Related Search
Subject: Craig Hlavaty
Live Shots: Kings of Leon
May 14, 2007Last Night: Valient Thorr and ASG at the Meridian
August 7, 2007SXSW: Health, The Cribs, The Black Keys, The Soundtrack of Our Lives, And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead
March 14, 2008Slideshow: Method Man & Redman at House of Blues
Craig Hlavaty Craig Hlavaty braved a serious contact-high risk to take some shots of East Coast blunt-lovers Method Man & Redman's Blackout 2 tour at House of Blues last night. Click here for a slideshow. - Chris Gray
November 20, 2008Usher's Security Don't Take No Mess
Photos by Craig Hlavaty Click here for a slideshow Last night at one of the last stops on Usher's"Ladies Only" tour, I realized that I was one of maybe two dozen or so dudes in attendance. And I was working the damn thing, so even then. I don't think it was the tour's name that accounted for the lack of men. I think it was Usher's sheer presence. The guy is handsome has hell and can dance. Uh, I mean, he's very talented. But do you really want to spend an hour and half around
November 25, 2008Chinese Democracy Not Exactly Flying Off the Shelves
Photos by Craig Hlavaty For curiosity's sake, Rocks Off drove over to the Galleria-area Best Buy at 5133 Richmond yesterday afternoon to see if Guns 'N' Roses' new album, Chinese Democracy, was flying off the shelves. This record has taken over thirteen years to come out. Thirteen years ago I myself was about to enter the seventh grade and was almost religiously into MTV's Singled Out. It seems that Kanye West's new 808s & Heartbreak and the obligatory (read: record
November 26, 2008Aftermath: Eagles of Death Metal at Meridian
Photos by Craig Hlavaty It's super-hard to intelligently review a party band. You can't very well sit in one corner of the venue, gently stroking your scholarly beard jotting down notes on each intricate riff and drum fill. In the interest of science, you have to immerse yourself in the atmosphere and pray that you find some sort semblance of rational thought. Eagles of Death Metal is a party band, through and through. There is no time for shoe-gazing and opining on political s
November 26, 2008A Black Friday Soundtrack
It's become a tradition. You spend two days cooking, slaving over a hot stove, sweating into the family green bean casserole, making gallons upon gallons of iced tea for assorted loved and loathed ones. But instead of taking the next day off to go comatose and let the fullness subside, what do you do? You wake up the next morning at 3 a.m. to go to your local mall or big-box store to fight people for a cheap plasma television. It's come to be called Black Friday, by shoppers and merchants a
November 28, 2008Not Quite the Crowds We Expected at Rice Village or the Galleria
After all the hype of the past week leading up to Black Friday, we decided to venture out into the world of massive sales and astronomical blowouts and deeply discounted electronics. But where'd you all go? Did we miss all of you? Did you already head home to make Turkey Helper? We drove over to Rice Village this afternoon. Nothing doing. Parking spots were relatively plentiful, meaning you didn't have to stalk some poor lady drinking a latte as she walked out to her SUV. The stores looked j
November 28, 2008Merry Christmas from the Rocks Off Family
...and so say all of us! - Chris Gray, Craig Hlavaty, Dusti Rhodes, Keith Plocek, William Michael Smith, Bob Ruggiero, John Nova Lomax, Ernest Barteldes, Brandon K. Hernsberger, Jef With One F, Michael Arceneaux, Linda Leseman, kris ex, Kathy F. Mahdoubi, Rosa Guerrero, Nick DiFonzo, Jason Ferguson and Shea Serrano
December 25, 2008Aftermath: The Ka-Nives at Big Star Bar
Photos by Craig HlavatyWith a roaring fire pit outside and the Schlitz flowing freely inside, three-piece Ka-Nives put on a one-off gig in a corner of the Heights' Big Star Bar late Saturday night. The erstwhile Austin plumbing enthusiasts tore through a short set of their Jerry Lee Lewis-cum-garage-rock fan favorites, like "Where Was Moses" and "Let's Dance." A guitar amp was paraded through the throng of boozy die-hards like a member of the band by Ben Murphy. At one point, the amp was
March 2, 2009Aftermath: One Wild Weekend
Craig Hlavaty The Imani School Student Jazz Ensemble Craig Hlavaty Erykah BaduRocks Off is still in the very early recovery stages from this weekend, which was one of the most satisfying musical whirlwinds he's been sucked into in quite some time. He started off Friday evening at the Arena Theatre (his new favorite local venue) for Erykah Badu's retro-futuristic benefit for Houston's Imani School. The local private academy's jazz ensemble - no member was over age 13 - ev
March 9, 2009SXSW: Rachel Ray at Maggie Mae's
Photos by Craig Hlavaty We valiantly attended the Rachael Ray party at Maggie Mae's on Sixth, braving free food curate by the talk show host and Rose's Mojitos by the gallon. Hometown boy Bob Schneider opened the show upstairs, doing his old reliable ladykilling jams. While downstairs New York's Semi Precious Weapons preened and pouted, jolting the middle of the road crowd out of their food coma with sleazy rock and roll straight outta the Bowery circa 1977. The food was excellent of course. N
March 21, 2009Slideshow: Homopolice at Westheimer Block Party
Craig HlavatyLeather-loving noise-punks Homopolice's show at Mango's during Westheimer Block Party Saturday evening had it all: amplifier humping, instrument smashing, guest screaming from Rusted Shut's Don Walsh, lots of blood and even more dude-on-dude action. It was so over-the-top outrageous it obviously deserved its own slideshow. Craig Hlavaty risked life and limb to get up close and personal - click here for the rest of the pictures.
