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Thursday, March 26

Sunset Rubdown's New Album: Dragonslayer

Spencer Krug totally just naming his albums after his Netflix queue now. Sunset Rubdown's New Album: <i>Dragonslayer</i>

Looks like Spencer Krug has a thing for early-80s sci-fi/fantasy movies. You could say the same thing about plenty of us late-70s babies, but Krug is especially all over this stuff. Already this year, his Swan Lake project has released an album called Enemy Mine. And in a few months, another one of Krug's bands, Sunset Rubdown, will drop a full-length titled Dragonslayer. Yes, as in the 1981 Peter MacNicol fire-breathing romp. At this rate, the next Wolf Parade album is going to be called The Last Starfighter.

Jagjaguwar will release Dragonslayer, Sunset Rubdown's fourth album, on June 23. That mysterious mangled mannequin above is the cover. For this album, they've added another member, bassist/drummer Mark Nicol.

In the first week of April, Sunset Rubdown will also release a 7" single called Sunset Rubdown Introducing Moonface on Aagoo Records. It'll feature two non-album songs, "Coming to the Dawn" and "Insane Love Is Awakening", and it'll be a picture disc. Here's the picture:

Aww.

Sunset Rubdown will spend their spring touring Europe.

Dragonslayer tracklist and dates below.

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News in Brief: Celebration, The Black Keys, Rock Plaza Central, Eddie Bo

News in Brief: Celebration, The Black Keys, Rock Plaza Central, Eddie Bo

-- TV on the Radio buddies Celebration are through with releasing music the traditional way. A post on their blog states their new forward-thinking strategy: "Our plan is to post new songs monthly, as we create and record them. All of our new music will be free to download. When we have enough music for an album, we will release it on vinyl for those who want to have something to hold." Sounds reasonable to us. They also have a note for the haters: "If we be fools, let us be the Fool of the tarot." Oh snap.

-- Now that Black Keys singer-guitarist Dan Auerbach (beard) has his own solo album, Black Keys drummer Patrick Carney (glasses) is working on his own side project, according to Entertainment Weekly. It's a new band called Drummer featuring (um) drummers from Ohio bands. Ironically, Carney plays bass in Drummer. They have a couple gigs lined up for May.

-- Folky Toronto band Rock Plaza Central have a new album ready to enter the world May 26 in Canada and June 16 in the U.S. It's called ...at the Moment of our Most Needing, or If Only They Could Turn Around, They Would Know They Weren't Alone. (Fiona Apple, all is forgiven.) Download a song off the album called "(Don't You Believe the Words Of) Handsome Men" here.

-- According to the AP, Eddie Bo-- New Orleans singer and pianist who worked with Irma Thomas and Art Neville, and wrote the Etta James hit "My Dearest Darling"-- died of a heart attack earlier this week. He was 79 years old.

Posted by Ryan Dombal on March 26, 2009 at 3:55 p.m.

Tags: Album, Celebration, Eddie Bo, Obituary, Patrick Carney, Rock Plaza Central, The Black Keys

 

Echo Chamber: The Thermals

Echo Chamber: The Thermals

"duuuuude...the interview with John Norris is 4 minutes and 20 seconds long. Coincidence? I don't think so."

-- The Thermals deconstruct a giggly SXSW video interview. (via @thethermals)

Posted by Ryan Dombal on March 26, 2009 at 3:20 p.m.

Tags: Echo Chamber, The Thermals

 

Santigold to Tour America With Full Band

Bud Light Lime will be flowing! Or, you know, not flowing. Santigold to Tour America With Full Band

Photo by Kathryn Yu

Santigold-- that singing, dancing, name-changing, Brooklyn-repping, Ashlee-co-writing, Bud Light Lime-shilling pop multitasker-- knows how to put on a show that makes people wish they knew how to dance. And she looks like she's having fun up there, which is nice. Until now, she's only toured North America with a skeleton crew including a couple of militaristic B-girls from space.

But she'll break out the full band (and keep the dancers) when she heads out on a victory lap trek through the U.S. and Canada in May before bearing down on her second LP later this year. Trouble Andrew (who guested on Santi's debut) and Amanda Blank (who got Santi to lay down a guest shot on her upcoming debut LP) open. Dates:

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Sinéad O'Connor Reissues Breakout LP

Sinéad O'Connor Reissues Breakout LP

If you're looking for an excuse to watch the "Nothing Compares 2 U" video for the 748th time (and, really, who isn't) here we go: Sinéad O'Connor's breakout 1990 sophomore LP I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got is the latest album to get the reissue treatment from Capitol/EMI in the label's effort to make a little money off their catalogue while CDs are still something that exist.

But we're not too mad about this one. The double disc set is out April 21 and features a 10-song bonus disc with B-sides, live cuts and two previously unreleased tracks, including a cover of John Lennon's "Mind Games".

Click for full tracklist:

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Metallica Add Dates, Reunite With Jason Newsted for Rock Hall Performance

Everybody now: "Die! By my hand!" Metallica Add Dates, Reunite With Jason Newsted for Rock Hall Performance

Photo by Tom Breihan

One of the best things about Metallica's utterly ripping secret/not-secret SXSW show (crowd pictured above) was the way they treated Stubb's, an extremely small venue by Metallica standards, like it was an actual arena. Stubb's is an outdoor barbecue joint with a capacity of about 3000, but that did not stop one of the world's biggest bands from blazing through an hour and a half of their classics, delivering all their gloriously over-the-top stage-banter ("Are you ah-liiive?"), and dumping a cup of beer on my head (Lars). Even better: The crowd treated it like an arena show, too, belting all the big lines right back at the band and generally acting like a way rowdier bunch of motherfuckers than you usually find at music-biz conferences.

