Word has come that Doc Watson, beloved 89-year-old flat-picking genius and elder statesman of the Americana music scene, has been airlifted to Baptist Hospital in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, after ...
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Three former Houstonians who have been included in the second edition of the Encyclopedia of Country Music defy all odds. To call Rodney Crowell, Lyle Lovett or Steve Earle "country songwriters" or "c...
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As founder and president of Healthcare for the Homeless -- Houston (HHH), Dr. David Buck is a busy man. So busy, in fact, he was taken aback when his office got a voice message from U.S. Representativ...
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Mickey Newbury paved the road from Houston to Nashville for a Hells Angels-ish, hard-drinking, hard-drugging gaggle of songwriters who, like Newbury, would go on to make a serious mark on Music City...
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Grady Gaines, who in a few years would be playing in the most important rock and roll band on the planet, was 12 years old throwing newspapers... More >>
Since moving to Nashville in 1995, 52-year-old Darrell Scott has had a career most who take that Hillbilly Highway to Music City USA would envy. A triple-threat talent, Scott was for years a session...
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Dennis McNett, one of the nation's renowned printmakers, practices the tedious, time-consuming art of carving. Most of his works are huge and have a graphic basis in '80s skateboard and punk rock cult...
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Nick Lowe
Continental Club
May 7, 2012
Nick Lowe learned a lesson Monday night: Houston rocks, and Houston will shut up and listen.
Lowe and his band seemed slightly flummoxed by the Continental Clu...
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Along with pickled pig's feet and a steady supply of Slim Jims, a good jukebox is a prime element for any great bar. But, like dinosaurs, jukeboxes are a vanishing breed. Unlike digital jukes, iPods o...
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One of the most pleasant discoveries at last weekend's iFest was the guitar sculpture of local graphic designer and political junkie Pen Morrison. A Yankee who came south to college and fell in love w...
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Charley Pride is tired of being asked about how tough it was. The three-time Grammy winner, who broke Montgomery County's color line by dining at... More >>
Houston International Festival
Downtown Houston
April 22, 2012
With a slight north breeze keeping festival-goers from broiling under a cloudless sky, Sunday's iFest turned into a perfect laid-back Ho...
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David Grissom has a resume that most guitarists can only dream of. From his early days with Hank III in Killbilly, Grissom went on to playing, along with Jimmy Pettit and Davis McLarty, for Joe Ely fr...
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The last time Rocks Off caught up with Jesse Dayton, he was up to his eyeballs in alligators with his film project Zombex, working on an album of Kinky Friedman cover songs and playing Kinky for a bun...
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Voted the best bandoneonist (player of a type of small accordion) under 25 in Argentina when he was only 17 years old, Hector del Curto is today a world-class musician. He has played with most of the ...
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Paul Thorn is in Nettleton, Miss., standing in his front yard watching his 8-year old daughter bounce on the trampoline while he takes yet another interview call. Asked if another time would be better...
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While Houston played a huge part in the early history of country music, by the end of the 1950s a new breed of artist was coming on the scene. Western Swing, for all purposes, was a relic, and althoug...
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Like our neighbors over at Eating Our Words, Rocks Off would like to tell you about some places that didn't quite make the cut in our few most recent Best of Houston issues (categories change every ye...
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Multitalented Mississippi-born Marty Stuart is one of the last true hillbillies in Nashville. Picked by Clarence White to be in Lester Flatt's... More >>
Our fourth installment of Houston-area country-music pioneers honored with inclusion in the second edition of The Encyclopedia of Country Music details the last of an amazing group of local musicians ...
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Forty-seven years after his breakout hit, "Treat Her Right," 69-year old wildman Roy Head is still fighting the entertainment wars, continuing... More >>
The further one digs into the second edition of The Encyclopedia of Country Music, the deeper one's appreciation of the contributions of Houston's country-music pioneers becomes. Yeah, just check out ...
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Rocks Off hadn't thought much about Sundance Head since his 13th-place American Idol finish in 2007 and the momentary ballyhoo that followed.
Head, the son of legendary Houston blue-eyed soul man Roy...
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There's only one really bad thing about the anti-clotting pill Pradaxa. You can't fall or get cut while taking it because once you start bleeding, there's almost no way to stop it. There's no reversal agent, no antidote.
There's no gloves or batting helmets when Larry Joe Miggins and the rest of the Houston Babies regularly travel back in time to play the game by its 1860 rules.
