Tuesday, March 1st, 2005

Ride Into The Sun

Sometime in the wee hours of last night, at New York City’s Bowery Ballroom, Luna played one last encore, said farewell and left the stage for the last time. They leave behind seven studio albums, one live album, several EPs and a sad spot in my heart as one of my favourite bands ever are no more.

Andy, who runs the Galaxie 500/Luna website Full Of Wishes, has started a groupblog – Luna’s Last Waltz – to document the final days of the band, collecting reviews, photos, testimonials and reminiscences from fans over the course of their final tour. There’s some really nice dispatches and photos from last night, including a pic of Dean loading his guitar into a cab to go home.

For my part, I bid the band farewell last Fall, first in Toronto and then Chicago (from where today’s photo was taken) even though that turned out to not be their final date in the Windy City – they stopped by once more last month on their way back home to New York City for their final four shows over three days.

Update: Photos from the last show.

As a parting gift, I present a farewell track – a Velvet Underground cover, natch – recorded June 3, 1993 at the Borderline in London.

MP3: Luna – “Ride Into The Sun” (live)

Goodbye.

One to put in your distant future pipe… Joe Pernice is trying to add a solo Toronto date onto “his very extensive 2-4 show tour of the world” (mailing list’s words, not mine) which currently includes London, New York and probably Boston. If it happens, it’ll probably do so around late April/early May. I admit, when Joe moved up here last Fall, I was hoping it would mean at least a couple local appearances, but the man’s been keeping a very low profile. But still, I’ll take what I can get.

The Times and The Guardian both run Manchester-angled interviews with Doves, whose Some Cities came out a couple weeks ago in the UK and is out today in North America. From Pop (All Love). And anyone who’s not rushing out today to buy the new record and needs a little more convincing, there’s a streaming audio sampler here. And if you like other people to tell you what to like, Pitchfork testifies.

You can preview a couple of tracks from The Carlton Chronicles, the new album from Centro-Matic side-project South San Gabriel. It’s out April 5.

David Bowie tells Rolling Stone why he likes Arcade Fire.

Wait for the punchline. Wait for it. From Golden Fiddle.

24: Well, I guess they decided that schizophrenic daughter storyline wasn’t going anywhere. So that’s the second major plotline wrapped up (kidnapping, meltdowns) by 6PM. Thirteen hours to go – what will they do next? Hopefully Jack will get a chance to have a sandwich or something, the boy hasn’t eaten all day. But really, I must once again applaud the producers for not dragging things out. Lots of believable (relatively speaking) mini crises are much more interesting than one drawn-out completely incredulous one. Of course, they’re also not going to convince anyone that the terrorists have yet another contingency plan in place… but they’ll try anyways. Let’s see what’s next. Maybe they’ll spend the next few hours in couple’s therapy where Audrey will confess that seeing Jack apply live electrical wires to her ex-husband’s nipples didn’t repulse her so much as excite her.

np – New Order / Power, Corruption & Lies

By : Frank Yang at 9:16 am
Category: Uncategorized
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  1. Rachel says:

    The Iron and Wine cover of Stereolab is –uh– lacking. What were they thinking? Anyone heard of Brooks Hubbert? If not, you will soon. FYI, I speak of the son, not the father, but both are worth listening to.

  2. Torr says:

    New Doves album just ain’t doing it for me; it’s by far their weakest yet. And I think that’s the first time pitchfork has ever given above a 7.0 to any brit band who is currently big in the UK.

  3. Paul says:

    Same here. I was a big fan of the first Doves album, moderate fan of the second, and a non-fan of the newest.

  4. Gary Campbell says:

    I disagree with Rachel — that Iron & Wine cover of Stereolab is awesome. It caused me to go dig out some old Stereolab and listen to it all over again as if for the first time. Thanks Iron & Wine!

  5. Frank says:

    I like the I&W cover too. I don’t know the Stereolab original, though.

    And while I’m being contrary, I preferred Last Broadcast to Lost Souls and have really liked what I’ve heard from Some Cities so far.

  6. Jacky Jack says:

    I disagree with all of you. I neither love nor hate the Iron and Wine cover, and I’m wholly ambivalent about the Doves.

  7. Frank says:

    AMBIVALENCE IS NOT AN OPTION!

  8. ryan97ou says:

    of course…rollingstone is about 100 years behind…great…now a million 16 year olds will be at the next arcade fire show…

  9. D. says:

    My 2 cents:

    After hearing tunes like ‘Sea Song’ on the advance EPs I held my breath until I was blue in the face (cue happy memories of a friend coming into our sixth form common room, slamming the debut EP down and exclaiming "you’ve really, really got to listen to this").

    But when Lost Souls arrived I felt it MOR’d where it should have soared. Alas.

    The Last Broadcast however, had a few goliath-slaying numbers on it: There Goes The Fear, New York and Pounding. If it weren’t for the occasional foray into featureless Travis-country they’d have finally lived up to their own potential.

    From what I’ve heard of the new one, though, they’ve gone a bit off track. The current discussion on Stylus seems to sum it up – the band have outgrown Jimi Godwin’s sincere but off-kilter voice.

    Still love ’em though.

  10. horace says:

    i didn’t think it was possible to prefer last broadcast over lost souls. to each their own though.

  11. Kevin says:

    Bought it but haven’t heard Doves newie yet.

    I live in the burbs of Boston and Joe Pernice actually lived the next town over. I would see him out and about all the time. We shopped at the same places. Hope he finds his way out and manages some business with his music.

    Our loss is your gain, apparently….

  12. Rachel says:

    Frank, Frank, Frank, go listen to the original Stereolab song. It is light years above and beyond the Iron and Wine ickiness. Trust me. Have I ever steered you wrong before? Oh, and I have a CD for you. Now THERE’S a switch!

  13. Andy says:

    Frank, sorry I’ve been meaning to say hi and thanks for chromewaves – it is up there amongst the first things I check most mornings. But a(nother) Luna piece got me out of my shell. Thanks

  14. Frank says:

    16-year olds read Rolling Stone? I figure it’ll attract more 40-somethings who want to seem as cool as Bowie.

    I believe Joe’s Torontonian status is a temporary thing, there was an interview in the Big Takeover last year where he said he and Laura were moving to Canada for a little while, maybe a couple years, but not permanently. I saw him at the Matthew Sweet show last year, sporting a big ol beard.

    Hi Andy – thanks a lot, you’ve done a great service to the Luna fan community over the years, I hope it stays together even though the band is not.

  15. CBC During Dinner says:

    Frank

    Do you work for CBC? Because I can’t think of any other reason that they featured Luna on As It Happens on Tuesday night.

  16. Frank says:

    did they really? Nope, wasn’t me. I can SEE the CBC from my work, but that’s not really the same thing.

  17. Tom says:

    Don’t listen to the Some Cities refuseniks. It’s a great album, much stronger than Last Broadcast which aside from the singles, words and satellites was patchy in my opinion. Best moment is the lovely That Joke Isn’t Funny Anymore homage at the end of Someday Soon.