Santana (Band)

The Rocks Off 100: David DeLaGarza, Don of Tejano Stars La Mafia

Welcome to the Rocks Off 100, our portrait gallery of the most compelling profiles and personalities in the far-flung Houston music community -- a lot more than just musicians, but of course they're in there too. See the entire Rocks Off 100 at this link. Any conversation about Tejano music is inco ... More >>

The Best Concerts In Houston This Week: All Local Edition (No Foolin')

DJ Sun The Flat, April 1 Now that some of the well-deserved publicity surrounding DJ Sun's first-ever full-length release, One Hundred, has subsided a little, his true accomplishment on the disc seems even more impressive. In the span of 70 minutes, he pours his 20-plus-year career as one of Housto ... More >>

Top 10 Soul-Destroying No. 1 Hits

I don't like these songs. I feel it's ridiculous that hundreds of thousands of people actually paid out money and drove them to the top of the Billboard charts. While they might not necessarily be the absolute worst examples of the lowest common denominator's purchasing power, they quickly came to m ... More >>

Last Night: Willie Nelson at Arena Theatre

Willie Nelson Arena Theatre March 10, 2013 For some artists, even superlatives aren't enough. Willie Nelson turns 80 next month. He's been making music -- and making a living off it -- longer than my parents have been alive. And while there are other country artists of similar vintage and pedigree ... More >>

Last Night: New Year's Eve Cataclysm at Fitzgerald's

Free Press Houston New Year's Eve Cataclysm Feat. Buxton, Infinite Apaches, Robert Ellis, Ben Godfrey Fitzgerald's December 31, 2012 Devil, your name be "Michelada." Who else could I blame for a New Year's Eve that seems to exist only as flashes and sounds and 11 pages of barely legible notes? Let' ... More >>

Rest of the Best

Houston's top 5 local music venues.

Paul Ramirez Band

Friday Night: Journey at The Woodlands

Journey Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion August 24, 2012 Rewind: Saturday Night: Styx & REO Speedwagon at The Woodlands Journey's enduring popularity might seem a little improbable at first, but it's not that hard to figure out. Core members Neil Schon, the former Santana guitarist, and bassist R ... More >>

Journey, Pat Benatar

Saturday Night: Cafe Tacuba at House of Blues

Cafe Tacuba House of Blues August 18, 2012 Imagine for just a second that Fishbone, the raucous L.A. band that threw all sorts of music into a blender with minor success in the late '80s and early '90s, grew to an award-winning, arena-size act that could draw tens or even hundreds of thousands of p ... More >>

The Great Taj Mahal, Still Whistlin' the Blues

It's been a long time so it's hard to remember exactly, but some time in the winter of 1970-71, Taj Mahal played the Houston Music Hall. Between 1968 and 1971, he had put out five albums and become a staple of the hippie music scene. Yet with his soulful reinterpretations, permutations and homages ... More >>

No Fences: Garth Brooks & the Fuzzy Math of 10 Mega-Concerts

Fifteen years ago this week, the greatest country music artist of all time, Garth Brooks, made history by playing a free concert to a massive crowd in New York's Central Park. Now, not just anybody gets to play Central Park, but Brooks had the megawatt stroke in the entertainment biz back then to ma ... More >>

The 10 Greatest Summer Concerts I Never Saw

Well, kids, summer has arrived. If you have ever noticed, all the good concerts seem to come during the summer -- with May being more like a pre-show. My parents, when I was younger, took me to many concerts at some of these venues, mainly Contemporary Christian concerts. I myself had only been to ... More >>

Marcie Chapa Gives Freedom Over Texas a Beat

With all due respect to pop-country stars Sara Evans and Billy Currington, the real show-stopper at the City of Houston's Freedom Over Texas July 4 celebration in Eleanor Tinsley Park Wednesday might be the Ernest Walker Band, the jazz/R&B/funk/Latin table-setters whose ranks -- all of them with Hou ... More >>

Freedom Over Texas

Going The Distance: The Hot 100's 10 Longest-Charting Songs

Let us hop in our time machine and head back to a magical place in the past known as Dec. 23, 2010. Here is a snapshot of things going on at the time: Rocks Off was making wishes for the year 2011; Kanye West was knee deep in Album of the Year wins for My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy; Eddie Vedder ... More >>

Saturday: iFest In Downtown Houston -- Los Lonely Boys, Los Amigos Invisibles, Etc.

