MusicfestNW

Free Admission. Doors open at 6pm.

A film about a man, a musician, Bobby Bare Jr., and the relentless struggle of a touring artist fighting to survive on the road, doing what he can to keep his world afloat and provide for his children, all the while fighting his way out from the shadow of his famous father with a rock all his own. But this is not a concert film. There’s more that goes into it than getting up in front of a crowd and it’s not all pretty.

With very few interviews, the audience is a ‘fly on the wall’ along for the ride and drawn into the world that is Bobby Bare Jr. while he weaves his way thru complicated rock ‘n’ roll situations. You don’t need to know his music, listen to him, or even like him but you will relate to him. He embodies the American spirit, and when so many other musicians would step down or sellout, Bare Jr. steps up, even delivering lost airport luggage when not touring to feed his kids. This isn’t a glowing or pompous look at a musical diva, but rather a look at an artist who will do whatever it takes to live out his passion.

Be it 500 people or 5 people, a packed club or someone’s living room, Bobby Bare Jr. provides a unique musical experience for his audiences – connecting and drawing each person in with his personality, his stories and of course… his rock.

Legendary documentary filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker (DON’T LOOK BACK, MONTEREY POP) is an advisor on the film, and musicians including My Morning Jacket, Justin Townes Earle, Hayes Carll, David Vandervelde, Blue Giant, Duane Denison, Carey Kotsionis, and Bobby Bare Sr. make appearances in the film.

The film was photographed on mixed formats including Super 16mm, 16mm, Super 8, and HD.

PRESENTED WITH THE NORTHWEST FILM CENTER’S 30TH REEL MUSIC FILM FESTIVAL, OCTOBER 12-25, 2012. MORE INFO HERE.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $18 at the door.  Doors open at 7pm.

If you ask the guys of Joyce Manor to describe themselves, they’ll tell you the band is “four guys who have a taste for bad Chinese food, Thin Lizzy guitar solos, and calling ‘shotgun’.”  But one listen to their infectiously catchy pop-punk reveals them as much, much more than that.  Joyce Manor deconstructs punk rock to it’s most catchy core with Weezer-esque pop sensibilities and gigantic hooks that beg you to sing along.

Originally conceived as a 2-piece acoustic duo in 2008 by singer/guitarist Barry Johnson and guitarist Chase Knobbe during a drunken escapade at Disneyland, the band grew to include Matt Ebert (bass/vocals) and Kurt Walcher (drums) by November of 2009.  After releasing a demo and a split 7″, the band released their first self-titled full-length in 2011 on 6131 Records to critical acclaim.  LA Weekly singled out Joyce Manor as “one of the most promising bands” in LA, while Absolutepunk hailed them by saying, “Joyce Manor have become the poster child for the young band that does everything right.“ Alternative Press called their debut a “sprightly, enjoyable record,” and Bring On Mixed Reviews commented, “It’s rare that a band gets it this right with their first effort,” while Decoy Music claims “Joyce Manor is one of a few bands to do their forefathers proud.” Perhaps Punknews put it best and most simply though, when bestowing upon the band the honor of 2011 Album of the Year, that “Joyce Manor is everyone’s favorite new artist. Those who disagree are clearly lying.”

2011 also saw the band release a handful of new splits and a busy touring schedule that saw them criss-crossing the United States. In November of 2011 the band began recording for their second full length, Of All Things I Will Soon Grow Tired, which will be released on Asian Man Records on April 17, 2012.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $32 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

It’s simple: Once you see and hear LP, you remember. She’s a gripping performer, a curly-headed force of nature who looks like a cross between a young Bob Dylan and Marc Bolan, albeit often wielding a ukulele. A rockin’ ukulele, in front of a dynamic, versatile band, that is. And her voice is instantly ear-catching, a natural instrument of power and grace.

But there’s much more to it. There’s just something about the Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter-artist that grabs hold — a spirit, an exuberance, and a belief in her gifts as a musician and in the power of music to reach people. It comes through in her songs, whether written for Rihanna (the 2011 hit “Cheers”) and Christina Aguilera (“Beautiful People” from the movie Burlesque), or for herself, such as “Into the Wild” (the song that has tantalized ears through its use in a Citibank Card TV commercial) and the hauntingly epic “Tokyo Sunrise,” also from the “Live At EastWest Studios” EP (6-song CD + DVD)to be released April 24th, 2012.

While writing songs for others was rewarding (artistically, as well as in other ways), her most natural habitat is on stage. It was playing the L.A. club gigs that reenergized LP’s drive to write songs for herself as a solo artist. Thinking back about her earlier days, performing live is what motivated her while living as a rock ‘n’ roll road warrior: “We were doing 250 shows a year, driving around the country in a crappy van my brother leased for me; one hotel room for all of us in the band,” she explains.

Fueled by a contagious, pure love of performing, LP’s stage presenceis inherently powerful with a free-flowing, infectious confidence honed through her years of touring. At a January show at the Troubadour in West Hollywood, it became abundantly clear after just one song that the energy shared between artist and audience reflected a breakout buzz gig confirming LP’s status as an artist to watch in 2012.

In fact Esquire Magazine has singled out LP as one of 2012‘s rising stars, adding its voice to a growing, global legion of fans. All this comes before she’s even released her Warner Bros. Records debut live EP, let alone the full album she’s currently working on with producers such as Isabella Summers (Florence and the Machine), Rob Cavallo (Green Day, Alanis Morissette), PJ Bianco (Metro Station, Veronicas), and Fraser T. Smith (Adele, Ellie Goulding) among her collaborators.

And then there are the multitudes of people online Google-ing to find the striking voice behind the mysterious “Somebody left the gate open” line (a vocal snippet from LP’s song“Into The Wild” ), which can be heard accompanying the daredevil rock climbers in the much-discussed Citibank Card commercial. The success of this song and commercial was the subject of a recent CNN news piece, not to mention a surge of popularity for viral videos of LP’s concert performances, in which she sings her own songs and delivers soaring versions of everything from Guns ‘N Roses’ “Sweet Child O’ Mine” to Beyoncé’s “Halo.” That growing awareness and word-of-mouth is not the work of the PR machine; it’s just the natural order of events that has brought fans to LP’s music.

LP — born and raised in New York and now a Los Angeleno — came to music early, despite hailing from a “family of doctors and lawyers.” Her mom loved to sing, though, and the youngster was not to be deterred. She was drawn heavily to transformational artists, those who blended mystique with the rare ability to make an instant connection with listeners, both as performers and writers.

When LP talks about the music and artists who have provided inspiration, she says: “I’m a huge Jeff Buckley fan. Kurt Cobain is another one — he was able to make the most unique music that stands on its own. I also love Chris Cornell’s voice and Chrissie Hynde’s swagger. I love Joni Mitchell, Jim Morrison, and Robert Plant; and I really appreciate rappers like Jay-Z. The wordplay is really important to me. I’m into so much music and I draw from everywhere.”

Trying to describe LP’s own music is daunting task. There is an elegant energy that rocks but does that make it rock music? The structures are memorable and melodic but does that make it pop music? The lyrical content has an emotional depth that holds a universal appeal, which draws the listener closer, but does that make it folk music? One might detect traces of Roy Orbison, or the aforementioned Jeff Buckley, a hint of U2 or maybe some suggestion of Edith Piaf but it somehow doesn’t really sound like any of these per se. This is the music of LP.

LP’s live performances gracefully evolved during bouts of intense touring, and her songwriting skills developed profoundly while working with such top songwriters as Billy Steinberg and Desmond Child among others. “When I went into sessions with people, I had to make it rain really fast or they wouldn’t want to write with me again,” she says. “You learn to hit your mark pretty quickly.”

All of those factors are coming into play as LP makes her Warner Bros. debut album, which she hopes will be worthy of her teachers and will also satisfy her own creative expectations. “I want to make a journey of a record, something that flows as a full and complete piece of work,” she says.

It’s the same for her approach onstage. “I’m at my most intense when fronting a full-on band,” she says. “But what I ultimately strive for is that connection with the audience.”

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $15 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

the minus 5 – a brief compendium Scott McCaughey. Charioteer, optometrist, master brewer, or corpse? The blatherers rage on. What HAS been established is that “McCoy” is long addicted to rock’n’roll and its various sidekicks, at great expense to family and friends. To wit: Young Fresh Fellows (1983 to present) – songwriter, singer, instrumentalist; The Minus 5 (1993 to present) – songwriter, singer, instrumentalist; R.E.M. (1994 to present) – instrumentalist; Tuatara (1996 to present) – instrumentalist, songwriter

With these groups, Scott has made many records (best seller: 5 million; worst seller: 450), and played many shows (highest attendance: 125,000; lowest: 8). “McOi” is always available and enthusiastic when it comes to these activities. In fact, there have been many other bands that have

“benefited” from Scott’s talents (first documented stage appearance: 1972, with Vannevar Bush & His Differential Analyzers). A complete discography may never exist, but for more information see Guy With A Pencil – McCaughey’s Odyssey In Song (Dalkey Archive, Normal IL, 2002).

Thee Minus 5 itself started when McCaughey realized he had a dumptruck-load of songs that the Young Fresh Fellows would either never get around to, or would wisely choose not to. His friends and fellow Seattle-ites Peter Buck, Ken Stringfellow and Jon Auer were quick to volunteer to help Scott capture his “Let The Bad Times Roll” vision, and these early sessions produced The Hello EP and Old Liquidator. Many other luminants have since joined the ranks of the Minus 5 (see list below). It’s a bit like a cancer, really.

the minus 5 vs. wilco – historical background Uncle Tupelo opened for the incredibly popular Young Fresh Fellows once at the Off Broadway in St. Louis, 1988. There was an undeniable musical kinship between the bands (since denied) despite the fact that Jeff was 14 and Scott was 40. Years later other things happened. Peter Buck produced Uncle Tupelo’s beautiful March 16-20, 1992 album. Every so often Scott and Jeff Tweedy would find themselves at their wife’s house in Chicago, playing each other records and new stuff their bands had recorded. On a night off on R.E.M.’s 1995 world tour, Jeff learned a bunch of the songs off of Old Liquidator, and played a set with Scott and Peter at the fabled and much-missed Lounge Ax. Somewhere along the line Tweedy and McCaughey started talking about the desire to record together, and they kept talking about it, though nobody listened.

After a Golden Smog show in Seattle, Jeff, Scott and Barrett Martin recorded a new Minus 5 song “Childhood Lament” (which resides carelessly on the unreleased Let The War Against Music Begin Vol. 2 album). Wilco toured with R.E.M. in 1999. McCaughey regularly contributed moogerfooger banjo to “Misunderstood.” Backstage in Munich came the Tweedy/McCaughey/Buck anthem: “Lyrical Stance (I’ve Got A).” Later, in Toronto, Scott and Jeff penned “The Family Gardener” and recorded a rough version of the song with Brian Paulson in a Raleigh, NC Holiday Inn. In January 2000, a two-week celebration of Lounge Ax (finally being evicted from its longtime home) brought Scott to Chicago to perform a set of new material, with no rehearsal, and featuring Wilco as the Minus 5. This set has been widely bootlegged. Ha!

great moments in the minus 5 Yes, there have been many, but this hardly seems the time or the place to go into them.

great moments in scott mccaughey (in order) 1. SM weds singer/anthropologist Christy McWilson April 27, 1980. That night they go to see Roy Loney & The Phantom Movers at the Inn Of The Beginning in Cotati, CA. 1. October 1994 finds SM performing with R.E.M. on Saturday Night Live and consorting with Bill Murray and Chevy Chase. In a fashion. Chase has a flask of whiskey in suit pocket; McOi makes note of this. Later gives Chase unsolicited, in depth, and quite favorable review of Cops And Robbersons. 3. Young Fresh Fellows first concert, opening for Sun Ra at the Rainbow Tavern in Seattle WA, Dec. 1983. SM buys mysterious vinyl album (which features Pharoah Sanders) from Mr. Ra himself in dressing room. 3. School lunch “sermon”; jail time. 4. March 2001 – M5 performance of “You Don’t Mean It” on Conan O’Brien. 1. SM plays the vibraphone, with R.E.M., backing Neil Young on “Ambulance Blues,” two nights running at the Bridge Concerts, Oct. 1999. 1. Scott & Christy’s children invent a real robot, Kyle. 1. T. Rex / Poco / Doobie Brothers bill at Winterland, 1972. 2. YFF in-store at Tower Records Shibuya Tokyo Japan. Members of Japanese band the Circus Posters attend, perform private concert of YFF songs for SM. 2. 1998: SM writes magnum opus “There Is No Music”, records both YFF and M5 versions, shitcans them both. 2. Young Fresh Fellows conquer Spain, like Cortez. Spanish insist on yearly conquerings from 1992 to present. Occasional complying results. Callemacha = red wine + Coca Cola. 3. SM and Mike Mills play keyboards on “Mindtrain” with Yoko Ono at the Crocodile in Seattle, 1998. Yoko totally digs SM’s scene. And vice versa. 11. March 2001 – M5 performance of “You Don’t Mean It” on Conan O’Brien.

down with wilco – first person account abbreviated, by scott mccaughey “I am driving by airports practicing retrieval of you.” With this message from Jeff “Parfumery” Tweedy, I knew that I was finally headed to Chicago to start working on a long-discussed collaboration with Jeff and his bandmates in Wilco. And it was a heartfelt and nobel convergence as Jeff, John, Glenn, Leroy and I submarined ourselves into SOMA Studio Chicago with grande pianos, Mike Jorgensen, and free-cone resonance on Monday, Sept. 10, 2001. The next day was not good though. With heavy hands and troubled minds, sounds so still and confused were cordoned off that week onto whirring reels. It seemed like all we could do. On Saturday all manner of cookery was lasered from studio to Abbey Pub tabernacle and we foisted eight of the nine songs we had managed to magnetize in the preceding blur of days. The new Wilco then displayed its mighty bench press for the first time. The crowd was tattered, thirsty, ready to be barked at for some precious hours of musical release and friendship guzzling.

Two months later Ashleigh Banfield produced five or seven more tracks at SOMA. She really did. Rebecca Gates planted a tree in the sidewalk. “The Days Of Wine And Booze” was the last song. Jeff was slumbering in a bad virus and wouldn’t let me leave without rolling the song up in the piano carpet.

Back in Seattle, at a pile of logs in the Bastard District, regularge M5ers jumped to interject. Indeed they could, handily, in the shapes of Peter Buck, Minister of Tar, and Kenneth Stringfellow, Cautionary Extract. It was hardly a surplus that Charlie Francis, Christy McWilson and Sean O’Hagan would llama themselves in, reprising reprievious stints. People feel sorry for me and will take an hour to cudgel me when asked.

On a stealthy and miserable Mission to London, I smuggled in an analog hard drive. Charlie made sure the mixes were crenellated. By keeping Howlin’ Wolf a prisoner in the car, driving by Abbey Road tabernacle every day, and making the birds sing on cue, the whisky turned to stone so it would be there always, like a Harry Nilsson demo.

One year later, you hold the frothy ale in your tankard. Or is that simply a diagram of a cow, with #30 designating brisket?

recommended reading (complete the following novels to enjoy “down with wilco” to its fullest) The Third Policeman – Flann O’Brien; Gargantua and Pantagruel – Francois Rabelais (trans. Raffel); Ulysses – James Joyce; Wittgenstein’s Mistress – David Markson; Cruddy – Lynda Barry

recommended listening (these should be listened to at all times, including before, during, and after “down with wilco”): Bill Fay – Bill Fay / Time of the Last Persecution; Howlin’ Wolf – Memphis Days; Nick Lowe – “Basing Street”

recommended eating a soda cracker and a peanut

recommended drinking Guinness Stout, Single Malt Scotch Whisky (Lagavulin $$$, or Bowmore $), Diet Coke, Red, Red Wine (Spanish Rioja), Anything

minus 5 discography ALBUMS/EPS Down With Wilco (Yep Roc 2003); The Minus 5 In Rock (Book Records 2000); Let The War Against Music Begin Vol. 2 (unreleased); Let The War Against Music Begin (Mammoth/Malt 2001); My Chartreuse Opinion (re-issue of 1989 McCaughey LP, Malt/Hollywood 1997); The Lonesome Death Of Buck McCoy (Malt/Hollywood 1997); Emperor Of The Bathroom EP (East Side Digital 1995); Old Liquidator (Glitterhouse/East Side Digital 1995; Malt/Hollywood 1997); Hello EP (Hello Recording Club 1994)

SINGLES “A Thousand Years Away” b/w “Echos Myron”/”Wicked Annabella” 45 (Houston Party, Spain 2000)

TRACKS ON COMPILATIONS “I Still Miss Someone” (Love Is My Only Crime compilation, Veracity, Germany 1994) “Power To The People” (Working Class Hero compilation, Hollywood 1995) “Find A Finger” (Live At The Crocodile c

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $18 at the door.  Doors open at 7pm.

Andrew Jackson Jihad is an American folk/punk/rock group from Phoenix, Arizona, formed in 2004. They have been classified as everything from indie rock to anti-folk to Americana.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $12 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm

Reminiscent of so many bands of yesteryouth, muddled with our generation’s lazing indie spirit, Adventure Galley strikes a certain note of dance party agelessness. A monolithic keyboard facade made of an old radio stands boldly centered at their live show, the one steadfast bolt amidst wildly flying notes, dancing fans and soaring singalong melodies that are just too fitting for a band named after an old ship.
-Mike Harper, BBQCHICKENROBOT

Adventure Galley has been on the rise since 2008, playing to crowds of dancing people of all ages across the West Coast. Utilizing traditional rock instruments in combination with synthesizers, drum machines, and other electronic music staples, Adventure Galley creates highly original music with unique, powerful vocals and unforgettable melodies. Their music has been described as “infectious”, “danceable”, and “epic”. Adventure Galley recorded their debut EP “The Right Place To Be” at Jackpot! Studios in Portland, OR. It was released on May 7th, 2010 and is available online or at your local record shop.

“The band has the highly elevated sound of the Arcade Fire, but with a more electrified feel.” -The Source Weekly, July 2010

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $20 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Hungry Ghost was formed in a garage in Portland, OR some time around 2007 by Sara Lund (Unwound, Corin Tucker Band) and Andrew Price (Irving Klaw Trio). After 3 years as a 2-piece, jamming out funky, bluesy art rock, Lorca Wood (The Drags) joined as bass player in 2010. With Lorca’s solid grounding bass riffs, a heavier style emerged. But the blues and the groove and the sense of experimentation have never left. Andrew’s vintage hollow body Gibson rumbles and screeches in John Fahey tunings while Sara’s bombastic beats keep your head bobbing and booty shaking. The 3 share vocal duties, combining their voices to create harmonies and call and response inspired by the rootsy music they all love.

These latest recordings were produced by friend and hero Sam Coomes of Quasi, Crock, Pink Mountain and numerous other projects.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $15 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

BOBBY BARE JR’S QUICK FACTS

- has a degree in psychology from the UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE

- made 2 albums for Immortal Records with his band BARE JR. one for sony records in 1998 and one for virgin records in 2001

- releasing a 7 song EP of songs by the bands BREAD and/or AMERICA called “THE AMERICAN BREAD EP” on aug 11th 2009

- born raised and still lives in Nashville, TN

- VERY afraid of elves

- has 2 children – one boy one girl

- nominated for a grammy at the age of 6 years old for a duet with his dad called “daddy what if”-written by Shel Silverstein

- that year the grammy for country duet went to THE POINTER SISTERS

- believes that blue is a flavor and not a color nor a feeling

- has made 3 albums and 1 ep for BLOODSHOT RECORDS since 2003

- co-produced his dad’s last record THE MOON WAS BLUE in 2006

- grew up in HENDERSONVILLE, TN with George Jones and Tammy Wynette as his next door neighbors

- recorded his last album “THE LONGEST MEOW” in 1 day – 11 songs 11 people, 11 hours (there were a couple of overdubs during mixing)

- is only making music in the hopes of getting one step closer to his ultimate dream of being STEVEN PATRICK MORRISSEY’S personal bicycle mechanic

- has toured with DR. DOG, THE WALKMEN, THE DECEMBERISTS, THE BLACK CROWES, BOB DYLAN, AREOSMITH, MY MORNING JACKET, CENTRO-MATIC, THE BOTTLE ROCKETS, THE DRIVE BY TRUCKERS, ANDREW BIRD, and THE OLD 97′s

- has been romantically linked to the BOB’S BIG BOY boy

- has played BONNAROO, SASQUATCH and AUSTIN CITY LIMITS FESTIVAL

- in June of 2007 Bobby was asked by a casting company to audition for the role of “Shrek” for “Shrek the Musical” on Broadway

- is on HOUSTON PARTY RECORDS in spain and HAZELWOOD RECORDS in germany

- did a family album of all SHEL SILVERSTEIN songs called “SINGIN’ IN THE KITCHEN” in 1975

- can NOT speak mandrin chinese

- wrote with and had all his songs critiqued by SHEL SILVERSTEIN till Shel passed on in may of 1999

- sang on the song “getting back into you” on THE SILVER JEWS album “TANGLEWOOD NUMBERS”

- sang on the song “riding” on WILL OLDHAM’s album “bonnie prince billie sings Greatest Palace Music”

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $12 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm

“What does your band sound like?” The most common, and unavoidable, question asked of a musician. One friend said we sound like Smart Pop. Another likened us to the West Coast Blondie. When people ask, I usually say “Have you ever been to Venice Beach late at night, when the cops have stopped patrolling, and you’re not sure which shadows the drug dealers and pickpockets are hiding in, but the Ocean is loud and the Air is wet and you feel safe because you’re with someone you know? It sounds exactly like that feels!”

I don’t actually say that, but it’s definitely more fun than “A really good rock band. I think you’d like it.”

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $20 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Red Fang is the latest effort from long time bros and collaborators Bryan Giles (Last of the Juanitas, Party Time), Aaron Beam (Dark Forces, Lachrymator), David Sullivan (Party Time, facedowninshit, Shiny Beast) and John Sherman (Party Time, Bad Wizard, Trumans Water, All Night). The four have boiled down their disparate sounds to create the ONLY sound: Red Fang.

Unleashed on New Year’s Eve of 2006 in Portland, Oregon, Red Fang stormed out of the gates, introducing a sweaty, seething basement party to a new kind of unforgettable fist-pumping, beer-chugging rock music.

Red Fang recalls a time when rock was urgent and a little horrifying. Residing somewhere between Black Flag and Black Sabbath, Red Fang can shift from barn-burning punk to mid-tempo Big Business-style hyper-distorted bass destruction to YOB-inspired doom while still sounding totally cohesive. Synthesizing such a variety of heavy music influences while maintaining a distinct and identifiable personality sets Red Fang apart.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $32 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Getting to Where We Belong: The Making of Passion Pit’s Gossamer

“Hideaway”

Hundreds of hipsters, college kids and music biz schmoozers gather under a massive white tent to see Passion Pit. It is an afternoon shindig hosted by the blog Brooklyn Vegan, at the 2009 South by Southwest festival. The sun is setting and it is a classic make-it-or-break-it moment for Passion Pit, who is headlining despite having just released a lone EP, Chunk of Change. The crowd is giddy on both free Izze fruit soda and the Boston band’s bubbly pop. Between songs, frontman Michael Angelakos runs his fingers and sweat through his thick, curly, Greek hair. He starts to rant—about a shirt he bought for his new girlfriend, about veganism, about inane blog comments. After a few awkward minutes, the music kicks back in. By the end of the performance, Michael is rolling on a red Persian rug amongst many, many keyboard and effects pedal cables, clutching his microphone, wailing in his signature helium falsetto. The audience cheers, the Tweeters tweet, the bloggers blog ecstatically.

Michael leaves the stage and begins crying. He has made it, and he has broken.

When the festival ends, the rest of the Passion Pit guys van back to Massachusetts. Michael stays behind in Texas. He calls a friend for support and begs her to come be with him. In a panic, he buys her a plane ticket. It is for the wrong year, 2010. He calls his parents in Buffalo, New York. “I’m going to a hospital,” he tells them.

Michael is standing with his father outside a hospital in Houston, looking at mock-ups of album artwork on his cellphone. Passion Pit has just signed to Columbia Records, and a debut album, Manners, is due in a couple months. The record cover is green and messy and murky. Michael is not crazy about it, but there is no time, as the hospital is about to take his phone away from him. “It looks fine, Michael,” his dad says. “Just go.”

In the hospital, Michael is not allowed to talk about work. “Up there, onstage, you’re alone, darling, ” a nurse tells him. “And if your life evolves into ruin, everyone will watch what you’re doing.” Michael thinks these would make good lyrics. His friends smuggle in positive reviews of Manners. When one magazine blesses the record with an 8 out of ten, he almost cries again.

“I’ll Be Alright”

This first sentence was not always the first. Originally, I was going to start with a simile: Michael Angelakos’ brain is like a shaken can of spray paint with no nozzle. Millions of particles of bright ideas bounce around in there. When inspiration punctures his head, art sprays out. Often, someone else must puncture the can, or smash it. Only, if you hold Michael’s bursting skull up to a canvas, you would not get a cloudy splatter of dripping bits. The paint would land perfectly in a detailed map of the knotty Tokyo subway system.

You can hear this “I’ll Be Alright,” the second song on Gossamer, in which a sudden seizure of skittering programmed drums swarms over diced synths. “My brain is racing and I feel like I’ll explode!” Michael sings amidst the orchestral glitch. He compares it to the sensation you feel after an orgasm.

Writing about creativity is like architecturing about dance. When I sat down to describe Michael’s thought process, a can of paint formed in my mind for whatever reason. After that, I thought no nozzle, because I like the alliteration. Then I tacked on a subject and verb. I start with a phrase, an image or a rhythm of words and construct around it. I’m not a beginning-to-end sentence builder. Michael asked me to write this piece because he intuited, correctly, that my writing is akin to his song crafting.

A spark of a Passion Pit song might be found in the fuzz of a guitar pedal. It might be a stumbled-upon drum loop, the tintinnabulation of layered chimes or some gibberish harmony he’s humming. It might be one of the 200 scratch melodies Michael has stored on his iPhone. Later, Michael might sit at a keyboard and work out a melody. “I do things backwards,” he admits, “and I’m a maximalist.” Indeed. The songs on Gossamer carry anywhere from 60 to 200 instrumental tracks, according to Michael. If you ask Alex Aldi, Michael’s engineer, the number 80 to 120. (The maximum output on their version of ProTools is 120 tracks.) Whatever, it’s a fuckton. But it’s important to talk to Alex.

“Constant Conversations”

When Alex and Michael set forth to record Gossamer in January of 2011, the two first rented a studio near the Manhattan Bridge in Brooklyn’s DUMBO neighborhood. Well, it was technically an office space. The new Passion Pit headquarters shared the building with digital media start-ups, dot.coms, that sort of thing, which were not appreciative of gut-rumbling bass bumps rattling the uninsulated walls.

“We’d blast these huge R. Kelly–like booms,” Michael says. “There would be fists pounding the walls,” Alex remembers.

The duo began working from 6PM to 6AM, partly to avoid pissing off the neighbors, partly because Michael is “really OCD about who’s hearing me” In the wee hours, Michael would toil at his array of keyboards, sequencers and computers.

The fruit of this first stage is the stunning slow jam “Constant Conversations.” It’s the kind of stank-faced, flesh-slapping R&B groove that makes a name like “Passion Pit” sound positively filthy. That is, until you pay attention to the lyrics. They are not nocturnal; they are dark. “I’m drunker than before / They told me drinking doesn’t make me nice,” Michael sings. “Well, you’re standing in the kitchen and you’re pouring out my drink.”

It’s important to pay attention to the lyrics.

“Slip-ups in this town are like a sentence to life.” –“Mirrored Sea” What makes Southern California’s orange sherbet sunsets so gorgeous? It’s the life-strangling smog. Toxic clouds can sometimes lead to beauty.

In June of 2011, Michael headed to L.A. to continue work on Gossamer with a variety of big name producers. One producer would bring in pretty girls to sit on a couch in the studio. He would play back tracks at top volume. If the girls got up and danced, it was a hit.

Michael slept in another studio beneath the control room, where he could hear some dude fucking people’s brains out all night. The walls were marble.

Michael slept where Fiona Apple once slept. Michael recorded in a fancy house outside of which photographers snapped model in lingerie. Michael worked with a prominent hip-hop producer. They tinkered with “Hideaway,” an upbeat tune set to a speech a nurse once gave him. Michael played the hip-hop producer his demo. “You don’t need anyone to produce you,” the producer humbly admitted. Michael flew back to Brooklyn, ending what he now calls his “June gloom.”

“Everyone let’s me make these mistakes,” Michael says.

“Carried Away”

“He plays music so loud in his headphones, I can hear everything he’s doing. When he’s working, he won’t get up to use the bathroom or to take a sip of water. Watching him is watching someone in their element, someone doing what they were born to do. But it can be a waiting game for him to get an idea. Then, bam, ninety minutes later there’s this amazing finished song. He does stuff on the fly. Michael thrives on that, the immediate pressure. Everyone else game-plans. The game-plan is in Michael’s head and he’s twenty steps ahead. Conveying that is difficult. It’s information overload.’” — engineer Alex Aldi

“It’s Not My Fault, I’m Happy”

Aside from the sarcastic “Love Is Greed,” all the songs on Gossamer are one-hundred-percent true. I know this because I’ve compared the lyric sheet to a 3,672 word life story Michael emailed me. It begins, “A main talking point seems to be about the fact that there is a dichotomy in my music.” It ends with, “The next day I quit drinking.” I read it one evening while listening to “It’s Not My Fault I’m Happy” repeatedly as tears welled in my eyes.

