Green Day

[Photos] Westboro Baptist Church Protests the Southern Baptist Convention. This Should Be Fun

In the world of protestors, there are the revolutionary type (Arab Spring) and the pacifist/sit-in type (Occupy Wall Street), and then you have the bat-shit crazy, inappropriate, and downright horrible type. The notorious Westboro Baptist Church falls under that last category. The hateful yet except ... More >>

The 10 Worst Things at SXSW This Year

This year Rocks Off and DC-9 at Night, the music blog at our sister paper Dallas Observer, teamed up to bring you only the most unfortunate moments from last week's SXSW madness. Security and Cops Gettin' Wild: Look, I get it. Every drunken dickhead in town "knows someone" or thinks he has pull at ... More >>

Exploring Songza: Four Offbeat Playlists From the Curated Music Service

We introduced you to Songza -- the service that acts as a "music concierge" -- a few weeks back. Using curated playlists sorted not only by genre and theme, but also by activity, Songza helps you pick the best songs for the occasion. More importantly to me, the playlists are expertly curated, mean ... More >>

Christmas Past: Our 5 Favorite Punk Rock Christmas Songs

While we celebrate the holidays, Rocks Off is resurrecting a few of our best Christmas-themed blogs from the past few years. (Wait... resurrecting is Easter. Never mind.) This blog originally appeared December 11, 2009. Aside from the heavy metal Christmas songs we threw your way earlier this week, ... More >>

Who Should Play RodeoHouston In 2013?

On October 30, just a few days from now, RodeoHouston will announce its first round of performers for the 2013 edition of the star-studded, yeehawin', nearly three-week event at Reliant Park. The booking the last few years has been getting more adventurous, with the likes of Kid Rock, KISS, Mary J. ... More >>

ACL 2012 Rumors: 10 Bands That Could Make the Cut (No, Not Radiohead)

Before we begin, Radiohead is in Europe for the duration of this year's Austin City Limits Music Festival. They will not fly 12 hours to play a field in Austin. Ah, it just wouldn't be May without ACL rumors running rampant. Rocks Off is guilty every year of stoking the fire, sometimes just one day ... More >>

This Week in Deliciousness: New Mex to Tex-Mex, the Monte Cristo & More

Welcome back to the weekly roundup here at Eating Our Words, where we're growing out our summer mustaches so that we can carry around the savory scent of any crawfish boils we attend for at least a week. Speaking of weeks, we started this one off right with a look at how New Mexican cuisine compare ... More >>

Top 10 Greatest And Most Essential Music Lists Of All Time

​Any fan of music journalism, well hell any sort of journalism in the past five years has seen a massive amount of top 10, 20, or 31 lists all over the Internets. They help cull information into one meaty morsel for you to swallow without, you know, have to type shit. Pretty cool, huh? As a ... More >>

Florence The Machine In Houston May 2 At Verizon Wireless Theater

In touring news which is sure to delight many Houstonians, Florence The Machine have announced a May 2 date at Verizon Wireless Theater. This will be the first show here by F M ever. This Houston show comes just before their New Orleans Jazz Fest appearance the following weekend. We can assume ... More >>

Gimme Some Truth: What Happens When Rabid Fans & Bands Meet

​We have all been there. You may have had a few drinks, you are at your favorite band's show, and you come to find yourself in the vicinity of one of your heroes. Word vomit. Torrential word vomit. But you mean well. "I really think youse guys is great and your albums really means a lots to ... More >>

Green Day Singer Kicked Off Flight Over Pants, Heralds Armageddon

Mason Lankford said, "There will come a day when we forget the Rapture ever even happened," but Rocks Off is keeping an eye out for signs of our impending Armageddon. We were wrong last time, but we're totally right this time! ​In a bizarre incident last Thursday, Billie Joe Armstrong, belove ... More >>

The 25 Most Influential Music Videos Of All Time

​It's hard to fathom a time before music videos, and it's even sadder to remember when channels like MTV and VH1 were wall-to-wall music videos. In between there was a golden age, when with every clip that you watched could spark a revolution in you, or at least change your fashion sense. It's ... 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 >>

Rolling Stone's 25 Worst Cover Misfires

​Happy Birthday, Rolling Stone, the first magazine that made us want to pick up a pen and notebook paper and go on an ether binge. The current-events and music magazine turns 43 years old today, and we wish them 43 more. The magazine's first cover boy was John Lennon on the set of the film H ... More >>

Screeching Weasel

Aftermath: Reborn Punk Rock Karaoke Is Promising, Perhaps At Another Venue

Photos by Craig Hlavaty​ Friday night's live-band Punk Rock Karaoke renaissance at Notsuoh on Main didn't draw a ridiculously large crowd, but it did show incredible promise. The night had been on hiatus for the better part of a decade but has made a return to the Houston stage just in time for wh ... More >>

