For the former lead singer of the Runaways, Cherie Currie, life has been an intense ride. While a portion of the Runaways’ story has finally been told thanks to a 2010 biopic starring Dakota Fanning as Cherie and Kristen Stewart in the role of guitarist and foil Joan Jett, the…
Tim Reynolds is the soft-spoken singer, songwriter, and guitarist that once upon a time virtually convinced an unknown Dave Matthews to sing his own songs. His work with the cultishly popular Matthews is what Reynolds is best known, but in fact, he occupies so many different musical arenas that his…
Better than: Flying to New York for a Killing Joke show and having the band cancel last minute. The Cult’s frontman, Ian Astbury, is a firm believer in the sanctity of music in a live setting. In a time when more than a handful of the Cult’s contemporaries are happy…
For Ian Astbury, iconic frontman of the Cult, life is about the experiences. From his time as a member of the influential post-rock group, Southern Death Cult, to penning mega-selling hard-rock anthems as the frontman of the Cult, Astbury has experienced just about everything the music world has to offer…
There was a time when a punk and garage rock show held the promise of airborne beer cans, flailing humans (dancing or fighting), and a bit of tinnitus that followed you around on Monday as a reminder that you lived a little in the days between shifts. It would seem,…
It is a proper shame to lose a venue of any sort in South Florida, particularly in Broward County. We don’t exactly have a wealth of nice places to house live music, let alone one willing to handle some of the sonic baptisms and noise rituals in which many of…
If there’s one criticism people throw about when discussing the current crop of heavy metal acts, it’s that their sound is generic. We have to agree that when it comes to the most popular groups in metal, particularly death metal, the bands aren’t only generic, but unbearably derivative. However, Hollywood-based…
Better than: Seeing a legacy group perform with backing tracks Last night, the reunited, and mostly original, Black Sabbath triumphantly returned to South Florida. It was a balmy summer night, and Palm Beach’s Cruzan Amphiteatre was dense with darkly-clothed denizens of metal, all of whom had answered the call to…
While every subgenre in the vast, factionally divided world of heavy metal has earned its own legion of devout followers, authentic thrash is seeing a serious revival. Of the bands currently carrying the reignited torch of thrash metal, Denver, Colorado’s Havok is without a doubt one of the most exciting…
Black Sabbath is undeniably one of the most influential bands of all time. And while many legendary acts often sully their legacy by reuniting and culling an album from the dregs of should-have-been B-sides, Sabbath was spared this fate. The Rick Rubin-produced 13, an album that finally earned Sabbath its…
Better than: Dancing in your room to “Love My Way.” For bands whose songs induce nostalgia, past major successes can also limit contemporary relevance. Saturday night’s bill at the Culture Room featured a pairing of bands that maintain beloved legacies, but approach life after hits in two very different ways…
Of all the unique artists spawned from the now nostalgic, post-Nirvana ’90s, Spacehog may well be the most criminally underrated. A complete oddity in its unabashed referencing of ’70s British glam-rock in an era characterized by the decidedly antiglam climate of grunge, Spacehog enjoyed a massive hit in 1995 with…
The reunion of Black Sabbath’s Ozzy Osbourne, guitarist Tony Iommi, and bass guy Geezer Butler — you know, the seminal dark lords of metal — has managed to help keep the heavy-metal masses smiling. With crossed arms, of course. Even without legendary original drummer Bill Ward thundering the skins, Black…
As the rain falls hard on this (occasionally) humdrum town, fans of the Smiths have reason to rejoice! This week, Mr. Johnny Marr announced a Fort Lauderdale date on his impending U.S. tour. While Marr is best known as Morrissey’s former songwriting foil in the Smith’s, the guitarist’s keene sense…
As expected, the highly controversial Trayvon Martin case has called everyone from the lowliest of Facebook pundits and apparent overnight law school grads, to the upper echelon of proper lawyers and cultural icons to roost upon a bandwidth-choking, virtual soapbox. Whether you believe that Saturday’s verdict was wrong, right, or…
South Florida has a long and storied history of spitting game-changing heavy bands out from its steamy loins. Perhaps it is the inhospitable nature of the area that motivates bands to seek the road and promotes the creation of meaner, darker, and more emotionally charged material. Whatever the case may…
Kiss may very well be the most polarizing band in rock music. However, the hard rockin’ kings of glam showmanship have assembled a veritable army of makeup-caked fans, thanks to a 40-year career of loud rock ‘n’ roll delivered from stages littered with explosives, flames, comically large walls of amplifiers,…
Beach Day and Mr. Entertainment and the Pookiesmackers Hollywood Beach Bandshell June 28 Better than: Hiding from the summer heat in a movie theater. Summer has officially arrived in South Florida. Back to haunt South Floridians is the familiar wall of moisture that hangs in the air, the baking sun…
For all of the diverse and wonderfully weird artists that South Florida has spawned over the years, our music scene is not one that necessarily encourages longevity. It’s no secret that, for serious musicians, South Florida’s musical landscape can be an inhospitable one. However, for Steven Toth — better known…
Album release shows are generally the best kind of shows, because they bring out the finest in the bands. That vibe usually permeates through the crowd, and great energy prevails. However, when the show celebrates the birth of two records, you’d better believe it’s going to be proper party. Hollyweird’s…
It’s been over a month since the tragic passing of Slayer guitarist Jeff Hanneman. The fact that we will never again see what is undoubtedly the nastiest group to come from the Big Four of thrash return to the stage with its original lineup intact has settled in. We have…
The term “hipster” is one that has evolved from a benign adjective used by grandmas and square folk to describe those with an inclination toward the arts and the off-kilter to a derogatory term of implied arrogance. Although we all know at least one individual who is guilty of the…
