Denton

The Great Outdoors

Your 2013 music-festival outlook, Texas edition.

Your 2013 Music Festival Outlook (Texas Edition)

I don't know about you, but I am not totally in love with winter weather. Yes, it affords you the ability to wear beanies and cool fingerless gloves and dress like a hoodlum, but it's the heat that I love the most. That's why I love thinking about music festivals, because that's where we all get t ... More >>

The Texas 30: The Third Runners-Up, Albums 60-51

Friday, Rocks Off told you about our "Texas 30" project, compiling a list of the best 30 albums of the past 30 years. Today we're about to show you the first of three bubbling-under appetizer lists we did just to put a little oil on the gears. Here, starting with No. 60, is where it gets interestin ... More >>

The Anarchist Song Book

Noise musician BLACKIE searches for total freedom in music.

App of the Week: Let iTranslate Voice Do Your Talking for You

App: iTranslate Voice Platform: iPhone Web site: iTranslate Voice Cost: $0.99 Back in the '90s, there was this cool band from Denton called Ten Hands. They were sort of a weird mix of the Talking Heads, Peter Gabriel and Frank Zappa. They had really quirky material and covered a wide range of style ... More >>

The Healthiest County in Texas Definitely Isn't Around Here

The University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation have put together a list of health by county across the nation, looking at births, deaths and various measures of the quality of life. You can get a statewide ranking of the counties in your state, and if ... More >>

Rocks Off's Ultra-Hip Rodeo Concert Guide: Eli Young Band

Date: March 5 Name: Eli Young Band AKA: "The band that performed the worst rendition of the National Anthem since Roseanne." Genre: Bummer country

The Jesus And Mary Chain Hitting Houston On March 13 During SXSW Swing

Known best for their 1985 album, Psychocandy, the Jesus And Mary Chain have been called one of the most influential British bands of the '80s. With the wall of crushing reverb, drenched in pop hookiness, their sound foretold bands like the beloved My Bloody Valentine, the cultish Black Rebel Motorcy ... More >>

4 Fictional Rainstorms That Royally !@#$-ed Someone's Day

If you're like us you woke up yesterday thinking that you'd set your alarm for the wrong time because the sky outside was as black as Satan's colonoscopy. The clouds had that look your drunken uncle gets when someone argues with his political views, and then the heavens opened up. Texas has been st ... More >>

Riverboat Gamblers

Centro-matic Scratches A Very Specific Itch At Fitz

Photos by Jason Wolter​Unless there's no way to avoid it, the one night of the week Rocks Off does not like to review shows is Friday. After five straight 10- to 12-hour days (at least), our brain is usually in tatters and all we want to do is limp home or to a preferred watering hole and shut ... More >>

Centro-matic Paints A Tighter Picture On Candidate Waltz

Matt Pence​Will Johnson, enigmatic front man of Denton rock outfit Centro-matic, is chuckling over reviews for the band's latest album, Candidate Waltz (Undertow/Thirty Tigers). "For the most part they've been good, but even the negative ones - and there are some that are so negative - I can ... More >>

Sanctus Bellum: Nothing Certain But Metal And Taxes

Photos courtesy of Sanctus BellumSanctus Bellum at Denton's 35 Conferette in March​What fuels heavy metal music? Some might say the Armageddon that is flirting with our world; others, watching the machinations of craven political and religious leaders. We, however, can testify that some of the ... More >>

The Best Local & Texas Albums Of 2011 (So Far)

​Chris Gray: My pick is a dead heat between a pair of Lost Highway albums by a couple of artists who just happen to be appearing at Summer Fest this weekend, Hayes Carll's KMAG YOYO (& Other American Stories) and Black Joe Lewis & the Honeybears' Scandalous. Though he's been one of my favorit ... More >>

Championship BBQ Cook-Off

Rocky Horror Picture Show: The Ultimate Covers Mixtape

​The Rocky Horror Picture Show turns 35 this week. Rocks Off started going to the midnight queen of cult movies at the River Oaks Theater when we were just 15 years old, and has now strapped on high heels and corsets as part of the cast for the better part of a decade. It's an experience so ... More >>

