ue the song “Last Night” by the Strokes, a band with a jangly hard-driving punky sound everyone says is so New York — sneering latter-day Lou Reeds. Immediately follow it in the randomizer with electronic artist Jega. The Manchester native’s dark, rapid-fire cut “D.M.C.” rips through the previous track’s guts…
Ed Hale and Transcendence touch down this week with a CD-release party for their new Rise and Shine. Atlanta transplant Hale first appeared on the Miami scene as one of the Broken Spectacles. When the Specs broke for good in 1994, Hale hit the road for two years, traveling the…
“You learn how to play music so you don’t have to talk to people,” says Nick Valensi. “Then you do something good and everyone wants to talk to you about it.” It’s a discussion the Strokes aren’t quite in the mood to be having. They’d much rather be sitting poolside,…
Nursing a lingering cold that’s rendered him “somewhat incoherent,” Adam Goren rests on the counter at a Philadelphia deli and waits for someone to make a hoagie for him. “Thanks for being interested in what I do,” he sniffles politely to the reporter on the other end of his cell…
The diva anthems at crobar this Sunday may be kept to the legal minimum. Monthly resident Victor Calderone is in desperate need of a change. The superstar DJ has spun nearly every gay-circuit bash nationwide and quickened the pulse of New York’s underground diva-house vibe. The remixer to the stars…
Patrons flip through songbooks on a typical Saturday night at the Main Street Café in Homestead, eager to sing along with house band the Pathfinders. Packed with couples and friends sitting around small square tables, the large, airy room is warmed by votive candles, familiar greetings, and the strum of…
Ever wonder what old Specials or Madness songs would sound like in Yiddish? Or hear a reggae memorial to those who died in the Holocaust? King Django will let you know, as well as sound out plenty of funky drums, reggae backbeats, and rockin’ guitars, with a dose of loop…
Time has passed, memories have lapsed, and the revolution has all but collapsed in the decades since The Last Poets first hit the black-arts and civil-rights movements with their unique blend of political fervor, poetic justice, and righteous rhythms. Inspired by key figures of those turbulent times — from Malcolm…
This is Danny Jessup: Danny of the one-liners, Dan of the local music scene, the man onstage with the microphone and a quip, the impresario, the promoter, the artist, the handyman, the erstwhile talk show host, the poor man’s Letterman, the jokester friend on a barstool near you. This is…
The Politics of Dancing. For DJ Paul van Dyk that’s both an album title and the catch phrase of a scene at a crossroads. Since crashing the industry nearly a decade ago, the German native has become an international sensation in electronic music. His name draws sell-out crowds in clubs…
Phone lines are cut in the small desert town 60 kilometers from Pakistan. “India and Pakistan are getting ready for war,” the e-mail reads, “security is tight. The airport is closed.” So in this town in Northern India a handsome, dark-haired man boards a train that will take him from…
If Sax on the Beach fails, the newly opened music bar will be just another Miami jazz dream deferred, like Arthur’s (which featured big names in the Eighties) and the cozy, if empty, Champagnes on 79th Street that closed months ago. This gin joint in the lobby of the Bay…
Jorge Moreno’s manager had a plan. With the kid’s good looks, he could be the next Ricky or Enrique. That was the pitch for the record companies. Trouble was, he was pitching to Madonna’s new Latin label, and Maverick Musica wasn’t shopping for just another pretty face. Sure the Material…
So this is odd, the painful realization that all has gone wrong/And nobody cares at all,” sighs Chris Carrabba. “And nobody cares at all,” answers the gentle children’s choir of the crowd. What the hell? Seven hundred fans have arrived at Millenium, a dance club in Pompano Beach — on…
It’s a lonely hour, one promoters dread. Billboardlive is empty save for bartenders wiping down bottles and tonight’s first-up DJ prepping the sound system with not-ready-for-prime-time records. But Jeffrey Sanker, a promoter who draws up to 25,000 for his major DJ events, knows the club will soon be packed for…
They’ve got the look, they’re gettin’ the buzz, and their sound is straight out of a New York garage via Memphis. This is the kind of lo-fi, hi-fuzz sound that rattled the windows of the neighbors’ houses across the U.S.A. — 30 years ago plus. Named after a couple of…
Carlos Vives will never be caught in a sequined jump suit. Exuding gentleness rather than libido, the pop vallenato singer is more likely to gambol across stage wearing a T-shirt, sandals, and shorts. Mischievous eyes framed by long, loose curls, his bustling energy at age 40 is a far cry…
The makeup of Miami’s jam-fusion band Outdance is a microcosm of South Florida itself: Tom Korba, who plays the Chapman Stick, is a transplanted New Yorker. Drummer Raul Ramirez was born in Puerto Rico. Guitarist Josh Sonntag grew up in Cancún. Percussionist Sean Dibble is a Miami-Dade County native. But…
What’s house music about? Arguably the first form of electronic dance music to rise from the ashes of disco, pure house is hard to find these days, save for too-brief sets by originators like Derrick Carter and Frankie Knuckles. Yet Christopher Lawrence and Judge Jules still summon ghosts of the…
Justin Gracer seems none too satisfied, crouching alone on the outdoor stage of Piccadilly Garden’s PopLife, packing up his guitar. As the crowd of hipster indie-rockers and wannabe Brit-poppers mills about the fountain and foliage, the vocalist/guitarist of the Miami-based alternative rock quartet Machete slips his sleek white Stratocaster into…
It’s already dark when the farandula gathers outside Café Nostalgia on a Thursday evening. Journalists, artists, songwriters, and industry types kiss and shake hands, careful not to crease their starched shirts or defrost their frozen smiles. Inside, waiters cut through the multitudes, carrying sugar-laced trays of mojitos and rocks glasses…
Aslender bamboo leaf floats from above and alights on the surface of a shallow pond. Under the water a school of dime-size minnows darts among the reeds, under a moon bridge, then circles around carefully placed rocks. Amid all this Asian greenery, a visitor resting beneath the shade of a…
