Nate Jackson

The Five Must-See Shows in OC This Weekend

Friday, May 24 LA Philharmonic with Gustavo Dudamel Segerstrom Concert Hall Classical music isn't exactly "hot" right now as most of the original artists are long-dead. But with the talent of the Los Angeles Phil Harmonic Orchestra and the leadership of conductor Gustavo Dudamel, the works of the ... More >>

Kirk Franklin Talks About His New "Gospel Brunch" at House of Blues

Kirk Franklin is easily one of God's greatest hype men. On stage, his ball of ad-libs, inspiration and intensity breaks through the angelic roar of every choir he's ever put together. Not an easy task, considering he's surrounded himself with some of the world's greatest vocal talent since since he ... More >>

The Five Must-See Shows in OC This Weekend

Friday, May 10 Lil' B The Observatory Lil B, the heavily tattooed Berkeley, California rapper with a gleaming grill and oversized earrings, entered the hip-hop game in 2006 as part of Bay Area rap group The Pack. Over the last three years he's garnered a tremendous Internet following, popularizing ... More >>

The Five Must-See Shows in OC This Week

Monday, May 6This Time With FEELINGDetroit BarFor being a "four-piece fridge rock band" This Time With Feeling sure know how to heat up a dance floor at an indie rock show. Embracing sharp pop structures,  full bodied rhythm, and Ali Coyle's vocals seething with attitude, the punchy four-piece ... More >>

The Five Must-See Shows in OC This Weekend

Friday, May 3 Basscon The Yost Theater Friday night's alright for partying down, so make your way over to Santa Ana's historic Yost Theater for Basscon tonight. The Yost has been putting out great EDM and trance music nights for a while now, but Basscon looks like its going to be an intense night o ... More >>

Zakk Wylde Once Went 77 Days On Tour Without Brushing His Teeth or Showering

Zakk Wylde's gut punching distortion and furious guitar solos have caused plenty of irreparable damage to our ear drums in the name of metal since his days touring with Ozzy Osbourne. Even after the heyday of old-school metal, his riffs remain savage, his leather jacket game always on point. These d ... More >>

The Best of Coachella: Weekend One

Karen O's Outfit Karen O's wardrobe on Friday night was bad ass. The Yeah Yeah Yeah's front woman appeared on the main stage in a technicolor cape draped over a suit that looked like it was made of mercury. The vibrant collage was topped with a headpiece that Liberace might have worn had he ever bee ... More >>

The Worst of Coachella: Weekend One

Daft Punk Fake-Out Friday and Saturday, all anyone could talk about was if Daft Punk was going to show up during Phoenix's set. Why? Because we were fucking teased. On the main stage before the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, a long commercial for their new album played, and then we found out that members of the ... More >>

The Five Must-See Shows in OC This Weekend

Friday, April 5 Feeding PeopleFingerprints Feeding People play a delightful brand of fuzzy-buzzy garage rock seasoned with reverby vocals and spooky-circus guitar riffs. At times, they're reminiscent of the Doors (but if the Doors had made it to the late '70s.) Another way to conceptualize Feedin ... More >>

OC Music Awards - City National Grove of Anaheim - March 9, 2013

Last Saturday night, a well-dressed army of local music fans, press and artists packed into the City National Grove of Anaheim for the 12 annual OC Music Awards. Like most awards shows, the night's festivities went  bit longer than necessary with a few fumbles here and there and a mixture of in ... More >>

The Five Best Concerts in OC This Weekend

Friday, March 1 Super Diamond House of Blues Anaheim Remember the movie Saving Silverman with Steve Zahn and Jack Black? It was about a couple of lovable loser musicians whose idol was none other than Neil Diamond, the psuedo-rock crooner from your parent's generation. Sometimes truth is stranger ... More >>

