If you thought Memorial Day was all about veterans and remembering fallen soldiers from past wars, well, guess again. Up in West Palm Beach, the Jamaican community has planned a large fete this Monday dedicated specifically to good music and jerk cuisine. You can get jerk chicken, jerk pork, jerk…
This “Vic Kingsley” seems to be a Mr. Vic Garcia, backed by Messrs. Luke Moellman, Jon Draper, and Ethan Carlson at various capacities, organic and otherwise. This 11-tracker is another solid calling card for the boys over at Dungeon Studios, and it is, for all intents and purposes, slightly danceable…
School’s out, but this college crowd is going nowhere. It could be the gas prices, but from the looks of it, it’s the need to consort with schoolmates that keeps these collegians at the Bull Bar. The name pays homage to the bull dolphin — you’ll know it by the…
In this week’s issue of the Miami New Times, for my Suicide Blonde column I spoke with JWL B and Shunda K of the Tampa-based electro-rap group Yo Majesty. Click here to read my explanation of why they’re one of the most punk rock things out there right now. But…
I miss Franz Ferdinand. Yes, unfortunately the Scottish quartet has continually suffered massive overexposure of all its singles. But that’s because you absolutely cannot fail with top-notch, hooky, angular U.K. rock that works as well on a dance floor as on a concert stage. Luckily, to fill in that gap…
Critical Miami recently pointed out Pitchfork Media’s pretty unforgiving review of Trilla. Yes, that’s a decimal point — on Pitchfork’s sort of infamous 10-point scale, I’ve never understood how reviewers arrive at the exact number. Why is it a 2.4, and not a 2.6 or a 2.3? Is there some…
Logan Fazio Erykah Badu and the Roots Mizner Park Amphitheater, Boca Raton Tuesday, May 20, 2008 Better than: Listening to Lil Wayne’s “Lollipop” on the radio for the umpteenth time. You never know what you’re going to get when you see the Roots concert. The band has roughly 14 years…
It seemed like this trial would never happen, but as of yesterday, R Kelly’s child pornography trial finally began in Chicago. The famous R&B singer has managed to delay this trial numerous times to the point where the 14-year-old girl he’s accused of performing lewd sex acts on camera with…
2008 Keeps on getting better for Rick Ross. MTV recently dropped their “Hottest MC’s in the Game” list and it’s already causing a stir. There are a few questionable picks on the list and I’m not sure if I agree with any of it based on the order. If you…
Sayre Berman Duran Duran Mizner Park Amphitheater, Boca Raton Monday, May 19, 2008 Better Than: Just about every other show in the last six months by a band existing for more than fifteen years. The Review:Last night Duran Duran, now at some 28 years and running, managed to achieve nearly…
How do you follow up a story on a Duran Duran concert? By hitting folks with a video to one of their most popular songs of all times–that’s how. When they first dropped this Indiana Jones like vid back in the early 80’s, it didn’t seem nearly as weird then…
So, who doesn’t want to gently easy into their Monday afternoon with a good 20 minutes of time-wasting bad Internet videos? The smartest YouTube searchers know that the site’s treasures are often found simply by typing “worst” whatever in the search box, or, for a grab bag, just “worst” itself,…
Last Friday night, the gossip hounds at CNN were going on and on about actress/troublemaker Lindsay Lohan. There’s nothing new with that–except the talk was all about her cameo in the new N.E.R.D. video for “Everybody Nose.” According to the folks on CNN, the song is all about partying and…
Ivon David Rojas THE POLICE CRUZAN AMPHITHEATRE SATURDAY, MAY 17, 2008 Better Than: What’s better than sitting in traffic for three hours? Somewhere in Palm Beach County there is a sadistic concert-hater who said, “I know, let’s close half of Southern Boulevard out by the Fairgrounds – that way it…
The Square Egg, once upon a time, was one of THE best live acts going in Miami, with a live hip-hop/jazz/soul kinda thang that has yet to be paralleled in quality in this town. But eventually, as too many people do, frontman Lee decamped to Brooklyn – boohoo! Luckily, though,…
There’s no ignoring Ben Taylor’s musical lineage: With James Taylor as dad and Carly Simon as mom, Ben’s prowess in songwriting and performance is proving itself to be as impressive as his parents’. Yet his unique style is less hippie and more hip-hop. Ben’s set to open up for mom…
Tomorrow afternoon and evening, snag a free spot to learn some of the latest hands-on electronic beatmaking programs with George Acosta, Miami boy and legendary trance and progressive house DJ. (In 2007, Acosta was voted America’s Best DJ in DJ Times magazine. Also, remember those days at the Mix afterhours,…
Animal heads and mounted skulls give me chills. Nothing strikes fear in my heart like a room that celebrates Bambi’s untimely demise by having his decapitated head bolted to the wall. And like so many of my irrational convictions and strange fears, this started when I was a little girl…
You may think of Katt Williams only as a comedian — and a hilarious one at that — but there’s more to the 34-year-old than jokes. For starters, most of us saw him for the first time as “Money Mike” in Friday After Next, the silly third installment in Ice…
Outside of Fela Kuti and his ever-popular Afrobeat sound, African music as a whole is hard for a lot of novices to understand and, furthermore, purchase. There’s so much of it, spread out across 53 countries on one giant continent, that you need a guide — a Rough Guide, perhaps…
A few years ago, a psychology lecturer at a British college came up with the formula for the “perfect” mood-lifting pop song. Dr. Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic posited a certain equation involving pitch, positive lyrics, and serotonin levels that, when tweaked in precise amounts, would result in a vastly improved emotional state…
Sometimes, the assholes in charge of dishing out work visas make mistakes. When British rapper Riz MC (who’s Muslim and of Pakistani descent) tried coming to the United States a couple of months ago for a showcase at South by Southwest followed by a couple of spot dates in New…
