Brighton's indie rock quartet have come a long way since 2003's The Decline of British Sea Power. The band's eccentric catalog has evolved through familiar Britpop idiosyncrasies on their debut, eased into more global pop hooks on the follow-up, Open Season, and now enters the great big world of stadium rockin' indie with this year's Do You Like Rock Music? more ›

Emo’s Free Week has come and gone, but the venue and the city march on with a buffet of mouth-watering shows available for consumption tonight. Eclectic beats from Dan Deacon pace Emo’s inside stage (as a part of the Ultimate Reality Tour) while Steamroller, She Craves, Killer Crocs of Uganda, and The Banner Year rock Emo’s Lounge. more ›

Image by LuiSFher Gallo via Cafe Tacvba’s MySpace Cafe TacvbaThursday, December 6La Zona Rosa (612 W. 4th Street)$40, Doors at 7pm, Show at 8pm[info] | [tickets]Pop quiz: name a band that has won multiple Grammys, performed on MTV Unplugged, been compared favorably to Radiohead, played three encores at a recent Lollapalooza, and headlined to 170,000 people at Mexico City's Palacio de los Deportes. If you're thinking U2 or Coldplay, we couldn't blame you. But the... more ›

Formed from the ashes of Split Enz, Crowded House may well have been the best pure pop-rock group of their era. Twenty-two years after their beginnings in Melbourne, Australia, Neil Finn and Nick Seymour have brought back Crowded House's classic songwriting and effortless melodies via a new album and tour. The group disbanded in 1996 and has weathered the shocking suicide of founding member Paul Hester, the disconnect of distance (Finn lives in Auckland,... more ›

Luciano Pavarotti, widely regarded as the world's finest living tenor, passed away this morning at his home in Italy. Pavarotti had been battling pancreatic cancer since 2006, and was hospitalized in August of this year as a result of ongoing struggles with the disease. Known as the 'King of High Cs,' Pavarotti popularized opera and classical music more than any of his contemporaries, particularly in the U.S., bringing the genre to the forefront of American... more ›

The Horrors – The Horrors EP Coming straight outta the swampy backwaters of, erm, London art school…hm, let’s start over. Not to be confused with the US Horrors, who play the same excessively raw neo-proto-punk but don’t get any press because they live in Iowa, these London delinquents split the difference, both visually and aurally, between Edward Gorey’s Victorian grotesques and Elvis in Jailhouse Rock. There’s no doubt that The Horrors are well-connected—how else do... more ›

A few years ago, Snow Patrol were broke guys in Scotland with a knack for writing jangly rock songs. These days, their latest album debuted in the Billboard Top 40 and at #1 in the UK, they spent last year opening for U2, and their last CD went triple platinum in Europe. While Snow Patrol have already played Austin twice this year (at Stubb's in March and May), they'll be back in the States... more ›

When we were in high school, we used to put on our hemp necklaces, Doc Martens, and zip-off pants and go to concerts like Edgefest – you know, big generic shows filled with big, generic bands and thousands of kids dressed just like us taking in the music under a haze of very low-quality smoke. The Snow Patrol show this past Friday at Stubb’s gave us some unfortunate flashbacks. Nothing's wrong with Snow Patrol,... more ›

Irish indie rockers Snow Patrol released their second US album, Eyes Open, earlier this month, following up on the tremendous success of their debut stateside LP, Final Straw. "Run" reached the top 5 in the UK singles chart; its eminently singable chorus and mainstream accessibility ensured their status as one of the most popular British bands here in the states (according to wiki, "Run" was played roughly twenty eight thousand times on US radio stations... more ›

Hello Forward Russia! [Forgive us for not doing the Spanish exclamations on that one, even though it's part of their shtick, but we don’t know the “special keys” for that, so okay then.] Coming straight out of Leeds and kicking ass since 2004, this quatro has a reputation for stirring the shit and getting the monkeys to stop holding up the wall. We're going to take the lame route and just start naming other bands... more ›

It could have been a lot worse. Mariah Carey could have walked away with Song, Record, or even Album of the Year; at that point, we would've completely given up on the music industry. Not that we have an extreme degree of faith in the corporate arts as is, but giving the big one to an album titled The Emancipation of Mimi would have all-but confirmed that those people are insane, evil, and totally... more ›

For those of you who did not hear about it, yet, one UT student got the thrill of a lifetime this past weekend when he got to play with his heroes, U2. Nineteen-year-old Arlington native and pre-med student Sunjay Devarajan had taken a homemade sign with “Angel of Harlem” written on it, accompanied by the chord progressions, in case the band had forgotten them. On the other side of the sign he had written, “Let Me Play.” Sure enough, as they have done in various shows for decades, Bono and the boys called the young fan on stage to jam with the band. After successfully playing guitar along with the Edge and Co. and singing along with Bono, Sunjay hugged Bono and then motioned that he’d like to make a sunglass-swap. Bono obliged, handing the kid his Armani shades in exchange for some Eckerd’s cheapies. more ›

None of the Austinist staff was among the lucky 1 million who scored tickets to the much-ballyhooed Live 8 international music orgy. And chances are, neither were you! more ›

Our apologies to all the U2 fans who assumed this had something to do with everyone's second favorite Irish import (next to Bushmills of course)... In fact, that was just a teaser to get you here... and it WORKED! Sucker... But please don't be angry, because the true subject of this post aint about the hate, it's about the love... The love that ONE WORLD THEATER spreads around Austin. We Austinists are all about Austin, and Austin is all about the arts... Nobody more so than the folks over at One World. The theater itself is beautiful, and offers season after season of some of the most ecclectic and amazing talent in town - spanning art forms and genre boundaries. And better still, in true Austin fashion, this non-profit uses it's proceeds to fund a successful outreach program which brings arts from around the world to schools all over Austin (many of which have had funding drastically cut in recent years). The theater and box office are out on Bee Caves Road (or 2244, or any of the other twelve names people want to give it) and can be reached at (512)32-WORLD... Check it out! One World in the one and only Austin... more ›