Cypress Hill

You Won't Catch Slightly Stoopid With Cottonmouth Anytime Soon

Hey, so you can cancel those drum lessons with the guy who teaches out of his parents' basement. Ryan Moran, Slightly Stoopid's resident drummer animal, is ready to take over those teaching duties. No, I'm not fucking with you. Those lessons exist, and are yours for the taking. Slightly Stoopid, wi ... More >>

Rating 5 2012 EDM Crossover Attempts, Best to Worst

As 2012 comes to a close, it's time for all of us to take a look in the mirror and accept the truth: Whether we like it or not, EDM is a major force in music and is here to stay. We all knew it was coming; anyone who has spent time listening to mainstream radio has heard how house music has become ... More >>

Bruce Kessler's Incredible Houston Concert Photo Archive

Cypress Hill

The Rest of the Best: Houston's Top 10 Rock Venues

10. Concert Pub North It's probably safe to say that Concert Pub North is the only venue in the area attached to a seafood restaurant/bar, known as the "Concert Pub Yacht." Like its cover-band-oriented Galleria-area counterpart, CPN programs plenty of "party bands" like the Velcro Pygmies, Electric ... More >>

UPDATED: Memorable Houston Concerts of 1992

UPDATE (2:03 p.m.): Alice In Chains was advertised but dropped out, and was replaced with Australia's Baby Animals. The year 1992 was an important one for me as far as Houston concerts are concerned: It's the first time I went to a concert within the Houston city limits, the "Outside Broadcast" leg ... More >>

Heat Index: The 10 Summer Album Releases We're Sweatin' the Most

Most places in the world, summertime is easy living: No school, no snow and no real responsibilities beyond mowing the lawn every couple of weeks. Here in Houston, summer is a little more intense. Triple-digit temperatures, hurricane warnings and Astros baseball present an annual threat to our city' ... More >>

A Slew Of New Houston Rap MP3s That Don't Suck

Here's a story. Back in late April, early May I had to fight through the most unwanted thing to anyone who owns a Macbook: A hard-drive fail. I'm sure we can curse Steve Jobs, Siri and the rest for making those short-ass chargers, but there's more headache than need be with a hard drive fail. So I ... More >>

RIP Adam Yauch: Beastie Boys' MCA Dead At 47

Well, damn. Adam Yauch, the gravel-voiced third of Noo Yawk '80s and '90s rap-rock superstars the Beastie Boys, has died at age 47, Rolling Stone reports. The exact circumstances of his death were unknown at press time, but Yauch had been battling cancer since being diagnosed with a tumor in his sa ... More >>

The Simpsons' Top 11 Musical Guests

​When The Simpsons completes its last (contracted) season in 2014, it will have set staggering new broadcast records for longest running sitcom (over 550 episodes) and longest running prime time scripted TV series (25 seasons). These are all American records, of course, because the Japanese co ... More >>

25 Essential Eponymous Albums

​Eponymous: (of a literary work, film, etc) named after its central character or creator: The Stooges' eponymous debut album. On this day in 1983, a young woman from Michigan who had recently given up on a career as a hard-rock singer released her first album of electronic dance-pop, an album ... More >>

Top 5 Weed-Inspired Album Titles

​Moments ago, actually earlier this afternoon now, Rocks Off opened an envelope from Universal Music that turned out to contain young No Limit-affiliated rapper Curren$y's major-label debut, Weekend at Burnie's (Warner Bros.). We'll give you three guesses what the New Orleans native's primary ... More >>

The Best Summer Movie Soundtracks Of The '90s

This movie is old enough to drive.​Summer is officially here, even though it's been ball-dripping sweaty since at least early May. This is also about the time that we are already steeped in big-budget Hollywood summer would-be blockbusters, the kind of movies that have fast-food promotions and ... More >>

What Happened: 20 Lyrical Shots Of Tequila

"Tequila. Straight. There's a real polite drink. You keep drinking until you finally take one more and it just won't go down" - actor Lee Marvin (R.I.P.) ​How out of it is Rocks Off after Wednesday night's sublime Arcade Fire show? Even though we've known about it for weeks, it took us until ... More >>

Everlasting House

House of Pain reignites Celtic pride that once had nation jumping around.

Friday Night: Snoop Dogg At House Of Blues

Larami Culbertson​Snoop Dogg House of Blues March 18, 2011 11:08 p.m.: Just walked in. Snoop just stepped onstage a second ago. This place is packed. The ticket lady said that there were already over 1,400 people inside, likely with a couple hundred more to follow soon. Should be fun. 11:10 ... More >>

Top 10 Mentally Unstable Rap Songs

thesource.com​As you may have already heard, Gucci Mane was recently admitted into a mental-health facility on a "special plea of mental incompetency" in order to delay his probation revocation trial. He has since been released, and got an ice-cream-cone face tattoo in time for his trial this ... More >>

Graphic: Top Five Rejected Girl Talk Mash-Ups

​Tonight is the big, wildly anticipated Girl Talk show at Verizon Wireless Theater. The show was originally slated for the House of Blues, but ticket sales and space dictated the gig move a few blocks away to capture the magic. Girl Talk, aka Gregg Gillis, is notorious for his inventive mash ... More >>

1991: Best Music Year Ever?