The Five Best Concerts in OC This Week

Monday, February 18 DJ Hype The Observatory Pre-iPods, pre-laptops, pre-everyone's-a-DJ, DJ Hype was circling the globe, bringing his turn table skills to millions of party people. Born in Belgium, Kevin Ford began as a DJ on Fantasy FM, a pirate radio station in London. But he hit mainstream ... More >>

The Five Best Concerts in OC This Weekend

Friday, February 15 The Ziggens Slidebar If you don't know much about Orange County ska/ surf/punk/garage band the Ziggens, it's ok, somehow they've been over shadowed by one time label mates such as Sublime. But unlike Sublime, who burned out before becoming massively succesful, the Ziggens have ... More >>

The Five Best Concerts in OC This Week

Monday, February 4 Social Distortion House of Blues Anaheim With few shows happening this Monday, you might consider trying to check out Social Distortion's umpteenth gig at the House of Blues this month. Perhaps setting a record for the most shows played at the Anaheim venue by a single band in o ... More >>

Annie McQueen's Country Sound Prefers Not to Fit In

In a genre in which fashion practically forces allegiance to all things plaid, paisley and plain, folk artist Annie McQueen easily qualifies as a conscientious objector. Studying her from the soles of her black platform boots to the fur to the mystical, Stevie Nicks-esque accessories all the way up ... More >>

Former Doll Hut Owner Linda Jemison Remebers the Clubhouse That Punk Built

To a lot of people, you could say former Doll Hut owner Linda Jemison is one of OC's unsung patron saints of punk rock. The owner of the legendary--now extinct--punk club ran the place from 1989 to 2001 with a tough, mother hen ownership style that helped define the place during its heyday. As of ye ... More >>

Eugene Owens' Slow Learner Collective Embraces Musical Polygamy

Long Beach is a city for musicians who like to spread themselves around. It's nothing new to hear about a guitarist or drummer who happens to play in four or five bands at a time. Sure, we wouldn't call that exclusively LB behavior. But we'll be damned if musicians in any other city do it as effortl ... More >>

Young Dubliners Can't Wait to Return to the OC Pub That Scammed Them

It's not often that a band can look back fondly about a time they were tricked into a playing a venue. But fortunately for world-traveled Celtic rock band Young Dubliner's the luck of the Irish was on their side the first time they were asked to play Muldoon's Irish Pub in Newport Beach. For a band ... More >>

The Five Best Concerts in OC This Week

Tuesday, Dec. 4Bruce Springsteen Honda Center Some rock 'n' roll shows simply fill a Tuesday night with enough noise to free the audience from the minutiae of the work week. The band sings a couple songs and flashes some strobe lights--whoopity doo. Then there are concerts that are spiritual, st ... More >>

Darryl Jenifer of Bad Brains Vents Heavily About His Band's Documentary, 'A Band in D.C.'

This week ,we got the chance to snag an interview with Bad Brains bassist Darryl Jenifer to talk about the survival story of the legendary hardcore outfit who just put out a new album. Read the full story here. Of course we got a change to branch into other topics including a pretty revealing rant a ... More >>

Eats Everything is Pudgy, But Gets a Better Onstage Workout Than the Average DJ

Sure, talk shit on his weight if you want. But in an EDM landscape filled with stoic, overly-polished, stereotypical Euro types, Bristol-born DJ Eats Everything is a big man who knows to move. Should you be one of the fortunate revelers to watch him spin his pulsing, percussive mish-mash of house, h ... More >>

The Five Best Shows in O.C. This Week: Nov. 5-9

Monday, November 5Lindsey SterlingThe Observatory It's violin dubstep from a sci-fi-loving, eccentric little 26-year old with a knack for interpretive dance. This is Lindsey Stirling and she was born right here in OC. Her sound is a surprisingly unconventional collaboration of styles and genres--b ... More >>

The Five Best Shows in OC This Weekend: Adam Ant, Frightenend Rabbit

Friday, October, 19 Crocodiles, The Soft Pack The Glass House Two new bands--"new" as in they post-date the Feelies and the Psychedelic Furs, respectively, even if they've both been around for a couple years--with two new albums on which they make some perfect new choices and deliver us some ... More >>

