Kenny Chesney

Mark Germino

Country Music Awards

StubHub: Houston is America's 17th "Most Rockin' City"

Stranded on Planet AC/DC... Don't Bother Sending Help

Texans Score 30 Grammy Nominations

Allison Krauss, Robert Plant and T-Bone Burnett (far right) Texas artists landed 30 nominations in 20 categories when the contenders for the 51st annual Grammy Awards were announced today, including all five nominees for Best Tejano Album and four of the five Best Norteno Album contenders. All of ... More >>

MySpaced Out: "Fuck Radiohead" and Some Twisted Tennesseeans

Aurélie Decourteix The Russian Sextoys: No Thom Yorke fans, they.MySpace is a great place for discovering off-the-wall tunes and performers. Here are three wack jobs from cyberspace that hail from that weird place that Captain Beefheart found so easily and in so many forms. The Russian Sext ... More >>

Fish Out of (Frozen) Water in New in Town

Renee Zellweger as the anti-Norma Rae

Just How Texan are Hayes Carll and Miranda Lambert?

Renee Zellweger as the anti-Norma Rae

Sizing up the summer's classic-rock scorecard

Season in the Sun

Willie Nelson: A Moment of Forever

Season in the Sun

Hello, Houston!

Noise breaks down the months of live music ahead

Scott Faingold Listens to Everything

And comes up with a random smattering of tortured musings

Just Say No Más

In which we examine Cancuntry music

Never Go to a Party in Friendswood

Where does your town rank in the Houston-area good-taste stakes?

He's Gone Country

The Nightfly tries out as the next Bocephus at Sam Houston Race Park

Playbill

The Nightfly tries out as the next Bocephus at Sam Houston Race Park

Crapped Out

After his latest CD, few of Pat Green's fans are feeling like Lucky Ones

Americana Pie

Grab a slice of 2004's best roots music while it's still hot

Americana Pie

Grab a slice of 2004's best roots music while it's still hot

Letters

Grab a slice of 2004's best roots music while it's still hot

Queer Eye for the Country Guy

Have today's C&W stars been consulting with the Fab Five?

F.Co

The King of Texas (F.Co Music Management)

The Strait Dope

Gettin' jiggy with George Strait at his country music festival

Creep Show

O Pioneers!!! turns growing up into unrelenting punk rock.

Hell on Earth

Long Island hardcore quartet This Is Hell thrashes till the sun goes down.

Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, John Mellencamp

Long Island hardcore quartet This Is Hell thrashes till the sun goes down.

StubHub: Houston Is More "Rockin'" Than Vegas, Less So Than Hartford and Milwaukee

Craig HlavatyThe Phish of the Southwest and king of Houston's summer concert hill: George Strait​Online ticket broker StubHub.com released its annual list of America's Top 20 "Most Rockin' Cities" Friday, with Houston holding steady at No. 17 for the second year in a row. We probably would have be ... More >>

Oh, Great: Nashville Songwriters Name Redneck Doofus Toby Keith Artist of the Decade

We beg to differ, jerkwad...​Sadly, it's official: Toby Keith, that big redneck doofus who is always threatening to put his boots up somebody's ass or feuding with the Dixie Chicks, has been declared by Nashville Songwriters Association International the top songwriter/artist OF THE DECADE. Man, ... More >>

Pop Rocks: Why 2010 Is Going To Suck, Pt. 1

I know I'm not the only person who feels like high-fiving everyone at the end of the holiday season, heady with the triumph of having survived another two weeks of forced jocularity, awkward family moments, bad TV, and worse music. The new year, with it's promise of fresh opportunities to screw up a ... More >>

RodeoHouston 2010 Entertainer Lineup Includes Mary J. Blige, Black Eyed Peas, Justin Bieber and Some Country Folks You Can Probably Guess

​Monday morning, the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo announced the remainder of its Reliant Stadium entertainment calendar for this year's rodeo, which begins March 2. Debuting on Reliant's revolving stage this year are Jason Aldean (March 6) and Texans the Eli Young Band (March 19). Returning fr ... More >>

Dierks Bentley

​Monday morning, the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo announced the remainder of its Reliant Stadium entertainment calendar for this year's rodeo, which begins March 2. Debuting on Reliant's revolving stage this year are Jason Aldean (March 6) and Texans the Eli Young Band (March 19). Returning fr ... More >>

Aftermath: Darius Rucker's Forever Road To Purple Rain, Via David Allan Coe And Hank Jr. At RodeoHouston

Photos courtesy of Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo™​Took us long enough, but Aftermath finally understands the rodeo. After one performer who left us cold, and another who turned Reliant Stadium into the world's biggest gospel/R&B revival, Darius Rucker's set Tuesday was the definition of " ... More >>

He Said She Said: Did We Shave Our Legs For This? More Cornball Country Comedy

Not all country music has to be about down-and-out truck-driving lifestyles, D-I-V-O-R-C-E, abusive husbands and the dissolution of the American Dream. More than any other genre, country lends itself so nicely to parody and self-satire. The best country music is self-referential, where the artist k ... More >>

Wrong Number

Houston's Miss Leslie dials up more honky-tonk homilies on her new CD.