Brew Blog: Deschutes Brewery

​Many excellent West Coast and Pacific Northwest brewers have long shown the good sense to ship their wares to Texas, and Deschutes Brewery has now joined the party in a real way, too. The Bend, Oregon brewery has inked a deal with Ben E. Keith Beverages to expand its local reach. Of course ... More >>

Bowling For Soup

Free Press Summer Fest Team Taking Over Fitzgerald's

4:38 p.m.: UPDATED with more information from Afra. Matthew KeeverThe crowd dances to Brave Combo at Fitzgerald's 33rd anniversary this past Saturday.​Free Press Houston editor/publisher Omar Afra and Pegstar.net owner Jagi Katial, the principal figures behind Free Press Summer Fest, announce ... More >>

The Top 5 Musical Eco-Fails

uscgd8 via Flick​The bad news about the Deepwater Horizon oil spill is that BP's magic undersea dome didn't work, and the slick is now the size of Connecticut. And unless the latest half-assed stopgap measure (a "junk shot" of debris fired down the well in an attempt to plug it) works, it could be ... More >>

Rocks Off's Rodeo Concert Guide: Actual Texans The Eli Young Band

Date: March 19Name: Eli Young BandAKA: "Who?"Genre: Up and countryBest Known Song(s): "When It Rains," "Always the Love Songs"Key Demographic: UNT grads, people who think "fire" and "guitar"

Music Cities

Texas has its own brand of March Madness

Your Guide To The Annual March Music Invasion Of Texas

​March can be a harrowing, exhausting time to be a music fan in Texas. Or it can be the most exhilarating time of all.Everyone knows about the monster that is SXSW. It can be far too easy to be overwhelmed by options, last-minute hype and logistical nightmares. Luckily, this week's feature provide ... More >>

B L A C K I E

ACL 2009 Day Two: !!! & Neon Indian Before The Rain

Photos by Groovehouse​Denton-area band Neon Indian came in at the last minute to cover for the absent Danish garage-gloomers The Raveonettes. We really dug these kids, which includes members of Ghosthustler and and VEGA. They only played for about forty minutes but it only took the first half for ... More >>

The Soundtrack of Our Lives: Local Musicians Pick a Love Song

For every relationship, both failed and successful, there's a song that reminds you of that special (or not-so-special) person whenever it plays. Not to be used with the more cliched "our song," which is picked by both parties and can, most of the time, be repeated out loud with some pride. For the ... More >>

Aftermath: Brave Combo at Discovery Green

Photos by Allen Hill It would be interesting to find out how many weddings have taken place at Discovery Green since it opened last year, but it's hard to imagine that any of them could have been any livelier than Brave Combo's free concert there Thursday evening. In its second season, DG's free con ... More >>

New Year's Eve

The Old 97’s at ACL Fest

Moses Guest

Canada Day, with the Drams

Drenched in Blog: SXSW Bitchin' Band Alert: Ghosthustler

Home for the Holidays

Last Night: Midlake at Numbers

Quantum Mechanics (and Fucking!)

Endless CFS

Endless CFS

Football U: Pigskin for Turkeys

Football U: Pigskin for Turkeys

Kinky Talk

Faux Fox

Black Glove or White Glove (Quartz Inc.)

Raking In the Chips

Denton's Riverboat Gamblers know when to hold 'em and when to fold 'em

Pine Bluffing

Texan Joe Cripps is finally coaxing a new record out of Delta blues legend CeDell Davis

Ice Ice Baby

Varnaline's Anders Parker goes cold when asked about his inspiration

Dunlavy

The Alison Effect (Camera Obscura)

Conference Kudos and Crud

Eating It Up

Slobberbone is playing with its heroes, and living off expectations

Press Picks

Rotation

Juicy Stuff

Ames gets sued; the Juice -- Brutal and O.J.-- take to vinyl