Unlike some songwriters, Michael does not write in character. He compares the album to a collection of John Cheever stories. “It’s non-fiction, but dramatized. It’s euphoric pain,” he tells me.

The record is more intimate than that. Listening and reading along, I feel as if I am reading his chart. I am eavesdropping. I am putting him inside one of the TSA’s full-body millimeter wave scanners.

Ah, I think, “Take A Walk” must be about his father and his father’s father, his Papou, who sold old roses and owned a candy kitchen, using his savings to bring his village to America.

Hearing the celestas and xylophones skittering about the opening of “Love Is Greed,” I envision bolts of blue electricity flashing across Michael’s grey matter. The systolic, panicked pulse of “Mirrored Sea” is awash in adrenaline and amphetamine salts. The pomp and silver twinkle of “On My Way” is confetti for a forthcoming wedding.

“Are you sure you want to be this

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The story of Against Me! begins in Naples, FL, the year 1997. Tom Gabel, who was playing in a local grind-core band at the time, started playing under the name as a solo project with no intentions of doing anything beyond making a demo tape, and overcoming stage fright by playing a show by himself. Shortly after these goals were realized, he started collaborating with his friend Kevin Mahon (now of the band forgetters), who accompanied him on a make-shift drum set built out of scavenged (dumpster) pickle buckets and whatever real drum parts they could round up. The two then recorded another 10 song demo tape entitled Vivida Vis on a four track tape recorder in Tom’s bedroom at his mother’s house. They self-released the album by dubbing copies on boom boxes and stealing photo copies for the covers and lyric booklets from Kinko’s and Office Depot’s all across America. Tom and Kevin moved to Gainesville in 1999 and released their first self-recorded, self-titled 5 song 12″ EP on the Baltimore label Crasshole Records in 2000. This was followed by their first 7″ EP, recorded by Rob Mcgregor at Goldentone studios, entitled Crime As Forgiven By…  and released by Sabot Productions in 2001. Shortly after, they were joined by James Bowman on guitar, followed by Dustin Fridkin on bass. After the last show of their first full fledged tour as a 4-piece band, while driving south on I-75 from Bloomington, IN back to Gainesville, FL their van was struck by a semi truck. They rolled multiple times and landed upside down in a ditch, and while all of their equipment and van were destroyed, everyone walked away from the accident relatively unscathed. It was at this point Kevin Mahon left the band to pursue an interest in train hopping. After briefly considering quitting altogether, Tom and Dustin continued under the name as a 2-piece releasing another 7″ EP on Sabot Productions, fan-titled The Acoustic EP. Unsatisfied with playing music as an acoustic duo, Tom and Dustin began playing music with Warren Oakes on drums and were rejoined by James Bowman on guitar.

In 2002,  the four-piece released the landmark full length album Reinventing Axl Rose on Gainesville, Florida’s No Idea Records, recorded by Rob Mcgregor at Goldentone Studios; an album that has gone on to become No Idea Records’ top selling album. Shortly after the album’s release, Dustin Fridkin left the band to return to college. Faced again with an uncertain future, the band considered breaking up. By chance, Tom received a drunken email from his friend Andrew, who at the time played in the Murfreesboro, TN band Kill Devil Hills. Andrew jokingly said that Against Me! should kick their bass player out and let him join the band. Tom called his bluff and shortly after, Andrew moved to Gainesville, FL. Together, Tom, James, Warren, and Andrew released 3 full length albums, 1 live album, 1 DVD and multiple EPs.  As The Eternal Cowboy, released in 2003 by Fat Wreck Chords, saw Against Me! with Rob McGregor as producer but this time making a 100% analog recording in Memphis, TN at the famous Ardent Studios (The Replacements, R.E.M., Afghan Whigs, Led Zeppelin, Big Star).  Against Me! toured relentlessly in support of the album. In 2005, Against Me! headed to Baltimore, MD to record with producer J. Robbins  (Government Issue, Jawbox, Burning Airlines); the album, Searching For A Former Clarity (Fat Wreck Chords), was met with much mainstream critical praise and landed AM! a record deal with the label Sire Records. The bands major label debut  New Wave, recorded in 2006 and released in 2007, was produced by Butch Vig (Garbage, Nirvana, Smashing Pumpkins, Green Day) and mixed by Rich Costey (Mars Volta, My Chemical Romance, Franz Ferdinand). The album was a media breakthrough and among many other accolades was named Spin Magazine’s album of the year. Against Me! hit the road to support New Waveand again, the road ended with a crash. Early in the morning hours, on an icy interstate, while driving overnight from Denver to Salt Lake City, the band’s tour bus hit a patch of ice, skidded out of control and landed on its side in a ditch off the interstate. Luckily, everyone walked away unscathed. The moment was a breaking point for the band in many respects as shortly after finishing the remaining few weeks of touring in support of New Wave, Warren Oakes left the band to open a Mexican restaurant in Gainesville, FL.

In 2010 Against Me! recorded their 5th full length album, White Crosses, once again working with Butch Vig, but this time featured Alan Moulder (Smashing Pumpkins, NIN) doing the mix, and George Rebelo (Hot Water Music) playing drums. They also began touring with pianist Franz Nicolay (The Hold Steady, World/Inferno Friendship Society). Shortly after the albums release Against Me! announced it would be parting ways with Sire/Warner. The band also announced that drummer Jay Weinberg (Madball, The E Street Band) would now be sitting behind the kit, pounding heads.

The band has jumped head first into 2011 already completing a full headlining tour of the U.S. followed by another tour supporting the Dropkick Murphy’s and has dates planned taking them through the summer into the fall including another U.S. headlining tour (supported by Screaming Females and Lemuria), dates on the Van’s Warped Tour and appearances at a slew of other festivals. In February the band entered Madison, WI’s famed and now closed, Smart Studios for a week where they recorded a two song 7″ EP to be released by Sabot Productions this June 14th entitled “Russian Spies/Occult Enemies”, the first Against Me! recordings to feature Jay Weinberg. This May 23rd the band will also be releasing a collection of rarities and demo recordings on Fat Wreck Chords recorded during the Searching For A Former Clarity era, entitled “Total Clarity”.

Since 1997 Against Me! has played over 2,000 shows worldwide, not only having played in every state in the U.S., but traveling world-wide to Japan, New Zealand, Australia, Iceland, Ireland, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Spain, Italy, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark, Hungary, Croatia, Poland, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Lithuania. They have toured with a wide range of bands including The Foo Fighters, Green Day, The Pogues, Jimmy Eat World, NOFX, Lucero, Ted Leo & The Pharmacists, Mastodon, Matt & Kim, Cursive, Rise Against, The Bouncing Souls, Hot Water Music, Billy Talent, Silversun Pickups, Alkaline Trio, The Blood Brothers, Social Distortion, Japanther, The Grabass Charlestons, and Sage Francis.  In addition, they have made multiple appearances at festivals such as Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza, The Warped Tour, Reading & Leeds, Pukkelpop and many more.

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Sloan was one of the most successful Canadian bands of the ’90s, which was both a blessing and a curse. While they were well known in their homeland, where their Beatlesque power pop became a radio staple, they had a difficult time breaking into the American market, especially after their label, DGC, decided not to market their hooky pop in the wake of grunge. After spending several years fighting the label, and nearly breaking up, Sloan re-emerged in 1996 with One Chord to Another, a record that became an instant success in Canada and a critical sensation in the U.S. upon its American release in 1997, establishing the group as one of the leaders of the new wave of power pop groups in the late ’90s.

Andrew Scott (drums), Chris Murphy (bass, vocals), Patrick Pentland (guitar, vocals), and Jay Ferguson (guitar, vocals) formed Sloan in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, in 1991. Ferguson and Murphy had previously played in the local band Kearney Lake Rd., a group inspired by underground American bands like R.E.M. and the Minutemen. Scott and Pentland also played in various local bands, but the group didn’t come together until Murphy and Scott met each other while studying at the Nova Scotia School of Art and Design. The group debuted in the spring of 1991, and within a few months, their feedback-laden live shows had gained a sizable audience. By the end of the year, their first recording, “Underwhelmed,” appeared on the local Halifax compilation Hear & Now. Early in 1992, they released the Peppermint EP on their own Murderecords, and by the summer, they had signed with DGC. Sloan’s debut album, Smeared, a record where Sonic Youth met Beatlesque pop, appeared in October in Canada and in January 1993 in America, and it was greeted with positive reviews. While the band had a gold album in Canada, the good press didn’t translate to sales in the U.S., even as the group supported the Lemonheads and fIREHOSE at several concerts. Nevertheless, the domestic success of Smeared sparked a brief period of interest in “the Halifax scene,” with groups like Eric’s Trip, Thrush Hermit, the Hardship Post, and Jale all benefiting from the exposure.

For their second album, 1994′s Twice Removed, Sloan simplified their sound considerably, concentrating on melodic, hook-laden power pop. DGC wanted the album to be noisier, yet the band won its fight to keep it bright and melodic. Nevertheless, DGC failed to promote the album upon its release, especially in America, even in the wake of good reviews and strong Canadian sales. The band toured relentlessly to support Twice Removed; the record was named “The Best Canadian Album of All Time” in a poll by Chart! magazine, and Spin called it one of the “Best Albums You Didn’t Hear This Year,” but DGC was not giving the band much support. By the end of the year, the group decided to cancel their remaining shows in the new year and decide whether they wanted to pursue a career.

Sloan re-emerged in the summer of 1995, playing a handful of concerts and releasing a single, “Same Old Flame,” on Murderecords. During their hiatus, the members pursued various side projects, with Scott forming the Maker’s Mark and playing in the Sadies, while Murphy drummed for the Super Friendz; Pentland wrote a handful of songs, and Ferguson worked at Murderecords and managed the Inbreds, as well as co-producing a record by the Local Rabbits. Toward late summer, Sloan decided they wanted to continue as a band, and that winter they recorded One Chord to Another, a record that expanded the power pop approach of Twice Removed on a small budget. Although its origins were modest, the album was a huge Canadian hit upon its June 1996 release.

After much negotiation, Sloan signed with the fledgling EMI subsidiary Enclave in early 1997, and One Chord to Another was finally released in the U.S. in the spring of 1997 to overwhelmingly positive reviews. Navy Blues followed a year later. A double live album, 4 Nights at the Palais Royale was released by Murderecords in 1999, as was a new studio effort, Between the Bridges. Pretty Together arrived in 2001, followed by Action Pact in 2003. The career retrospective A Sides Win: Singles 1992-2005 was released in the spring of 2005. The following year, Sloan released their eighth full-length record, the self-recorded Never Hear the End of It — which featured songs from all four members — on Murderecords in Canada, while Yep Roc issued it in the U.S.

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Superhumanoids make dreamy pop that shouts summery ‘60s harmonies, garage rock’s raw tonality, slick new-wave electronics, and the adventurous dissonance of ‘90s indie rock. Originally the solo bedroom project of Cameron Parkins, the LA band quickly evolved into a multifaceted quintet featuring Sarah Chernoff (vocals and keys), Max St. John (bass, vocals, and programming) and Evan Weinerman (percussion).

Parkins began the project as an escape from the music of his past, revivalist rock and folk, intending to experiment in electronics that fused an interest in pop music, new technology, and lush orchestration. A crash-course in electronic music history, keen knowledge of vintage synthesizers and drum machines, and a DIY home studio left Parkins with a new musical palette to nourish. Early demos reflected a keen pop sensibility and child-like wonder for the sounds and textures these machines could create.

Soon after these early ventures, Parkins met Chernoff, a university-trained jazz vocalist who quickly gelled with the tones, melodies, and progressions put forth in Parkins’ productions. St. John, a longtime friend of Chernoff’s and a musician-producer in his own right, heard their recordings and began collaborating with the two, adding a sense for R & B’s smoother textures to Parkins’ more angular designs. Weinerman, a close friend of the trio, rounded out the troupe with his background in orchestral percussion, forging a uniquely symbiotic relationship with the rigid, mechanized drum machine.

?After some months spent honing their live show and songwriting as a unit,Superhumanoids entered the studio and recorded their debut EP Urgency,released in July 2010 on artist-operated label Hit City USA. The EP received acclaim from myriad sources—The Guardian, The FADER, LA Weekly, Popmatters, and others praised it’s unconventional yet accessible sound.

The band made waves at CMJ with their boundary-pushing live set, fluidly mixing organic textures with electronic elements. Later that fall, the band toured the UK with LA brethren Local Natives, rounding out a year of excellent shows with an array of amazing independent artists—Delorean, Surfer Blood,Broken Social Scene, School of Seven Bells, Liars, Beach Fossils and more.

2011 is off to an even stronger start—the band’s second EP, Parasite Paradise, is set for release right before SXSW. After descending upon Austin, the band will tour with Cults, Magic Kids, and Royal Bangs on two separate tours that cross the greater United States. In May, LA-based label Black Iris (Best Coast, Fool’s Gold) will release a 7” containing two brand new tracks. Following the release, Superhumanoids is poised to tour straight through the summer, eventually landing in the studio this coming fall to record their debut full length album.

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Hot Snakes formed in 1999 as a bi-coastal collaboration of down stroke enthusiasts. John Reis of Rocket From The Crypt, Drive Like Jehu and other punk atrocities along with Jason Kourkounis (aka J. Sinclair of Mule and Delta 72) convened in San Diego for a whirlwind session that gave birth to the Hot Snakes dark white sound. Once this skeleton had been erected, Rick Froeberg (aka Rick Farr aka Le Fork of Drive Like Jehu and Pitchfork) joined the duo as vocalist. John added the dubious sounds of broken organs and keyboards to elevate the mix to the desired height, solidifying the sinister chemistry. The results are documented on the band’s acclaimed debut Automatic Midnight.

After it’s completion the trio was hungry to expand into a breathing creation that could be seen on display in cities across the country. Enter Gar Wood (aka Dner of luminaries Beehive and the Barracudas) on low end. “It’s alive!!”, proclaimed the Swami. After East Coast and West Coast tours (the band finds the coasts to be weirder) it was back home to simmer.

A year or so passed and the Hot Snakes were ready to regroup, but this time as an initiated foursome. Rick picked up his guitar, Gar brought his bass (although he barely touched it) and Magi organ, Jason borrowed yet another drum kit and John showed up with a fresh guitar arsenal. The band found solace in a condo in Imperial Beach, CA preferring the stiff reflections of drywall as opposed to the tame acoustics of modern day recording studios. It was here that they recorded the much-anticipated second album Suicide Invoice.

Best described as a blasting wall of maudlin soaked punk, Suicide Invoice contains the true voice of the Hot Snakes. Their chemistry now a congealed flan- like murk, with Rick’s guitar work and Gar’s organ, bass and hi-tech sensibilities a new addition for these recordings. Still present is the enormous boom and the violent DSPM (down stroke per minute) levels, but now the compacted aftershocks are swung like an army of baseball bats. The guitars tug o’ war and sometimes decide to gang up in order to give your ears a mean rousting. The deep end beckons with a sinister pulse that drowns the listener in studded, velvet robes. Rick’s vocals, still full of his trademark howl, take a turn towards a smoother rasp that burns more evenly than before. Jason’s trap kit teeters between thud and SCUD and keeps it loose like a pack of bombs. Swami John, just recovering from Swami John Surgery, has new tendons and ligaments in his arms and wrists to abuse with insistent veloci-wailing. Gar’s demanding presence is punctuated by frying your speakers. Together, they hammer out a 13 story phallus to appease the punk gods.

The band promises to tour parts of the earth if the money is right and to never break up forever until the end of time.

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“He was all over the stage, driving the crowd into a frenzy, grinding sounds from his guitar with the back of his hand, the ceiling beams, the mic stand. His extended solos were soul-dripping, finger-flailing explosions that he looked like he could have done in his sleep.”
- Todd Hamm, Seattle Weekly

While standing behind a kick drum armed with a guitar and all kinds of attitude, Jordan Cook a.k.a. ReignWolf instantly captivates the crowd with his howling vocals, ferocious riffs, and raw energy.

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Erik Koskinen grew up in the heart of the middle of nowhere .. northern Michigan. Playing solo and band shows since age 14. Both in the country and in the town erik has formed his own brand of American music based heavily on and for, quite simply “people”. Koskinen’s musical pursuits have prompted him to load up his old pickup truck and relocate to various American musical meccas, including Nashville, New York, and California finally to find his way to Minneapolis, Minnesota. Making it his home as a producer, recording engineer, sideman with Dead Man Winter and Molly Maher but most of all as his own band leader and songwriter playing over one hundred and fifty shows a year. Erik’s band has been a mainstay at Nye’s Polonaise Room (best bar in America, Esquire Magazine) for the past five years and continues to build a scene out of the establishment alongside Molly Maher and Her Disbelievers as her band leader. Erik has producing and engineering credits with The Waifs, Molly Maher, Trampled by Turtles(Billboard Bluegrass #1 for the album Palamino), Dead Man Winter, Teague Alexy, The Hobo Nephews of Uncle Frank, Ray B and The Reverberation, and many more. When Erik isn’t fronting his own shows he is out on the road with Molly Maher, Randy Weeks and Dead Man Winter, always trying to establish an honest music scene that seems to have lost it’s footing in recent years.

Erik has opened for Pieta Brown, The Texas Tornados, Hank III, Jimmie Vaughan, Trampled by Turtles, John Hiatt, Al Kooper, Ray Bonneville, Randy Weeks, The Pines, Kevin Russell (of the Gourds), The Grass Roots, The Devil Makes 3, Richie Havens, Spider John Koerner and more….

Erik has played with Lucinda Williams, Al Kooper, The Waifs, Trampled by Turtles, Tom Rush, Randy Weeks, The Pines, Will Sexton, Ray Bonneville, Ramsey Midwood, Dead Man Winter, Charlie Parr and more ….

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“Portland, Oregon’s Marius Libman, otherwise known as Copy, combines dense harmonies with snap-tight digital beats to create an emotionally affecting style that doesn’t neglect the dance floor. Meshing the sounds of classic synth pop with electro, disco, 8 bit video-game soundtracks and hip hop, an instantly familiar yet unique sound emerges from each song Copy produces.

Complimenting the two full length albums released on Audio Dregs (2006’s Mobius Beard and 2007’s Hair Guitar) Copy has remixed numerous artists including Ratatat, Hey Willpower, Truckasauras and Panther, in addition to his notorious bootleg remix CDR’s The Diva Mixtape Vol. 1 and Bone-Thugs-N-Copy.”

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“Those Darlins come off like the toughest, most dangerous group around. They deliver thrilling song after thrilling song that’ll have you hyping them to all your rock & roll friends as soon the album stops spinning.” – ALL MUSIC GUIDE

“Hooky, saucy, punky songwriting in a mood somewhere between Be Your Own Pet and the Donnas, only savvier. Those Darlins have mouths on them, yes they do. But their mouths are connected to their hearts and minds, and amped by loud guitars” – ROBERT CHRISTGAU A-, NPR’s ALL THING CONSIDERED

“My favorite band right now is Those Darlins, who have a really cool garage-country vibe. They’re doing something totally out-of-the-box.” – Bethany Cosentino of Best Coast in Rolling Stone’s Best of Rock

“an instant garage/power-pop classic that would make everyone from Iggy Pop to King Tuff proud.” – PASTE: 8.5 out of 10

2012 is shaping up to be the biggest year for Those Darlins yet. Having just returned from their first European tour, the band is now recording a new album with acclaimed producer Scott Litt (REM, Nirvana, Patti Smith) before heading out for Summer fun fun fun on the road with Best Coast.

Expect new music this fall and enjoy their videos for their current singles “Be Your Bro” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiyXjv1aaf8) and “Screws Get Loose” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0tzfzN0MyhU&feature=relmfu) to get a taste of what Those Darlins are all about.

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One part Rolling Thunder Revue, one part banged-and-bruised balladeering, two parts just plain strange, These United States have their sights set on a rock-and-roll reformation. Taking their cues as much from Walt Whitman as from Wilco, Jesse Elliott and co. walk the thin line between the coffeehouse and the roadhouse, spinning something fiercely, unapologetically positive out of the sinking reality of an empire gone Titanic.

After releasing 2 albums and playing 200 shows in 2008, the DC-Kentucky- psych-folk-lit-pop rockers are rumbling surely towards the next benchmarks in a long string of critical acclaim, including several Best of 2008 mentions for Crimes and A Picture of the Three of Us…, and features on NPR’s “All Things Considered,” Paste, Filter, Village Voice, Brooklyn Vegan,Daytrotter, My Old Kentucky Blog, The Onion, Jambase, KEXP, WOXY, and KCRW.

Press Quotes:
“It is, without being at all overly enthusiastic, one of the best records you will hear this year, and it will make you feel completely human.” – DAYTROTTER

“A beautiful collection of understated, orchestral roots rock that will enrapture both NPR and Pitchfork devotees.” – ALTERNATIVE PRESS
” A bevy of images, all delivered with the same gentle intensity… small melodic bits pull and push the listener’s attention, moving continuously under layered melodies and a wash of words. – NPR

“The production is spot-on and few albums in recent memory put a candle to the lyricism present here.” – KEXP

“It is easily one of the grooviest efforts of 2008. Even though it sounds like it was made in 1968.” – WIRED

“Labyrinthine and grandiose… the 12-song cycle coils around itself in tales that rage and lull in turns. An impressive achievement… a rousing communal affair befitting it’s epic and twisted ambition” – PASTE MAGAZINE

“It’s a phenomenal record..this is almost as much of a supergroup as the New Pornographers or Broken Social Scene. And even though they might not have a fraction of those bands’ fame, to judge solely on Saturday’s performance, they’ve already started playing with a level of energy that suggests that nobody bothered to tell them.” – YOU AIN’T NO PICASSO

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Hi, we’re Cheap Girls. We’re a rock band from Lansing, Michigan.

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The Portland music scene is nothing more than a gigantic pool of artistic incest. Collaborations are happening all over town, and with increasing frequency.

And it makes sense. Now that there are fewer restraints on when and where and how we create, record, and perform our art, it’s only a matter of time before the idea of having a “band” collapses into a lawless orgy of cross-genre fornication. Some would argue that the process is already well underway.

Stay Calm is the new project featuring Claudia Meza (formerly of Explode Into Colors), Zac Pennington (Parenthetical Girls, Xiu Xiu), and Joe Kelly (formerly of Panther and 31 Knots). Given the diversity of their backgrounds, it’s hard to predict where the band is headed (Claudia admits they’re “still trying trying to figure out where everyone’s musical interests/aesthetics converge”). But one thing is clear: with this much expert musicianship crammed into one place, it’s kinda hard to go wrong.

A couple winters back, when we brought Explode Into Colors to a cabin in the woods, Claudia made sure that her new friend Zac came along for the trip. One of the tracks we shot was a duet they performed; a cover of a Ramones song.

We had no idea that more than a year later, we’d be shooting the two performing again, although this time in a completely different context, and with a completely different allocation of their talents.

We were there to catch the beginnings of Stay Calm, but there was a lengthy chunk of time in between our two snapshots of their progress. We got in touch with Claudia to help us out with the rest of the trajectory.. She tells the story much better than we ever could.

My collaboration with Zac came out of our friendship and the Ramones song, “I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend.” Before I really knew him and was simply just charmed by his presence, I asked him to work on a cover for an Explode Into Colors show playing with The Raincoats. That was back in early October of 2009. It was a really exciting show for me since The Raincoats have been one of my favorite bands since my teens and I had it in my head that something special had to be done.

No one else in EIC seemed to share my sentiments, so I emailed Zac to see if he wanted to learn a Ramones cover I had reworked, and play it with me as a dedication to the Raincoats. I think we had just become Facebook friends so somehow it seemed totally appropriate for me to call on him with this random request. He was very gracious and not creeped out in the slightest (which, thinking about it now should have been a warning sign). He learned the song in a couple of hours and ended up writing this really great keyboard part for it.

Joe Kelly is the other non-Zac and non-Claudia member in Stay Calm. He used to play in Panther and in 31 Knots. The space we practice in is Joe’s woodworking shop. In addition to drum shredding, he is an amazing furniture maker. He is also a proud owner of a black Vanagon with a license plate reading, “FAGX.” Nope, he is not an undercover gay superhero, nor is he a gay guy with straight-edge leanings.

Anyhow, the show landed on Zac’s birthday, and strangely enough Panther opened up that show so Joe was also there. I’ve since taken that as a sign. After that, I kept springing the Ramones cover on Zac at other EIC shows, even when he begged me not to. But since my band had like 8 songs total I really had no choice when we were called back for an encore. We had nothing to share but awkward smiles, and I could clearly see Zac’s curls bobbing in the audience.

Our practices are very goal-oriented, but only because we are all adults with many, many commitments. We do jam, though. It’s really hard not to, and I think I would go a little crazy if there was no noodling around. Zac is notorious for saying he does not jam and has no use for it, but I’ve seen him get down. Heavy jam sessions with that guy – a real jazzbo.

Zac is also surprisingly humble about his musicianship. He toots his own horn pretty much all day regarding his internet trolling skills and massive water intake (like gallons a day) but he’s oddly shy about the fact that he can pick up almost anything and make it sound good. (Zac could not be reached for comment – Ed.)

It’s taken us quite some time to bring it all together since Zac is in two other bands and I’ve also been busy with other projects. It also took us a while to find Joe even though he had contacted me to share his interest in jamming literally the day after the news broke out that I had left EIC. I think I was still mourning the loss of that band and had filed away his email under “too soon.”

It’s not a particular concern of mine to distance myself from my past projects, but I am concerned with personal growth and development in my general music-making. Having said that, I do feel like this track is the most reminiscent of my previous band. And I think it’s because I made the guitar riff and intro beat while I was in that band. I have a lot of other riffs, beats, and general ideas from that project that I’m looking forward to fleshing out in Stay Calm.

I’m not sure what the songs we are writing really sound like. I think we are just doing what we do. I do know that because of Zac’s involvement, this band has a lot more harmony and melody than my previous projects. The way I personally work out songs is beats first, and I’m not a particularly good or versatile drummer, or even slightly accomplished at sequencing at this point. The real influence or direction of this band is Joe’s drumming, Zac’s patience and melodic leanings, and my one too many opinions.

Starting a new band with people whose musical output you’ve always admired is really exciting and also super weird too. It’s sort of like starting to date someone but you know almost everything about them, and whenever they go somewhere with something, you just think, “Of course you went there, that’s so you!” And then you kind of feel like an ass for thinking that. But we are still trying trying to figure out where everyone’s musical interests/aesthetics converge. And since I had the most available and ready-to-use riffage we are going with a lot of my immediate ideas, but I’m not sure how strict of an epigraph our first songs are going to be for our following material. Maybe we’ll go electro speed metal? I have a much-ignored distortion pedal that I keep trying to work in that keeps getting snubbed by the dudes.

We have our first show this coming Wednesday, July 27th at Holocene. I’m pretty stoked on the show because my good friend Mike McGonigal curated the entire evening and it’s a benefit for the IPRC which is a super cool independent publishing resource in town. There are some pretty great bands playing that night as well, including Pierced Arrows. Those are some heroes of mine, so not bad company for our first show.

Also, I just wanna play a fucking show already.

-Claudia Meza

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What started as a noise letter to a friend in 1995, Tenlons Fort has become a four album song cycle of musician, writer, director, artist and human rights activist Jack Gibson. The latest release Shelters LP consists of ten songs, an equal number of paintings, and a fund to raise money for homeless individuals in LA, Austin, and beyond. 50% of record sales of Shelters LP serve as the initial donations to Tenlons Fort Shelters Fund.

After years of following the melancholic muse resulting in the first three releases The Golden Handshake, Followed By Bad Luck and Forever is a Long Time, Tenlons Fort replaces the meditations of death and doom, with tales of wisdom, patience, and clarity without leaving the emotional territory that has made him an underground favorite since 2005.

Shelters LP is out March 3 at the record release show planned for Los Angeles that night at Los Angeles’ Synchronicity Space with Will Courtney (Brothers and Sisters), Downtown/Union and Manhattan Murder Mystery.

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The Hundred In The Hands have emerged from their dimly-lit New York studio with a self-produced meditation on separation and reunion, love nearly lost and the long night back to it; a chronicle of late-hour pining awash in digital glow.

Red Night arrives in the form of an after-light transmission from a faraway source, leading the listener deep into the city’s thrum. Following the release of their self-titled debut in 2010, Eleanore and Jason traversed the globe with the rambunctious electronic pop of that album before returning home to begin work on their next chapter.

“There was an idea, non-literal, about tuning into an almost supernatural plane, a space in the static between radio stations or the echo of tunnels or on lower bands where you begin to see something else moving”. This is a city growing and unwinding, where sounds and memories delay against one another tracing themselves, devolving and reconstructing. Time stretches, tempos drop, guitars plunge several octaves rumbling and throbbing out against denser and denser vocals. It’s an abstract, yet considered approach very different from their debut. Drawing from the cloudy digital ether of contemporary electronic and hip-hop production and New York City’s long lineage of avant-garde dance music, Red Night is a rare sonic bridge between aesthetic encampments. From shadowy minimal techno to the more linear approach of classic songwriters, the DNA of these songs is indistinguishable from the finished works, such is the vitality and mystery at the core of the songs…and these are Songs first and foremost. Though they may be wrapped in brilliantly abstracted production, the calls of loneliness and hopeful abandon are what anchor everything to a startlingly human heartbeat.

