There’s no way to put it lightly: The men of Gospel Claws have been through the wringer. Lineup changes. A cancer scare. Most tragically, the suicide of guitarist Mark Erikson. It’s been a weird couple of years since the band’s last record, 2010’s excellent C-L-A-W-S. Given the strife, it’s easy…
“Wine makes everyone hopeful.” These are the inspirational words that appear on a sign that our friend Topper’s mother bought for our tasting room. The sign showed up on “one of those days,” and I promptly displayed it. This subject came up this past weekend while celebrating a respectable showing…
Titanic, Batman, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Castaway, The Sandlot, The Bourne Supremacy, Hook, Across the Universe, and 70 other movies with underwater scenes were cut and spliced for Flock of Dimes’ single “(This is Why) I Can’t Wear White.” Drowning, screaming, punching sharks in the gut, heavy make-out sessions, deep-sea…
Are you a musician? Is your group having issues? Critic Jessica Hopper has played in and managed bands, toured internationally, booked shows, produced records, worked as a publicist, and is the author of The Girls’ Guide to Rocking, a how-to for teen ladies. She is here to help you stop…
Let’s step backward, folks. It’s 1996, and a hotshot young music writer, Laurie Notaro, is writing about some hotshot young Tempe guitar pop band, The Chimeras, for Phoenix New Times. “The unofficial bio for The Chimeras has all the stereotypical ingredients of a rock ‘n’ roll miniseries: alcoholism, drug addiction…
We get it, Ben. We know that you’re an artist whose hands have helped shaped the foundation of indie pop over the past fifteen years. We know you married and divorced the harbinger of quirky alt-girl songstresses. We know that you front one of the biggest bands to ever grace…
Once a week Up on the Sun features a new comic strip from punk rocker, cartoonist, and full-time dad Brad Dwyer. See the New Times print edition to check out the strip in glorious, inky newsprint each Thursday…
The news waits for no one — at least that’s what we read somewhere — so it’s perfectly understandable that you, the reader, might have missed out on a musical tidbit, breaking news about your favorite venue, or one of our rants. So enjoy this digest-style sampling of some of…
If you hear the sound of rowdy partying mixed with slick electro beats emanating from Spanish Fly on Saturday night during the weekly FRWD party, it means that Sean Essex is in control of the turntables at that particular moment. That’s because the local DJ knows how to do with…
Melissa Lenberg Lenberg is the owner of Citrine Natural Beauty Bar at UNION Biltmore Fashion Park. Learn more here. When you put your key in the ignition and turn on the radio, what station would play right now?Sirus Channel 42, The Joint. What’s the first album you bought? Wu-Tang Clan, Enter…
After a two-and-a-half-year run, DJ William “Fucking” Reed has decided to pull the plug on Sticky Fingers, Bar Smith’s ultra-hip Friday night dance party (which just so happened to win our best of award for Best Weekly Dance Night for Hipsters in 2012, and a whole bunch of other years…
I can’t believe there’s actually a Twitter war going on (when isn’t there a war on Twitter?) over the legitimacy of #Seapunk. What’s that “hashtag seapunk,” you ask? Imagine if you took Lisa Frank’s fetish for porpoises, ran it through crappy late-’90s Geocities GIFs, and added some terrible, too-clever ocean-themed…
By Dave Good It’s hard not to notice: Indie bands seemingly soundtrack just about every sitcom, film and television commercial today. But why? Influential music supervisor Alexandra Patsavas swears it’s not just about cheap labor. “It’s far more of a creative decision than a monetary one,” she says. “We’re picking…
He’s being awful polite about it, but Lawrence Zubia has places to go. It’s Halloween evening, and he’s sitting at a table at Casey Moore’s in Tempe. He looks every inch the rock star. He’s sporting a black vest and drain-pipe black Levis, a red bandanna around his neck, and…
It starts simply enough, with a pulsing electric guitar blip and waves of synths. “Brace for the glory, as you stare into the sky,” Deftones vocalist Chino Moreno moans through the fuzzy washes of noise. “Beneath, I know you can’t be tired,” he sings softly, as the twin guitars roar…
In hip-hop, the past is a constant, and idealization of one’s forefathers — or mothers — is an uncrossable tradition. The Game might be hip-hop’s most eloquent eulogizer. His 2005 hit “Dreams” spoke poignantly to that point: Game all but admitted that he’ll never mean as much to the culture…
The quickly expanding lineup of McDowell Mountain Music Festival 2013 has added two more big names to the roster: The Shins and Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeroes. The 2013 installment of the festival is looking to have the most impressive lineup in MMMF history, as The Shins and Sharpe…
Local DJ and activist Austin Head was assaulted early Friday morning in what has now been designated an anti-gay hate crime. The local community has expressed outrage over this incident, as well as sending its best regards to Austin Head. Check out what some local DJs have to say about…
With the holidays rapidly approaching, some of us have our sights set on another holiday. One awash in Olympic-sized swimming pools of Guinness and all the corned beef we can eat. It’s one of the few holidays where public urination, vomiting, and rabble rousing are perfectly acceptable forms of celebration…
Are you a musician? Is your group having issues? Critic Jessica Hopper has played in and managed bands, toured internationally, booked shows, produced records, worked as a publicist, and is the author of The Girls’ Guide to Rocking, a how-to for teen ladies. She is here to help you stop…
Update: Phoenix Police have officially designated the attack on Austin Head an anti-gay hate crime. Read more at New Times’ news blog, Valley Fever. Local DJ, activist, and former New Times Clubs Editor Austin Head was assaulted early on Friday, November 9, while walking down Central Avenue. Two men harassed…
I imagine there are some casual Morrissey fans out there, but most of the Moz fans I know are the diehard sort, the kind of folks who’ll stick by the singer no matter what grumpy things he says and does. So while I’m sure someone was just kinda bummed about…
