Carl Perkins

Pro-Gay Marriage Willie Nelson Returns With A New Album April 16

As Willie Nelson inches towards 80 years of age on April 29, his schedule doesn't seem to winding down one bit. He tours at an astounding clip, and it seems like he was in the Houston-area at least four times in the past year. In fact, we reviewed his latest Arena Theatre gig here on Rocks Off earli ... More >>

Happy E-Day: What If Elvis Had Lived?

Note: Elvis Presley would be 78 years old today, if he had not (supposedly) died in Memphis in August 1977. This article originally appeared as part of Rocks Off's "Elvis Week" in January 2011, and still seems plausible two years later. Do you realize that Woody Allen, Julie Andrews, the dude who w ... More >>

Last Night: Chris Isaak at Arena Theatre

Chris Isaak "Beyond the Sun Tour" Arena Theatre August 28, 2012 Chris Isaak is an accomplished singer and actor. He is also, as his performance at Arena Theatre Tuesday night proved, a great dancer, a snazzy dresser and a pretty funny guy. The Houston leg of his "Beyond the Sun" tour just as easi ... More >>

Houston Theater Awards

From actors to designers, directors to technicians, the city's brightest talent gets its due.

Elvis: Why A 22-Year-Old Still Loves The King

Elvis Presley was one of my first favorite musicians. Around 1994, my parents had signed up for one of those ridiculous 99 cent CD clubs, getting endless amounts of CDs. An Elvis Presley compilation was one of them. I found myself jumping around my house doing my own kind of five-year-old version o ... More >>

Million Dollar Quartet

Introducing...The Beatles: Celebrating Their First Ed Sullivan Performance

Lonesome, Onry and Mean didn't get in much trouble in school. So his parents were a little disturbed to find the eighth grader in the principal's office on the afternoon of February 10, 1964. He and his best friends, Mike Clowdus, Brad Rutledge, and Larry "Suitcase" Simpson, had been written up and ... More >>

NRBQ

R.I.P. Marshall Grant, Johnny Cash's Tennessee Two Bassist

Marshall Grant, the Memphis bassist who along with Carl Perkins' brother Luther, were the members of Johnny Cash's seminal band the Tennessee Two, died early Sunday in Jonesboro, Ark. Cash's daughter Roseanne reported via her Twitter account Sunday that Grant had died of aneurysm, and that she h ... More >>

The Worst Hairpieces In Rock & Roll (And We Mean Bad)

Photo manipulations by John Seaborn Gray​Getting older is no fun. Your body starts to hurt for no reason, you lose all your energy, you stop being able to digest certain foods, you realize just about everyone in the world is an asshole (including yourself), you get cranky and curmudgeonly and ... More >>

Chinaberry Reflections

Houston Kid Rodney Crowell learns to "fail better."

Future Elvis: What If The King Had Lived?

​Do you realize that Woody Allen, Julie Andrews, the dude who was in the Darth Vader suit, and Ron Paul are all the same age as Elvis Presley would be on Saturday? Look at Woody Allen next time you see him on TMZ and just think, he's as old as Elvis. In order to get in the frame of mind to t ... More >>

Justin Townes Earle's Musical Family Tree

credJustin Townes Earle at Warehouse Live, May 2009​Tonight Justin Townes Earle headlines Fitzgerald's with Caitlin Rose in tow. For the past three years, Earle has been making believers out of most every audience he has come across, either converting the uninitiated or further leading his dev ... More >>

Exile In Margaritaville: Marshall Chapman Blooms After Jimmy Buffett

tallgirl.comL-R: Kenny Vaughan, Tim Krekel, Carl Perkins and Marshall Chapman at New York's Bottom Line, November 1996​A year ago, Lonesome Onry and Mean wrote in these pages about the passing of a rather unsung musical giant, Tim Krekel. So it was quite a pleasant surprise to recently open a ... More >>

He Said She Said: 10 Artists Who Never Got Their Due

In the course of music history, some bands get that extra push by pop culture and become uber-iconic, while others, though just as deserving, go largely unnoticed except by those who choose to dig even deeper. For every Elvis Presley, there is a seedier Carl Perkins off to the side. David Bowie get ... More >>

Love and Theft

The decade with no name left behind plenty of memorable music.

Aftermath: Drive-By Truckers' Cathartic, Down-Home Halloween Redemption at House of Blues

Photos by Jay Lee​ It took Aftermath most of Friday to figure out why we were in such an awful blue funk after Thursday's Pogues show, especially after the band delivered a more brilliant set than even this 20-year fan thought they were capable of. But after leaving work early and relaxing for a w ... More >>

Feel a Whole Lot Better: For His Birthday, Five Great Non-Petty Tom Petty Songs

Tuesday just happens to be the 59th birthday of Rocks Off's personal hero, role model and by all accounts someone who smokes even more weed than we do, Thomas Earl Petty. Speaking of, it's also Snoop Dogg's birthday, which means 10/20 deserves to be a NORML holiday even more than 4/20 does. But unt ... More >>

Aftermath: Th' Legendary Shack Shakers at Rudyard's

Photos by Chris Gray​ Th' Legendary Shack Shakers are a sort of Blue Ridge Parkway answer to Los Skarnales, mining Anglo-American roots music and all things Memphis - Sun Records, Beale Street and the Oblivians - to create a turbo-charged, gypsy-flavored, punk-speed rockabilly dynamo with a metric ... More >>

Flamin' Hellcats

Texas Music on Sirius/XM's Outlaw Country

Rodney Crowell, Forever the Houston Kid

Gasoline Dreams

Drive-By Truckers, A to Z

Alabama Ass Whuppin'

Bo Diddley, RIP

Lelia Rodgers's Matagorda Island Discs

Overnight Express: In Case You're Not Sick of Me Going on About Tom Petty...

Last Night: Mike Ness and Jesse Dayton at Meridian

Mike Ness, with Jesse Dayton

MySpaced Out: Fortress Europe

One Piece at a Time

Psychobilly at the gates

Pep Torres

Pep Torres performs Saturday, May 26, at the Continental Club, 3700 Main, 713-529-9899.

South By Lomax: Part One

Various Artists

Rockin' Bones: 1950s Punk & Rockabilly

Bring On the Backlash!

Flinging poo at the haters with the Arctic Monkeys

James Hand

Friday, May 5, at Blanco's, 3406 West Alabama, 713-439-0072

Letters to the Editor

South By So Huge

Austin's little music festival is all grown up

Playbill

Playbill

Drive By Truckers

The Dirty South (New West)

Letters

Family Feud

Hip-hop turns 25, and the battle lines are drawn

The Mild Ones

The young gentlemen of rockabilly, San Antonio's Cave Catt Sammy

The Amazing Crowns

Manic musicianship

Still Howlin'

Omar Dykes keeps finding ways to push the blues out there

Phat Cat

Ex-Stray Cat Lee Rocker brings rockabilly into the '90s

Wanted Man

Johnny Cash may just be a legend, but he's never sounded better

Nails in the Coffin

Five decades of Chess Records lead to a blues stalemate

Sex Sells

Live Shots