Neil Young

UPDATED: Is ACL Festival Ignoring Houston? Does It Even Matter?

UPDATED (Thursday, 2:50 p.m.) to reflect the Houston-area roots of a few ACL performers this year, as pointed out by reader comments. We stand by our original point, though. As most of our readers no doubt know by now, the Austin City Limits Music Festival announced its 2013 lineup at the stroke of ... More >>

10 More Things I'll Be Doing at ACL Festival This Weekend

That's right folks, it's ACL Music Festival time again in Texas, and Rocks Off will be flying to Austin on the private Rocks Off jet this weekend to cover the fest from Friday until the last notes of "Give It Away" at the end of the Red Hot Chili Peppers set on Sunday night. That's my way of telli ... More >>

Rocks Off's 2012 ACL Festival Houston Spillover Sweepstakes

This week has seen a temporary lull in festival season, after Bonnaroo and Electric Daisy Carnival this past weekend. Wait. Never mind. According to musicfestivaljunkies.com (who are these people?), three of them start today: BamaJam in Enterprise, Ala.; The Friendly Gathering in Windham, Vt.; and ... 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 >>

Your 33 Black Angels Pick 10 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die

​Sunday night, Notsuoh plays host to Your 33 Black Angels, a manic garage-psych group from Brooklyn, N. Y. The band sometimes boasts eight members, and reminds us of a less-pretentious Brian Jonestown Massacre or trance-driven Black Lips. And there's the "96 Tears" organ that chimes in here a ... More >>

Together Always: Country Duets for Valentine's Day

Maybe it's because I'm a Libra, but I believe that everything in life should be as harmonious as possible-love, especially. Duets might be the ultimate musical testament to such a theory. I'm not talking about the resonance that's created when a woman is vacuuming while her man watches television. I ... More >>

Lord Lordy, Look Who's Forty: The Best Albums Of 1972

Last week I told you about the best debut albums of 1992, making a lot of us feel old in the process. Hell, I was only nine when those came out and I felt feeble making the list. This week we look at the best albums of 1972, now four decades in the hole, but no less fulfilling and influential. Wha ... More >>

My Morning Jacket

Hail, Hail: 10 Things You Should Know About Pearl Jam

Mark C. AustinPearl Jam at ACL '09​Amongst all the Nevermind love running rampant this week, people seem to forget that Nirvana contemporaries Pearl Jam are also celebrating their 20th anniversary this year. Obviously the Nirvana tributes are different since one member is not living and the we ... More >>

Sugar and Spice and Everything Nice: Top 5 Songs about Sugar, Spices & Herbs

photo: elsaelsa.comEdison Lighthouse ​While pondering the "Top 5 Songs about Food"...I figured, why not be a little more specific? I mean, I'm sure there are 5 different songs about ice cream, or cheeseburgers, or chicken or candy (all in good time, my pretties...). Wanting to highlight some o ... 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 >>

The Best Fourth Songs On History's Greatest Albums

Sorry, Manowar, maybe next year...​As we come up on the July 4th weekend, Rocks Off considered a myriad of blog ideas to commemorate the holiday. Most patriotic songs, album covers, artists? Sorry, Lee Greenwood, Richard Pryor, and Ted Nugent, but it's all been covered. On this weekend of inde ... More >>

Who Are You? Songs Commonly Attributed To The Wrong Artists

​Last week, after the tragic, alcohol-fueled passing of Jackass hero Ryan Dunn, Rocks Off at Taco Cabana wearing a promotional shirt for The Hangover II that we stole borrowed from the office here at the Press. As we were loading our hands with condiment containers, a guy came up to us and sai ... More >>

Alabama Illegal Immigration Law: Texas Tea Partiers Can Only Look On In Awe

That truck is no doubt filled with dehydrated, oxygen-starved illegals​Sure, Rick Perry can swagger about a meaningless "sanctuary bill" to keep the brown hordes out of Texas, but if you want real action on illegal immigration, the place to go is Alabama. That state's governor, faced with the ... More >>

ACL 2011 Rumors: Ten Bands Who Could Make The Cut

Marco TorresWill ACL close with classic rock again, like with the Eagles last year? Neil Young?​The Austin City Limits Music Festival's big 2011 lineup announcement is imminent, scheduled for May 17, and Rocks Off will surely be on top of the news after it hits. Last year we sat on the compute ... More >>

10 Albums We're Not Supposed To Like But Do

​In everyone's record collection there are junk-food albums, the ones that you feel bad for consuming but coat your ears with happy, because you have been conditioned by everyone else to either hate them or disown them. But when push comes to shove on that media player or stereo, the junk-food ... More >>

Top Five Songs About Horses

​Rocks Off's regular readers presumably know by now that we love few things more than offbeat anniversaries, and recently we came across one of the oddest yet. Thirty-two years ago Monday, on Feb. 28, 1979, the "actor" who played the original Mr. Ed in the 1960s TV show passed away. Yes, we're ... More >>

The Most Anticipated Albums Of 2011

​NATIONAL White Lies, Ritual: They killed at festivals in 2008 and 2009, but do London's Interpol-styled lads have longevity? Dr. Dre, Detox: It's been on hold or gestating since at least Clinton was in office. Will it continue to be hip-hop's Chinese Democracy? R.E.M., Collapse Into No ... More >>

