Are you READY for Rocks Off's
Washington Shore party this Thursday? If not, this video of Jersey Shore's Snooki
interviewing Phoenix on MTV will melt your brain.
If you read even one Houston-based music Web site, you probably already know that a petition is circulating to show support for the closure of Westheimer as a way to bring back the
Westheimer Street Festival (or Westfest, if ya nastay). Mayor Annise Parker gushed all about her love for The Montrose in a
documentary that aired recently on HoustonPBS, and she supposedly verbally committed to
Free Press Houston's Omar Afra to help bring Westfest back to Houston, so go sign the petition and put the ball in her court.
If you live in Houston and you are in a band (or you want to be), and you aren't yet reading
Matthew Wettergreen's blog, well, yer doin' it wrong. Wettergreen, the mastermind behind
Bandcamp, A DIY school for musicians; and
Caroline Collective, a coworking community, has this week alone published a guide to
Houston's local music press and a free e-book on
booking your band at Texas venues. And we're not just saying that 'cuz he said nice stuff about us.
Speaking of music blogs, two new ones were brought to MCM's attention this week - at least, two we didn't know about before:
HoustonMusicReview.com, which dubiously boasts to be Houston's best music source since 2001 (Rocks Off begs to differ); and
Unsigned Houston, the latter of which recently featured this
video interview from
Springfield Riots, who have kind words about the Houston music scene.
And speaking of video,
Electric Purgatory, the independent film about black rock musicians by Houstonian Raymond Gayle (Rocks Off wrote about it
in November) is now available on DVD from
Microcinema.
Oh. Em. Gee. This Hands Up thread about
fake Houston band names with historical significance is HILARIOUS pre-humpday reading. Makes MCM giddy for the cleverness of Houston's music community. The post was inspired by Rocks Off contributor Jef with One F's
query for real bands whose names are based on historical events (see the afore-mentioned Springfield Riots). Anyone want to start The Avondale Hustlers with us?
Friend of MCM™ Marc Brubaker has
taken the editorial helm over at Houstonist, and one of his first projects as Gentle Leader is a series called
Ol' Houstonian's Music Emporium, an "attempt to expose local music of which we either weren't aware or hadn't listened to yet, accompanied by a few remarks about said artist."
MCM thinks it's awesome.
Garage-punk aficionado
Mal Thursday has posted a new podcast called "Texas Tyme Machine," featuring music from John Wayne to The 13th Floor Elevators to The Ugly Beats. Download it
here, and subscribe to the podcast while you're at it.
