And unsurprisingly, it fucking rocks. Alright, so I haven’t yet listened to the Hangouts side (sorry; I will soon, I swear), but I couldn’t […]
So, a while back indie-emo solo guy (and perennial SCR favorite) Jonah Matranga came to town to do one of those stop-by-on-the-way-to-SXSW shows. I caught his show up at Super Happy Fun Land and then hung out for a bit in the wee hours of the morn with Jonah and show organizer, temp Jonah bassist, […]
This is probably going to be old news to the poor souls who braved the sporadic downpour to drive from God-knows-where (Alvin/Spring/Tomball/etc.) down to Reliant Park yesteday for the Houston stop of the Warped Tour, but the weather forced the Tour crew to shut down this past weekend & reschedule for, yes, today, Monday, July […]
Yes, it’s that heady time of year, when local musicians, fans, and media types alike all swoon and pant in eager anticipation of the year’s Houston Press Music Awards — who will win the coveted “Best Experimental” award? Who will get snubbed, both by the voters and the indie-hipster elite? Who will be left crying […]
Oh, man. I caught this one measly time on MTV, waaaaaaaay back in the day (like, when Illadelph Halflife came out, back in ’96), and it made me laugh so hard my stomach hurt. Flash-forward to the age of anything-in-the-damn-world-is-online, and here it is on YouTube, The Roots‘ video for “What They Do,” which happens […]
Some days it really does seem like humanity as a whole really, truly sucks. No, I’m not talking about the dipshit in the black pickup who nearly killed me when he decided his turn-only lane that merged into mine was actually a go-straight lane, or even about the fact that there are apparently still people […]
Been attempting to clear out the office and am having to part with a stack of 80 or so 7-inches (plus a few LPs), so I figured I’d post ’em here & see if anybody wanted ’em. I’m asking $30 or OBO for the whole lot. The first bunch are newer and in better shape; […]
Man, it’s getting so that this is my favorite part of the year, H-town music-wise — the Houston Press Music Awards are coming up. The festival itself is still a little ways off (here’s me crossing my fingers that it’s actually on while I’m in town and not gallivanting around Michigan or Sweden in the […]
Yes, you too can join the ranks of the elite, unpaid, unloved host of KTRU DJs who spin strange, intriguing music at all hours of the day and night on H-town’s/Rice University’s wonderful KTRU 91.7 FM. Since most of the DJ kids are headed home for the summer, KTRU lets non-Rice students apply every year […]
I don’t get out much these days. In fact, I’ve only gone to see shows sporadically for quite a while now, long enough that I can count on one-and-a-half hands the number of times I’ve caught a live show this past year. My evenings these days consist of coming home from work, eating dinner, playing […]
Ah, Internet, how we love you. No, not because you help us find the nearest drycleaners or figure out effortlessly which curly-haired actress was in Felicity (for the record, yes, it was Keri Russell; sorry, Kim…), but because you open our eyes to the obscure world of weird, weird, amazingly neat things that lurks out […]
Man. So I just caught Avril Lavigne on SNL, and…well, damn. I haven’t seen somebody that wooden on a stage in a long, long time. She’s punk the way a twelve-year-old girl from the ‘burbs thinks punk should sound and look like. I mean, c’mon, when your backup singers are more dynamic and interesting to […]
Oh, yes. While culling through the bazillion or so shows coming up in the not-far-distant future this past week, I happened to notice newly-booked shows by a couple of really, really cool out-of-towners: Sun., May 6 – Son Volt @ The Continental Club Holy…um…wow. How is it that I haven’t heard people screaming to the […]
A little late notice, I know, but here it is: tonight’s Gym Class Heroes/RX Bandits/P.O.S./K-os show at The Meridian is gonna be fucking insane. Why? Well, while I do like the Heroes (“Papercuts” is a fine, fine track), enjoy the Bandits (who contributed one of the best tracks on the first Rock Against Bush comp, […]
Okay, so hopefully me posting this isn’t letting the cat out of the bag to their current drummer or anything — one would hope he’s been informed and not just left hanging a la Dave Mustaine getting booted by Metallica — but local indie-rock kids .belville have made it known that they do indeed need […]
This really, truly makes my week. A while back, I stumbled across a two-year-old post over on The Skyline Network about the glory of the ancient-but-amazing It Came From Nowhere… 7″ comp, where long-ago scene vets Mark Caperton of Ojet Recs and former Celindine/etc. guitarist/singer Trey Pool both popped up and offered a copy of […]
I’ve got the skin of a shark / And I’m gonna make a muscle… Weird; in the span of just a couple of days, I’ve had a series of “remember when?”-type happenings that’ve made me think back to the Good Old Days of H-town rock (in this case, primarily defined as the period in the […]
Normally this cross-referential blogging-about-other-blogs thing kinda irks me — there’s nothing as irritating as following the digital breadcrumb trail of some little blurb back through a half-dozen blogs linking to one another just so you can find out where the hell it originated from — but what the hell, I’m doing it. Just watch me, […]
This “editor/co-publisher” shtick has its perks from time to time. Sure, there’re all the moments when I want to rip the hair out of my head because things don’t happen when they need to, there’s me staggering into work bleary-eyed the morning after the almost-weekly update (yep, I’ve got a day job, and I like […]
Congrats to the Dixie Chicks for the win. While I tend to think the Grammys generally mean about as much to the real musical world as the Oscars do to the real world of film, Taking the Long Way is a good album, and the Chicks deserve it. Nyah-nyah, Nashville.
Back to the Grammys: the Chili Peppers, God love ’em, are on stage playing a song so weak and anemic it makes me wonder if Freaky Styley really only ever happened in my head. Guys, c’mon. You’ve turned into the Aerosmith of funk rock, releasing what sounds like the same song over and over again […]
…from the Grammys. Timberlake, goddammit, just put the fucking guitar down. Please? This show’s bad enough without you ruining one of the best Bill Withers songs ever. Well, at least it didn’t last long.
While I’m looking down the shows list, I’ve just got to point this out: Rik Emmett is playing McGonigel’s Mucky Duck tomorrow night (Sunday, Feb. 11th, that is). No, really, that Rik Emmett, as in “of Canadian prog-rock cheeseballs Triumph.” Man…first one of the two guys from Blue’s Clues, then Jeff Daniels(!?), and now an […]
Anybody who knows much of anything about indie-rock or punk knows who J. Robbins is. The guy’s an honest-to-God icon in the indie/punk/hardcore scene, dating from his days in Government Issue and Jawbox (one of my all-time favorite bands, as well as one of the most intense, awe-inspiring live bands I’ve ever seen) up through […]
Damn, this makes me sad. While I’m not a subscriber, I am an Amplifier fan (er, maybe make that “was”…), and the whole sordid pay-for-review mess depresses the hell out of me. Believe it or not, I completely and totally get the reasons/justifications Amplifier honcho Joe Joyce has thrown out there to defend his actions […]
