Subject: Stevie Wonder

• Five Songs for MLK Day

  January 21, 2008

• Mp3: The Tontons, “Sea and Stars”

  April 11, 2008

• Get Lit: The Pitchfork 500

  November 12, 2008

• Aftermath: Spain Colored Orange at the Continental Club

  Photos by Chris Gray Is Spain Colored Orange the Badfinger of Texas? Why not? Thursday at the Continental Club, the local quintet's heavy, lush pop was dense and intricate, but never at the expense of melody. Its members have also heard at least one jazz album in their lifetimes, evident in their frisky interplay and consistent groove. Multiple Houston Press Music Award winners in 2006 and this year, SCO has been tagged as one of Houston's most likely to break out for years, and that still ho

  December 5, 2008

• U2 Lace Up Their Dirty "Boots"

  Among, you know, a few other things, the past 24 hours have been the start of a very, very big year for the band Rocks Off affectionately refers to as the Best Band Ever. U2 appeared alongside Bruce Springsteen, Stevie Wonder, "One" pal Mary J. Blige and many more as Barack Obama's opening acts at yesterday's massive "We are One" concert on the National Mall in Washington D.C. "Restraint" is not a word normally associated with Bono and the boys, but they showed it yesterday. Not so much in th

  January 19, 2009

• Rotation

  February 13, 1997

• Post-Valentine's Day Relationship Rescue Songs

  Dwight McCannSo Valentine's Day is over, and you spent all your dough on Cupid swag for that special sweetie, which hopefully bought your way out of the doghouse for the time being. But if not, Casanova, your Rocks Off homies still have your back - provided you have an iTunes account. Sentimentally speaking, what could be more romantic than the gift of lovey-dovey pop songs? They say so much, and, until iTunes' new pricing tiers take effect this Spring (driving big hits up by as much as a

  February 17, 2009

• Rotation

  January 22, 1998

• Night & Day

  October 29, 1998

• Idol Beat: The Top Ten Results

  Photos by Frank Micelotta/ Fox Songs in the Key of Idol: Stevie Wonder performs Thursday night.I dare you. I double-dog dare you. Try not to break out into a toothy, mile-wide grin while watching Stevie Wonder command a stage, loop-de-looping through a handful of his zillions of classics in that inimitable zig-zag, running-through-tonal-mazes-at-light-speed style of his. Was he actually playing those keys live last night on American Idol? Doesn't matter, because we knew he was singing "O

  March 27, 2009

• (Another) Local Album of the Week: Spain Colored Orange's Sneaky Like a Villain

  Spain Colored Orange Sneaky Like a Villain www.myspace.com/spaincolouredorange Thanks to differences with Spain Colored Orange's former label Lucid Records, the songs on the local psych-pop quintet's brand-new disc Sneaky Like a Villain are already old hat to the band members. For the rest of us, though, Sneaky - released on Brooklyn's Shout It Out Loud Music - is a mellow, eclectic album that sounds both cagey and carnivalesque, accessible and exotic. Some passages recall the Beatles' Sgt.

  April 3, 2009

• Remembering Martin Luther King Jr. in Song

  January 15, 2009

• Raphael Saadiq: The Way I See It

  October 2, 2008

• Big Sam's Funky Nation

  April 17, 2008

• Motor City Mellow Men

  Slum Village plays catch-up to the White Stripes and Eminem

  November 14, 2002

• MySpaced Out: European Discotheque

  Goldfrapp inspires a cyber-search for the perfect beat

  March 13, 2008

• British Television Advertising Awards

  February 21, 2008

• Stevie Wonder

  An Icon returns to the stage after 14 years

  November 29, 2007

• Tony Bennett

  August 23, 2007

• Yvonne Washington

  Tuesday, February 14, McGonigel's Mucky Duck, 2425 Norfolk, 713-528-5999.

  February 9, 2006

• Leela James: Let's Do It Again

  April 23, 2009

• Free Movement

  February 16, 2006

• Night School

  DVD review

  May 24, 2007

• Woodbelly

  Woodbelly performs Friday, March 30, at Dan Electro's Guitar Bar, 1031 East 24th, 713-862-8707.

  March 29, 2007

• Hand It to Him

  February 8, 2007

• DJ Chicken George

  Monday, May 29, at The Flat, 1701 Commonwealth, 713-521-FLAT

  May 25, 2006

• Supreme Party

  February 23, 2006

• Hurricane Mixtape

  Music to drown by

  September 29, 2005

• Raul Mid�n

  State of Mind

  August 4, 2005

• Mellow, Chilled-Out Fellow

  The wonder that is Devin the Dude

  May 19, 2005

• Music Awards Survey

  A rundown of every act on this year's bill

  July 22, 2004

• Donny Hathaway

  These Songs For You, Live! (Rhino)

  July 8, 2004

• Van Hunt

  Van Hunt (Capitol)

  April 1, 2004

• The Gift of Gab

  Fourth Dimensional Rocketships Going Up (Quannum)

