Wayne Coats and Nicholas Villa are Phoenix-based musical confederates whose surnames happen to sound really classy together — suggesting, perhaps, a high-end home furnishings boutique or a Jean Renoir flick. As it turns out, they make damn handsome music, too. The pair, which once formed half of the Mesa-based folk…
Let’s hear it for gender diversity in the workplace. After tearing up Valley gin joints for the better part of two decades in mainly all-female bands, blueswomen Rochelle Raya and Nancy Dalessandro have relaxed their ladies-only policy and launched a new group with some help from the less-fair sex. Not…
So even if your grandma didn’t get you an awesome new sweater for Christmas just begging to be shown off downtown, there are still plenty of reasons to drag your butt to Trunk Space Fest. Namely, reunion sets from some of the scene’s most sorely missed acts, like Shizz founder…
Until Sufjan Stevens gives California his “Fifty States Project” treatment, we’ve got Your Yellow Dress, a gentle indie-folk outfit that waxes wistful and nostalgic about the people and places of its native Orange County. The band centers around Alex Poska — who sings of SoCal coastlines, streets, childhood memories, and…
We remember a day when Dos Gringos was this stinky little patio on University in Tempe where the just-turned-21 crowd would day drink instead of going to class.These days, Dos Gringos has come a long way. With four locations in town, there’s always a Dos Gringos patio just down the…
I usually try to leave anything semi-art related to Arty Girl, but I this flier for a show at Trunk Space by Allison Karow, which also features music from The Glowchids, really caught my eye. I can’t vouch for Karow’s work (our print edition ran this on her) but I…
We’re thinking there probably won’t be too many presents waiting under the Christmas trees of the members of Vayden. It’s not because the Tempe/L.A. alt-rock foursome (whose members split time betwixt the two cities) has been particularly naughty, per se, but rather because Santa already has been handing them plenty…
You know you’re getting old when you hear some smooooooth jazz on the radio and think to yourself, “Wow. This would sound fantastic at my next dinner party.” Listening to keyboardist-composer David Garfield is kind of like that. One minute, you’re marveling at his clean West Coast texturing and slick…
As the old chestnut goes, life is all about timing. A mere six months ago, the Dancing Machine Review was just another hokey traveling tribute act (in the vein of such faux shows as Fab Four or Beatallica) paying homage to the Jackson 5. But after the “great gloved one”…
Tastemakers are split over these Long Beach, California-based psych-rockers and their debut long-play, Tentacles. Some reviewers and bloggers insist that the album picks up precisely where the band’s self-released, untitled EP (2008) left off — namely, in a state of feverish musical ass-kicking. Others suggest that the speedier Tentacles backtracks…
Holiday spirit is slowly seeping into the Valley’s December’s concert lineup, and add local indie poppers Kinch to the long list of seasonal soirees. Slotted within days of shock-rocker and driving-range master Alice Cooper’s annual Christmas Pudding party at Dodge, the emo pop Winter Wonder Slam at US Airways Center…
The bombastic electro-hop duo of Oren J. and Carnegie (a.k.a. Silver Medallion) must be plenty tired lately, because the past few weeks have been crazy-busy for the pair of rhyme-slinging cats. They’ve entertained teenyboppers at Chandler’s Hamilton High School as a part of 101.5 Jamz “High School Invasion,” impressed Scottsdale…
Band: HaloceneRecord: The Secret, a six-song EPBasics: Halocene is a Phoenix female-fronted fivesome that’s a little bit Letters to Cleo, a little bit Veronicas, a little bit The Maine. For the most part they’ve got a pure pop rock sound but they show a little edge from time to time. Love…
Looks like the corner of 32nd Street and Indian School is finally getting the love it has so desperately missed since the demise of Glam. If its maiden voyage Friday night was any indication, Club Vibe maybe the new spot to kick off the weekend with its anything-goes dance night…
Draconian DUI penalties. Overpriced drinks. Snotty bartenders. There are any number of reasons why P-town urbanites haven’t been willing to travel far from home to get to their favorite clubs or dance nights over the past few years. So longtime Blunt Club resident Pickster One has a solution to the…
Christmas albums are as unavoidable as the awkward family gatherings and office holiday parties that everyone suffers through every December. No fewer than 30 different Yuletide CDs will be hitting shelves and iTunes this month, including discs from Bob Dylan, Andrea Bocelli, Tori Amos, Michael McDonald, and even the most…
The Mormon-heavy milquetoast milieu of Mesa is likely one of the last places you’d expect to become a hotbed of death metal and hard rock, but such is the case, thanks to the soldiers of the Mosh Pit Army. The metalheads of this military-like clothing company/concert promoter (which boasts fan…
It’s amazing that, as busy as the members of the Canadian indie-rock group Metric are, they can still find time to release any new material. Metric frontwoman Emily Haines and guitarist James Shaw are both members of the Canadian indie-rock super group Broken Social Scene. In 2007, Haines released an…
It would be easy to compare the acoustic folk-rock trio The Sweet Remains to a group like Crosby, Stills & Nash. Easy, but not necessarily accurate. The group, made up of Rich Price, Greg Naughton, and Phoenix’s own Brian Chartrand definitely shares similarities to CSN, but its music really has…
With Ruby Room’ sudden departure from the downtown music scene we’ve been watching veeeeery closely to see what venues are picking up the old place’s shows. Add Chopper John’s on Indian School to the mix, as they host this show for Ruby Room regulars Skinwalkers, noted KISS-hater Jay Bennett’s band…
Band: Jim Bachmann and The Day DrinkersRecord: Jim Bachmann and The Day DrinkersBasics: Jim Bachmann, a country-styled man about town whose a fixture at Tempe’s Yucca Tap Room. Bachmann once did a Sun Session cover of Alan Jackson’s “Chasin’ That Neon Rainbow” which I still regard among the best we’ve…
We found ourselves way out in the East Valley on Saturday night and we thought it might be a good idea to poke around one of Chandler’s old stand-by’s, Fibber Magees. Now, it was freakin’ freezing that night so we were a little worried everyone was home, cuddled up in…