Bun B Counts His Money; Kenny Chesney Chopped And Screwed

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. ​"Get Well Soon, Bun" Single of the Week: "Countin' Money," Bun B feat. Yo Gotti Wire to Wire That Trae vs. The Box situat ... More >>

Hands Up Post: Honky-Tonk Houston's Done Got Out Of Hand

​A recent thread on the Hands Up Houston message board found poster "honky honk" complaining (and mangling the English language): Dear Houston. Why are you excepting [sic] this right wing, overtly white genre of music known as honky tonk or country? Why do we have to travel that far back ... More >>

Blanco's Honky-Tonk Hot Streak Finally Runs Out

Stephanie Meza​Lonesome Onry and Mean recently opined that one of the reasons honky-tonk bands are back in vogue in Houston is that some of the better musicians in town have gravitated to honky-tonk bands in the last couple of years. It had been a long stretch since we had seen a country band ... More >>

Kenny Chesney's Real Life Lessons For The Boys Of Fall

​Rocks Off found out last week that country singer Kenny Chesney is offering free DVD copies of his high school football documentary The Boys of Fall to any schools or coaches who might be interested. If you want to buy it, it's only available at Walmart. From the email: In the documentary, C ... More >>

In Case You Missed It...

Marco TorresIt's a bird... it's a plane... it's... Usher!​Rocks Off knows you have had a busy week. So have we. But, we figured, what with Thanksgiving and Black Friday and traveling to and from your various other holiday ports of call, you may not have had as much time in front a computer as ... More >>

Plus-Size Songs For Those Post-Holiday Pounds

​One of the reasons Lonesome Onry and Mean's local waterhole is our local waterhole is its excellent, eclectic, even exotic jukebox. There's truly something for everyone. For the novices and/or narrow-minded, there are easy defaults like Willie Nelson & Family's Live, the Stones' Exile on Mai ... More >>

Kenny Chesney Joining Final Four Concert Series... Maybe

Bryan WilliamsKenny Chesney at RodeoHouston, March 2010​CultureMap thinks it has a "scoop" for you. According to Houston's glossiest lifestyle Web site, barefoot beach-lover Kenny Chesney "appears to be" coming to join Kings of Leon at the NCAA's "Big Dance" concert series the weekend of April ... More >>

So Kenny Chesney Is Playing Discovery Green After All

Kenny Chesney models what will now be known as "The CultureMap Smirk."​Looks like CultureMap - and their "anonymous" sources - had it right. Way to go, guys. After the Houston digital daily broke the story (to Rocks Off's extreme skepticism), The NCAA, Turner Sports and CBS announced later Th ... More >>

Hold Steady, Panic!, Pat Green Round Out Big Dance Lineup

Allen HillLos Skarnales at Discovery Green, September 2010​This weekend Houston gets invaded by college basketball like never before as the Final Four takes over Reliant Stadium and Discovery Green for a slew of concerts and parties for the folks coming into town for the games and us locals al ... More >>

More Local Music News Than Final Four Traffic Snarls

Buxton mixing their new album in L.A.​The Final Four descends upon Houston this weekend. Oh, if there were only four feeds we had to follow to bring all this lovely Houston music news to everyone. Instead, MCM crawls through more feeds than there are colleges in the NCAA, gathering up every bi ... More >>

Last Night: Kenny Chesney at Discovery Green

Photos by groovehouse​Kenny Chesney Discovery Green April 3, 2011 Check out our slideshows from this weekend's Big Dance Concert Series: the bands and the fans. A little before 9 p.m., Kenny Chesney took to the stage donning a tattered, straw cowboy hat and a faded, sleeveless shirt to mat ... 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 >>

2 Become 1: Musical Match-Ups We'd Like To See

​Kanye "Hitler" West and Jay-Z released their (overused music writer word alert) epic Watch the Throne album this week, to mostly great reviews. This fall the first fruits from the recently announced Lou Reed/Metallica collaboration should be on the store shelves, which still sorta weirds us o ... More >>

Forlorn Hope: "Blink" & You Won't Miss Modern-Rock T-Storm

Each Wednesday, Rocks Off arbitrarily appoints one lucky local performer or group "Artist of the Week," bestowing upon them all the fame and grandeur such a lofty title implies. Know a band or artist that isn't awful? Email their particulars to sheaserrano@gmail.com. Forlorn Hope on Facebook​ ... More >>

Randy Travis' Arrest: Five Other Country-Music Arrests That Sound Like Country Songs

Randy Travis: Life is like a country song​Randy Travis' arrest sounded like nothing more than the opening verse to a country song. The singer is drunk, late at night outside a Baptist church, drinking wine out of the bottle. If that doesn't set you up for a redemptive last verse after you've ... 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 >>