It’s finally May and — surprise, surprise — the music festivals are getting into full swing. There two noteworthy ones this weekend alone, and both are new kids on the block (or relatively so): tonight’s JMBLYA Festival and tomorrow and Sunday’s Suburbia Fest. And that’s just the tip of the…
It’s been an awfully strange week in Graceland. (Well, not Elvis’s Graceland. But then when isn’t that strange?) Dallas-reared New Bohemians’ vet Edie Brickell hit headlines earlier this week for a bizarre domestic dispute with her long-time husband, good ol’ “Rhymin’ Simon” himself, Paul Simon. Then they showed up to…
JMBLYA, Dallas’ growing gumbo pot of a music festival, is returning this weekend for a second year with an amplified purpose. Marked for last year’s appearances by Grammy rivals Kendrick Lamar and Macklemore, this year’s lineup boasts a slew of highlights with the likes of Chance the Rapper, RiFF RaFF,…
The Observer is looking for a part-time Clubs Editor. The job includes: – Data entry to keep our clubs listings current. – Managing the Dallas Observer concert calendar. – Visiting and writing about new bars and clubs, and re-visiting old standbys when their listing needs a refresh. The ideal candidate…
We all know it, but it’s time to show it. Urban Outfitters is a creative wasteland, a shortsighted cul-de-sac of trends and trash-culture bent for capital gain — one large, unthinking slab of cultural masturbation. But, by and large, it’s a beast we ourselves feed. Like creepers to a drug…
You might remember the Dallas-based filmmaker who wanted to raise $7,500 for a documentary on Fat Wreck Chords. Well, Shaun Colón wound up raising all of that in 24 hours and he had 35 days to go after that with his Indiegogo campaign. When we spoke to him at the…
Courtesy Martin House Brewing CompanyLast Thursday, the Toadies played Irving Plaza in Manhattan with Battleme and Supersuckers. Friday, they were off to famed Asbury Park venue Stone Pony before playing a few more east coast dates and heading back home to Dallas, where they’ll appear next week as headliners for…
North Texas pumps out some of hip-hop’s most artistic and underrated artists. Don’t believe us, please refer to the release of the hip-hop documentary We From Dallas. Being creative spawns in an area more times than not overlooked on rap’s national scale, new age artists are emerging that aren’t afraid…
Ten years ago this past Valentine’s Day, Warpaint formed and slowly but surely the music world got hip to this psychedelic dream-pop quartet from Los Angeles. Critical acclaim poured in from all corners for their debut EP, Exquisite Corpse, in 2007, and the band’s 2010 full-length debut, The Fool, continued…
In the splendidly unflinching 2012 documentary Charles Bradley: Soul of America, the Florida-born, Brooklyn-based Charles Bradley openly shares the highs and lows of the point in his life when he has finally found an outlet, and an audience, for his heart-on-sleeve soul music. As a whole, the film is both…
Things of Earth is a four-piece that started in Mesquite, where a majority of its members reside. But instead of taking the route of being a derivative Slipknot knockoff or a cover band destined to play wallpaper corporate gigs, this band has a thundering sound of twisting post-rock with a…
At 74, Al Jarreau is one of the living legends of jazz and R&B. For well over five decades, the man has been one of the few singers to cross over and have success in the pop marketplace. Jarreau’s 1981 album Breaking Away featured his signature song, the lovely “We’re…
Updated with a response from the Double Wide below. One of Dallas’ most beloved recent institutions, Good Luck Karaoke at the Double Wide, is no more. This weekly festival of alcohol and bad singing to great tunes, heavily assisted by the two men in charge and their refusal to ever…
Naming your band TEEN can have some repercussions. Just ask Kristina “Teeny” Lieberson. While some might assume a band called TEEN might feature a least a few teenagers, Lieberson simply used her childhood nickname as the inspiration for a moniker. And there is nothing immature about the music of this…
Atlanta’s Manchester Orchestra play indie music with an epic feel. Over the course of a decade, this nimble five-piece led by the enigmatic Andy Hull have released four albums of quality alternative rock. The band’s most recent effort, Cope, may well be the band’s best effort yet. Speaking from his…
Even though he fronts the sonically aggressive electro-metal band Powerman 5000, Spider One (AKA Michael David Cummings) is a thoughtful and downright restrained individual. I guess you have to have a cool head to keep some form of a band going for 23 years. Over that time, Powerman 5000 has…
For nearly 20 years “Thrashin'” Alan Tuggle has been promoting metal on his radio show Hard Time Radio on KNON. It’s a position that has also afforded him opportunities to interview idols of the metal scene from Ronnie James Dio to “Dimebag” Darrell Abbott. He’s become a fixture in the…
Pulsing EDM and rattling hip-hop will officially be wed in trapped-out matrimony this Saturday, April 19, as Dallas welcomes the first ever Rageville Music Festival. The ADHD brainchild of Intelligent Grind Promotions, the one-night hodgepodge packs a broad lineup of masked rappers, live DJs and trill robots. In other words,…
After all these years, there’s still something special about seeing the Old 97’s back where they started — right here in their native Dallas. Perhaps it’s Rhett Miller and the boys’ longevity; perhaps it’s whatever that certain something special is that leaves us longing for the “next” Old 97’s. Either…
Angus Young looks like a possessed schoolboy as fire explodes from his fingertips each time they dance across the fretboard of his signature Gibson SG. His older brother, Malcolm, has been providing fuel to his fire for more than four decades. And together they’ve created some of heavy metal’s most…
This March I found myself at Amoeba Music in LA, one of the most celebrated record stores in the world. The size, the selection and the pricing were all very impressive, but none of it compared to the sense of community living inside. It was contagious, enlivening. For a fan…
The Rail Club has been a mecca for metal since opening its doors in 2010. But new owner Josh Campbell hopes to expand it to include other genres of music, making it a mecca for all musicians. “When it comes to music, I play metal and I love metal,” Campbell…