March 31, 2009Local Motion
September 27, 2007Mail Call
A Different Breed
August 30, 2007Aftermath: Cake at Verizon Wireless Theater
Photos by Craig HlavatyCake has never sounded like anyone else, and no one that came after has ever come close to sounding like the Sacramento band either. It's not like Nirvana or Green Day, with 1,000 copycat bands immediately coming out of the proverbial woodwork to shove out their own shingle. Even if you think all Cake songs sound the same (and most, in fact, do), one must admit that their greatest achievement is being utterly and completely unique. With our recent piece on 94.5 The Buzz an
April 30, 2009Cop Warmth Poaches Rocks Off's Artwork on New Cassette
"Jesus Sanchez"... sorry, Craig Hlavaty Rocks Off loves getting local tapes and vinyl in the mail here. That's not a cry for free shit or a sad call for pity. We just dig hearing new music off something other than an Apple product or a boring plastic round disc. That being said we just got in the new Cop Warmth tape from the boys in Chemical City. Craig and the crew even included a handy list of fun facts about the release, including its genesis from a live recording at the immensely fun Westhei
May 1, 2009Aftermath: Flight of the Conchords at Jones Hall
Photos by Craig HlavatyThe thing about musical comedians is that if the humor is there but the tuneage is not, you can pretty much cash your chips in and give up and steal some of Louis CK's jokes and start selling out basketball arenas. New Zealand's Flight of the Conchords almost has too much musical talent to waste it on songs about racist dragons and gay cowboys. But luckily the duo keeps plugging away, leaving the audience wondering why we didn't wear adult diapers to the show because we ar
May 7, 2009Aftermath: Fake Problems and Born Anchor at Walter's on Washington
Photos by Craig Hlavaty On a Monday night, all you can really look forward to is a decent evening of lackluster television and maybe some leftover barbecue from the weekend's flame-kissed debauchery. But last night at Walter's was the exact anecdote for a "case of da Mondays" in so many ways. In recent years, it sounds as if punk kids have started to crawl deeper into their family record collections. Early Springsteen, Thin Lizzy, all manner of grimy/twangy beard-rock, and even U2 circa The Josh
May 12, 2009Live Shots: Yanni At The Toyota Center
It's about to get all new age up in this piece! Stay tuned for our review of last night's show... Photo By Craig Hlavaty
June 14, 2009Discounted Woodlands Lawn Seats All Day
Craig HlavatyUntil midnight tonight, the folks over at Live Nation are selling all lawn tickets to shows way out in the woody, mall-y expanses of the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion for just $24.99. The concert conglomerate has been running deals on Hump Day for about the past month to alleviate all this economic stress that has been plaguing our land, and came under fire recently when it came out that - although they were slashing prices - all those pesky fees and taxes were still being levied
June 17, 2009Slide Show: Albums Almost as Old as We Are
The other day, the Rocks Off brain trust was sitting around talking, and one of us happened to mention whatever album it was we were talking about - it might have been Duran Duran's Rio - came out the year one of us was born. That got us thinking, "How much have albums released within 12 months after our birthdays influenced our musical tastes?" Quite a bit, really. Click on the Rocks Off staffer's name for their slideshow; release dates are based on the best information we could gather via Wik
June 22, 2009Aftermath: Double Dagger at Super Happy Fun Land
Craig HlavatyWallet, keys, lighter, cellphone, camera(s). We had it all last night as we walked into the arty confines of the East End's Super Happy Fun Land. But one thing we didn't have was a pair of earplugs, and right about now we feel kinda silly not dishing out the extra buck for the ones sitting right behind the counter. Two of Houston's loudest bands, Muhammad Ali and Black Congress, brought forth a hellacious ferocity last night that grinded down the eardrums with the equally decibeli
June 24, 2009Corpus Christi: Home of the Whataburger
Photos by Craig HlavatyThis past weekend, we visited the hometown of Whataburger, Corpus Christi. The burger chain is based there, but the center of operations will be moving to a bigger complex in San Antonio in the next few months. The move is a sad one. The chain has been based in Corpus since 1950, when Harmon Dobson opened up its first location there in the middle of town off Ayers Street. Corpus is teeming with Whataburger locations -- there are almost a dozen by our count off the main
June 25, 2009Who Are the Mysterious Sunset Stripperz?
