Some exciting stuff has been going on w/ RCRD LBL lately
1. Our weekly podcast that I host is now avails on iTUNES. Click here to add it.
2. We released an incredible RCRD LBL exclusive Santogold bonus track yesterday. It's called "your voice", and it is a beauty of a dub-tinged ballad. Click HERE to grab it for free.
3. We started a weekly Top Ten list so you can keep track of our most downloaded releases. The new one goes up tomm, but last week's is here.
That's it for now!
So, as fun as it's been doing this blog on a (somewhat) regular basis for almost four years, I think the posting is going to slow down since my newest project/company RCRD LBL is now up and running. Thanks to everyone who dropped me a line during this crazy week and said they dug the site, found out about a cool new band or just generally supported what we're looking to do—it means a lot.
And in the event any of the bands we've signed or the labels we are partnering with are reading this, thanks to all of you for being on board since day one, before we even had a BETA of the site and it was just a far reaching idea I chatted you all up about over summertime lunches and late night beers.
For the foreseeable future, you can expect for me (as well as the great writers we're going to be working with) to be blogging at RCRDLBL.com from now on, so drop a line and say hi. You can add our RSS feed here and also download any of our widgets and embed them on your site, computer, etc to stay in the loop about what we, as well as all of our artists and labels, are up to.
Really excited!
Good people, sorry I haven't been posting too often lately. I've been super busy with my latest project. More news on that soon.
BUT—to reward all of you for tuning in, I have a really special contest that my bros at DFA and Ghostly International hooked up. I'll spare you the editorializing and just let you check out the info below. I mean, dudes, Matthew Dear (with his live band Matthew Dear's Big Hands), Tim Sweeney, Tim Goldsworthy, Magic Juan, Morgan Geist, the awesome Invisible Conga People— this is going to be nuts! And maybe someone will play "Hybrid Moment"!
I've got two pairs of tickets to give away. All you need to do is email me (elliot at the simplemission dot com) with HALLOWEEN BASH in the subject line and cross yr fingers. Winners will be chosen at random this Sunday, 10/28. Good luck!
STUDIO B PRESENTS:
GHOSTLY/DFA HALLOWEEN BASH
WEDNEDSAY, OCTOBER 31st 2007
@ STUDIO B, BROOKLYN, NYC
Presenting the first ever event collaboration of Ghostly International and
New York's DFA Records, Studio B is hosting a Halloween Bash devoted to dance music and featuring a line-up to DIE for: Juan Maclean (DJ), Morgan Geist, T&T (Tim Sweeney and Tim Goldsworthy), Derek Plaslaiko and capping-off the 2007 Asa Breed Tour, Mathew Dear's Big Hands. A new resident of NYC, this will be Dear's debut performance at Studio B and a perfect finale to his Asa Breed Tour.
Just added is the feted Invisible Conga People (Italians Do It Better) and the side room now opened with Ghostly DJ Jeffrey Sfire, and resident T-shirt maker takes over the back room for spooky cosmic italo vibes.
18+ | 10PM
ADVANCE TICKETS $12 / $15 DOOR
AVAILABLE @ TICKETWEB, OTHER MUSIC & SOUNDFIX
OPEN ABSOLUT BAR FROM 10-11
CASH PRIZE FOR BEST COSTUME
Studio B
259 BANKER STREET
BROOKLYN, NY
http://www.clubstudiob.com
Same as it ever was, urban bluesman TK Webb is still the TRUTH good people. Lately, Webb's been moving towards becoming a full on rock and roller thanks to the help of his fantastic "backing" band, the Visions. If you can imagine what would happen if J Mascis fronted a Midwestern version of the Bluesbreakers, that's a pretty good entry point into TK's current stylings.
I think where he's headed with all this is pretty fucking great.
Take a listen to this brand new song (thanks to the Social Registry for the hook up) and if you like what you hear, check out TK and Visions on Friday night at Mercury Lounge. They are supporting another excellent blues dude, Dax Riggs, for the show and it's sure to be a good one.
Click here to grab "Chee Chee Beach", a brand new jam featuring members of Love As Laughter.
Support real people doing real things.
1. Saw Vampire Weekend at 8PM an at emusic event to promote audiobooks. Now that you know that, you can guess that their set was pretty quick and pretty basic. Nothing more than the dudes playing their songs in front of some people. Of course, that they write great songs helped things. They played a new song tonight that was really pretty.