“From the start there was a darkness that was coming out both lyrically and sonically, the songs were all heartbreak and fear of losing something special, trying to find that better light. It seemed there was this gloom in the air and I’m not sure we knew what to make of it. On the last record we were very much crate-digging and putting together all our favorite reference points, but this time we kind of disappeared into our own headspace and weren’t listening to much. We tried to be more personal and honest knowing we wanted to make an album that felt like a unified whole, less like a collection of singles. When we began, we just didn’t know what that meant exactly.”

What it would eventually mean was that their music would explore many previously uninhabited spaces. Empty Stations and Recognise begin the album draped in Space Echo and lilting harmonics, deftly balancing low-end heft and delicate emotional melody. Red Night and Faded marry seamless songwriting with encompassing dropped guitars, sampled bells and overlapped processed vocals contrasting goth-Rn’B monster Stay The Night and the dense analog house-gaze of Tunnels. First single Keep It Low is a grinding jam that foregrounds the sounds of timeless Industrial and Krautrock tracks, whilst maintaining an undeniably affecting vocal performance from Eleanore. The emphasis throughout is on the overarching feeling, the thread that unites the entire album…

“The grime and grit of the textures, it’s like all the shit you deal with day to day, in big and small ways, the deep tunnels of dirt and filth that run beneath, taking that trash and turning into something that can transcend itself, rise higher and maybe become beautiful.”

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Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $15 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Founded in Reno’s DIY scene and currently transmitting from Portland, metaphysically-minded quintet SWAHILI have quickly emerged as one of the Northwest’s most exciting experimental rock bands of late.  The band’s sound is founded in the marriage of pulsing synth rhythms and deep, throbbing drum sounds which find melodic expression in angular, atmospheric vocals and luminous guitar washes masterfully aimed at making contact with the unseen realms.

“Cavernous, quasi-tribal processionals featuring heavy tom-tom tattooing and reverbed female vocals prevail in Portland quintet Swahili’s cathartic sound.” – The Stranger

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four freebirds high on life/doing the things we wanna do/we’ll get as high as we fucking please/fuck it

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M. William Helfrich, better known as the Portland, Oregon-based mbilly, a folk-pop songwriter with a knack for crafting time-proven melodies with aged wisdom, will celebrate the release of his sophomore full-length, malheur (self-released), nationally on June 5, 2012.

A collection of eleven songs recorded over ten days in the summer at Type Foundry with engineer/producer Adam Selzer, malheur was written in the months following the death of one of his best friends growing up. The album takes its name—French for misfortune—from the county in Eastern Oregon where he grew up.

“He and I were in a band together in high school and every aspect of my musical life began with him,” mbilly says of his friend that passed. “We began playing shows together, writing songs, and recording; all of it was done for the first time with him.” In a fitting coincidence, the album’s June 5th release date would have been his friend’s 32nd birthday.

He continues, “We weren’t close at the time of his death, but it brought out a lot of feelings and questions that I hadn’t anticipated and couldn’t easily articulate. I have a similar ambivalence towards Eastern Oregon, where I grew up. It’s very much part of who I am and I am anchored by it in an unidentifiable way, but I also felt very disconnected from it and at odds with it.”

Attempting to address the parallels between his friend and his hometown, the songs mbilly wrote became an album of open-ended questions.

“I didn’t attempt to answer them,” he says. “In past songs I’ve written I’ve tried to resolve them with an answer of some kind. The nature of the questions asked in these songs is such that there are no simple answers, nothing neat in the way things are wrapped up.”

Another thing new for mbilly, who recorded his debut full-length, Mister Nobody Baby, at four different studios over the course of three years, is the structure in which this record was made. Spending plenty of time on pre-production with Selzer, mbilly knew exactly what he wanted to do with the songs when he went into the studio.

“I knew from the beginning that I wanted all the percussion on the album to come from old analog rhythm machines, so I started using them as I was writing the songs. I love the way they sound rigid and stiff, but at the same time organic and rich.”

His thought behind the drum machines, one of the many decisions they made ahead of going into the studio, was that they would create a nice, static foundation for the songs in contrast to the fairly loose instruments on the record.

The result is an album that shines with its late-night starkness and airy, less-is-more instrumentation choices; however, that is not to say the instrumentation feels short, because the full-sounding compositions compliment the space beautifully.

The Portland Mercury has written that, “… he has a voice that flexes and ripples like Jack LaLanne’s pectorals – classic and classy, despite the nakedness,” while The Oregonian wrote, “… a sly sense of humor and a potent darkness,” about his previous album. The same rings true with malheur, as does Willamette Week’s quote that, “…songs that contain both a plainspoken charm and a knack for communicating some deeper truth,” a style that will instantly have you recognizing mbilly.

malheur may have been conceived from the idea of death and memory, but the forward-thinking album doesn’t dwell in the past. It questions what really makes us who we are as adults and if we can ever really understand their influence. It’s simplicity, yet depth, will stun those that pay attention; meanwhile, the well-crafted melodies and spacious songwriting will have you mesmerized by every note.

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Here We Rest: The first motto of Jason Isbell’s home state got changed in the early part of last century to a Latin phrase that translates to “we dare defend our rights”. What starts out as peaceful idyll descends into a defensive posture with the threat of bellicosity just beneath the surface. That’s what tough times will do to a people. Jason Isbell’s home is northern Alabama, a region that has been hit especially hard in the recent economic downturn. “The mood here has darkened considerably,” says Jason. “There is a real culture around Muscle Shoals, Florence and Sheffield of family, of people taking care of their own. When people lose their ability to do that, their sense of self dissolves. It has a devastating effect on personal relationships, and mine were not immune.”

The characters that populate Here We Rest are wrung out. In “Alabama Pines”, the protagonist has found himself on the outside of the life he once knew. He is living in a small room and in a state of emotional disrepair – estranged from the woman that he loved, as well as friends (“I don’t even need a name anymore/When no one calls it out, it kinda vanishes away”). He is beginning to recognize that his own remoteness and obstinacy has played a large part in his current state of affairs, and longs for “someone to take him home through those Alabama pines.” He’s not quite clear how to get back there himself.

Place plays a prominent role in the songs on Here We Rest. Jason was home considerably more this year, having toured less in 2010. After being on the road for 200 or more days for more years than he cares to count, he stayed home mostly to write and record this album. “I could probably live anywhere, but I love it here,” says Jason. “Being home is very different than being on the road. You learn a certain discipline that has its entire context within the touring lifestyle. This was the first time that I’ve been an adult in my own house, in my own community. Plus on the road, you have your whiskey waiting for you when you get to the gig. Here you have to go get it.”

Spending all that time around his hometown, he could reacquaint himself with the locale and immerse himself with the rhythms of life in northern Alabama. “Being able to sit on my stool at D.P.’s, a bar in the building I live in, talk to my friends, and hear the problems that they have helped inform some of these songs.” Sometimes, people in that bar grow tired of hearing others bitch when they themselves were on the edge, and it would sometimes lead to fights. “Save It For Sunday” grew out of one of those experiences. A bar patron, unsure of the solidity of his relationship, tells his fellow bar patron that “we got cares of our own,” and suggesting that the he save his sorrows for his “choir and everyone” at his church.

Our military draws disproportionately from areas that are economically depressed, and northern Alabama has more than its share of those that have served, not only out of a deep sense of patriotism, but also because of shrinking employment options. In “Tour Of Duty,” Jason writes of a soldier that is coming home from war for the last time, and will try, more than likely in vain, to assimilate back into civilian life. His soldier is voracious for normalcy. He admits to not knowing or caring how his loved one has changed and dreams of eating chicken wings and starting a family. But there’s a subtle sense that this craving for normalcy will cause him to suppress the damage done to him during wartime: “I promise not to bore you with my stories/I promise not to scare you with my tears/I never would exaggerate the glory/I’ll seem so satisfied here.” Seeming satisfied is not being satisfied, but it’s the best he can imagine.

The time off from the road also had an effect on the musical sensibilities that shaped this album. Jason was able to collaborate with more artists (he played on the latest albums by Justin Townes Earle, Middle Brother, Abby Owens and Coy Bowles), which broadened his ideas about how he could present his own music. “I always felt like certain things, like my guitar playing, had to be perfect, and when I was in the studio environment, I could make sure that it was. But looking back, it might have robbed the music of a certain amount of spontaneity.

There’s more out and out rock and roll guitar on this album.” In addition, Jason embraces a more acoustic, more traditional country music sound to a degree that he had been reluctant to in the past. “When you come from Alabama, that country soul music is in the water. I’ve always loved it and been proud of it, but there’s always been this sense of proving that you were capable of more than just that. If I was going to create an album that gave listeners a sense of the place, I felt it was important to let the songs go there if they wanted to.”

The time at home has also had an effect on the lyrical point of view of the album. Because of the subject material of the album, Jason wrote from a more empathetic point of view than ever before. “I tried more than ever to get out from behind my own eyes and see things through others’ eyes,” he says. In “We’ve Met,” Jason puts himself in the place of a person that was left behind in their hometown and, with a tinge of bitterness, remembers the one who went away better than they are remembered (Jason says, “I’m quite sure that I’ve been the person that didn’t remember before, and I hate it”).

As with the last album, the 400 Unit shines. Keyboard player Derry deBorja, guitarist Browan Lollar, bassist Jimbo Hart and drummer Chad Gamble play with either the ferocity or subtlety that the songs call for. Having played over four hundred shows together as a band have given Jason and the guys an innate sense of one another; they are gelling into a truly great band. The original state motto was written by Alexander Beaufort Meek, a former Alabama attorney general, in his 1842 essay outlining the history of the state. The last lines of that history say: “We have shown the condition and character of our population; the Red Sea of trials and suffering through which they had to pass; the fragile bark that floated in triumph through the perils of the tide….From such rude and troublous beginnings, the present population of Alabama, acquired the right to say, ‘Here we rest!’” The times are indeed rude and troublous again in Alabama, and Jason Isbell’s inspired album offers both documentation and the same fervent hope that his people will find their rest.

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The People’s Temple was formed in 2007 by two sets of brothers: Alex Szegedy (guitar/vocals) and George Szegedy (drums) and Spencer Young (bass/vocals) and William Young (guitar/vocals).

The Lansing, Michigan band met while growing up in Perry – a small town 20 minutes outside of Lansing. While still in high school the brothers became influenced by ’60s psych, folk, and shoegaze, which show in the band’s reverberated sound. The band started playing gigs in the Lansing area in 2008 and has since developed a reputation of performing wild stage shows, with ample guitar feedback.

The band has 7-inch EPs on Certified PR Records, Milk-n-Herpes Records and HoZac Records. Their debut LP, “Sons of Stone” was released in Mayl 2011 on HoZac Records. Also a 7″ on Goodbye Boozy appeared in late 2011. The band is working on a new studio album for 2012.

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Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $13 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

It started with an elementary school marimba band. What followed was a high school career absorbing Coltrane and Scott-Heron, a degree in Ethnic Studies, a marimba duet with an Ewe drummer, and a stint immersed in Buenos Aires’ burgeoning Digital Cumbia scene. This is the path that has lead now-Portland-based musician Joshua Fulfs to where Palmas begins.

Weaving dense African and Latin percussion and warbling synthesizers into dance-demanding beats all filtered through an unwavering pop ethos, Palmas is a discussion is counterpoint. Club ready production is pulled from organic and roughly hewn casts, electric guitars blend effortlessly into walls of samples and joyful melodies mask jaded lyrics about vacuous romances, wasted youth, and aimless summer nights. All this leads Palmas to find a different answer to the all too hashed-over question of where “world music” and “pop music” intersect.

“The rhythm is as sexy as they come, a shimmying groove that feels feather light. It never really touches ground. It just bounces and sways and teases. You’re already in deep by the time Fulfs’ vocals kick in. His is a hazy, processed melody that adds a little heft to the proceedings but never weighs it down.”
- Willamette Week (http://bit.ly/vWoJRY)

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In less than two years, this enigmatic 21-year old house producer from Montreal has given the current musical landscape progressively deeper ideas of what house music can mean in the new decade. With a slew of remixes and original releases that haven’t skipped a beat, the talented songwriter has already collaborated with Katy B, Radiohead, and Jimmy Edgar.

As new artists compete with each other so brutally for attention these days. Jacques simply toured. Playing top European venues such as Fabric Live, Plastic People, Panoramabar and major festivals like Sonar, MUTEK, the Bloc Weekender and Bozar Electronic Weekender, he steadily conquered each crowd with his undeniably potent songs and infectious demeanor. With “Another Girl”, all the hype came to him. Tearing down the gate with two EPs on LuckyMe and Nightslugs, and nothing short of an anthem on the latter’s Allstars compilation, he grew as the best artists do. With quality releases and unforgettable live shows.

As the initial disbelief at how young he was, his love of heart aching RnB, his mysterious appearance, and who/what he uses to record begins to sink further and further back into the pages of Google, the initial hype will be followed by better and better music.

Limited run white labels, a jaw-dropping analog live show, and the launch of his own imprint Vase Records will further establish his vision. This plan was a long time coming.

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Sun Angle is a three piece tropical psychedelic punk band who use phasing and polyrhythm to create a frantically energetic musical vibe.

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“Their raucous set was like if the Velvet Underground had turned to the MC5 at their Boston Tea Party concert in 1968 and, instead of insulting them, had turned and made love to them—and that was how Lou Reed wound up wearing that dog collar. I couldn’t make out a single lyric, but did they really close the set with “Little Honda?”
-Dan Collins, Editor, LA RECORD

Swirling, distorted psych, bulldozed along by pounding primitive drums, fuzzed out vocals, all glued together with a heavy spaced out guitar drone. If that ain’t the ingredients for record of the month my name is Prince Bloody William. Imagine if you will the best of THEE OH SEES jamming deep with MOON DUO, with the aid of some sort of retro type drug that only Brace Belden knows the name of and you would almost be right on the money. Heavy, without losing one single hook, repetitive without being the least bit boring and shamelessly stepped in the glory years of acid rock without being a boring regurgitating hipster. Be warned, this record will give you a contact high.
(Cosmonauts-S/T LP Review)
- Sean Dougan, Maximum Rock N Roll #337

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ABOUT

The Pynnacles are a garage psych band from Portland, OR carrying on the tradition of psychedelic, garage rock from the 1960′s. Members of The Pynnacles have been in the following projects ranging from everything to Grunge, New Wave, Surf and rock.

They are currently working on their debut album to be out fall 2012.

Just a taste of other Bands members have been in and are currently in:

Crackerbash

Full Lengths and EP on Empty Records

Singles on Sub Pop, Simple Machines, Imp and more

Satan’s Pilgrim’s

Full Lengths Empty Records, Estrus Records, Musick Records Singles on Dionysus, K, Kill Rock Stars

The Chimps

Musick

Paradise

Luvvers Club

Sweet Heat

Kill Rock Stars

The Countdown

Full Lengths and EP on Invisible Records Bigelf Full Length Third Hole Records The Exies Full Length on Ultimatum Music

The Lords of Altamont

Full length on U.S. Gearhead Records/ Eur. Fargo Records

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Strategy has been a mainstay of the west coast electronic music free-for-all for over ten years, operating in a wide range of styles. Widely recognized as a longtime originator and motivator in Portland’s electronic music community, his immediate, raw sound and appetite for experimentation distinguish him from passing fads and genres-of-the-moment. He operates the Community Library label and is currently recording for labels such as 100% Silk, Endless Flight, Kranky, and Peak Oil.

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Quasi was formed in Portland OR in ’93 by Sam Coomes & Janet Weiss. Their first album was self released in ’95. They released three albums between ’97 & ’99 on Up Records. They moved to Touch & Go Records in ’01 & released three albums with them, & additionally T&G reissued the first album. The band moved over to the Kill Rock Stars label in ’09. Quasi albums are licensed by Domino Records in Europe & PVine Records in Japan. Throughout this time they have also toured &/or recorded either individually or collectively with SleaterKinney, Elliott Smith, Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks, Built to Spill, Bright Eyes, Heatmiser, the Go Betweens, Pink Mountain, Blues Goblins, The Takeovers, Jandek, numerous other less recognizable names. Prior to Quasi, SC was in the San Francisco band Donner Party (c.’83’88) & both SC & JW were in the Portland power trio Motorgoat (c.’90’92). Joanna Bolme (Jicks, The Minders, Calamity Jane) joined the band in c.’06. JW & JB are still members of Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks. SC runs the online branch of Exiled Records. Quasi is still in the new, gentrified Portland.

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Naytronix is an evil dance band cloned from the stem cells of multi-instrumentalist/producer Nate Brenner. His songwriting style is deeply rooted in the traditions of the future, which few alive today know anything about. And while the compositions are geared towards the sinister post-apocalyptic dance colonies that are on the verge of sprouting up around the world, an undeniably timeless funk is woven into the Naytronix hit machine. Fashionable grooves merge with found sounds and homemade instruments to unsettling yet familiar effect, as humans play side-by-side with robots, intertwining in a nefarious tango until you don’t know where veins ends and circuitry begins. Rumor has it Nate Brenner himself is half robot. The parties of the 23rd century never end. The world is bathed in the continuous dirty glow of evil summer twilight, and bands of 300 or more pick up anything they can hit and gather to play the music of Naytronix. This is pure speculation.

Brenner has been called, “The Bootsy Collins of Oakland, California,” where he currently resides. He is a native of the synthetic desert cities of William Onyeabor, the vanguard estates of Charles Mingus, and the family manor of Sly Stone. As the bassist for genre-bending institutions tUnE-yArDs and Beep!, he is not a stranger to voyaging across his great many homelands and spinning platinum out of the resources he trades along the way. Naytronix is the confluence of these worlds as well as of the virtues of the past and the dark exuberance lurking in the future. Brenner conducts the show with the exactitude of a subtle supervillain. Let the evil dance party begin.

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Named one of the “Best New Seattle Bands” by Seattle Magazine, Lemolo is a dream-pop duo comprised of Poulsbo natives Meagan Grandall and Kendra Cox.  The girls became instant friends as kayaking instructors on the waters off of Lemolo Shore Drive, where they learned of their shared love for music and adventure.  It didn’t take long for them to begin performing together and making their mark in the Seattle music community, creating what Seattle Weekly calls the “most promising expansions on the pretty sounds that have dominated the local zeitgeist.”  The energy these two produce live is a “force to be reckoned with,” according to Three Imaginary Girls, and Sound on the Sound adds that Lemolo leaves the listener “aching for more.”  Along with receiving generous reviews for their lives shows, the duo has toured with The Head and the Heart, performed at Bumbershoot and the Dave Matthews Band Caravan Festivals, performed on KEXP 90.3 FM and sold out their upcoming album release show in only eleven hours.  Lemolo will be releasing their anticipated debut album, The Kaleidoscope, on July third, and they look forward to what lies ahead.

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Portland’s premier party punks The Mean Jeans return with their long-awaited follow up to 2009′s Are You Serious! This is a different album, though, more mid-tempo catchier, and poppier (but less “pop punk” if you know what we mean) than their debut. In addition to the standard 3 piece instrumentation, On Mars also features, at various times, acoustic guitar (!), keyboards (!), drum machines (!), empty Jaeger bottles (!) and boxes of macaroni (!) played as extra percussion. Oh and it also features the debut of new member Jr. Jeans on bass! (Howie Doodat is busy tearing up Portland in the Suicide Notes!) This is a fantastic, exhilarating summertime pop album, so down a couple of jaegy bombs and get ready to moonwalk into the unknown with the Mean Jeans!

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Evian christ is 22 year old Joshua Leary.

Press Quotes:

“The most exciting new artist of the year.” The Fader

“The producer’s mixture of distorted hip hop samples, ambient tones and melancholic atmospherics sparked discussion far beyond the usual circuit of left field observers.” Clash

“There is no one new producer I am more excited about as we go into 2012 than Evian Christ.” – Dummy

“This is an arresting debut that will probably end up marking a particular point in time.” FACT

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On April 10 Thirty Tigers/RED will release Trampled by Turtles’ highly anticipated album Stars and Satellites. The band’s 2010 release Palomino (Thirty Tigers) garnered critical acclaim from NPR Music who praised both the band’s “impeccable dexterity” and “charm and melody to the songs.” AOL Spinner called the record “hard-charging music…infectiously raucous,” while Paste Magazine admired the band’s “punk ethos” as well as “virtuosity and energy” while naming the band as one of the Top 25 Live Acts of 2011. The band will support the new album with a North American tour this spring.

Since forming in Duluth, Minnesota in 2003, Trampled by Turtles always felt they were able to attain an energy on stage that can’t be found in the studio. They were so comfortable playing on the road that they treated their previous albums’ recording processes like tours. For Stars and Satellites, however, Trampled by Turtles didn’t want to simply try to recreate a live show. “We wanted to make a record that breathes,” explains Dave Simonett (guitar/vocals), “musically we wanted to step out of our comfort zone.” “This record is all about going inward,” Erik Berry (mandolin, vocals) adds, “building a focused bond as players and friends, and bringing a different mindset to the sounds Trampled by Turtles can make.” With the help of engineer Tom Herbers (Low, Jayhawks) the band moved into “Soleil Pines,” a log home outside of Duluth, to record. “You know how sometimes they say ‘less is more,’” notes Berry, “that’s what Stars and Satellites is about. “

Trampled by Turtles is Dave Simonett, Tim Saxhaug (bass, vocals), Dave Carroll (banjo, vocals), Erik Berry and Ryan Young (fiddle). Within the contained music scene of Duluth, the members of the band did their own time in punk and rock bands, brandishing their electricity proudly before switching to acoustic instruments. While they never set out to be a “bluegrass” band, Trampled by Turtles employs many of the same traditional techniques of the genre, but their differences in influences, attitude and attack make for their unique sound.

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I have a little window I peer out of at my house in Rohnert Park where I sit at night and write things down that have come to me throughout the day. Most of the stuff has to do with people, how we treat each other, and our ever increasing ability to hurt one another, as well as unconditionally love. It’s always amazed me, the contrast in which we move and work. While writing “Zoo,” I was confronted with the problem of confining humans, in that – I didn’t want to harp on the fact that we’re killing ourselves, and each other all the time, or fall into the habit of writing things that seemed too pessimistic about our current state – something punk and hardcore bands have pursued many times over. We all have a cluster of emotions in us that are always there, and articulating those many sides was my main dilemma. I think the music reflects that. There are songs on the record that sound fast, slow, eerie, full, or abrupt, each one different, but at the same time very similar. This is what reviewers call “comprehensive.” I suppose this record is our first sort of comprehensive sounding record, in that – each song binds to one another better than we’ve done in the past. The title “Zoo,” comes from the idea that we’re all living in a world that has been heavily structured for us, by us, which feels strange because no other civilization has been so extensive in furthering comfort, entertainment, schedule, and basic living. The problem being – with existing here on earth comes suffering, suffering that often sneaks up on us as bewilderment, and with that suffering brings people who try to relate the state we’re in, in order to soften the blows. “Zoo” isn’t a concept record, or any attempt at changing people’s minds, or exacting the world’s problems, it’s just a pursuit in trying to understand what it means to be a human living in a world that sometimes seems too full of everything, because it is – it’s full of us, an extremely complicated people, and we’re doing all we can to live in harmony, free from whatever it is that closes us in, bars us, and cages the joy of being here. – Ross Farrar 5:52 PM

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Getting to Where We Belong: The Making of Passion Pit’s Gossamer

“Hideaway”

Hundreds of hipsters, college kids and music biz schmoozers gather under a massive white tent to see Passion Pit. It is an afternoon shindig hosted by the blog Brooklyn Vegan, at the 2009 South by Southwest festival. The sun is setting and it is a classic make-it-or-break-it moment for Passion Pit, who is headlining despite having just released a lone EP, Chunk of Change. The crowd is giddy on both free Izze fruit soda and the Boston band’s bubbly pop. Between songs, frontman Michael Angelakos runs his fingers and sweat through his thick, curly, Greek hair. He starts to rant—about a shirt he bought for his new girlfriend, about veganism, about inane blog comments. After a few awkward minutes, the music kicks back in. By the end of the performance, Michael is rolling on a red Persian rug amongst many, many keyboard and effects pedal cables, clutching his microphone, wailing in his signature helium falsetto. The audience cheers, the Tweeters tweet, the bloggers blog ecstatically.

Michael leaves the stage and begins crying. He has made it, and he has broken.

When the festival ends, the rest of the Passion Pit guys van back to Massachusetts. Michael stays behind in Texas. He calls a friend for support and begs her to come be with him. In a panic, he buys her a plane ticket. It is for the wrong year, 2010. He calls his parents in Buffalo, New York. “I’m going to a hospital,” he tells them.

Michael is standing with his father outside a hospital in Houston, looking at mock-ups of album artwork on his cellphone. Passion Pit has just signed to Columbia Records, and a debut album, Manners, is due in a couple months. The record cover is green and messy and murky. Michael is not crazy about it, but there is no time, as the hospital is about to take his phone away from him. “It looks fine, Michael,” his dad says. “Just go.”

In the hospital, Michael is not allowed to talk about work. “Up there, onstage, you’re alone, darling, ” a nurse tells him. “And if your life evolves into ruin, everyone will watch what you’re doing.” Michael thinks these would make good lyrics. His friends smuggle in positive reviews of Manners. When one magazine blesses the record with an 8 out of ten, he almost cries again.

“I’ll Be Alright”

This first sentence was not always the first. Originally, I was going to start with a simile: Michael Angelakos’ brain is like a shaken can of spray paint with no nozzle. Millions of particles of bright ideas bounce around in there. When inspiration punctures his head, art sprays out. Often, someone else must puncture the can, or smash it. Only, if you hold Michael’s bursting skull up to a canvas, you would not get a cloudy splatter of dripping bits. The paint would land perfectly in a detailed map of the knotty Tokyo subway system.

You can hear this “I’ll Be Alright,” the second song on Gossamer, in which a sudden seizure of skittering programmed drums swarms over diced synths. “My brain is racing and I feel like I’ll explode!” Michael sings amidst the orchestral glitch. He compares it to the sensation you feel after an orgasm.

Writing about creativity is like architecturing about dance. When I sat down to describe Michael’s thought process, a can of paint formed in my mind for whatever reason. After that, I thought no nozzle, because I like the alliteration. Then I tacked on a subject and verb. I start with a phrase, an image or a rhythm of words and construct around it. I’m not a beginning-to-end sentence builder. Michael asked me to write this piece because he intuited, correctly, that my writing is akin to his song crafting.

A spark of a Passion Pit song might be found in the fuzz of a guitar pedal. It might be a stumbled-upon drum loop, the tintinnabulation of layered chimes or some gibberish harmony he’s humming. It might be one of the 200 scratch melodies Michael has stored on his iPhone. Later, Michael might sit at a keyboard and work out a melody. “I do things backwards,” he admits, “and I’m a maximalist.” Indeed. The songs on Gossamer carry anywhere from 60 to 200 instrumental tracks, according to Michael. If you ask Alex Aldi, Michael’s engineer, the number 80 to 120. (The maximum output on their version of ProTools is 120 tracks.) Whatever, it’s a fuckton. But it’s important to talk to Alex.

“Constant Conversations”

When Alex and Michael set forth to record Gossamer in January of 2011, the two first rented a studio near the Manhattan Bridge in Brooklyn’s DUMBO neighborhood. Well, it was technically an office space. The new Passion Pit headquarters shared the building with digital media start-ups, dot.coms, that sort of thing, which were not appreciative of gut-rumbling bass bumps rattling the uninsulated walls.

“We’d blast these huge R. Kelly–like booms,” Michael says. “There would be fists pounding the walls,” Alex remembers.

The duo began working from 6PM to 6AM, partly to avoid pissing off the neighbors, partly because Michael is “really OCD about who’s hearing me” In the wee hours, Michael would toil at his array of keyboards, sequencers and computers.

The fruit of this first stage is the stunning slow jam “Constant Conversations.” It’s the kind of stank-faced, flesh-slapping R&B groove that makes a name like “Passion Pit” sound positively filthy. That is, until you pay attention to the lyrics. They are not nocturnal; they are dark. “I’m drunker than before / They told me drinking doesn’t make me nice,” Michael sings. “Well, you’re standing in the kitchen and you’re pouring out my drink.”

It’s important to pay attention to the lyrics.

“Slip-ups in this town are like a sentence to life.” –“Mirrored Sea” What makes Southern California’s orange sherbet sunsets so gorgeous? It’s the life-strangling smog. Toxic clouds can sometimes lead to beauty.

In June of 2011, Michael headed to L.A. to continue work on Gossamer with a variety of big name producers. One producer would bring in pretty girls to sit on a couch in the studio. He would play back tracks at top volume. If the girls got up and danced, it was a hit.

Michael slept in another studio beneath the control room, where he could hear some dude fucking people’s brains out all night. The walls were marble.

Michael slept where Fiona Apple once slept. Michael recorded in a fancy house outside of which photographers snapped model in lingerie. Michael worked with a prominent hip-hop producer. They tinkered with “Hideaway,” an upbeat tune set to a speech a nurse once gave him. Michael played the hip-hop producer his demo. “You don’t need anyone to produce you,” the producer humbly admitted. Michael flew back to Brooklyn, ending what he now calls his “June gloom.”

“Everyone let’s me make these mistakes,” Michael says.

