Music

Passage to India

A new compilation by the Zakary Thaks.

Three Chords and A Station Wagon

In the years before anyone had heard of Woodstock or Altamont, teenagers across Texas started bands in their parents’ garages, banging out earnest rock songs on cheap equipment and hoping to hit it big at the local skating rink or VFW post. For some, those dreams won’t fade away.

Symbolyc One

On collaborating with Rhymefest and Kanye West and more.

Bun B

On his new album, Trill O.G.; his late partner, Pimp C; and more.

Chamillionaire

Two thousand five will always be remembered as the year that Texas hip-hop finally got its due. Sure, Houston’s Geto Boys were already considered rap legends, and Port Arthur’s UGK, through Jay-Z’s smash hit single “Big Pimpin’,” had already introduced the world to “them Texas boys comin’ down in candy

The Slow Life and Fast Death of DJ Screw

Until he overdosed in November, he was one of the most influential cultural figures in Texas, the master of a scene fueled by drugs and his own brilliant, eccentric music.

Money in the Making

Houston’s new movers and shakers don’t hang with the Wyatts or Sakowitzes. They’re Eightball, Scarface, Lil’ Keke, and the other power players of the city’s rap music scene.

Vinnie Paul Abbott

The former Pantera drummer on the twentieth anniversary of Cowboys From Hell and more.

A Q&A With Michael Hall

Michael Hall, who spent months trying to piece together the life of one of the best slide guitarists ever, talks about tracking down leads, writing about musicians, and really listening to the music of Blind Willie Johnson.

Mance Lipscomb

What was so special about Mance Lipscomb’s dentures?

The 100 Best Texas Songs

Two are by Willie. Which songs, exactly? And what about the remaining 98? You’ll have to check our list to find out.

Birthplaces of the Blues

Want to see the Texas of Leadbelly, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Mance Lipscomb, and other pioneering musicians of the twentieth century? Your trip through time begins near Washington-on-the-Brazos.

Voice of Amerykah

Whether or not Erykah Badu is the Billie Holiday of hip-hop, her uplifting songs and soulful singing are winning fans from coast to coast.

Featuring Norah Jones

A collection of collaborations.

Not Too Late

Sell 20 million of your debut album and you suddenly bring a little clout to the table. No one has wielded hers more curiously than NORAH JONES, who followed her elegant Arif Mardin-produced 2002 triumph with a reluctant shrug: a homemade-sounding second album and a barely serious side group with

The Laziest Girl in Town

A new album by Elizabeth McQueen.

Asleeping Beauty

More than two decades after he arrived in Austin, Asleep at the Wheel’s Ray Benson still reigns as the king of swing.

Kinky Friedman’s First Roundup

Wring your hands, cut your wrists, do anything, but just listen to how Kinky can sing.

The Coming of Redneck Hip

Rock and Country music met in Austin. That friendship may make the state.

David Lee Garza

Poteet

Erykah Badu

Dallas

Home Girl

Most people from Dallas who make it big in the music business get out of town as soon as they can. “That’s what celebrities do,” Erykah Badu says. “I never wanted to be a celebrity.”

The Queen Is Dead

When Selena Quintanilla Perez was killed on March 31, Texas mourned—and around the world, the veneration began.

He’s About A Mover

Country, jazz, blues, R&B, polka, and conjunto—the late, great Doug Sahm was a walking encyclopedia of Texas music. An exclusive excerpt from a new biography explores how he stirred it all together and found his own sound in his first great song.

Some Things Never Change: Doug Deep

He’s a little bit country, rock and roll, and everything in between. That’s why Doug Sahm is still going strong.

Girl Talk

Executive editor Skip Hollandsworth discusses this month's feature "O Sister, Where Art Thou?"

O Sister, Where Art Thou?

History makes no mention of what was one of the most popular all-female country acts ever. Yet the story of the Goree Girls—inmates who banded together in the forties at Texas’ sole penitentiary for women—is worth a listen.

Blue Notes

Goree prison unit inmate Hattie Ellis had a short-lived recording career, but her music made a lasting impression.

