Cold War Kids have announced a new album to be released in September. The as-of-now-untitled release is a follow-up to the band’s 2006 release Robbers & Cowards. A teaser video with new music and footage of the recording process is streaming at Cold War Kids’ website, or you can watch it here after the tour dates listing. Along with news of the upcoming album, the band has released dates for a fall US tour.

Tour Dates:
06/27 – Brooklyn, NY @ Celebrate Brooklyn
08/22 – San Francisco, CA @ Outside Lands Festival
08/23 – Los Angeles, CA @ Sunset Junction Festival
08/24 – Bend, OR @ Les Schwab Amphitheater
09/20 – San Diego, CA @ Street Scene
09/27 – Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom
09/28 – Vancouver, BC @ Richards on Richards
09/29 – Seattle, WA @ The Showbox at the Market
10/01 – Boise, ID @ The Neurolux
10/02 – Salt Late City, UT @ In the Venue
10/03 – Boulder, CO @ Boulder Theatre
10/10 – Minneapolis, MN @ Fine Line Music Cafe
10/11 – Chicago, IL @ Vic Theare
10/14 – Boston, MA @ Paradise Rock Club
10/15 – New York, NY @ Webster Hall
10/16 – Brooklyn, NY @ Williamsburg Music Hall
10/17 – Philadelphia, PA @ Theatre of Living Arts
10/20 – Carrabo, NC @ Cat’s Cradle
10/21 – Nasville, TN @ Mercy Lounge
10/23 – Ft. Worth, TX @ Lola’s
10/24 – Austin, TX @ Emo’s
10/25 – Houston, TX @ Warehouse Live
10/26 – New Orleans, LA @ Voodoo Music Experience

The Verve have a new album set for release August 19th after a lengthy time of inactivity for the band. Forth is the title, and for fans eager with anticipation of new material, there are two offerings for your listening pleasure. Here you can find the song ‘Mover’ which will not be on the new recording, and for a listen to the first single from the upcoming release check out their Myspace page where you can stream ‘Love is Noise’.

MP3> The Verve ‘Mover’

The Verve had a decent run back in the 90’s with the hit single ‘Bittersweet Symphony’ off of Urban Hymns which, I might say, was a dandy of a record. A video reminder of that much liked recording:

‘Lucky Man’

The title says it all for the most part. Our friends over at Do512.com have a sweet contest for you. Sounds too good to be true? Maybe you think that the shows are a bunch of lame-ass shows that you wouldn’t be interested in going to see? Wrong you might be my friend. This prize applies to any show at Emos, The Parish, The Beauty Bar, Antone’s, Beerland, Flamingo Cantina, and Threadgills for the month of August.

Here is the official release from the Do512ers.

Win the Ultimate Month of Free Live Music

Do512.com Promotes Embeddable Music Calendar with Seriously Cool Prize

(Austin, TX): Do512.com, the Austin website that lets users see and hear bands playing upcoming shows, is promoting their new embeddable show calendar with a prize that matters to the music lover: a month’s worth of free shows at the top venues across the city.

By going to http://dostuffmedia.com/do512/, show goers can easily create their own interactive concert calender and plop it right where they live – on places like their Myspace, Facebook and blog pages. There, their calendar “widget” will stay live, with the capacity to play update-able audio and video of chosen shows right on that page. The folks at Do512 think these personal music calendars will change the way Austin music fans choose and share that information with friends. And to get people to use the thing, they’re dangling a big carrot: a chance to win two free passes to every single show at Austin’s top music venues for a full month.

“Static, word-and-date calendars are pretty boring,” says Do512 co-founder, Scott Owens, “and are relatively uninformative and uninspiring. Our little calendar widget lets our users hear, see and share the bands playing upcoming shows on their own social web pages. No big deal, but we think it’s a quantum leap in music sample-ability and overall enjoyment. Which ought to make a difference in how people experience our rich music scene.”

To enter the contest, go to do512.com/VIP, and embed the calendar widget on a page between July 1^st and 31^st . The winner will be notified July 31^st, and will receive a pass for themselves +1 to every show at Emo’s, The Parish, Antone’s, Flamingo Cantina, Beerland, Beauty Bar and Threadgill’s for the entire month of August.

