Fun Fun Fun Fest Nites Lineup Announced

See also: Full Fun Fun Fun Fest lineup announced Fun Fun Fun Fest dropped its free aftershow list today, including names like Superchunk, Dwarves, Imperial Teen, Liturgy, Seaweed, Nachtmystium, plus local showings from Sundress, Fungi Girls, Power Trip and A.Dd+. Other notables: There will be a Bob Mould DJ set…

How I Quit Crack – Black Lodge – 8/24/12

How I Quit Crack, Deflowered Electric Flesh Bride, Habu Habu Black Lodge Friday, August 24 Black Lodge is tucked in a corner of Deep Ellum that seems annexed from the rest of the area, and perhaps that’s what made Friday’s show at the tiny gallery space feel extradimensional. The space…

Colleen Green

L.A. seems to be in the throes of a full-scale weed jam explosion, both in aesthetic and sound. Singer-guitarist Colleen Green doesn’t seem to care how much you know she’s influenced by The Ramones — she even has a song called “I Wanna Be Degraded” — or that there’s a…

Lighting Bolt

When I first saw Lightning Bolt in a dingy club in Brooklyn a decade ago, I did not foresee the Providence duo still being around in 2012. Not that they weren’t good enough: That performance, in which drummer Brian Chippendale and bassist Brian Gibson set up on the floor and…

Lovestory Tour

Sandaga 813 is the perfect venue for this touring soul/hip-hop caravan, headlined by Shawn Chrystopher, who just released the Timbaland-produced mixtape, LoveStory. Fellow emcees Sean Falyon, El Prez, Raven Sorvino, Jabee, Austin’s QLee and Dallas’ Drama Tha King keep the verses flowing. Starts at 8 p.m…

The Medium Is the Message: Checking In With Dallas’ Tape Heads

As with vinyl culture, cassettes never really went away, they just served certain micro-scenes a bit more efficiently. Nationally, cassette culture has been on an upswing for a few years, as CDs become increasingly inconvenient/obsolete, and the analog heads respond to the digital glut. Tapes used to be Morse code…

Six Albums To Torture Your College Roommate With

The first week of college is here, so the Observer staff is providing you with some tips to get your through the first week/month/year. My freshman year of college, my roommate used to play Wu-Tang Clan’s 36 Chambers every night as she went to sleep. And not just start to…

Willie Nelson Will Be In the House Tonight

Despite “breathing problems” landing Willie Nelson in the hospital over the weekend, his show tonight at House of Blues, deliciously sponsored by Raising Cane’s Chicken Fingers, will go on as scheduled. In the meantime, check out Thomas Fawcett’s piece on Dallas producer Phil York, who passed away earlier this month…

Playdough Digs Into Oddisee’s People Hear What They See

See also: Bludded Head’s Nevada Hill riffs on Harvey Milk We’ve started poking around in locals’ iTunes, iPods, Spotify playlists, CD players, cassette decks, turntables and brains with one question in mind: What are you listening to? We don’t even care if it’s good, we just want to know what…

Nevada Hill Riffs On Harvey Milk’s My Love Is Higher…

See also: Smile Smile love the Ronettes See also: Shiny Around the Edges on Death Grips We’ve started poking around in locals’ iTunes, iPods, Spotify playlists, CD players, cassette decks, turntables and brains with one question in mind: What are you listening to? We don’t even care if it’s good,…

Stalley at Trees

Maybach Music Group poet Stalley’s newest mixtape, Savage Journey to the American Dream, features a Hollywood Squares-type roster of cameos: Rick Ross, Curren$y, 2 Chainz, Wale. It’s also one of those hip-hop albums that feels very much a product of modern politics/geography/ideology, his introspective lyrics bumping up against dreamy, surreal…

Derrick Carter at It’ll Do Club

Chicago house music totem Derrick Carter has had the sort of longevity not many DJs enjoy, influencing and structuring scenes throughout the U.S. and across the pond as well since the late ’80s. And, as It’ll Do has become an East Dallas outpost for house music, having a titan like…

Blackstone Rangers, Zhora at Double Wide

Speaking of cassette culture, local trio Blackstone Rangers just released their five-song EP, Into the Sea, on tape via Dallas Distortion Music. It’s actually the perfect medium for their distorto-pop, and since their first run of tapes sold out, this show will have a second-run “red” cassette up for sale…

Keep It Reel With DJ Ruthless Ramsey at Elm Street Bar

With cassette culture invading the mainstream these days, seems like every artist has an angle to preserve and champion what many see as a fossilized art form. Arizona DJ Ruthless Ramsey, however, has been obsessed with cassettes since he was rocking single digits. Touted as the world’s “only cassette mixologist,”…

Video: DFW Cypher Raps About Sneakers

DFW Cypher’s past videos have been experiments in location and lyrical synergy: Give a random group of emcees a beat, take them out of the studio or club, and make them collaborate, whether it’s in the kitchens or atop the bridges of Dallas. In the process, they’ve discovered a wealth…