He Said She Said: Songs For A First (Perhaps Only) Date, Part 2

​He Said is going to admit right here and now that he has never been a master of the first date. True it is that we have dated some very awesome and artistic women, but we always lack when it comes to that first swing out of the box. He Said is way better at the weeks, months and years after that ... More >>

Houston Musicians Recall Their Own Rock and Roll High School Days

​Tonight Rocks Off is hosting the first annual Texas High School Rock Off, with local bands from area schools fighting for a grand prize of $500 and bragging rights around town. This past week we have profiled the seven bands in the running: The Paperwaits, Useful Information, The Handshake, Livin ... More >>

Love and Theft

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

The Last Place You Look, Metavenge, Peekaboo Theory, American Fangs Lead Local Texas Buzz Nominees

Megan E PhotographyThe Last Place You Look​ It's no secret that sometimes Rocks Off likes to rag on Houston's, ahem, "New Rock Alternative," 94.5 FM The Buzz - let's see, according to www.yes.com, last hour the station played Green Day's "Longview," Foo Fighters' "My Hero," Pearl Jam's "Even Flow" ... More >>

Our Five Favorite Punk Rock Christmas Songs

​ Aside from the heavy metal Christmas songs we threw your way earlier this week, Rocks Off also loves us some punk rock Yuletide jams. Over the years plenty of punks have tried their scabby and tattooed hands at holiday songs, especially the pop-punks, who are very fond of those ironic covers ... More >>

Coming of Age

Against long, long odds and punishing heat, Free Press Summer Fest is a hit.

Aftermath: Free Press Summer Fest at Eleanor Tinsley Park

Photos by Amber Roussel/ Click here for slideshows from Day 1 and Day 2​ They said it couldn't be done, that no one in Houston would dream of spending two days in the punishing August heat at an outdoor music festival.An anonymous Of Montreal member shows off his tiger style.​Rightfully (somewha ... More >>

Summer Stock

Slide Show: Albums That Went Darker

​ For most rock acts, the traditional way to deal with success is to rework their lyrics, image and sound to become palatable to a larger audience. Usually this means brightening the subject matter, cleaning up the bad words, softening the sharp edges on those power chords and getting haircuts tha ... More >>

Single-Album Sets We'd Like to See, Part 2: Blondie, Green Day, U2 and More

There are so many artists coming to Houston this summer and fall who should pick up on the "classic album" trend Rocks Off could hardly stop at just five. See our picks for Nos. 6-10 here. 5. Blondie (Arena Theater, August 23) Album: Eat to the Beat (Chrysalis, 1979) After 1978's Giorgio Moroder-ass ... More >>

Before We Go: Devin the Dude, ZZ Top, Camp Jam Houston, The Orb, Something Fierce and More

Free Press Houston has added Devin the Dude, whom Rocks Off is currently trying to track down for a prospective new feature (email us, mang!) and Prince Paul to its Summer Fest August 8 and 9 in Eleanor Tinsley Park. See FPH's or Pegstar's Web sites for ticket info (hint: it's $7 per day). Yesterday ... More >>

Aftermath: 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 rec ... More >>

Aftermath: 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. E ... More >>

Musicians Don't Have W. to Kick Around Anymore... So Now What?

Now that Lil' Bush has shuffled off the Presidential coil - or will in a couple of hours, anyway - and heads off into some Dallas burg to write his memoirs and reflect on his two wild and strange terms as Commander in Chief, it seems that the writers of so many protest songs can call off their guns ... More >>

Things That Make Us Feel Old: The Year 1989

"Hey Ladies" As another year begins, record labels start unleashing commemorative editions of classic albums to take advantage of anniversaries of release dates and more importantly, yo' money. We already got wind of the impending Pearl Jam reissues a few weeks back. Now we get word that the Beasti ... More >>

XM Nation: Catching Up and Moving On

Nothing Happening Here: Protest Music, Then and Now

Protest Songs for George W.

That's my Bush!

Freaky Weekend

For Those About to Rock

Guitar Hero cranks rhythm-gaming up to 11

Tiger Army, with Lost City Angels and the Unseen

Sunday, April 10, at the Meridian, 1503 Chartres, 713-225-1717

Take This Love and Shove It

The best X-rated breakup songs

Alkaline Trio, with Pretty Girls Make Graves and Pitch Black

Tuesday, June 3

Midtown

Thursday, October 10

Still Angry After All These Years

The Oven feeds a malnourished punk scene

Highway to Heck

Though Christian on the inside, MxPx is pure punk on the outside

Original Punks

Songs and Sickness

That's what it's about with D Generation, man

Poster Points

His Generation

The Hates' leader may be the last of Houston's original punks

Sound Check

The Future of Rock and Roll

We've seen it in a crystal ball and the pictures aren't pretty

Rotation

Hot Koko