Denton

50 Reasons to Be Thankful for Dallas Music

Well folks, welcome to the best week of the year. "Why's that?" you might ask. Because Thanksgiving is this Thursday and it's the best holiday of the year. (Just ask our resident Englishman about it.) It's one of the rare times of the year when we all get to slow down, however briefly, and contempla ... More >>

Denton Vet Chris Pickering Returns Home for Thanksgiving with Future Punx

There is an undeniable American fascination towards New York City, and perhaps from the world, where everything and anything could be a cultural metaphor. For better or worse, the pulse of this metropolis continually re-kindles creativity in everything from cuisine to art to fashion. And music. One ... More >>

After Banning Fracking, Denton Braces for Backlash from Drillers, a Bush and its Own Lawyer

Last week, the City of Denton became the first city in the state to pass a city-wide ban on fracking. The ban passed in a landslide, with 59 percent in favor of the ban and 41 percent against, after more than five years of struggle between anti-fracking activists and the energy industry. See also: ... More >>

Who Loves the Sun Books the Bands That Denton Deserves

In the dull roar of a post-homecoming crowd at Crooked Crust in Denton, Garrett Gravley has his dining choices mocked. The perpetrator, Albert Louis, scoffs: "Dessert bread sticks and beer?" To which Gravley explains, "He's always giving me shit about how I eat." This is the makeshift office space ... More >>

Peek into the Brains of the Future

Denton Fracking Ban Passes, But for How Long?

By the time Denton's city offices opened this morning, officials already had two brand new lawsuits waiting for them. As Denton's attorneys begin the weary post-election process of sorting through a legal defense against this inevitable barrage of suits, it's clear the battle over the ban on frackin ... More >>

DJ Space Chase Spreads His Turntable Gospel from Denton to Cambodia

Eight months ago, Chase Dugger was staring down the other side of graduation. The recent UNT graduate and long-time Denton dance scene fixture had already achieved much, including his own residency in the much beloved Andy's Bar. Titled "Subsonic Indulgence," the weekly featured Dugger and friends' ... More >>

50 Signs You've Been Partying Too Long in Denton

By H. Drew Blackburn, Jaime-Paul Falcon and James Rambin There ain't much to do in Denton, Texas except party. We're talking about the quintessential college town, a place where the highest percentage of residents are between the ages of 20 and 29. A place where if you didn't end up there because o ... More >>

The Best Punk Venues in North Texas

Punk venues are a little like snowflakes: Each one is different and they're all uniquely special. Well, okay, maybe that comparison will be lost in this part of the country, but the point remains the same. Which is to say, as far as music venues go punk venues are a special breed, meant more often t ... More >>

Fracking Emission Carcinogens Found in Denton Playgrounds

A new report published by ShaleTest, an independent environmental research agency in Denton, found levels of benzene in several Denton parks that exceed the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality's long-term exposure limitations. Benzene is a carcinogen found in cigarettes, gasoline and is a comm ... More >>

Oaktopia Was a Great Concept with a Messy Execution Over the Weekend

Oaktopia Festival With Neon Indian, Immortal Technique and more Denton Friday, September 19 and Saturday, September 20, 2014 For a line-up that didn't really move the needle much, Oaktopia sure as hell brought out the kids. Which is a fantastic thing if you were a venue who could charge people who ... More >>

Best Concerts in Dallas this Weekend 9/19 - 9/21

Well, it's the weekend once again. We here at DC9 hope you powered through the week and that you're looking for some relief. We want you to go to some bars and have a few drinks. We want you to pregame beforehand. (That's just being fiscally responsible.) But most importantly, we want you to check o ... More >>

What 35 Denton Could Learn From Oaktopia

In the fall of 2011, I got a gig as an in-house scribe for 35 Denton. It wasn't paid, save for a complimentary wristband to the four-day festival (which is damn near a golden nugget for any young music fan). One of our tasks leading up to the festival's weekend in March was trodding around Denton an ... More >>

Denton Loves its New Hypnotic Donuts-Cultivar Coffee Shop, Judging by the Line

Living up to its name, Hypnotic Donuts seems to have cast a spell on the people of Denton. During my visit on Saturday -- four days after the Lakewood shop opened its newest location in Denton's town square -- a line stretched out the door. Parents, their gazes eerily transfixed on the soft glow e ... More >>

Rubber Gloves' Free Week Hosts the Best Free North Texas Shows All Week Long

Oh, Free Week. It's officially September and school is back into full swing for UNT and TWC up in Denton. Fortunately, Rubber Gloves is doing its part to help ease the dread by hosting its annual Free Week festivities to promote local Texas music and make the kids forget about that whole "higher edu ... More >>

Argyle ISD Arms Its Teachers for Back-To-School Security Initiative

With around 2,000 students in the district's three campuses, Argyle ISD is a small, quiet district located smack dab in the middle of Denton and Fort Worth, off Interstate 35. And this school year, some teachers at Argyle ISD have a secret: Several of them have a guns hidden away on their bodies whi ... More >>

