Before the Streets pushed things forward, before Dizzee Rascal fixed up and looked sharp, Rodney Smith — a.k.a. Roots Manuva — set the tone of future-funking UK hip-hop. Back in early ’99, Roots dropped the digitized, high-stepping Brand New Second Hand, double-dipping as innovative producer and basso profundo MC. That…
MOMIX dances with rattlesnakes SAT 2/12 The lights dim, the music starts, and the dancers appear to have been eaten by the giant Gila monster crawling across the stage. Huh? No, there wasn’t a peyote button in your taco — it’s Opus Cactus, the latest offering by dance illusionist group…
After a decade as a rock-anthem-spewing locomotive, Fort Lauderdale’s Crease has nearly arrived at a cohesive, big time-ready persona. The four-piece puts on a serious game face to attack Only Human, its second full-length; this is a band that’s seen the wet end of the music industry stick, having been…
It might not sport as many notches on its silver-spiked belt, but this year’s Zippo Hot Tour had something the Vans Warped Tour didn’t: local draw. Fort Lauderdale’s Trendkill battled seven local bands in venues across Broward and Palm Beach, eventually beating out other hard rockers like Higher Zenith and…
Don’t be fooled by the slick duds and white stretch limo. Urban Mystic, the Fort Lauderdale native rising fast on the national R&B scene, hasn’t let success go to his 19-year-old head just yet. “I try to keep it straight, let the homies know I’m from the ‘hood,” he says,…
Now that Ice Cube is doing slapstick comedy, we can all agree that the edge of gangsta rap is permanently dulled. The writers of Are We There Yet?, which opened recently in South Florida theaters, originally had in mind Adam Sandler to play the lead role of Nick (a mere…
Like British counterparts Sidestepper and Da Lata, Domenico+2 offers further proof that Brazilian music can yield some of the most intriguing forays into electro-trad fusion. The key difference between those groups, though, is that Domenico+2 is actually Brazilian. And that indigenous legacy is important: Guitarist Moreno Veloso is the son…
As one of the first European DJs to put down roots in South Beach in the early ’90s, Ivano Bellini played a critical role in exposing South Florida crowds to new sounds. Born in Lausanne, Switzerland, to a musical family, Bellini knew early on that his life would be dedicated…
Miami’s I/O Lounge was at half capacity January 14, the crowd divided between hard-core hip-hop heads and general-interest partiers ready to recite lyrical ringers like “Yo mama’s got a peg leg with a kickstand.” Former Pharcyde fellow Fatlip was headlining, but by the time he wrapped up his couldn’t-call-it-a-comeback set,…
“Indeed, some of my most pleasurable moments on a tour occur in the struggle to secure a working payphone on a rainy night with only 10 minutes until the bus will finally and irrevocably leave my ass behind somewhere in Missouri. For it is of this stuff — an essence…
Remembering Never Women and Children Die First (Ferret) Simplekill A Novel in May (Self-released) Between these two undersubtle, overwrought Fort Lauderdale hardcore bands is only the tiniest distinction. Simplekill screamer Panjo sounds like he gargled a bowlful of thumbtacks, while Remembering Never’s Peter Kowalsky growls like he’s smoking a diesel…
Everybody does it. Sometimes people even pay for it. The truth is — as I’m sure you know — Cex is well worth the money. To take the metaphor to the next level of freaky-deaky, this type of copulation comes between man and machine. Cex, a.k.a. Ryan Kidwell, is a…
This show will be brought to you by the number 3 and the letter F. And that’s F for funk, kids — the sticky, syncopated New Orleans kind originated by the Meters back in the early ’70s. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, listen up: PBS is…
It’s Nice 2 Be Rich (Self-released) On his second self-released full-length, West Palm Beach rapper/producer Rich Nice strings together a solid collection of rugged, street-level sketches on the eternal hip-hop hustle. Nice has a clipped, well-measured flow that lurches out of the gate a little woodenly, but by midway through…
The formula is pretty much fail-safe: Cram 1,400 seasoned revelers aboard a chartered cruise ship with 25 hard-charging bands, lubricate briskly with around-the-clock boozing and recreational drugs, and spike it with the debauched lawlessness afforded by international waters. Sure, some tolerance for hyperextended solos and pinwheeling hippies is required, but…
Most underground rappers have a hard time staying underground — if they’re talented, eventually they draw the spotlight. Somehow, Fatlip hasn’t had that problem. Once a member of acclaimed West Coast quartet the Pharcyde, the Angeleno’s hilarious, insane genius disappeared into obscurity and rumors of crack addiction. His brazen honesty…
Go ahead and argue, but MOFRO is hands down the best rock band to come out of Florida since Skynyrd. You can keep your whiney emo brats and poseurific rap-metal numbskulls — Jacksonville natives J.J. Grey and Daryl Hance have them beat with an easy and true Deep South soul…
Two words: Hawaiian hip-hop. Not hip-hop made by inner-city Hawaiians but stuff as authentically islander as that flowered polyester shirt you bought at Marshals last summer. Dreamt up by Bay Area producer Jim Greer and multi-instrumentalist Brandon Arnovick, a duo known for its work with Dan the Automator and Galactic,…
Gabriel Fain has a superhuman ear for detail. You can hear it foremost in his euphoric, voluptuous house music sets at places like Voodoo Lounge and Club Space in downtown Miami. But you can also hear it in his speech, in the careful way the Israeli-born DJ uses metaphor to…
A dozen years ago, I went on Crazy Fingers tour. The band worked the South Florida circuit, and my friends and I hit almost every show between West Palm and Miami during the summer of ’92. Back then, they were strictly a Grateful Dead cover band, playing dead-on (pun intended)…
Local underground label Audio Thrift Shop Records might be South Florida’s last bastion of bling-free, un-crunk hip-hop. ATS crews like the Leftoverz and Secondhand Outfit rock dense, dark breaks and spit intelligent, world-weary rhymes that speak far more directly to reality in these parts (shitty jobs, bitter girlfriends, suburban angst)…
It has all the right ingredients for prize-winning radio hip-hop: reedy, snake-charming synths; a raggamuffin dancehall hype man; a smooth-crooning homeboy chorus. So why is Lauderdale MC Mike West’s single “Don’t Know Me” so damn sterile? West suffers from the same problem that much of Southern hip-hop falls prey to…
