Friday, June 15th, 2007
“There are no plans what-so-ever to record another Mojave 3 record” – dire words and a damned strange way to start a press release, especially one most logically targeted at fans of the band that it’s purporting to be burying. The band in question is The Loose Salute, the occasion is the release of their debut album Tuned To Love this past Tuesday and the common thread is Ian McCutcheon, drummer for M3 and frontman for the Loose Salute, and the man to whom the above quote is attributed.
It was well known even while M3 were supporting last year’s Puzzles Like You that the band would be taking a break – bassist/vocalist Rachel Goswell was/is still recovering from health concerns and was unable to tour and support the record, frontman Neil Halstead already had plans for a second solo record and wheels were rolling on The Loose Salute – the closing track on Puzzles, “The Mutineer”, was sung by McCutcheon and also appears on Tuned. No one expected them to head right back into the studio and turn out another record, and so McCutcheon’s statement is probably technically correct. But the way it’s phrased and presented, as though the band is dead, is probably a bit sensationalistic and designed to grab attention… like this post. Ahem. Anyways, to my knowledge (and I asked), they’ve not notified 4AD of any sort of dissolution so I will simply interpret this as a break – a temporary one – while they tend to other things and fully expect one of my favourite bands to return with another wonderful record… eventually.
But since I’ve taken the bait, let’s talk Loose Salute. As “The Mutineer” proved, McCutcheon has a fine voice not worlds removed from Halstead’s – soft and breathy and not really what you’d expect from someone who’s as much a monster on the drumkit as he. And similarly, the band’s sound isn’t far off from his day job’s – this is not McCutcheon exorcising his death metal joneses. Instead, their sunny, Californian boy-girl vocals pop is like the cover art for Out Of Tune committed to tape – in fact, what I’ve heard sounds an awful lot like Out Of Tune, period, though lighter and breezier. It’s all quite pretty and while McCutcheon isn’t a songwriter of Halstead’s calibre, he does quite well for himself here. But treading so closely to where his other band has already gone, comparing the two is inevitable and maybe it’s just my own, obvious bias but given the choice, I’ll take Mojave 3 every day.
MP3: The Loose Salute – “The Mutineer”
MP3: The Loose Salute – “Turn The Radio Up”
MP3: The Loose Salute – “Death Club”
Video: The Loose Salute – “The Mutineer” (YouTube)
Video: The Loose Salute – “Turn The Radio Up” (YouTube)
eCard: The Loose Salute / Tuned To Love
MySpace: The Loose Salute
Exciting new session at Daytrotter – a Mountain Goats session recorded at SxSW consisting of two new originals, an old cowboy song and one Peter Tosh cover which, sadly, you can’t download anymore because of royalty issues.
Richard Thompson’s latest album Sweet Warrior
was released at the end of May and from all accounts, his first fully electrified record since 2003 is a sparkling highlight of a long, sparkly career. I must seek out a copy. He’s been doing the interview circuit, talking to The AV Club, Kentucky.com, The Denver Post, Cleveland Free Times and Ents24.
Pitchfork offers up details on Hideout, the third album from Film School due September 11.
Cincinnati CityBeat talks to native son Bryce Dessner of The National.
Wilco are all about the streaming concerts – tonight’s show in Indianapolis will be streaming off their website starting with Low at 8PM EDT and then Wilco at 9:15. They’re even including the opening set. How cool is that? Their Sunday night set at Bonnaroo will also be streaming at the AT&T’s Blue Room – they’re on at 5:30 CDT.
Chris Garneau is at Sneaky Dee’s next week on June 20 for a free show. I haven’t given his record Music For Tourists the attention I’d have liked but what I’ve heard is intriguing. I will dig it out and give a listen before next Wednesday, maybe check it out. If you’re curious, there’s this one track to download, more at his MySpace and this Takeaway Show with a rather lovely Elliott Smith cover. Actually you know what? Reading reviews like this one, I think I kinda have to go to this show. Done and done.
MP3: Chris Garneau – “Not Nice”
Bill “don’t call me Smog” Callahan is in town September 11 for a show at the Music Gallery.
Devandra Banhart returns to Toronto on September 21 for a show at the Danforth Music Hall in support of his forthcoming nameless, release date-less record. Pitchfork has some info on the record from Banhart himself and also confirms he’s still batshit crazy. Tickets for the show are $32.50 and go on sale next week.
