Sometimes, blues music sounds better coming out of a woman’s mouth. The sultry lyrics and hard-knock lifestyle just have a more poignant ring to them when a woman is belting them out — and it’s almost guaranteed that they’ve lived through everything they’re singing about. Anyone who feels the same…
A yellowed newspaper article set in a hazy frame hangs in the back of Sonny’s Stardust Lounge, proudly proclaiming that the aged honky tonk bar is the last bastion of Old Fort Lauderdale. It’s dated September 1988. Last time I checked, Fort Lauderdale was still here and still kicking —…
Imagine a planet where two of your favorite artists from various genres are constantly smashed together on one track. Rick James and Busta Rhymes. Sean Paul and the Temptations. Arrested Development and Jay-Z, for Christ’s sake. It’s an odd world, but Brooklyn’s funky DJ collective the Rub pulls it off…
Aw man, I love challenges like that!” It’s a Sunday morning, and Pigeon John is piloting his tour van toward Memphis, Tennessee, and gleefully recalling his gig two nights earlier — a South by Southwest Festival showcase during which he and his threepiece backing band opened for such disparate acts…
Ravi Shankar may be India’s best-known musical export, but it’s also safe to say most people would be stumped if they were forced to identify another. Put out a poll on sitar virtuosos and chances are it would be the late Beatle George Harrison who’d top the tally. Then again,…
Whether he likes it or not, John Ralston will always be seen as the vagabond singer/songwriter whom people love to hate. Most South Florida folks either remember him from his days of touring with Dashboard Confessional or for working at local bars in the area, but these days, John Ralston…
Norah Jones is still searching for her perpetual groove. Since garnering instant acclaim at the top of the jazz and pop charts with her multiplatinum debut album, Come Away With Me, Jones’ forward momentum hasn’t been all that successful. Though undeniably sensual and seductive, her second album, Feels Like Home,…
The Weirdness ain’t punk-classic like Fun House, but let’s be fair — nothing the recently reunited Stooges can do will ever match their early-’70s peak. This band does rock, however. Ax-man Ron Asheton is not only a funky-ass rhythm freak but the dude’s piercing feedback screech on “Greedy Awful People”…
The world of indie rock has never really embraced the concept of the instrumental jam band. The few exceptions that (barely) fit into that category — Godspeed You Black Emperor!, Mogwai, Tortoise — don’t really follow the genre’s rules, instead occupying a space between the Fall’s deconstructed rock and the…
First it was radio, then American Bandstand, then MTV, then Dawson’s Creek. Now if you’re a band that wants a megahit, you gotta get your tune onto Grey’s Anatomy. For that to happen, however, your music has to be polished and melodic but not too saccharine, interesting but not too…
Otep, the L.A.-based metal fusion quartet led by singer/poet/self-described “mental pugilist” Otep Shamaya, released one of the densest, most disturbing debut albums in the history of metal with 2002’s Sevas Tra, a fiery confessional wherein Otep screams about being raped by her father against a searing sonic backdrop of eerie…
Last things first: If you like Tom Petty, Bob Dylan, or the Pixies, chances are you’ll go apeshit for Lake Worth’s zany rock outfit Black Finger. Combining a nomadic mix of bluegrass, punk, and Southern rock, its music has gypsy veins and wanderlust woven into most of the material. The…
In the past decade or so, rock has been swept up in an excess of imitation. Best-selling bands like the Strokes and the Black Crowes eschew originality while tapping the template created by the Stones and other ’60s stalwarts with a fondness for booze ‘n’ blooze. The Colour, an Orange…
Supergroups seem to be the new “in” thing these days. Everyone from Perry Farrell of Jane’s Addiction fame to Damon Albarn is putting them together, but none of those supergroups has anything on old-time indie outfit G3, comprised of Joe Satriani, Paul Gilbert, and John Petrucci. Who? you ask. Don’t…
It’s virtually impossible to figure out how Ted Leo became, you know, Ted Leo. Born in Bloomfield, New Jersey, Leo graduated from Seton Hall Prep and received a degree in English from Notre Dame. He is now a strict vegan and plays socially conscious punk music. (We didn’t think they…
You don’t often hear gospel music at an outdoor hippie gathering. Much more likely to cater to the stoner crowd are hip-hop artists with crossover appeal, like the Beastie Boys. But church music? That’s never been a big draw at jam band concerts. Maybe it’s the proselytizing or harmonized shout-outs…
Do you want to see what’s in the box or what’s behind door number three? The latest episode in the radio payola version of Let’s Make a Deal is looking like a zonk. The heroic crusade of then-New York Attorney General (now Governor) Eliot Spitzer against payola — netting more…
Ex-Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr knows a little something about dealing with strong-willed vocalists (ahem, Morrissey), so it’s no surprise that his contributions to the poppiest Modest Mouse record yet are solid. But it’s still a treat to hear how focused Isaac Brock and Co. are on the lushly arranged Ship,…
Afrobeat is an often imitated music form, but few bands approach it with the respect and creativity that Brooklyn’s Antibalas has over the years. When the band was created nearly a decade ago, their music picked up where the genre’s architect, Fela Kuti and his son Femi respectively left off—taking…
Rebel music is ensconced in the DNA of Malian nomad group Tinariwen. Started in the early 1980s as a band of drifter-turned-guerrilla musicians, this septet of African blues players is essentially a group of political refugees creating their own liberation anthems one note at a time. Alchemizing traditional Tuareg blues…
There are certain instruments folks wouldn’t ordinarily associate with jazz music, and the steel pans (used in soca and calypso) are on that list. But on Andy Narell’s latest disc, Tatoom, the pans are taken to a different level and the jazz tunes that are created here seem abstract at…
The indie hip-hop movement bubbling up out of Miami is gaining ground on its mainstream opposition, not only because its beats and rhymes are tight but also because it’s learning to break all of the right rules. Take homegrown record label Hoverock, which has released the Kill Ugly Remix —…
