Courtesy Chipster PR

Dust: Richie Wise, Kenny Aaronson, and Marc Bell

When you think of classic rock power trios, names like Cream, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Blue Cheer, Grand Funk Railroad, and Mountain come to mind. But only hardcore music nerds may remember the short-lived Brooklyn-based Dust.

Formed in 1969 the band - which included Richie Wise (vocals/guitar), Kenny Aaronson (bass), and Marc Bell (drums) - released just two records: Dust (1971) and Hard Attack (1972). Both are full of fine loud, fast, and furious music - with just a tinge of blues, country, and psychedelia - and are treasured by collectors.

On April 16, Sony/Legacy will release a single CD featuring remastered version of both records, along with a special vinyl edition for Record Store Day on April 20.

More »

tvline.com via creative commons

Justin Timberlake did look sharp, we'll give him that.

Dear Stupid Grammys,

I have a bone to pick with you.

I sat through Taylor Swift's uninspired opening act while she half-sung/half-yodeled at a guy on a spinning bullseye. It was complete with an insulting and transparent Alice in Wonderland costume ripoff (which I'm not getting, by the way... is she supposed to be more hardcore now?), and she still can't sing live worth a shit.

I suffered along with the rest of the audience through fun.'s "cat howling in the rain" performance (does anyone else think he sounds a little like the singer from Yes?), and I didn't even change the channel during the Dierks Bentley/Miranda Lambert mash-up under a giant naked winter tree, despite my loathing of their music.

More »

Songs are like babies. Some of them drop into the world with barely a push, while others require yanking out with a wicked set of tongs after a long labor. Generally the latter is more common than the former, which is why any musician worth his or her salt carries around some sort of notebook to keep track of ideas, lyrics, chord progressions and the like.

Sometimes these notebooks, laptops, and even whole sets of masters get stolen. More often than not, that's the end of the project. If you're out there saying, "Why can't you just start over again?" then you've never really made an album before. Creativity is a capricious mistress that tends to answer every question with "No, nothing's wrong. Absolutely nothing."

If a musician loses his or her all-important records of creative sparks, those sparks are usually just gone. At least five albums have been aborted this way, all because of sticky-fingered jerks looking for a quick score and not realizing they hijacked someone's hard work. Sometimes it was honestly for the best, and sometimes it was absolutely devastating.

Let's take a look at what unbridled jerkery caused.

More »

Photo by Marc Brubaker

Cyndi Lauper sings the blues at House of Blues, August 2010

Have you ever bought an album of an artist you were familiar with and thought, "wow... that's different?"

In fact, many artists try out other genres than the one where they originally became popular as a way for them to grow as artists. But a big question remains: Will the audience grow with them and be won over? Either way, it's a risk for both the artist and their record company.

But sometimes it can also be a good thing. For example, when Alison Krauss teamed up with Robert Plant in 2007 to record their critically acclaimed Raising Sand album, they created an often sublime mixture of rock and bluegrass that practically swept the 2009 Grammys and became a left-field commercial smash, eventually going platinum. Bluegrass records almost never go platinum.

They weren't always quite always as successful as Plant and Krauss, but these artists were similarly unafraid to stick their necks out.

More »

Nobody called them "band nerds."

We've really got to thank filmmaker Mark Landsman. Not only did his 2010 documentary Thunder Soul put the story of Houston's legendary Kashmere Stage Band on to the silver screen, but it also helped revive the band itself.

After reforming with a handful of Kashmere High School alumni and students to promote the film at festivals and other events two years ago, the mighty KSB is now having too much fun to quit. You can catch the former teen titans of jazz/funk Saturday night at Fitzgerald's, and you should.

While Landsman has helped greatly to spread the story of Dr. Conrad "Prof" Johnson's musical vision and legacy, the songs that spawned a thousand breaks remain largely unknown to many, even in the Kashmere Gardens 'hood that spawned the soul nearly 40 years ago. Luckily, crate-digging isn't dead yet.