Houston International Festival Downtown Houston April 21, 2012 There's something beautifully eclectic about Houston's iFest. Only there can you drink a beer as you stuff your face with curry, shoulder to shoulder with a Buddhist, while listening to Hare Krishnas sing their hearts out. Ok, maybe it' ... More >>

Why The Monkees Should Be In The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame

The death of Davy Jones Wednesday isn't just the end of one man's life. For fans of the Monkees, it means the end of a lot of things. It means no more reunions. It means no more movie and TV cameo appearances. It means no more new music It means no performance to celebrate the Monkees' induction ... More >>

Blue Letter: The 10 Best Fleetwood Mac Deep Tracks

Fleetwood Mac is perhaps the most distinct and musically diverse bands around. What started out as a British blues band headed by drummer Mick Fleetwood and lead singer/guitarist Peter Green became a pop/rock powerhouse with the addition of guitar virtuoso Lindsey Buckingham and his then-girlfriend, ... More >>

Baron Wolman: A Bounty Of Iconic Rock Photography

Photos by Baron WolmanIke & Tina Turner​Every Picture Tells a Story - Baron Wolman: The Rolling Stone Years Omnibus Press, 176 pp., $37.50 If you could point to one thing that makes today's music journalists most jealous, it would probably be the music journalists of the '60s and '70s. Back t ... More >>

Texas Pop Festival Finally Getting Historical Marker

Mike PorterBathe, hippies, bathe!​Rocks Off can't do anything about the drought, but this weekend we will be breaking our own personal drought and returning to the Austin City Limits Music Festival after taking 2010 off. But long before ACL, there was another massive musical gathering in Texa ... More >>

Extreme Heat Unlikely To Affect Future Concert Seasons

Marc BrubakerArcade Fire in the glorious days of May, when temperatures only reached the low 90s.​Is the heat getting to you yet? Rocks Off is not going to say this week or two of consecutive 100-plus-degree days is affecting our judgment, but earlier today we approved one of our writers' pitc ... More >>

New Venue The Flamingo Room Has A Leg Up

Photos by Marc Brubaker​Astute readers of the Houston Press' and Rocks Off's local concert calendars might have noticed that a new venue is pulling some names into town. Sidled up to the Gulf Freeway just minutes from Hobby Airport, The Flamingo Room is Houston's newest mid-level venue. Rumor ... More >>

True Blood: Nick Cave, Neko Case Open Season 4

Alan Ball was known for his masterful use of music in Six Feet Under. He's lost none of his touch when it comes to his current HBO series, True Blood - which happens to be set in the Louisiana swamps, not terribly far from Houston. ​We're a little more than a month away from the fourth seaso ... More >>

Top 10 Worst Top 10 Lists Of 2010

​Now that's a headline, ladies and germs. It has the added benefit of being succinct as well. That's exactly what we're summing up here, the worst Top 10 lists our peers have written this year. Let's get started, as we've got a lot of ground to cover. 10. This One Not really, this is just t ... More >>

Espantapajaros

Friday Night: Tim & Eric At Fitzgerald's

Photos by Jim Bricker​ Tim & Eric, Neil Hamburger FItzgerald's November 12, 2010 It took Aftermath a while to "get" Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim's Awesome Show (Great Job). We were a fan of their original Adult Swim offering, Tom Goes to the Mayor, but at first unfairly lumped in their m ... More >>

Ten Rejected Glee Episodes

Fox​It seems like Glee can make any song, no matter how trite, terrible, or just inappropriate for singing by high-school-age children into a runaway smash pop hit. However, Rocks Off would like to hypothesize that there are artists that are beyond even Fox's ability to mold into mainstream. ... More >>

Last Night: B L A C K I E, Summer Blondes, The Tontons And Somosuno At Mango's

Photos by Marc BrubakerSomosuno​B L A C K I E, Summer Blondes, The Tontons, Somosuno Mango's July 29, 2010 Aftermath had an inkling that we'd wind up at Mango's on Thursday as soon as we heard about the so-called "surprise show." For one, our love of music perpetually drags us out of our home ... More >>

