Yeasayer

Coachella 2013 Takes It Back to the '90s

Coachella, the Only Music Festival That Matters (or so we're told), announced its 2013 lineup late Thursday night, no holograms or Rolling Stones included. Instead, two beloved '90s UK acts whose popularity in the U.S. is spotty at best, Blur and the Stone Roses, headline the first night of the tw ... More >>

Fun Fun Fun Fest Saturday In Review: Kreayshawn, Refused, Girl Talk & More

Saturday's FFFF was a dusty affair, with merch tables making money off bandannas and other face coverings hand over fist. Where did that phrase come from, by the way? What do hands and fists have to do with making money, aside from petty crime? SLIDESHOW: PiL, Refused, A$AP Rocky: Fun Fun Fun Fest ... More >>

Dust Off Your Flannel

Does the looming '90s revival presage a Nirvana-style breakthrough?

Friday Night: Mountain Goats at Fitzgerald's

Let us be clear from the very beginning -- this member of the Rocks Off Aftermath team isn't the most storied fan of The Mountain Goats. Though we'd heard of the legendary John Darnielle before, out first actual exposure to his music was in 2007 with Heretic Pride, and we were so struck by the power ... More >>

Your Favorite Bands: How To Correctly Pronounce Their Names

​Back in December 1998, when Eminem was just hitting MTV and rap radio, we remember people pronouncing his name as "Eee-mine-im," and not the candy-inflected way it actually was. We even made the mistake during our first viewing of "My Name Is" late at night on the video channel and calling a ... More >>

Summer Fest Sunday: Peak Fun With B L A C K I E, Hayes Carll, Guitar Wolf, Yeasayer, Robert Ellis & More

Jim BrickerGood ole boy done good: Hayes Carll had a productive homecoming.​Chris Gray: Not long after I got to Summer Fest Sunday, I spotted festival honcho Omar Afra finishing up one of local musician/yogi Tyagaraja's yoga workshops in the wooden glade known temporarily as the Budweiser Beer ... More >>

Summer Fest Critic's Guide: Who We're Seeing At Tinsley

Jermaine Rogers​In three very short years, Free Press Summer Fest has gone from an experiment most people thought would fail to destination music festival most people wouldn't dare miss even if it is going to be 105 degrees outside. Rocks Off has seen quite a bit of online chatter from people ... More >>

Summer Fest Releases Stage Schedule, Set Times

Jermaine Rogers​If Rocks Off learned anything at iFest these past two weekends, it's that we should have started our own bottled-water franchise. And that when you go to a music festival, it's a good idea to know who is playing and when. Running around willy-nilly is all well and good unless i ... More >>

Summer Fest Adds Big Boi, Beirut, Girls, Killing Joke

Jermaine Rogers​Free Press Summer Fest has added four headliners to the two-day festival scheduled for June 4 and 5 in Eleanor Tinsley Park, organizers Free Press Houston and pegstar.net announced this morning. Atlanta rapper Big Boi (still one-half of OutKast, we think), Balkan-tinged indie- ... More >>

Weezer, Ween, Sharon Jones, Bun B Head Summer Fest Lineup

"I'm gonna pull out some shit on stage that will make the Flaming Lips cry and possibly retire in awe." - Hayes Carll, via @hprocksoff GroovehouseYeasayer at House of Blues, April 2010​Weezer, Ween, Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings, Yeasayer and Houston rappers Z-Ro and Bun B head up the lineup ... More >>

Katy Perry? For Album Of The Year? Seriously?

​Don't get Craig's Hlist wrong, we think that Katy Perry is extremely attractive. In fact, if we think about her long enough, it makes us want to cry and punch a wall. She's a buxom, bubbly, raven-haired pop star who dresses like she's expensive grandma candy. We even interviewed her last ye ... More >>

ACL Day 3 Recap: Eagles, Norah Jones, Wayne Coyne's Diet

Ed. Note: Updated at 1:42 p.m. to include information on Don Henley's medical condition we received from Eagles manager Irving Azoff. Photos by Marco Torres​It's just a few hours after the Eagles left the stage at this year's Austin City Limits Festival, closing out the weekend. Rocks Off mad ... More >>

ACL Day 3 Recap: Devendra Banhart, Band Of Horses, Other Beardos

Photos by Marco Torres​Aftermath doesn't know the bargain Austin City Limits promoter C3 Presents gets by booking both Lollapalooza and ACL, but to this dog-tired participant, this year's Zilker Park festivities ended up feeling less Austin weird and more something-something. Not that it's a ... More >>

Live From The Austin City Limits Festival, Day 3

Marco TorresTrombone Shorty​Craig Hlavaty: News coming out of the media tent: Don Henley of the Eagles had a stent put in his heart this past week. He will be singing and possibly playing guitar, but not exerting himself on drums. This could very well be the last Eagles show for a while - if e ... More >>

Will The Real Fun Fun Fun Fest Lineup Please Stand Up?