Scott Hutchison

This is a new little experiment in trying to be a bit more creative with the site, so please be patient with me as I fine tune this idea, hopefully with some help from you.

We all love reading interviews with our favorite bands, and the interviews usually cover a lot of the same stuff, how the band got started, new album details, etc., etc., etc. Coming into contact with quite a few artists on a regular basis, I figured I could prepare a short set of short answer questions that I could deliver without having to go into a lengthy sit session of talking and editing. This is my first attempt, and I realize it needs some serious tweaking, but you got start somewhere, right?

First off, thanks to Scott Hutchison for being my guinea pig in this little experiment. He was very cooperative and gracious. Frightened Rabbit played their second show in Austin, @ the Mohawk to be exact, within two weeks, and judging by the size of the crowd last night and the reaction, seem to be on the right track and generating quite the buzz along the way.

Get to Know in 7: Scott Hutchison from Frightened Rabbit

1. What year were you born? “1981″
2. What’s your favorite color? “Dusky sky blue”
3. Last album or record you chose to listen to or selected? “Cease to Begin, Band of Horses”
4. Favorite piece of clothing? “Until recently it was a pair of shoes that I’ve had to replace because they smelled so bad”
5. Deceased artist or person that you wish you could meet? “Ummm, I would love to meet John Candy. Yeah, why not?”
6. Boxers, briefs, thong, or commando? “Boxer/commando in lieu of the laundry situation”
7. Vinyl, CD, or MP3? “All of the above, I have no actually format to play any of those things at this point in time, so yeah, all. Maybe supermarket stereo would be the place I hear most music.”

Frightened Rabbit’s folk infused style of indie-rock has my attention, and their most recent release The Midnight Organ Fight is definitely one of my favorite releases of 2008. The musicianship is great and the lyrics are raw, real, and humorous at the same time. Don’t miss the opportunity to catch this band on the road this time around.

MP3> Frightened Rabbit ‘My Backwards Walk’

Frightened Rabbit Myspace for Tour Dates

Video:”Heads Roll Off”

I’ve checked out a few of these over the past few months, but they keep getting more interesting, with the selection of artists that they are presenting on this site. It’s a simple, weird, but effective concept: ONE SONG. ONE TAKE. ONE CAB.

That’s the Black Cab Sessions. Check it.

My Morning Jacket on Black Cab Sessions

The Cave Singers on Black Cab Sessions

In order to do what I do, and quite simply because I’m a huge music geek, I spend a lot time reading bits on the old Internet as well as a fair amount of print. My print exposure has been slimmed with the discontinuance of print by some mags, but it only forces me to explore previous options not pursued. Here are few items that I found of interest over the past week or so:

• Pitchfork (I start with a giant, yes) just put up a story about Devo suing McDonalds over a Happy Meal toy. Why I find this of interest? One, I love Devo and two, I despise McDonalds. Devo Suing McDonalds Over Happy Meal Toy
• One of my favorite sites for music business news and information, Hypebot.com (A highly recommended read by anyone caring about the state of the industry) posted a piece about Facebook passing Myspace in worldwide traffic. Facebook Passes Myspace Worldwide
• On to the local blog scene, where you can find an interesting post on the Austin 360 blog Music Source, written by Michael Corcoran. Simply titled “Manager’s Spouse Pens Escovedo Cover Story” the post starts out fairly mild, then turns a bit sour on the subject with several good points being made throughout. It’s comes across as a bit of swipe at the local paper that ran the cover story.
• Now on to print. I picked up the latest issue of Paste magazine, mostly for the fact that My Morning Jacket is on the cover. Who isn’t interested in the ever growing popularity of the band who probably made the record that it is going to catapult them in the consciousness of the mainstream audience? I use the term “mainstream” loosely. Despite headlining festivals for the past few years, the band has remained fairly unknown to this “mainstream” audience until as of recent. As I make my way through the article/interview which takes place with the band while they were here in Austin for this year’s SXSW festival, I came across this: “The next evening, the band plays an official showcase at SXSW’s largest venue, the Austin Music Hall, a concrete hangar where good sound goes to die.” Ouch! You can flip through the digital version of the copy here: Paste July 08

  

• And for those who still pick up the print, I have grown quite fond of Death + Taxes over the last year. The magazine covers a lot of ground in the interest of music, film, books, and art in a way that is very artful itself. It reads well, it looks good, and is chocked full of interesting articles. The May/June issue contains an interview with Michael Stipe, articles on The Death Set, Austin’s own Sword, Times New Viking, Lightspeed Champion, Tilly and The Wall (who look absolutely fantastic in the photos), Zach Galafianakis, plus much, much more. I highly recommend this print.

