The tusked mascot tasked with filling San Diego’s airwaves with oldies is getting harpooned. The station will soon be rebranded as the New Max 105.7. The Walrus handle was installed five years ago by then-station …

Singer/songwriter Josh Blevins knows Gunner Gunner’s reputation as the band that really hustles with posters, social media, and intense person-to-person lobbying. Blevins tells the Reader that it’s the best way to keep getting the prime …

"I’d say 80 percent of the wheelchair off-ramps between San Ysidro and Oceanside were cut out by me.”

With posts decrying “an end of an era,” and lamenting “there goes our music,” social media was reacting to veteran DJ Steve West’s surprise separation Wednesday from 91X. West joined 91X a month after 91X …

“Reality shows aren’t real,” says Amy Armstrong, who was given a unanimous thumbs-up by the judges on America’s Got Talent and was promised on air to move on to a third competition in Las Vegas. …

It’s been over a year since Fallbrook guitarist/singer Larry Robinson, 64, was beaten to death at the music store where he worked. His extended musical family is still looking for answers. Robinson played around greater …

As was first reported by the Reader on May 2 of this year, ex-members of As I Lay Dying bought Brick by Brick, which has been closed since February. The Bay Park music venue was …

The San Diego County Fair may not be known for its adventuresome booking of bands, but few can claim that the annual expo underpays the acts. It was reported in 2007 that one of its …

Graham Nancarrow’s upcoming tour grew out of a chance meeting at a memorial for his father, newscaster/ecologist Loren Nancarrow, who died last December. “This lady saw us play at the Reuben H. Fleet theater,” singer/guitarist …

San Diego’s live-music venue options have been shrinking over the past five years. Bucking that trend is the arrival of a new venue — within a venue. While it still does not have an name, …

Dave Mustaine’s appearance with the San Diego Symphony was an ambitious collaboration of rock and classical. San Diego’s Mosaic Quartet is all about mixing rock and Rachmaninoff. Three members have studied at a conservatory. They …

It’s been over a year since Heavy Glow has played a local show. But it’s not because the psychedelic/metal trio doesn’t like to play. “We did five tours last year,” says singer/guitarist Jared Mullins. Their …

Tim Lambesis, the lead singer for world famous local metalcore band As I Lay Dying, was taken away in handcuffs May 16 to start a six-year prison sentence for paying to have his wife murdered. …

It seems the days when surf and skate companies could be counted on to help local bands are coming to an end. Last year, Volcom folded its record label it ran for 18 years, leaving …

On May 1, the day before As I lay Dying lead singer Tim Lambesis was to be sentenced for his role in paying for his wife's murder, the fate of three of his former bandmates …

SRH founder Kevin Zinger started connecting with the action-sports crowd in 1991 by selling T-shirts and caps at local shows by Sublime, Slightly Stoopid, Pennywise, NOFX, 311, and Korn. This Saturday’s SRH Fest at the …

Just as the success of the Moonshine Flats country bar downtown seems to signal a turnaround in the live-music scene, word is that the Gaslamp will get another live venue in late May or June. …

Country music makes KSON San Diego’s second-most-popular radio station. So, why are there are so few venues for live country music? Sure, country superstars such as Toby Keith, Kenny Chesney, and Tim McGraw can be …

Another San Diego music venue has pulled the plug. The Griffin, the Bay Park bar known for its quality sound system and presenting nationally touring headliners such as Imagine Dragons, Crosses, Nico Vega, Band of …

The remodeled 85-year-old North Park Theatre is positioning itself as a viable concert venue. Co-owner David Cohen tells the Reader that they’ve installed a new sound system, a removable seat configuration that will allow the …

Only the Belly Up has a greater tradition of bringing live music to North County than Gilles Knafo. He opened the Calypso Cafe in 1995 as a Mediterranean-style restaurant and dinner club. His seven-night-a-week blues, …

The Ramona Music Center is a storefront music store with a recording studio/rehearsal space in the back. It’s the only business of its kind serving this small, rural town in San Diego’s backcountry. Seven years …

While he has released some ten albums, appeared in a handful of movies, had years of MTV exposure and tons of radio airplay for his novelty hits (“Debbie Gibson Is Pregnant with My Two-Headed Love …

The Super Bowl halftime show got close to punk with the once-revolutionary Red Hot Chili Peppers. The founder of local Sex Pistols salute Rotten Johnnies maintains that all threatening rock eventually becomes safe. “If enough …

Larry Groupé had no problem that Canadian figure-skater Kevin Reynolds used his music for the Olympics. “My brother called me from back East.” says Groupé, Oceanside’s two-time Emmy-winning composer. “They got the Olympics three hours …

