Email Author Chris Gray

Awards

• 2012 - Best of the West/First Amendment Funding, Inc., published February 10, 2011

  "Getting Past the Bouncer"

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2010 Stories by Chris Gray

• Thankstaking

  published November 25, 2010

  Come Thanksgiving night, we imagine a lot of people will be thankful for any reason to get out of the house. They could do a lot worse than this... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Friday Night: Social Distortion At House Of Blues

  published Nov 22, 2010

  Social Distortion House of Blues November 19, 2010 In its 30-year lifespan, the impact Social Distortion has had on its audience is easy to tell. Friday night at a packed House of Blues (more on that... More >>

• Butch Hancock, Flatlanders Still Chasing The Horizon

  published Nov 19, 2010

  Pound for pound, Rocks Off's choice for greatest living Texas songwriter is Butch Hancock, who happens to play in the same band as his closest competition for that title - old Lubbock buddies and fell... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Last Night: The Black Angels And Black Mountain At Warehouse Live

  published Nov 18, 2010

  The Black Angels, Black Mountain Warehouse Live November 17, 2010 Some music is so evocative and overwhelming it can cause you to flash back to before you were even born. Not all of it - when a Mozar... More >>

• Dancing With The Stars: Ready... Aim... Fire!

  published Nov 17, 2010

  As someone who is both left-handed and left-footed, and has carried a bizarre taffeta-related phobia with us since childhood, Rocks Off generally goes out of our way to avoid Dancing With the Stars at... More >>

• Sam's Place

  published November 18, 2010

  Lightnin' Hopkins is official. This past Saturday, a crowd that overflowed the tent erected due to the inclement weather (though it never... More >>

• Reduxion

  published November 18, 2010

  We're baaaaaaack! After a couple of months off, our Rocks Off music blog's monthly series of local bands covering their biggest influences... More >>

• Robbie Fulks

  published November 18, 2010

  Back in the '90s, when the gathering forces of insurgent country went after pop-happy Nashville with all the passion and potency their punk... More >>

• Bluefinger: Rock & Roll Tragedy, One Comic Moment At A Time

  published Nov 15, 2010

  Plenty of rock stars have shown that there's a fine line between fuck-up and folk hero. Herman Brood, the central figure of Catastrophic Theatre's Bluefinger, doesn't bother with that line - or any ot... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Reduxion Returns Next Wednesday With Tax The Wolf

  published Nov 15, 2010

  We're baaaaaaack! After a couple of months off - hey, things happen - Reduxion, Rocks Off's monthly series of local bands covering their biggest influences, returns just in time to get you nice and h... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Lightnin' Hopkins Dedication Draws Overflow Crowd

  published Nov 15, 2010

  Lightnin' Hopkins is official. Saturday morning, a crowd that overflowed the tent erected due to the inclement weather (though it never actually rained) showed up to witness the dedication of a state... More >>

• Lightnin' Hopkins' Six Best Songs, By Mr. Blues In Hi-Fi

  published Nov 12, 2010

  Tomorrow, Rocks Off - and, we hope, a lot of our readers - will drag our raggedy asses out of bed and over to Project Row Houses in Third Ward at 10 a.m. to witness something incredible: The dedicatio... More >>

• John Fullbright: Woody Guthrie Sells A Lot Of Hamburgers

  published Nov 12, 2010

  John Fullbright, playing a writers-in-the-round with Jess Klein tonight at Anderson Fair, looks like the kid at the grocery store sacking groceries or gathering carts from the parking lot. The innocen... More >>

• Rocks Off Threw Wrench Into U of H & Rice's Secrecy Plan

  published Nov 12, 2010

  This morning the Texas Watchdog published a follow-up to yesterday's story, which released several emails from the consulting firm the University of Houston hired to negotiate its purchase of KTRU. Th... More >>

• Springsteen Web Site: '78 Summit Show Best Video Ever

  published Nov 12, 2010

  Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band, "Fire," live at the Summit 12/8/78 Since one of the extra goodies is a complete video of Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band's December 1978 concert at the... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Spinal Tap's Nigel Tufnel's 11 Loudest Quotes

  published Nov 11, 2010

  Today, 11/11/10, we honor a man willing to lay down his life for rock and roll, master of the saddest of all keys, Spinal Tap lead guitarist Nigel Tufnel. (It seems like today is also some sort of oth... More >>

• Texas Watchdog: U Of H Covered Up KTRU Purchase Plans

  published Nov 11, 2010

  UPDATE (4:07 p.m.) KTRU staff and the Friends of KTRU released a statement Thursday afternoon condemning both universities' actions in the station's sale. See it after the jump. The investigative Web... More >>

• iPod: Happy Anniversary, You Little Devil

  published Nov 10, 2010

  Can somebody please tell us what the hell Firewire isr Nine years ago today - November 10, 2001 - Apple unveiled a new kind of MP3 player known as an iPod. About the size of a deck of cards, the dev... More >>

• Young Man, Older Woman: Top Ten Cougar Anthems

  published Nov 10, 2010

  Congratulations to Houston folksinger Glenna Bell. Her "The Cougar Anthem," from this year's Perfectly Legal: Songs of Sex, Love and Murder, was singled out Tuesday alongside Aaron Neville, Keith Rich... More >>

• Lightnin' Hopkins Historical Marker Dedication

  published November 11, 2010

  For everyone who thinks the wheels of government only turn three speeds — slow, slower and slowest — we respectfully submit the case... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Last Night: Merle Haggard At Mo's Place

  published Nov 08, 2010

  Merle Haggard Mo's Place November 7, 2010 Next month, President Obama will look on while Willie Nelson inducts Merle Haggard into the Kennedy Center ring of honor, our nation's artistic equivalent o... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  106.9 FM Gets In The Zone, Misses The Pointr

  published Nov 08, 2010

  Another Houston radio station has changed formats, or "flipped," although early reaction from some listeners is that the change is so slight it's hardly a change at all. Cox Communications has rechri... More >>

• Rocks Off Denied Justin Bieber Reviewer Tickets

  published Nov 04, 2010

  Should we be... or... or... We don't know how to feel. Mommyr By the way, the show is sold out.... More >>

• Justin Bieber: Why Are We Going Saturdayr

  published Nov 04, 2010

  Justin Bieber is much more than a Twitter phenomenon and the most-copied hairstyle since Jennifer Aniston. He's also a living, breathing, 16-year-old human being who will perform at Toyota Center Satu... More >>

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  FEATURED STORY

  Top 10 Honorary Texas Musicians

  published Nov 03, 2010

  Right here, right now, and in print all damn week, you can read the Houston Press' interview with perhaps the hottest new band on the South 40, San Antonio's Hacienda (above). Whether or not they go o... More >>