Sunday, April 29th, 2012

"When You Sleep"

The Twilight Singers cover My Bloody Valentine

WikipediaIf the accompanying image this post looks familiar, it may be because I went to this record – The Twilight Singers’ 2004 covers album She Loves You – as recently as last October for a selection. And why not? As I mentioned in that writeup, Greg Dulli is a master of the cover version and any excuse he gives me to listen to or share one of them, I’ll probably take it. And getting The Afghan Whigs back together – as he did this year for live dates both festival and not – counts. So why not post a Whigs-era track, which I’ve got more than a few of? Because he didn’t cover My Bloody Valentine with them, turning the one of the band’s poppiest songs into a loungey piano number (but with guitars – no heresy here) with a Bette Midler coda (really), and the long-awaited MBV reissues – they were announced back in early 2008 to coincide with their own reunion dates – are finally coming out. No really, they are.

Slicing Up Eyeballs has got actual photos of the remastered Loveless and Isn’t Anything reissues as well as the new double-disc EPs 1988-1991 compilation CD sets and after being teased by non-working advances a few times, I finally heard them this weekend. They’re real, people. And they’re out May 7. With so much productivity, maybe the Pitchfork interview where Kevin Shields said a new album was almost done has some truth to it? Of course, just because it’s been recorded doesn’t mean it’ll come out. These releases had been recorded for over twenty years, after all. Bassist Deb Googe clearly isn’t waiting on further MBV activities to fill her calendar; she’s followed Shields’ footsteps and joined Primal Scream.

The Twilight Singers, who released Dynamite Steps just last year, are on the shelf while The Afghan Whigs collect their due over a decade after calling it quits. That they’ve begun announcing North American dates (well, New York) makes me hopeful that more are coming. They’ve been kind of the unofficial soundtrack of my 2012.

MP3: The Twilight Singers – “When You Sleep”
Stream: My Bloody Valentine – “When You Sleep”

By : Frank Yang at 9:57 am No Comments del.icio.us digg facebook

Sunday, April 22nd, 2012

"The Weight"

Wilco, Nick Lowe & Mavis Staples cover The Band

YouTubeNot the best week for the world of music, this past one. First there was the news that Robin Gibb of The Bee-Gees, who’d started the month with the good news that his cancer was in remission, had fallen into a coma due to pneumonia; then on Wednesday, Dick Clark was felled by a heart attack. Arguably the hardest blow came Thursday, however, when it was announced that Levon Helm – drummer and vocalist for The Band – had passed away from a battle with cancer that he’d seemingly beaten over a decade earlier.

His loss was immediately felt all throughout the music world, with tributes by way of covers of The Band’s music ringing out from stages everywhere. This week’s selection wasn’t one of them, but instead comes from a dressing room at Chicago’s Civic Opera House in December of last year. Helm was still alive and well, then, so all that Wilco, Nick Lowe, and Mavis Staples were saluting at that time was one of the great songs of twentieth century popular music, one which easily transcends geography, genre and generations.

Jeff Tweedy and Glenn Kotche of Wilco were just some of the countless artists who paid tribute to Helm this weekend; Bob Dylan was another. There are worthy looks back at Helm’s life and legacy at Exclaim, The AV Club, and Billboard.

Nick Lowe is in town tomorrow night for a show at The Phoenix in support of his latest record The Old Magic. Wilco continue to tour last year’s The Whole Love; Band songs have graced their set lists in the past and it’s not unreasonable to expect that they’ll be working their way back in. Mavis Staples released the Jeff Tweedy-produced You Are Not Alone back in 2010 – she’s still on the road for that one.

And in a bit of good news, Robin Gibb is out of his coma.

MP3: Wilco, Nick Lowe & Mavis Staples – “The Weight” (live – Chicago, December 2011)
Video: Wilco, Nick Lowe & Mavis Staples – “The Weight” (live – Chicago, December 2011)
Video: The Band – “The Weight” (live – Festival Express, 1970)

By : Frank Yang at 10:23 am No Comments del.icio.us digg facebook

Sunday, April 15th, 2012

"Sweet Child O' Mine"

Luna covers Guns N’ Roses

WikipediaDespite their having a great number of great and interesting covers to their name, I genuinely didn’t think I’d have occasion to post any more Luna on account of the fact that they ceased to exist seven years ago as of this past February and the ’90s reunion bandwagon has not yet rolled through Luna-ville, nor is it likely to anytime soon. So with that in mind, the fact that the last two Luna albums – 2002’s Romantica and 2004’s Rendezvous will be getting released on vinyl for the first time this Friday for Record Store Day as part of a reissue campaign is as good an excuse as any.