And also note that the Lemonheads show originally scheduled for July 20 at Lee’s Palace has been moved to July 24 – refunds are available if you need them. The band is also still scheduled for a free show at the Berkeley Church on June 21 (email audience200@gmail.com with “Lemonheads” in the subject line to get in). Of course, the official Lemonheads tour itinerary has them in Albany that night, but I’m sure it’s all worked out. After all, Evan Dando seems like a bright, responsible young man with a good head on his shoulders.
Thursday, June 14th, 2007
I don’t know who it was that put this bill together – the country-soul Jersey girl and the oh-so English New Wavers – but they either have impeccable taste in music and a commendable disregard for genre pigeonholes… or they just like putting ridiculously good-looking frontwomen on tour together. Either way, they have my thanks.
The Jersey girl in question was one Nicole Atkins, accompanied by her band The Sea. I’d seen her perform at SxSW but not her band – somewhere between Newark and Austin, they got misplaced and she had to perform a truncated set backed by The Parlour Mob as ringers. They did a fine job backing her, I was majorly impressed, but after seeing her on Monday night I understand that I wasn’t seeing a fraction of what she was capable of.
Atkins has an incredible voice – think Loretta Lynn if she sang as much soul, blues and rock as she did country. Rich and heart-rending, powerful without ever oversinging and supremely versatile, Atkins and her band were bale to move from style to style effortlessly and naturally, sounding simultaneously timeless and contemporary. And need I mention that she was completely warm and charming onstage? Or that I was completely bowled over by her show and I went in with pretty high expectations. Simply one of the most astonishing new talents I’ve seen in forever.
I grabbed a copy of her 2006 EP Bleeding Diamonds ($3.98 at Insound – you have no excuse. Get it.) and it’s gorgeous, focusing on the slower, torchier side of her repetoire. But based on the live show and other tracks floating around the internet, her debut full-length Neptune City will incorporate more of the upbeat songs and display more of her Garden State rock influences (I’m talking Springsteen, not Bon Jovi, though Atkins might well dispute that). It’s out July 24 and if she’s touring anywhere near you, go see her. I’m hoping she’ll make it back here (the NxNE listings had her as playing the festival last weekend but apparently they forgot to actually ask her) but in the meantime I’m prepared to head down to Austin for ACL in September to see her. Well her and some others, but definitely her.
But wait, there’s more. She was just the opener and while she set the bar absurdly high, The Long Blondes were up to the task. Though this was their first Canadian show and technically their album Someone To Drive You Home had only been released over here last week, it was obvious from the rabidness of the crowd that most had been living with the record via import since last year and had been waiting for this show for almost as long. I’d only heard some of the singles and wasn’t completely sold but was certainly prepared to buy if the pitch was good. Let’s just say they made an offer I couldn’t refuse.
While they can’t necessarily boast about their musical virtuosity, they kept things simple and effective letting guitarist/chief songwriter Dorian Cox’s words and singer Kate Jackson’s voice and boundless charisma do the rest. Sexy and swaggering in a sheer black pencil skirt, Jackson was a magnetic frontwoman with an arsenal of songs blending pure pop with New Wave stylings with the same sort of inimitably sardonic Englishness that defined their most frequent point of comparison, fellow Sheffield natives Pulp (though to get a little more contemporary, there was more than a little Franz Ferdinand-esque vibe on display). Experienced live (and from maybe four feet from Jackson), the songs which had left me sitting on the fence going in had me dancing just a bit coming out – delivered with such energy and sass, they were irresistable. They kept things short and sweet – not even an hour including onetwo-song encore – but I can’t imagine anyone was disappointed. Either Atkins or the Long Blondes’ sets on their own would have been worth the price of admission. Together, it was one of the best nights of live music you could imagine.
Harp gets to know Atkins a little better, she tells The New York Sun why she hasn’t tried out for American Idol and NPR has got an interview and three-song World Cafe set available to stream. Also check out the Rolling Stone piece from March 2006 that declared her one of “10 Artists To Watch”, one of the magazine’s rare recent instances of getting it exactly right and while we’re going back a bit, there’s an interview with her circa the same period at Village Indian. Pitchfork, meanwhile, solicits a guest list from Blondes drummer Screech Louder and Jackson gives Express an idea of what to expect from their next album.