Glee: Sir, You're No Vinnie Vincent

​Apparently you've forgotten our deal, Glee: I won't goof on the fact that you keep hitching yourself to trendy musical topics and awkwardly using old Top 40 sings to teach that week's life lesson, and you won't mess with any of my favorite bands. This time, it's personal. More on that later. ... More >>

Glee: You're No Vinnie Vincent

​Apparently you've forgotten our deal, Glee: I won't goof on the fact that you keep hitching yourself to trendy musical topics and awkwardly using old Top 40 sings to teach that week's life lesson, and you won't mess with any of my favorite bands. This time, it's personal. More on that later. ... More >>

Glee: We're Gonna Keep On Rockin' Forever...Forever

​The theme this week was the loss of the glee club's voice -- both literally (Rachel has laryngitis) and figuratively (Puck gets a haircut, followed by a corresponding loss of mojo). Will asks everyone to solo in front of the whole group with a song that represents where they are in in their l ... More >>

Glee: We're Gonna Keep On Rockin' Forever...Forever

​The theme this week was the loss of the glee club's voice -- both literally (Rachel has laryngitis) and figuratively (Puck gets a haircut, followed by a corresponding loss of mojo). Will asks everyone to solo in front of the whole group with a song that represents where they are in in their l ... More >>

Glee: Tonight At McKinley High School: Everyone Gets Laid

​It's fitting that the Madonna episode would feature not one, not two, but three cherry popping story arcs: Rachel deciding to give herself to Jesse, Finn submitting to Santana's years of experience, and Emma peeling off the cardigan for Will. That only one of the three actually went through w ... More >>

Glee: Highway to Hell-O

​ We're over the halfway point in Glee's inaugural season, having just overcome a three-month hiatus following the New Directions' (the William McKinley High School glee club) victory at sectionals. The last episode ended on such a high note -- the club triumphant, Will and Emma together at ... More >>

Glee: Highway To Hell-O

​ We're over the halfway point in Glee's inaugural season, having just overcome a three-month hiatus following the New Directions' (the William McKinley High School glee club) victory at sectionals. The last episode ended on such a high note -- the club triumphant, Will and Emma together at ... More >>

The Music of True Blood, Episode 2: Austin's Vallejo Lies Down With a "Snake In the Grass"

​Vallejo is a rock and roll band of the highest caliber from just a few miles away in El Campo. The band started as a trio of three brothers who moved to Austin in order to pursue their dream of being the next Santana. Once in the "live music capital of the world," they added a rhythm guitarist an ... More >>

The Forgotten Festival

The 1969 Texas International Pop Festival

Remembering 1969, Part 1: Altamont, Rosemary's Baby, Santana at Woodstock and More

1968 might have been - at least politically - one of the most turbulent years of the '60s. Students rioted left - specifically, the Left Bank in Paris - and right against the war in Vietnam, while back home racial tensions escalated, especially after the murder of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The po ... More >>

Aftermath: Neon Collars at Rocbar

Photos by Chris GrayWith a heavy funk groove, guitar equally rooted in jazz and rock and soulful vocals as fierce as anything Sasha could belt out, Neon Collars makes you wonder - happily, for once - what they're teaching in the schools these days. The five-piece sometimes telegraphs its age in Fran ... More >>

HOUSTON PRESS NEW YEAR'S EVE GUIDE

Kiss 2008 goodbye in style

Asian/Pacific American Heritage Festival

Sufi rocker Junoon brings his Santana-meets-Led Zeppelin sound to Miller Outdoor Theatre

The Class of '03

Grab your gift certificates and trade in your white elephants -- here's what you really wanted for Christmas

The Mars Volta, with Saul Williams

Saturday, October 4

Drop Trio

Big Dipper, Self-Released

The Mars Volta

De-Loused in the Comatorium (Gold Standard Labs/Strummer Recordings/ Universal )

Houston Music Map

Queen Norah reigns, Josh Groban pains, and lots of Natalie Maines

Amplified

Local music news

Temper, Temper

Rotation