It’s September, which means that most music nerds are deep into their “Albums of the Year” process. I’m no different. I’ve got about 15 drafts of my list, and the name Unknown Mortal Orchestra appears on most of them. The Portland-via-New Zealand band’s eponymous debut alternately recalls Led Zeppelin, Prince,…
This year has been kind of fantastic for Phoenix indie-rockers, Snake! Snake! Snakes! Aside from making their way into the trailer of the independent film Tanner Hall, their song “We Come Out At Night” is in The Morning Infidelity’s top 25 list of the year’s best local songs, and the…
Luz de Vida, a compilation featuring Neko Case, Spoon, Jimmy Eat World, Calexico, Giant Sand, Lenguas Largas, Robyn Hitchcock, Brian Lopez, The Meat Puppets, and many, many more, is set to see release in two formats, a 37-track digital album, and a limited-edition 12-song vinyl release, on October 18. The…
The rest of this week’s just announced shows: …
Polish up your wingtips and bust out your finest duds Tempe, you have a new dance floor to cut a rug on. Starting on October 6, Thursday nights are going to be a whole lot fresher with the start of Café le Swing. Hosted by Savoy Hop Cats, the same…
One of our most notable local musicians is the king of shock rock, Alice Cooper. We may know him as a radio DJ, celebrity golfer, and restaurateur, but the folks behind This Is The Coop reach way back to bring readers weird and wild pics of “The Coop.” More on…
It’s been a weird couple of weeks for strange collaborations — like that Jack White/I.C.P. jam — but there are few stranger musical team-ups weirder than the forthcoming Lou Reed and Metallica album, Lulu. The first single from the record, “The View,” went up on the Lou Reed and Metallica…
I won’t attempt to explain the amalgam of esoteric in-jokes that manifested into the tour poster seen above. There’s a perfectly good but lengthy explanation for why the four of us chose to put John Fogerty’s head on a French Quarter t-shirt, gave him dice for eyes and exhorted the…
After four weeks of competitive gigging, the dust has settled on X103.9’s Fall Frenzy Showdown. What started back in August culminated in last night’s seven-way battle for a slot on this year’s main stage featuring Blink 182, Matt & Kim and Jimmy Eat World. Local bands, Saving Shea, Halocene, Howard…
Big ups to the folks over at NPR’s All Songs Considered blog. Today they featured Sister Cities, the Phoenix band that our own Christina Caldwell wrote up back in August, telling the tale of the band’s global roots and dream-pop sound. “If you’re a band from the west coast, you…
They don’t come much more “multi-cultural” than Rupa and the April Fishes. Born in California to Indian parents, songwriter Rupa Marya was raised in France, India, and the United States. The music she makes with her group, The April Fishes, borrows sounds from all of her cultures. French nouvelle vague…
Jeff Moriarty Moriarty is the organizer of Ignite Phoenix. The next Ignite Phoenix is Friday, October 28 at the Virginia G. Piper Theater. When you put your key in the ignition and turn on the radio, what station would play right now? I haven’t listened to the radio in years. I stream…
Sophia Gunn blends old and new professionally.She brings her “younger” humble beginnings to some of the Valley’s hottest nights and mashes them with fresh, new technology to give her turntabling skills new edge. She mixes vinyl with MP3’s. She has learned to adapt with the times. Now, she’s adapting to a…
On Saturday, September 24, the Musical Instrument Museum is scheduled to open “Power of Music: Photographic Portraits of Americans and Their Musical Instruments 1860-1915.” Featuring portraits from the collection of Mark Lee Gardner, author, historian, and musician, the portraits capture remarkable images of Civil War-era soldiers, housewives, children, the rich,…
In this week’s issue, Nicki Escudero brings us the tale of Arrowheart — a young combo of country-pop singers that have their eyes set on the big time with the guidance the hit-maker who co-wrote Madonna’s “Open Your Heart.” We’ve also got mini-features from M.T. Richards on Colour Revolt (don’t…
This week, New Times ran a list in our print publication highlighting some of the most interesting posts published at Up On The Sun over the past week. Here are links to those posts. How did Valley hip-hop artist Intrinzik wind up in a band with his father? Want to…
The ladies of Arrowheart look ready to shoot a video, or a magazine cover, or to film the pilot for a reality show. Their makeup is perfect, their hair looks perfectly ironed and curled, and their outfits include sparkly cowgirl boots and feathered earrings. The group’s Western wear fits its…
You don’t know Yeshe Perl, but you know his alter ego, Mickey Avalon. He is the last of the MySpace stars, dripping with heartache and sexuality. His autobiographical lyrics of bisexual street hustling and narcotics seem written for, and inspired by, Hollywood’s young-money, drug-addled Paris Hilton-wanna-bes and pinner punks. Mickey…
Taken at face value, Colour Revolt look like prototypical Southern rockers. Yet this Mississippi group has a subversive streak that is miles wide. Colour Revolt’s emotionally conflicted tunes draw largely from their experience growing up in the South, where right-wing evangelical Christians are thick on the ground. Frontman Jesse Coppenbarger,…
This calls for an extended summer all the way through October 20, when Jimmy parades his cheery ass through Phoenix for an evening full of tropical-themed sing-alongs and awful Hawaiian button down shirts.Joining Jimmy Buffett with shows of their own are The Game, Trampled By Turtles, Joe Walsh and Wiz…
It was a familiar sight in front of Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s downtown office yesterday afternoon. Another assembly of a dozen protesters or so had gathered and members of the media were waiting in tow. Word eventually reached Joe that some multilingual, slightly-famous international recording artist was on his way to…
Our sister blog, Chow Bella, knows the score when it comes to the whole food truck boom here in Phoenix. As such, the staff there has all details regarding tickets to the first annual Phoenix Food Truck festival, which features over 30 food trucks taking over A.R.T.S. Project #1/ 408…