  

I’ve got a music blog site. I didn’t start this music blog site just to be a blogger, although I have no plans to give it up at anytime, I intended on using the blog to find away to thrust myself into the music industry in some form or fashion. I’ve been in the service industry for years, and as much as I love the industry and as much as I could be successful in the industry for years, music is my passion, artists are my passion, and I love everything about the scene. As this thrust into the music industry takes form and opportunities arise, I often find myself concerned about the fact that I’m ready to devote my life to an industry that is quite a bit of decay compared to previous years. The glory days of rock-n-roll are behind us and what lies ahead is in serious question, but I would believe that things are only to get better.

With that being said, a good friend of mine suggested that I subscribe to this newsletter sent out by this guy named Bob Lefsetz. Trusting this friend’s advice and not questioning why, I did so, and am glad I have done so. I don’t know Bob’s history, but it appears that he has been around the industry for quite awhile now, and his observations on the current state of the industry as well as stories that he has from experiences along the way, going back to being a store clerk at a Tower Records shop in L.A. back in the 70’s are worth the time taken to read. They are truthful, insightful, and more than often, damn funny. Maybe I’m not sharing anything new with many of you out there, but hopefully I’m introducing a small handful of you to something new.

Meet Bob Lefsetz

One of his more recent newsletters titled:

Enemies List

1. Doug Morris

Despite the aegis of caring about music and consumers he’s an ignorant old man who is single-handedly holding back the monetization of recorded music online.

No one who sues his own customers can give a shit about them. That’s like killing slaves for their own good.

And, believe me, RIAA policy is Universal Music policy. Based on the company’s market share, if nothing else.

This is an old man whose success is based on a radio/retail model, get the song on the radio and see if the album is moving at the store, when radio is terrible and ineffectual, kids not listening to it, and it’s difficult to even find a record store.

This is the guy leading the charge?

And you wonder why we’re in trouble.

2. Zach Horowitz

Morris’ consigliere. If we want change, we’ve got to kill them both.

3. Bill Clinton

Bill Clinton? Huh?

Yup, he signed the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which ruined radio.

Twenty two minutes of commercials per hour and predictable playlists. Music on terrestrial radio is finished. All because of this legislation.

4. Gene Simmons

For spreading the heinous concept that musicians are just in it for the money. For blaming the chaos of today’s music world on the fans. You keep telling us how smart you are Gene, but every time you open your mouth you just demonstrate how uninformed and dumb you truly are.

5. Bob Sillerman

He rolled up concert promoters, he created a mountain of debt. Without Sillerman, concert tickets would never be so expensive.

6. Ryan Seacrest

Emblematic of the fiction that the public wants bland, ineffectual, no substance talent.

Wrong, people want an edge, they want a living, breathing human being who speaks his mind and even has warts.

7. Jann Wenner

For destroying the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

Utilizing it as his own personal enterprise, Wenner lords over the organization like a despot. Only his taste counts. So we end up with non-rockers (Miles Davis) in, and classic rockers (Alice Cooper) out.

Put Madonna in the Business Hall of Fame. But once you induct her into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, the institution loses all meaning.

8. TicketMaster

For not leaning on promoters and talent and insisting that the fees be included in the overall price. Sure, it’s not their fault, but do they have to roll over? No one’s hands are tied to this extent. After all, they’re almost a monopoly!

Read more

photo : valerie@fremin.net

Unlike Islands last jaunt through Austin on the Emo’s main stage, the band did not get pulled mid-set Monday night. The Montreal sextet took the stage and opened with arguably their most visually dark song, “Vertigo,” then transitioned seamlessly into “The Arm,” both off their recent May release Arm’s Way. The energy of the audience was at an immeasurable high at this point, causing lead singer Nick Thorburn to praise Austin for “know[ing] some shit” just two songs in.