2. Went to the Black Lips show at Bowery at 11PM with a heavy head. My mood improved and I got lost in a song or five, just bobbed my head and jammed the fuck out. I gotta say, if there's anything still subversive about white boys playing twangy R&B in 2007, it's that these four bros have the BEST time just being their skinny little degenerate selves. They are a band in that way that to picture them doing normal things just doesn't compute. They are Rock and Roll in the present tense. All the time. At least they were last night for 50 or so minutes.
Some things that have happened since my last post:
1. I listened to "Houseclouds", the second song on the new Liars record, about fifty times and thought to myself it sounded more ’90s than actual songs from the ’90s. Some real ringer-T rock there, my friends.
2. Watched Rain Man, Unzipped, Stardust Memories and liked them all. Watched the two new episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm and was not too impressed. B- work at best. The funniest bits in both episodes revolved around dick jokes, or playing with dicks. We can do better, really.
3. Kicked it with Knox and heard all about this dope new group he is working with, BLK JCKS.
4. Copped the excellent London Is The Place For Me compilations from a buddy, after I spent months looking for an easy way to buy them online and had zero luck.
5. Put in some major grind time with RCRD LBL. Good stuff!
First things last, Battles' show this past Friday was one of my ultimate jam fests of the summer. It's taken me a while to come around to navigating all the pitches and shades of their LP Mirrored, but that's more a personal thing than anything else.
What you need to know is that when these cats play a show, it's no joke. Actually, it's more of a robotically-enabled rock and roll concert with real people making real music that happens to be technically astounding.
It's not in a condescending way or anything, but they play for the audience. They want to rock you. And they do. You don't have to know where the sounds come from, you just have to let them hit you. Friday was the first time I've been able to see them play up close and after checking out how much WORK these dudes put in behind the buttons and on the floor (via pedals), it's amazing how the end result of all that tech and prowess is just great sounds.
I don't really cover, nor do I listen to, "songer/songwriters"—so I'll call Brooklyn-based Luke Temple a man with guitar and a beauty of a voice. It's a warm, reedy sort of vocal style that goes very high and hits you very hard.
Temple, along with four backing musicians (one of whom used to play with Jeff Buckley and is such an insanely talented drummer I can't even say) performed at Joe's Pub last night to celebrate the release of his latest, Snow Beast. His tunes sounded far more direct live than they do on record, err, stream. But most important, they sounded like him. And that's a big compliment to an artist working in a genre where reference points often outshine the artist's own material. Spend some time with the tunes on his Myspace page and see what you think. Recommended.
Earlier this week, I saw one of my favorite straight up rock bands from NYC, Sam Champion. I could throw out that I heard specs of "Refugee"-era Petty and stoned bits of Pavement, but I think letting you know that I smiled when I heard the hooky choruses and snarled when their guitar player laid down some ill loosey-goosey guitar licks would be of better service to their performance. These guys really do it for me. I love it when cats with great record collections write great songs.
The first time I heard Shocking Pinks was in an office, the office of DFA Records (Shocking Pinks' current label), to be exact. At the time, I was struck by how confessional and emotive the music was, that it referenced the dream pop of the early ’90s and that a lot of the lyrics seemed to be about girls. In the context of recent DFA releases, it was much closer to the emotional timbre of say, LCD's "All My Friends" than the brutally minimal deadpan punk of Prinzhorn Dance School. At first pass, I guess you could say I was intrigued and I looked forward to hearing more out of an office setting.
Last week, Shocking Pinks' sole member/composer/dude (think Magnetic Fields-type deal) Nick Harte was in the city for a quick promo this and that and so I decided to have a chat with him to learn more about Shocking Pinks and see what was what. When I introduced himself and we started chatting about his new Black Flag tattoo (he now has matching ones on each arm), I knew it was going to be gravy. Here's what went down. Hope you dig.
Simple Mission: Can you introduce yourself and briefly touch upon how Shocking Pinks came to be?
Nick: Sure. When I was about six years old, I started playing piano and then picked up drums, bass and guitar when I was eight. After that, I studied modern musical composition and learned the viola, violin and the cello. At about ten, I studied jazz and learned the alto, tenor and soprano sax.
Simple Mission: Wow. I’m guessing now that you play all the instruments on your records.
