Ryan McPhun of The Ruby Suns describes the tour for his latest album as “a live rock band approach to not-live-band rock music.” His fourth Ruby Suns album, Christopher (released in January on Sub Pop), is indeed a synth-laden futuristic pop album, highly polished and danceable. But McPhun made the…
There’s plenty to suggest Larry “Mud” Morganfield is the second coming of legendary bluesman Muddy Waters. First, there’s the look: that contorted expression when he sings, eyes closed and face scrunched up like a wrinkled Shar Pei. There’s the perfectly balanced mustache riding on top of his upper lip. Then…
Fadil El Ghoul — better known to dance floor princes and princesses as R3hab — is relatively new to the EDM game, breaking out in 2008, right as the genre began to experience a seismic shift in popularity. A proponent of “Dutch house” style, there’s a distinct menace to R3hab’s…
With apologies to the Paul Oakenfolds and John Digweeds of the world, the realm of electronic dance music has become more a domain for the young in recent years. So much so that it if your average bedroom producer wunderkinds haven’t conquered Beatport or Hypem with their remixes, inked a…
Following up last year’s New Times Soundcheck, a two-day festival at Club Red in Tempe — which featured performances by The Love Me Nots, Sugar Thieves, 2 Tone Lizard Kings, Jason Devore, The Insects, Crusher Sound System, and more — was a serious task. But challenges are cool, right? Up…
Mill Avenue is always busy on the weekends. Just try to find a parking spot among the partying coeds and crazy cab drivers and you’ll know what we mean. Luckily, the ladies of Arizona’s Roller Derby know how to push through a crowd, like they did when they hosted a…
Nathan Willett of Cold War Kids says that when it came time to make the band’s new record, the forthcoming Dear Miss Lonely Hearts (due April 2), they decided to play less to what the band “should be” and more to what it “could be.” “I feel like we started…
Singer Stan Devereaux has been playing R&B and soul in Arizona since the 1960s, growing up in Tucson before exploring the Phoenix soul scene after college, then departing for Europe, South America, and Georgia. His journey led him back to Phoenix, and since he’s settled into a groove here in…
The most obvious difference in Hanni El Khatib’s music these days is a sense of control. The former skate punk — “playing the world’s worst guitar” (but “Guitar Hero is helping out),” he jokes — still dabbles in garage, psychedelia, punk, and blues, only now his songs are tighter, more realized…
For someone not even old enough to drink, Sareena Dominguez sure has accomplished a lot: After signing to the River Jones Music label less than a year and half ago, she’s played South by Southwest, released an album (her debut, Moonbeams), and starred in a music video of the same…
It’s no coincidence local rockers Mergence have been likened to California’s Cold War Kids. Not only is the Phoenix band a quartet, but it also has a knack for crafting bluesy, soul-inspired opuses — kinda like those other guys. So it seems only natural that they would get the nod…
There comes a time in every music snob’s life when they realize pre-judging a band based on the city where it resides and what musical genre it fits into is just as stupid as it sounds. In the case of L.A.-based duo In the Valley Below, a new musical project…
The story of Orpheus and Eurydice, a myth originally told by the ancient Greeks but best-preserved in Western culture through the Roman poet Ovid, generally is interpreted as a cautionary tale about the perils of living in the past. Orpheus, a famous Greek bard, loses his wife to a snake…
Don’t mean to sound like an etymology spazz, but there’s a huge difference between dorks, dweebs, and doofuses. God help you if you’re a doofus: hapless, ham-fisted, hopeless. Calling someone a dweeb at least connotes a smidge of intelligence, albeit a kind that is nerdily articulated or used pathetically for…
How do you figure a song called “I Am the Antichrist to You” should turn out? Awfully metal, right? Well, in the hands of Kaoru Ishibashi (who records and tours as Kishi Bashi), the track materializes as a fleet-footed, cloud-soft slice of folky chamber-pop — practically the mathematical opposite of…
It’s not often one hears a musician proclaim he wants to start a “vocal-driven pop band,” but such was the case with Mother Mother guitarist/frontman Ryan Guldemond. But why aim for such commonplace pop fare? Because this is the kind of music the generally unaware music populace loves — it…
For all the snarky comments Vampire Weekend gets about biting Paul Simon’s style, maybe it’d be worth looking back even further? Sure, Simon was the one who released the landmark Graceland in 1986, incorporating African polyrhythmic sounds and vocals. But, uh, pre-existing actual African musicians who already made those kinds…
If you’ve never witnessed the turntable swagger of DJ Logan “Element” Howard at any point during his 16-year career, you’ve missed out on something special, fool. The YouTube videos of the local legend scratching away on hip-hop vinyl like a rabid cat don’t do it justice as seeing him in…
If there’s one thing that The Sail Inn is famous for — besides its granola-friendly jam-band sessions and ultra-irie reggae fest on Sundays — its enormous musical repasts featuring local bands and DJs. The venerated Tempe venue is built for the task, given its amphitheatre in the back and a…
Music has been recognized as one of the higher art forms for centuries. In modern pop music, its most recognizable tool has been the guitar. I find the guitar fascinating. I could spend hours poring over photos of guitars and learning about the intricate construction process behind how to make…
Bassist Victor Wooten has always been musical innovator, challenging the limitations of the electric bass and, in the process, developing new sounds and ways to play the instrument. His songwriting follows the same pattern. Whether composing as a founding member of the genre-bending bluegrass/psycho-space outfit Bela Fleck and the Flecktones,…
Listen, I’m a sore loser and a sore winner. I used to cry after losing my elementary school chess matches, which thankfully directed me away from competitive pawn-pushing and into the soothing subjectivity of the arts. However, I also love to gloat when proved right: I put my chips down…
