Baby Boomer nostalgia seems to be fueling a lot of modern leisure and entertainment, especially in South Florida, but there are some things that can't be brought back. Like Double Roads, the area along the ocean north of Marcinski Road in Juno Beach. That's where teens, many of whom are now in the Boomer age bracket, once congregated from the 1960s through the 1980s. There … [Read more...]
‘Head On’: Legendary Dolphin Csonka recounts losses amid gridiron glory
It's impossible to reflect on Pro Football Hall-of-Famer Larry Csonka's new memoir Head On (Matt Holt/BenBella Books) without referencing Always On the Run (1973), the former Miami Dolphins fullback's previous book of ever-colorful exploits. As told to New York Times columnist Dave Anderson, that entertaining 50-year-old set of tall-but-true tales was authored with Csonka's … [Read more...]
Northwood entrepreneur dreams of Wynwood vibe in West Palm
Location, location, location. It's recurrently stressed as the prime factor in real estate and startup businesses, but always with an eye toward the present. Joe DeStephan, on the other hand, has both eyes fixed on the future. His Northwood Art & Music Warehouse in West Palm Beach is situated in an industrial region several blocks west of the Northwood section's … [Read more...]
‘Well of Souls’ traverses shameful histories in telling tale of the banjo
Usually, the movie follows the book. But in the case of Kristina R. Gaddy's well-researched, comprehensive chronology Well of Souls: Uncovering the Banjo's Hidden History (Norton), it follows a documentary on the same subject by 14 years. Bela Fleck & the Flecktones' namesake banjoist and bandleader covered similar territory in 2008 with Throw Down Your Heart. The Sascha … [Read more...]
At a Lake Worth Beach church, another school of rock takes shape
Chris O’Brien, founder, owner and instructor at the Lake Worth Beach-based music school Music4Lyfe (www.music4lyfe.org), tried doing things by the book. After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in music from Florida State University in 2009, the Delray Beach native and resident returned south to pay it forward. Over the next decade, he taught at a handful of Palm Beach … [Read more...]
Season Preview 2022-23: The season in pop
"Pop" is an all-encompassing term used to describe music that basically isn't jazz, classical or opera. Therefore, it describes the sampling of James Brown, Johnny Cash, Ray Charles, Jimi Hendrix, Alison Krauss, Lucius, Nirvana, Public Enemy, Stevie Ray Vaughan, and Hank Williams. Which mostly constitutes a cross-reference of what's become, in the tribute act era, a form of … [Read more...]
Season Preview 2022-23: The season in jazz
In 1998, a quartet of jazz/fusion veterans started an instrumental group in which they interpreted music by seminal jam band the Grateful Dead. More recently, a rising jazz record label started mixing in elements of hip-hop to draw new and younger fans to America's time-honored genre. Both are called Jazz Is Dead. Yet this isn't an obituary for live jazz, rather … [Read more...]
Bumblefest, Edition No. 6, takes West Palm streets Sept. 2-3
For cultured South Florida listeners seeking to hear things they've never heard before, who think that the area is inundated with only classic rock nostalgia tours and tribute acts paying homage to them, this "buzz" is for you. The sixth installment of Bumblefest (www.Bumblefest.com), celebrating the 11th anniversary of Lake Clarke Shores-based promoter and publisher … [Read more...]
West Palm’s own jam band, Guavatron, seeks larger territory
None of the members of young, West Palm Beach-based quartet Guavatron (www.guavatron.com) are old enough to remember when the original "jam bands" started out in the late 1960s, long before that term was ever coined. That's when the California-spawned Grateful Dead, Georgia act the Allman Brothers Band, and British bands like Cream and Pink Floyd colored outside of the … [Read more...]
Guitarist Carlton masterful at Funky Biscuit show
Larry Carlton is on the short list of iconic jazz/fusion guitarists who emerged between the late 1960s and mid-1970s, bringing more attention toward the subgenre that mixes jazz with rock and other popular music forms. And during his late show at the Funky Biscuit in Boca Raton on July 24, "Mr. 335" (a nickname based upon his frequent use of the hollow-bodied electric … [Read more...]