Sealion Lives for the Thrill of Playing House Shows

On a sweaty Sunday night in July, Fort Worth indie labels Dreamy Soundz and Lo-Life Recordings threw a party at the Where House. For Panther City music fans, the Where House is more or less the locus for boozy, large-scale, late-night DIY throwdowns. One of the two stages was set up outside in a spo ... More >>

New Grading Policy Makes It Really, Really Hard for Denton ISD Students to Fail

Denton ISD's new grading policy rolls out today with the first day of school, to the delight of middle and high school students and the chagrin of their teachers. The district-wide policy veritably ensures that Denton students have to work harder to fail than to pass their classes. Their future coll ... More >>

Oaktopia Is Back, and It's Way Bigger

Last year, first-time Denton festival Oaktopia delivered on content but not so much on attendance. As Aaron Ortega reported in November, the largest crowd was 200 or so, for the mighty Del the Funky Homosapien. You might suppose a festival that drew such a modest crowd last time would scale back a l ... More >>

Texas Is Actually Considering (Slightly) Tighter Fracking Regulations

Just a few weeks after Denton failed to pass a ban on fracking, the Texas Railroad Commission is proposing tighter regulation on oil and natural gas drilling in response to the north Texas earthquakes. At its monthly meeting yesterday, the commission accepted a new set of rule proposals regarding ... More >>

Spooky Folk Celebrate Youth is a Notion at Dan's Silverleaf Tonight

Tonight sees one of DFW's favorite bands, Spooky Folk, play a release show for their sophomore album Youth Is A Notion, a follow-up to their much-acclaimed self-titled album from 2010. With various band members residing in different parts of the country, it's become a rare treat to catch the band in ... More >>

Four Denton Bands You Need to Listen to Right Now

The formula for the Denton music scene is no accident: cheap rent and plentiful venues make for a perfect melting pot for bands to pop up all over the place. Whether it's a house or dive bar show, there's somewhere for you to perform. If you either live in Denton or find yourself there, here are fou ... More >>

Gas Industry Is Looking Nervous About Denton's Proposed Fracking Ban

The initiative to ban fracking in Denton started out as many seemingly hopeless political campaigns often do, just a petition by angry homeowners fighting a well-funded industry that had already trampled the Denton City Council in court and follow-up negotiations. But now that little petition has ... More >>

Chambers Set Their Sights on the Top with Debut Inner Room

No one actually hates Chambers. Their recent series of clever promotional videos may have depicted members of various notable local bands chastising their debut record, Inner Room, but they are essentially a beloved member of the landscape of Dallas-Fort Worth and Denton music. That won't necessaril ... More >>

Mountain Goats Played Like Hometown Heroes at Dan's Silverleaf

The Mountain Goats With Loamlands Dan's Silverleaf, Denton Friday, June 20, 2014 By Jezy J. Gray I first saw the Mountain Goats in 2006 at The Opolis in Norman, Oklahoma. I was 19 and the band had just released their Get Lonely LP, songwriter John Darnielle's most polite and somber offering to dat ... More >>

Parquet Courts' Andrew Savage on Making Art and the Move from Denton to Brooklyn

To say the past year was an eventful one for Parquet Courts and frontman Andrew Savage would be a mammoth understatement. As NPR noted in this First Listen featuring Sunbathing Animal, Parquet Courts went from playing "humble Brooklyn warehouse spaces to Late Night With Jimmy Fallon in the span of 1 ... More >>

Chambers Premiere "Midlake Hates Chambers" Video for New Record, Inner Room

We have to hand it to Chambers: there is, indeed, more than one way to promote a record. If you're a major-label artist, that's a good chance that will mean over-the-top self-aggrandizement. But for the moody four-piece from Denton, they opted to take the opposite route: complete self-laceration. An ... More >>

As Denton Voters Come Out Against Fracking, City Council Passes Surprise Temporary Fracking Ban

After the Denton City Council had its butt handed to it in court by oil company EagleRidge last Fall, Denton civic leaders decided to pretty much stop fighting EagleRidge altogether and let it drill close to a few residential neighborhoods. Residents complained, but the city said it had no choice, b ... More >>

Denton Homeowners Are Suing to Stop EagleRidge's "Loud and Constant" Fracking Operation

It might seem like an obvious point: no, you can't just start a massive industrial operation right next to a middle-class residential neighborhood. Most homeowners aren't cool with that. But Dallas-based EagleRidge Energy has boldly gone ahead and extracted oil on sites next to a few Denton resident ... More >>

Fat Tuesday Comes Early to Historic Denton

Denton City Council Says It Must Allow Fracking Near Homes, so Homeowners Turn to Voters

Last fall, Eagleridge Energy won some permits to frack right next to a few Denton neighborhoods, despite a new city ordinance that was supposed to keep the company further away. The city said sorry, it was powerless to stop Eagleridge, because the company had found an extremely clever loophole. So n ... More >>

Thin Line Film and Music Festival is Not that Other Music Fest. Does it Matter?