Nick: Yes. I started recording songs on a hand-held tape recorder when I was 13. They were somewhat in the style of the songs I play now and I consider those earliest songs to be Shocking Pinks songs, because they were written and played by me. I’ve be writing music for about 20 years and have worked as Shocking Pinks for almost 15.
Simple Mission: How did Shocking Pinks initially co-exist with your old band, the Brunettes?
Nick: Before I joined the Brunettes, I was in a band called Incisions. We played old-fashioned R& B and rock and roll stuff, like Link Wray. A few of the Brunettes saw one of our gigs and asked me to play drums. Although I mainly thought of myself as a solo artist, I thought it would be fun to play other people’s material. But after moving to London for six months, I came back to New Zealand and just wanted to do my own thing.
Continue reading "Shocking Pinks! DFA! Simple Mission! Interview!" »
Yesterday, in a once-mainly Orthodox enclave of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, a team of actors, extras and randoms came together to film what will be Mr. Bob Dylan's next official music video for "Most Likely You'll Go Your Way (And I'll Go Mine)". As many of you probably already know, the song has been handed over to producer Mark Ronson for a remix treatment, and this video is going to be used to promote said remix. Truth be told, I think ANY Dylan remix is a nitsch nitsch, but for what it is, the execution is pretty good.
Now, for the geeks among you, you should be able to recognize all the iconography shown below. We've got the Triumph, Pennebaker, "Chew Gum", a boxer and Desire all represented. I have no idea if and when the finished version of this will air (I split after the first scene was wrapped), but as a huge Dylan nerd, I thought these were just too good to keep to myself.
Continue reading "Simple Mission Exclusive: On Set At The New Bob Dylan Video" »
On Saturday, the entirely like-able Vampire Weekend played a lovely show at the East River Music Project. Ships sailed in the background, kids (like, actual 7 year olds and not just the uptown college kids who are always at VW shows) danced and the band's best tunes like "Campus" and "Walcott" were toe-tappingly divine. This show was yet another reason to fall in love with Vampire Weekend. Not like you needed my convincing.
Later that night, I took some bad photos of a very good band, Minneapolis's Digitata. If you're not yet familiar with this female-fronted trio's brand of pleasing, beat-driven electro pop, don't sweat it. You'll be hearing more from them soon.
Sunday afternoon was all about Ted aka "Shred" Leo. I'll be straight with you, after going to his shows for about seven years, I was ready to stop because they had just been so-so the last few times. Not on Sunday. Ted was every bit the fist pumping, ska-loving, dude of dudes that I, and thousands (should be millions) of other love and cherish so much. Bravo!
The last stop on the party train was the Social Registry anniversary jump off. Gang Gang Dance closed out the night with 3/4th of an amazing set. Due to noise complaints, the show had to end by ten PM. And it did. Someone pulled the plug on the band in the middle of a brand new mind sprawler of a song at 10:01. That was a shame. So was my camera dying before GGD's set, which is why you are looking at a photo of the Social Registry dudes (honcho Rich on the left) having a bro-ment before their set. Still, a great night for real music in New York City.
I must say, for the day after the Daft Punk show (was there, you already know how amazing it was) and the Dafterparty (was not there, heard how cray-zee it was), Eamon, the Bangers and the Fun Crew really came through with a great show to wake up a hung over and tired city. First up, were Simple Mission faves Metronomy. Between the heart on sleeve lyrics and the quirky stage show, Metronomy's live performances fall somewhere between Devo and perhaps the very earliest-era Cure, plus all the electronic knick-knacks and mini Korg synths that bring their sounds up to date and make you wanna dance to it. I don't think it will be long before more peeps catch on to them and they start getting a look from Hot Chip fans.
Next up were Glass Candy, a band that should have caught on years ago when they were a noisy post no-wave mess of hotness, but never did. I think this ultimately made them a much more interesting band. Basically, they became a two piece and went into this sinister death disco/italo direction, adding some more sex and pop to their mix (their bassist helped put together the excellent Italians Do It Better comp.
With her unapproachable swagger and up for three days being fab demeanor, Singer Ida No might be closest thing indie rock has to a Warhol superstar. Her mannerisms on stage pretty much reinforce that she does not "not know what drugs are". During the middle of their last song, out of nowhere, she broke into an interpolation of Madonna's "Get Into The Groove". I'm not sure if it was meant to make fun of or desecrate the original, or perhaps give an honest glimpse into what the band really want to be—mixed up, downtown club musicians playing in clubs where people dance in giant hanging birdcages. Them days are done, of course, but I'm glad Glass Candy are still around to promote that freaky deaky NYC spirit.
