Vampire Weekend, whose 'Contra' may be very well be XL's tenth number one this Sunday, are playing a free gig at Somerset House at 5.30pm on Thursday. There are no tickets, just turn up. The first 50 fans to arrive will be given the chance to ice skate for free.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
M.A.N.D.Y. vs Booka Shade
Have a listen to the new song from M.A.N.D.Y vs Booka Shade, Donut. It's pretty nice, and out on new label Living The Dream.
Othello Woolf free gig for single launch
We like Othello Woolf. You might have noticed. He makes good music. And he was nice enough to ask us to come and play records at his launch party. We get excited about things like that.
Othello Woolf 'Stand' launch party
Othello Woolf - live
+ DJs
Mystery Jets
Golden Silvers
DUMMY Magazine
A Love Supreme
Ronojoy Dam (Real Gold)
Lambrini Girls
Young & Lost Club
Thursday 21st January
The Legion, Old Street, London
From 8pm
FREE ENTRY
Beach House play Heaven on 1st June
As the Bush Hall date sold out a while ago, but Beach House (who we like) have announced another date, at Heaven, on the 1st June.
You really should buy tickets for this. “Teen Dream” is released 25th January on Bella Union records, it's a really smashing record, and you should buy it and love it, and call anyone who mentions Fleet Foxes with reference to them a lying toerag.
Wednesday 10 February – GLASGOW – King Tuts (£9)
Thursday 11 February – MANCHESTER – Islington Mill (£9)
Friday 12 February – LEEDS – Brudenell Social Club (£9)
Saturday 13 February – DUBLIN – Whelans (18 euro)
Sunday 14 February – BELFAST – Speakeasy (£9)
Tuesday 16 February – CARDIFF – Arts Centre (£5)
Wednesday 17 February – LONDON – Bush Hall **(SOLD-OUT!)**
Monday 8 March – NEWCASTLE – The Sage (with Grizzly Bear)
Tuesday 9 March – EDINBURGH – Queen's Hall (with Grizzly Bear)
Thursday 11 March – BRIGHTON – The Corn Exchange (with Grizzly Bear)
Friday 12 March – COVENTRY – Warwick Arts Centre (with Grizzly Bear)
Saturday 13 March – LONDON – The Roundhouse (with Grizzly Bear)
Sunday 14 March – LONDON – The Roundhouse (with Grizzly Bear)
You really should buy tickets for this. “Teen Dream” is released 25th January on Bella Union records, it's a really smashing record, and you should buy it and love it, and call anyone who mentions Fleet Foxes with reference to them a lying toerag.
Wednesday 10 February – GLASGOW – King Tuts (£9)
Thursday 11 February – MANCHESTER – Islington Mill (£9)
Friday 12 February – LEEDS – Brudenell Social Club (£9)
Saturday 13 February – DUBLIN – Whelans (18 euro)
Sunday 14 February – BELFAST – Speakeasy (£9)
Tuesday 16 February – CARDIFF – Arts Centre (£5)
Wednesday 17 February – LONDON – Bush Hall **(SOLD-OUT!)**
Monday 8 March – NEWCASTLE – The Sage (with Grizzly Bear)
Tuesday 9 March – EDINBURGH – Queen's Hall (with Grizzly Bear)
Thursday 11 March – BRIGHTON – The Corn Exchange (with Grizzly Bear)
Friday 12 March – COVENTRY – Warwick Arts Centre (with Grizzly Bear)
Saturday 13 March – LONDON – The Roundhouse (with Grizzly Bear)
Sunday 14 March – LONDON – The Roundhouse (with Grizzly Bear)
Blood Red Shoes return
Blood Red Shoes, bare boned Brighton band are back. We've had a soft spot for them since we were in three dimensions and they announced details of their new album and single earlier today. Listen to lead single 'Light It Up' at their myspace and think about either buying their album, Fire It Up, out March 1st, or seeing them live at the below dates, underneath this other track on the album.