During “Where There’s a Will There’s a Whalebone” AWOL ONE joined the band onstage to do the mid-song rap, which was sufficient but was no where near as good Busdriver’s original. “Pieces of You” was rather perturbing, but that’s just because the lyrics (“they found your bones in the homes of a thousand little gnomes who’d taken pieces for decoration”) personally freak me out, but it ended up being one the best sounding songs of the night.

photo : valerie@fremin.net

The songs off the bands first release Return to the Sea, garnered the most recognition and applause from the audience, most notably “Don’t Call Me Whitney, Bobby” before which Nick stated: “This is what we used to sound like, before we alienated you,” triggering great laughter from the crowd followed by a massive sing along, as seemingly everyone in the venue knew the song. Finishing out the pre-encore set was “Creeper,” the band’s infectious, drum machine, 80s-esque dance song. During the song, one could not help but stare at Nick’s “blood” stained wife beater as he repeated, “Right from the start I was stabbed in the heart/ Didn’t know I wasn’t breathing/ Didn’t know I had been bleeding.”

photo : valerie@fremin.net

For the encore they played the expected “Swans” and “Rough Gem” but surprised me by playing “Humans,” one of my favorite songs off of Return to the Sea. During the song, two guys (whom I believe were part of the opening band Crayonsmith), picked up Nick, put him on their shoulders, and carried him around the stage, for an awkward, yet endearingly funny moment.

Despite the band’s dark and morbidly themed songs (especially those on the new album), the performance was light-hearted and fun with both the audience and the band enjoying themselves. The band members played well off of one another and Nick was unexpectedly affable. As he stated mid-show, it was “hotter than the devil” in the venue, which surprisingly didn’t diminish the enthusiasm of the crowd, though it was obviously taking a toll on the dressed-all-in-black band. But what does any good crowd do? You buy the band a round of drinks of course, which only added to the great adoration the audience showed the band all night. As the band’s website url states, “ISLANDS ARE FOREVER,” as is Austin’s undying love and awe for the band. Come back soon Islands. Austin misses you already.

-Emily J

photo : valerie@fremin.net

photo : valerie@fremin.net

photo : valerie@fremin.net

photo : valerie@fremin.net

photo : valerie@fremin.net

Over at the Jagjaguwar Records Tour Dates page under Okkervil River, they have the following listed:

09/28/08 Austin, TX – Austin City Limits Festival
09/28/08 Austin, TX – Stubb’s w/ Black Keys

Which leaves a festival goer with a dilemma Sunday night:
Okkervil River and The Black Keys aftershow VS. Foo Fighters closing out the festival.

My choice was almost too easy. Sorry Foo Fighters, but unless you pull out something like, I don’t know, playing with Led Zepplin (*Hint. Hint. Robert Plant will already be in town*) on Sunday Night, I will be seeing Okkervil River and The Black Keys rock out at Stubb’s.

Based off this aftershow revelation, and after seeing the Lollapalooza aftershows, I can’t wait to see what else C3 Presents is putting together for ACL.

-Emily J

Okkervil River also have their 5th full-length recording The Stand Ins wrapped up and scheduled for release this fall on Jagjaguwar (Sep. 9th US and Oct 13th UK and Europe).

MP3> Okkervil River ‘Our Life is Not A Movie Or Maybe’

Haven’t had any Radiohead news lately, so here’s a quick fix. Radiohead have released a live video album that features the band performing the bulk of In Rainbows live in producer Nile Godrich’s basement. The video is available for purchase, only $7.99, at the iTunes store. Can you ever really get enough of Radiohead? I can’t, and even as I was working on this post, KEXP DJ Cheryl Waters, played “How to Disappear Completely” causing me to stop my work and wallow in the sweet sounds of that track. It’s as if she knew exactly what I wanted to hear at that moment. The perfect soundtrack to my life at that time. Creepy, but awesome!

Or you can watch it on YouTube if you prefer. Here’s “Videotape”.

