John Mellencamp has carried a chip on his shoulder for several years now. Hell, probably all of his life. Mellencamp tried to make nice will Bill Maher on “Real Time” a couple of weeks ago, but he seemed to be as uncomfortable as a tweed suit in the summertime. By the time he appeared on Maher’s podcast “Club Random” several days later, Mellencamp was perhaps no more relaxed in an interview setting, but he was (surprise!) ready to cut loose with some opinions.
After lighting Maher’s pre-roll, Mellencamp offered up his take on smoking (he’s for it) and then followed Maher into a discussion on the subject of hypocrisy, particularly as it applies to rock stars. “If someone called me a hypocrite, I’d look at them and go, ‘Yeah. Call me anything you like. I don’t give a shit.’”
Sufficiently warmed up, the ever-iconoclastic singer took on the Grammy Awards. Mellencamp is not a fan. “I have never been to the Grammys in my life,” he declared. After Maher said that he had attended the Golden Globes a few weeks ago, Mellencamp snapped back with, “Do you know what a Golden Globe is, or a Grammy? It’s fucking nothing, It means nothing. It means less than nothing.”
Attaboy, John. There’s no room for BS in today’s world.
Ticket Alert
As my dad used to say, Don Toliver “came by it honestly,” growing up in Houston in a house where music played almost constantly, since his father was part of the Swishahouse chopped and screwed scene. Mixing singing and rapping, Toliver has catapulted from local to national star status, releasing multiple platinum albums and headlining a series of concert tours. Get ready for Toliver’s homecoming concert on Thursday, May 14, at Toyota Center, which should be quite the party. Tickets are available now, so don’t wait around and be disappointed.
Several years back, a Flaming Lips documentary was released with the title The Fearless Freaks. And that pretty much sums up what you need to know about the band. After a hardscrabble upbringing in Oklahoma City, Wayne Coyne and company hatched a band that moved from punk into psychedelia and art rock, notching a hit with 1993’s “She Don’t Use Jelly.” Since that time, the Lips have released a string of critically admired albums but have never again approached the Top 40. Tickets are on sale now for their concert on Thursday, May 7, at the White Oak Music Hall.
If you can book two consecutive nights at Toyota Center, you’re doing something right. First up, Rapper J. Cole will perform on Wednesday and Thursday, September 16 and 17. After a night off for the crew at Toyota Center to recover, Kevin Parker’s rave aggregation Tame Impala will roll in for shows on Saturday and Sunday, September 19 and 20. Tickets for all concerts are on sale now and going fast.
During the New Wave era, the Psychedelic Furs always had a distinctive sound, with Richard Butler’s vocals enveloped in an appealingly murky instrumentation. No warbling tenors with funny haircuts here! Presales are in progress for the band’s show at the House of Blues on Saturday, May 23, with the general ticket sale coming up on Friday.
British traditionalists Mumford and Sons will perform at the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion on Thursday, October 1, in support of their latest album, Prizefighter. The record represents something of a departure for the band, including collaborations with artists like Christ Stapleton, Hozier and Finneas (Billie Eilish’s older brother and songwriting partner). Presales are currently available online, and ticket access for those without the proper type of credit card begins on Friday. By the way, Marcus King, a tremendous young blues singer and guitarist, will be opening the show, so get there early.
Concerts This Week
Sue Foley is known as “the Ice Queen,” but not because she is aloof and unemotional. No, it’s just a reference to her admiration for Houston bluesman (Yates HS, represent!) Albert Collins, who made his mark with songs like “Frosty,” “Thaw-Out” and “Sno-Cone.” Foley and her pink paisley Telecaster have loomed large on the Texas blues scene for years, but recently she has begun to explore acoustic sounds played on a flamenco-style guitar. You can hear both sides of Foley’s musical personality on Thursday at the Mucky Duck, where she will play two shows, early and late, so those who don’t like to stay out on a school night can still make curfew.
On Friday, guitarist Ana Popović, the “Serbian Scorcher,” will play a concert at the Dosey Doe Big Barn. While she never strays too far from her blues roots, Popović is not afraid to mix things up a bit, throwing in dollops of funk and rock as circumstances dictate.
After establishing herself with a stint fronting the Boston band ‘Til Tuesday (“Voices Carry”), Aimee Mann embarked on a solo career, initially recording for Epic and Geffen Records before telling the latter to honk off after the company refused to release her album Bachelor No. 2, believing that it was not sufficiently commercial.
Consequently, Mann began selling records at her shows, EP’s that she had pressed herself, characterizing the strategy as a “DIY fuck-you-record-company-I’m-selling-it-myself move” in an interview with Stereogum. Never afraid to chart her own course, Mann will perform on Saturday at the Heights Theater. ‘Cause Knowledge is Power: Mann has appeared as an actress in The Big Lebowski (she was one of the nihilists), “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” “The West Wing” and “Portlandia.”
After everyone recovers from the meat sweats following this weekend’s “World’s Championship Bar-B-Que Contest,” the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo officially kicks off on Monday, with a performance by country artist Riley Green. The guy is red-hot, coming off of multiple awards last year from the Country Music Association and The Academy of Country Music.