Rocks Off Sr.'s choice for 1991's best album.​1991 was one of the biggest years in modern music. It was when metal went pop, radio country ruled, grunge went mainstream, and rap began its climb to chart dominance, even if it was spearheaded by a white candy rapper from Dallas. There were man ... More >>

Top 10 Rap Covers By Non-Rap Artists

​Artists have many ways of expressing admiration for their peers. Name-dropping those who inspire them in liner notes and offering them groupies on the tour bus are just a couple of ways of showing respect. Covering one of their popular songs? Now that's the ultimate tip of the hat. That's an ... More >>

Cypress Hill's Hazy Tuesday At Warehouse Live

Photos by Marco Torres​ For more photos from the show, see our slideshow here. If Aftermath never sets foot inside another rock concert for the rest of our life, we will still more than likely not pass a drug test until our grandson's freshmen year of college thanks to the giddily oppressive conta ... More >>

Coming At 4:20: Free Cypress Hill Tickets!

This afternoon at the weeding hour of 4:20 p.m., Rocks Off will give away a pair of tickets for Cypress Hill's Warehouse Live show Tuesday night on our Facebook page. You must be a fan of the page (i.e. "like" us) to play the game. What, you aren't already? As with our Dead Weather giveaway last we ... More >>

Bun B Hurt At Gumball 3000 Rally Concert

Careful there, Bun.​Bun B jumps onstage at Houston-area hip-hop concerts so often that the idea of the II Trill rapper getting hurt under the lights is almost inconceivable. But apparently that's what has happened. Allhiphop.com is reporting that Bun, whose presence will no doubt be missed at toni ... More >>

Cypress Hill

The Worst Rap Battle Ever, And Best-Kept Hip-Hop Secret In Town

There's lots of talk about Cypress Hill coming to Houston next Tuesday. But to get that legendary Latin hip-hop/funk sound on a regular basis, you might not have to go farther than La Porte. That's where you'll find a group called Hafaza, made up of mike-wreckers Frank, Omar, Luno, Gonz and Bar Jes ... More >>

A Playlist For Our Wetbacks in Arizona And For All Who Pray For Them

"It may well be that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition is not the glaring noisiness of the so-called bad people, but the appalling silence of the so-called good people."- Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.​There's something so powerful about music. It gets us through life's bu ... More >>

At 4:20 On 4/20, Music's Biggest Burnouts

​ You should all know what today is. Today is the day pot-smoking amateurs giggle to one another about how high they're going to be all day, while the real potheads simply wait with stoic stoner patience for the magic hour to roll around. Yeah, you'll know the real burnouts when you see them. Not ... More >>

Distant Early Warning: Athlete, The Bangles, Cypress Hill, Imogen Heap, MGMT, O'Jays, Rush, Talib Kweli, Etc.

​Athlete, Carney: Sat., June 26. Walter's on Washington. All Leather, Balaclavas, Yip-Yip: Sat., May 15. The Mink. The Bangles, Tonic: Sat., May 29. Moody Gardens Outdoor Amphitheater. Tyagaraja, Black Queen Speaks, Peekaboo Theory, Robert Ellis & The Boys, The Tontons, VerseCity, Wayside Dri ... More >>

Turning the Screw: K-Rino, Bun B, Lil Wayne, Snoop Dogg, C-Murder, Lil' Kim, Flavor Flav, Guccie Mane, Mike Jones, etc.

Welcome back to Turning the Screw, Rocks Off's weekly rap post. It probably won't rhyme, at least most of the time. E-mail tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. Thanks, homies. Single of the Week: "Phony," K-Rino Wire To Wire Always good to read something from Bun B. K-Rino had an album release part ... More >>

Beastie Boys, Cypress Hill and the Roots of Alt-Rap

Beastie Boys, "So What'cha Want" Today is one of those cosmological coincidences so uncanny it may be no coincidence at all: the Beastie Boys' Mike D and Cypress Hill's Sen Dog were both born this day in 1965. (Scorpios represent!) In the late '80s and early '90s, from opposite sides of the U.S., ... More >>

Turning the Screw: K-Otix, T-Pain, Bun B & Face?, Jay-Z & Coldplay, Master P, The Game, The Kanye, MF Doom and More

Grand Theft Auto X: The Screwston Chronicles

Give Us a Hand

Lil' Brian and the Zydeco Travelers

Worldwide

Pretty Girls Make Saves

As video games go indie, Wack imagines a few likely pairings

Bling Twango

Big & Rich delivers country music without prejudice

Best Beats from the Bayou

H-town's top ten rap jams

Super-Size Relief

Sean Carnahan and Roni Size drop beats for a good cause

Junkie, MD

A Houstonian makes an Intoxicating film

Adieu, Monsieur Mojo

...And other SXSW adventures

A>S>H>S to A>S>H>S, Bust to Bust

Hounded by the authorities, an experimental band and its mortifying collaborators look for a home

Rage Against The Machine

Renegades (Epic)

Rap It Up

Rave organizers turn to hip-hoppers to entrance the kids

Still Angry After All These Years

The Oven feeds a malnourished punk scene

New Releases Reviewed

Tricky

Rooting Interest

The Roots make rap for both your hips and your head

Rap of Ages Inc.

Battle Scars

Cypress Hill's B Real looks to the future, but can't forget his past

Short People

The lowdown on 2-Low and kid rap

End Game

This is the way the year ends, this is the way the year ends, this is the way the year ends, not with a bang but a ... year-end roundup