“Carried Away”

“He plays music so loud in his headphones, I can hear everything he’s doing. When he’s working, he won’t get up to use the bathroom or to take a sip of water. Watching him is watching someone in their element, someone doing what they were born to do. But it can be a waiting game for him to get an idea. Then, bam, ninety minutes later there’s this amazing finished song. He does stuff on the fly. Michael thrives on that, the immediate pressure. Everyone else game-plans. The game-plan is in Michael’s head and he’s twenty steps ahead. Conveying that is difficult. It’s information overload.’” — engineer Alex Aldi

“It’s Not My Fault, I’m Happy”

Aside from the sarcastic “Love Is Greed,” all the songs on Gossamer are one-hundred-percent true. I know this because I’ve compared the lyric sheet to a 3,672 word life story Michael emailed me. It begins, “A main talking point seems to be about the fact that there is a dichotomy in my music.” It ends with, “The next day I quit drinking.” I read it one evening while listening to “It’s Not My Fault I’m Happy” repeatedly as tears welled in my eyes.

Unlike some songwriters, Michael does not write in character. He compares the album to a collection of John Cheever stories. “It’s non-fiction, but dramatized. It’s euphoric pain,” he tells me.

The record is more intimate than that. Listening and reading along, I feel as if I am reading his chart. I am eavesdropping. I am putting him inside one of the TSA’s full-body millimeter wave scanners.

Ah, I think, “Take A Walk” must be about his father and his father’s father, his Papou, who sold old roses and owned a candy kitchen, using his savings to bring his village to America.

Hearing the celestas and xylophones skittering about the opening of “Love Is Greed,” I envision bolts of blue electricity flashing across Michael’s grey matter. The systolic, panicked pulse of “Mirrored Sea” is awash in adrenaline and amphetamine salts. The pomp and silver twinkle of “On My Way” is confetti for a forthcoming wedding.

“Are you sure you want to be this

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L.A.-based producer Nosaj Thing (Jason Chung) is a sound innovator. He’s a sweet kid with a sinister musical agenda. His electronic soundscapes and wild beat tectonics play like vignettes that affect the listener’s mind as deeply as he hits their soul. Without a doubt, Nosaj Thing is among L.A.’s finest musical modulators.

Jason’s early work came awkwardly but not at all haphazardly. At age 13, he took his first computer from his father, an archaic PC that struggled even with word documents. In the hands of Nosaj Thing, it became an Intel Celeron home studio. With a “donated” copy of Reason, a demo version of Ableton Live and a computer mouse (he couldn’t afford a MIDIcontroller), Nosaj Thing began making music. He built his first productions note for note on the electronic staff of his Frankenstein studio. When your focus is strong, all you really need is a machine that works.

In high school, Jason picked up a day job at a local music store, focusing his efforts on the arduous task of saving up for his first Mac. But Destiny had become fond of Nosaj Thing’s resolve. In a contest, Jason won a favored producer tool: his own honest copy of Logic Pro. Wild circumstances? Perhaps. But he’s still using it, winning beat battles, remix contests, gigging and DJing within his network of like-minded musical vigilantes. Now 23, Nosaj Thing creates nothing less than the sound mastery of beat driven, experimental electronics from a gifted noise constructor.

Nosaj Thing has been featured as an artist-to-watch in magazines like Fader, XLR8R, The New Yorker, and Nylon, and as one of Urb Magazine’s Next 1000 artists. He’s remixed Flying Lotus, Daedelus, Elliot Lipp, and Health, won Turntable Lab/Plastic Little’s remix contest featuring MF Doom, and won L.A.’s prestigious Project Blowed beat battle. He has shared the stage with the likes of DJ AM, Architecture in Helsinki, DJ Krush, Z-Trip, Flying Lotus, Free the Robots, Diplo, The Glitch Mob, and Daedelus. He has received regular airplay on BBC Radio One and Los Angeles’ KCRW, and is a staple and a crowd pleaser at L.A.’s underground hip-hop good time, Low End Theory. Comparisons run along with Ratatat, DJ Shadow, and Aphex Twin. A survey of his own record collection will turn up pieces from Boards of Canada, Stereolab, Radiohead, Daft Punk and Eric Satie.With his first full-length in the works, be prepared to hear a lot more noise from Nosaj Thing.

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Old 97′s – A biography

Since the Old 97′s roared out of Dallas more than fifteen years ago, they have blazed a trail through alt-country and power-pop, led by the piercingly observant lyrics of lead singer Rhett Miller. Each new Old 97′s record is hotly anticipated, and rightfully so: “Blame It On Gravity,” from 2008, contained some of the band’s most deeply felt and passionately played songs. But in a career full of high-water marks, “The Grand Theatre Volume 1″ is perhaps the most ambitious and accomplished set of recordings yet.

The album, the band’s eighth, began to come together last year, when Miller was on a solo tour of Europe with Steve Earle. “When I started in this band, I wrote on the road constantly,” Miller says. “But I was 23 then, so everything was new to me. Over the years, those strange and wonderful things have begun to feel more commonplace. On the familiar highways, in familiar hotels, it’s pretty easy to turn into a zombie. But on this tour, I was in England and Ireland and Scandinavia, places where I haven’t spent very much time in, and because of that things seemed somehow fresh. I felt recharged. In these old British theaters, you sit around in ancient dressing rooms filled with these objects that could only be in these ancient dressing rooms. It was all very inspiring instead of tiring.”

The result was a set of songs rooted in specific locations. “The title track, which I wrote in Leeds, is like a series of postcards that try to capture the moment of falling in love; it begins in the Grand Theatre, which is a historic venue there, on the elevator. There’s another song, ‘Every Night Is Friday Night (Without You),’ that I wrote, or at least started to write, while I was walking around in Soho. And a song like ‘The Dance Class’ wouldn’t have happened if I wasn’t in Birmingham, trapped in a hotel, looking out at streets that were bleak and gray except for a dance studio across the way. I imagined an agoraphobic who sees a beautiful girl in that studio and fantasizes about being freed by her.” Miller’s portraits of love and loneliness are paired with some of the sharpest music the band has ever produced, from the propulsive celebration of “Every Night Is Friday Night (Without You)” to the manic (and almost panicked) energy of “The Dance Class.” There are also moving counterpoints, such as the album’s closer, “The Beauty Marks,” a stark, hushed ballad about a love affair in a London pub.

Even the songs written on this side of the Atlantic benefit from the same sense of charged observation. “There’s an anthem on there, ‘A State of Texas,’ that I wrote in New York,” Miller says, “and it’s specifically about not quite being home: the lyrics says ‘I’m living in a state of Texas’, not the state of Texas’.’

When Miller had his songs, he brought them to the rest of the band, and as usual, the Old 97s — the bassist Murry Hammond, the guitarist Ken Bethea, and the drummer Philip Peeples — rose to the challenge and then some. “I’ve been through this process many times — bringing my songs to the guys as we start to make a record — and I know they’re going to do something great with them. I’m still surprised to hear what they do, but I’m no longer surprised to be surprised. But there are so many fantastic things on this record, from a band standpoint. Murry’s basslines stray so far from the one-four alt-country style that he’s known for. They’re things that he might have played in our previous band, Sleepy Heroes, eighteen years ago, but he hasn’t, for the most part, done it on Old 97′s records.”

The set was produced by Salim Nourallah, who also produced “Blame It On Gravity,” and once again it was an all-Texas affair. The band rehearsed the album in Dallas, at Sons of Hermann Hall, and recorded it — mostly live in the studio, with a minimum of overdubs — in Austin’s legendary Treefort studio. The richness and diversity of the album has led Miller to liken the record to the Clash’s legendary “London Calling,” a comparison he says is only half-flippant. “We had a running joke in the studio. Salim would say ‘Hey — that was great. Now try to do it more like the Clash.’ We aren’t the Clash, obviously, but that kind of direction does bring out some of the best parts of our band’s sound, that aggressive live rock-and-roll thing. There’s also a question of artistic freedom, and what ‘London Calling’ meant to them at that point in their career. After the first albums, they had a little bit of leeway to do something more grandiose. We’re in a similar place in our career. We’ve gotten critical approval, for what it’s worth. We have the loyalty of our fans. Now, we can do something bigger and weirder.”

Much of that weirdness comes from the band. “I come in with my songs,” Miller says, “but I really pride myself on being able to change on a dime when we’re in the studio. Someone might suggest doing a song faster, or slower, or with a train beat. I’ll try it, and then I’ll listen to it new. It’s a great process, because a song that was floundering can be the best song once it goes through that process. When I first wrote ‘Every Night Is Friday Night,’ it was a more traditional party song, and it wasn’t completely successful. I was singing, or thought I was singing, ‘Every night is Friday night with you.” But then Ken, who is the last person to even notice lyrics much less suggest a lyrical change, said that he had originally heard it as ‘Every night is Friday night without you.’ He wondered if it might be better that way, less predictable, and it was.”

One song that depended upon predictability was “Champaign Illinois,” which is a straightforward rewrite of old composition — and not one of the band’s own. It fits a set of new Miller lyrics to Bob Dylan’s epochal “Desolation Row,” and the experience of putting the song on the record was, even for hardened rock-and-roll veterans, an eye- opener. “I had written this song while I was listening to the Dylan song, obviously,” Miller says. “But I assumed we’d never be able to record it. Then, while we were making the record, we decided to go for it.” Phone calls were made, and more phone calls after that, and word finally came back that Dylan, who had heard a live version of the song, wanted to read the lyrics. “To hear my manager say, even in a flat business voice, ‘Bob Dylan likes what he heard and wants to read your lyrics,’ well, that was something you dream about,” Miller says. “It turned out that he liked our version so much that he wanted to split the publishing 50/50 with us. So that’s how I ended up writing a song with Bob Dylan. I’ve never been prouder, and I assume he feels the same.”

Though Miller is frequently funny and self-deprecating, the “Volume 1″ of the title is not a joke. “I came back from the trip with more than two dozen songs,” Miller says. “I kept thinking we would whittle the set down, but it became obvious that none of the songs were falling by the wayside.” That meant, for the first time in the band’s career, that the Old 97s would record a double album. “But how do you really have a double album in today’s climate?” says Miller. “I mean, think about how records are distributed and consumed.” The solution was not a traditional double album (as it would have been in the seventies or eighties) or two albums released simultaneously (as it would have been in the nineties), but rather a pair of thematically linked records released six months apart: “The Grand Theatre Volume 2″ is due out in May 2011.

The same themes — place and displacement, communication and correspondence — power the second volume as well. “If anything, they’re a little more explicit on the there,” Miller says. “But that idea, that songs come from somewhere, is strong on both halves of the record. It’s funny, because when I’m on stage and I feel myself drifting away, I bring myself back to the moment of writing the song. With the Grand Theatre songs, I was much more compulsive about marking down exactly where I was when the idea came to me. I think that makes for a unified studio record, and it definitely makes for a more focused set of performances onstage.” American audiences will have a chance to experience the band’s focus through the fall: the Old 97s are touring behind “The Grand Theatre Volume One” from December until next April, at which time the touring for “The Grand Theatre Volume Two” will begin.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $13 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Purity Ring is a Halifax/Montreal-based duo comprised of Corin Roddick and Megan James. Their debut album Shrines will be released on July 24th. Purity Ring make lullabies for the club, drawing equally from airy 90s R&B, lush dream pop, and the powerful, bone-rattling immediacy of modern hip hop. Megan’s remarkable voice is at once ecstatic and ethereal, soaring joyfully through Corin’s carefully chopped beats, trembling synths, and skewed vocal samples.

Despite the band’s young age (Corin is 21, Megan 24) and short gestation (they formed in late 2010), Purity Ring have delivered one of 2012’s most assured – and anticipated – debuts with Shrines. Indeed, Shrines feels like anything but a first record – its vocal hooks are inescapable, its lush production futuristic and sophisticated but also as pristine as anything on pop radio. The record’s 11 tracks trace a unique aesthetic universe that is carefully crafted and fully realised – deftly walking the lines between trap-rap exhilaration and otherworldly rapture, pleasurecentre pop and diaristic emotion, childlike dread and total self-possession. Purity Ring’s is a universe that invites exploration and demands revisiting.

Corin and Megan grew up in and around Edmonton, Alberta where they were an integral part of that city’s small, tight-knit all-ages DIY music community. They toured extensively together in the band Gobble Gobble (now Born Gold), with Corin on drums and Megan singing. In the midst of a six-month-long tour, Corin’s love of R&B and hip-hop grew, and he began experimenting with beat-making in Ableton Live. He asked Megan to lay down vocals on a song called “Ungirthed”, and Purity Ring was born. The song made its way online in January of 2011 to immediate international acclaim, and thus the two were suddenly faced with the daunting task of turning a studio project into a real band. To meet the challenge, Megan and Corin spent nearly six months conceiving of a live show that could do justice to the unique music they were recording.

It shows. Every element of Purity Ring’s live presence has been carefully considered – from the clothes they wear (all designed and handmade by expert stitcher Megan) to the tactile, hybrid musical instrument / lighting machine that Corin built himself. The resulting spectacle can’t be overstated; infectious vocal leads chopped and screwed improvisationally, synth leads and lighting triggered live with a drummer’s precision. Purity Ring’s performance is a lived synaesthesia that transcends the pitfalls often associated with live electronic-based music. Of course, perhaps the most exciting thing about Purity Ring is the overriding sense that these live performance innovations and their exceptional debut Shrines are merely the beginning of a collaboration whose remarkable chemistry is sure to bear much more to come – future pop, in every sense of the phrase.

Download Shrines album track, “Obedear” from www.purityringsongs.com

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $13 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Guantanamo Baywatch was started by Jason Powell and Chevelle Wiseman in Portland about 4 years ago to an immediately enthusiastic reception, released a very well received and now out-of-print LP on Portland’s awesome Hovercraft Records, as well as a couple of EP’s/tapes. The band really came into it’s own, though, in late 2010, with the addition of Chris Michael (also in BOOM!) on drums. Technically they joined the Dirtnap roster in June 2011, but they took their time recording their debut for the label, done mostly at home by the band themselves.

Chest Crawl sees the band working more vocal numbers into the mix, incorporating the usual surf/garage suspects (Cramps, Trashmen), more obscure 50′s rock n’ roll/RNB wildmen, as well as slightly heavier nods toward the young-oldies sound being popularized today by bands such as Hunx, Shannon And The Clams, Nobunny, etc.

Wildly popular here in Portland, and not afraid to tour, Guantanamo Baywatch are gonna be all over the place in 2012, starting with a 2 week tour with frequent bill-mates The Mean Jeans in March, followed by a solid summer of touring following the release of Chest Crawl.

Dirtnap doesn’t sign up local Portland bands very often (last one was Mean Jeans in late 2008!), so when we do, pay attention!

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Signed before even hearing 1 note and amidst broken limbs, APACHE bring forth their first diamond ­ BOOMTOWN GEMS. APACHE is just looking for a good time. Songs about Sugar Glidin¹ and White Hammer, the boys are here to PARTY! Recorded and Produced at Screaming Viking Studios with Matthew Johnson and APACHE. Mixed at New and Improved Recordings with Eli Crews. The albums sways and moves to the groove of that 70¹s glam/punk thing. One friend described them as NY Dolls meet the Ramones meet Kiss. CD VERSION IS DIFFERENT THAN THE LP VERSION. NOT ONLY IS IT MASTERED DIFFERENTLY, BUT THERE IS SOMETHING EXTRA ON THE CD!

Their first single on douchemaster is now sold out. Here¹s what they said about the boys: “If the Zeroes had been into The Quick but also quietly listened to a good bit of Alice Cooper, they would have likely sounded like this Apache 45.”

Featuring members of The Cuts, Parchman Farm, Ghenghis Khan and others…this band needs no introduction around these parts. Well…maybe just the SF/Bay Area. Apache is a band. 4 dudes. 1 guitar. 1 bass. 1 drummer. 1 singer. The songs are rock n’ roll club hits. One after the next, they hit you like a WHITE HAMMER. Described as Kiss meets the Ramones meets the New York Dolls. With elements of 70′s pop, glam rock, and stadium drums, Apache’s songs are like none before. Truly. The big guy sings falsetto, while the surfer bro behind the kit bangs out beats heavy enough to ride any wave. The guitar player is some sorta re-incarnation of Jimi Hendrix meeting Kurt Cobain in a dark club in NY. And the front man, leading the charge…we simply call him APACHE.

With a changing of the guard, comes El Paso native and childhood friend of the band, Mike Morales on Drums.

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Dorian Duvall is Onuinu. He’s been crafting electro pop in Portland, OR for the past few years where the music community has been watching and waiting for this,his first full length album Mirror Gazer. Up til now there’s been a release on an Ape Tapes compliation and a video for the catchy “Ice Palace” replete with kaleidoscopic, melted visuals – directed by Andrew Sloan (Tender Loving Empire).

Dorian, a multi-instrumentalist, wrote and produced the album. Jeremy Sherrer (the Gossip, Dandy Warhols, Hockey) co-produced, recorded/mixed the record and played drums.

Dorian calls the music Disco-Hop and is easy to cite influences like: Yellow Magic Orchestra, Michael Jackson, the Brainfeeder Crew and Stones Throw Records. The giant chorus of opening track Mirror Gazer, the 70’s shimmer of Happy Home, and the roller rink ready Always Awkward, point to his foundation in the disco, power pop and hip hop worlds.

“I was drawn more to guitar when I was a teenager listening to Hendrix and Jazz and then transitioned into more pop music Like the Beatles, Kinks, Zombies.”

“I didn’t really play in very many bands, I jammed with friends, attempted to start a few bands with friends and then decided to make music on my own – I did some early recordings with an acoustic guitar and a Casio. Then I bought my first sampler and synthesizer and with those I started making loops. The early influences with that stuff was all over the place from Eno, Bowie, Madlib, J dilla, Prince, and Jan Hammer.”

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Brainstorm is like an eight-dollar smoothie of ecstatic art rock, gospel spirituals, and African highlife. This high energy 2-piece manages to seam together a variety of influences into one coherent onslaught of shimmering pop, which will put a smile on your face and a tune in your head. Crushing riffs, explosive percussion, old world chanting, casio disco, and jaunty tuba lines make Brainstorm one of the most exhilarating and unique bands around.

Multi-instrumentalists Adam Baz and Patrick Phillips formed Brainstorm in the summer of 2008, when they were recording with Portland’s Ohioan and the Native Kin. They exchanged a mix tape, featuring such bands as USAisaMonster, Tinariwen, Ponytail, Sam Cooke, and Lightning Bolt, and quickly realized the extent of their musical compatibility. Now, two years into the project, their influences have synthesized into a fleshed-out brand of noise-pop that they can truly call their own.

Brainstorm released their first record Battling Giants on Lasercave in 2009. Received well by local press, the band toured throughout the following year. Their second release, a 7-inch EP called Beast in the Sky, was co-released on High Scores & Records and Lasercave in October 2010, and has been highly acclaimed by blogs, papers, and critics throughout the US and Europe.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $12 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

The Alialujah Choir is Adam Shearer and Alia Farah of Weinland, and Adam Selzer of Norfolk & Western and M. Ward.

Shearer, Selzer and Farah began writing and recording songs at Portland’s Type Foundry with no commercial ambitions. They simply wanted to take shelter from the chaos of touring and make music together. Ensconced by friendship and solitude, the trio’s shared sensibility to embrace their love for roots folk music has created a beautiful and compelling album.

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Omar Souleyman hails from the small town of Ras Al Ain, located in northeasten Syria near the Iraqi and Turkish borders, in a region called the Jazeera. It was there, in the mid-1990s, that he began his singing career at the age of 30. Omar was encouraged by friends after singing at a handful of weddings, and he soon began taking the new endeavor seriously, performing at local events backed by traditional instruments such as the ney, violin, hand percussion and saz.

In 1996, Omar approached a young local musician – Rizan Sa’ id – who had been performing on keyboards with local groups. Rizan, a talented multi-instrumentalist, began playing with Omar at a time when a new wave of dabke (the regional folkloric dance and party music) was emerging in the Levant. Armed with whatever Arabic-modified synthesizers could be had at the time, Rizan lent a distinctive and driving sound – incorporating Syrian, Iraqi, Kurdish and other Arabic styles, resulting in some of the most furious dabke sounds to be heard in the 1990s and 2000s.

Depending on what a wedding host could afford, Omar and Rizan would perform as a duo or occasionally as an embellished mini-ensemble featuring saz, percussion, ney and violin. Hamid Souleyman, a local saz and bozouk luminary, joined forces with Omar for several years until he relocated to Germany in 2002. Another local bozouk and saz player – the young Ali Shaker – began playing with Omar at that time.

Syria in the 1990s was fairly isolated from the rest of the world, without internet or cellular phones or a wealth of imported products from the West – a strikingly different country from what it is today. The extant cassette tape networks of the time moved slowly, but it wasn’t long before Omar’ s distinctive image, adorned with his trademark khaffiya and sunglasses, could be seen at nearly every cassette kiosk in the country. Ras Al Ain producer and label-owner Zuhir Maksi was first responsible for getting Omar’ s name to a dabke-loving population throughout Syria. Zuhir recorded and released countless early Omar recordings and was also one of the first people to whisper poetry and rhymes in Omar’ s ear while he sang. This would continue as Omar began working with revered local poets Mahmoud Harbi and Hassan Hamadi, among others.

This age old poet and singer relationship is a tradition in the region and often employs the poetry form called the ataba – a form of folk poetry still employed today. During a concert, the poet often stands very near to Souleyman, following him into the circle of dabke line-dancers, and whispering verses relevant to the event and the families that host it into Omar’ s ears. Acting as a conduit, Souleyman strides into the audience, vocalizing the prose in song before returning for the next verse.

Souleyman’ s first hit in Syria was Jani (1996), which gained cassette-kiosk infamy and brought him recognition throughout the country. Jani became popular via a live wedding concert tape as opposed to a studio recording, as sometimes happens with Syrian dabke tracks. Since that time, well over 500 cassette tapes have been issued – and more recently MP3 discs and VCDs. A large percentage of these cassettes feature long-form live recordings from weddings. The tapes often start and stop abruptly and contain one long medley that cuts on side A and resumes on side B, usually edited haphazardly throughout by its producer. The purpose of these cassette recordings are to keep a singer’s name alive and in demand for weddings and events.

Additionally, Omar and Rizan have produced several studio albums in Syria over the years. These have a different sound than the wedding cassettes – cleaner and more calculated – and have also yielded significant dabke hits. Khataba, for instance, was Omar’ s 2005 studio hit that put him on the pan-Arab map.

Over the years, Souleyman’ s popularity rose steadily among the dabke folk scene, and the group performed tirelessly throughout Syria and also accepted invitations to perform abroad in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Lebanon.

In 1998, Mark Gergis, a California-based musician, documentarian and frequent collaborator with the Sublime Frequencies label, first heard Omar Souleyman cassettes blaring from the cassette kiosks of Damascus and began collecting Omar tapes on subsequent visits to Syria. In 2006, he set out to meet Omar and thus began a friendship and partnership, leading to Omar’ s first western releases on the label and eventually, international tours.

In 2007, Sublime Frequencies released Highway to Hassake, the first compilation of his works to be issued in the West.

An excerpt from the liner notes to Highway to Hassake:

“Here, classical Arabic mawal-style vocalization gives way to high-octane Syrian Dabke (the regional folkloric dance and party music), Iraqi Choubi and a host of Arabic, Kurdish and Turkish styles, among others. This amalgamation is truly the sound of Northeastern Syria. The music often has an overdriven sound consisting of phase-shifted Arabic keyboard solos and frantic rhythms. At breakneck speeds, these shrill Syrian electronics play out like forbidden morse-code, but the moods swing from coarse and urgent to dirgy and contemplative in the rugged anthems that comprise Souleyman’s repertoire.

The collection was culled from cassettes recorded between 1995 and 2009 – and offered a rare glimpse into Syrian street-level folk-pop – a phenomenon seldom heard in the West, not previously deemed serious enough for export by the Syrians and rarely included on the import agenda of academic musical committees.”

The success of Highway to Hassake and the internet-video created for the album’s opening track, Leh Jani helped propel Souleyman and his group into their first Western tour in 2009 alongside label-mates Group Doueh (from the Western Sahara). This successful tour quickly elevated Souleyman to the status of an international legend – deservedly so.

Now several albums and western tours later, Omar Souleyman’ s legacy continues….

Mark Gergis – May, 2011

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Last we left this amplified tribe of two on 2005’s “Hypermagic Mountain”, Lightning Bolt were tossing thousand of years worth of musical history into a wood chipper and coming up with some chewy chainsaw taffy. This new missive, “Earthly Delights,” comes after two years of intensive electro-shock therapy driven recording. The doors of Lightning Bolt’s practice space literally spill forth giga-liters of sweat born of echo-stretched dedication to archaeology of understanding advanced musicology. Taking the lessons of extreme meta and blood-brother marrying them to expansive and explosive song form and applying it to Olympic training methods – “Earthly Delights” uses electric stimulus to shock smile technology to worldwide domes. This is what two thousand years of evolution and the invention of electric instrumentation introduced into the tank of hook force can do to you.

Fidelity and attention to tune smithery are total, so please, dear listener place your alabaster hand in mine and embark on a musical journey that will take you to places both divine and sublime. This record has the sound of a ten piece band with a much tighter pay scale, matched with the sonics of military cartoons. This record is truly the sound of the air show ablaze with the joy of a ground-bound fighter powerless to eject.

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The Men yes, “The,” are a four-piece post punk outfit from Brooklyn, NY. Their catalog, which began in 2008 with a hand-dubbed self-released demo cassette, has grown to include two LPs — We Are the Men and Immaculada — two more tapes, and a 7-inch. They have toured three times, played over 75 shows and have grown a following of die hard fans crowding into living rooms and basements throughout the five boroughs, desperately trying to see them. The buzz in their hometown has grown so fervent that the Village Voice debuted this album’s first single, “Bataille,” a full six months before the record was scheduled to street. Named for the famed French pornographic writer, the track review expounds, “rides a pug-ugly joy-punk riff into almost krautrock oblivion — complete with gorgeous voice cracks and face-mooshing distortion.”

Nick Chiericozzi, Mark Perro and Chris Hansell recorded this album at Python Patrol in 2010. Rich Samis joined the band shortly after and is now their full time drummer. Having three songwriters in the band allows them to pull from innumerable post punk sources, referencing drone, metal, shoegaze, and even Spaceman 3 lyrics on Leave Home. Recording to tape for the first time here, using elements of distortion, feedback, pop hooks, and a couple of beautifully destructive instrumental passages, The Men have been described by Mishka as, “more composers than musicians.” They have breathed new life into the genre of hardcore and created a seminal album that is truly for punks of all ages. Look for them on tour this summer.

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It’s impossible to understate what Flying Lotus has created with Cosmogramma, since there is so much to unpack: The effortless musical cohesion of the historical avant-garde and the next chapter of futurism. The conversation at the post-hip-hop crossroads of two urban music traditions, American and British, and at the center of one of the most vibrant sound scenes on the globe today: the beat-and-bass-heavy corner of Los Angeles (of which FlyLo’s Brainfeeder is a mainstay). The uncommonly natural musical communication between the physical world and the spiritual, one made personal and given a cohesive form. Even the funny smells, without the slightest whiff of self-importance.

Many artists strive for something grand and vast, but 26 year-old Steven Ellison actually brought it forth from his head and heart. To not dress it in the garb of the special does it a great disservice.

“It would have been so easy to just make a dubstep album,” says Ellison, a nod to the scene that has, since the 2008 release of his Warp debut, Los Angeles, lionized him as one of its progressive champions. (Take a listen to the bass communiqués spun each week on Mary Anne Hobbs’ BBC radio show to get a good sense of just how much pull Flying Lotus’ soulful sound has in that world.) Instead, he made Cosmogramma, a far-reaching kaleidoscope of sonic emotion, which Ellison calls “my most honest work, just true to what I wanted to say.” Not to say that dubstep headz won’t find themselves drooling all over it; just that it goes much deeper than that.

No longer simply an outgrowth of Ellison’s machines, the music here is also the product of live instrumentalists from the worlds that Cosmogramma engages. There’s the constant bass presence of Stephen “Thundercat” Bruner, a cornerstone of Sa-Ra Creative Partners and the Young Jazz Giants; there’s Rebekah Raff’s harp connecting the dots between the music of Harry Partch and Ghostface Killah (both of which she’s performed); there’s an appearance by the tenor sax of Steven’s cousin and jazz royalty, Ravi Coltrane, and by the voice of one Thom Yorke, an Oxford bloke taking respite from singing in the most influential rock band of the 21st century. There are also contributions from hip-hop string players, and Nintendo-influenced Austrian keyboardists—presumably just so that Flying Lotus would not have to invent them.

Because inventing himself from disparate parts was already work plenty.

Ellison’s heritage forecast how different approaches to creativity could form a singular whole. His grandmother, Marilyn Mcleod, wrote and produced popular songs for Motown (most famously, Diana Ross’ disco smash “Love Hangover”); while his aunt, the harpist/pianist Alice Coltrane (wife of saxophone colossus, John Coltrane), created legendary compositions that remain bedrocks of the jazz avant-garde, not to mention crucial fusions of Eastern and Western tonalities, incorporating spiritual themes into modern music.

