Louis Armstrong

Clockwork Angels

Veteran rockers Rush brought their steampunk-themed concept album to Toyota Center December 2.

RIP Dave Brubeck: "Take Five" Jazz Great Dies at 91

Dave Brubeck, the professorial jazz pianist and composer whose No. 2 album Time Out was a standard of the Mad Men era, has died at age 91, the Associated Press reported Wednesday morning. Brubeck's manager, Russell Gloyd, told the AP that Brubeck died of heart failure on his way to a cardiologist ap ... More >>

Rest Of The Best: Houston's Top 7 Downtown Bars

Life is about perspective and so is Houston's downtown. Perhaps some look at it as a commercial district and once wannabe party king who lost its luster with the emergence of its cousin Midtown. Or you can see it as a beautiful skyline -- the best in Texas -- that's lightly peppered with a magnifice ... More >>

Milton Hopkins & Jewel Brown

Capsule Stage Reviews: The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, Cinderella, Fruitcakes, The Santaland Diaries

Capsule Stage Reviews: The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, A Christmas Story — A Ghost Story of Christmas, Fruitcakes, The Nutcracker, The Santaland Diaries

Commercial Break

103.7 is winning fans with its "adult alternative" format.

Capsule Stage Reviews: Anna Bella Eema, A Christmas Carol, Cinderella, Fruitcakes, Irving Berlin's White Christmas, The Nutcracker

Last Night: Kanye West, Jay-Z and the Watch the Throne Tour at Toyota Center

Photos by Marco Torres​8:08: You know what's just never a slick move? Red wine in a plastic cup. Just an FYI, ladies. "Oh, you're drinking red wine? That's classy. Wait. Is that a plastic cup? Never mind. I forgot this was the Walmart break room." 8:58: Ooh, neat. There's a guy here wearing ... More >>

Here to Stay

The Rebirth Brass Band continues to evolve by "growing the music."

Dead People We Wish We'd Seen

​Regrets, sang Frank Sinatra, Elvis and Sid Vicious, I've had a few. (Or, for Sid, a feee-yooouuu.) So have we all. But if you review concerts for a living, there's nothing worse than someone you like dying before you get the chance to see them live. So for this week's Round Table, Rocks Off ... More >>

Eldorado Ballroom: A Concise History By Dr. Roger Wood

David Bush/ houstondeco.comThe Eldorado Ballroom in 2006​Rocks Off was pleased as punch to report last week that, thanks to the efforts of the Texas Blues Project's R. Eric Davis and Project Row Houses, which has owned the historic Third Ward venue since 1999, the Eldorado Ballroom will receiv ... More >>

"Whacko From Waco" & 10 Other Batsh!t Texas Songs

Texas: You're soaking in it.​Happy Texas Independence Day, everyone. Today The Only State That Matters officially enters its 175th year of pissing off the lesser 49 states and producing the best music anywhere on Earth. One of Texas' biggest honky-tonk heroes is of course Billy Joe Shaver, who ... More >>

Last Night: Clay Aiken At Jones Hall

Photos by Groovehouse​Clay Aiken Jones Hall February 14, 2011 While most people celebrated Valentine's Day last night, we headed to Jones Hall to see former American Idol contestant Clay Aiken. While it wasn't necessarily our ideal way to spend the most romantic of all holidays, we'd by lying ... More >>

Kermit Ruffins

Great Moments With Mr. Rockefeller: Ray Price, Bobby "Blue" Bland and the Kansas City All-Stars

[Ed. Note: To help spread the word about next Friday's benefit for the Houston International Festival's education programs at Rockefeller Hall, featuring Texas Johnny Brown and Marcia Ball, Rocks Off asked iFest director of performing arts and former Houston Chronicle music critic Rick Mitchell to r ... More >>

Midwinter Graces

The sounds of Christmas 2009 from Bob Dylan, Sting, Tori Amos, Rob Halford and more.

Inquiring Minds: Talking Christmas Music With Aaron Neville

​Even for a stone-cold atheist (which Rocks Off is not), listening to Aaron Neville sing "O Holy Night" has to be one of the true pleasures of the Western world. The best-known voice of New Orleans' No. 1 soul-funk family dynasty thanks to songs like "Tell It Like It Is" and Linda Ronstadt duet "D ... More >>

The Sister Cities Of Houston: A Critical Appraisal, Part Two

With the recent addition of Karachi, Pakistan, Houston now is a sister to 18 other cities around the world. Hair Balls is on the case - we studied all of them so you wouldn't have to. See the first half here.Sister: Luanda, AngolaHow we are sisterly: Houston's only African sister is yet another sea ... More >>

The Collector: Mack McCormick's Huge Archive of Culture and Lore

A great American folklorist has spent a life squirreling away bits and pieces of Texas culture. Now time is running out on him and his inventory.

Houston's Jazz History

The Houston International Festival Is Upon Us

Trombone Shorty and Glen David Andrews at Fado

Get Lit: Rock & Roll Heaven, by Robert Dimery and Bruno MacDonald

Save Our Houston Songs

A plea for monuments and musical preservation

Farewell T-99

Show business is sure going to miss Jimmy Nelson

Stealing the Show

New Orleans musicians blew into Houston on Katrina's winds and everything was magic for a while

Mr. Renfrow Risin'

A fresh coffeehouse and some familiar radio voices shine new light on the Houston scene

Tremé, Texas

The soul of New Orleans lives on in Houston, especially at Sammy's on Main

My Darlin' New Orleans

What hath God wrought?

New Angels in Rock Heaven

Scoring the grim reaper's 2004 harvest

Boxing the Rock

Six of the year's best multi-disc sets (and one of the worst)

Blizzard of Oz

Dubya, Ashlee and Bill O'Reilly have spun Racket's mind into the twilight zone; also, two local retro-cool institutions bite the dust

Mystery Bopping

Racket searches for the hoppingest grocery store in town

Columbine Harvester

Michael Moore goes threshing about on guns and fear

Grand Illusions

San Francisco's Soulstice shows that bringing the past into the future is no mirage

The Rebirth Brass Band

Saturday, December 1

Heart Attack

The source of Billy Harper's aggressive tenor style lies in a power greater than himself

Pepper Shakers

Los Hombres Calientes take jazz into booty-shaking territory

Rotation

Django Reinhardt -- Gluecifer

Preservation Hall

Project Row Houses will revive Houston's first home of black music

Blowing His Own Horn

Rotation

The One Who Stayed Behind

World of Their Own

Carolina retronauts the Squirrel Nut Zippers swing clear of camp

Burying the Brakeman

Rotation

Rotation

The Horn of Africa

Trumpeter Hugh Masekela hears the beat of the music in the world

Sing, Muse, the Wrath of Ma Rainey

More than just a blue period, Ma Rainey sings -- and boasts and celebrates and laments -- the tale of a culture