Top 5 Daniel Lanois Productions

​This past Saturday in Los Angeles, legendary producer Daniel Lanois, known for his trademark echo-heavy sound and work with the likes of U2 and Bob Dylan, was involved in a near-fatal motorcycle accident. Lanois was slated to soon begin work on Brandon Flowers of the Killers' solo debut and the u ... More >>

Acts We Think - OK, Hope - Are Playing ACL Fest This Year

​By this time Tuesday, we will all know who is playing the Austin City Limits Music Festival in October. Damn, it seems like we have speculating about the line-up since, well, we got the last of the "Dillo Dirt" out the middle of our toes after last year's muddy and rainy ACL weekend. Tuesday brig ... More >>

A Day At Discovery Green With The Tea Partiers

Photo by Marc Brubaker​The noise leading into the November election is only getting louder, as the dissent on the right side of the nation grows deafening. Yesterday on Discovery Green, a group of at least 1,000 Houston Tea Party supporters and some from other spaces in Texas converged to hold a T ... More >>

Lady Gaga Sells Out In 6 Minutes; July 26 Show Added; Don't Forget Jack Johnson

​Just in time to rob you of your hard-earned tax refunds, the summer concert season is finally here. Yes, you will be forgoing oil changes, dye jobs and tuition payments for the next few months to afford everything coming through Houston. Thank God for that too, because we were starting to wonder ... More >>

Dead Confederate

This Week In TV: Idol's Coming, Whether You're Ready or Not

My car's in the shop, I can't figure what season it is, and I don't know what to do about the Indians in the lobby. This was Thanksgiving week in TV Land: • Glee is going bye-bye for a while. The last episode of the year will air on December 9, completing the original 13-episode order, and the s ... More >>

Lonesome Onry and Mean: Previewing Saturday's Conroe Cajun Catfish Festival

​Lonesome Onry and Mean has to hand it to those people in Conroe: they know how to book a cool festival lineup. In fact, the list of performers for the Go Texan! Wine & Food stage at Saturday's Conroe Cajun Catfish Festival is downright scary from the standpoint of cutting-edge, less-than-high ... More >>

Local Motion: Top Sellers at Cactus Music, Sound Exchange, Soundwaves, Sig's Lagoon and Vinal Edge

Cactus Music 2110 Portsmouth, 713-526-9272 www.myspace.com/cactusmv1. Ryan Bingham, Roadhouse Sun 2. Dave Matthews Band, Big Whiskey & the Groo-Grux King 3. Steve Earle, Townes 4. Grizzly Bear, Veckatimest 5. Elvis Costello, Secret, Profane & Sugarcane 6. Eric Clapton & Steve Winwood, Live at Madiso ... More >>

How Classic Is Classic Rock?

Classic Rock Corner: Nils Lofgren, Sideman, Sideburns and Solo

Guy AcetoIt's certainly an accomplishment for any rock musician to have a long and fruitful career either solo or with a band. Then it's icing on the cake to be further associated with a genuine icon. But to have two icons in your story? Just an embarrassment of riches. In the case with ... More >>

Album of the Week: Heartless Bastards' The Mountain

Heartless Bastards The Mountain www.heartlessbastards.com Gnarlier than a century-old Live Oak, Heartless Bastards' The Mountain plugs the Cincinnati-born trio's scorching postmodern blues - their debut, 2006's All This Time, could skin a cat - into the eerie backwoods folk of Greil Marcus' ... More >>

Lonesome Onry and Mean: A Sweet Piece of Art for Sweetheart

My California compadre Charlie McGovern, who produces records by interesting people like Tony Gilkyson (Goodbye Guitar), Victoria Williams (Sings Some Ol' Songs), and Mike Stinson (Last Fool At the Bar), is also Salinas, California's biggest booster and amateur historian. It's all in a day's work f ... More >>

Top Ten Americana Albums of 2008

Picking the best folk and Americana records of the year isn't nearly as hard as discarding those great records that just didn't feel right stuck in the category. Releases by Calexico and DeVotchKa felt far too worldly to pigeonhole as folk or country, for instance, while Blitzen Trapper's fantastic ... More >>

Barnstorming Georgia Trio The Whigs

Complete Control

Artist of the Week: Andrew Karnavas

Buxton: A Family Light

Another Bump

Ten of the best coke anthems, plus a shortlist for the Cocaine Hall of Fame

Eleventh Dream Day

Zeroes & Ones

Singin' a Carroll

Guitar-Shredding on the High Seas

Built to Spill and the Decemberists offer alternate takes on alt-rock

Ultra Man

Champa is the champ of our DJ competition at South Beach

Secret Machines

Now Here Is Nowhere (Reprise)

Taj Mahal & the Hula Blues, with Susan Tedeschi

Sunday, May 2

Kings of Leon

Holy Roller Novocaine (RCA Records)

Do Look Back

The Band dances The Last Waltz, but can time heal old wounds?

Cross Canadian Ragweed

Friday, February 1

Playbill

The Butthole Surfers

Famous Potatoes

Idaho's Built to Spill survives the indie-to-major metamorphosis with its street cred intact

Rotation

Sound Check

Live Shots

Hiatt Regency

Spend a few stolen moments in the grand hotel of songwriters -- a perfectly good performer lives there too. Plus: The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.