“When I was younger, I didn’t really appreciate [their presence] as much,” Steven says. “This is my grandma and my aunt—that’s just how they work. But as I started developing my own thing and (getting) into the jazz thing, it was like, ‘wow!’ They never pressured me to make music. They were just super supportive of my creative endeavors, whatever they might be. They didn’t really get what I was doing, even my aunt. She didn’t really follow [hip-hop], but she knew deep down that I was meant to make music.” There is, in other words, a deeper reason why a reprise of FlyLo’s tribute to Coltrane, “Auntie’s Harp” (or, more specifically, a chunk of Raff’s remix), appears on Cosmogramma.

Throughout his Los Angeles-area youth, Ellison was living under twin musical spells: There was hip-hop, where Dr. Dre (“still my biggest influence…the first man to produce beats [with] melodies”) and Snoop’s Doggystyle were primary intoxicants, the Roland 505 drum machine his cousin gave him was the gateway, and the hundreds of beats Steven banged out by the time he was 14 were the result. Yet there was also the familial musical tradition, with Ellison learning piano chords from cousins and playing saxophone in a school band.

One other set of experiences contributed to Steven’s creativity since his youngest days: a continued exploration of lucid dreams and the spiritual plane.

“I must have been 16, 17 when I first had an out of body experience,” he says. “I woke up and I was floating, swimming around the room, looking back at myself. Ever since then, it’s been on! I’ve tried not to push [my beliefs] on the listener, but [these experiences] have played a part in my music. It’s very inspiring stuff. You try to unravel the mysteries of the universe in the music.” (The Cosmogram that contributes to the new album’s title is in fact, a figure of this world, created for meditational purposes and often signifying the wholeness of the universe. Mandalas are good examples of cosmograms.)

Steven’s initial creative pursuits were in film and he followed that love to San Francisco’s Academy of Art. There, an encounter with a fellow student, the artist who remains known only as Dr. Strangeloop, changed his perspective. “At the time, I wasn’t familiar with making music on computers, and he was doing that, as well as being a film-maker. He showed me how to do it, and that was it. After that, I started cutting classes to make beats.” (Dr. Strangeloop remains a primary audio-visual member of Brainfeeder.)

Ellison returned to a Los Angeles scene beginning to simmer with ingenuity. The sound there mixed underground hip-hop and soul, a jazz-like prerogative on improvisation and exploration, leaning towards progressive bass and electronic rhythms, and embracing a modern West Coast psychedelic mindset. It loosely united folks around shows at Little Temple (on Hollywood’s east side), the Dublab collective, and the futuristic fusions being cooked up on the labels Plug Research (who released Flying Lotus’ first track, “Two Bottom Blues,’ on it’s The Sound of LA comp, and later his debut album, 1983) and Stones Throw (where Ellison was an intern).

By the end of 2006, these disparate groups had their own clubhouse, the now-famous Low End Theory weekly at The Airliner. They were also fostering an atmosphere that not only helped give name to FlyLo’s 2008 album, but, four years later, is one of the globe’s musical hotbeds.

“LA is cool,” says Ellison. “It’s a nice little vibe here, supportive, very family-oriented, very inviting. When I grew up in the Valley, no one was doing any of the stuff I was doing, there was no guidance, no peers. [Whereas], the 18 year-old kid who can’t drink at Low End Theory, but is asking us how to do stuff, that’s the kid I am looking out for now. All the scenes blend [at LET], which is another cool thing about it. It’s not really bound by race or gender or a sound. If you play low, bass-y stuff, it goes off, no matter how fast or slow—electro, drum’n’bass, hip-hop, dubstep, house, it don’t matter.”

It’s an attitude that’s had global connotations too.

“I love the fact that now there are kids and musicians coming over from London to Low End Theory, and they are doing their biggest show ever there. And vice versa. When I first started, no one really cared. Now we’re doing Brainfeeder in London.”

The success of Los Angeles found Lotus’ self-described “surrealist hip-hop” fitting perfectly into Warp’s fusionary electronic legacy, and forecast soulful mutations for the international bass (so much more than just ‘dubstep’) scene. Kanye West and Radiohead commissioned remixes, and his world expanded. But in Ellison’s mind, “I always figured [that] when we do this third record, it’s going to have to be the shit. I always had in the back of my mind that I have to really venture within. “

I’ll let Ellison’s own words explain what happens next:

“In the midst of the shit, my mom dies last October [2008], right when I started to get into a groove of being inspired. It was unexpected, super sudden, super terrible and, you know, it changed my life. I learned a lot about myself through making this thing. I hope it comes across.

“The last year man for me it’s just fucking unbelievable, both good and bad. I don’t think you could ever truly comprehend it. I am working with Thom Yorke and then dealing with my mom’s death, and I have these crazy psychedelic experiences, and getting a little bit more famous in this whole music thing. So yeah, it was enough to inspire a new direction of music, joining with new people, look within and find my own understanding of life as I know it.”

To hear Ellison tell it, Cosmogramma was built on the ideal of deeper, shared musicality.

“The thing I noticed recently was the emphasis on technicality: people are just interested in how long we can program these snare drums, or how to m

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The growlers are a rock and pop group formed in long beach California in 2006 who are yet to became one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed bands in the history of popular music. During their years of stardom yet to come, the band consists of Brooks Nielson (vocals) Scott Montoya(bass guitar, vocals,), Matt Taylor(lead guitar, vocals) and Brian “don’t surf” Stewart (drums, vocals). They were managed by their own alter ego Epstein until his death in 2009. Although their initial musical style was rooted in 1960s rock and roll and skiffle, the group works with different musical genres, ranging from ice flossing hip hop to psychedelic rock. Their clothes, style and statements have made them trend-setters. While their growing social awareness saw their influence extend into the social and cultural revolutions. During the release of their first album and their ongoing singles releases, they have experimented with recording techniques that have the ability to bend sound in ways only drugs can. By now this “bent sound” has been perfected in their live act that some onlookers call “groovy” and or “sick”. The groovy unexcelled value in Lo fidelity sound is their stock and trade. They are the result of a combination of skilled modern engineering techniques and the very finest outdated recording and amplified equipment. The Growlers sound is best exemplified through Nielson’s cryptic lyrics and the relationship it has with matt Taylor. As if the two are each other’s half. Though they complete each other, they compel and challenge one another in ways only the frequent growler fan can truly understand. Perhaps it is what the growler fan feels while taking part in the drug wave of bent sound. -ALEX KNOST

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Who is this manic Master of Ceremonies who openly confesses to the two grand black bohemians said to be lunatic Sun Ra and George Clinton, and whose antics certainly remind us of a young Herman Sonny Blount and his Solar Arkestra?

King Khan & The Shrines have been spreading their love like peanut butter since 1999. A youngblood King Khan on his royal buddhistic journey decides to sow some wild oats in Germany, he finds true love and fulfills his life long dream of leading a super bad ass 10 piece soul inferno!!!!

“I didn’t just want the audience to have an aural orgasm… I wanted an EYEGASM too!!!” – King Khan.

The line-up includes 60 year-old Chicago-born, Ron Streeter (the live-percussionist of Curtis Mayfield, Stevie Wonder, and many other Soul-Legends), a horn section consisting of Simon Wojan (the mastermind behind Kranky Records recording artists Cloudland Canyon), Ben Ra (Germany’s John Coltrane), and famous French rockabilly saxophonist Big Fred Rollercoaster. The rhythm section of the Sensational Shrines has been called “a German/French version of the Freak Brothers”.

Their first album THREE HAIRS & YOU’RE MINE was produced by Liam Watson recorded in the legendary Toe Rag Studios in London, England and released in 2002. A second full-length, MR. SUPERNATURAL, followed in 2004. King Khan & the Shrines became an all-star international movement. Numerous gigs followed all across Europe with the Black Lips, Enon, Demolition Dollrods, Mr.Quintron & Ms. Pussycat, an after-party for 50 Cent in Norway. They headlined Toronto’s NXNE festival 2006 playing three nights in a row and even had a member of the Sun Ra Arkestra join their brass section….

In 2007 King Khan made the soundtrack and film score for “Schwarze Schafe” a major motion picture in Germany. The soundtrack included music from The Black Lips, The Spits, Gris Gris, Quintron and more.

In 2007, King Khan also released WHAT IS?! which received critical acclaim from all over the world, landing at #33 on Pitchfork’s Top Albums of 2007 while their track “Welfare Bread” landed at #66 on Pitchfork’s Top 100 Songs of 2007.

Now comes 2008 and for the first time ever this musical dynamite is widely available the U.S. of A. for the very first time. A greatest hits of his greatest hits, the cream of a very creamy crop – this is the Supreme Genius of King Khan and The Shrines at their absolutely very best. The entire 11-person psychedelic-soul big band revue will be raving up stages for the first time through North America the summer of 2008, leaving behind them a colorful spell of amazement and wonder.

THE HISTORY

King Khan is born in Montreal in 1977, being the son of immigrants from India. The Khan siblings (his majesty, Lil’ Brother Gumbo and Sister Cocobutter) inherit far more than mere musical talent: “My great grandfather was the Johnny Thunders of the sitar. He played but never recorded anything and became a serious opium addict. My father tried to play sitar but chose the fast life over that and wound up down and out and addicted to cocaine. My mother can play harp like Bob Dylan.”

The Khan parents’ house, Canada’s predominantly Christian influence, a vivid admiration of horror movies and the mother’s and grandmother’s affinity to the occult draw the first outlines of the disposition that will much later condense to a holistic utopia, enhanced by elementary encounters and events in between tarot shamanism and Brahmandom, in between native American mythology and hallucinogenic transcendence, in between string-theory and the metaphysics of Sun Ra. “You don´t have to be from Louisiana to practice voodoo, I learned much from my mother and grandmother. I began seriously practicing voodoo to fulfil my infinite sexual fantasies and when the mojo started working I figured “hey, why not put this to music?”

In 1995 Khan leaves the frosty soil of the Canadian province of Montreal playing the bass for the International-Underground-Legends THE SPACESHITS. The band is produced by Mike Mariconda with special guest appearances from the Fabulous Andy G (Devil Dogs) and Candy Del Mar (The Cramps). Khan founds the secret lodge of the KUKAMONGAS. The most important contacts of this period are Allen Ginsberg, Sophie Crumb, Billy Childish, Dickie Peterson and the defunct magician “The great Antonio”.

During the oncoming years Khan tours across the States. Detroit, New Orleans, New York City, LA, San Francisco, Dallas, Tijuana etc. He lives for a short while with the Mohawk-Indians in the Kahnawake reservation. “I learned lots about being a punk from my two best Mohawk friends Leborgne and Beserker. We used to get drunk, smash cars, go hunting for white women.”

Khan doesn’t return from the first Spaceshits-Europe-Tour in summer of 1999.

In Germany the Canadian founds the Soul-Big-Band THE SHRINES. The first line-up includes bass-player Volker Zander, who will eventually leave the band to join the US-Combo Calexico, and Ron Streeter, live-percussionist of Curtis Mayfield, Stevie Wonder, Al Jarreau and other Soul-Legends. The Shrine’s first concert in London is suspended by the police. The band escapes through the back-door. Numerous Gigs will follow all across Europe, among others with Bob Dylan, Neil Young and Beck.

After several short-players the Shrines record their first album in the Toe Rag Studio in London. THREE HAIRS & YOU’RE MINE is being produced by Liam Watson, producer of the White Stripes.

In 2003 Khan encounters the Hazelwood-producers-team Gordon “Two Horses” Friedrich and Wolfgang “Kaneoka One” Gottlieb (Sacharine Trust, Universal Congress Of, Mardi Gras bb., Kool Ade Acid Test, and others), who stage the second longplayer MR. SUPERNATURAL in the beginning of 2004, digging itself knee deep into the suds of the Seventies.

In 2007, King Khan’s inquires platonically WHAT IS?! and snatches the master question right out of the astonished community’s mouth. This album reaches at least one decade further back and decorates the garage with psychedelic iridescent wallpaper composed of uninhibited multi-colored dazzling sixties fragments. Between clashing, clanking Keith, Lou and Iggy flirtatious guitar psychodelica, the MAHARAJA OF SOUL unexpectedly mutates into the RAJA OF SONG and spits out fourteen manically affected unforgettables into the airwaves, singalongs like monoliths – stoic, bewitching, unmistakable.

Now comes 2008 and for the first time ever this musical dynamite is widely available the U.S. of A. for the very first time. A greatest hits of his greatest hits, the cream of a very creamy crop – this is King Khan and The Shrines at their absolutely very best. The entire 11-person psychedelic-soul big band revue will be raving up stages through North America in the summer of 2008, leaving behind them a colorful spell of amazement and wonder.

ESSAY BY JARED SWILLEY FROM THE BLACK LIPS

The first time I crossed paths with King Khan and the Shrines was on a cold foggy day in London. The gloomy weather was fitting as I’d lost my passport, money, and most of my personal effects at the previous night’s concert. My spirits were down and I was in desperate need of salvation. As I sat wallowing in sorrow outside of the club I suddenly felt a supernatural calling that drew me in like a rat following the Pied Piper. What followed was to this day one of the best shows I have ever witnessed. The scene inside was nothing short of insanity. Horns were blaring that could have taken down the walls of Jericho, the drums pounding a rhythm deep into my heart, guitars, bass and organ wailing and King Khan at the epicenter of it all commanding the stage like a soul-soaked shaman. I was spellbound, moved, shaken, stirred and cured – not unlike what I hear religious experiences are like. I left the show a saved and converted man. I had experienced Supreme Genius.

INTRODUCING THE SHRINES

Mr. Speedfinger: guitar Original member of the Shrines. He owns a bar in Kassel and hasn’t charged Khan for a drink in five years.

Riddiman: bass Gypsy-punk and truck-driver. He found his bass in the garbage and plays it up to the very day. Member of the Anarchist-Elektro-Punk-Band EGOTRONIC.

John Boy Adonis: drums Even though he looks like a bizarre mixture between Jesus Christ and Charlie Manson, no kinship could be proven. Member of the Experimental-Sub-Underground-Band INCLUB EXPLOSIVO.

Ron Streeter: percussion Percussionist of countless soul-legends. Khan slid a paper with his phone-number under the toilet-door, with one simple plea “don’t wipe your ass with it”. Two days later Ron played with the shrines.

Freddy “Mr. Ovitch” Rococo: lead organ and piano Khan had organized a show for the French one-man-band FREDOVITCH. Freddie performed in a silver go-go dress with a matching cowboy-hat and full beard. Two weeks later the shrines had him flown into the London studio.

Sam Fransisco: trumpet Plays in numerous noise-bands with long artful names. After his girlfriend left him, Sam hurled himself into excessive drug abuse

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JOHN MAUS lives in his birthplace of Austin, Minnesota. Whilst working towards his PhD in Political Science he also composes music that taps into melancholic fantasy and affirms that we are all truly alive. Questing synthesisers, tensely strung bass lines and chasing drum machines provide the perfect backdrop for John’s deeply resonant reverb-drenched vocal.

Born in the decade of synth pop and sharing his birthday with George Frideric Handel, John started making music when Nirvana posters went up on every teenager’s wall. It’s this curious conflux of influences that partially helps to describe John’s music. It’s a world where the Germs jam with Jerry Goldsmith, Cabaret Voltaire relocate to Eternia and Josquin des Prez writes a new score for RoboCop. The confrontation of punk, the fleeting poignancy of 80s movie soundtracks, the insistent pulse of Moroder and the spirituality of Medieval and Baroque music all find salvation in John Maus.

After a spell working alongside Ariel Pink and Gary War in Haunted Graffiti, 2006 saw the release of John’s debut album proper through Upset The Rhythm.

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Mixed Emotions is the debut album by Tanlines, a Brooklyn NY duo composed of Eric Emm (vocals, guitar, keyboards) and Jesse Cohen (drums, keyboards, bass). Initially born as a production project based out of Emm’s Brooklyn-based Brothers Studio, Tanlines has evolved into a deeply personal, unique electronic pop group.

But before there was Tanlines, there was just Eric and just Jesse, working in separate bands and projects until their paths crossed in 2008. Jesse’s former band had recorded at Eric’s studio; the two got along famously and struck up a friendship. “We have complementary qualities. It’s like a lot of duos, I think. We have different personalities, but we just innately understand each other,” says Cohen. The pair began making music together almost on a lark, deciding one night to remix a song for the band Telepathe, with whom Eric was working at the time, and put it on the internet that same evening for no reason beyond simply doing so. Suddenly, the song was making rounds on the web and being championed by various tastemakers. Their second song, “New Flowers,” written for one of Jesse’s friends’ art projects, had the same reaction, resulting in excellent UK label Young Turks (The XX,SBTRKT) emailing the band to release a single in 2009. “It was at that point that we thought, ‘Okay, this is a real project now,’” says Cohen.

Shows around the world followed, including amazing sets at the likes of The Guggenheim, The Whitney, the New Museum and more in their hometown of NYC (“Our genre was ‘Museum House’ for a while,” jokes Emm), and an opening slot on Strokes frontman Julian Casablancas’s solo tour in 2009. Effortlessly cool Parisian label Kitsune released a Tanlines single, while American label True Panther released the Tanlines’ first EP in 2010. They booked a three week tour in Europe, excited from the exciting things that had been happening to them, only to play some of the most disappointing shows of their career. “It was eye opening,” says Emm. “We realized we had a lot of work to do.” The inspiration for said work came in the form of albums the duo brought with them to listen to while driving through Europe. “We brought R.E.M. records, skate punk records from the 80’s, Born in the USA, stuff like that. Emm says, “listening to them, I became very aware of the lasting resonance of a good song. A good song transcends production trends. That’s what we were missing, and I wanted to start making songs that would have a life of their own.”

Upon returning from the European tour in the spring of 2010, Cohen and Emm returned home to New York to find an eviction notice for the recording studio that Eric and his brother (one-time trance producer Joshua Ryan) had built from the ground up eight years prior. The building had been sold and there were plans to convert it into a homeless shelter (…which was ultimately never built). For two years, the studio had been their figurative, and sometimes literal home (the spare bedroom often housed Jesse Cohen after late night sessions). With all of that change and uncertainty in mind, Tanlines began to work on their first proper album.

That album, Mixed Emotions, is a testament to the benefits and pitfalls of life’s changes, getting older, and being pushed out of one’s comfort zone. The band that was born out of a studio suddenly found themselves without a home base, forced to reevaluate themselves. Emm honed his voice, a confident and tranquil baritone, and focused on lyricism, something he had not done seriously in the past. Many of the songs on Mixed Emotions began as simple songs written on a guitar, with the band later adding their palette of electronic and organic sounds afterwards. “A great song can stick with someone for their whole life,” says Cohen as a means of explanation. “As a musician, you have the opportunity to create that, and that is the thing that you chase. When we were forced to really figure out what we were trying to do with our album, our music in general, and our lives broadly, it was obvious.” Emm attributes his newfound lyrical earnestness and immediacy more directly- “I just reached a point in my life where I wasn’t afraid and didn’t give a shit.”

Emm sings stories about loss, the passage of time, and the lessons and warnings of accumulated knowledge gleaned by someone who has spent an entire lifetime in music. “Real Life,” one of Mixed Emotion’s most bombastic songs, has Emm countering with the searching lyrics: “For a minute I was lost / I looked away/ I was looking for a home / I was looking for a role.” Emm, who by his own account has lived “an extremely unconventional life,” quit school at 15 to play guitar and skateboard, joined his favorite band and toured around the world at 19, and built a studio that hosted some of the area’s most notable underground acts in the mid 2000s, found the displacement both bittersweet and liberating. The lyrics that poured out of him reflect both earnest excitement and wisdom- they are about recognizing the sadness of a loss while still accepting that nothing ever really changes for good. On “Brothers” he sings “You’re just the same as you ever were / You fight and you don’t wonder why it makes no sense, I’m just the same as I ever been / But I’m the only one who doesn’t notice it”.

“This process,” Cohen says, referring to the agita of recording in the midst of the studio loss and its subsequent, sudden adulthood, “felt more like making a movie than an album.” Ultimately, the final step of mixing the album took them to an entirely different musical universe, the Miami-based studio of legendary mixer Jimmy Douglass (Timbaland, Aaliyah, Justin Timberlake, Television, Roxy Music) in whom the band found an unlikely kindred spirit. It was a journey that pushed the band to expand their sonic ambitions and away from the comfort of their previous experiences.

Perhaps that’s why Mixed Emotions feels so vivid—sometimes painful, sometimes transcendent—a very precise labor of love. It obscures and blurs the lines between synthetic and organic sounds, real and fake, happy and sad. It is the sound of stadium pop in small spaces. Before deciding on the name Mixed Emotions, Tanlines’ debut was called ;( (pronounced “winky-sad’), an emoticon of their own creation and the unofficial mascot of the band. A winky-sad is used to indicate something that is sad, but that you can still make a joke about. Musically, it is perhaps a happy-sounding song with melancholic lyrics. It’s the acknowledgment that most things are many things at once. It is Mixed Emotions ;(

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Of the many roots musicians traveling the world, spreading the early American music tradition, St. Louis musician and singer Pokey LaFarge is the next in line to make a significant impact on music enthusiasts everywhere. His creative mix of early jazz, string ragtime, country blues and western swing rings true and fine, making him one of the most innovative of all the purists performing American roots music today. It’s wonderfully infectious, and all laid down in front of a big, big swingin’ beat. A lot of performers are content to play old material, reworking the tunes to give them new life or to stamp them with personal style. But LaFarge both achieves timelessness with his original songs and honors the legendary songwriters and musicians of songs he covers. He uses his booming voice as an instrument with an incredible range; above his parlor guitar one moment he shouts a line and the next he croons. And while his music may be a fitting soundtrack to R. Crumb’s comics, don’t dare to call it “old-timey.” Whether performing solo or with his crew of painstakingly hand-picked supporting musicians, Lafarge’s extraordinary blend of raw talent and refined, idiosyncratic charm turns reviewers into poets as they attempt to label his one-of-a-kind sound.

Born in the heartland of America and now just 26 years old, Pokey LaFarge has been hitching through the countryside and whisking off to faraway lands ever since he was a teenager. He is a perpetual traveler, constantly in motion and drawing musical inspiration from the heroes and misfits of yesterday; the long lost troubadours of country, the kings of swamp-drenched ragtime, and all the legendary bluesmen of the Cotton Kingdom. Sharing that inspiration has been a mission of sorts for LaFarge, making sure that people remember that there’s more to music than just the sounds that manufactured pop stars are making today. LaFarge is out to help listeners and live audiences rediscover an earlier time in America by bringing forth his special mix of music, featuring such acoustic instruments as parlor guitar, guitjo, double bass, kazoo, and harmonica. His sounds are truly original and modern, yet LaFarge’s influences are apparent, as tinges of Blind Boy Fuller, Bob Wills, and Jimmie Rodgers are easily recognizable.

LaFarge has swiftly gained a large legion of fans ever since he self-released his debut album Marmalade back in 2007. Shortly after the album came out, he landed a main stage slot at top annual roots music bash Pickathon in Portland, Oregon, where he was widely regarded as one of the standout acts of the event. In 2008, LaFarge released his follow-up solo album, Beat, Move & Shake, on St. Louis-based label Big Muddy Records. In 2009, LaFarge began working with The South City Three, a trio made up of fellow St. Louis musicians Joey Glynn, Adam Hoskins, Ryan Koenig. With Glynn swinging and walking the upright bass, Hoskins displaying great versatility on his archtop guitar, and Koenig getting down on harmonica, washboard, and snare drum, LaFarge & The South City Three found a sweet spot. In 2009 Pokey and his crew hit the road and began to tour at a mind-spinning pace, quickly winning over crowds throughout America and Europe, making waves at such high profile festivals such as the Big Chill Festival (UK), the Tonder Festival (Denmark), and most notably the 2010 Newport Folk Music Festival (USA), where Spin Magazine called Pokey LaFarge & the South City Three “Best Discovery” and Bob Boilen of NPR called their performance “simply charming.” In 2010, LaFarge joined with the South City Three on his 3rd release, Riverboat Soul, on Takoma Park, Maryland based label Free Dirt Records. The recording quickly took the American roots music scene by storm, reaching the top 5 in the Freeform American Roots Chart (FAR), the top 10 in the Americana UK chart, and receiving critical acclaim by a host of influential music journalists. Terry Nolan of No Depression may have described LaFarge and his album best, as he mused that the songster “could be the birth of the next Bill Monroe creating such a fine mix of ragtime, jugband, blues, folk and country, he has found his own genre. For now, he’s solidly in the contemporary Americana genre, only because the music is hard to categorize. And I think Pokey LaFarge prefers it that way. Catch him on record and live before he leaves us all in his dust.”

LaFarge has no plans of stopping his mission of spreading the joy of early American music to the masses. With him and The South City Three already scheming their next studio recording and planning their jam-packed 2011 performance schedule that will certainly have them playing even more high profile venues and events worldwide, look for Pokey to continue his rise as a premier tradition-bearer, musician, songwriter, and entertainer.

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Gardens & Villa is the project of five college friends from Santa Barbara, formed following the collapse of a noisier post-punk band and a hitch-hiking journey up the west coast. Members Chris Lynch, Adam Rasmussen, Levi Hayden, Shane McKillop began playing in earnest as Gardens & Villa in 2008. The name is pulled from the location of their house on Villa Street, and the property’s lovely garden to which they tend. The music they make is very much connected to coastal city they call home — the stoney bike rides, dance parties, a scene free of judgment. The band refers to this Santa Barbara feeling as “coco vibes.” For two weeks in the summer of 2010, the band camped behind visionary and now-labelmate Richard Swift’s Oregon studio. No shower, no kitchen, but all the magic you could ask for. After taking a band oath to always play all parts live — a la Talking Heads’ Stop Making Sense — the band added member Dusty Ineman to supremely execute the live incarnation of the band.

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Menomena Biography

Menomena: Mines

“There’s nothing quite like trying to capture the spirit of art rock in a series of painstakingly tuned paragraphs without coming off as pretentious or verbose. Especially when you’re writing about your own band. We probably should have hired someone to draft this for us, if only to give the illusion of an objective third party saying flattering things about our new record, instead of having to take personal ownership of every sentiment voiced here. No one wants to sound self indulgent, on top of it all. But that’s what any home-recorded band comes down to. What’s more indulgent than spending every day listening to your own voice isolated in headphones for two years straight? That’s pretty much what I’ve been doing lately.

It’s been three-and-a-half years since the release of our last album. Roughly two of those years were spent touring and working on the music contained on Mines, and the rest was spent continuing to work on the new music and on arguing over it. On one hand, it seems like forever. On the other hand…well no, it still seems like forever. Nothing holds up a process like an indispensable band member being both a perfectionist and a control freak. Especially when your band features three of these types. And we certainly haven’t gotten any more agreeable in our old age – quite the opposite.

However, in the wake of brutal disagreements, unrelenting grudges and failed marriages (not to mention a world full of modern terrorism, natural disasters and economic collapse) somehow this band is still standing.

Mines was constructed the same way we’ve always made music: We jammed and recorded hundreds of loops spontaneously, using the same ol’ trusty software program Brent wrote as a college assignment back in the day. We individually pieced the resulting loops together like jigsaw puzzles, adding in voices and sentimentality. We made big strides building skeletal song structures, and did a decent job collaborating as the ideas began to take shape. But just when a song became familiar to one of us, the other two members broke it apart again, breaking each others’ hearts along the way. We rerecorded, rebuilt, and ultimately resented each other. And believe it or not, we’re all proud of the results.

I should have started this thing off with a catchy headline. Something like, “Mines will blow off your limbs like an Italian VS-50!” or, “Get ready to strike gold in the mineral-rich soil of Mines!” But again, I can’t speak too smugly here. So then, Mines. Land mines, ore mines, plural possessive “mines”? All of the above, I guess… But mostly the latter. I’m just realizing now that I’ve already illustrated the possessive by choosing to write this myself.

As usual, the end somehow justifies the means. It’s done, and it’s the best record we could make at this time in our lives. Thank you for listening.

Love,

Danny / Menomena”

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In a year of constant touring with her many projects, Kendl Winter has taken her love of superstition to the birds, literally: bluebirds mean good luck, chickadees mean call home, and a whippoorwill’s morning song is a sign of a good day. And so it follows that she would name The Mechanics of Hovering Flight, (KLP238) her second full-length K release, for the hummingbird and its opposing ideas of flight and motionlessness. A traveler, a dreamer, a banjo player, Kendl sprouts alfalfa beans in mason jars in the back of her tour van and counts the days until she returns home to her house boat to write songs on her banjo through the rainy afternoons. Growing out of her previous release, Apple Core (KLP224), some songs on The Mechanics of Hovering Flight are folk. Some are bluegrass. Some smack a bit more of country, with twangy guitar and foot-stomping rhythm, but somehow Kendl has created an album that is one moving piece, that tells a story between the liner notes. Perhaps it is her voice. Unwavering, at times haunting, Kendl’s song reminds one of the legendary Lucinda Williams. Perhaps it’s her pure dedication to writing the perfect song that serves her so well—to write a song that plays to the seasons, to the harvest, and speaks to the truth about life. About love. About the simple love of a singer and her banjo.

Recorded with Calvin Johnson at Dub Narcotic Studios, the thirteen songs of The Mechanics of Hovering Flight are fluid and rich. In line with her organic vision, Kendl invited her friends to record and sing on many tracks. Joe Capoccia plays bass, Austin Cooper and Kevin Raspberry play the drums, Derek Johnson plays cello and buddy Pam Margon plays fiddle. Their joy and spirit of community are palpable, even in the darker songs of the album. But it is Kendl who is storyteller, who takes the listener by the ears and holds them, captivated, until she is finished. Kendl, the superstitious woman that she is, has noticed that since she gave her album a name for the hummingbird, hummingbirds have appeared almost everywhere in her life. Coincidence? Perhaps. But surely a sign of good to come, and certainly of more songs that, if nothing else, are wholly true.

