Miami quartet Little Atlas calls itself an art-rock band, but its music skews closer to the adventures of Genesis, Yes, and Rush than the undulations of Franz Ferdinand and the Futureheads. Lead vocalist Steve Katsikas sings songs such as “The Prisoner” and “The Ballad of Eddie Wanderlust” that are filled…

It has been a little more than two years since I wrote my first “Basshead” column. It ended with the sentence: “Perhaps that’s why, when I first moved here, I was scared shitless.” Why would I publicly admit Miami is an intimidating place? The foreignness of this city, with its…

The first things you notice when you visit Sweat Records are the pastel colors. Several canvasses by local artists such as LEBO, Duane Hosein, and Helena Garcia dot walls painted in bright hues, creating a perpetually warm and earthy environment. You could assert without irony that Sweat Records is a…

Those who love to laze along Miami Beach’s well-trod sands will still want plenty of sun come July 4, so why not listen to some good music while you’re at it? Nikki Beach is offering a prize for you aesthetes: an all-day, all-night party featuring big-time DJs Steve Lawler and…

If most of the Ghostly International clique, led by sterling electronic producers Matthew Dear and Tadd Mullinix, is the resurrection/remix of all sounds Detroit, then Kill Memory Crash is the revival of nearby Chicago’s Wax Trax! past. Kill Memory Crash mixes its heavy industrial vibes with newfangled IDM techniques, seeking…

July 4 is all about freedom — at least for the privileged Americans who can afford to buy it — so what better way to spend the weekend than to go to an awesome free show? Remembrance features four rooms dedicated to hip-hop, breaks, drum and bass, and IDM. Its…

Wikkid Lil Girls is light years removed from the sub-Björk-isms that infected Breath from Another, Esthero’s 1998 debut. Esthero vocalizes over her backgrounds, which range from jazz and cabaret to pop, soul, and hip-hop, with more confidence and swagger than before. The album is excitingly drenched in sex, with songs…

When Renea L. Moss took the microphone during Mello Mondays, the District’s weekly spoken-word event, there were few men in the room. The Miami Heat were playing the Detroit Pistons in the NBA’s Eastern Conference finals. The place was mostly filled with groups of smartly dressed young black women (which…

DJ’ing isn’t easy. It usually takes years of sweating it out in hole-in-the-wall nightclubs, passing out mix CDs to anyone who’ll take one, and opening for big-name headliners before you finally reach the heights of Tisto. Concurrently most of the top jocks who can sell out a superclub or arena…

“Dirty Filthy,” “Wowie Zowie,” “Sugar”: the world of London-based producer Tom “Superchumbo” Stephan is big and booming, as fat (as in the old-school slang phat) as the megasize club speakers that broadcast his tracks. Unabashedly enraptured with tribal funk, Stephan tries to make his tracks as deep as possible: One…

Ge-ology Plays Ge-ology works almost in spite of itself. At 30 tracks, it’s way too long, more of a compilation of Ge-ology’s many remixes, instrumentals, and productions for artists such as Unspoken Heard (“Elevator Music”) and Consequence (“Fa Sho”) than a traditional album. To hip-hop fans, Ge-ology’s tracks will sound…

This week there is no joy in Mudville. Winter and spring have ended, stemming the influx of tourists and supermarket checkout celebrities. The sweltering season has begun, bringing with it tropical storms and hurricanes and, when it isn’t raining, feverishly hot weather. Worst of all, the Miami Heat did not…

Yes, this is another story about a local hip-hop act. In case you didn’t know, Miami-Dade County has become a way station for American rappers, whether it’s Houston producer Paul Wall roaming around South Beach (and skipping interviews!), Twista camping it up at Marlin Bar, or Juvenile camping out in…

Since first appearing (and being overshadowed by Big Daddy Kane and Craig G) on the posse classic “The Symphony” way back in 1988, Masta Ace has been one of the most underrated artists in the hip-hop genre. Perhaps because his consistency has yielded plenty of underground hits — his G-funk-era…

Since their promising 1998 debut, Behind the Front, the Black Eyed Peas have become the group you love to hate, an unabashedly pop act who would have earned the epithet “sellout” if everyone else wasn’t selling out too. Monkey Business is shallow and corny, an overproduced and derivative simulacrum of…

In 2005, house music is still everywhere. Want proof? Meet Jask, a producer from Tampa, of all places, who is slowly building a reputation with his brand of “Thai house,” a rhythmically deep twist on the sound that will ring familiar to fans of Osunlade, Ron Trent, and François Kervorkian…

This month Centro Cultural Español is cosponsoring five concerts, four of which are free. The series includes performances by singer-songwriter Miguel Luna, the popular Spanish fusion band Ojos de Brujo, balladeer Pedro Guerra (who will give an acoustic set), and a joint appearance by jazz singer Celia Mur and pianist…

Spread out over five days and numerous venues, this year’s JVC Jazz Festival boasts a truly impressive list of talent. The main concert, which takes place at the Jackie Gleason Theater Friday, June 3, is a smooth jazz blowout featuring Norman Brown, Chris Botti, Raul Midon, Peabo Bryson, Brenda Russell,…

Rajko “Isolée” Mueller’s 2000 debut, Rest, was a classic piece of electronic music that truly encapsulated tech-house, a term that has been kicked around ever since Armand Van Helden and Carl Cox began slamming out records with a fiercely seductive 4/4 beat. (Confusingly their music is now referred to as…

As is the case in all major American cities, you can hear almost any sound in Miami, from cheap crunk and tribal house to meat-market salsa and roots reggae. Even subcultural disciplines such as IDM and electro have supporters who blare the music at select out-of-the-way clubs. But I have…

Most artists these days are obsessed with sex of the romantic, psychological, and gynecological kind. But few are as playfully raunchy as Blowfly. The nom de plume for funk musician Clarence Reid, Blowfly charmingly reduces the act of making love to its nasty, all-too-human essence: pussies and dicks (or in…