Grammy Awards

Dear Grammys, I'm Breaking Up With You

Dear Stupid Grammys, I have a bone to pick with you. I sat through Taylor Swift's uninspired opening act while she half-sung/half-yodeled at a guy on a spinning bullseye. It was complete with an insulting and transparent Alice in Wonderland costume ripoff (which I'm not getting, by the way... is s ... More >>

Way to Suck All the Fun Out of the Grammys, New CBS Dress Code

With CBS still smarting from its bungling of the Super Bowl XLVII blackout coverage and a (supposed) Beyonce halftime nip-slip, earlier this week the network's Program Practices wing released wardrobe guidelines for Grammy Awards attendees. With the awards show happening this coming Sunday evening ... More >>

Abandon All Hope: Your Guide to the 2013 Grammy Award Underdogs

There are certain truths we all accept about the Grammy awards, including but not limited to: no matter how many times she's won Taylor Swift will always make that "ohmygod people like me?!?!?!" face; that NARAS president Neil Portnow will show up to make a speech that no one will remember; someone ... More >>

Lightnin' Hopkins Finally Wins a Grammy

It took the Texas Historical Society long enough to appropriately recognize Houston bluesman Lightnin' Hopkins, but not as long as the Grammys. As part of the run-up to Sunday night's 55th annual Grammy Awards, its governing body the Recording Academy announced that Hopkins, who died in 1982, will ... More >>

Grammy Snubbed: Should We Really Feel Bad for Justin Bieber and Grizzly Bear?

You may have heard that the Grammy nominations were released this past week. It has some great choices from the committee, surprisingly enough. You've got nominations for extremely deserving artists such as Fiona Apple, Frank Ocean, Bjork, and Tom Waits. Even the Album of the Year award is a competi ... More >>

10 Surprising Things About This Year's Grammy Nominations

This year music has been dominated by viral pop like "Call Me Maybe" and "Gangnam Style," songs that initially became "hits" from outside the music business' traditional delivery system, usually YouTube. Thursday, the Grammys recognized that by nominating "Maybe," by 17-year-old Justin Bieber proteg ... More >>

Jan Hammer and the Top 10 TV Theme Songs of the '80s

Not a lot of television shows win multiple Grammys. Then again, not a lot of television shows ever sounded (or looked) like Miami Vice. The cutting-edge series perfectly captured the pastel zeitgeist of its time when it debuted in 1984, influencing film, fashion, design and music in a way that few T ... More >>

Bon Iver, Hipster Doofus

Top 5 Reasons Bon Iver Is the Clown Prince of Hipster Doofuses

Who is Bon Iver? The name originally referred to a band, I guess in the same way Nine Inch Nails referred to a "band," but since hitting it big, it's mostly just a nickname for frontman and songwriter Justin Vernon, who, depending on who you ask, may either be Jesus or the antichrist. Consulting my ... More >>

Traders Village 6th Annual Fiestas Patrias

Tokyo String Quartet

Unscripted: Top 10 Actor/Musician Collaborations

Johnny Depp and Marilyn Manson have been hanging out a lot lately. The actor joined the antichrist onstage a couple of weeks ago at the Revolver Golden Gods Awards show in L.A., and played guitar on "Sweet Dreams" and "Beautiful People." Depp also collaborated with Manson on a cover of Carly Simon' ... More >>

Maria Stuarda

Dave Grohl Vs. Skrillex: Dumbest Music Feud Ever?

Sometimes it's very easy for Rocks Off's brain to go on autopilot while checking our email in the morning. If we're not weeding out actual spam to delete, we're wincing at messages hyping music whose wretchedness practically leaps off the screen. (Someone you've never heard of touted as a "legend" i ... More >>

The Beats Go On As Grammys Take Care Of Their Own

Hands up, everyone who is surprised.​The Grammy Awards on CBS Sunday night could have easily turned into a wake - or worse, a funeral. After Whitney Houston's death Saturday, the mood was appropriately somber until a dance party broke out, or perhaps a coming-out party for dance music. Foreve ... More >>

We Tell You Who Will Win Grammys So You Don't Have To Watch Them

SPOILER ALERT​The best thing about the annual Grammy nominations and awards shows is the clamor of anger that rises up when the mere mention of the event even comes up. Immediately people begin calling it a travesty, trotting out all the people who have been snubbed -- Jethro Tull beats Metall ... More >>

Happy Birthday To Dolly Parton, The Backwoods Barbie!

She's an eight-time Grammy award winning musician, an Oscar nominated actress, theme-park owner and today, she's the birthday girl, turning 66. I mean, obviously not all of her is 66 as she has proudly stated "If I see something sagging, bagging and dragging, I'm going to nip it, tuck it, and suck i ... More >>

Grammy Sham: Americana Artist Gets Nominated Through the Web

The subtle front page of Chorney's website.​As if the Grammys didn't have enough credibility issues, NARAS, the organization that controls the process, has left a loophole large enough for a complete unknown to manipulate her way onto the final ballot in the Americana category. The news broke ... More >>

Five Curiosities from the Grammy Nominations List

The Grammy nominations were officially presented last night. Not surprisingly, Adele, who is considered a front runner in nearly every category she is nominated in, cleaned up with six nominations for her album 21, but was beaten out by Kanye West who had seven, though curiously not among them a nod ... More >>

Grammys Wrap Nominations, Performances Into Live Show Tonight

In this week's edition of "no one cares so do whatever you want," the Grammy's will be announcing nominations tonight for their annual awards presented in February. Normally, a simple press conference would suffice, but NARAS (National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences) thinks it would be a goo ... More >>

Grammy Nomination Fantasies

​Once again all the Grammy nomination razzamatazz has fired up, with local label ZenHill Records of course leading the charge with its recent press release, "ZenHill Artists on the Long List for a Grammy." One of our editors took a couple of incoming email shots from a so-called "reporte ... More >>

Top 20 Throwback TV Theme Songs Part 1

​We grew up on television. Whether it was Saturday morning cartoons, afternoon re-runs, Sunday Disney and Wild Kingdom or Thursday night "must see" TV, we saw it. We noticed that on November 2, 1985, the Miami Vice soundtrack went to number one on the Billboard charts where it would stay for ... More >>

Chicken Fried

The Zac Brown Band takes a laid-back, well-fed path to country stardom.

