Even if your holiday plans perished due to the pandemic (as mine did) City Times Media is here to keep your love for local music alive and well. From the washed-out, nighttime pop of Headworm to the acid jazz of Ebaugh to the hazy sweet soul of Thee Sacred Souls, we’ve put together a batch of songs to keep you company during your next 10- … or 5-day (?) isolation.

“You have to find a way of managing time between your job and your passion, and maybe that means doing a job that pays less so you have more freetime,” Fritz Fayman, guitarist in The Reckless, said.

Each semester, the students of professor Michael Espar’s jazz history class are assigned to review a jazz release. We’ve gathered some of the best of this semester’s reviews together. They range from classic jazz singers such as Ella Fitzgerald to the new sound of contemporary jazz of Orin Evans.

We’re back with our second monthly playlist of local music and it’s packed to the gills with tunes from across the musical biosphere.

Surviving music venues in San Diego deal with reopening amid a precarious economy and uncertainties imposed by COVID-19.

The COVID-19 pandemic affected us all, but small businesses were hit especially hard -- perhaps none more than live music venues. As San Diego gradually reopens following a year-and-a-half of restrictions related to the pandemic, here are some of the venues that didn’t make it through. 

Supporting and organizing reggae concerts since 1980, Cheatom has produced 39 annual music festivals, although as we all know with COVID-19 came the closing of music venues and cultural centers and with that WBCC closed from March, 2020 until its recent reopening in September.

Co-founded in 2016 by musician and grassroots activist Steph Johnson, the mission of Voices of Our City Choir is to provide healing and hope through music for the unhoused population in San Diego. Today, it has expanded beyond music to offer housing assistance, weekly outreach, case management and advocacy training.

As Matt Lamkin thinks about his new album “Dirty Job,” the former frontman for The Soft Pack finds humor in the fact that it may be his weirdest. At times infectious, and at others perplexing, “Dirty Job” channels all of the wild, uncertain nature of pandemic life. 

On Oct. 12 and Oct. 13 City hosted its first basketball tournament of the season winning both out conference games.

The City College dance program will present “An Evening of Dance 2021” for two shows at the Saville Theatre on Nov. 20.

In an effort to shine some light on San Diego’s incredible musical offerings, we at City Times Media decided to create a monthly playlist that highlights local musicians.