Photos: The Long Blondes, Nicole Atkins & The Sea @ Lee’s Palace – June 11, 2007
MP3: The Long Blondes – “Once And Never Again”
MP3: Nicole Atkins & The Sea – “The Way It Is”
MP3: Nicole Atkins – “Bleeding Diamonds”
MP3: Nicole Atkins – “Carouselle”
Video: The Long Blondes – “Weekend Without Makeup” (YouTube)
Video: The Long Blondes – “Giddy Stratospheres” (YouTube)
Video: The Long Blondes – “Separated By Motorways” (YouTube)
Video: The Long Blondes – “Once And Never Again” (YouTube)
Video: Nicole Atkins – “Neptune City” (YouTube)
MySpace: The Long Blondes
MySpace: Nicole Atkins
Cleveland Scene examines the Springsteen-ness of The National.
Asbury Park Press, Denver Westworld and The Washington Post talk to Bloc Party.
UK buzz band (yes, another one) The Fratellis are coming to town for a show at the Mod Club on August 7. Tickets are $20 and go on sale Saturday.
JAM and eye chat with Jenn Grant about her debut album Orchestra Of The Moon. She’s at the Horseshoe tomorrow night.
The Joan As Police Woman show scheduled for July 28 at the Horseshoe appears to have been canceled.
Muzzle Of Bees asks five questions of Great Lake Swimmers’ Tony Dekker. I’ve been seeing all the shows that he’s wanted to! Ha ha. Sucker.
The internet is full of lists, many/most of them boring or predictable. So thank goodness for The AV Club and their First Annual Absolute Best Issue.
Wednesday, June 13th, 2007
My ideal itinerary for NxNE’s Saturday would have required me to either be in three or four places at once or at the very least, access to a helicopter to get from one venue to the next so the best compromise I could come up with was to plant my ass at Lee’s Palace, which was hosting a decently eclectic bill.
Portland’s High Violets were a name I’d seen a number of times before and I think I’d intended to see them play at at least one SxSW in the past. Well score one for passively waiting for the band to come to me. Led by Kaitlyn ni Donovan’s angelic vocals, reminiscent of Emma Anderson or maybe Meriel Barham, the High Violets sound like someone took all the shoegazey bits of my CD collection and threw it all into a blender – all the ingredients are familiar and tasty, but for whatever reason goes down a little flat and texture-less. I really wanted to like them and to a modest degree, do/did, but wasn’t bowled over the way I’d hoped I would.
I then ducked out for some dinner, intending to miss the next band whose bio compared them favourably to Finger Eleven. That plan succeeded, but I wasn’t able to kill enough time to miss the next act, local girl Tara Slone. Slone has had some success initially fronting the 90s Garbage wannabes Joydrop and then as a contestant on the INXS edition of Rock Star. Fronting what looked like an alt.rock band assembled by focus group, Slone copped what I can only assume was intended to be a “tough, sassy rocker chick” pose – cursing liberally, talking about her boobs and performing songs from her new album Just Look Pretty And Sing as well as Joydrop’s hits (both of them). The audience response was muted – something Slone took note of – and I couldn’t help thinking about the irony of something ostensibly called “modern rock” sounding so utterly dated.
Great Northern came all the way up to Toronto from Los Angeles to show off material from their debut album Trading Twilight For Daylight. The record is filled with lush and lovely pop built around the tight harmonies of Solon Bixler and Rachel Stolte. It’s terribly pretty but rather soft around the edges, production-wise. Happily, in a live setting things snap into much sharper focus – there’s more sonic punch and the delivery rawer, but without sacrificing any of the beauty. A pleasant surprise and they also take the prize for traveling with the absolute biggest keyboard I’ve ever seen. If you told me that after the show, they strapped some wheels on it and rode it to their next tour stop, I would’ve believed you.
While the crowds at Lee’s ebbed and tided through the night depending on who was playing, things definitely began filling up for the headliners, Chicago’s Urge Overkill. I figure there’s three kinds of UO fans – those who only know them from the Pulp Fiction soundtrack, those like myself who discovered them with 1992’s Saturation but didn’t explore much further and the hardcores, who’ve worn out multiple copies of Stull and Americruiser and shoot eye daggers at fan types one and maybe two. Somewhat surprisingly, the crowd seemed heavily weighted towards fan type three and it was for them that the Urge delivered a shockingly rocktacular set. While I by no means expected them to be bad, I also didn’t expect them to be so damned good.