MARCH 2010
02 - Birmingham, 02 Academy 3
03 - Nottingham, Rescue Rooms
04 - Bristol, Thekla
05 - Brighton, Komedia
06 - Leeds, Cockpit
08 - Edinburgh, Electric Circus
09 - Dundee, Doghouse
10 - Glasgow, King Tuts
11 - Newcastle, 02 Academy 2
12 - Manchester, Academy 3
13 - London, Garage
MARCH 2010
02 - Birmingham, 02 Academy 3
03 - Nottingham, Rescue Rooms
04 - Bristol, Thekla
05 - Brighton, Komedia
06 - Leeds, Cockpit
08 - Edinburgh, Electric Circus
09 - Dundee, Doghouse
10 - Glasgow, King Tuts
11 - Newcastle, 02 Academy 2
12 - Manchester, Academy 3
13 - London, Garage
Wednesday, January 06, 2010
Good Shoes Stags Heads
Excellent rock band are hosting a mini-festival at the Stags Head to launch their album, 'No Hope No Future.' Over four days, 20th-23rd, Good Shoes will be playing the Dalston venue with very many of our heroes, including Othello Woolf, Fiction, Is Tropical and Hatcham Social. This is a very good idea for an album launch. Head over to their website (or double click the image above) to find dates, times, book tickets and so on and so forth.
The Knife announce Darwin opera CD release
Breaking news – the Knife (superb Swedish terror-trance musicians) are releasing the music from their opera, 'Tomorrow In A Day' as an album on Brille Records, in collaboration with Mt Sims and equally excellent musician planningtorock. The opera was commissioned by a Danish performance group, and deals with Darwin thematically. As we share an office with Brille, we've had the honour of hearing it. First reactions? It's fantastic. It's out on the 1st March.
If you sign up at their website, www.theknife.net, then you get a free song called The Colouring of Pigeons.
Here's the full, actually very interesting, text from the release –
Commissioned by Danish performance group Hotel Pro Forma to write the music for their opera based on Charles Darwin and his book ‘On the Origin of the Species’, The Knife decided to make this a collaborative process, working with artists Mt. Sims and Planningtorock for the first time, to capture the huge width of the Darwin and evolution theme. They extensively researched Darwin related literature and articles, with Olof attending a field recording workshop in the Amazon to find inspiration and to record sounds.
‘Tomorrow, In A Year’ is a unique musical project. Richard Dawkins’s gene trees have formed the basis of some of the musical composition, artificial sounds have been mixed with field recordings, with the music inspired by everything from the different stages of a bird learning its melody, to a song based on Darwin’s loving letters about his daughter Anne. These are compositions that challenge the conventional conception of opera music.
Pushing the experimental process further still, composer, choreographer, costume designer and set designer worked separately, only coming together 3 and a half months before the first performance of ‘Tomorrow, In A Year’ in Copenhagen on the 2nd September 2009. Described as “shifting the position of operartic art in a single leap”, further performances of ‘Tomorrow, In A Year’ are confirmed to take place in Athens (8-9 Jan), Stockholm (29 Jan-1 Feb), and Munster (5 June), with further dates to be announced.
Olof Dreijer says: “At first it was very difficult as we really didn’t know anything about opera. We’d never been to one. I didn’t even know what the word libretto meant. But after some studying, and just getting used to opera’s essence of pretentious and dramatic gestures, I found that there is a lot to learn and play with. In fact, our ignorance gave us a positive respectless approach to making opera. It took me about a year to become emotionally moved by an opera singer and now I really do. I really like the basic theatrical values of opera and the easy way it brings forward a narrative. We’ve approached this before in The Knife but never in such a clear way.”
If you sign up at their website, www.theknife.net, then you get a free song called The Colouring of Pigeons.