On The Road in Texas

Texas was Elvis‘ home away from home in the early days of his career, a direct result of getting on the “Louisiana Hayride.” He signed a contract in late 1954 with the popular radio show, which was broadcast live every Saturday night from 50,000-watt KWKH radio in Shreveport. (CBS syndicated

Viva Fort Hood

Before Elvis Presley became an overweight entertainer in a rhinestone jumpsuit, there was a brief, more innocent time when he wore khakis as an Army private in Central Texas. It was his last chance to be a normal human being. And to be happy.

Steve Brodner’s Sketchbook (1)

“And don’t forget to come back next week for the Greensheet Awards. Everybody in Austin can win something if you just stick around long enough in this town. A lot of people dressed up tonight and a lot of people didn’t give a s—t, did they? Nobody’s going to work

Steve Brodner’s Sketchbook (3)

Mark: “They’ve mixed a lot of the Western side with the original, but they’re not original. And this right here is the biggest joke I’ve ever heard. She’s doing mudras [hand movements] through the whole thing, but she’s not even doing the mudras right.” Dan: “It’s nonsensical, the way they’re singing.

Steve Brodner’s Sketchbook (2)

“The artists that are performing tonight have written compositions or have been influenced by compositions written in Spanish, traditional Mexican music, and what’s called border music, if you will, a marriage of Tex-Mex. And so tonight they are celebrating that acoustically, singing the songs they’ve learned.”— Susan Charney, co-producer of

5,707 Schmoozers, 750 Bands, 29 Musical Cars, and 250 Gallons of Cream Gravy

That was the recipe for this year’s South by Southwest Music and Media Conference. Here’s how it all cooked up.

Steve Brodner’s Sketchbook (4)

“Cake is a great band. It’s soulful music. It’s food for the soul.” — Krys Holland, audience member, watching Cake at the Austin Music Hall.“When I say go, turn that s—t all the way up.” — Wayne Coyne, lead singer of the Flaming Lips, having passed out cassette tapes to

Drawing Conclusions

Before chronicling the South by Southwest Music and Media Conference for Texas Monthly, New York illustrator Steve Brodner had never been to Austin—but that actually worked to his advantage. “The idea was to capture the scene as someone who just happened upon it,” he says. “I wasn’t trying to get

The Cult of Keen

It took two decades of shows at honky-tonks filled with frat-boy fans and Aggie admirers, but singer-songwriter Robert Earl Keen has his first major-label record deal.

Lyle Lovett

Ray Benson

“I’m a personality and a singer—that’s how I make my living—but I’m always a guitar player.”

The Ballad of Billy Joe Shaver

If the Corsicana native is the best songwriter in Texas, perhaps it's because he knows his material. Hardscrabble upbringing. Sinful behavior. Redemption. Personal tragedy. Profound sorrow. And, finally, more redemption.

The Widow’s Pique

In Lubbock they call her the "Spanish Yoko Ono," and María Elena Holly, Buddy Holly’s widow, has always had a troubled relationship with his conservative hometown. Some folks rave on that it’s her greed that has killed the city’s Buddy Holly Music Festival. But it’s more complicated than that.

Music Clubs

Old country and western in Mingus, zippy zydeco in Bridge City: The shows always go on at these ten tuneful spots.

Straight Outta Golden

At the Sweet Potato Festival with Nashville’s next big thing from small-town Texas.

Kelly Clarkson is Engaged!

After waiting it out for a year, the singer got a giant canary yellow diamond and will marry Brandon Blackstock.

A Holiday Gift Guide for Music Lovers

Gary Clark Jr.'s newest set, Blak and Blu, and five other albums by local artists.

Dissecting Bobby Keys’ Saxophone Solo on “Brown Sugar”

There's more to the performance than meets the ear.

Sax & Drugs & Rock & Roll

Bobby Keys and the Rolling Stones: behind one of pop music's most famous solos.

One Man’s Mission to Help Heal Soldiers

Darden Smith finds that music therapy can help soldiers with PTSD.

Six Degrees of Will Johnson

A new album from the Centro-Matic front man—and indie rock's one-man social network.

Making an Austin City Limits Debut

Terry Lickona, the television show's executive producer, talks about some of the acts that will step on the Austin City Limits stage for the first time, including Radiohead and Kat Edmonson.