Kendl Winter is a dreamer of dark clouds, has a drawer stuffed full of stolen socks, and picks banjo and guitar like a hillbilly in the Ozarks. Born in Arkansas and based in Olympia, Washington, Kendl performs as a solo artist with a loop pedal, guitars, banjos. She twists those instruments into captivating melodies, crossing into the realm of country music. Kendl writes and plays with various touring bands from the Pacific Northwest, including the Blackberry Bushes, the Pasties, Southern Skies and It’s All Gotta Go. Her fourth solo album, (and first K release) Apple Core [KLP224], was self-recorded on a boat in the Puget Sound and a house on the west side of town. It features sweet and sad songs unique to Kendl’s dark dream cloud with layers of harmonies floating over banjo, guitar, dobro and piano.

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In 2001, a year after the release of Meditations in B, the band released two albums simultaneously: Seminar II and Seminar III. For these records, Luke Scarola joined to use electronics. On Seminar II, Steven Brodsky of Cave In wrote the lyrics for one song, and Jay Randall of Agoraphobic Nosebleed contributed on electronics. On August 24, 2004, the band’s most recent album Christmas was released.

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Erik Koskinen grew up in the heart of the middle of nowhere .. northern Michigan. Playing solo and band shows since age 14. Both in the country and in the town erik has formed his own brand of American music based heavily on and for, quite simply “people”. Koskinen’s musical pursuits have prompted him to load up his old pickup truck and relocate to various American musical meccas, including Nashville, New York, and California finally to find his way to Minneapolis, Minnesota. Making it his home as a producer, recording engineer, sideman with Dead Man Winter and Molly Maher but most of all as his own band leader and songwriter playing over one hundred and fifty shows a year. Erik’s band has been a mainstay at Nye’s Polonaise Room (best bar in America, Esquire Magazine) for the past five years and continues to build a scene out of the establishment alongside Molly Maher and Her Disbelievers as her band leader. Erik has producing and engineering credits with The Waifs, Molly Maher, Trampled by Turtles(Billboard Bluegrass #1 for the album Palamino), Dead Man Winter, Teague Alexy, The Hobo Nephews of Uncle Frank, Ray B and The Reverberation, and many more. When Erik isn’t fronting his own shows he is out on the road with Molly Maher, Randy Weeks and Dead Man Winter, always trying to establish an honest music scene that seems to have lost it’s footing in recent years.

Erik has opened for Pieta Brown, The Texas Tornados, Hank III, Jimmie Vaughan, Trampled by Turtles, John Hiatt, Al Kooper, Ray Bonneville, Randy Weeks, The Pines, Kevin Russell (of the Gourds), The Grass Roots, The Devil Makes 3, Richie Havens, Spider John Koerner and more….

Erik has played with Lucinda Williams, Al Kooper, The Waifs, Trampled by Turtles, Tom Rush, Randy Weeks, The Pines, Will Sexton, Ray Bonneville, Ramsey Midwood, Dead Man Winter, Charlie Parr and more ….

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Arrington de Dionyso (b. January 4th 1975) makes trans-utopian world music for a world that exists in fever dreams and hallucinations. Using performance and visual art, he traverses the nameless territories held between surrealist automatism, shamanic seance, and the folk imagery of rock and roll. Ecstasy vs. Madness.

De Dionyso’s most recent project, Malaikat dan Singa, is a trance-punk outfit featuring bass clarinet, guitars, multiple drummers and his trademark wild vocals (multi-spectral harmonic throatsinging combined with grunts, yelps, and barks) -this time, all sung in Indonesian. Malaikat dan Singa translates as “Angels and Lions,” and de Dionyso’s Indonesian lyrics combine mythology and fantasy with haphazard translations of poet William Blake on the debut Malaikat album. The project, however, ultimately defies a clean translation. Malaikat dan Singa gains power by crossing boundaries — both linguistic and psychic. On the one hand, the Indonesian language allows Dionyso to communicate on levels more deeply subliminal than those accessible in his native English. On the other, he hopes to reach his growing Indonesian audience with his eccentric brew of ecstatic lunacy and prophetic madness, clarified to perfection during his 15 year tour-of-duty with Olympia’s Old Time Relijun.

Arrington tours constantly, and has also presented workshops on improvising with the voice throughout North America, Europe, Israel and Japan. His visual art has been featured in exhibitions in Italy, New York City, Washington DC and Portland, Oregon and published in Yeti Magazine, Prism Index and The Stranger.

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Portland, Oregon’s Hosannas have managed to amass a sizable following along the West Coast over the last 3 years with their intense tour ethic and consistent presence in the Portland house show scene. Brothers Brandon and Richard laws grew up listening to Kraftwerk and The Beach Boys. These disparate influences are at the core of the duo’s haunting vocal harmonies, rich verbal imagery and unpredictable guitar. Add to this combination Christof Hendrickson’s Rhodes, Moog and Omnikorg and Lane Barrington’s tasteful, dynamic percussion and the result is simply Hosannas. The band’s influences are as diverse as their instrumentation and they are as comfortable mixing Bollywood samples with tin-foil piano as they are in hushed a capella harmonies or full tilt power shred mode.

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A Beautiful fusion of Talent and DependenciesBiography

Sandpeople was formed roughly five years ago as an unlikely gathering of hip-hop artists in the Pacific Northwest. This crew has since built itself into a 10 member unit fully equipped to fill a stage and empty a keg (preferably in reverse order). Within the first two months, and long before most Sandpeople had even met each other, their debut album Points of View was recorded and released independently over a two week span. That album laid the ground work for what has become a quick moving crew with extremely high standards. Having several “sub-groups” – with two or three members pairing for a series of projects – interwoven throughout the bigger collective, the crew’s catalogue has been growing rapidly since their inception and only continues to gain momentum.

Sandpeople member Illmaculate has also been stacking his list of substantial achievements. After winning the world renowned battle at Scribble Jam in 2004, he has been extremely busy. His establishment as one of the world’s top 5 battle MCs gained further validity with his victory at the World Rap Championship in Las Vegas. He and Scribble Jam 2006 champ The Saurus, won the prestigious 2-on-2 team battle that began in New York and culminated by facing the top team from the UK on the Vegas strip (http://jumpoff.tv/). As the only undefeated team in the entire competition, their achievement has been viewable nationally On-Demand (Comcast) while also providing them coverage in XXL.

The latest installment from Sandpeople is an album titled Honest Racket. The project – which boasts 16 tracks – acts as further proof that this crew is constantly moving forward. Production is handled entirely in-house by Sapient and Simple, as they craft a unique and cohesive sound from start to finish. The MCs attack each beat with their signature style and amazingly the outcome is an album that feels like it was made by a tight knit group, rather than such a large crew. Included on this breakthrough effort are features from two of hip-hop’s finest – The Grouch (Living Legends / Zion I & The Grouch) and Sean Price (Boot Camp Clik / Heltah Skeltah).

To the untrained eye, the Sandpeople may appear to be a confusing mass of hungry emcee’s full of passion and low on serotonin. To the trained eye, this is a certainty. In the cloudy and gray corner of the country not known for its bountiful supply of physical sand, an inappropriately named force is emerging. Concerned first with making quality music that is relevant to real everyday life, Sandpeople are sure to connect with listeners where other artists most commonly fail to. As their name and inventory continues to expand, this will undoubtedly be looked back upon as the crew’s humble beginnings.

Band Interests

Surviving off the art!

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Aan is a fearless experimental pop band from Portland, Oregon mixing heavily textured guitars with rich vocal harmonies. The band has been active since 2007, self-releasing several CD-Rs and garnering a reputation throughout the Northwest as a progressive force in the independent scene.

The band beckons a bevvy of comparisons but their sound cannot be pigeonholed. The vocal dexterity of singer Bud Wilson skillfully reaches the octaves of the late Jeff Buckley while maintaining a timbre that is much grittier. Aan’s arrangements lie somewhere between Sub Pop’s late nineties catalog and the Anticon label’s inventiveness.

Their forthcoming LP “Amor Ad Nauseum” will be the group’s first proper release. The work will demonstrate a patience and attention to space not found in much of the new cannon of up and coming artists. Aan will continue to tour through the continental US in 2012.

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In a typical teenager’s New Mexico bedroom, Zach Condon recorded Gulag Orkestar shortly after quitting college, with some help from local musicians Jeremy Barnes and Heather Trost (A Hawk and a Hacksaw). For him, it was nothing new, having recorded hundreds of songs since he was fifteen the same way. This time, however, a flood of attention followed, as online raves lead to reverential fandom, international acclaim, and a tsunami of interviews, photoshoots and features, as Condon and his newly formed band traveled to Russia, Poland, Turkey and throughout North America and Europe.

Astonishingly, he proved himself as talented a bandleader as composer. New songs were written, album songs reworked, and the band’s shows quickly developed to dramatic heights far beyond its mere months-long existence. This band went on to record an EP, Lon Gisland, in 2007, which marked the first Beirut recordings with the live ensemble. Half a year later, Beirut came out with another album, The Flying Club Cup. Inspired by an obscure photo from 1910 depicting hot air balloons taking flight mere steps away from the Eiffel Tower, an image Zach stuck to the wall for inspiration, The Flying Club Cup is an homage to France’s culture, fashion, history and music.

In 2009, Beirut released the double EP March of the Zapotec & Realpeople: Holland. The first was partly recorded in Oaxaca with the Mexican Banda Jimenez, and a more pronounced South-American flavor. The second EP ‘Holland’ was credited to Condon’s old name Realpeople and consists of five electrotracks.

Summer 2011 saw the release of The Rip Tide on Condon’s own Pompeii Label, Beirut’s first proper LP since The Flying Club Cup. Written in isolation during a snowy upstate winter, the album marked a stark change in emotional direction, that is to say, inward. Reflecting less on the travels and travails borne of the wanderlust struck musician, instead, The Rip Tide has crystallized the sounds of Beirut’s past into a cohesive and remarkable whole, all while maintaining the unmistakable aesthetic that has brought them around the world, and home again.

Currently, Beirut is touring the world in support of The Rip Tide.

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“This is what happens when Brian Wilson, Anton Newcombe, and Kevin Shields take off their clothes and have sex in a cacophony of sound. The product of their love is the Grandparents, rolling along a tape track of bends, twisting tones, and sweet-sweet harmonies drenching the listener in the warm syrupy tones of their minds. Formed in 2009 when an old group of friends met new ones in dorms across Portland, Oregon. Their love of sonic experimentation and manipulation has resulted in pure psychedelic swoons that reflect the love of their namesake.” – PM

Federation X reveals an original and chaotically absolute way in the alternative rock scene. Conceiving fuming themes, amplified by folk, garage rock, and punk references, the Washington state trio ultimately delivers a set of extreme rock & roll. Assembling in the late ’90s, in Yakima, WA, Federation X counts on with a lineup comprising guitarist Ben, drummer Beau, and vocalist and guitarist Bill. The trio first met trough mutual high-school friends, and since their acquaintance naturally starting playing together. Following a period of time rehearsing intensively, Federation X, self-described as a “civil war band,” played its first live shows. A few months later, the team then concentrated on creating its first full-length album. Federation X, the crew’s eponymous and self-released debut album, offered in 2000, revealed for the first time the trio’s incensed rock creations. Dedicating the following months to a short U.S. touring season, the band then appeared on several compilations and split discs before re-entering the studio to prepare their second full-length. American Folk Horror, issued in 2002 by Estrus Records, confirmed the trio’s aptitude in conceptualizing distinctive and chaotically enhanced compositions. The group honed the sharper and more agressive side of their sound on their third album, 2003′s X Patriot, recorded by Steve Albini.

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One part Rolling Thunder Revue, one part banged-and-bruised balladeering, two parts just plain strange, These United States have their sights set on a rock-and-roll reformation. Taking their cues as much from Walt Whitman as from Wilco, Jesse Elliott and co. walk the thin line between the coffeehouse and the roadhouse, spinning something fiercely, unapologetically positive out of the sinking reality of an empire gone Titanic.

After releasing 2 albums and playing 200 shows in 2008, the DC-Kentucky- psych-folk-lit-pop rockers are rumbling surely towards the next benchmarks in a long string of critical acclaim, including several Best of 2008 mentions for Crimes and A Picture of the Three of Us…, and features on NPR’s “All Things Considered,” Paste, Filter, Village Voice, Brooklyn Vegan,Daytrotter, My Old Kentucky Blog, The Onion, Jambase, KEXP, WOXY, and KCRW.

Press Quotes:
“It is, without being at all overly enthusiastic, one of the best records you will hear this year, and it will make you feel completely human.” – DAYTROTTER

“A beautiful collection of understated, orchestral roots rock that will enrapture both NPR and Pitchfork devotees.” – ALTERNATIVE PRESS
” A bevy of images, all delivered with the same gentle intensity… small melodic bits pull and push the listener’s attention, moving continuously under layered melodies and a wash of words. – NPR

“The production is spot-on and few albums in recent memory put a candle to the lyricism present here.” – KEXP

“It is easily one of the grooviest efforts of 2008. Even though it sounds like it was made in 1968.” – WIRED

“Labyrinthine and grandiose… the 12-song cycle coils around itself in tales that rage and lull in turns. An impressive achievement… a rousing communal affair befitting it’s epic and twisted ambition” – PASTE MAGAZINE

“It’s a phenomenal record..this is almost as much of a supergroup as the New Pornographers or Broken Social Scene. And even though they might not have a fraction of those bands’ fame, to judge solely on Saturday’s performance, they’ve already started playing with a level of energy that suggests that nobody bothered to tell them.” – YOU AIN’T NO PICASSO

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LAKE is a group of cloudy individuals brought together through lines drawn along Interstate-5, intersecting in Olympia around 2005. Since forming, they have gained and lost members, recorded 12 full length albums (only 3 of which have seen proper release), played across the world supporting such talented acts as Adrian Orange and Her Band, Half Handed Cloud, Laura Veirs, and Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy. The sounds they craft are straight from the playbook of the good parts of Billy Joel, Fleetwood Mac, and Turkish psychedelic music. Caressing the Rhodes piano, endearing drum fills, guitars that don’t sound like guitars, and some slamming bass lines: listening to LAKE is like pouring sugar in your ears. They’ll turn your brain into chocolate, 67% cacao

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The inspiration for Radiation City’s newest output stems from an old piano. The piano has lived in drummer Randy Bemrose’s basement for eons. It’s old, cumbersome, and on it’s last legs. The band used sounds from the piano throughout the recording of this new EP… not just the keys though, the clicks and clacks from the body, the slamming of the lid, and virtually every other sound you can imagine making on the piano. After they were finished, the piano was beat up, out of tune, and falling apart. Having used the old piano of all it’s worth, and as a celebration of an intense year, Radiation City engaged in the ceremonial destruction of the old piano documented on the first single’s video, “Find it of Use.”
Cool Nightmare is the followup to the dream-pop quintet’s acclaimed debut, The Hands That Take You, released this past fall on Tender Loving Empire (Typhoon, Loch Lomond). Originally out via cassette on Radiation City founders Cameron Spies and Lizzy Ellison’s cassette-only record label Apes Tapes, The Hands That Take You has been lauded by MTV, ELLE, Brooklyn Vegan, Paste, FuseTV, Prefix, and The L Magazine.
Radiation City is influenced by certain staple macro-genres such as 60′s bossa nova and Chicago jazz, but their version of this classical sound is supported by irresistible pop vocal hooks and the employment of minimal electronics which provide rhythm but leave plenty of space. The band will soon embark on their first trip to SXSW as part of a tour that will take them down the West Coast and through the Midwest.
Radiation City is Lizzy Ellison (vocals, keys), Cameron Spies (guitar, vocals), Randy Bemrose (drums), Matt Rafferty (bass), Patti King (vocals, keys, bass).
..More info on The Hands That Take You In 2009 Cameron Spies caught Lizzy Ellison becoming transfixed by the fluid movement of a bank teller’s hands– a involuntary hypnotic condition that Spies oddly enough shared. The Hands That Take You, the title of the debut album from the pair’s dreamy-pop outfit Radiation City, is an homage to this phenomenon as it was the catalyst for not only a long-term love affair but a wellspring of creativity. The subsequent years came to be the most influential time in both their lives. Together they founded a DIY cassette tape label, planted a thriving vegetable garden in the backyard of their Portland, Oregon home and formed Radiation City, which, after only a few live performances was already being lauded as part of “a new generation of acts that don’t care much for the longstanding walls between slow acoustic pop, dance music, experimental electronic music and distortion-fueled rock (Willamette Week)”

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Somehow it would not have been quite right for Sarah Gwen to give her debut CD any other name but her own. “Yes, every song here is autobiographical,” Sarah Gwen definitively admits. “When people come up to me at my shows and say, ‘It’s so real’, I think, well, what is it supposed to be? I was naïve and clueless,” she continues, “I didn’t even realize that people wrote fictional songs until everyone seemed to think it was weird that every one of my songs was true. I will never understand people writing songs about riding trains when they weren’t on them.”

While it is true at a certain level for all debut records that the artist went through a lifetime of experiences to create that work, Sarah Gwen’s story is more literal than many.

Inspired by Nirvana then at their apex, Sarah taught herself to play guitar and start writing songs at 15, in the small Idaho town where she grew up.

A decade later, in her mid-­‐20’s, she found herself divorced and living in Portland OR. “I didn’t play music while I was married, but when we broke up, I moved into an apartment and it was all I did. I would come home from a bar and couldn’t sleep, so I had this window to write and record songs between 1 and 3 a.m. It was always a private thing, a cathartic outlet, and a way for me to express the things I was pissed off about but didn’t know how to say to people. All these songs were written about my ex-­‐husband and two guys I dated after that.”

Enter Portland guitarist and songwriter Scott Weddle (Amelia, Storm Large, The Flatirons). “I never would have made this record without Scott,” says Sarah. “I would have been happy to play the songs alone in my bedroom at night. But Scott introduced me to people, helped me get some shows and encouraged me.”

That push led Sarah Gwen to Portland’s Dead Aunt Thelma’s Recording Studio with Scott Weddle, multi-­‐instrumentalist and engineer Mark Orton (Tin Hat Trio), and somewhat remarkably, two friends of Weddle’s and one of the most highly regarded rhythm sections in Americana music – drummer Jay Bellerose and bassist Jennifer Condos – on a brief hiatus from touring as Ray LaMontagne’s band (The Prairie Dogs) and various high placed sessions jobs (Robert Plant / Alison Krauss, Aimee Mann, Joe Henry, Paula Cole and a near endless list).

They knocked out all 12 songs in two days. Sarah Gwen: “It was all kind of a blur. But it was awesome to hear these songs sounding so complete, professional and beautiful. The players on this record are insanely great. I’d never had a bass player before, but it worked so well with the songs, made them sound so much fuller. “

The songs vary quite a bit in flavor from country (“King of France”, “Good Girl”), Tom Waits-­‐ish blues folk (“Come Get Me”, “Woods”), soul (“Don’t Mean To”, “Ready”), pop (“Be Mine”) to a couple of terrific ballads (“I’ll Show You”, “Elephant”).

But it’s all about Sarah Gwen’s warm, expressive, deeply passionate voice and unflinching lyrics (“Another woman’s baby on my hip / She cries all damn day / Guess I’ll join her”). You immediately sit up and listen in “Impossible” when she sings “Your hands on my neck / you said spread your legs / You kissed me so hard I thought my teeth would break.” No one would guess that such a newcomer would possess the power, control and confidence shown in “Impossible” to repeat a simple line and just ever so slightly turn up the heat as she proceeds: “Are you jealous?” “Are you jealous?” “Are you jeall-­‐louss? Do you get jealous?” Sarah Gwen is a natural, blessed as both a writer and singer with a controlled intensity and authenticity that you can’t teach.

The one song here that Sarah Gwen did not write is an unlikely cover – Genesis’ “Misunderstanding”, about as far from the tough Americana tone of this CD as one can get. There is zero irony in this slowed down, aching version of the song, which Sarah Gwen against all odds transforms into something genuinely moving.

Ask Sarah about her influences and she gravitates not to the female singer-­‐songwriters she sometimes gets compared to (Lucinda Williams, Liz Phair, Polly Jean Harvey), but Tom Petty. “Oh man, Tom Petty. I wish I was that tough and a rocking guitar player like him.”

I find it fitting she would use the word “tough” because one of the main reasons these songs resonate so strongly for everyone who hears them is their rare combination of bare vulnerability and undefeatable resilience. As one friend of mine leaned over and said to me three songs into the set the first time he heard Sarah: “Goddamn, she is bad ass.”

From here, Sarah Gwen is looking forward to finally putting music first in her life, out from the cover of the middle of the night and into record stores and live music venues across the US. Her goal is as simple and direct as her songs: “I want people to hear these songs as authentic genuine music.”

So is Sarah in the same space as when she wrote these songs? “I am happier in my personal life now,” says Sarah Gwen. “I don’t feel as vulnerable as I did a few years ago. But when I

sing the songs live, I easily tap right back into what was part a big part of my life. And I will probably always write about things that bum me out. I have tried to write a love song but trust me, I am not very good at it (laughs).”

Jim Desmond

When You Motor Away music blog http://whenyoumotoraway.blogspot.com/

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In an era of industry-obsessed MCs, interchangeable hashtag raps, and “viral” everything, it has become increasingly difficult to find a true original in the rap game. Yet ask anyone who’s been paying attention and they’ll tell you: Danny Brown is that dude. In 2011 the Motor City MC teamed up with Fool’s Gold Records and released XXX, a tour-de-force concept record about hedonism, growing up, and Detroit, which took listeners on a profane and psychedelic journey through his own uncensored id. After a year of universal critical acclaim – from Spin naming XXX Rap Album Of The Year to Danny covering the Metro Times and Real Detroit in the same week as their Artist Of The Year – Danny continues to spread his irreverent gospel worldwide with extensive touring and even more unrestrained, unstoppable rhymes.

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Moon Duo was formed by Ripley Johnson of Wooden Shjips and Sanae Yamada in San Francisco in 2009. Inspired initially by the legendary duo of John Coltrane and Rashied Ali, Moon Duo counts such variant groups as Silver Apples, Royal Trux, Moolah, Suicide, and Cluster as touchstones. Utilizing primarily guitar, keyboards, and vocals, the Duo plays space against form to create a primeval sound experience. After a debut 12″ single on Sick Thirst, the group released the acclaimed Killing Time EP on Sacred Bones. The followup LP “Escape” on Woodsist, marks the fullest realization yet of the group’s sound.

“As with any great EP, (Moon Duo) leaves you aching for more as the blurred visions of the A-side peak with “Speed” and then give way to slower mindscapes on the flip that burn low and practically beg to pick back up into a fevered beat.” – Raven Sings The Blues

“Ripley Johnson from Wooden Shjips teams up with Sanae Yamada to create Moon Duo, and births a sorta Kraut-inspired (the motorik Neu!-beats especially) psych record that blows hundreds of stoner bands out of the water and back into their parents’ basements. Best new record in a long, long while.”
- Andreas Knutsen, Other Music

“If you like your goth music dignified and spooky like Death in June, then you should come over and we’ll have a little goth-together where we have some beers and turn off the lights and listen to Moon Duo.” – Vice Magazine

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Los Angeles-based Tropic Of Cancer is the solo project of Camella Lobo. Though her music has been labeled gothic, cold wave and drone pop, Lobo’s take on her influences is anything but nostalgic. Tropic Of Cancer has managed to imbue its own elusive gaze and craft a strangely beautiful and intoxicating sound in the wake of its predecessors.

Majestic, booming drum machine beats and cascading string synths cradle Lobo’s vocals, which strike a delicate balance between the ethereal and foreboding. Her lyrics are chanted in and out of chambers of reverb, piercing guitar rhythms and hypnotic ambience.

“Tropic of Cancer’s at once funereal and exhilaratingly romantic sound – with perfect pop hooks buried deep under oceans of reverb – has earned them a considerable, and well-deserved, cult following” (FACT magazine)

Formerly a duo with minimal electronic artist Silent Servant (Juan Mendez), Tropic Of Cancer has been stoking a slow-burning cult following since its first EP (The Dull Age) on Berlin-based label, Downwards in 2009. Later releases on the label, and The Sorrow of Two Blooms, an EP released on London imprint Blackest Ever Black, catapulted Tropic Of Cancer into the underground spotlight. Lobo’s most recent release as a solo artist, Permissions Of Love is in its second pressing on Italian-based label, Mannequin Records.

Lobo, who toured UK/Europe with HTRK last year, and this year the West Coast U.S. with Demdike Stare will be supported on stage by Taylor Burch of the band, DVA DAMAS.

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Dreamboat is the collaboration between folk/drone musician Ilyas Ahmed and bass clarinet/modular synthesizer duo Golden Retriever.  The collaboration was born over late nights and an overlapping soundworld.  Their music lies somewhere between exploded modal song forms, ambient drift, and that high lonesome sound.

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Cooky Parker has been scouring the basements of record stores, the far corners of the world, and even less likely places, constantly on the search for a demo or rare gem that will make you run for the dance floor! Motown/Stax, Northern soul, New Orleans R&B, Girl Groups, Funk, Popcorn soul, Doo Wop, Brill Building pop, and Beach will all get a spin on the turntable. By handpicking sets each night DJ Cooky Parker will make for an unstoppable night of shakin, twistin, jumpin and even mashed potatoin!! So come on out to shake a tailfeather and if it is your pleasure do “the Double Bump” or maybe “the Funky Penguin” or even better “the Pop-eye!”

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Formed in St. Johns, Portland, Oregon in early 2011 by Grant Miller (guitar/vocals) Dylan Reilly (bass, harmonica), and Eric Johnson (drums), Bison Bison has one boot firmly planted in the groove-based riff rock of the 70s, and the other trudging the nebulous sludge of Doom. Bison Bison has coalesced a range of creative styles that make them versatile enough to open for acts ranging from the moody metal of Witch Mountain to the gravelly roots rock of the Builders and the Butchers. A brawny strain of rail-splitting rock ‘n’roll, whether reveling in the rumble of Sleep or the diesel driven locomotion of early Grand Funk, Bison Bison stampede through various musical landscapes, leaving the listener with hook-laden earworms that burrow in the brain for days, flood the ears in a warm glow of psychedelia, and leave one either head tripping, head banging, or head scratching: in a good way.

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Harmonies are nailed with a panache that would make Brian Wilson take pause, and the group doesn’t think twice about bitch-slapping audiences by ‘attacking and destroying’ songs with a Neil Young mentality.” – A. P. Kryza, WIllamette Week

Following up on their 2010 debut album The Dirty Future, Old Light’s harmony-rich, electric Autoharp-driven sound has developed into an incendiary live band replete with double drummers and transcendental guitar excursions.

Where their first record might evoke a four-way fatality car crash involving Crazy Horse, Faust, the Band, and Ennio Morricone, their new material explores territory described by Old Light mastermind Garth Steel Klippert as “dance metal.” Whether his description is at all accurate seems not to matter, as Old Light has steadily built a strong Portland following, having played MFNW, Pickathon, OPB In House, and having shared the stage with acts as diverse as Sallie Ford & the Sound Outside, Agesandages, Matter, Aerial Ruin, 1939 Ensemble, the Golden Bears, MIke Coykendall, and Black Prairie.

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BIG BUSINESS has two guys in it. It is spelled here in capital letters so you know we’re talking
about a serious band. Jared Warren plays the bass guitar and sings. He used to be in this band
KARP and then he was in this other band for awhile name of TIGHT BROS FROM WAAAY
BACK WHEN. Coady Willis plays the drums and sometimes yells and stuff. He used to be in the
MURDER CITY DEVILS and probably some other bands you haven’t ever heard of. BIG
BUSINESS put out their first full-length record out in January 2005. HYDRAHEAD RECORDS
was the label, HEAD FOR THE SHALLOW was the title. Lots of touring followed. Adventure!
Then, a mysterious phone call led to a secret meeting with the MELVINS. BIG BUSINESS
became part of the MELVINS with Buzz Osborne on guitar and vocals, Jared assuming bass and
vocal duties, and Coady playing second drumset alongside Dale Crover. This new lineup
recorded an album in the summer of 2006 and called it (A) Senile Animal. Out Oct. 10th on
IPECAC records. But Wait! BIG BUSINESS has also just recorded a new record! “HERE COME
THE WATERWORKS”. It was produced by record producer PHIL EK (Modest Mouse, Built to
Spill, Band of Horses) and was dropped on your face by Hydra Head on March 6 of 2007.

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The love child of Brooklyn and the Internet, Baauer was born out of noise. A sound that began steeped in the 4/4 dance tradition, slowly took on hip hop tendencies until the two became one. Influenced heavily by southern hip-hop and UK bass sounds, Baauer has found himself smack dab in the middle of the electronic renaissance. He is the delectable fusion of future-crunk and leather shaken aggressively in a bottle for years and has only just opened the top to pour the mixture out

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A junkyard band with a heart of dirt, smoke, and wires; The Curious Mystery involves slowburn psych and garage experimentalism. Cool night air, Captain Beefheart, late night crawlers, native fowl, dinner, all over me, river blindness – these are some of the things the mysterians bide their time thinking about. The band’s K records debut,Rotting Slowly [KLP206], was released in 2009. Their follow-up full length, We Creeling[KLP225], hit in early 2011.