  March 25, 2004

• Hip-hop Honky-Tonk

  Local MCs make the scene on the Almeda drag

  November 27, 2003

• Citizen Arcane

  Broadcast mines Czech vampire films and French library music to create lush electronica

  November 6, 2003

• Best Retro DJ

  DJ Mod Scott

  September 25, 2003

• Super Mario Brother

  The youngest Escovedo rides his sin-breathing Dragons into town

  June 26, 2003

• Black Gold

  A gusher lay beneath the surface, but you had to drill deep

  December 26, 2002

• Isn't He Lovely

  Glenn Lewis waits for the world to see him as more than just a Wonderkind

  October 10, 2002

• Best Grocery Store Music

  Fiesta

  September 26, 2002

• Eric Clapton

  Reptile (Reprise)

  May 10, 2001

• Local Album of the Week: Leela James' Let's Do It Again

  Leela James Let's Do It Again www.leelajames.com To understand what an arresting, puzzling record Leela James' Let's Do It Again really is, look no further than the L.A. native and adopted Houstonian's cover of Foreigner's mid-'80s soft-rock/gospel-lite singalong "I Want to Know What Love Is." James takes it about as far over the top as a church-raised singer who recalls Chaka Khan, Mary J. Blige and Erykah Badu can be expected to, but both her demanding vocals - she needs to know what lov

  April 17, 2009

• Joe Cocker

  June 11, 2009

• Tonight: Rozz Zamorano Jazz Trio at the Big Top

  Big Sir Junior Super Live Zam RecordsRecorded during live sessions at Houston's Jet Lounge in early 2006, Big Sir Junior's debut release shows the power of three accomplished musicians firmly in their element. Local bassist Rozz Zamorano (Fondue Monks, Yoko Mono, Rozz Zamorano Trio) recruited former Houstonian Chris Young (guitar) and New York-bred drummer Jano Rix specifically for the sets, which drew both hardcore jazz aficionados and newbies alike. Being among the latter, what Rocks Off remem

  July 3, 2009

• Michael Jackson Funeral Coverage Coming Tomorrow

  Somehow the folks at West Coast Sound, Rocks Off's sister music blog over at L.A. Weekly, have scored the hottest ticket in show business in years: a ticket to Michael Jackson's funeral Tuesday at Los Angeles' Staples Center. So far Stevie Wonder, Jackson's old Motown boss Berry Gordy, Brooke Shields, Usher, Kobe Bryant, John Mayer, Mariah Carey and many more are scheduled to appear. Weekly music editor Randall Roberts promises to Twitter from the ceremony "when it's not considered vulgar to do

  July 6, 2009

• Michael Jackson, You Will Be Honored...And Twittered

  The Most Important Event Ever....Will Be Twittered!!!!Our colleagues at West Coast Sound, the music blog of our sister paper L.A. Weekly, will be in attendance when The Nation Stops at noon tomorrow (Houston time) to give a final send-off to Michael Jackson at Los Angeles' Staples Center. So far Stevie Wonder, Jackson's old Motown boss Berry Gordy, Brooke Shields, Usher, Kobe Bryant, John Mayer, Mariah Carey and many more are scheduled to appear. Weekly music editor Randall Roberts promises to

  July 6, 2009

• Rocks Off's Brother Once Stepped in Human Shit at a U2 Show... Got a Better Astrodome Story?

  Smash Mouth had just finished playing, and not coincidentally, Rocks Off's brother John had just returned from a trip to the bathroom. It was November 1997, and we were watching the stagehands putting the finishing touches on U2's ginormous set in the Astrodome. The Irish rockers were touring behind Pop, an album as underachieving - and also underrated - as No Line on the Horizon, the reason for their October 14 stop next door at Reliant Stadium with Muse. Suddenly Rocks Off caught a whiff of a

  August 7, 2009

• Aftermath: More Drums and Drummers Than We Ever Thought We'd See at an Intercontinental Airport Hangar

  Videos by Craig Hlavaty Any drummer jokes, say the one about Ginger Baker and coffee both sucking without Cream, pretty much have to go out the window when you enter an expansive warehouse that includes over 100 boys and girls, and men and women, pounding on their respective kits. Sometimes in tandem, and other times to the same beat. Jesus, we didn't think this blog was going to be so rife with double entendres. On Sunday afternoon, Rocks Off ventured to a hangar near Bush Intercontinental Air

  November 2, 2009

• On Its 40th Birthday, the Top 10 Sesame Street Musical Guests

  Sing the blues, Kermit... or greens. We know how you feel. Big Bird, Oscar the Grouch, Bert and Ernie, Elmo and Grover have something to celebrate. Sesame Street, their fictional New York borough, and the television show probably responsible for everything you knew as a kid, turns 40 today. Created in 1969 from the psychedelic mind of puppeteer Jim Henson (back in the freewheelin' '60s, when puppeteering could actually be a career), Sesame Street is now the longest-running children's television

  November 10, 2009