Ray Davies

Is One Halfway Decent Thanksgiving Pop Song Too Much to Ask For?

Not so long ago, Rocks Off was wondering why there has never been a decent pop song about Thanksgiving. Not despairing, just wondering. Apart from all the complete shite, you could fill an entire wing of your iTunes library with quality tunes about Thankgiving's yuletide neighbor, but Turkey Day its ... More >>

Tears In Heaven: The 10 Best Songs To Come Out Of Tragedy

Since the dawn of time, great art has been birthed out of great tragedy, happening numerous times with playwrights, artists, and musicians. In many ways, expressing grief through music serves as a healing agent that gets the artist through tough things such as the loss of a loved one. It also helps ... More >>

Verizon Wireless Theater Now Known As Bayou Music Center

Verizon Wireless Theater will no longer be known under that name, because owner Live Nation's sponsorship deal with the communication provider has expired. The venue, which holds about 3,000 people within downtown entertainment complex Bayou Place, will now be known as Bayou Music Center. Rocks Off ... More >>

More Labor Day Music: 5 Secret Anti-Labor Songs

​Work sucks. You know it, Rocks Off knows it, and just because your boss magnanimously decides to throw you one day off between July 4th and Thanksgiving doesn't change that fact. So you take your solace where you can, in the little things, like music. Musicians are hard workers like you, ri ... More >>

New Music Releases April 5: Leon Russell, Robbie Robertson, The Ravonettes, The Kills, Etc.

​Last week brought new releases from Britney Spears, Radiohead, and a few Pearl Jam re-issues hitting store shelves amid reports that the industry was finally starting to see some improvement. Spears' Femme Fatale is currently projected to enter the top spot of the Billboard 200 chart with sal ... More >>

25 Famous Bands' Less Famous Previous Names

​As promised, here are the answers to Rocks Off's "Original Band Name" quiz from Tuesday. John St. Lee, if you'd care to email us, we'll see what we can do about getting you a prize. Do you like Devo? 1. Chicago: At about 25 or 6 to 4, the Windy City jazz-rockers realized The Big Thing sucked ... More >>

Reduxion: Talking Kinks With Young Girls' Pete Tijerina

Find Young Girls on Facebook hereYoung Girls, dedicated followers of fashion.​When it comes to the Big Three of the British Invasion, the Kinks were always the Chrysler to the Beatles and Stones' Ford and GM - up there, but not quite that far up there. Nevertheless, among Anglophiles and songw ... More >>

Kinks DVD Shorts UK Celluloid Heroes

​The story of this most quintessentially English (and sadly underrated) of the British Invasion bands makes for a fascinating tale: The music, the stylistic changes, the concept albums, and the battling Davies brothers. Unfortunately, that DVD tale remains to be told. For while this rock doc techn ... More >>

Sole Of Houston: UH Architecture Professor Graphs Bellaire Boulevard

Ray Davies never sang about seeing stars on Bellaire Boulevard​Three years ago this month, David Beebe and I trekked Bellaire Boulevard from west of Highway 6 to the Little Woodrow's on the train tracks at the West U / Bellaire border. We didn't continue any further because the prosperous stretch ... More >>

Further On Up the Road

Excerpts from the Press's copious online coverage of SXSW.

Yes, We Are Sick Of SXSW Too, But We Did Find (And Shoot) These Videos...

Bun B x Motion Family x SXSW from Motion Family on Vimeo. Bun B wrecks it at SXSW; video by Motion Family As the dust settles from SXSW 2010, we began scouring YouTube for clips of some of our favorite performances. We managed to capture a handful on our own, but the internet video site is awash wi ... More >>

SXSW Aftermath: The Texas Garage-Rock Torch Passes At The Continental Club

Photos by Brittanie SheyChristopher Gerniottis of Zakary Thaks (left) joins Austin's Ugly Beats​ In February, Magnolia City Mixtape mentioned a piece in Texas Monthly about the storied history of garage rock in Texas written by Aftermath nerd-crush Michael Hall. (His reporting has gotten men on de ... More >>

SXSW Aftermath: Alex Chilton Haunts A Festival Full Of His Musical Children

Dan OkoThe line for the Black Keys outside the Mohawk Saturday afternoon... we have no idea about the pinata truck, either​ After the mega-shows last SXSW with Metallica and Kanye West, the 2010 version of SXSW launched struck your humble badgeholder as busier than last year, just on a smaller ... More >>

SXSW Aftermath: Wild Moccasins Strike, Ray Davies Quakes, Deer Tick Boogie

Photos by Craig HlavatyWild Moccasins​Aftermath roused ourselves from our quick hour-long vegetative session after Thursday's day-party frolicking to venture into another night of SXSW music, that would include a local band's breakthrough, a legend reconnecting with his base and two indie-twang ba ... More >>

Happy Birthday, "Louie Louie"

Forty-six years ago today, a group of teenagers gathered in a Portland, Oregon, studio to record a ridiculously simple anthem that would go on to become one of the most influential - and most misunderstood - songs in rock history. The group was the Kingsmen - none of whom was over age 17 - and the ... More >>

Aeros-Rampage: No Kinks So Far

Welcome to Never Ever Land

Johnny Flynn: A Larum

Born-Again Shock Rocker (and Golfer) Alice Cooper

Spider Man

Q&A: Little Steven Van Zandt

Sia

Some People Have Real Problems

The Night Diamond Dave Rejoined Van Halen

Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love

Rock Band

It's never been easier to start your own (fake) band

John Royal's Astros Recap. In Song.

Rod Stewart Trivia

Take our quiz

Idol Chatter

The Citizen Kane of Crap

Scott Faingold Listens to Everything

The man continues to randomly listen to every promo CD sent his way, regardless

Hidden Treasures

Introducing some of the best discs you've never heard

Robyn Hitchcock

Spooked

Like a Prayer

FrenetiCore's latest production sings praise without being preachy

Guided By Voices

Friday, January 16

Holly Golightly

Friday, October 10

Evan Dando, with the Love Scene and the New Amsterdams

Friday, October 3

Best Rock and Roll Theater

A Soap Opera

Band of Easy Virtue

Meet the New Pornographers, who change genres as often as porn stars change partners

Something Else by the Kinks

IBP and the Starmaker prove you can't stop the music

Ironing Out the Kinks

Infernal Bridegroom Productions resurrects Ray Davies' A Soap Opera after 27 years in rock limbo

Various Artists

Sharp Dressed Men: A Tribute to ZZ Top (RCA)

Prime Meridian

Steve Forbert escapes the "new Dylan" tag and makes his own name.

Story Teller

Ray Davies wants to tell you a tale

Pure Spunk

Del Rio-bred Radney Foster is a cowpunk both on stage and off

Show Cased

The good, the bad and the Mogwai highlight SXSW

Outsiders with Stamina

Smear Campaign

Blur searches for America's kindly embrace -- just so they can shrug it off

Souls Shaken, Minds Stirred

Kula Shaker's got what you need -- or so they say

Messing Up in Public

Ray Davies gets the kinks (if not the Kinks) out of his career

What Invasion?

Spacehog comes in peace, but finds success anyway

The Song Remains the Same

The Smithereens don't have a hot new angle, only solid old sounds

Thriving -- or Simply Surviving?

After all these years, Alex Van Halen insists his band isn't "D.O.A."