Jillionaire Says Major Lazer Can Free The Universe From Boredom at EDM Shows

If you've been to a Major Lazer show recently, you realize that their name has become a bit of a misnomer. Not that we're complaining--after an endless summer of EDM shows spent watching one identical laser-light party after the next, it's nice to see a group take a notably different route in their ... More >>

The Best Five Shows in OC This Week: Big Business, Major Lazer

Monday, October 15Big BusinessAlex's BarFor those not familiar with the genre Sludge Metal, meet Big Business. Hailing from Seattle and signed to Gold Metal Records, they traffic in crunchy, chugging jams with wonky, drop-tuned strings. Reminiscent of instrumental metal band Pelican, Big Business fe ... More >>

The Five Best Shows in OC This Weekend: Sound Asylum, Agent Orange

Friday, October 12 MeikoThe Yost TheaterThe Yost Theater puts on three musical events in one night--the festivities start off with a co-headlining act of Meiko and Bobby Long at the early hour of 6 p.m. Local transplant folk musician Meiko, a native of Georgia, came to Los Angeles at a young ag ... More >>

Top 25 Greatest Orange County Bands of All Time: The Complete List

Go ahead, call us a bunch of culture-less, lily-white suburbanites with a partiality to flip-flops and right-wing politics. Those kind of labels never cease to amuse us. Because one thing that instantly dooms most of the tired cliches ascribed to OC is the music--the one-of-a-kind frustration, aggre ... More >>

Top 25 Greatest Orange County Bands of All Time: 25-15

Go ahead, call us a bunch of culture-less, lily-white suburbanites with a partiality to flip-flops and right-wing politics. Those kind of labels never cease to amuse us. Because one thing that instantly dooms most of the tired cliches ascribed to OC is the music--the one-of-a-kind frustration, aggre ... More >>

The Five Best Shows in OC This Week: Conor Oberst, Dr. Dog

Monday, October 1 The Two FoscariSegerstrom Center for the Arts The LA Opera makes a one-night-only appearance at the Segerstrom Center for the Arts to perform Giuseppe Verdi's The Two Foscari. Verdi based his three-act opera on the historical play of the same n ... More >>

The Best Five Shows in OC This Week

Monday, September 24Pawn Shop Kings The Constellation RoomA unique musical style often comes from superior talent and vision, though it can also be a product of geographical diversity. Case in point: Pawn Shop Kings. They're a musical melting pot--a whole lot of Arkansas blended with SoCal's sunshin ... More >>

Emblem3 Talk About X Factor, Trying to Avoid Being Labeled a Boy Band

Last week, OC represented itself in the world of reality show contests yet again thanks to a teenage trio called Emblem3 who took the stage on Fox's the X Factor for a live audition. The Huntington Beach group, featuring Drew Chadwick, 19, and brothers Wesley and Keaton Stromberg (18 and 15 res ... More >>

The Five Best Concerts in O.C. This Weekend

See Also:*Free Ticket Wednesday: She Wants Revenge at the Observatory*The Hives - The Observatory - September 11, 2012 [w/Video]*Jim Norton Wants to Sleep With You, if You Can Stand His Sleep ApneaFriday, September 14She Wants RevengeThe ObservatoryIs that the sound of the 1980s reemerging from the ... More >>

FYF Fest 2012: Five Reunited Bands We Really Want to See

See Also:*FYF Fest Two-Day Line-up Announced*The Growlers Announce New Album Release* Pacific Festival: The Dunes AnnouncedPlenty of people tend to associate FYF Fest with bands that will soon be filling their iPods with fresh sound for the fall. This year, its lineup of subterranean, local and ... More >>

Tricia Freeman: The Blond-Haired Blues Ambassador of South County

See Also:*Hank III Doesn't Aim to Be Legendary, Just Original*Brandi Carlile Explains Why She Had to Record Her New Album in the Middle of the Woods*Iris DeMent: Ass-Kicking, Outlaw Country Singer Talks Growing Up in OCSure, places like San Clemente and Dana Point aren't exactly the Nashville of the ... More >>