Fronted by a still-emaciatedly lean Nash Kato and a decidedly not-lean Eddie “King” Roeser (drummer Blackie Onassis is not part of the reunited lineup), the band was medallion-less but not unfashionable – the matching purple crushed velvet pants and mustard shirts were classic Urge style. I also assume the set list was classic Urge – it consisted mainly of material unfamiliar to me and I presume it was old material though they could well have been airing out new material as well. Either way, you didn’t need to know the songs to appreciate their foot-stomping guitar fury and pure rock bliss. Saturation was represented by just three songs – surprisingly one was “Heaven 90210” though delivered while the band was still riding an adrenaline rush, it wasn’t nearly as pretty as I remembered the album version being. Similarly, “Girl, You’ll Be A Woman Soon” was saved for the second encore but lacked the flamenco flair of their recording. No, the band wasn’t in delicate mode this night – just the rock, please. A top-notch, utterly exhausting cap to what turned out to be a pretty damned good NxNE. The festival may earn that acronym yet.
Roeser talked to NOW before the fest about the fall and rise of Urge Overkill, leading up to the current reunion.
Photos: Urge Overkill, Great Northern, Tara Slone, The High Violets @ Lee’s Palace – June 9, 2007
MP3: Urge Overkill – “Sister Havana”
MP3: Great Northern – “Home”
MP3: The High Violets – “Sun Baby”
Video: Urge Overkill – “Sister Havana” (YouTube)
Video: Urge Overkill – “Positive Bleeding” (YouTube)
Video: Tara Slone – “We Were Stars” (YouTube)
Video: Tara Slone – “My Little Secret” (YouTube)
Video: The High Violets – “Love Is Blinding” (YouTube)
Video: The High Violets – “Invitation” (YouTube)
MySpace: Urge Overkill
MySpace: Great Northern
MySpace: Tara Slone
MySpace: The High Violets
Congratulations to Cat Power on winning this year’s Shortlist Of Music prize for The Greatest, an honour well- and hard-earned. Billboard has more details. Cat Power brings the Dirty Delta Blues band to the Phoenix on July 10.
The Cleveland Free Times welcomes native sons The National back to Ohio.
The Hold Steady are feeling chatty and talking to folks like Bend Weekly, Stereogum, AZCentral.com The St Louis Tribune and The Idaho Statesman. They’re at the Opera House on August 6.
St Vincent, who impressed when opening for Midlake back in February, returns for her own show at the Horseshoe on July 20 with Scout Niblett as support. Her debut Marry Me is out July 10. Give a listen.
MP3: St Vincent – “Now Now”
PopMatters revisits Joe Pernice’s Scud Mountain days, marveling in particular at “Silo” from Massachusetts. I should really dig my Scuds stuff out, it really was excellent.
Idlewild frontman Roddy Wooble’s solo record, My Secret Is My Silence, will get a North American release on July 10. It came out last year in the UK so it’s good to see the Idlewild curse of extended staggered releases lives on! This record is where Woomble put his quieter, folkier material, leaving the rockers for the band’s Make Another World, released earlier this year.
Tuesday, June 12th, 2007
Here’s a bit of consolation to residents of our nation’s capital who are looking for something to do now that the Senators’ playoff run has ended (in failure, again, if you weren’t keeping track). Kicking off next week is the Capital Idea festival, running from June 20 to 30 at clubs all over Ottawa and featuring acts such as The Walkmen, The Wrens, Sunset Rubdown, The Besnard Lakes, Destroyer, Xiu Xiu, The Fiery Furnaces, amongst many, many others.
Courtesy of Mocking Music, I’ve got a pair of festival passes to give away to one lucky Bytown-er (or maybe someone from Toronto or Montreal willing to make the trek to Ottawa and hang out there for ten days or so) that’s good for all shows except the Girl Talk show on the 29th, which is a benefit show and which you should pay for because it’s good for your karma. To enter, email me at contests AT chromewaves.net with your full name and address in the body and “That’s a Capital Idea” in the subject line. The contest will close on Friday, June 15 at midnight.
Congratulations to Suzie, who won the passes.
Tuesday, June 12th, 2007
Though it was a game-time decision, I decided to bail on the Dinosaur Jr show at the Phoenix on Friday, opting to concentrate on the Voxtrot gig at Sneaky Dee’s instead. And by “concentrate”, I mean take the time to eat something resembling a proper meal and watch some TV before heading out for the evening to catch the late half of their double-header.
The appeal of tourmates Au Revoir Simone is obvious – three pretty girls in Summer dresses playing gentle pop music over banks of whirring synths and drum machines. What’s not to like? Their latest record The Bird Of Music is pretty much a study in breeziness – pleasant and refreshing but not exactly what you’d call substantial. Live, they remedied this somewhat by simple virtue of being able to turn up the low end and move some air and hit the keyboards that much harder. Particularly entertaining was watching Heather D’Angelo banging away at her keyboards and jumping up and down like she was in Motorhead. Breezy it may have been, but sometimes that’s exactly what a Summer evening calls for (though it was actually pretty cold for early June) and their three-part harmonies would be welcome any time of the year. They return for a headlining show at Lee’s Palace on August 15.