Photos by Craig Hlavaty This past weekend, Midtown haunt Coffee Groundz held its first weekend music festival. The music started early Saturday afternoon and didn't end until late in the day on Sunday. Acts like Runaway Sun and soul-rocker Kenneth Scott were crowd favorites on the back patio. We were coaxed over to the coffee joint Saturday evening by the promise of loudness, namely from a band called Sunsett Stripperz. The moniker alone made us leap from our Late Nite Pie and waddle a few block
June 29, 2009Bayou Beat: B L A C K I E on Tour, Michael Jackson Tribute at Discovery Green, Ticket Deals and More
Above is some video from B L A C K I E's performance Monday night at New Orleans' Dragon's Den, the first show of his mini-tour. The feedback-loving local rapper visits Baltimore Friday and Brooklyn's Afro!!Punk!!Fest!! Sunday. Rocks Off has heard through the proverbial grapevine that there's a Michael Jackson tribute at Discovery Green tomorrow at 6 p.m. Dance Houston and several other local dance groups will be demonstrating how to do the "Thriller" dance just like those Filipino inmates. Con
July 1, 2009Almost A Millionaire: One man's brief stint in the spotlight
July 9, 2009Aftermath: Clutch at House of Blues
Photos by Craig Hlavaty If you ever wondered what might have happened if James Brown and Audioslave had a baby, you should have been at House of Blues Wednesday night. You might only be wondering this if you are a member of the male gender, because - with a few exceptions at the almost-full venue - Wednesday proved quite the sausage party as well. But in a week when ZZ Top has already been haunting Aftermath's dreams, and Led Zeppelin always is, Clutch was exactly what we needed to hear.
July 16, 2009Aftermath: Archgoat, Blaspherian and Thorn Spawn at Walter's on Washington
Photos by Craig Hlavaty This week has been one of many firsts for Aftermath. Sunday night, we attended our first drunken Tejano show at an icehouse in Pearland while visiting the parents. It was an eye-opening experience, full of balls-out accordion breakdowns and Freddy Fender covers that reminded us of our Hispanic-American roots, even if we are only a quarter. Thursday night, we hit up Walter's On Washington for our first-ever black metal show. To outsiders, the genre is corny and ensconced i
July 17, 2009Aftermath: Rancid and Rise Against at Verizon Wireless Theater
Craig HlavatyThere's something about the punk rock of Northern California's Rancid will remain forever and indelibly ingrained in Aftermath's heart. No matter what we seem to find ourselves getting into, all we need to hear is a few spins of ...And Out Come The Wolves to bring us back to our liberty-spiked, snotty roots. The band's working class romanticism and brotherhood ethos has struck a chord with us for nearly a decade and a half.