[UPDATED with CEO Defends Octo-Auction:] Nadya Suleman Will Date You ... for a Price

See the update at the end of this post on WhatsYourPrice.com's CEO defending the auction of a date with Octomom. ORIGINAL POST, AUG. 6, 12:30 P.M.: Octomom Nadya Suleman of La Habra has continued her trolling of the Interwebs for money from saps, parlaying her recent GoFundMe.com plea for $150,000 ... More >>

Yes, Virginia, There Are Hipsters in OC

[Mental Notes] Plus, Avalon Says No to Being Sober

SunGod Summer Sunfest Organizer 2Mex: Flexing his Fan Base, Fucking with People's Heads

2Mex's fan base will destroy you. Just look what they did to that deer.​2Mex is the kinda guy who likes to put his money where his mouth is. Two months before the November release of his new album, My Fan Base Will Destroy You (on Sage Francis' label, Strange Famous Records), this vetera ... More >>

Letters From OC Weekly Readers

Concerts Everywhere

[Mental Notes] If you didn't watch a show last week, you missed out

Five Questions With Gram Rabbit's Todd Rutherford

​Last night, Gram Rabbit brought their brand of desert psychedelia to the Detroit Bar. (Read the review of the show by Nate Jackson here). After playing LA and OC, and doing the requisite KCRW rounds (watch it here), the duo is touring the Southwest to support their latest, Miracle & Metaphors ... More >>

Lightning In a Bottle, The Return of the Ice Cream Man, the New Limb News

[Mental Notes] It's almost summer, and the festival scene is heating up

Sublime With Rome With Tour Dates

[Mental Notes] Also: Re-liking the Like, running with Letterman, and much love for Avi Buffalo

[Year In Review] Revisiting the Greatest Orange County Concerts of 2009

[Sound Guy] Jessica Dobson's Connections Run Deep. Plus News From Local Natives and Jeffree Star

Showgazing: Death Hymn Number 9, Head Sounds at Detroit Bar

​"You wrote about the Dig, and you missed their set. You're the worst music editor ever!"Those (good-natured, assuredly!) words from DJ Oldboy--at Detroit Bar last night in his capacity as a percussionist for Death Hymn Number 9--greeted me as I walked through the parking lot.It was kind of late. ... More >>

No Sleep till Indio: Huge Week of Shows Leading up to Coachella

Even if you're not making it out to Coachella this weekend, there's plenty of runoff 'round these parts to keep you satisfied, with a plethora of artists playing the festival hitting us up on the way to Indio.

Last Night: Boogaloo Assassins, Allensworth at Detroit Bar

BY NATE JACKSONLast Night: Allensworth, Boogaloo Assassins at Detroit Bar; Saturday, January 10.Better Than: Break dancing on hot coals.Despite years spent incessantly trolling for talent on the local music scene, there is still something oddly special about showing up early to a great gig. You know ... More >>

Letters From OC Weekly Readers

Last Night: The Living Suns, The Entrance Band, Cavil at Rest, My Pet Saddle, The Union Line @ HOB Anaheim 7/12

By Nate Jackson After almost three years or wrestling with their debut album Self, the Living Suns finally let their finished product see the light at the House of Blues. When I read the lineup for the band’s record-release party, I had to hand it to the Suns for putting together a great OC/LA in ... More >>

Last Night: Abstract Workshop’s 10th Anniversary Party @ Detroit Bar, May 31, 2008

Darondo, Nino Moschella and the Park, Rhettmatic, Jud Nester, Cocoe, Scotty Coats, Schmuck and others @ Detroit Bar on 5/31 Better than: Sex and the City… or in the country. Almost. Download: tracks from Darondo’s Let My People Go Just about everybody brought his A game to Abstract Workshopâ ... More >>