Townes Van Zandt

When the Sh*t Hits the Fan

Whether it's a coupon-clipping, back-to-nature guy escaping the rat race, or someone certain we're on the brink of war or a future in which Barack Obama has taken away our guns, preppers are ready. The rest of us, maybe not so much.

Playing for Keeps: Vinyl Essentials

Here's our must-haves if you're kick-starting a record collection.

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 >>

Hootenanny 101: Folk Songs to Help You Study for Finals

Lead Belly​It's the last week of classes for most of us who are still in school, which means that next week is finals time. We here at Rocks Off feel your pain -- it's hard trying to cram for five finals on only 60 milligrams of Adderall. Hell, we have two projects due tonight by 7 p.m. and we ... More >>

Vintage Pics Of Destiny's Child, ZZ Top, Blue October & More

Photo by Steve Harris/Compadre RecordsHayes Carll before he was old enough to shave... not that he ever has.​The other day, one of the Rocks Off Crew was rummaging around in the Houston Press office and came across a bunch of publicity stills for various musicians. Allow us to explain what th ... More >>

Top 10 Texas Movie Soundtracks

​This weekend, as the rest of the world catches Harry Potter mania for (perhaps) the final time, Houston gets a serious dose of Urban Cowboy nostalgia. Theater Under the Stars' production of the Tony-nominated 2003 musical - which The New York Times called "a conclusive demonstration that it's ... More >>

Leslie Newman, Last Concert Cafe Fixture, Passes Away

​Word has reached Rocks Off that veteran Houston singer-songwriter Leslie Newman has succumbed to leukemia. According to sources at Last Concert Café, Newman died around 8 a.m. Monday morning. Apparently Newman's condition worsened considerably three days ago and he had been unable to eat si ... More >>

iFest's Second Weekend Brings It All Back Home

Jason WolterTexas Connection: Joe Ely, Lucinda Williams and Townes Van Zandt (not pictured)​See lots more iFest pictures from Saturday and Sunday (and some food) in our slideshows. Yes, it was hot at iFest this weekend. Houston hot. Sunday afternoon, partway through Lucinda Williams' surprisi ... More >>

Going Platinum: Artists We'd Pay $10,000 To See - And When

​It started one night on the patio of Big Star Bar in the Heights; over Lone Star and cigarettes, a handful of Houston music wags debated the shows they would pay top dollar to see from lartists, iving or dead. We argued the aspects of an At the Drive-In reformation, seeing Sam Cooke in 1963, ... More >>

Steve Earle, Lyle Lovett Praise Houston On NPR

npr.org​Monday around lunchtime, local singer-songwriter and multiple 2010 HPMA nominee Lee Alexander emailed us that Steve Earle and Lyle Lovett were being interviewed together on NPR's World Cafe. Not only that, he added, both men were saying lots of nice things about Houston, where - in cas ... More >>

Stirred and Shaken: Salt's Tequila Twilight

​It was a slow Tuesday at Salt (4216 Washington Avenue, 713-868-5155), so I didn't feel too guilty asking Sonali to invent a tequila drink for me. It took her a couple minutes to balance the equation, but the result was fine -- a little like a Tequila Sunrise, though better in both the taste d ... More >>

Pop Rocks: How The Marriage Ref Almost Ruined My Marriage

​My wife and I have been married for almost 14 years. In that time, we've had to come to a certain...understanding about each others' tastes.We agree mostly on the big stuff, like politics (pinko), finances (slightly more free-spending than Ebenezer Scrooge), and child-rearing (sleep in a drawer a ... More >>

Guitar Zero: Played It 'Til My Fingers Bled...

No, this song is NOT about the year of Woodstock and the Moon Landing. It was the summer winter of '69 2010. Robert told me to come up with five songs I wanted to learn how to play (on guitar, in case you weren't keeping up). The Wife, seeking to maximize the parental utility of my music lessons, h ... More >>

Robert Earl Keen

No Turkeys Allowed

Our annual holiday shopping guide to recent local releases

Lonesome Onry and Mean: Old Home Weekend at Anderson Fair

Two alumni of Houston's fabled folk scene return to Anderson Fair this weekend. Vince Bell lives in Santa Fe, N.M., these days, but he will always be associated with the heyday of the Houston folk scene and Anderson Fair. Mentored by Townes van Zandt and Guy Clark, Bell had a major influence on Lyl ... More >>

Ghosts of Washington Avenue

Noise goes whistling through the scenester artery's music venue graveyard.

Steve Earle to Play Conroe's Crighton Theater, Cactus Music for Townes

Steve Earle will play the Crighton Theater Thursday, June 18, as a last-minute addition to the Montgomery County seat's annual Sound of Texas Music Series. The show, says Conroe City Councilman Jay Ross Martin, is a "bonus that we got the chance to add." Earle's tribute disc to mentor Townes Van Zan ... More >>

Mango's Becomes Full-Time Music Venue Next Weekend

The Houston scene has another music venue in the mix, as Mango's Café on Westheimer has its grand opening next Friday with a huge show headlined by the Sideshow Tramps. Took 'em that long to get the joint cleaned up from the Homopolice show, we imagine, and let's hope they got the res ... More >>

Lucinda Williams, with Buick 6

Lonesome Onry and Mean: Good Trouble for Hayes Carll in 2008

We freely admit we are homers, as big a fans of Hayes Carll as Milo Hamilton is of the Astros, but the Press isn't the only media outlet in the country impressed by Carll's first Lost Highway album, Trouble in Mind. The album, which featured the Americana Music Association's song of the year, "She L ... More >>

Aftermath Extra: The Best Concerts of the Year, Part 1

[Note: Aftermath attended all these shows and reviewed most of them. Even he couldn't see them all.] Six Organs of Admittance, Walter's on Washington, January 18: "[Ben Chasny's] quieter moments reminded me of the softer side of bands like Pavement and Guided by Voices, and the mournful specte ... More >>

Rodney Crowell: Sex & Gasoline

Grand Theft Auto X: The Screwston Chronicles

Last Night: Steve Earle and Allison Moorer at Cactus Music

Little Joe Washington Gravely Ill

David Olney

Nashville lifer is nobody's dummy

The Houston 100: From Sir Douglas Quintet to Guy Clark

David Olney

One Tough Town

South By Lomax: Part One

Starry Lullabye

Ailing Houston-area native David Schnaufer has taken the Appalachian dulcimer to the mountaintop

Dan Crump

Truth Is

Graham Weber

Friday, March 24, Shoeshine Charlie's Big Top Lounge, 3700 Main, 713-529-9899

Singin' a Carroll

Townes Van Zandt

Live at Union Chapel, London, England

David Olney

Tuesday, April 19, at McGonigel's Mucky Duck, 2425 Norfolk, 713-528-5999.

Elf Rock

The Decemberists bring their magic-realist, Picaresque new album to town

Rotation

Defending the Dirty Thirty

And coping with Yankee slander

I'm Not Dreaming of a White Christmas

No snow and no Bing for Racket

Club Directory

Letter from Uzbekistan

Spoiled meat, fermented mare's milk and a president who says he'd rip off his kid's head -- such is Wil Wuerdig's life as a musician in Central Asia

Meet the New Boss

John Nova Lomax

Once More With Feeling

Rotation

Rotation

Letters

Press Picks

Rotation

A Promise Fulfilled

Vince Bell returns from the brink with hard-won songs of love and loss