Beck has always been that artist that I really do like, but don’t really seem to keep up with his every move like I do with some of my other favorites. My introduction to Beck was of course Mellow Gold, and Odelay just completely blew my mind when it came out. I remember purchasing the CD while visiting a friend in L.A. and driving around jamming it over and over and over. So much to the point that we irritated my girlfriend and her friend who were along for the trip.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that he is headlining one of the nights of this year’s ACL Festival, and is a definite “must see” that weekend. And if you haven’t see the man Beck perform, I would highly suggest you make an effort to do so soon. The man puts on a show to please kids of all ages.

Beck’s upcoming release Modern Guilt isn’t hitting legal until July 8th, but as artists do these days, a peek as to what to expect is available in a couple of different formats. A video trailer has been posted, giving us snipits of tracks from the release and two tracks for the recording can be streamed at Beck’s iLike page. You can listen to “Orphans” and “Gamma Ray” in their entirety.

The lovely twin singer-songwriters Tegan and Sara have announced their final US tour in support of their 2007 release, The Con. The tour takes them across the country, ending with a four night stay at L.A.’s Henry Fonda Theatre. After Australian and Canadian tours later this year, the duo are rumored to be heading back into the studio next year to record their 6th album (!) with Con producer and Death Cab for Cutie member Chris Walla.

MP3> Tegan and Sara ‘Back In Your Head’

Tour Dates:
Jun-27 Calgary, ALB Sled Island Music Festival
Aug-10 Vancouver, BC Under the Volcano Festival
Sep-20 San Diego, CA San Diego Street Scene
Sep-21 San Francisco, CA Treasure Island Music Festival
Sep-28 Austin, TX Austin City Limits Festival
Sep-30 Atlanta, GA The Tabernacle*
Oct-02 Baltimore, MD Rams Head Live!*
Oct-03 Philly, PA Electric Factory*
Oct-04 Worchester, MA The Palladium*
Oct-05 NY, NY Terminal 5*
Oct-06 NY, NY Terminal 5*
Oct-09 Chicago, IL Riviera*
Oct-11 Minneapolis, MN State Theatre*
Oct-13 Denver, CO The Paramount*
Oct-16 Los Angeles, CA The Henry Fonda Theatre*
Oct-17 Los Angeles, CA The Henry Fonda Theatre*
Oct-18 Los Angeles, CA The Henry Fonda Theatre*
Oct-18 Los Angeles, CA The Henry Fonda Theatre*
*w/ City and Colour (aka Dallas Green from Alexisonfire) and Girl in a Coma.

Today, Death Cab for Cutie will be stopping by Morning Becomes Eclectic. They will perform a few songs and chat with host Nic Harcourt. Tune into KCRW at 11:15am PST/1:15pm CST and stream the band’s appearance live. If you happen to miss it however, KCRW archives everything so it should be up within a day or two.

Here is a cover of The Smith’s “There’s A Light That Never Goes Out” that Death Cab recently played at Philadelphia’s Radio 104.5.

MP3> Death Cab for Cutie ‘There is A Light That Never Goes Out’ 

Out of the ashes of Montreal band The Unicorns arose Islands, the new project of Nick Diamonds and J’aime Tambeur (who has now left the band). After crafting one of the better albums of the last few years, 2006’s Return to the Sea, Islands released a follow-up this year entitled Arm’s Way. The band’s sound is more of a fuller sound then that of the Unicorns, but still manages to keep all of the catchy hooks and fun that they had, but with soaring vocals, instrumental interludes, and an occasional rap thrown in. They did the rounds at the most recent SXSW,  stirring up swells of admiration by some heavies in the blog scene, but this is their first jaunt down to Austin promoting the new album.

Today you have a chance to catch the band not only once, but twice, as they are playing an instore at Waterloo at 5pm before their gig at Emo’s.

MP3> Islands ‘Creeper’

Islands Myspace 

Maybe I’m being a little lazy today and taking the easy path of blogging, by posting video. Anyone that knows me, knows that I’ve been a flag carrying fan of My Morning Jacket for years, and it seems that with the latest release of Evil Urges, their popularity has exploded. Good for the guys. It’s Friday, so take it easy at work, watch the clock crawl to 5, and watch some MMJ on Conan video while you do so.

Conan introduces fan to the band:

The band rocks: