You can’t blame Pete Yorn for wanting to cut an album with Scarlett Johansson. After all, the Match Point actress is freakin’ hot. Still, that doesn’t mitigate the fact that Yorn cut an album with Scarlett Johansson. What’s the big deal? Well, imagine if Michael Chabon agreed to co-author a…
Whether it’s music, news, or the arts, when you want the best roundup of everything going on in downtown Phoenix (and only downtown Phoenix) you go to CenPho.tv. But when you want to actually hear the best music from downtown Phoenix? Well, you go to the CenPho.tv One-Year Anniversary Bash…
In a way it seems appropriate that the second full-length album from Polka Dot Dot is entitled Syzygy, a term used to describe the alignment of three or more celestial bodies in the same gravitational system along a line. If you were feeling sufficiently poetic, you could say that was…
If Jamey Jasta, Hatebreed frontman and former host of MTV’s Headbangers Ball, ever gets sick of the music biz, the dude could probably make a decent living as a motivational speaker. Take the lyrics from “In Ashes They Shall Reap,” a song from his long-running hardcore band’s new self-titled album:…
With all the Scottsdale nightspots that have closed for business in the previous 12 months (SIX, Pink Taco, Mickey’s, etc.), it’s kinda unique to pimp a place that’s managed to survive the triple threat of economic upheaval, tougher DUI laws, and the ever-fickle whims of clubgoers and scenesters. The folks…
Who says there’s nothing to do on a Sunday night? Well, to be fair, there wasn’t a whole lot going on. Thankfully the folks behind Retro Hi-Fi at Sidebar pulled out the big guns, in this case Montreal’s Jojo Flores. An internationally revered garage, deep house and Afro-Latin DJ, Flores…
List of possible reasons to see Blues Control at Trunk Space: 1) Indie cred. Your unhip friends “wouldn’t get it,” and even though Pitchfork has already given the band some love, they don’t even have a Wikipedia page yet. You and your post-rock sensibilities are so ahead of the curve…
The best thing about a band that classifies itself as a blend of death metal, progressive house, and Christian rap is finding out that they’re fucking with you. It’s a great way to endear yourself to a listener, as the King Khan & BBQ show do on their MySpace page…
You would be forgiven if you assumed that Powerman 5000 was a protein-rich meal-replacement shake or the name of a roughly three-mile charity race benefiting lupus sufferers. But you’d be wrong. It is, in fact, the 15-year-old industrial metal band fronted by Rob Zombie’s real-life kid brother, Spider One (a.k.a…
“Like a Disney ride, but with murder.” That’s how frontman/creator Brendon Small describes the “virtual” live show he puts on in the guise of Dethklok, the animated heavy metal quintet whose comic misadventures and skull-blasting power-chords form the basis of the cult series Metalocalypse on Adult Swim. Small “performs” as…
All Leather is piercing, menacing, and in your face. Envelope-pushing rocker Justin Pearson of The Locust teams up with Nathan Joyner from Some Girls and Jung Sing of the Mexican laser-punk band Maniqui Lazer, to produce the loud, chaotic dance party that recently signed to Dim Mak Records. The California…
Many a fashionable tear was shed when bygone hotspot Glam died a premature death in June 2008 and, thus, brought an end to Jared Alan’s explosively popular fauxShow Friday Night. Since that dark day, the hunky hipster DJ started a new joint (Cheap Thrills) but continued to search for a…
Getting a shitload of band names on a single flier without said flier looking like a total clusterfuck is always a challenge. So this week we honor Modified Arts for managing to make the poster for their three-day music fest this weekend look pretty damned good. And, as we’re counting…
Band: The Plump Tones, a Prog-leaning Classic rock type band from Chandler. Record: Brown Chicken Brown Cow album Basics: The Plump Tones sound like what they look like: A gang o’ weekend warriors playing some funky, often-instrumental jams. They’re competent but not fully gelled and seem more interested in rocking…
We were inspired by our Food Critic’s blog about Oysters and Bloody Marys a couple weeks ago so we scraped together some fellow boozers and headed down to Casey Moore’s on Sunday, November 8th to absorb a little sun (and a little alcohol).Of course, we weren’t alone (just look at…
The Blaze is, according to our Best of Phoenix issue, the station of choice for those jonesing to hear what’s happening in local music. Here’s the chart documenting what ASU’s Original Alternative played over the past week.1. Fruit Bats – The Ruminant Band2. Arctic Monkeys – Humbug3. Grand Archives -…
Doug Bale does some cool stuff. The singer-songwriter (here billing his title above his name) not only has a great mid-fi sound that sorta reminds me of Matthew Sweet (check out his stuff below), he’s got a cool web site and some super cool art work. It all works together…
Just because he’s no longer putting on Shake!, hipster king William Fucking Reed is not about to spend his weekend fucking nights sipping Chablis in his swank bachelor pad. Nope, the 32-year-old is gonna be busier than ever, as he’s not only joining forces with Jared Alan and Sean Watson…
Since The Format went on hiatus a few years ago, the once unconquerable Peoria duo — Nate Ruess and Sam Means — have gone their separate ways. Means, who still pops up at the occasional local show, recently released his soundtrack to The Sinking of Santa Isabel, an indie comedy…
Old hardcore rockers don’t die — they just learn to play “This Land is Your Land.” At least, that seems to be the operating principle behind this newly annual roots-rock hootenanny. Only Chuck Ragan of Hot Water Music is back from the last year’s maiden Revival Tour, but the format…
It’s been nearly eight years since The Used released their self-titled debut, which put them on the rock music map and helped create the screamo genre. The disc spawned four catchy singles: “The Taste of Ink,” “A Box Full of Sharp Objects,” “Buried Myself Alive,” and “Blue and Yellow.” And…
Frontman? Frontman?! This proggy instrumental-metal outfit doesn’t need no stinking frontman. On Geneva, their third full-length album, the Chicago-based trio proves fully capable of creating scintillating song narratives simply by shredding their asses off. From guitarist Mike Sullivan’s ominous, beast-summoning strikes on “Fathom” to the empty-desert bleakness of Brian Cook’s…
