Features

Here are a handful of shows that were just announced this week.

So I walked into the Zia Record Exchange location near 40th street and Thunderbird this morning, hoping to sell a Jimi Hendrix box set and some DVDs for extra weekend cash. But when I walked in, the whole building was empty (save for a couple CD bins), and a work crew was stripping the walls. I asked the clerk what was going on, and she informed me that they were closed; they found out they were closing about a week ago. She suggested I take my potential trades to the Zia locations on 19th Avenue and Thunderbird, or 19th Avenue and Indian School.

By Steve Jansen OnePlace — the downtown music venue that infamously doubles as a church — announced last night on MySpace that they are closing their doors. The 2006 Best of Phoenix winner will be holding their final show on July 31…

By Jonathan McNamara If you’ve delved into Benjamin Leatherman’s piece on JerkRag in this week’s Phoenix New Times you’re already aware of what it is that the Valley’s premiere Rock Band band does on stage. Here’s your chance to see their plastic controllers in action during a mid-April Sand Bar…

On a recent Wednesday afternoon, I stood in the garage of a Paradise Valley home, surrounded by carillons, chromatic bell instruments that had their heyday in the 1700s. The antiquated, Dutch contraptions — which sound like clinking church bells fused with sharp piano tones — are the namesake of local…

Down the list of least needy causes, it’s just below a man standing next to his Hummer bumming for gas. But any true lover of melodic pop music oughta sign a petition to get Graham Nash inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. What’s that, you say? Nash…

The members of JerkRag are having something of a shitty night. It’s an unseasonably rain-drenched evening in May, and the setup for their third-ever gig has been marred by endless difficulties, including missing equipment and soundboard snafus. They’ve spent weeks practicing in anticipation of rocking the rafters of Tempe nightclub…

So our regular, weekly “Flier of the Week” doesn’t go up until tomorrow, but after stumbling upon this fly flier for weekly Vice Saturdays at e4, I had to share. Nothing like a glossy card with a foxy lady to get us out to a Top 40/hip-hop dance night.

A few weeks, ago, I posted a blog inviting local music artists to send their CDs to me for review. I vowed to review each local CD in the order it was received. Since then, I’ve gotten a handful of CDs and done reviews, giving critical treatment to Underwater Getdown, Reign of Vengeance, and Dude Offline. This week, I’m reviewing Mr. Blackbird.

This past weekend was split between work and play. 80 percent of the time, when I go out, I’m out to cover shows and events for this here fine publication. So it was on Friday night, when I drove out to Last Exit Bar & Grill in Tempe for the Tramps & Thieves CD release party. Saturday, I headed to an old haunt, the monthly industrial dance night *Sadisco, at Homme in Central Phoenix. Sunday was spent drinking potent imported liquor at a friend’s house, so we’ll skip that bit (not that I remember a whole lot anyway).

By Jonathan McNamara No dear reader, we haven’t gone loco on you. We know Bonnaroo went down in Tennessee, but members of the Village Voice family were there recording it all for you. BB King shows he’s still got it at Bonnaroo. Check out not one, but two galleries from…

This abject Amy Winehouse video surfaced on the Internet today, a viral outbreak that started with British tabloid News of the World posting it to their site. The video, shot by Winehouse’s continually-incarcerated husband, Blake Fielder-Civil, shows Winehouse and a friend singing a song that delivers slurs to all sorts of races, sexual orientations, and even the handicapped. Later, Winehouse is shown passed out. Here is the video:

Here’s a handful of shows that were just announced this week.

At all times, legendary hip-hop drummer Ahmir “?uestlove” Thompson is a man pulled in many directions. The 37-year-old musician, producer, blogger, and hip-hop tastemaker usually has enough projects going on that he could win a multi-tasking award. Aside from being a mainstay in his long-term band the Roots since the…

2008 is proving to be a quizzical summit for Jimmy Eat World. The global masticators from Mesa are touring in support of the still-new Chase This Light (released last October), an album designed to recapture the directness and lightness of “The Middle” after the collective “huh” with which many critics…

It’s been a tough couple of years for The Futureheads. Following the mixed reception to 2006’s ambitious News and Tributes, the British post-punk quartet was dropped by its label and briefly considered packing it in. Instead, they soldiered forward, forming their own label and releasing their third album, This Is…

This week’s creepy-cool flier is for the monthly industrial/EDM event Sadisco. The art fits with the “doppleganger” theme of this Saturday’s soiree.

There are a lot of crappy dating sites littering the Information Superhighway. With millions of users placing and browsing personals ads and inputting general, arbitrary information like “Interests,” “Politics,” and “Religion,” finding true compatibility can be an almost impossible task.

But if music is a universal language and also the language of love, then perhaps a personals site that focuses on the musical interests of its users isn’t such a bad idea.

A few weeks ago, I posted a blog soliciting local CDs for review in this weekly feature called “You Asked for It.” Since then, I’ve received albums from Underwater Getdown, Reign of Vengeance, and this week’s review subject, Dude Offline.

What the hell is wrong with Metallica? I had some empathy about the whole Napster snafu in 2000, when the band complained about copyright violations and being ripped off for royalties when Napster was a free file-sharing site. Metallica won a settlement from Napster (now a pay site), and alienated a lot of fans in the process.

By Benjamin Leatherman Music editor Niki D’Andrea decided to take a well-deserved sabbatical this past weekend, getting as far as possible from the Valley as she could. She didn’t tell anyone where she was headed, but knowing the kind of crazy life the pint-sized powerhouse of lesbian spunk leads, it…

By Joseph Golfen This weekend marked Summer of Sound’s second concert. This time around the hip hop-centered event invaded Chaser’s Bar and Nightclub in Scottsdale; a laid-back, grimy bar that shares a strip mall with both Americano Tattoo Parlor and the Jesus Is Lord Christian supply store. The Premiere The…