RIP Pinetop Perkins: Blues Legend Dead At 97

Ralph Mooney, former Waylon Jennings steel guitarist, also dies Steve Azzato/pinetopperkins.com​Legendary multi-Grammy-winning blues pianist Pinetop Perkins has died at his home in Austin, according to his Web site. Perkins, who was part of Muddy Waters' band for years, was 97. No cause of ... More >>

Friday Night: Lady Antebellum At RodeoHouston

Photos by Marco Torres​Lady Antebellum Reliant Stadium March 11, 2011 Less than a month after winning five Grammys, Lady Antebellum made their way to Houston for another stint at the Rodeo. Having been forced to listen to "Need You Now" countless times over the past year - half a dozen times ... More >>

Championship BBQ Cook-Off

The University of North Texas One O’clock Lab Band

Things We Never, Ever Want To Hear Again

​Editor's Pick: Vampire Weekend's "Holiday." Everything I hate about indie rock (cloying, fey, highly irritating) and car commercials (they're car commercials) in about 15 seconds.. Repeated seven or eight times a fucking hour. Marc Brubaker: "Check us out on Twitter!" or anything else Twitt ... More >>

Top Ten Dining Etiquette Tips to Slow Your Devolution into a Caveman

vastaYes, you CAN figure this out. ​Humans seem to have lost their manners as we have journeyed from the '90s grunge era through the reality TV of the '00s to the present. I understand that you probably learned table manners from that one part of Point of No Return when Anne Bancroft schools ... More >>

Katy Perry? For Album Of The Year? Seriously?

​Don't get Craig's Hlist wrong, we think that Katy Perry is extremely attractive. In fact, if we think about her long enough, it makes us want to cry and punch a wall. She's a buxom, bubbly, raven-haired pop star who dresses like she's expensive grandma candy. We even interviewed her last ye ... More >>

Allen Toussaint

GhoulsFest

Trade Martin: Stopping The "Mosque At Ground Zero" In Song

Every day Rocks Off trolls the tubes of you in search of videos to share. If you have something that you think deserves to be video of the day, send a link to jef_rouner at yahoo dot com. ​Now, your daily VJ has been told by the nice people whose checks pay for his daughter's daycare that he ... More >>

When Keeping It Real Goes Wrong: Pop Princess Edition

MB Pictures/ Rex Features​Dave Chapelle teaches us that the art of "keeping it real" may sometimes go awry. According to urbandictionary.com, this occurs when "in the act of keeping it real, the outcome is unexpected and usually has a negative effect on the individual who decided to keep it re ... More >>

Suicide Notes Movie Sneak Peek Party

So, the deal is I'll be dead but really famous?

For Your Entertainment? Nice Try, Adam Lambert, But These Music-Awards Moments Were Even Creepier

​The best news that Jennifer Lopez could possibly have heard this morning was that America is still more interested in clucking about public displays of gayness than in pointing and laughing when a diva falls on her ass. We imagine there's already one of those jumbo-sized Harry & David fruit b ... More >>

Lonesome Onry and Mean: Dear Local Musicians, Grammy Consideration Is Not the Same Thing As Grammy Nominations

Ah, here we go again with local artists trumpeting "Grammy nominations." The latest is Atascocita-grown country singer Susan Hickman, who seems to fancy herself as a Miranda Lambert/Martina McBride type. We stumbled across Hickman accidentally through MySpace's "Status Updates," and our eye was imm ... More >>

Flamin' Hellcats Corral Scarface, Billy Gibbons, Texas Tornados for New Album

Local trio the Flamin' Hellcats have been some busy vatobillies. The band is in San Antonio this week recording its new album with Grammy-winning engineer Joe Trevino at Blue Cat Studios, and keeping some pretty fast company. Frontman Jaime Hellcat reports that the band's old bud ... More >>

New York Metropolitan Opera: Madama Butterfly

Web exclusive!

Moments the Grammy Awards Would Rather Forget

Soy Bombed

Grammy Day at U of H Until 5

Paul Wall: Also available for oral-hygeine advice. Today at the UH Main Campus on Cullen, The Recording Academy and the Grammys are putting on a Career Day for students in the college's music department. The Grammys hold these workshops around the country for students looking to take the leap into ... More >>

The pAper chAse

Grammy-nominated music producer fronts sinister Dallas rock quartet

Gipsy Kings

The Roma musicians bring their flamenco-pop to CWMP

Itzhak Perlman

The award-winning violinist performs works by Bach, Strauss and Schumann

Bone Thugs-n-Harmony

‘90s hip-hoppers return to tha stage

Mavis Staples

The Solid Blues show is solid gold

Hoob Job

Los Super 7

Heard It on the X

Last Night at the Alamo

A Grammy party at a local theater turns into quiz night down at the local pub

Mary J. Blige

Sunday, June 30