Love Your Local Band: Pieces
Local singer-songwriter Courtney Nicole started playing open mics in San Francisco almost a decade ago. Just before moving to Santa Cruz four years ago, she changed her name to Pieces, a nickname...
View ArticleMusic Picks Jan. 17-23
Music highlights for the week of January 17, 2018. THURSDAY 1/18 NEWGRASS RAILROAD EARTH I have no idea what the roots music scene is like in Stillwater, New Jersey, but if Railroad Earth is any...
View ArticleLove Your Local Band: Yaya’s Kitchen
Sarah Cruse recalls an earlier musical project that she worked on during a dark period of her life—the darkness, she says, was represented in the music itself. But you would never know Cruse had a dark...
View ArticleGiveaway: Junior Reid
Reggae and dancehall artist Junior Reid was frontman and lead vocalist for the legendary Jamaican group Black Uhuru for three albums, Brutal, Positive and Black Uhuru Live in New York. He’s also the...
View ArticleLove Your Local Band: Whiskey West
Last October, just before Whiskey West was about to go on stage at Moe’s Alley, acoustic guitarist/singer Eric Winders was telling upright bassist Devon Pearse about a song about redneck hippies....
View ArticleMusic Picks Jan. 31-Feb. 6
Live music highlights for the week of January 31, 2018. WEDNESDAY 1/31 A CAPPELLA LADYSMITH BLACK MAMBAZO Little was known about Ladysmith Black Mambazo in the U.S. prior to 1984, when Paul Simon...
View ArticleLove Your Local Band: Fulminante
Sudden. Tremendous. Explosive. These are the rough English translations for the word fulminante, and the best descriptions for the powerful music behind the local three-piece act that bears the name....
View ArticleLove Your Local Band: Kuumbwa Honor Band
Many professional musicians get their start in high school music programs. For Santa Cruz high schoolers with an interest in jazz, they can aspire toward the Kuumbwa Jazz Honor Band, which is open to...
View ArticleMusic Picks Feb. 7-13
Music highlights for the week of February 7, 2018. THURSDAY 2/8 REGGAE-ROCK FAYUCA In 2013, Arizona reggae-rock-Latin band Fayuca released a video for their song “Por Que Seguir,” which included some...
View ArticleMusic Picks Feb. 14-20
Live music highlights for the week of February 14, 2018. WEDNESDAY 2/14 FOLK LAURA LOVE DUO In the 1990s and 2000s, singer-songwriter Laura Love released a stream of well-received albums, and was a...
View ArticleLove Your Local Band: West of Nashville
Kim Arzate was a Spanish teacher who always wanted to be a country singer. In early 2015, she decided to follow this passion and form a band. At first, their style was too varied—country, pop, rock,...
View ArticleGiveaway: Molotov
In the mid-’90s, Mexican rock band Molotov formed and started playing gigs at underground clubs in Mexico City. With messages of political resistance, sexuality and protest, the band’s debut album,...
View ArticleMusic Picks Feb. 21-27
Live music highlights for the week of February 21, 2018. WEDNESDAY 2/21 ROCK SHAKEY ZIMMERMAN Led by Pat Nevins, Shakey Zimmerman will perform a one-night-only acoustic tribute to iconic rockers Bob...
View ArticleGiveaway: Psychedelic Furs
“Love My Way,” “Pretty in Pink,” “Heaven,” “The Ghost in You”—hit after hit after hit, the Psychedelic Furs were an era-defining band in the 1980s. Whether you were new wave, goth or punk, the Furs...
View ArticleMusic Picks Feb. 28-Mar. 6
Live music highlights for the week of February 28, 2018. WEDNESDAY 2/28 JAZZ MILES ELECTRIC BAND Miles Davis landed at the center of the jazz/rock fusion movement with the release of Bitches Brew,...
View ArticleGiveaway: Flogging Molly
Formed in the late 1990s, Flogging Molly has carved a niche for itself as a pioneering Irish-American Celtic punk band out of Los Angeles. The band has been around long enough that if you’ve been...
View ArticleMusic Picks Mar. 7-13
Live music highlights for the week of March 7, 2018. THURSDAY 3/8 HAWAIIAN MASTERS OF HAWAIIAN MUSIC The connection between Santa Cruz and Hawaii is strong, with surfing, a laidback lifestyle and a...
View ArticleLove Your Local Band: Aza
It’s not easy for Fattah Abbou to explain the musical and cultural influences that are in his band Aza’s music. On one hand, it’s a mixture of traditional Moroccan music and Western music. But, as he...
View ArticleMusic Picks Mar. 14-20
Live music highlights for the week of March 14, 2018. THURSDAY 3/15 CELTIC BLACK BROTHERS The Black Family has been one of the most important modern Celtic music ensembles since the ’70s. The group...
View ArticleGiveaway: Don Carlos
Jamaica’s Waterhouse district has produced a number of genre-defining dub and reggae artists, including King Tubby, Junior Reid, King Jammy and former Black Uhuru vocalist Don Carlos, who was part of...
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