B Real, Bizzy Bone, Smooth Vega, Qween $ching & Clark Perry, SKS, Steve Victory.June 20, 2009PurgatoryBetter than: just slowin’ down in an Escalade to peep.Live hip-hop is what it is: Pound-for-pound against traditional live music, it’s a step-sister of the karaoke family–vocals set to a recording. It’s a crapshoot, at…
St. VincentGranada TheaterJune 18, 2009 Better than: the first time you watch Bambi. Check out photos from the show in our slideshow, too.There she stood on stage, impossibly cherubic and near-porcelain with her noir-ish good looks, appearing oh-so-innocent one moment and possessed by something evil the next. It’s an alluring duality indeed, watching St…
SantigoldHouse of BluesJune 18, 2009 Better than: Watching this guy. Check out more photos from the show in our slideshow.Santigold, the artist formerly known as Santogold (whose real name is Santi White), stopped by House of Blues last night to deliver a scorching performance on the latter half of her current…
Camera Obscura, Anni RossiThe LoftJune 16, 2009 Better Than: Staying at home and building your own camera obscura. Radio has long lost its hold on the music-seeking masses, having essentially been replaced by music blogs, the seeming medium of choice for fans looking for bands that are new and different than what they are…
Grizzly Bear, Here We Go MagicGranada TheaterJune 15, 2009 Better than: pretending I wanted room to dance anyway… There’s nothing like a false start to a song to gauge an audience’s mood at a concert. Take what happened seven songs into Grizzly Bear’s set at the Granada Theater last night, for instance. …
Viva Voce, Cut Off Your Hands, and Robert GomezHailey’s ClubJune 12th, 2009Better Than: imagining Clap Your Hands Say Yeah covering Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends in its entirety.Hailey’s hosted another fine show on Friday night, but only a couple dozen people came out to see it…
Music aside, one big part of the fun at Bonnaroo is just experiencing the interaction of strangers who would never have anything to do with each other outside of such a frenzied environment. This is true everywhere, from the open-air drug markets along “Shakedown Street” to the campgrounds to the…
David ByrneJune 14, 2009Majestic TheaterBetter than: just about anything else happening on a Sunday night. Dressed in all white, like some kind of angelic delivery boy, legendary indie rock icon David Byrne thrilled a packed house at the Majestic Theatre with two hours of angular pop/funk that was downright inflammable…
Peaches, Drums of DeathGranada TheaterJune 12, 2009Better than: the last show I was supposed to review for DC9. It’s fitting that the most climactic moment of Peaches’ nearly two-hour set at the Granada came before her two encores, as she finished her main set by launching into her breakthrough electro-clash…
Friday, 3 p.m.”Yeah! Brooklyn!” someone yelled during a lull after “The Party” during St. Vincent’s Friday afternoon set. Now, I’m not the kind of guy who needs to shout his affirmations of civic pride, but I was tempted to clarify where St. Vincent got her start by offering a counter-shout…
As of Friday at noonish, nothing at the 2009 Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival has happened the way I’ve expected it to. Or the way I’ve thought it should’ve gone. Or the way Triumph the Insult Comic Dog thought it would either, for that matter.No surprise that there are lines…
Air Guitar Regional ChampionshipJune 11, 2009The LoftBetter than: sitting at home praying it doesn’t rain anymore. Plenty more photos in our slideshow.Though it was brutally long at nearly five hours, last night’s Regional Air Guitar Championship was nonetheless a fascinating sociological experiment. The evening at The Loft started off inauspiciously…
Bonnie “Prince” BillyGranada TheaterJune 6, 2009Better Than: The George Strait concert at Cowboys Stadium, or pretty much anything else any of you suckers were doing on Saturday night. Opening with a ramshackle version of the Stanley Brothers classic “Nobody’s Darling on Earth,” it was readily apparent that Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s…
Constantines, Crystal AntlersSons of Hermann HallJune 5, 2006Better than: Any show I’ve been to this year. In front of about 100 people, Canada’s Constantines played as if its audience at Sons of Hermann Hall on Friday night numbered in the thousands. Full of fire and vigor, the unkempt quartet made…
The Helio Sequence,The LoftJune 5, 2009Better Than: Being in the registration line at SMU, which is the only other place I’ve seen this many undergrads. The best concerts aren’t always the ones that you’ve been excited about for months–you know, the ones where you repeatedly refresh your browser on the…
Animal Collective, Black DiceHouse of BluesJune 4, 2009Better Than: Sitting at home alone burning a stick of Nag Champa while staring at the cover of Meriwether Post Pavilion. Walking into House of Blues last night, two things were obvious: The show was sold out, and many of the tickets were…
Alejandro Escovedo, The Strange BoysSons of Hermann HallJune 4, 2009Better than: Putting up with the crowds at the House of Blues for the Animal Collective show. (A review of that show should be up shortly) It wasn’t exactly an energetic start to the evening at Sons of Hermann Hall: There…
New York DollsHouse of Blues’ Pontiac GarageJune 3, 20009Better than: When I caught the Dolls last year and I fell down backstage, drunk, while looking for an autograph. The New York Dolls came to town last night, undoubtedly bringing greatness in tow. Expecting anything less, of course, would be futile…
Black Moth Super Rainbow, School of Seven Bells, Darktown StruttersHailey’s Club, DentonJune 3, 2009Better Than: Sulking at home last night while poking around on Craigslist and eBay for those Animal Collective tickets you should’ve bought months ago… Turns out there weren’t any “Quadrophenia-esque rumbles” in Hailey’s parking lot after Black…
Passion PitGranada TheaterJune 2, 2009 Better than: Staying home and watching a cartoon or puppet show with a character whose voice sounds like Passion Pit frontman Michael Angelakos’ vocals. In today’s fast-moving indie music climate, hype so often outdoes form, disappointment has seemingly become act after act’s cliched finish. This is, for…
Bob Log III, Willem Maker, El Paso Hot ButtonClub DadaMay 29, 2009 Better Than: Jumping 12 school buses on a Harley XR-750 only to find out you missed the thirteenth one. The crowd at Club Dada slowly trickled in after the late sunset on Friday. Tattoos swirled from arm to arm,…
Check out more photos by Hal Samples in our slideshow.Last night a steadily growing crowd kept the Granada staff on its hospitable feet as well-wishers, friends and music lovers in general (and yeah, a news crew or two) celebrated the release of Carter Albrecht’s solo album, Jesus is alive…and Living…