Not that 1999’s The Days Of Our Nights, which this Guns N’ Roses cover closed, is part of those reissues. I don’t know if there are rights issues to the record, what with it being issued on an imprint of an imprint of a major label that ceased to exist shortly after this album came out or if it’s just not high enough in the hierarchy of popular Luna releases, but I do know that it was hard enough to find when it was technically in print – I had to go all the way to Dean Wareham’s old stomping grounds of Cambridge, Massachusetts to get my copy (okay, I didn’t go expressly to buy it there but that’s where I found it). In any case, it’s a rare occasion of a cover being included on an album proper rather than saved for b-sides, but as the interview with Dean and Sean preceding the live version also included below indicates, it was supposed to catapult the band to fame and fortune. Or not.

The half of Luna that was Dean and Britta carry on as Dean & Britta, and have been busying themselves with their 13 Most Beautiful and Plays Galaxie 500 shows, though one would think that some new material of their own is percolating. Sean Eden and Lee Wall also seem to be keeping busy.

As for GN’R, you’ve probably heard the kerfuffle that ensued when questions of would the original lineup of the band reunite to play the induction ceremony last night were downgraded to would they even show up together and then even those were dashed earlier this week when Axl announced via Facebook that he was declining the induction altogether. They inducted him anyways. I would like to think that if/when Luna are inducted to the Hall Of Fame, they’ll reunite for the occasion. They’re eligible in 2017.

MP3: Luna – “Sweet Child O’ Mine”
MP3: Luna – “Sweet Child O’ Mine” (live on World Cafe)
Video: Guns N’ Roses – “Sweet Child O’ Mine

By : Frank Yang at 10:52 am No Comments del.icio.us digg facebook

Sunday, April 8th, 2012

"Saturday"

M. Ward covers Yo La Tengo

Frank YangIt’s kind of funny to hear M. Ward introduce this song to his audience as being “by another American band called Yo La Tengo“, at least in the context of it being 2012. After all, these days Ward is a reasonably big name – thanks as much to his work with She & Him and Monsters Of Folk as his solo work – and Yo La Tengo are generally regarded as indie rock royalty.

Rewind to 2001 and while Yo La Tengo were still pre-eminent on the scene, M. Ward was not so much. This live recording was part of the Live Music & The Voice of Strangers album, self-released by Ward and sold on tour supporting his second album End Of Amnesia – presumably to help pay for gas.

It’d be nice to think that Ward is much better off these days, as he readies the release of his latest A Wasteland Companion on Tuesday, but have you seen the price of gas lately? Maybe he’s not. Yo La Tengo are in town at the Toronto Underground Cinema on April 21 to provide a live soundtrack to The Sounds Of Science as part of the Images Festival, as they did for 2002’s The Sounds Of The Sounds Of Science. That’s a Saturday.

MP3: M. Ward – “Saturday”
Video: Yo La Tengo – “Saturday” (live in Pittsburgh, 2011)

By : Frank Yang at 10:02 am No Comments del.icio.us digg facebook

Sunday, April 1st, 2012

"Time For Heroes"

Graham Coxon covers The Libertines

AmazonI don’t think that Pete Doherty and I have very much in common – my drug habit is very much under control, thank you for asking – but it would seem that our list of musical idols shares some overlap. After all, if I were to itemize my guitar heroes 1-2, they’d probably be Bernard Butler of Suede and Graham Coxon of Blur, the former of whom produced The Libertines’ very first single “What A Waster” and the latter of whom was enlisted to play guitar on his 2009 solo album Grace/Wasteleands. So should it ever come to pass that we were locked in a room together, I suppose we could talk about that.

Coxon’s relationship with Doherty, at least musically, goes back further than that though, as he turned up to play “Time For Heroes” live with Doherty as early as 2004 and covered said tune in a visit to BBC’s Live Lounge in Fall of that year. It was released commercially as a 7″ b-side to “I Can’t Look At Your Skin”, one of his own solo singles circa 2006’s Love Travels at Illegal Speeds, his sixth solo record.

His eighth solo record A+E is out this week; DIY talks to him about the record and The Telegraph finds out about his fashion sense. Pete Doherty is, against all odds, still alive and not in jail and though The Libertines reunion hasn’t done much since 2010, with both Doherty and Carl Barat turning their attention to less lucrative solo pursuits, they technically remain an ongoing concern with both occasionally promising/threatening to do something again in the near future.

MP3: Graham Coxon – “Time For Heroes”
Video: The Libertines – “Time For Heroes”
Video: Pete Doherty with Graham Coxon – “Time For Heroes” (live 2004)

By : Frank Yang at 10:09 am No Comments del.icio.us digg facebook