Rodriquez – Annette Strauss Square Ampitheater – May 3, 2013

Friday night at the AT&T Performing Arts Center’s Annette Strauss Square Amphitheater, two things were pristinely clear: the gorgeous night sky above the blanketed crowd of BYOB-ers, and that the Search for Sugarman is now a full-blown phenomenon of followers who’ve found their guy in Rodriguez. The crowded, but comfortable,…

Jonny Fritz Signed His Record Deal with a Gravy-Dipped Quill

If you’re a fan of Dawes, Deer Tick, Andrew Combs or Shovels and Rope, you may have already heard of Jonny Fritz without realizing it. The Virginia native released an excellent album under the pseudonym Jonny Corndawg in 2011. The Corndawg album, which featured instrumental help from Dawes’ Taylor Goldsmith…

The O’s Blaze Their Own Trail on the New Thunderdog

On a typically desolate Monday night in Deep Ellum, John Pedigo of the The O’s opens his trunk to reveal dozens of cardboard boxes filled with his group’s new CD, Thunderdog. It’s a big moment, not just for The O’s but for Punch Five Records — the label he and…

Country Divas Ashley Monroe and Kacey Musgraves Have a Need for Weed

Kellychristinephoto.comWhere the weed at?This week the Golden, Texas native Kacey Musgraves finally releases her eagerly-awaited debut album, Same Trailer, Different Park. Indeed, it’s fitting that she’s from a town named Golden, as the new album is but the most recent example of some serious Solid Country Gold that’s come from…

The Texas Music Revolution Felt Pretty Revolutionary, Actually.

On Saturday, as the rain poured outside of the historic Southfork Ranch in Parker, just east of Plano, nothing could dampen the beautiful and electric vibes inside the complex’s conference center where the annual Texas Music Revolution (hosted by KHYI 95.3 The Range) was taking place. The 17th edition of…

Caspian Wants to Body-Slam Your Ears

Phil Jamieson, who mans the keys, synth and guitars for instrumental rock act Caspian takes the “post-rock or just rock” questions with a great deal more understanding than many of his more celebrated, non-singing peers. In fact, some guitar-intensive acts get downright pissed when confronted with the seemingly innocuous “post-rock”…

Former Squirrel Nut Zipper Jimbo Mathus Shuffles His iPod For Us

Mississippi native and former lead-singer for the successful Squirrel Nut Zippers, Jimbo Mathus, shows his true southern self on his latest, excellent album, White Buffalo. While his old band brought attention back to Swing music for a while in the late 1990’s, it’s now tough to imagine Mathus ever being…

San Francisco’s The Mother Hips Shake Their iPods For Us

For over 20 years, the Mother Hips have expertly offered a soulful, psychedelic sound that just seems to flow in the Northern Californian waters. Although it’s been a while since the band’s last album, the groove-tastic Pacific Central Dust, was released in 2009, word has it that a new album…

These Machines Are Winning Do it All at Once

Dallas may have its first band to ever officially count a photographer/cinematographer as a member. These Machines Are Winning, a new music and art hybrid performance project conceived and fronted by former [DARYL] frontman Dylan Silvers, started as an enthralling, ambitious idea that’s now become a living, breathing entity of…

Holly Williams Doesn’t Think Country Needs Radio Anymore

Holly Williams, the 31 year old granddaughter of the iconic Hank Williams, has grown into a formidable artist all her own. Unlike her off-his-rocker dad and her crazy-ass half-brother, Hank Williams III, Holly hasn’t really dabbled in the stone-cold honky-tonk sounds that her family has been making for decades. She…

Loretta Lynn

While George Strait and George Jones recently garnered headlines for their announcements that they would be retiring from the road soon, Loretta Lynn keeps rolling. Last year, the 80-year-old daughter of a coal miner told the Observer that the secret to an artist’s longevity is “how hard they’re willing to…

Sean Watkins of Fiction Family Shuffles His iPod For Us

Sean Watkins has been kicking around the music biz for many years now. As perhaps the least-heralded member of the now-dormant roots group Nickel Creek, he shared the stage with his sister, Sara, who is now enjoying solo success and the recently crowned “genius,” and mandolin virtuoso, Chris Thile, who…

If the Sound City Soundtrack Rocks Half as Hard as the Movie, It Will Rule

The Dave Grohl-directed documentary Sound City, is a loving and thoroughly entertaining docu-valentine to the legendary studio just outside of L.A. where many landmark albums were recorded. Throughout the film’s first half, we’re given glimpses of behind the scenes action on the making of such classics as Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors,…