This week, South Florida is home to a number of solid shows. !!! (Chk Chk Chk) will be at Gramps in Wynwood on Wednesday and Urban Beach Week kicks off the day after. For those willing to leave Miami and head a little north, The Griswolds and Magic Man are…
Oftentimes, when we somehow stumble upon a veteran band for the first time, our first instinct is to snatch up the group’s greatest-hits compilation. For those unfamiliar with !!! (pronounced chk chk chk), a dance-punk outfit formed in Sacramento in 1996, don’t bother looking for any kind of best-of CD…
Whether it’s riffing on model and Kardashian-to-be Blac Chyna’s two “baby bumps” or upsetting black women with vaguely misogynistic jokes, Marlon Wayans has managed to stay in the spotlight and on top of current events throughout his career. The 43 year-old actor, comedian, and writer long ago broke free from…
Words are powerful. They can move nations, they can break hearts, and they can inspire the hopeless. They can also confuse the hell out of people when used improperly. And leading up to the Saturday night DMX show at House Nightclub, there was a bit of a brouhaha over who,…
Because hip-hop relies so heavily on words, rappers are always running their mouths. However, that doesn’t mean they always have something worth listening to. Plenty are just talking shit, boosting themselves up, and spouting a lot of hot air between occasionally hot beats. Talib Kweli, on the other hand, is…
If Florence Welch of Florence and the Machine ever decides to run for public office, her tendency to physically interact with large crowds is going to give her security team nightmares. Thursday night, the flame-haired songbird attempted to grab hold of almost every single person at the American Airlines Arena…
Here’s a fun fact: Florence and The Machine (or Florence + The Machine, if you’d like) have never scored a number one single on the American Billboard charts. In fact, the highest the band has ever charted is twenty-one with “Dogs Days Are Over” back in 2008. And yet, the…
In less than ten years, Armando Christian Pérez went from Mr. 305 to Mr. Worldwide, not just in name and on record, but in real life. As the most famous Cuban-American musician since Gloria Estefan, the man better known as Pitbull has escaped the trappings of his Miami upbringing and…
The Star Wars fandom is at an all-time high these days. Thanks in part to the new film, game, and TV projects launched by Disney. It’s no surprise then that lightsaber-wielding nerds created an unofficial official holiday back in 2011 centered around its most well-known quote. Since, the annual celebration…
This week’s best show isn’t a singular concert but an entire weekend of hip-hop mayhem instead. Rolling Loud is one massive mixtape come to life. The lineup for the two-day festival is a murderer’s row of high profile rappers and rising stars: Future, Young Thug, Ty Dolla $ign, Lil B.,…
There’s a song, “Delirious,” On Grace Potter’s solo debut, Midnight, that channels Prince both in name and in spirit. It’s a glittery pop song with a funky guitar rhythm clearly inspired by the late star. With his recent passing, it’s no surprise then that she began her show Wednesday night…
Later this month, Tribeca Film Festival will debut I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead, a new documentary film about the life and times of Benihana founder, the late Hiroaki “Rocky” Aoki, and that of his son Steve Aoki — whom some may know as one of the biggest EDM stars in…
So, we’re going to assume you don’t have a Beyoncé ticket. But don’t worry. There’s still another option. “Hot to the Touch,” the first track off of Grace Potter’s 2015 solo debut, Midnight, sounds a little bit like the theme song to the BBC science fiction drama, Torchwood. But in addition…
Ushers leading audience members to their assigned seats isn’t very punk. With reserved seats well over sixty bucks and some reaching up past a hundred, Iggy Pop and his Pop Depression Tour at the Fillmore Miami Beach was a far cry from his days with The Stooges and their bloody…
The world is filled with long-winded storytellers and boring status updates about babies and dinner. Unless you’re Keith Richards, Ozzy Osbourne, Richard Branson, or some other filthy-rich British person, there’s a good chance your life is pretty mundane. Still, there are the rare few who can take a seemingly unexceptional…
Unquestionably, the concert of the week is Iggy Pop and Josh Homme at the Fillmore. It’s a big deal and so on and so on. However, the best upcoming show in Miami not on your radar comes via a homegrown Florida outfit. SALES are an indie pop duo from Orlando…
For all the debate that surrounds autism, specifically the myriad of possible and still largely unknown causes, one of the things that may got lost in the conversation are autistic people themselves and their needs. One person who isn’t just talking about it is Patricia Kayser. The Miami transplant and…
Early in our interview, Sharam Tayebi, who — as one of the world’s most respected progressive house DJs and producers — often goes only by his first name, laughs and humbly worries aloud that he won’t have much to talk about. Before long however, despite the lack of details he’s…
Growing up, I had a friend whose dad was older and often in poor health. He was a Cuban immigrant who spoke very little English. He did, however, speak one language: Zelda. Day in and day out, homebound because of his illnesses, this man in his 70s who had more…
Hip-hop is at a crossroads. With rap dissolving into a hazy swirl of over-produced beats and brain dead, mumble robots like Future and Young Thug topping the charts, it’s easy to fall prey to the notion that all the real MCs and lyricists are long gone. Thankfully, that’s far from…
Love them or hate them, poetry slams are a thing. These are competitions where writers shout their poems at an audience, and judges determine a winner based on arbitrary criteria. It is a slow death for most admirers of the art form. Mercifully, Piano Slam is nothing like that (despite…
One day in 1994, residents of Little Havana and Downtown Miami heard a loud boom. It wasn’t a hurricane or a riot or anything dangerous. It was Arnold Schwarzenegger blowing some shit up with a big-ass, fake Harrier Jump Jet. True Lies, the action comedy about a secret agent that…