Marc BrubakerMetallagher at Fun Fun Fest 2009​Lots of late-night intrigue in the Twitterverse, as anticipation for the announcement of the lineup for Fun Fun Fun Fest 2010 builds to a boil. Late Wednesday, Austin blog Party Ends published a list including Animal Collective, Gang Gang Dance, Ga ... More >>

How Is Houston Doing ACL-Wise?

Marco TorresThe Eagles have flown, at least as far as Houston is concerned.​If you have even bothered to venture out of doors during these days of 105-degree heat indices and "Unhealthy" air-quality advisories, you may have noticed that things have been a little light on the roadshow front lat ... More >>

Which ACL Headliners Will Play Houston?

www.eaglesband.comWho knew the Eagles shot their publicity stills for The Long Road Out of Eden at ACL 2005?​When the Austin City Limits festival lineup is released every spring, one of Rocks Off's favorite parlor games besides wondering what sort of Biblical weather-related calamity God will visi ... More >>

2010 ACL Line-Up Goes Live And (Early) By Surprise

The line-up for the 2010 Austin City Limits Music Festival went live at the fest's website at midnight this morning while the rest of the world was snoozing. Luckily we are up and stirring to bring it to you. No Pavement and no Soundgarden, but we do have the Strokes down. More commentary coming in ... More >>

Invasive Exotics

Indian Jewelry continues to defy easy description on new album Totaled.

Aftermath: Three (Count 'Em) Takes On SXSW Heroes Local Natives At Mango's

Ed. Note: As anyone who followed our SXSW coverage would know, perhaps no band got as much critical love thrown its way as L.A.'s Local Natives. So much so that, when the Natives returned to Mango's this past Saturday, somehow Rocks Off wound up with three reviewers at the show. It might have been f ... More >>

Aftermath: Yeasayer's Tribal Future Shock And Benevolent Manipulation At HOB

Photos by Groovehouse ​Your brain balls bounce to the bang-bang as you skip through the flash fantastic and your goo-goo ears drip dreamlike while they try to find your face and your tongue stays tied in a twist fist spooning sinews just attacked by a snare snake made of sound leaving litt ... More >>

Aftermath: Mango's Shakes To Warpaint, Grandfather Child, Buxton And Balaclavas

Jason WolterWarpaint, back in Texas again...​There couldn't have been a more a disparate yet completely unifying bill at Mangos on Friday. Grandfather Child headlined, showcasing their new seven-inch release, with Los Angeles' Warpaint and Houston's Balaclavas and Buxton bringing up the rear. The ... More >>

Aftermath: At The End Of The World As We Know It, Shooter Jennings Feels Fine

Photos by Marc Brubaker​ "I've seen the future, brother," Leonard Cohen once sang. "It is murder." Maybe that's why there weren't more people at Meridian Wired Live Friday night. Pondering the shape of things to come is bad enough without coughing up a Jackson to have your weekend entertainment ha ... More >>

Yeasayer

SXSW Aftermath: Local Natives, The Only Indie Band That Matters This Year

Photos by Eggs/ Breakfastontour.com​It's kind of hard not to notice that SXSW has become, for the most part, a festival celebrating (and sometimes setting the trend for) the past and future six or so months of Pitchfork-friendly indie music; and for the past at least five years there has been that ... More >>

Houston 2020: The Future Is Unwritten

But hey, that's not stopping Noise.

The Way He Sees It

To Raphael Saadiq, music is music and Yeasayer is all right with him.

Start the Guessing Now: Which Fun Fun Fun Fest Artists Will Also Play the Next Block Party?

​ Fun Fun Fun Fest, the scuzzier, noisier cousin to the Austin City Limits Music Festival, announced its lineup this afternoon. Held November 7 and 8 in Austin's Waterloo Park, FFFF is up to 91 artists this year, everyone from rappers the GZA, the Pharcyde and the Cool Kids to electronic/dance act ... More >>

Annuals, Minus the Bear

A Classic-Rock-Free Morning

Bill Bentley Goes Online with Sonic Boomers

Native Houstonian creates Web site for boomer music fans

Has ACL Festival Jumped the Shark?

SXSW: Carbon/Silicon, Ting Tings, Santogold, MGMT, The Cribs, White Rabbits, Supersuckers and Robyn

MGMT, Yeasayer