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A wise man said: Pick your tenants wisely. Fort Lean, the New York rock band you apparently like so much that you sought out the official literature, are a tenant of mine. This is not poetry. I am their landlord. The first of every month, with remarkable diligence, the Fort wires 200 American into my bank account for the use of a cramped and water-damaged rehearsal space I still haven’t gotten around to soundproofing. I like these guys. They’re respectful of other people’s belongings. They clean up after themselves, usually. I have my suspicions that Keenan Mitchell, the band’s wild-eyed singer, has slept in the space without my permission, maybe even with women–but it’s all good. The band owns expensive vintage amplifiers. They’re open to sharing (usually). As far as tenant/landlord relationships go, ours is copacetic.

As for their music? You’ve heard it. Fort Lean write big, anthemic rock songs, and they play the hell out of them. Stakes are high. They want to be Oasis. They want to be Springsteen. They want to be U2. My guess is they will be, and here’s why: Fort Lean don’t want people to “kinda like” them. They want to be a girl’s first crush. They want college kids to make bad life decisions based on misinterpretations of their lyrics. They want to write the song you dance to with your second wife on the night of your wedding to your first wife. When your son moves to whatever the new Bushwick is in twenty years, and when he calls you, crying, to report he just got shook down by a bunch of punk kids, Fort Lean want you to smile to yourself and think of that line from “Sunsick”: “Get-tin’ mugged by chil-drennn!!”

You would think this is every band’s wish–to be The Biggest Band In The World. But it turns out that’s a lot of work! It turns out that most musicians are self-absorbed fuck-ups who haven’t earned the right to be either. Most importantly, it turns out, 99.9% of bands just don’t have the chops or the songbook. Fort Lean somehow have both–which is why they stuck out like a sore thumb this past CMJ. They’re writing choruses you wish you had written, and playing tighter than your band ever could. They’re only going to get better too. Mark my words: the world will get at least five great albums from this band before the singer cracks and decides he wants to be a doctor after all.

Look. I could write thousands of words about keyboardist Will Runge’s impeccable style (great face, great denim). I could rap on drummer Sam Ubl’s tasty hi-hat work, or bassist Jake Aron’s smart use of space. I could tell you about the first time I heard Keenan’s voice–an oaky, siren-like tenor that proves once and for all that nature does in fact trump nurture. Or how about this: Zach Fried routinely wears tight red pants, plays a Telecaster, and insists on using an enormous eighty-pound pedalboard even though he only has like two pedals–and somehow gets away with it all! There’s just so much to like about this band in the particular. But right now, the thing I like most about Fort Lean is quite simple. They pay their rent on time. They chip in when equipment gets broken. They let me use their Twin Reverb, and the Peavy Bandit (great for leads). I didn’t have to tell them twice about not leaving bikes in the hallway. It’s hard to find bands like this. I will miss them when they’re gone.

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Between these four musicians, French Cassettes’ individual craving for what music should feel like creates a unique melting pot of inevitable head bobs and a curiosity of what the next track will sound like.

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Unknown Mortal Orchestra first dropped into the world in late 2010 as a bandcamp account carrying a single called ‘Ffunny Ffrends’.

‘Ffunny Ffrends’ was everything you imagined it might be – alien beatnik pop music that echoed 60s psychedelia and krautrock minimalism with just a hint of gentle weirdness that suggested its roots might equally lie in the verdant indie of the equally distant New Zealand scene.

Ruban Nielson is a New Zealand native who had transplanted to Portland, Oregon with his band Mint Chicks. UMO was a project conceived as Ruban’s escape hatch to a new musical dimension where his vision of junkshop record collector pop could be realized in a sound that recalled Captain Beefheart, Sly Stone and RZA jamming on some kids TV theme too dark to ever be broadcast.

Out of the home studio, Ruban was joined by local Portland producer Jake Portrait on bass and teenage prodigy Julien Ehrlich on drums. They have been on the road all year, sleeping in ditches and running drunkenly from venues when needs be, curling ears and turning heads with their intoxicating sound all the way.

The eponymous UMO debut album is released June 21st on Fat Possum. Its probably something you should listen to.

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Casey Neill & The Norway Rats perform rock music informed by post punk ethos, combining haunting dirges and diesel fueled rave-ups. Neill’s original weather beaten narratives eschew irony in favor of romance, celebrate society’s miscreants, and explore the hidden corners of the American landscape. The Norway Rats, a crack gang of Portland’s finest musos, perform Neill’s originals with unhinged live energy. With accordions, over-driven guitars, and Neill’s raspy voice, the band blends elements of Scots/Irish tunefulness, feral abandon, and heartland rock. Neill has left his impact on audiences in the United States and overseas while touring extensively for more than a decade.

The Norway Rats are Joe Mengis – drums, Chet Lyster- guitars, Jenny Conlee – accordion, keys, and Jesse Emerson – bass. Their CD ‘Goodbye to the Rank and File’ was released in 2010 to rave reviews from press, radio, and blogs. Casey Neill is on tour with the band and in solo performance throughout 2012.

“Be it through raucous rockers, fragile acoustic ballads, ragged country, passionate bursts of punk fury or soulful touches of Irish folk, Neill’s narrative talent and concern for real people’s struggles stand out. (Neill) evokes an epic feel that fits perfectly with the implicit grandiosity of this emotional material, delivered with a raspy, affectionate voice that recalls Life’s Rich Pageant-era Michael Stipe. The results are so evocative, you’ll be tempted to steep further in these memories, the better to share Casey Neill’s particular blend of personal and historical experience.” – SPLENDID eZine

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Daughn Gibson’s debut album is by far the catchiest, most infectious White Denim release, and also quite possibly the strangest, which is certainly saying something. Imagine if Nicolas Jaar edited together a cocaine-country album, with a crooner somewhere between Lee Hazelwood and Roy Orbison on the mic. You know how James Blake brought R&B into the post-techno age? That’s what Daughn is fitting to do with country, no matter who likes it. Shades of Arthur Russell, Scott Walker, Magnetic Fields and Matthew Dear might pop up here or there, but this is a work unlike any other.

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In the cold and dreary winter of 2009, alone in his bedroom and hidden
from the darkness of the world outside Justin Paul Vallesteros had begun
working on something that would change his life forever. What began as a
couple notes played in experimentation soon transformed into vibrant
melodies that soon shook Vallesteros’ musical foundation to the core.
Guitar chords laced over pulse sating synth melodies and drum rhythms
was a departure from Justin’s previous work; he began to create the
dreamy nostalgic pop music that is Craft Spells. Justin is a California native
who now finds residence in the mid-size town of Stockton, the heart of
California. Craft Spells is the epitome of the recent uprising of the DIY
music scene. Coming from a place not known for its musical history or
impact on music culture it seemed destined for Craft Spells to stay as a
bedroom pop project with no final destination in sight. But soon the shear
amount of blog volume his work began to generate was unimaginable.
Sites like Weekly Tape Deck, Pasta Primavera, No Modest Bear and
Pitchfork’s Forkcast took notice and thus began the never ending
worldwide posting and re-posting on blog after blog of Craft Spells. The
sound is led by Justin’s blissful voice, backed behind beautiful guitar
melodies over heavenly synths, pop basslines and looped rhythms.
Captured Tracks has released 7” single for the song “Party Talk” and
the debut LP in Spring 2011 called Idle Labor. 2011 is
going to be a busy year now that Justin has set up a live band for future
touring. Keep a look out for tour dates in Europe and US come the new
year. In no time at all, Justin has been able to move out of Dave Brubeck
and Pavement’s shadow to create something his own which he shares
with the ever continuing admiration of the world.”

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“Supercharged songs with a hooky playfulness and white-knuckle power…” —Esquire

“Lit up and charged…four-part harmonies that are close to being crystalline.” —Daytrotter

On April 10 Thirty Tigers/RED will release Trampled by Turtles’ highly anticipated album Stars and Satellites. The band’s 2010 release Palomino (Thirty Tigers) garnered critical acclaim from NPR Music who praised both the band’s “impeccable dexterity” and “charm and melody to the songs.” AOL Spinner called the record “hard-charging music…infectiously raucous,” while Paste Magazine admired the band’s “punk ethos” as well as “virtuosity and energy” while naming the band as one of the Top 25 Live Acts of 2011. The band will support the new album with a North American tour this spring.

Since forming in Duluth, Minnesota in 2003, Trampled by Turtles always felt they were able to attain an energy on stage that can’t be found in the studio. They were so comfortable playing on the road that they treated their previous albums’ recording processes like tours. For Stars and Satellites, however, Trampled by Turtles didn’t want to simply try to recreate a live show. “We wanted to make a record that breathes,” explains Dave Simonett (guitar/vocals), “musically we wanted to step out of our comfort zone.” “This record is all about going inward,” Erik Berry (mandolin, vocals) adds, “building a focused bond as players and friends, and bringing a different mindset to the sounds Trampled by Turtles can make.” With the help of engineer Tom Herbers (Low, Jayhawks) the band moved into “Soleil Pines,” a log home outside of Duluth, to record. “You know how sometimes they say ‘less is more,’” notes Berry, “that’s what Stars and Satellites is about. “

Trampled by Turtles is Dave Simonett, Tim Saxhaug (bass, vocals), Dave Carroll (banjo, vocals), Erik Berry and Ryan Young (fiddle). Within the contained music scene of Duluth, the members of the band did their own time in punk and rock bands, brandishing their electricity proudly before switching to acoustic instruments. While they never set out to be a “bluegrass” band, Trampled by Turtles employs many of the same traditional techniques of the genre, but their differences in influences, attitude and attack make for their unique sound.

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For as volatile as it sounds, the actual dictionary term for “radioactive” leaves a lot to the imagination. But just as he does with every word he spits, Ghet-O-Vision/Shady recording artist Yelawolf gives it new life and meaning. Making it a fitting title for his official debut album.

“I think its a perfect word to describe where I’m going,” says the Alabama born rapper. “It’s the fallout, the aftermath of everything I’ve been through and here’s what’s left. This radioactive material.”

With a life story that no book could contain, the artist born Michael Atha could have auditioned for the “most interesting man in the world” title. Geograpically, he was born in a state that rests between Mississippi and Georgia but mentally he was raised in a state of constant change. Bouncing around between Alabama and Tennessee as a child, Wolf’s upbringing exposed him to the impoverished realities of both White America’s trailer parks and Black America’s ghettos.

The duality would finally define itself on a fateful evening where his mother was playing host to a group of friends who happened to be the roadie crew for rapstars Run DMC. It was that night where Wolf, who was raised on a healthy dosage of Southern Rock, would hear songs like “My Adidas” and Beastie Boys “Paul Revere” for the first time. From that point on he knew that Hip Hop was now in his DNA. Unfortunately up to this point Wolf had to battle Hip Hop listeners who judged by outside appearance…but he’s winning that fight now.

After years of toiling in the rap chitlin circuit, the mixtape matrix and doing hooks for a spectrum of artists ranging from Juelz Santana to Slim Thug, Wolf broke out in grand fashion with his critically acclaimed independent release Trunk Muzik (Ghet-O-Vision Ent.) on New Year’s Day 2010. Prideful boasts on songs like “I Wish” (“I wish a motherfucker would tell me that I ain’t Hip Hop/Bitch! You ain’t Hip Hop!) made listeners look beyond his tattoo-decorated skin and respect his skills. The excitement, paired with his unforgettable live shows, led to numerous magazine covers a record deal through Ghet-O-Vision/Interscope and then a partnership with Shady Records. The label founded by the man who many naysayers opted to unfavorably compare him to, Eminem.

“There is a fair comparison between us,” says Wolf. “But the true difference is vocal. The cadence and the words I use. There are words that I can rhyme that he can’t just because of my Southern accent. I can go to totally different places because of my slang alone.”

He wastes no time taking you to these places on Radioactive. With an additional meaning of aspiring to be “active on the radio” the album’s first single “Hard White” featuring club music kingpin Lil Jon is a dark, 808-fueled uppercut that shows traces of the 3-6 Mafia influence he picked up while living in Tennessee. Wolf takes it even further on “Throw It Up” featuring former Mafia member Gangsta Boo and Eminem, pulling from both sides of the tracks he was raised on.

“Juxtaposition is very comforting for me,” he says. “You can’t stare at a square, that’s boring. But if it’s broken, you stare at it longer and try to figure it out. This song is culturally impactful.”

With skateboarding being his first love before his affair with Hip Hop, Yelawolf already traveled the country living everywhere between California and New York, crashing on couches and park benches. So when he writes national anthems like “Made In the USA” that pairs lyrics about the dirt with a flowery hook, know that it comes from the perspective of a fly that has been in the dumps, not just on the wall.

“The grit and gutters are what I know the most about,” says Wolf who also had a stint as an artic fisherman in Alaska. “I always believed that the people who build the cars, clean the houses, dig the ditches and sell the drugs are the ones who make the world go round. As pretty as the hook is, it’s still sarcastic. The melody is great, but I was able to hide a real vocal point behind it.”

He continues to drive these points home on the tracks “Growing Up In the Gutter” featuring his Slumerican partner in rhyme Rittz and the instant smash “Let’s Roll” featuring fellow American badass Kid Rock. Both of which showcase his unique ability to shift gears from Southern Hip Hop to Southern Rock all the while remaining neutral in his own lane.

“I’m one of the most honest artists out there and I’ve always been this way,” says Wolf in mentioning his crotch-kicking manifesto “No Hands” where he shoots at naysayers and imitators. “It doesn’t matter what music I make whether I’m rapping on an 808 or over a guitar. I have a birth right to talk about these things that I do.”

Radioactive is also Yelawolf’s opportunity to open up and share some of the non-musical experiences that have made him the man and artist he is today.

On “I See You,” a song inspired by a talk with his grandmother, he talks about hitting rock bottom before finally realizing that you had the best in life all along. With “The Hardest Love Song In the World” he stays true to the title admitting that it’s two parts difficult writing a “rap ballad,” especially about the special type of woman he likes. Then in the appropriately named “The Last Song” he talks about his rocky relationship with his estranged biological father, for the final time.

“I’m not mad at him and I don’t have a grudge,” he says. “But I just had to get that off, musically.”

Though he’s been releasing material since the early 2000’s, Radioactive qualifies as Yelawolf’s official “debut.” Unlike his prior efforts that were recorded in basements and garages, only to be appreciated by his first core of loyal fans, this album was captured amidst rigorous touring, growing anticipation and now, expectation. If his ability to survive the last ten years are any indication, Wolf will rise to the occasion and beyond.

“I see this album as my Southernplayalistic and I hope it does what “Hey Ya!” or “B.o.B” did for Outkast,” says the artist who was featured on Big Boi’s 2010 single “You Ain’t No DJ” that was produced by Andre 3000. “The goal of making albums is seeing where else you can go. I made sure everything I made was at the core, true to what i was.”

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Mirrorring is Jesy Fortino, who has recorded under the Tiny Vipers moniker, and Liz Harris, better know as Grouper.

The recordings on this album came about through a songwriting session in Portland, Oregon.

The resulting sounds are contemplative, reflective, and introspective, creating a feeling as much as a song, a mood as much as a tune.

One could try to assess what part of the album each artist was responsible for, but that would prevent one from seeing the proverbial forest for the trees.

Foreign Body was recorded and produced in 2011.

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Formed in the Winter of 2009, Sons of Huns have hit the Northwest music scene in a whirlwind of face melting shows. Opening for the likes of Red Fang, Danava, and Mike Watt and his Missingmen, the Sons are a force to be reckoned with. Their brand of breakneck rock has catapulted them in Portland, OR as one of the tightest acts this city has seen. Witness the fitness for your self and see this power trio riff stack and rip the stage apart!

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You would think that playing in bands for a decade, and touring constantly in shitty vans, might instill the desire to make your new project a lucrative one. This however, hasn’t crossed the minds of the four members of Toronto’s Quest For Fire. The sonic assault that these guys unleash onto unsuspecting listeners in a live setting, through their sometimes 10+ minute journeys is pure power. A contemporary take on classic rock and psychedelia.

The band, made up of Andrew Moszynski (guitar), Chad Ross (guitar, vocals), Mike Maxymuik (drums), and Josh Bauman (bass), spent a little over a year holed up in a tiny practice space near Toronto’s lakeshore, refining their vision and obsessing over their common love of all things strange.

Upon the inevitable demise of Canada’s most beloved garage rock underdogs, The Deadly Snakes (In the Red Records), of which Andrew and Chad were core members, Quest For Fire began to prepare for their great unveiling before Toronto’s wary rock scene. On a hot August night in 2007, the band made their first appearance at ‘The Boat’, one of Toronto’s most cherished dive bars located in Kensington Market. They quickly became the city’s most sought-after new band. Show offers came flooding in to open for acts such as Black Mountain, Ladyhawk, Mudhoney, Earthless, Howlin Rain, Witch……….. As their old bands burned out, QFF took off. The Deadly Snakes faded with time and Mike’s tenure with Canadian metal/hardcore heads Cursed came to an abrupt end. One year after the release of their debut album on Montreal’s Storyboard label, QFF is stoked to announce that they have been picked up by New York’s Tee Pee Records. Their self titled debut will now be available in the U.S./Europe in June of 2009.

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Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $10 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Raised on Dirty South, Soul, Gospel, Regional Southern Rap and Bounce, Nightlife and Raves. 90′s club kid. DJing since ’98.

Beyondadoubt uses her roots to bring originality to club nightlife. Her emphasis these days falls in two categories:

1) Spinning her collection of rare, vintage soul and R&B 45s.
2) Playing her own rhythmically-infectious club productions around the globe.

With a fierce reputation spanning more than a decade, Beyondadoubt brings the party.

Her ground-breaking monthly, “I’ve Got a Hole in My Soul,” at Rotture has achieved legendary status with soul heavyweights and “beautifully ecstatic dancers” around the country.

Beyondadoubt hosts MRS, a monthly queer dance party with friends at Mississippi Studios. Strictly playing her own productions, she gets the raucous queer community out on the dance floor shaking ass to real, underground club music.

Beyondadoubt introduced Portland to Bounce, and the West Coast to its first performances from Big Freedia and Sissy Nobby, through her bi-monthly event at Holocene, Buck & Bounce. At Buck & Bounce, she plays an arsenal of original rap-influenced bass music.

SELECTED HIGHLIGHTS:

Summer 2011 : Beyondadoubt toured Europe and the UK as Beth Ditto’s tour DJ, playing festivals in London, France, Swizerland, Milan and Moscow, and played her own productions as well as 45s around London.

Fall 2011 : Beyondadoubt performed her original, bounce-based productions to sweat-dripping crowds at TBA, the Portland Institute of Contemporary Art’s Time Based Art Festival.

Summer 2012 : At Paris’ digital arts & modern music center, La Gaite Lyrique, Beyondadoubt’s productions brought a sold-out crowd to their knees at a show curated by PICA.

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 ABX (pronounced like three consecutive letters) and STV SLV (pronounced “steve sleeve”) are collectively known as The Hood Internet. For the past five years, the duo have been chewing up the indie, pop, rap and R&B landscapes and spitting out pure fire. Like laptop-armed alchemists, they draw from their expansive interest in the many faces of modern music and re-imagine songs for mass public consumption through thehoodinternet.com.

Nearly 500 mixes and literally millions of free downloads later, The Hood Internet continue to ricochet across North America like an Arkanoid ball, bringing their arsenal of reassembled tracks to crowded dancefloors. And the dance parties have definitely been ignited in every city they roll through, not to mention holding it down at Lollapalooza, Bonnaroo, SXSW, CMJ, Pitchfork’s #Offline, Mad Decent Block Party, and Camp Bisco.

Having connected with so many musicians over the past few years, ABX and STV SLV are putting the finishing touches on an album of completely new material–but in the spirit of Hood Internet’s fantasy-sports-league stylistic collabos, the album is bringing together many different musicians from as many different walks of sound, to create a modern collaboration made possible by the speed of the Real Internet.

In the meantime, there are always new mixes and mixtures on the way from The Hood, with original works and remixes filling the spaces in-between. A compilation of remixes and original production work dropped in December via NYC clothing label Mishka. And so much more music on the way! All eyes on the Hood.

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Mimicking Birds play lachrymose songs that synchronously evoke warm-heartedness and an overall compassion for life without coming off dilettante or sending you an invitation to a pity party… Think ethereal melodies by way of cosmic psych-folk, with themes continuously based in universal logic, evolutionary concepts, and the infiniteness among the ephemeral.

Mimicking Birds began as the solo project of Portland native Nate Lacy. Nate is joined by Aaron Hanson on drums, Ian Luxton on guitar, Adam Trachsel on bass, and Matthan Minster on keyboards and electric guitar with all members sharing vocal duties. Mimicking Birds’ self-titled album was released in March of 2009 on Isaac Brock’s home studio and was produced by Clay Jones and Isaac Brock.

A constant creator whether wielding pencils, paint, found items, or a guitar Nate Lacy grew up with an ardent interest in creating various facets of art to reflect life and the natural world. Throughout his adolescence he began to expand upon this curiosity aurally and documented it through a number of self-produced and seldom heard bedroom demos. A close friend enamored by the sounds, began sending these songs (unbeknownst to Lacy) to Isaac Brock who was a great source of inspiration to them both growing up. Brock soon contacted Lacy about releasing a record. Shortly after, the self-titled album was released, in what reads as somewhat of a rock fairy tale, Mimicking Birds would then make their national debut on tour with Modest Mouse.

Since then, Mimicking Birds has continued to tour the US in a brave Subaru Outback playing festivals and touring with acts such as Blind Pilot, Deertick, Laura Veirs, Jenny Lewis and sharing stages with Fleet Foxes, Menomena, The Tallest Man on Earth, and Conor Oberst. Mimicking Birds experiments with improvisation and dynamics while rotating personnel in a quest for a living soundscape.

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Brown Bird is better listened to in a room made of wood. Of course, it is easy to download the code and listen to the band on small computer speakers, but what is the point? You miss the warm layers of guitar, banjo, violin, double bass, cello, and bass drum (wooden rim) which hangs thick over their latest full-length effort, “Salt for Salt”.Recorded live to tape in Pawtucket, RI, “Salt For Salt” is the first album by Brown Bird to capture the intense energy of the duo’s live show, surging in waves that often swell into high-spirited, foot-stomping madness. David Lamb’s lyrics are as well-written as they are emotionally intelligent, thankfully avoiding the pitfalls of the wish-wash known as “modern-folk” or “singer-songwriting”. Lamb and his partner MorganEve Swain write simply, and the record is eerily sparse at times – a tambourine, a bass drum and the cello often the sole accompaniement to Lamb’s (what a name) cracked, wood-smoke voice.

Brown Bird are also not afraid to write experimentally – “Ebb and Flow” and “Shiloh” (the latter a longer, entirely instrumental track) each boast melodies worthy of a dervish, the melodic structure reminiscent more of Turkish or Greek rebetika than old-time or bluegrass. Lamb and Swain work beautifully together, with his banjo providing a backbone to a fiddle break, her harmonies a lonesome echo of the melody. But Brown Bird also know too much to be pure romantics; Lamb’s continual reference to ships clearly come from his years spent working at the shipyard in Warren, RI, just as their arrangements well only from a deep knowledge of the American folk tradition.

Paring down from five musicians on their last album to the duo of Lamb and Swain on “Salt For Salt” resulted in some necessary instrument changes – Swain, a lifelong violinist, spends most of the album on cello and double bass, instruments she picked up in the past two years. Lamb has a kick drum and woodblock/tambourine rigged to a second pedal in front of him, using his whole body and voice to carry the rhythm and melody simultaneously. This new configuration propels each song forward with a blur of hands, feet and voices.

A cantankerous and drafty two-man ship stationed in Providence, RI, Brown Bird plays original, traditional American music in the best sense possible. It is music that comes from a context but is not afraid of the context: a living root with a view towards the leaves.

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Crystal Antlers releases new LP Two-Way Mirror out July 12, 2011 on Recreation Ltd.

In early 2010, following the release of their first full-length album and the completion of nine US and European tours, Crystal Antlers finally settled down in the small Mexican farming town of La Punta Banda—it was there that the bulk of what would become Two-Way Mirror was born. After the drastic downsizing of their label, the legendary Touch and Go Records, the band was ready to take a moment and begin to bridge the gap into new territory. Beginning with their first two self-releases following their break with TG (Tapes Volume #1 Tentacles Era, and Little Sister/Dead Horses 7-inch) the band began exploring new pathways and genres, touching on elements of avant-garde pop, surf rock, 1970’s folk, and grunge. Combined with their already constantly evolving sound of experimental, punk, noise & psychedelia, and newest addition/influence to the band, organist Cora Foxx, Crystal Antlers developed a sound uniquely their own which is showcased within their second full length.

With the new material in hand, the band began recording Two-Way Mirror in September 2010 at the Compound studio in their hometown of Long Beach, California. Returning behind the mixing board were producer Ikey Owens and engineers Athony Arvizu & Jeff Lewis—the recording team behind Crystal Antlers seminal debut, EP. The production of Two-Way Mirror encompasses an enormous spectrum of sonic textures dynamically flowing from song to song with all of the intensity the band has come to be known for. Songs like “Summer Solstice” and “Fortune Telling” display a sense of depth and clarity only scarcely seen before from the band, while the songs “Sun-Bleached,” “Way Out,” and “Knee Deep” are an intimate look into the world of Crystal Antlers home recordings.

The completed tracking was sent to acclaimed producer/mixer Jack Endino, (known for his work with Nirvana, Mudhoney etc) for mixing, and finally to influential punk artist Raymond Pettibon for album art. Two-Way Mirror is truly the most defiant & ambitious work yet from Crystal Antlers, reaching far beyond even their own boundaries of sound & classification.

Recreation Ltd. is a self-operated project management company created by the band and manager Phil Hoelting.

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Tender Forever comes along in tough times. Nobody can ignore the dark places we’ve watched the world go in the past few years. But as divisions grows in the world, so does our ability to connect. Ours is a world exploding with communication and Tender Forever sits neatly in the center of that explosion. Lots of flights and some missed phone calls, friends here, lovers there. Missed connections and connections made. Melanie Valera’s Franco-American pop project spans nationalities and leaps forward towards a world where we can close the gaps between countries, ideologies and ultimately hearts. Move closer.

Valera was born in 1977, the year of the punk, and spent her formative years in the village of Maurrin, in south west France. As often happens, this small town kid pushed past the restrictions of that kind of environment, out into the larger world. In this case the city of Bordeaux and the University Michel de Montaigne of Arts. Her years in Bordeaux saw her developing an aesthetic that would transfer into her first musical projects the Bonnies, and later, Garrison Rocks. Armed with girl group and R&B classics The Bonnies took on the streets of Bordeaux, and with the partnership of a Californian band mate and intelligent, soulful pop Garrison Rocks took on Melanie’s expanding world.

Tender Forever became Melanie’s project in 2003, a solo effort which simplified and concentrated her music. A laptop, a long mic cord and almost too much enthusiasm was all it took. Tender Forever from the start was as much an experience as a band. That girl with the mic moves with passion, pounds out fear, falls to her knees, cranks up the visuals and passes it off to you. All of this quickly led her out of Bordeaux to the gentle state of Washington and that weird, weird city of Olympia. New friends and collaborators of a like mind (including Mirah, The Blow, Anna Oxygen and Calvin Johnson) kept it a busy summer. These new connections would be the beginning of a Northwest/Bordeaux connection sending bands back and forth, and further establishing Melanie’s new intercontinental artistic life.

The Soft and the Hardcore, released by K in 2005 was the culmination of everything Melanie had done up to this point and then some. Songs sung in the tiny moments of waiting, hoping and loving that we experience daily, fleshed out in full color and life. The explicitly personal and ecstatically universal converged into one, filled with the power of international anthems. The Soft and the Hardcore is a testament to the terrifying and trilling first moments of love and self realization.

With her 2007 release, Wider, Melanie stretched out across both the globe and an expansive musical landscape. The album was recorded between Bordeaux and Olympia in the Dub Narcotic studio, hotel rooms, friend’s basements and guestrooms. Both lush and focused, Wider portrays an artist and person with new confidence, at home in a big/small world. For all their power Tender Forever songs remain just that — tender. A song is a delicate thing and Melanie coaxes these fragile things into the larger world. Tender Forever is the biggest, softest sound you’ve heard. It’s a kick drum in an empty warehouse while little kids play right outside.

Melanie’s third full length album, No Snare, was released in June 2010. This album moves away from the more exuberant dance oriented songs of past years into a darker and more melancholy direction. We get a deeper, denser sound, with songs that push through the forest as the evening comes, dripping wet; the lights of a little house up ahead. Perhaps it’s her current residence in the damp and dirty Pacific Northwest. Maybe it’s adulthood. Throughout Tender Forever’s work there is a commitment to understanding feelings and desires and seeing them through to completion. No Snare pushes through the wake and lays the turmoil to rest.

Tender Forever’s new album “Where Are We From” takes lost souls by the hand to create a chain of blinding light that leads to freedom and togetherness. Each song is impeccably different from the last and yet together, the collection is undeniably holistic and tightly interlaced. This is what you listen to on a road trip to your new self, louder than everything as the interstate ahead of you ribbons into dust and the blur of life is a distraction of sparkly lights. This is what makes your hands beat into your steering wheel and your head throw backwards to sing along. This is what you listen to when you need to shrug off an old armor in order to be reborn and washed clean while a steady hand gently pushes you in the direction of growth. Where Are We From is your new path, should you be brave enough to walk it?

