The front room and the darkroom behind–on the street side of photographer James Bland’s house in the heart of Oak Cliff–are unusually neat for one of the archivists of a scene as random and disordered as the early days of Deep Ellum, back in the mid-’80s when the now neon-lit…
David Newman’s Oak Cliff home contains a living-room wall of fame–the “Fathead National Museum”–adorned with his 28 album covers in chronological order. They date from 1959’s Fathead: Ray Charles Presents David Newman to last year’s Mr. Gentle, Mr. Cool. The great tenor sax player’s feisty old Aunt Freda runs his…
Satellite of Love Although much has been made lately about Christian music and the mainstream success the genre has enjoyed, most of the songs found there still fit into two categories: “capitalization” numbers wherein you need a lyric sheet in order to tell “love” from “Love” or “him” from “Him”;…
Be here now Return of the Funky Worm Johnny Moeller and Paul Size Dallas Blue Society Records Walk in the Sun Sue Foley Discovery Records What is it about the blues that makes each generation have to peer into them, squinting? Maybe it’s the same thing that unites all popular…
Edie teeters on one foot, streaming consciousness. Kenny noodles a spacey jam while John pings a cymbal here, a cowbell there, tom-tomming a slippery polyrhythmic groove. Slinky, sweaty old-school Boheads–Adina (but no Christina?), Amanda, Mark and Sherry, Kim and Brenda–pack a Club Dada sardine can; even “Grateful” Dave Moynihan, even…
The life of Corn Mo–stage name of Jon Cunningham–may well have been saved by rock ‘n’ roll. He’s on stage now, his long blond hair a tangle obscuring his face as he pumps and dips his way through an accordion-driven version of Guns N’ Roses’ “Sweet Child of Mine”; his…
Scrapple seems acutely aware of his environment, but he couldn’t be safer: He’s the four-legged pilot fish to New York City art shark Joe Christ, a transplanted filmmaker-musician-artist from Dallas whose confrontationally weird, painfully intense, and shocking films both document and run off the energy generated by the extremes to…
New Country The Picketts Euphonium Rounder Records “Euphony” is a pleasant concordance of sound, but with this, their third album, the Picketts have done more than fall easy on the ears: They’ve made one of the most affecting arguments for country as white folks’ soul music to come down the…
Downfall Solitude Aeturnus Pavement Music Even as the members of Metallica cut their hair and Soundgarden peddles its sub-Sabbath riffs alternatively packaged, Arlington’s Solitude Aeturnus continues its quixotic fight for the preservation of the metal beast. In Downfall–its fourth album–the band is more concerned with the dark, Gothic ambience of…
Casual Gods of the Tom-Tom Club Question of the week: What’s the difference between A) a band shamelessly exploiting its past; B) a band that keeps on keeping on like some old milk-cart horse that still must walk its route every morning even after retirement; and C) most of a…
Look out baby–it’s the kerosene man Although he came through here last year opening for Concrete Blonde’s farewell tour with just himself and an acoustic guitar, it’s been five years since former Dream Syndicate frontman Steve Wynn has mounted a major (read: with a band) American tour. His last gig…
The pool guy’s out back, a borrowed Lucky Strike dangling from his lips as he vacuums leaves out of the crystal-clear water. He comes once every few days to clean this beautiful pool that sits beneath a brick-wall cliff and an arrogantly blue sky, but the owners of the pool…
Those who frequent Local Band Hell are a capricious lot: They want tradition and continuity, yet if an act lingers locally–or, heaven forbid, makes a renewed bid for attention–they start to doubt the act: “Uh, if y’all were any good, woonchy’all be gone, like, by now?” Soul Food Cafe made…
Big Ronnie Dee Jamboree Rockin’ Bones: The Legendary Masters Ronnie Dawson Crystal Clear Sound With age comes self-consciousness, which is why rock ‘n’ roll has always been–on the creating end at least–the province of the young. A 15-year-old can go “huhhn!” or shout “aw, rock it now!” and pull it…
Pop goes the meaning Walking on Locusts John Cale Hannibal Records Be advised that you and John Cale might use certain words with entirely different things in mind: Because Walking on Locusts isn’t French film soundtrack, a live album, or a partially realized collaboration with singer-songwriter Bob Neuwirth, you could…
Paul Prudhomme and Marie Laveau–even if they were blazing on crystal meth and working ’round the clock–couldn’t begin to figure out the recipe for the gris-gris gumbo that is the Neville Brothers. After all, in New Orleans, a city where funerals are an excuse to party, it’s rumored that the…
Suckerpunch Suckerpunch 510 Records A cliche can only go so far: “Three chords is all it takes, broken strings, fuck the mistakes,” Suckerpunch announces in “Why Bother”–a song that appropriately sums up this album. Unfortunately there are no mistakes in this calculated stab at punk revival. Even the aptly named…
A hundred and ten on the old Hogs’ Back You don’t have to read much light history–let alone Cormac McCarthy–to realize that as a nation our current reality is built upon an ossuary, a mountain of broken skulls and bones that reaches up from the past and points toward where…
Bluesy singer-songwriter Keb’ Mo’ (street vernacular for Kevin Moore) has reached critical mass with his second OKeh/Epic album, Just Like You, setting the stage for a national breakout. The tall, lanky, and just plain lovable guitarist still looks 20 years old in his baseball cap. He appears to be one…
Passion, not diplomacy Adore or despise her, Madonna has surprised us once again. We’re not talking about her pregnancy here, but her recent incarnation as a big-wigged music-biz executive. Her Warner Bros. vanity label, Maverick, boasts a double dose of lightning strikes: a megaplatinum superstar named Alanis Morissette; and a…
Quirky, man, quirky Merkin Wig Riddle Me This Doilie Records Smirk The Sutcliffes Skiffle Beat Records Ambling through a smorgasbord of distinct sounds can be as dangerous as trying to inject a little humor into your music. Overplay your hand in the former case and you come off as unimaginative;…
It’s a Thursday night at Grinder’s and of course it’s humid out on the java joint’s patio, where a pair of young fellas perform music in the back. One does most of the singing; the other strums an acoustic guitar and sings backup. Some of their admitted inspirations are obvious,…