Because the late, great Prof believed so strongly in education, Rocks Off has here assembled a septet of essential Kashmere Stage Band cuts to help educate our readers on the high-schoolers' indelible impact on funk soul and hip-hop.

The quiz begins as soon as the bell rings at Fitz on Saturday.

More »

www.talentondisplay.com

The further one digs into the second edition of The Encyclopedia of Country Music, the deeper one's appreciation of the contributions of Houston's country-music pioneers becomes. Yeah, just check out the black circles under the eyes and drunk-ass grins on Leon Payne's band above. That photo alone speaks volumes about Houston about the time I was born.

As with our previous examinations of the new volume, today's installment covers some monumental figures who not only contributed mightily to the history of country music but to the coming worldwide craze known as rock and roll.

This is hardly surprising to anyone familiar with the mixed-up nature of Houston's music scene. Dave Alvin describes Houston as the place where blues, zydeco, Cajun, Western, Latin and Eastern European styles all converged into a unique sound. Hardcore honky tonk was one of those unique sounds that pushed several Houston musicians and songwriters to the forefront of the industry.

More »

When you ask the younger dubstep generation what ska is, they will usually begin to wax poetic about bands like No Doubt, the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Reel Big Fish and Less Than Jake - the kind of stuff they heard on their older siblings' stereos in the '90s. Only a precious few will throw the Specials, Prince Buster, Desmond Dekker, or even Madness at you.

After third-wave ska began to wain in popularity in the late '90s and early '00s, the education sort of ended. No Doubt turned into Blondie, the Bosstones went on hiatus, and the others either stayed true to their sound and continued to tour, or just flamed out. Third-wave ska is a story unto itself for another blog.

Don't even get us started on Houston ska bands. It can get messy, and any older cat will tell you about seeing the Skatalites, the third-wave old-school leaning Toasters, or Neville Staple at Fitzgerald's in the late '90s.

More »

Spurred on by the realization that both David Bowie's commercial breakthrough Let's Dance and Queen's News of the World had solid, sturdy side ones on their vinyl releases, I then began the hunt for other great vinyl slabs with amazing side ones.

Of course, the idea is that this could only include albums from the (first) great rock vinyl heyday. I am sure that Wilco and others have turned in great side ones in the past decade, but only a select few of you have heard them on vinyl.

The secret to great albums, of course, has everything to do with genius and gripping songs, plus proper sequencing and editing. And you may remember a few years back, when I attempted to cut some of most popular double slabs down to one lean collection.

More »

Courtesy Jacksboro Highway

L-R: Pete Best, John Lennon, Delbert McClinton, Bruce Chanel, Paul McCartney, George Harrison

Lonesome, Onry and Mean didn't get in much trouble in school. So his parents were a little disturbed to find the eighth grader in the principal's office on the afternoon of February 10, 1964. He and his best friends, Mike Clowdus, Brad Rutledge, and Larry "Suitcase" Simpson, had been written up and sent to the office by Mr. Stephen Haynes, the eighth grade honors algebra teacher.

The infraction? Combing our hair like the Beatles.

More »

photo by Jason Wolter

Jesse Dayton onstage in Becoming Kinky: The World According To Kinky Friedman

In our recent interview with Kinky Friedman, performing tonight at Dosey Doe in the Woodlands, we mulled over Jesse Dayton's on-going project of an album of Friedman's songs. Friedman was very enthusiastic.

"The last time we talked, Jesse had already done the basic tracks for eight songs," said Friedman. "I haven't heard them, but Jesse says he's trying to give them something like a Steve Earle or a Bruce Springsteen treatment. No one's ever really tried to do that with my work, so I'm very excited by this."

"What I'm glad about is that this is not going to be one of those fucking tribute albums," says Friedman. "I hate most of that stuff. I'm really happy that he's trying to put Jesse Dayton's stamp on them, not just do a half-ass regurgitation. But I'm really happy that Jesse's record may find new fans for those old songs."

More »