When Cowboy Junkies first introduced their lazy take on the blues, their somnambulistic approach earned them such nicknames as Quaalude Junkies. The band slowly (how else?) developed a sound that was part country and part languid rock, synthesizing the spirits of Lou Reed and Hank Williams. Sixteen years down the…
Before relocating to South Florida, I witnessed an endless procession of Cuban groups visit my then-hometown in the wake of Ry Cooder’s Buena Vista Social Club project. For a time it seemed every musician from the island who could claim an affiliation with this or any other famous Cuban act…
It’s a simmering mid-July Sunday night at Dada in Delray Beach, and Pank Shovel, an indigenous seven-piece rap-metal act, is in robust midperformance. But vocalist Genny Slag is on the couch. Not that she’s taking a breather from the brash, rousing amalgam of old-school punk, noisy free-jazz guitar freakouts, and…
There I was, hopped up on goofballs, crashed out in the freak room with the other layabouts, feeding Chee-tos to the ferret and watching another episode of B.J. and the Bear. But my bliss done got broked by an ill-timed phone call from one of those overearnest young suburban musician…
Outlasting many of his dancehall contemporaries, Yellowman (Winston Foster) is still going strong at age 42. Promoting his humorous brand of slackness, he packs his albums with bawdy rhymes, though he has relaxed his almost militant macho pose the last few years and added songs that decry racism and discrimination…
Free drinks and I’m there. They were pouring ’em strong Saturday, August 11, at the Lounge on Clematis Street as we all celebrated the launch of Closer magazine, a product created by Rodney Mayo (owner of Respectable Street, Dada, and the Lounge) and Steve Rullman (impresario of TheHoneyComb.com). The glossy…
The strange antics of Keith Thornton — the rapper alternatively known as Kool Keith, Dr. Dooom, or Dr. Octagon — began well before his pioneering work with Brooklyn’s Ultramagnetic MCs. His unpredictable, often psychotic wordplay is obviously informed by time spent in a Bellevue Hospital straitjacket. After a pair of…
Don’t look around this summer for our local little lovely lads of Stuck on Evil, featuring former Marilyn Manson guitarist Scott Putesky. After this week’s bon-voyage show at the Metal Factory, they make an enthusiastic little seven-week traipse through the verdant countryside. “Forty-four shows,” worries singer J.C. Reilly. “We’re gonna…
Mad props are in order for the young South Florida bands that have hooked up with some high-profile gigs this summer. First and foremost, congratulations to Coral Springs can’t-do-wrong lads New Found Glory. The sing-along punk-pop unit is still touring the country’s summer shed circuit with Blink-182, which brought the…
Do you like change? Change is good! Some say it comes only from within. I had some in my pants pocket once. But this latest upheaval has left two of the area’s best-known alternative acts irrevocably altered. Disconnect, which boasts members from Miami and Weston, is temporarily disconnected; leader Juan…
Steve Earle has beaten so many demons (the bottle, heroin addiction, bad marriages, worse managers) that seeing him emerge as country music’s poet laureate is not at all surprising; he’s a man of conscience and truth who’s not afraid to put his neck on the line. Since cleaning up his…
Say what you will about the strip mall, that ubiquitous bastion of South Florida culture. Some misinformed newcomers will maintain that there can’t possibly be any value in the much-maligned cinder block collars that ring our plentiful parking lots. In some parts of Broward, Miami-Dade, and Palm Beach counties this…
For a region crying out for folk music that hasn’t been dumbed down to the lowest common Dylan cover, the departure of Chris Chandler was disastrous. The witty, erudite, nose-thumbing strummer forsook South Florida in January, moving to Seattle and then Pittsburgh as part of a strategy to conquer the…
Backstage at a Dead Can Dance concert, summer of 1996: I was buried in the bowels of the Boulder Theatre, playing fanboy, soliciting autographs from band members, drinking their beer, and waiting for my turn to schmooze with Brendan Perry, the band’s sepulchral-voiced leader. Perry, sucking on a 22-ounce bomber…
Nothing about the most recent King Crimson album — last year’s rather inert ConstruKction of Light — hints at the unstoppable power of the band’s live shows, where disciplined musicianship and unbridled fun collide in a shower of sparks. The group’s mercurial leader, guitarist Robert Fripp, has altered the lineup…
Having never before attended a Depeche Mode concert and owning only one of the group’s records, 1986’s Music for the Masses, I may not be the best one to ask whether the group’s July 6 concert at the National Car Rental Center was a good one. But judging from the…
At least one person is happy that the Wotapalava Tour has been canceled — you know, that big queer-friendly summer package tour that was to visit Miami July 13. The one to which you didn’t buy $50 tickets. It sucks for the tiny handful of concertgoers looking forward to performances…
To most of us, “weird sounds from Boca Raton” means diamonds caught in a disposal or wheezing geriatrics struggling with groceries. And that stereotype is unlikely to change soon. Finding something edgy and hip in this subculturally deprived suburb is about as likely as finding bean sprouts on a Big…
Hey! You can’t put those there! Don’t, please — I have plenty of that stuff as it is, see? Awww, jeez, that one again? Look, can’t you find another… I mean, seriously… Ah, whatever. Just leave ’em right there. No, over there. Thanks. Thanks a lot. The Rezentments The Rezentments(self-released)…
When I set up a phone interview with Mark Eitzel, the last thing I expected to hear were Britney Spears jokes. The singer-songwriter’s work with American Music Club and on subsequent solo albums points to a despondent, dreary soul. Though underground-music mavens have anointed him one of the country’s greatest…
It would have been a journey certain to test the mettle of the hardest road veterans. But for the young foals who make up the Rocking Horse Winner, the schedule appeared beyond grueling. Immediately following a rousing show at Respectable Street May 25 (with some of the band members’ parents…
Derek Cintron does not care if you hate his music. Just tell it to him straight. “You can say we suck,” says the Miami-based multi-instrumentalist. “You can say you think we’re the worst band in the world. That’s fine by me. I’m not out to please everybody. I’m out to…
