In the myth of Narcissus, the vain son of Endymion and Selene rejects the advances of the nymph Echo, who sets a curse upon him. He becomes ensnared by his own beauty and is doomed to gaze at his reflection until his sorrow takes him across the River Styx to Hades. In much the same [...]
Roller Girls or C.I.A. operatives? Despite my wealth of journalistic credentials, there are still times that even I, Michael Jastroch, Associate Editor of OffBeat Magazine, the man who interviewed Meshell Ndegeocello, gets scooped. Case in point: somehow, despite my network of informants, I missed out on writing about the Big Easy Roller Girls’ fundraiser featuring [...]
On February 5th of this year, vocalist/bassist/guitarist Erik Corveaux, front man and songwriter for New Orleans rock ‘n’ roll outfit the Bad Off, got, in his words, “creamed” by a car while riding his bike to a Carnival parade. The accident, which resulted in massive injuries, put Corveaux out of commission for nearly three months. [...]
In 1831, the father of French literary realism Balzac wrote, “There is nothing left for literature but mockery in a world that has collapsed.” 164 years later, the father of West Bank hip-hop absurdism Ballzack wrote “You can’t punch a baby/You can’t eat a planet/But girl, I never took you for granted,” thus completing the [...]
“The real danger of [sound engineering] is that it just becomes focused on the equipment and the gear. It’s like having a songwriters’ conference and only talking about pianos and guitars. Gear is something you need to make a record, but it’s not the end all be all. We try to focus on the creative [...]
“After putting out music and having your band fall apart, there’s something to be said for going somewhere different and starting over,” begins Dave Fera, guitarist, vocalist and songwriter for Big Blue Marble. “I always figured why go to New York or LA to get noticed, which is probably the smart thing to do. For [...]
“A drunk woman was giving [drummer Andy Harris] a bath when I first met him,” says Joshua Glass, guitarist and vocalist for three piece post-rock outfit the Interlopers. “I asked him if he wanted to be in a band with me. He told me he wanted to be in a band that sounded like Morphine, [...]
"We were playing at the Circle Bar in early January, and the bartender came up and told me that Hunter S. Thompson was in the audience and that I should dedicate a song to him," explains Michael Hurtt, singer and rhythm guitarist for the aptly named Michael Hurtt And His Haunted Hearts. "I assumed he [...]
