Early in 1965, Cannibal and the Headhunters, a Chicano vocal quartet out of East Los Angeles, took “Land of 1,000 Dances” to No. 30 on the pop charts, shutting down a version by their archrivals Thee Midniters (which reached No. 67) in the process. It was the third national hit…
As monsoon winds swirl around the south Scottsdale practice space of Shoeless Joe, three members of the Tempe quartet — bassist Theron Wall, singer/rhythm guitarist Dave Wolfmeyer and lead guitarist Chad Hines — wait for drummer Michael Wood to arrive. “You’re late,” someone shouts as Wood finally emerges from an…
The Church A Box of Birds (Thirsty Ear) In 1989, almost in spite of itself, The Church sat conspicuously in the U.S. Top 20 with its lone chart hit “Under the Milky Way,” a tune — even by the group’s standards — that fell short of its water line. At…
The desert surrounding Jeff Dahl’s Cave Creek home is lush, made fragrant and green from recent monsoon thrashings. His neighbors on the next acre, the ones who run a Christian day-care center, have a sprawling ranch with many horses. A guy from Dokken lives just up the road. And there…
By the time the punk-rock revolution finally arrived in the Valley around 1978, the music quickly began to become filtered through the overheated minds of its desert practitioners. Groups like the Consumers, the Nervous and the Chemists offered up a uniquely Arizonan take on the anarchic sounds coming from New…
Once, during the early 1980s, Ray Benson and Asleep at the Wheel tried to escape from the enormous shadow that had blanketed the Western swing band since its 1973 debut album, which featured the immortal Bob Wills cut “Take Me Back to Tulsa.” The Austin-based band had run into a…
In theory, but all too rarely in practice, music can — as former rock scribe Jon Landau once wrote — “answer every impulse, consume all emotion, cleanse and purify — all the things that we have no right to expect from even the greatest works of art but which we…
Supersuckers The Greatest Rock and Roll Band in the World (Sub-Pop) Tucson-to-Seattle transplants the Supersuckers have gone through most of the ’90s performing their satanic cowboy punks gone metal shtick with their tongues planted firmly in their cheeks. As the decade draws to a close, the group has resurfaced with…
Now I look back, think I’ve known all the time I’ve been fighting myself for so long All the vows we made gone for old rags and lumber Disappeared on a cart down the road “Love Lived Here,” Faces, 1972 Although Ronnie Lane penned those lines, you can’t help but…
A beautiful summer day in Brooklyn, and the barking dog and the voice of a female companion in the background suggest Blondie guitarist Chris Stein is taking a stroll while talking on a cell phone. “This is good,” he exclaims. “Wow!” Stein isn’t excited to be talking to a reporter…
Wind-blown wisps of lightly graying hair swirl around the singer’s temples and brow as he mewls the lyrics to his early ’80s mouth-breather hit “Everybody Wants You.” The song’s stretched words flutter in the air, leaving many of the 6,000-plus in attendance to muster a faint gasp of recognition. Scant…
“That was fucking insane.” When all was said and done at last Wednesday’s Buck Owens birthday salute, that succinct verdict from Flathead bassist Kevin Daly was probably the assessment that best captured the tenor of the evening. Standing in a corner and looking resplendent in a Nudie-style suit and silver…
The Blue Hawaiians Savage Night (Coolsville/Interscope) It’s hard not to feel a bit sorry for the Blue Hawaiians, since there’s really no way that their hybrid of lounge and surf music won’t be associated, however misguided it may be, with a scene that reached its peak more than two years…
Lest you think that female-fronted bands merging glistening Southern California pop and intensely personal lyrics with an aching vocal snarl started with Hole, think again. The Muffs’ Kim Shattuck has been combining her tortured prose with sunny sounding punk-pop long before Courtney Love showed off her celebrity skin. When Love…
A Taco Bell just outside St. Louis might seem like an odd place for a life-altering epiphany, but for the Bottle Rockets’ Brian Henneman that’s just where it happened. “It was just a bizarre scene, man. I was sitting there eating my frito burrito or whatever the hell it was…
Next week, thousands of clubgoers are expected to line up for the unveiling of Sanctuary, Scottsdale’s newest nightspot. The hype surrounding this debut has been amazingly intense. Even if Sanctuary ultimately doesn’t live up to its billing, the planning and design of the 14,000-square-foot pantheon is like nothing Arizona has…
You can hear the excitement in the voice of N17 front man, Trevor Askew, when he talks about the August 31 release of the group’s long-awaited second record, Defy Everything. For the industrial rockers, the date is certain to be the peak of a five-month whirlwind of activity and planning…
Various artists We Will Follow: A Tribute to U2 (Cleopatra) The Friar’s Club couldn’t have concocted a better roasting for U2 than this tough-love fest. Don Rickles calling Bono a hockey puck somehow doesn’t even come close to demeaning the group’s early catalogue like having The Electric Hellfire Club’s singer…
Was it Magnet, Spin or Pulse! that first coined the insidious term “stoner rock” in an effort to describe a new sound emerging from the desert? The sound that’s at times lethargic yet prone to getting loud and sonorous at the crack of a high hat. Personally, I’m hoping the…
Chris Hillman knew Gram Parsons perhaps better than anyone, or at least as well as anyone could know a wealthy young man dedicated to living fast, loving hard, dying young, and leaving a beautiful memory. It was Hillman who brought Parsons into the Byrds in 1968; and it was Hillman…
It’s a Thursday, early in the evening, and the barroom at Tempe’s Balboa Cafe is abuzz with more than the usual happy-hour rumblings. In a corner by the stage, amid the din of chatter, video-game noise and the clink of glasses, a group of local musicians is huddled together discussing…
Ween Paintin’ the Town Brown (Elektra) Paintin’ the Town Brown, the most recent offering from demented duo Ween, reeks of contractual obligation or more likely Elektra’s failure to understand the burgeoning MP3/Internet culture. Brown was originally intended to be a limited-edition chronicle of Ween’s live shows from 1990 to 1998,…