Here's the full, actually very interesting, text from the release –
Commissioned by Danish performance group Hotel Pro Forma to write the music for their opera based on Charles Darwin and his book ‘On the Origin of the Species’, The Knife decided to make this a collaborative process, working with artists Mt. Sims and Planningtorock for the first time, to capture the huge width of the Darwin and evolution theme. They extensively researched Darwin related literature and articles, with Olof attending a field recording workshop in the Amazon to find inspiration and to record sounds.
‘Tomorrow, In A Year’ is a unique musical project. Richard Dawkins’s gene trees have formed the basis of some of the musical composition, artificial sounds have been mixed with field recordings, with the music inspired by everything from the different stages of a bird learning its melody, to a song based on Darwin’s loving letters about his daughter Anne. These are compositions that challenge the conventional conception of opera music.
Pushing the experimental process further still, composer, choreographer, costume designer and set designer worked separately, only coming together 3 and a half months before the first performance of ‘Tomorrow, In A Year’ in Copenhagen on the 2nd September 2009. Described as “shifting the position of operartic art in a single leap”, further performances of ‘Tomorrow, In A Year’ are confirmed to take place in Athens (8-9 Jan), Stockholm (29 Jan-1 Feb), and Munster (5 June), with further dates to be announced.
Olof Dreijer says: “At first it was very difficult as we really didn’t know anything about opera. We’d never been to one. I didn’t even know what the word libretto meant. But after some studying, and just getting used to opera’s essence of pretentious and dramatic gestures, I found that there is a lot to learn and play with. In fact, our ignorance gave us a positive respectless approach to making opera. It took me about a year to become emotionally moved by an opera singer and now I really do. I really like the basic theatrical values of opera and the easy way it brings forward a narrative. We’ve approached this before in The Knife but never in such a clear way.”
Tuesday, January 05, 2010
Night Slugs starts label, first release = Mosca
Night Slugs has been running incredibly bass-garage-whatever nights since 2006, and a pretty good blog, they've waited this long to start bringing out 12"s.
First up is Mosca's Square One EP, with the dark, housey title track backed by the 8 minute epic _Nike_ and a few remixes. It's out on the 25th.
Head here to download the Geena mix.
Swanton Bombs album & tour
I saw Swanton Bombs support Girls at The Lexington last year. (LAST YEAR. That's the first time I've written that this year. It feels weird.) They were tight, ferocious and very loud. Largely due to drummer Brendan Heaney's relentless energy, as displayed in the neighbour-riling video above.
Anyway, they're ace and their album Mumbo Jumbo and Murder is out on February 15th on vinyl and digital download.
I thoroughly recommend checking them out live too. Invigorating to say the least. Here's where you can catch them:
Happy Huw Year 2010 tour (Swanton Bombs, Frankie and the Heartstrings & Islet)
Jan 22 – 60 Million Postcards, Bournemouth
Jan 23 – Start the Bus, Bristol
Jan 24 – Lock Tavern, London
Los Campesinos! & Swanton Bombs:
February:
11 – Central Station, Wrexham
12 – Evol, Liverpool
13 – Fibbers, York
15 – Tunnels, Aberdeen
16 – Dog House, Dundee
17 – Bongo, Edinburgh
18 – The Venue, Derby
19 – The Musician, Leicester
21 – The Junction, Cambridge
22 – Arts Centre, Norwich
23 – Audio, Brighton
24 – Wedgewood Rooms, Portsmouth
25 – Koko, London
26 – Princess Pavillion, Falmouth
27 – Thekla, Bristol
March:
1 – The Rainbow, Birmingham
2 – Roadmender, Northampton
3 – Plug and Play, Reading
4 – Banquet New Slang, Kingston
Saturday, January 02, 2010
Oh hello
Happy 2010!
On with the job. Yeasayer's Ambling Alp video. Ft. Don Quixote, El Topo + the fierce urgency of NOW.
On with the job. Yeasayer's Ambling Alp video. Ft. Don Quixote, El Topo + the fierce urgency of NOW.
Yeasayer - Ambling Alp from Spy Films on Vimeo.
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