Clarification from the editor We received a letter on March 19 from Mr. Berkson's law firm stating the following facts: Although our client Howard Berkson did at one time have an interest in India Street …

“We don’t have a problem with Soma, but it seems like bands with no talent get to play [Soma’s] main stage. It’s all about who you know. It makes it difficult for bands that are …

Most clubs that host national acts rely on one of the “big three” concert companies — AEG, Live Nation/House of Blues, Nederlander — to route headliners to their stages. The Belly Up Tavern has never …

American kids don’t just pick up the clarinet or tuba like Mexican youth do. Dario Velasco, 20, is a student at Southwestern College who plays in Estrella de Pacifico, one of a handful of local …

Shocks of Mighty, the rock-steady band Michael Thompson formed, turns 20 this year. Trumpet player/singer Thompson’s allegiance to the proto-ska sounds created in Jamaica in the early ’60s wasn’t what his other bandmates wanted six …

Could Saturday be the last show at Brick by Brick? On Tuesday afternoon rumors started circulating that the venerable Bay Park nightspot was rescheduling some of its shows booked for February. Tuesday evening Brick by …

There are a couple of significant changes afoot on the local music-venue front, as Belly Up in Solana Beach is about to announce a new talent buyer and the Griffin in Bay Park is up …

Radio reggae show Yard Sound, hosted by Ras Charles, gets yanked by Palomar College station KKSM (1320 AM).

The Styletones were paid a one-time fee for the use of their version of Sam and Dave’s “Hold on I’m Comin’” that ran in a Super Bowl TV ad for milk last February. Steve Harris …

Attendees to events at the Valley View Casino Center (Sports Arena) frequently park offsite, where their cars are frequently towed, resulting in $300 fines. Arena operator Ernie Hahn says it’s egregious the way tow trucks line up after events begin.

Interview with 91X DJ Steve West, here since 1983, playing the “classic alternative” hits when they were new, alternative — not classic. Meanwhile, competitor FM94/9 played the same three hits every two hours on November 25. Bad FM94/9! or giving the people what they want?

It wasn't her dad that got Cailin Russo a gig to costar with Justin Bieber in his new video for “All That Matters.” Russo was born a couple years after her singer/guitarist dad Scott Russo …

Sprung Monkey regrouped five years ago. Their fifth studio album (“sweat-drenched, down-and-dirty rock and roll,” according to Summers) is set for release on November 26.

Why is the Tiki House closing after 39 years of hosting bands in Pacific Beach? Could it be that the roadhouse couldn't keep up with the much larger bars? Was P.B. becoming too precious for …

Former 4th&B concert venue won’t open under Avalon name as expected this fall. New owners say they are lining up permits before they begin construction; insiders say the city doesn’t want electronic dame music.

A new pastor plans to remove the pews at United Methodist Church in Normal Heights so he can interact more with congregants. But, no pews means that Carey Driscoll will have no seating for his Acoustic Music San Diego audiences. So, he’ll end the ten-year-long series of shows.

Oceanside’s Ocean House was poised to become a big nightspot, say investors; then, Sun Diego, a surf-shop chain, allegedly agreed to pay $29,000/month in rent, $7000 over the price that was to be paid by the disappointed investors, a group of Carlsbad businessmen that included owners of the Boar Cross’n and Mas Fina Cantina nightspots.

Mario Carrillo, singer/songwriter/guitarist of Cloud Feather, is a Native-American member of the Juaneño tribe. About a fourth of his band’s repertoire is about how rich tribes are not helping the poor ones.

At Mission Bay High, Sloat Dixon sported a mohawk and played in punk bands such as Common Ground and Black Republic. Now he plays drums for Yuma-based cow-punk band the Tramplers. Thanks to a random …

Erik Thompson wonders why no one has made a movie about the 91X he worked at 30 years ago. Driven by an exploding new wave and punk culture, 91X was one of the first commercial …

Grunge-shunning Dark Globe regroups two or three times a year, even though they broke up in 1994.

Blues singer Earl Thomas, whose same-sex marriage is imminent, explains the circumstance of being a performer in a genre that is typically hetero oriented.

Sean Peck, front man of San Diego heavy metal band Cage, talks about their heyday ’90s and how the gigs started drying up in Europe after he punched out Blaze Bayley of Iron Maiden.

Purple Church drummer Michael Prince found dead in Oceanside.

Both concert venues RIMAC and Jenny Craig Pavilion (at UCSD and USD, respectively) have had a sharp decline in shows presented there, largely due to the fact that booze can’t be sold when school is in session.