A Quick Rundown on Some Miami Acts Playing at SXSW

A few Miami acts are playing official (and semi-official) showcases at SXSW in Austin in a couple weeks. If you’re lucky enough to make it over to Texas for this, here’s who they are and where you can catch them.​DJ CrazeNicaragua-born, Miami-rased DJ Craze has had as many lives as…

70,000 Tons of Metal Cruise Adds Portuguese Cachet With Moonspell

Hey guys, do you think José Saramago’s later books hold a candle to Blindness?​There’s no better way to battle Friday morning’s demons than with some searing Portuguese prog-metal courtesy of Moonspell, the freshest addition to the 70,000 Tons of Metal cruise. If any of the hairs on the back of…

José El Rey is Dead

Mourning the loss of José El Rey.​Sad news kids, José El Rey is gone for good. Finished. Dead. José Flores, AKA El Rey, announced via Twitter that his exaggerated Cuban persona has officially retired.This has us asking: ¿Pero porque? El Rey was hands down one of the most imaginative characters…

Heineken TransAtlantic Festival is Back This April

​You may remember the Heineken TransAtlantic Festival. It came through last year? A whole bevy of top-shelf world music talent graced our fair shores. CuCu Diamantes participated, sharing her dulcet, neo-Cuban-cabaret-era-spliced-with-urban-NYC vibe. Quirky Mexican NuJazz songstress Ximena Sariñana also played a gig, and our own Rachel Goodrich opened. If you…

Music Movies at the Miami International Film Festival This Weekend

The Miami International Film Festival starts this weekend, and if you missed Miami New Times’ guide to the event, click here. Of more immediate interest to Crossfade readers, though, is the fest’s selection of music movies. Here they are. For complete screening and ticket details, visit miamifilmfestival.com. ​The Beatles on Recorda…

Art: Surfer Blood Poster by Vincent Parker

Creatively created by Vincent Parker​Even if our readers won’t be able to make it to Vancouver’s Biltmore Cabaret in April, special props to graphic artist Vincent Parker for his lobster-y lettered Surfer Blood/Turbo Fruits poster design. Check out a lot more eye-melting concert art, including another SoFla fave Blowfly, the…

Garage Tapes: Destroyio Records and Guerrilleros de Nadie at Churchill’s

Last Thursday, Destroyio Records invaded Churchill’s again. And every species of Miami punk was there: Hialeah soccer hooligans, dreaded lezzies, Calle Ocho crusties, Subhumans squat rats, weekend anarchists, Misfits aerobics instructors, hardcore dudes with neck tattoos, etc. It was a mixed pit. Everyone sipped some kind of clear alcohol from…

Music In This Week’s Print Edition of Miami New Times

Courtesy of Nacional RecordsCheck out a feature on ChocQuibTown.​While we update Crossfade a bunch of times a day, the Miami New Times still features a fresh crop of music news weekly, including features that go into more depth than the usual blog post. This week, Christopher Lopez gives the run-down…

Blast From the Past: The Cichlids – Be True To Your School

via boogiebobsrecords.com​The CichildsBe True To Your School (Bold/TK Records)The Cichlids’ story is one of your typical musical stories rife with intrigue, pleasure, strife, and the passing of time. The act was widely considered one of the first alternative Florida acts who could have (should have) made it, and 1980’s Be…

The Moody Blues Play Bayfront Park Amphitheater

Flash back 40 years. Picture a college dorm room, its walls swathed with black-light posters, the air heavy with the smell of incense and engulfed in thick clouds of pungent smoke. Its occupants seem preoccupied with resolving the secrets of the universe, despite coughing up the intake from a hookah…

Damon Fowler Group Hits Tobacco Road on Thursday

The namesake guitarist of the Damon Fowler group may look, at first, a little too fresh-faced to really know about the blues. And yes, Fowler is a cherubic Gen Y-er, but he already boasts more than a decade on the live circuit. Growing up in the Tampa Bay area, he…

D.O.N.S. Drops New Album at B.E.D. on Tuesday

In what may be a somewhat dubious distinction, D.O.N.S. is best-known to many clubbers as a remixer of Technotronic’s immortal “Pump Up the Jam.” In 2005, some 16 years after the original track’s release, the Hamburg, Germany-based producer managed to take his reworked version high into the reaches of the…

Off With Their Heads Top Churchill’s Bill on Saturday

Minnesota punks Off With Their Heads have been grinding out some of the best melodic “don’t call it pop” punk the Twin Cities have put out in recent history. For the past seven years, the band has gone under the radar. But a stable lineup since 2007 and heavy touring…