Perhaps it couldn't be helped. With somewhat spring-like weather in the Denton air on Thursday afternoon, it was hard to not have festival fever. In years past around this time, when 35 Denton would be taking place, you couldn't get past Dan's Silverleaf near Hickory Street before the festival fun w ... More >>

Thin Line Has a Thick Schedule of Film and Music

Lumberjack Fest Turns Ten: Founder Aaron Anderson on Meat, Beards and the Bar Band

Editor: Lumberjack Fest is this weekend at Dan's Silverleaf. For the first time ever, the festivities will stretch over two nights -- you can find more information on Saturday's installment on one Facebook page and the details for Sunday on another. Steve Steward had a very serious conversation with ... More >>

Slaying It Old School

The 7th Annual Thin Line Film Festival is Now Also a Music Festival, With Sebadoh Headlining

Before 2014, the Thin Line Film Festival was Texas' only documentary film festival fest that prided itself on conceptually blurring the ever-thinning line between fact and fiction. But after six progressive years as the internationally known 10-day short film party, Thin Line will blur even more lin ... More >>

Cafe Brazil Is Going to Denton

Maybe you've heard, Denton is pretty cool. And not just because of our close proximity to Canada. We're so cool, in fact, that noted Dallas-y places like Rusty Taco and Hypnotic Donuts are starting to find their way north. Way north. Like, caught between the moon and Downtown Daaaaaallas. It's a lan ... More >>

Denton Residents Angry as EagleRidge Continues to Frack Near Homes

Earlier this year, the city of Denton approved regulations that would supposedly stop gas companies from drilling new wells near homes. Yet recently, residents in the Vintage neighborhood began noticing some suspicious noises and vibrations. They were coming from an old gas well site nearby. Denton ... More >>

The Ten Best Bars in Denton

In many ways, Denton is DFW's little Austin, our small slice of "weird." Its inexpensive living costs and college town environment have made it something of a cultural hotbed, a landscape as readily filled with bohemians as fraternity herds. This unique melting pot of backgrounds and social interest ... More >>

Hypnotic Donuts Is Expanding to Denton

Doughnut shops are one of the few establishments that can get away without actually having a proper name, either on their building or anywhere else. All they need is a sign, preferably one that lights up, that proclaims "DONUTS" to the world. Pawn shops may be one of the only other places that can g ... More >>

Some of DFW's Best Venue Managers Recall Their Favorite Bygone Venues

It's the 25th Anniversary of the DOMA. And while it's true that bands and venues come and go, many of the people behind them have been here all along. We asked a few of these long standing music veterans -- now behind the scenes at DOMA nominated venues The Kessler, The Foundry and Rubber Gloves Reh ... More >>

Music Picks: North Oak Cliff Music Festival, Dirty Dozen Brass Band and More

What’s Your Sign?

Pageantry Live in Downtown Dallas: Video

Since its gradual formation in 2011, Denton's Pageantry has perfected a heady sound, big and open and dreamlike. You can year on that on the Friends of the Year EP, released this summer. It's the band's debut, but people are taking notice. They just toured their way to Chicago, scored an opening g ... More >>

The Morning News Says Spraying Saved Dallas from West Nile, but That's Not the Whole Story

Dallas County recently discovered its sixth person to test positive for the West Nile virus this year, in a season that's seen one death. It's a much less troubling situation than last year, when there were 400 human infections and 20 deaths. The Dallas Morning News has an easy explanation for the ... More >>

35 Denton Will Return in 2015, Under the Direction of Founder Chris Flemmons

Of all North Texas' music festivals, 35 Denton is unique. The magnitude alone is singular -- this year's installment featured several hundred bands. And when the festival's creative director (Kyle LaValley), talent buyer (Natalie Davila) and primary financial backer (Little Guys Movers) left their p ... More >>

Bucking For A Fair Fix

In Denton, AV the Great Has Grand Plans for His Raw and Underground Beat Battle

Raw and Underground event organizer AV The Great isn't the least bit shy about proclaiming his freestyle battle and beat competition being the "best representation of the Dallas hip-hop scene." In fact, in the spirit of rap battles and DJ swagger, he's not the least bit shy about anything. "This i ... More >>

Canned Festival, a New Music Fest from the Makers of Untapped, Coming to Downtown Denton

Local bookers Spune have announced the Canned Festival for the first Saturday in October, an extension of their Untapped series of festivals. These festivals aim to combine high quality music and alcohol into one intoxicating day out. After the success of the Fort Worth event, there's also been a ... More >>

A Taste of Herb is Already a Denton Staple

Just off one of the finest little town squares in North Texas, a recurring series of free gigs are starting to draw a real following. At 5:30 p.m. on every other Tuesday, an insanely early time for a gig in Denton, some unlikely heroes take to the stage in the form of a Herb Alpert and His Tijuana B ... More >>