July 20, 200952 Pick-Up
July 23, 2009Aftermath: Coldplay at Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion
Photos by Craig Hlavaty Coldplay carries with them almost every major defect available to make it possible for someone like Aftermath to hate them. Bandleader Chris Martin prances on the stage like a marionette detached from his strings for one, his gee-whiz smile notwithstanding. Just like the its music, the band's audience is lily-white, well-scrubbed and safe as hell. Not to mention that their sweeping anthems seem to be catnip for couples, making them the international makeout 'n' cuddle ba
July 23, 2009HPMA Bombshell: Kim Is NOT Asli
Craig Hlavaty During yesterday's HPMA festivities, our resident Rocks Off Wonder Woman Kim Douglass was mistaken for the Tontons' Asli Omar at least twice on the street. Here is definitive proof that they are two different people. Upon seeing this picture, both women looked at each other in a sort of weird Parent Trap style moment.
July 27, 2009Midtown Was Smokin' On Sunday -- We Have The Photographic Proof
Photos by Craig HlavatyMidtown residents were treated to a ton of smoke yesterday when a transformer blew and caught on fire.No injuries or major damage was reported, but it sure did look smoky/ HFD assistant chief Adrian Trevino tells Hair Balls an investigation will take place, but lightning is "the primary suspect" as the cause of the blaze.
August 10, 2009Aftermath: Passengers' Robotic Drug-Rock Drone at the Mink
Photos by Craig Hlavaty Seeing that Aftermath is childless (we hope), it's a rare occasion for us to see something be birthed before our very eyes. Sure, we have probably unwittingly been around for some conceptions, but never a full-on screaming mama genesis like we saw and heard Friday night at the Mink.
August 17, 2009Aftermath: Collective Soul and Black Stone Cherry at House of Blues
Photos by Craig Hlavaty Something strange happened during the '90s. Southern Rock as we once knew it all but disappeared. Charmed by grunge, drowned in amplification, bands began shedding the elements of blues and country that threaded that noble line from Lynyrd Skynyrd through the Georgia Satellites and the Black Crowes. Just as importantly, they abandoned lyrics that carried on the rich Southern storytelling tradition in favor of cheap radio platitudes and MTV-pandering nonsense. In that p
September 2, 2009Aftermath: The Dandy Warhols at Warehouse Live
Photos by Craig Hlavaty While Afermath doesn't have any hard data on hand to back this up, we're guessing that driving an audience to a show on Labor Day evening is a tough sell. Or at least it seemed to be for the Portland, Ore.-based Dandy Warhols Monday night at Warehouse Live. Despite their long-established musical reputation which sells out shows around the world, the Warhols had to content themselves with playing to a crowd of roughly 600 Houstonians. To their credit, it didn't seem to
September 8, 2009The Beatles: Rock Band Is In the House
Photos by Craig Hlavaty It's like Christmas morning here at Rocks Off today. We just got our copy of The Beatles: Rock Band and, like a car wreck or the Williams Tower waterwall, can't stop staring at it. (Must... look... away...) It looks like developer Harmonix spared no expense - and, at $250 for the limited edition, neither will you - but even before hooking the damn thing up, Rocks Off can kind of understand what all the hype is about. As an old bassist ourselves, we're especially lookin
September 9, 2009Aftermath: Taylor Hicks' Supper-Club Soul Patrol at Warehouse Live
Craig HlavatyMonday night's Taylor Hicks show left Aftermath with way more questions than answers, mostly of the existential variety rather than the musical. Our minds were blown, and not in the same "Oh man, I finally got to listen to Zaireeka the other night" kind of way that the Soul Patrol may have been hoping for. Yes, our minds were blown. But in the kind of way when your brain gets catalyzed after you open one dresser drawer too many and find that your beloved grandparents are each f
September 15, 2009ACL 2009 Day One: The Knux Rock Our Sox
Craig HlavatyWaking us up out of our Sixth Street-induced coma were The Knux from Los Angeles, by way of Nawlins on the Xbox 360 stage. The hip-hop trio were decked out in leather and spat out grimy Wu-Tang style rhymes with intermittent old-school Cure riffs thrown in for sick measure. Our favorite track was "Cappuccino" which after pulling an all-nighter sounded absolutely stellar. Next up for Rocks Off is Coheed and Cambria, with hopefully a dash of The Walkmen thrown in. The weather is
October 2, 2009ACL 2009 Day One: Thanks For Stealing Our Idea....
Craig HlavatyLook who totally copped Rocks Off's hustle? We would totally own these kids at Beatles: Rock Band but we don't feel like making kids cry. We are masters of restraint and resolve. Some call us saints in sinners' bodies.
October 2, 2009ACL 2009 Day One: Hi, Diet Coke. How Are You?
