Blurt: San Diego Music News
Rappers beefing in real life may be good for lyrics but it can cost you gigs. Consider local rapper Rob Stone, best known for his breakout 2015 hit “Chill Bill.” He tells how Florida rapper …
Southwestern College professor Jeff Nevin has been teaching Mariachi music for 20 years. Proceeds from concerts he organizes fund $20,000 in annual scholarships for music students. His teaching clinics help keep Mariachi alive. But Nevin …
The Guinness Book of World Records achievement for “Most Concerts in 24 Hours” (65 gigs set in Norway, 2012) is safe for now. Local vocalist Leonard Patton and his group with pianist Ed Kornhauser, bassist …
“I work eight hours a week for a yoga studio, but the rest of my money is currently made playing music on the streets, in venues, and selling my first book,” says Martin Stamper, aka …
“The Kirtan scene [in San Diego] is pretty small,” says Tom Warner, bassist in Pilgrimage of the Heart Kirtan Band, which has performed on over 400 occasions throughout Southern California. “Most people practicing yoga don’t …
He may not be a native, but Gary Wilson — singer, composer, multi-instrumentalist, collector of alien sunglasses, secret-agent lounge musician fetishist of flour and paint — must rank at the top of San Diego music …
As major record labels decline in relevance, getting well-connected managers and agents on your side has become more important for so-called “baby bands” that are struggling to get a national foothold. Consider the plight of …
“We’ve been a band since the early ’90s and are probably up on the list as one of the longest running San Diego bands,” says drummer Chad Farran of Superunloader. “We started playing shows as …
About seven years ago, Jamie Minotti of the Madero Group management outfit teamed up with several promoters throughout town to produce the Ocean Beats series, a forum for electronic bass music that had hitherto been …
Co-founded by Redwoods Music impresario Al Howard and keyboardist Josh Rice in 2009, the Heavy Guilt hung things up after their third and arguably best album, Heavy Guilt, in 2014. So why come back now, …
Bob Baker’s Auto Group, Mossy Nissan, Drew Ford, Toyota of Escondido... The manic anthems of San Diego auto commerce are forever seared into the brains of anyone who spent time near a radio in the …
Octagrape drummer Ely Moyal distilled the band’s spirit, as singer/songwriter Glen Galloway recalls: “We were planning a tour up the coast, and he goes, ‘You know, I just don’t think the juice is worth the …
All four Seattle grunge frontmen (Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell, Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder, Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain, Alice in Chains’ Layne Staley) played Iguana’s, the three-story Tijuana rock mecca that hosted major headliners during its 1989–’94 run. …
Does Linkin Park mix with Petco Park? Not really, according to newly released Nielsen ratings showing the results of the first full month Padres play-by-play aired on alt-rocker FM-94/9 — the station took a ratings …
In the late ’60s, Rob Lind joined the Navy and became an aircraft-carrier pilot. He flew in the Vietnam War, and he followed his love of aviation into a long career as a commercial pilot …
A chance encounter at the Doheny Blues Festival two years ago proved to be a pivotal moment for North Park blues woman Whitney Shay, who met a Brazilian guitarist/concert promoter named Igor Prado. “A couple …