A Love Letter to Rod the Mod

I don’t care about his feathered hair. I don’t care about his unfortunate fascination, in the Seventies and Eighties, with puff sleeves. Or his continuing fascination with white suits. Or the fact that, with some teenage parenting, he could technically be old enough to be my grandfather. I love Rod…

Guajiro Hits Puerto Rico, Then Brings Retro Rock to Miami

Speaking of Hialeah (since the blog post below is on the self-professed king of Hialeah freestyle), the city’s favorite punk band Guajiro is playing a series of shows in Puerto Rico next month. Anybody that’s visiting the island around that time and looking for some good tunes should check out…

Jose El Rey rules the House of Sex

If you haven’t seen Jose El Rey perform around town yet … you’re missing out. How to describe the legend? He doesn’t really sing, he doesn’t really rap…. He just kind of is, over some tinny 808 freestyle beats. He makes ladies want him and guys want to be him…

Bedouin Soundclash at the Culture Room Tonight!!

So if you’ve ever visited the ice-cold city of Toronto, you’ll know that when it comes to music and culture, it’s one of the biggest melting pots North America has to offer. With relaxed immigration and a stronger currency than the U.S. (ahem), Toronto isn’t a bad city in which…

Vampire Weekend is Just Catchy Enough

Here’s a fun video from the group Vampire Weekend that’s sure to stick in your head or at least make you tap your feet. The group is out of New York if you can’t already tell by their clanky style of up-top indie rock and they’ve got a sound that…

Arsis, live at the Culture Room on Wednesday

Arsis, in classical music parlance, most commonly refers to the up-beat, or unstressed parts of a measure. The term seems an odd choice of name for a technical death metal outfit whose lyrics focus on death, defilement, and the destruction of the sacred, and whose pummeling assault leaves no room…

First Phase of Marley Fest Announced…

Well, technically it’s now the “15th Annual Caribbean Fest,” but everybody knows it’s all about the Marleys. And this year, it looks like they’re getting it together musically. While the first few years were mostly reggae, and mostly Marley, things got a little scattered in the meantime. This led to…

Concert Review: 3 Inches of Blood and the Black Dahlia Murder

Hate Eternal, 3 Inches of Blood, and the Black Dahlia Murder Wednesday, January 23, 2008 The Culture Room, Ft. Lauderdale Better Than:Oh, making offerings to false metal gods? The Review:It’s always a reassuring sign when, after driving almost an hour in torrential rain, one is greeted at a venue’s entrance…

Rick Springfield

Generally speaking, ’80s icons haven’t fared well over the years in the looks department. The combination of cocaine, groupies, and incidents that may or may not have involved farm animals are usually to blame. The only exception to the “What the Hell Happened to Him — He Used to Be…

OneRepublic

No one really considers filthy-rich old-fart Rupert Murdoch a shrewd record-company exec. But the Fox Media mogul has catapulted tons of bands onto folks’ iPods and into record stores over the past couple of years for one simple reason: He owns MySpace. So when you think about it, the dude…

Hep Cat Boo Daddies and Los Diablos

Call it roots-rock or Americana if you want to (both are accurate), but when it comes to a show featuring the Hep Cat Boo Daddies and Los Diablos, what you’re going to get is can’t-miss blue-blooded rock ‘n’ roll. The Hep Cats are known for their hard-edged approach to blending…

Dionne Warwick

Wow, regardless of how you want to look at it, Dionne Warwick has been a musical powerhouse since she was discovered by Burt Bacharach doing background vocals for the Drifters. That was roughly 40 years ago, and the discovery yielded a string of major hits with Bacharach and his main…

Latest Local Fixation… Black Tide!

I can’t believe I haven’t written about these kiddies before, but I’ll fix that soon. Black Tide are four guys from Miami who are garnering major buzz for their crunching, amped-up, old-school kinda thrashy metal sound. They’ve already got a deal with Interscope, and they’re currently touring Europe with Avenged…

Village Voice’s 35th Annual Pazz & Jop Poll is Online

In case you missed it, this year’s edition of the Village Voice’s “Pazz and Jop” poll is online. It’s an annual roundup of a bunch of music critic’s top-ten lists for the preceding year. For this big-deal anniversary edition, 577 critics responded. Jonathan Cunningham (music editor of the Broward-Palm Beach…

Concert Review: Sofia at Harold Golen Gallery

Sofia January 19, 2008 Harold Golen Gallery Better Than:Tiesto’s faux “progressive” electronic beats Nowadays a lot of electronic music has very little to do with the genre’s original theories of sound experimentation. During its initial stages, weird, non-melodic tonalities ruled the day. For instance, Fifties artists such as Louis and…

Concert Review: Marilyn Manson at the Fillmore Miami Beach

Marilyn Manson January 20, 2008 The Fillmore Miami Beach Better Than: You can imagine. Only a dingbat or a dolt doesn’t dig Marilyn Manson. Really. I mean, unless you’ve absolutely no sense of humor, let alone sense of the absurd, or you believe rock shouldn’t come from a loud place,…

Concert Review: Envy on the Coast at Culture Room

The Audition PacTour: The Audition, Envy On the Coast, Danger Radio, Another Day Late Saturday, January 19, 2008 Culture Room Better Than: Dealing with the sweat and rain of an outdoor summer punk festival. I’m pretty certain that anybody who’s anybody at a South Florida high school was at the…

Concert Review: Artopia at Parkwest Night Club

The Spam Allstars helped the New Times celebrate its 20th Anniversary Spam Allstars, Awesome New Republic, and Raffa & Rainer January 19, 2008 Parkwest Nightclub Better Than: Any 20th birthday party I’ve ever been to! Hundreds of people piled into Parkwest on Saturday. Of course they did, it’s not everyday…

Junior Reid and Casely at Sobe Live Tonight

It should be a good time as local singer, Casely, will be singing his new hit “Emotional” and Junior “One Blood” Reid has a huge catalog of songs to choose from. All the info you need to know is on the flyer above. -Jonathan Cunningham…

Marijah and the Reggae Allstars Live Tonight

If you’re looking for some reggae this weekend, here’s a show to check out. Marijah & the Reggae All-Stars, voted New Times’ Best Live Band 2007 perform on the main stage at Evening on The Avenue in the Cultural Plaza between Lake and Lucerne avenues and M Street. Jan 18,…

Last Night: Foo Fighters at BankAtlantic Center

Photo by Ivon David Rojas The Foo Fighters were joined by Against Me! and Jimmy Eat World. Foo Fighters January 16, 2008 BankAtlantic Center Better Than: The ‘70s all over again. Media: Click here to see a slidehow from the concert. Timing. It really is all about timing. Oh, not…