Craig Hlavaty Here's Daniel Johnston pouring himself a glass of non-demon tainted Diet Coke. Which is weird because we always thought he was down with the Dew, as in Mountain. Not the band Mountain of "Mississippi Queen" fame. The gross-ass faux energy drink, the one that hillbillies but in their babies bottles so they will wake be awake for the nightly 3 a.m. trips to Wal-Mart to buy propane refills and cold medicine.
October 2, 2009ACL 2009 Snapshot: "I'm Wearing A Goofy Hat"
Photo by Craig Hlavaty"So, if you see me at the show I'm wearing a Goofy hat. Nah, not a funny hat. A Goofy hat. The dog dude from the Mickey Mouse movies. Remember that movie we watched in driver's education? That guy. I'm wearing his head on my head. Yeah. That Goofy."
October 3, 2009ACL 2009 Day Two: I Am Mulletron!
Photos by Craig HlavatyLook twice, that's actually a fake mullet. Homeboy has a patent on this item, which is actually a sweatband with hair woven into it. With his head-to-toe camo gear we just figured he was another red-blooded Son Of The Nuge with a characteristically questionable style. One more photo of the masterpiece is after the jump.
October 4, 2009ACL 2009 Day Three: In Which We Fall In Lurve With White Dress
Photo by Craig HlavatyWhite Dress opened for the Heartless Bastards on Thursday night in Houston, while we were at Them Crooked Vultures in Austin. We finally got to catch them just a few minutes back and sweet mama was it nice. The Austin-based band, led by the raven-haired Arum Rae, kicked the mud off our shoes with a quick set of bluesy PJ Harvey snarl. As the kids on the Hands Up Houston message board say: NOICE. We aren't just saying that because she looks like one of our tattoos. We don
October 4, 2009Aftermath: Reliably, Early Man and Valient Thorr Melt Our Faces One More Time at Rudyard's
video by Craig Hlavaty Thursday night was probably Aftermath's fifth or sixth time seeing Early Man and Valient Thorr since we discovered them in 2005. It's shows like these that allow the setting aside of critical artifice to straight up jam out. There's no taking of careful notes or delicately and painstakingly dissecting guitar layers or song structure. This isn't saying these two bands don't rock our nuts off at every turn or lack anything in the energy department. That's the exact opposite
October 16, 2009The Top 20 Freaks You'll Meet at Ren Fest
We went to the Texas Renaissance Festival in Plantersville this weekend to attend our cousin's wedding, and wouldn't you know we brought a camera along to document through our drunkenly narrow and judging eyes all the WTF-ery walking amongst the trees. Secretly we wish we could also don a pair of tights and play the lute whilst sitting against a turkey-leg stand, because -- sweet Lord -- those chicks west of Conroe love shoving their boobies skyward. Sadly we have gone full-nerd for much less.
October 20, 2009Aftermath: More Drums and Drummers Than We Ever Thought We'd See at an Intercontinental Airport Hangar
Videos by Craig Hlavaty Any drummer jokes, say the one about Ginger Baker and coffee both sucking without Cream, pretty much have to go out the window when you enter an expansive warehouse that includes over 100 boys and girls, and men and women, pounding on their respective kits. Sometimes in tandem, and other times to the same beat. Jesus, we didn't think this blog was going to be so rife with double entendres. On Sunday afternoon, Rocks Off ventured to a hangar near Bush Intercontinental Air
November 2, 2009Aftermath: Conspiracies, Prog-Metal, Gypsy-Folk, Hardcore and Remembering a Fallen Friend Sunday at Westheimer Block Party
Craig HlavatyRoom 101 Day 2 of the Westheimer Block Party started with slightly cooler temperatures and an hour-long caffeine-fueled session speaking with the 9/11 conspiracy booth in the parking lot at Numbers. Did you know that there were three shooters at Columbine, and bombs planted inside the federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995? That's another blog for another time and place, where we're not being followed by corporate spies with guns that shoot ice bullets and rayguns and whatnot
November 16, 2009
Now Click This
Free Classifieds Houston, TX
About Us |
Work for Houston Press |
Esubscribe |
Free Classifieds |
National Advertising |
Privacy Policy |
Terms of Use |
Problem With the Site? |
RSS |
Site Map
© 2009 Village Voice Media All rights reserved.
© 2009 Village Voice Media All rights reserved.