Pitchfork: Hot Hot Heat Set Dates for Spring Tour

Perhaps as a nod to their indie upbringing (or maybe just because they don't have anything better to do), Hot Hot Heat has shirked conventional marketing wisdom and will tour before, rather than after, their major-label debut Elevator comes out on April 5-- although one would presume that the rest of 2005 will see some heavy touring too. Once the band gets back from their current mini-trip in Europe, they'll start touring in late February on the West Coast and continue throughout the country until their as-yet-unscheduled appearance at South by Southwest.

The tour's also a bit of a warm-up for new guitarist Luke Paquin, who replaced Dante DeCaro shortly after Elevator was completed. Louis XIV, a band curiously loved in both their hometown of San Diego and the BBC Radio 1 studios, will be joining Hot Hot Heat for the U.S. dates. They too are anticipating a Spring 2005 release on Atlantic records, reportedly combining material from their self-released EPs with new material recorded last November and December. Jump around:

01-31 Hamburg, Germany - Molotow
02-21 Seattle, WA - Neumo's *
02-22 Portland, OR - Meow Meow *
02-24 San Francisco, CA - Great American Music Hall *
02-25 Los Angeles, CA - The Roxy *
02-27 Salt Lake City, UT - Club Sound *
02-28 Boulder, CO - The Fox Theatre *
03-02 Minneapolis, MN - Ascot Room *
03-03 Chicago, IL - Bottom Lounge *
03-05 Detroit, MI - St. Andrews Hall *
03-07 Boston, MA - Axis *
03-09 New York, NY - The Bowery Ballroom *
03-10 Philadelphia, PA - Theatre of Living Arts *
03-11 Washington, DC - 9:30 Club *
03-15 Dallas, TX - Trees *

* with Louis XIV

Elevator's first single, "Goodnight, Goodnight", is currently scheduled to be released on March 28, although there's no word yet on b-sides. However, the band was nice enough to throw up a substantial sample of that song on their website, accompanied with a video peek into the song's recording. Another track off the album, "Island of the Honest Man", also gets the preview treatment. There's lots of pretty Christmas lights in those videos, lining the perimeters of keyboards and sound engineer consoles, all of which should get you in the mood for some new Hot Hot Heat. Or Christmas...we're not sure which. And just in case you're feeling like it'd be waaaay too much effort to go all the way over to the Hot Hot Heat website, we've helpfully included links to the files below.

* Louis XIV: http://www.louisxiv.net