Tony Wilson, one of my personal heroes, passed away today. I'm glad that I had a chance to at least rub elbows with him when I spoke at his In The City Conference a few weeks ago. He didn't attend the second day of In The City, as he was rushed to the hospital during the early morning, but even still, this is such a sudden and depressing loss for me, and for lots of others as well.
All you need to do is email me (elliot at the simple mission dot com) with Social Registry in the subject line by 7PM tomorrow. A winner will chosen at random, so roll them dice and get those emails popping.
Also, on the rewind tip, why not check out some choice features from my back pages on Social Registry artists TK Webb and the dearly, dearly missed Blood On The Wall?
Thanks to Rich and Jim for the hook up and of course, for the all the choice tunes over the years.
Full flyer is avails here in case you want to pass along to friends, which you should.
Went out to see Shock Cinema/Trail of Dead and Booka Shade last night. Photos/recap to come. For now, I wanted to hip you to one of my favorite producers/artists, Metronomy, who is kicked off his US tour tonight. Do no sleep on seeing him. He was one of my faves from SXSW. And for my NYC heads, he's at the Sea Port next week for FREE with Au Revoir Simone.
METRONOMY
SUMMER TOUR USA 2007
3 Aug FRI Hartford, CT Sweet Janes
4 Aug SAT Washington, DC ROCK'N'ROLL HOTEL
5 Aug Sun Driving Day
6 Aug Mon Minneapolis, MN LORING PARK
7 Aug TUE Chicago, IL Funky Buddha Lounge
8 Aug WED Detroit, MI Museum Of Contemporary Art Detroit
9 Aug THU Pittsburgh, PA The Andy Warhol Museum
10 Aug FRI Manhattan, NY South Street Seaport Festival
10-Aug FRI Brooklyn, NY Studio B
11-Aug SAT Philadelphia, PA Pure
Fortunately, I was totally wrong. Perhaps what I loved best about Bat For Lashes was her refusal to hide behind any of the cliches she could easily play into (freak folk songstress from the UK, "the next Feist", critically acclaimed weirdo ala Bjork, etc). Watching her perform live, you do get a true performance, but it's one based on the music and the mood, nothing more and certainly nothing less. There's something really cool about how she arranges her songs. They sound like they were either recorded with a symphony or in her bedroom with a beatbox. Either way, I think she has the makings of a star. And by that I mean a real artist that real people could like.
The Knitting Factory was nice enough to offer up two (2) tickets to Wednesday night's Bat For Lashes show—no strings attached, except that you need to email me with your name and a good reason why you'd want to go to the show. A winner will be chosen at random on 2PM on Wed, so hit me up and roll them dice!
Also, in the interest of being totally transparent, here is some useful information the Knit asked me to tell you about. I'm a texting freak and I think it's actually pretty cool, so here goes.
"The Knitting Factory is one of the first venues that allow you to buy your tickets by merely sending a text and you’ll save some change – up to $1.50 less fees. You can do it now, just text BATLAS to 467467 and you are good to go!"
So yeah, this looks to be a great show. No guarantees that Batty will ride in on a pony or whatever, but I am sure it will be fun and weird. And she will def sing "Prescilla". That's reason enough to want to go.
More More More:
Yo! My boys White Rabbits landed a gig performing their smash single "the Plot" live on Letterman tonight! Tune in dudes. Not like it won't be on youtube in ten minutes, but hey, there's nothing like the magic of seeing your friends play live on national television.
A little while ago, I received a nice goodie bag from Molly Neuman's new label Simple Social Graces and began shuffling through some releases from this year and last. The one that really stuck with me was from a band from Barcelona called Les Aus. At first pass, I would describe what they do as internationalist math rock. What that means in real terms is that the band specializes in jittery instrumentals peppered with pinches of punk, flamenco and lo-fi psych. Me likey!
Their latest, Harrana Hanne has been getting some love on the Simple Mission stereo and so I wanted to pass along the good word that you should check them out. A few jams are available to stream here.
Also props to SSG for jacking the font from Oasis' Standing On The Shoulder... I see you!
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