So it would follow that the only thing better than seeing Metallica play a pretend arena show would be seeing them play an actual arena show. They are in rare form right now, pulling at least half their set lists from their bloodthirsty first three albums and generally knowing and caring why people like them. The band will spend their spring and summer in Europe, playing some shows with couldn't-be-more-perfect openers Mastodon. And when they make it back to North America this fall, you might owe it to yourself to check them out.

Until that time, though, you'll have to make do with pretending to be Kirk Hammet in front of your TV. "Guitar Hero: Metallica" drops on March 29 and looks pretty sick, Foo Fighters inclusion notwithstanding.

Also, the band will enter the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on April 4. Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers will induct them. And as Hammet told Rolling Stone, the band will reunite with former bassist Jason Newsted at the ceremony. If they're in a hatchet-burying mood, maybe they'll holler at Dave Mustaine, too.

Dates below.

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Warp Records Celebrates 20th Anniversary

They even dragged Aphex Twin out of his tank! Warp Records Celebrates 20th Anniversary

Warp Records, the English electronic music/experimental rock powerhouse, turns 20 this year, and the label is marking the occasion in some big ways. Before the year is out, Warp will release both a retrospective box set and an interactive greatest-hits album, and they'll throw parties on three different continents.

For most of its history, Warp was known mainly as an IDM label, the place where Aphex Twin and Autechre and Plaid and LFO and Boards of Canada all cranked out their alternately jittery and placid beat symphonies. In recent years, the label has branched out into more instrument-based fare like Grizzly Bear and !!!. According to a Warp rep, one of the releases the label plans for its 20th anniversary is "a deluxe box set featuring previously unreleased archive material from some of the label's best-known artists." I'm really hoping the box runs chronologically, so we'll get, like, three discs of jackhammer drum-machines phasing between speaker channels before, I don't know, Maxïmo Park shows up out of nowhere.

The label also plans to release a compilation album, with 10 tracks chosen by fan voting (the rest will be picked by Warp founder co-founder Steve Beckett). At this website, you can vote for which songs will make the cut. As I'm writing this, the Boards of Canada track "Happy Cycling" tops the list. There's also a Vincent Gallo track in the top ten, something I have to imagine won't stand for too long. (I'm thisclose to launching a voting campaign for Aphex's "Avril 14th".) If you like, you can leave "personal messages and memories" about the songs you're picking, and they might make it into the album's packaging. ("Dude, I got so stoned jamming on 'Bucephalus Bouncing Ball', you don't even know.") Warp plans to release the album this fall.

The label is also planning big events in five cities around the world. Thus far, they've only announced details for one of them. In Paris, on May 8-9, a gang of Warp acts will perform at the Cite de la Musique. Thus far, the lineup looks like a monster: Aphex Twin & Hecker, !!!, Pivot, Andrew Weatherall, and DJ Mujava, with more acts to be announced. There will also be a homecoming party in Sheffield, England in August. And the label also plans "music, film, and art installation events" in New York (July), London (September), and Tokyo (November).

Posted by Tom Breihan on March 26, 2009 at 12:50 p.m.

Tags: Box Set, Compilation, Festival, Warp

 

R.I.P. Blender Magazine

R.I.P. Blender Magazine

Today, Ad Age reports that Blender magazine is shutting down, with the current issue on stands now set to be its last. The magazine's parent company, Alpha Media Group, has let go of the entire staff save for editor-in-chief Joe Levy, who will oversee Maxim magazine.

Full disclosure: Many members of the Pitchfork staff, including myself, wrote for Blender during its eight-year lifespan.

While Blender may have been an easy target for some, with its often gratuitously skin-baring covers and plethora of jokey lists, it also offered a valuable mainstream forum for discussing music, and contained plenty of good writing. (Yes, of course, I'm biased.) Even if you didn't like Blender's editorial style, it featured robust, challenging opinions, and the magazine rarely kowtowed to the tyranny of critics' darlings. No more Blender magazine means some kid isn't going to pick up a copy at the 7-11 because he thinks Katy Perry looks hot on the cover, end up reading about Mastodon, and have his mind blown. And that sucks.

Posted by Amy Phillips on March 26, 2009 at 12:40 p.m.

Tags: Blender, Industry News

 

Echo Chamber: Ted Leo

"No lie: 90% of the music I write is never heard scores for never made cartoons. Call me if you need any of it."

(Via Twitter @tedleo.)

Posted by Pitchfork on March 26, 2009 at 10:55 a.m.

Tags: Echo Chamber, Ted Leo

 

Echo Chamber: Jim Jones

Echo Chamber: Jim Jones

"I want to be like MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice and them. I’m living a cliché. I don’t want the bad part. I want the fluffy part sometimes."
-- Jim Jones: rapper, actor, parachute pants nostalgist (via The New York Times.)

Posted by Ryan Dombal on March 26, 2009 at 10:30 a.m.

Tags: Echo Chamber, Jim Jones

 

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