Middle act Favourite Sons didn’t fare as well. There was a tangible hostility from the band as they took the stage to play songs from their record Down Beside Your Beauty – mayhap the early show didn’t go so well? – and it was returned in turn from the audience. Their rather ponderous, over-emoted rock came across a bit of a wet blanket on the evening and when some of the audience turned to heckling, frontman Ken Griffin flipped the bird without missing a beat. Methinks this wasn’t the first time he’d gotten such a welcome and I get the feeling it won’t be the last.
Voxtrot’s star has risen considerably since their last pass through town in April of last year, so the fact that they were still playing the same tiny club this time around guaranteed that this was going to be an intimate kind of show. The occasion for the tour was the recent release of their long-awaited full-length Voxtrot, which has been getting mixed reviews relative to the uniformly rapturous praise their EPs got. While the record’s not flawless – not at all – I find some of the criticisms to be overly harsh. The band had made their name with perfectly pop-sized discs that left the listener craving more and the album experience is considerably different. It’s a denser record both sonically – strings appear on more than a few tracks, maybe too many – and lyrically – Ramesh Srivastava’s penchant for wordiness is in full effect here – and with less overt hooks and a rather cheesy foray into piano balladry (“Real Live Version”). Repeated listens prove rewarding, though, with the strengths coming more to the fore and the shortcomings fading to the background.
But that’s the record, and this was the live show. I’d forgotten just how much fun Voxtrot were live, how easily they tap into the spirit of pure guitar pop with Srivastava full of manic energy and bounding around the stage like a man possessed (he still does his jump-up-and-down dance). The audience, still shaking off Favourite Sons’ dour set, was ready to party and the net result was a super-fun, if somewhat short, show. It seemed to me that the setlist seemed to lean more on the older material than stuff from the new album, which I found curious, but considering the great response it got from the crowd you couldn’t call it a miscalculation. I wonder if they followed the same strategy for the early show or mixed it up some more? Either way, the set we got made for a terrific time and after a quick, one-song encore the band went across the street to DJ an after-party at a bar and I went home and slept for ten hours. Everybody wins.
If you haven’t, check out the Reaching For Lasers minisite the band has assembled documenting the recording sessions for the album. Voxtrot is back in town on June 20 for a free show/television taping at the Berkeley Church – if you want to get on the guest list, email audience200@gmail.com with your name and “Voxtrot” in the subject line.
Photos: Voxtrot, Favourite Sons, Au Revoir Simone @ Sneaky Dee’s – June 8, 2007
MP3: Voxtrot – “Kid Gloves”
MP3: Favourite Sons – “Tall Grass”
MP3: Au Revoir Simone – “A Violent Yet Flammable World”
Video: Voxtrot – “Steven” (YouTube)
Video: Au Revoir Simone – “Fallen Snow” (YouTube)
MySpace: Voxtrot
MySpace: Favourite Sons
MySpace: Au Revoir Simone
Pollstar has got The New Pornographers as taking part in the Rogers Picnic on July 29 at Historic Fort York. This is the party that’s being headlined by The Roots and also featuring a slew of acts including the reunited Bad Brains, The Dears, Apostle Of Hustle and others. It’s unknown if it will be the full Bejar and Case-powered lineup taking to the road this Fall (but skipping Toronto for the moment) but I suspect not. They’ll surely be previewing material from Challengers, out August 21, which you can pre-order now and get a bunch of bonus goodies. The details seem rather complex so I’ll let you go read them yourself but in the meantime, check out the first MP3 from the record.
MP3: The New Pornographers – “My Rights Versus Yours”
NME has got solo dates for solo Super Furry Gruff Rhys in support of his album Candylion. The Toronto date will be September 25 at the Rivoli, so local fans had best get on that fast whenever tickets go on sale – they won’t last long.
Also coming soon – Animal Collective are at the Phoenix on September 8.
I neglected to mention before that last week, Daytrotter featured Asobi Seksu in session and in conversation.
Also for loud listening – Spinner is streaming the both discs of the deluxe reissue of Sonic Youth’s Daydream Nation, out today. File under: timeless.
Stream: Sonic Youth / Daydream Nation (deluxe edition)
The Toronto Sun talked to Lou Barlow about squeezing a new album out of the Dinosaur Jr reunion.
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