4 successful opuses (K RECORDS) and more than 800 international shows later, she has worked on  multimedia  projects,  including   collaborations with film maker Ted Passon, Multimedia artist Nick Lally and producer Christopher Doulgeris. She has shared the stage with  Cocorosie, Men, Deerhoof, The Blow, Calvin Johnson, Mirah, Electrelane and many more. Most recently, she performed at the TBA FESTIVAL 2010 in Portland-OR, the Whitney Museum in New York City and La Cité Internationale in Paris and soon at the Arts centers Georges Pompidou and La Gaité Lyrique in Paris to represent Portland’s scene. She has composed scores for multiple shorts, video games and advertisement. Melanie Valera’s multimedia pop projects explore and challenge spaces, overlap realities, tell you stories, span nationalities and leaps forward towards a world where we can close the gaps between countries, ideologies and ultimately hearts. She just currently released a 4th album on K records and has received the RAAC Grant to complete a collaborative project called with visual artist and animator Peter Burr. She went on a national tour playing the bass, noodling on keys and computer programs, drumming and singing with Thao and Mirah. A new coming LP 2013 announces exciting collaborations with Portland active scene members as well as new multimedia adventures that she just partially showcased at the Henry Art Museum in January 2012.

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Future Islands’ romantic synth sound scales new heights with On the Water, the Baltimore trio’s most ambitious and fully realized statement yet. Built around a song cycle exploring love, loss, and memory, their latest album finds the band continuing to deliver pounding rhythms, swelling melodies, and undeniable hooks – but finding new ways to probe inner space and tug at hearts.

Convening in March 2011 in Elizabeth City, NC’s historic, waterfront Andrew S. Sanders House, vocalist Samuel T. Herring, bassist William Cashion, and keyboardist Gerrit Welmers lived together in a space that served as both studio and sleeping quarters. The band used this tranquil retreat to refine their most reflective and mature batch of songs to date, adding new material in the process.

What emerged is a lush yet visceral album about two parallel journeys–one physical and one psychological. On the Water’s narrator offers enough detail that their story feels personal, yet open enough that any listener can inhabit each twist and emotional pang as their own.

Travelling on foot, we seek something – an exorcism, an epiphany, an ending. Memories wash across us as in life: nonlinear, linked by emotional resonance rather than conventional chronology. And so, the pain of letting go channeled by “The Great Fire” collides with a moment’s fleeting serenity in the Eno-esque “Open”; the triumphant rallying cry “Give Us the Wind, ” despite its confident declaration of individual strength, remains a mile away from final chapter “Tybee Island.” It is there the song cycle ends, and what is discovered in “Tybee Island” will be as different as the lives lived by each person who finds their way to this album.

On the Water may unearth aural memories as well. The mind may flash upon our first encounters with New Order’s “Ceremony,” David Bowie’s “Heroes,” or The Cure’s Disintegration, memories which, are continually reborn and reimagined in the context of the here and now. And as the song-cycle’s narrator comes to terms with his own memories, his singular journey collapses into the collective experience of album-closer “Grease.” It is here that the “I” of the nine previous songs collapses into the “we” of Future Islands, now singing the literal journey of the people who came together by the ocean to deliver these songs into our ears.

Far from just a narrative trope, the ocean played an integral role in On the Water’s creation. The bulk of the album was recorded with waves pounding sand mere feet away. The album opens and closes with field recordings made by the band on a nearby dock, and one pivotal track, “Tybee Island,” began with vocals recorded on the beach (subsequently fleshed out in the studio with additional instrumentation).

The ocean inhabits every note of these songs. On the Water is an addictive ride that demands repeat listens, eagerly awaiting the test of time. To produce these results, Future Islands fleshed out its sound with the additions of cello, violin, marimba, and field recordings. As with their 2010 breakthrough album In Evening Air, On the Water was produced by frequent collaborator Chester Endersby Gwazda, perhaps best known as producer of Dan Deacon’s Bromst. Noted guests include Wye Oak’s Jenn Wasner, who provides vocals on “The Great Fire,” and Double Dagger’s Denny Bowen on live drums and additional percussion.

For all its undeniable weight, On the Water is not a sullen concept album. Every track on the record works both as a contribution to the whole and as a stand-alone pleasure, evident in the insistent throbs, addictive melodies, and stirring vocals of tracks like “Close to None,” “Balance,” and first single “Before the Bridge.”

Make no mistake, On the Water is a record that aims to both break your heart and heal your wounds.

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Negotiations, the fifth full-length album written, recorded, and produced by The Helio Sequence, would sound different had it not been for a flood. In 2009, while touring in support of Keep Your Eyes Ahead, singer-guitarist Brandon Summers got an unexpected phone call in the middle of the night. Back home in Portland, OR, the band’s studio/practice space was under nearly a foot of water. Heavy rains had caused the building’s plumbing to overflow like a geyser. But Summers and drummer-keyboardist, Benjamin Weikel, were lucky: All of their best equipment was either on tour with them, or racked high enough off the studio floor to be spared.

Still, the band needed a new home. After three months of searching, Summers and Weikel settled into a 1500-square-foot, former breakroom-cafeteria in an old warehouse. They no longer had to work their recording schedule around loud rehearsals by neighboring bands, but were free to create late into the night in uninterrupted seclusion. With twice the square footage, the space also had room for more gear, a lot more gear. They decided to use this opportunity to try something different.

Summers and Weikel, who started playing together in 1996 and self-produced their first EP in 1999, have always been gearheads. But it wasn’t until the success of Keep Your Eyes Ahead that they could afford to step things up: The duo spent months (and many hard-earned dollars) retooling their studio. They left behind much of the cleaner-sounding modern digital studio equipment and instruments they’d always relied on, and embraced vintage gear that would color their recordings with a warmer, deeper sound: Tape and analog delays, spring and plate reverbs, tube preamps, ribbon microphones, and analog synths.

As the new studio came together, so did the songwriting. It proved to be the most spontaneous, open, and varied writing process they had ever experienced. Weikel, who was listening to minimalist/ambient composers like Roedelius and Manuel Goettsching, had created dozens of abstract synth loops of chord progressions and arpeggios. The two would put a loop on and improvise together with Summers on guitar and Weikel on drums, recording one take of each jam. Other songs like “One More Time”, “October” and “The Measure” quickly formed from rough one-minute sketches by Summers, while the down tempo “Harvester of Souls” was completely improvised musically and lyrically in a single take.

Tempering the free form approach to writing was Summers and Weikel’s meticulous attention to production and arrangement. Taking cues from the spaciousness, subtlety, and detail of Brian Eno and late-era Talk Talk records, they moved forward. Listening to the recorded live jam sessions, they set to work transforming the ditties into actual songs. “Open Letter,” “Silence on Silence,” “Downward Spiral” and the title track — some of the spacier, mesmerizing songs on Negotiations — came together in this way. Summers’ one-minute demos were brought to life in collaboration by Weikel spending weeks working on sound treatments and synth landscapes to enhance the songs.

Lyrically, Summers affirmed the improvised ethos, working deep into the night ad-libbing alone in front of the mic, abandoning pre-written lyrics and instead preferring to create in the moment. His delivery was largely inspired by the starkness and understated romanticism of Sinatra’s Capitol era “Suicide Albums”, imparting a more introspective and personal tone. “I used to view a lyric as a statement,” he says, “Now, I see it more as a letter you’re writing to yourself or a conversation with your subconscious.”

This collection of shimmering, reverb-heavy songs is a meditation on those inner dialogues (hence, Negotiations) with solitude, memory, misgivings, loss, atonement, acceptance and hope. Most of all, it’s a record that serves as a testament to the beauty, blessing, and excitement of a fresh start.

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Do The Pains of Being Pure At Heart belong? After garnering widespread acclaim from the likes of The New York Times, Pitchfork and NME to countless indiepop forums, blogs and even Live Journals for their out-of-nowhere s/t 2009 Slumberland debut, have The Pains made the kind of record that will matter to the kind of people to whom records still matter? From the opening explosions of electric guitar on “Belong” (“We don’t”) and the sumptuously synthetic dance pop perfection of “The Body” to the prom-in-heaven chorus of “Even in Dreams” and the closing moments of the uncommonly sincere and affecting “Strange” (“…and dreams can still come true”) the answer is an unqualified, resounding (and damn good sounding) “Yes.” Having moved beyond mimicking, albeit exquisitely, their impressive record collections, this album is a celebration of the possibilities of pop from New York City’s pre-eminent indiepop believers. It is as much an affirmative answer to “can they” (rise above their influences? Capture the magic of their debut without repeating it? Use color on their album sleeves?) as it opens the door to the more difficult question of “how do they?” Or more precisely, how do they make such affecting, yet unaffected pop music? How do they sound at once confidently vulnerable and carelessly thoughtful? How does a band on Slumberland make a record with two of the most recognized producers in the world and come out the other end sounding even more like themselves than before? The dichotomies are daunting, but their resolution on Belong is nothing short of stunning. Recorded with the production and mixing team of Flood (Depeche Mode, U2) and Alan Moulder (Smashing Pumpkins, Jesus and Mary Chain, Ride), Belong unleashes added power, while retaining all the sweet sweet melodies that still hit that pop spot. “I definitely see this album as keeping with what we started doing at the beginning, only more,” says singer/guitarist Kip Berman. “More immediate, more noisy, more beautiful. We never stopped believing in noise and pop, but now we’ve pushed both further. Compared to the last record, It’s far more visceral, more vital, more of the body. It’s about feeling, not feelings.” A continuation of what they started is a good thing, considering the loyal admirers and grass-roots support for what “could be the most promising indie pop group around” (Pitchfork). Never ones to get bogged down in self-seriousness, though, what we’ve got here is a band who tends to spend most interviews talking about how barely-remembered underground pop bands of the 80s and 90s are far superior to their own music, eats copious amounts of Haribo Gummi Candy and plays Boggle and Basketball on the road. “The whole experience has just been a lot of fun for us – and a huge learning process,” says singer/keyboardist Peggy Wang, “We’ve really always gone more on intuition than technique. We’ve always followed our heart. My favorite bands are the ones where you can tell the people are true friends and would be hanging out together even without playing music – or at least that’s what we are and I wouldn’t want it any other way.” One can certainly feel the intuitiveness and immediacy in each of the album’s ten tracks. But where past offerings might’ve cocooned front man Kip Berman’s woozy tales and beckoning high tenor in layers of gauze, Belong bathes them in a cathedral-like stained-glass light, revealing the beauty and pop perfection that once hid beneath fuzz and reverb. Radiant and heavenly, the band exults in the freedom and possibilities of pushing their sound beyond simple fuzz pop motifs and, liberated from the burden of those fuzzy memories, elevates their songwriting to new heights. “Alan Moulder and Flood had a lot to do with helping us believe in ourselves, but they didn’t try to change the way we did things,” says Berman. “They just helped us focus on the things that made us ‘us,’ and allowed us to go all-in on the things we loved and strip away the things we didn’t. It was an amazingly validating experience to even get a chance to work with them, since they came into this because they saw something in our music, not because we were some kind of fat paycheck or will win them a Grammy. Perhaps not, but The Pains of Being Pure at Heart have come a long way since their beginnings as drum-machine equipped neophytes playing a legendary 5 song, ten-minute set at Peggy’s birthday party in March of 2007. Through a self-released EP in 2007 and a series of eagerly-received singles like 2008’s “Everything With You” and “Kurt Cobain’s Cardigan” the band developed an intensely loyal underground following. Upon release of their self-titled debut album in 2009, that acclaim extended to well-respected cultural tastemakers like The New York Times (“sensitive and sublime, Best of 2009) Pitchfork (Best New Music, Best of 2009) Stereogum (“Addictive pop gold” Best of 2009) and The NME (“pure indiepop to hold close to your heart,” Best of 2009). Looking forward, Spin chose Belong as one of the upcoming “winter albums that matter most”, and Pitchfork gave the single “Heart in Your Heartbreak “Best New Music, stating “It’s immediately appealing in the same way their debut was.” “At first, it kind of surprised me that anyone would really take notice at all,” recalls Berman. “We’re an indiepop band and so many of our heroes were pretty much ignored beyond really obsessive music nerds – people like us. So I never expected much more than about maybe 50 people (parents not included) to like us – but hopefully those people would like us a lot. At some point, it occurred to me that ‘hey, we’re not hitting a wall here, we’re actually doing things right and people that might not care about out of print Rocketship singles or Sonic Youth b-sides actually like this as pop music – which to me is even more cool. We’re always eager to tell people about bands that are way better than us and educate younger people about all the cool, under-appreciated music out there.” Belong’s strength is the quality of the songwriting and each songs ability to sound distinct from one another while still holding together as a unified record from start to finish. Some, like the fuzz-mad “Heaven’s Gonna Happen Now,” “Girl of 1,000 Dreams” and statuesque “Too Tough” wouldn’t sound out of place on their first LP, taking their cues from Berman’s plaintive voice and liberal use of fuzz guitar. Others, like “The Body” and “My Terrible Friend” derive their power from drummer Kurt Feldman’s pulsing rhythms and Peggy Wang’s more pronounced keyboard lines – a winning development that helps push the band beyond their comfort zones to great effect. One place they never deviate is in their connection with their fans. Like them, The Pains have an idealism that stems from a nearly unhealthy devotion to pop music. Talking to the members one needs to pull out their band-to-conversation calculator, as they are likely to go off about bands they love – from The Pastels, The Promise Ring and Black Tambourine to Sonic Youth, Smashing Pumpkins and O.M.D. “The whole idea of the album, for me, is about what it’s like to not belong,” says Berman. In part it’s like our band – we have all these amazing opportunities, but I feel constantly out of place. Not ungrateful – but like, undeserving. On the other side it’s the idea of not feeling a sense of belonging individually and how it’s so great to be able to find someone else who doesn’t belong so you can not belong together. That’s what this band has always been about – being on the outside looking in. We somehow snuck our way into the conversation of ‘real bands’ even though I still think don’t really belong.” Berman might want to rethink that statement — with Belong, The Pains of Being Pure at Heart have created a piece of sonic bliss that fits – for the moment, and for the long-run. The Pains of Being Pure At Heart are: · Peggy Wang – keys + vox · Alex Naidus – bass · Kurt Feldman – drums · Kip Berman – guitar + vox

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Poison Idea was started in 1980 in Portland, Oregon, by vocalist Jerry A. (Lang). Within a year, the band had a solid lineup with drummer Dean Johnson, guitarist Tom Roberts (aka Pig Champion), and bassist Glen Estes. The band was motivated by the Germs and Black Flag, and took their musical cues from bands such as Discharge and SOA. Pushing the speed limits of contemporary punk rock, they played raw and angry hardcore the likes of which had rarely been heard before (or since). Their 1983 debut EP, Pick Your King, is a classic and arguably the best hardcore record ever released. Its subsequent followup, Record Collectors are Pretentious Assholes (featuring Pig Champion’s substantial collection on the cover), saw Chris “Tense” replacing Glen on bass. Both were put out on a small label from Eugene, Oregon called Fatal Erection.

In 1986, Poison Idea released the aptly titled Kings of Punk LP on Pushead’s Pusmort label. By this time, the band’s sound had changed from manic, breakneck thrash, to a more driving, Motorhead-influenced attack – losing none of their intensity, anger, or nihilism. In the next few years, Poison Idea’s lineup (mainly the rhythm section) changed several times. 1987′s War All the Time was somewhat of a misstep – nowhere near as powerful as their previous output – although the two EPs released the next year both had good material.

By 1989, Poison Idea seemed to pull it together; after trouble with record companies and distributors in the past, they started their own label, American Leather, and began by reissuing their 1982 demo. The band recorded the excellent Discontent 7″ and also found their most stable lineup in years: Jerry A., Pig Champion, Myrtle Tickner, and Thee Slayer Hippie (although the second guitarist seemed to switch between “Mondo” and Aldine Strichnine). In 1990, Poison Idea released the classic Feel the Darkness LP, successfully combining (where so, so many others had failed) the best elements of hardcore and hard rock for a dark, powerful sound.

In the next three years, Poison Idea put out several more records on American Leather – two more full-lengths, a string of 7″s, and an LP collection of all covers. When Pig Champion decided to leave the band in 1993, Poison Idea called it quits. However, a few years later in 1996, the band briefly reformed and recorded a 7″ for Taang!, who also reissued (again) most of their early catalog.

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Black Mountain doesn’t have a creation myth, or not exactly: “Most of us were found standing ’round parties wearing similar T-shirts or shoes and nodding our heads to something cool on the stereo,” Stephen McBean explains. “Others were heard from behind walls but never seen ’til years later. You share a smoke, do a shot then end up in a van together for what seems like the rest of your life.” 

In the late 1990s, Vancouver wasn’t particularly renowned for its raucous, all-encompassing psych-rock scene. “Just like everywhere else, Vancouver’s music scene has had its ‘up’ years, followed by its ‘down’ years,” Matt Camirand says. “When a city is in a musical honeymoon everyone goes to shows, more places start having shows, more people start bands, etc. Soon it’s too much of a good thing, people begin to take it for granted and eventually it all dies out like the dinosaurs. I think when Black Mountain started, Vancouver was near the end of a musical honeymoon.”

That lack of sonic spirit, however disheartening, led to a certain kind of aesthetic freedom. It helped birth a sound swampy, psychedelic, ecstatic, wild unlike much else in the indie-rock universe. “The complete indifference here to rock music in general at least at the time of our formation, it’s a bit different now made us completely unselfconscious about what we were doing,” Josh Wells adds. “Nobody gave a shit, so we weren’t making music for any people in particular.”

From those dank basement parties, Black Mountain came together organically vocalist Amber Webber was borrowed from another outfit and recruited for a 2003 tour, Jeremy Schmidt, Wells’ downstairs roommate, was assimilated based on the strength of his “solo synth-scape/space rock,” which according to Wells, “blew their minds” and churned out a handful of striking lo-fi recordings. In 2005, on the strength of those tracks, Black Mountain signed to Jagjaguwar and released its acclaimed eponymous debut. “The band was really just being born during the making of the first record,” Schmidt says. A follow-up, In the Future, arrived to critical adulation and copious Devil-horning in early 2008.

A little over a year later, Black Mountain’s third LP, Wilderness Heart, was built on the west coast of America, in part at London Bridge Studios in Seattle, but predominantly at Sunset Sound, a former automotive repair shop in Hollywood that began as an outpost for Disney (songs for Bambi, Mary Poppins, and 101 Dalmations were laid to tape there) before it went rock n’roll, capturing tracks from The Doors, Ringo Starr, the Rolling Stones, and more. L.A. with its tacos and sunsets, starlets and hills and post-Deco kitsch was a considerable inspiration. “Just being under the influence of one’s surroundings, as we were while recording in L.A., had a tremendous impact on the process and the way we play. Consequently, the LA sessions have a free and summery vibe. The Seattle sessions, made in the grey, rainy environs that we’re used to up there, have a chillier, more claustrophobic feeling,” Wells explains.

“Shacking up in Sunset Sound for a few days put a smile on everyone’s face,” McBean says. “We were definitely spoiled more this time ’round as far being able to plug into a lot of pretty historical gear. There’s something about playing an old Martin or Gibson and thinking ’bout how many hands have strummed it and all the songs written on ‘em,” he continues. “You can’t put ‘em down you want to continue the lineage.”

The new record is packed with succinct rock songs that pulse and pound with startling precision: it pummels you, you ask for more. Wilderness Heart is arguably Black Mountain’s tightest, most concentrated outing, but there’s still plenty of raw rock energy at work. “It’s our most metal and most folk oriented record so far,” McBean says. “I’m not gonna say it our best record or the album that we always dreamt of making ’cause that’s what everyone says. It’s all about where we were at the time the machines were rolling. You can’t control the electricity or how your limbs were moving that day. You have to erase the visions and just go along for the ride.”

“It’s a Black Mountain pop record, which is to say it’s nothing like pop at all,” Wells says. “This was the fastest record we’ve ever made. We’re used to spending a lot of time deliberating over the songs and spacing out recording sessions over years. Start to finish, this album was made in four months, which is something like a miracle for us. We’ve never worked with producers before and that was a challenge; for us to let go and let two outsiders into the process, D. Sardy and Randall Dunn it took some growing for us to be truly open, but this album is all the better for it.”

The band cites a slew of disparate influences New Order, King Crimson, Studio 54, Alex Chilton, sunshine, Janis Joplin, Please Kill Me, Shirley Collins, Mickey Newbury, jalapeno salsa, Night of The Hunter, Cactus Taqueria, Funky16Corners podcasts, Dennis Wilson, the house blowing up in the desert at the end of Zabriskie Point but, as Schmidt points out, “Who knows how these things connect with the holistic mix of often dissonant forces that become Black Mountain?”

Indeed: Listen and find out.

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No longer is it a crime to mash a hip-hop acappella into a techno track. In this arena, A-Trak, aka Alain Macklovitch, leads the pack. The 27 year-old Montreal native rides the line between hip-hop and electronic beats in a refreshing hybrid of everything ass-shaking.” (BPM Magazine, issue 86)

Very few DJs can jump from club sets to high-profile festival performances, to Kanye West’s larger-than-life stadium shows with ease. In today’s DJ culture, A-Trak holds a truly unique place. He and partner Nick Catchdubs founded America’s most trendsetting new label, Fool’s Gold, launching the careers of artists such as Kid Sister and Kid Cudi. Fool’s Gold’s mission to merge all aspects of club music was already outlined in Trizzy’s original mix tape manifesto, Dirty South Dance (2007), which set the tone for his own production. He is now one of the most sought-after remixers in electronic music, and his remixes for the likes of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Boys Noize have become undeniable mainstays in DJ sets the world over. 2009 saw the release of two critically acclaimed DJ mixes, Infinity +1 and Fabriclive 45, as well as the birth of Duck Sauce, his collaboration with Armand Van Helden. The duo’s radio smash “aNYway” cemented itself as the dance anthem of the year, A-Trak’s first true chart-topper with two videos in international rotation and across-the-board support from Pete Tong to Busy P, David Guetta to 2manydjs.

Not bad for a kid whom many viewed as a 90’s turntablism prodigy. Indeed, Alain’s career began at age 15 when he won the 1997 DMC World Championships and proceeded to take home every other DJ title known to man. He then toured the globe, first alongside Q-Bert’s Invisibl Skratch Piklz and then with Craze and the Allies. In 2004, he was handpicked by Kanye to be his tour DJ. A near decade of youthful meanderings was captured on his acclaimed DVD Sunglasses Is A Must.

Somewhere along the line, A-Trak also became a streetwear culture icon, collaborating with Nike, New Era, Kidrobot, Zoo York and pretty much every designer worth his salt. And all the while, his brother morphed into the lead singing lothario in the acclaimed electro-pop sensation Chromeo. The last couple of years have seen Trizzy headlining tours and festival stages the world over. Add to that scratching on Common’s classic Be, Kanye’s Late Registration and Graduation, and Kid Cudi’s Man On The Moon, as well as producing Kid Sister’s debut album Ultraviolet, songs with Lupe Fiasco, and original releases with Stones Throw and Kitsune.

After years of schlepping vinyl, accumulating air miles and dressing smart, A-Trak has finally become the man to call to make the kids dance. Ask him and he’ll tell you that this is the moment he’s been waiting for his whole career.

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California native Chelsea Wolfe has always embodied both light and dark. Yet though her music is a raw strain of electric folk tinted by black metal and deep blues, it never wallows in despair. Instead, it wraps itself like a thick blanket around the human experience, encouraging uplift, seeking triumph. Her voice is a haunting call, warm and lingering, and her lyrics acknowledge life’s obscure and melancholy moments in service to the unlikely truths and beauty they so often reveal. Her music exudes strength in the midst of adversity. It makes sense then that her influences run from Nick Cave and Selda Bagcan, to director Ingmar Bergman, with nods to the dramatic flair of Antony Hegarty, and even more so that she hails from the wilder, woodsy part of her state.

Wolfe’s unique romanticism began early, but it was always a private affair. At 9, she started sneaking into her father’s home studio to record warped keyboard covers and originals. Growing up, she lacked the confidence to share her work, and it wasn’t until much later that she even considered making music for others to hear. But in 2009, Wolfe embarked on a three-month stint abroad with a group of nomadic performance artists, playing cathedrals, basements and abandoned nuclear factories, and returned home with a new vision and drive. She recorded two albums worth of material back to back, starting by toting around an 8-track and recording as the mood hit, eventually editing her findings into her stunning 2010 debut, The Grime & the Glow. Described as both healing and harrowing, enchanting and narcotic, the album established Wolfe as an elemental force on the rise. At last ready to embrace her gift, she relocated to Los Angeles in the same year and recorded her second album Ἀποκάλυψις (pronounced “apokalypsis”) which found Wolfe in an actual studio with her live band, even as she maintained the strikingly visceral elements of her powerful debut. It was released in summer of 2011 and showcased her unique songwriting ability, as well as a serious heaviness of sound and an ever-present counterweight: that transcendent voice, which rightly landed it on numerous best of 2011 lists.

Since overcoming her initial hesitation to perform in front of crowds, Chelsea Wolfe has come a long way very quickly. Her name exploded in the art world after NYC pop artist Richard Phillips used her song “Moses” in an art-film starring Sasha Grey which premiered at the 2011 Venice Biennale. She recorded an exclusive i-N Session with i-D Magazine and was given “New Band of the Day” by The Guardian and “Band Crush” by NYLON Magazine. Her aesthetic has naturally been connected to fashion and she has been photographed wearing designers such as Alexander McQueen, Iris van Herpen, and Mordekai. Chelsea Wolfe is already hard at work on a third album, fittingly self-titled considering her newfound poise, due out in 2012.

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Portland, Oregon duo Kevin O’Connor and Lisa Molinaro create lush and evocative instrumental soundscapes under the name Talkdemonic. Formed in 2003, Talkdemonic began as Kevin’s pursuit for new frontiers in percussion and analog sound. Lisa joined Kevin shortly thereafter, further shaping Talkdemonic’s innovative style with her rich viola and cello arrangements. Talkdemonic released their 2004 débutMutiny Sunshine on Lucky Madison Records. In 2006, Kevin and Lisa went on to sign with Arena Rock Recording Co., releasing both Beat Romantic and Eyes At Half Mast, and garnering critical attention for their ability to pioneer the marriage of strings with unyieldingly strong percussion and inescapable harmony.

The bands fourth record Ruins finds them continuing to expand, stretching dynamic range from quiet brooding to all out distorted assault. Molinaro’s scenic melodies accompany the ever present forward motion of O’Connor’s steady beats. With a little help from Clay Jones and Isaac Brock in the mixing room this is Talkdemonic’s most well composed and realized work to date.

At times impetuous yet palliative, Talkdemonic’s sound captures the universally intangible, what we wish to say but cannot find words, a surge and a calm, instrumental modern music at its finest.

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It’s been 4 years since Joe Pug quit his day job as a carpenter, but his remarkable rise in the indie-folk world has been driven by the same hard-worn work ethic.  His path has been an unusual one, which has often challenged the traditional rulebook of the music industry, but even now as he prepares to release his second album “The Great Despiser“, it has always been characterized by one prevailing idea: Find a way.

After dropping out of college the day before he was to begin his senior year, he moved to Chicago and picked up the guitar he hadn’t played since his teenage years.  The songs that he wrote would eventually become the Nation of Heat EP, a self-released gem that has gone on to sell over 20,000 copies.  It was in those heady early days that the idea was born for a unique promotional strategy that would launch Pug into the national consciousness.  In an increasingly fragmented and disorganized music industry, it was harder and harder for a new artist to break through the white noise.  With no publicist and no access to radio, Pug decided to recruit his fans to help spread the word.  He took his most popular songs, printed up CDs, and offered to send them free of charge to anyone who wanted to share his music with their friends.  And share they did.  “People requested 2 copies, 5 copies, 10 copies, 20 copies.  We’d send them all.  We even covered the postage,” he remembers.  The impact was immediate and undeniable.  “Suddenly we’d be rolling into towns that we’d never been before and there would be crowds there who knew the songs. Our fans essentially became like a radio station for us, and they still are.”  While skyrocketing demand eventually forced a switch over to a digital version, the offer remains to this day at joepugmusic.com, and has been downloaded over 30,000 times.

The momentum attracted the attention of Nashville indie label Lightning Rod Records, who signed Pug and released his full-length debut “Messenger” in 2010.  The album was met with critical acclaim, with Paste Magazine saying “Unless your surname is Dylan, Waits, Ritter or Prine, you could face-palm yourself to death trying to pen songs half as inspired as the 10 tracks on Joe Pug’s debut full-length.” It featured plenty of the literate acoustic tracks that he was best known for, but an electric remake of “Speak Plainly Diana”, which was done acoustically on his first EP, provided some foreshadowing of direction he would later head.  He toured incessantly behind the album, which included appearances at Lollapalooza, Bonnaroo, and the Newport Folk Fest as well as tours with Josh Ritter and Levon Helm.  A higher profile did nothing to dull his independent streak, though. He experimented extensively with ticketing his shows directly with very low service fees, and often none at all.  ““Our guiding principle has always been: if we take care of the fans, they’ll take care of us.”

In 2011 Pug was lured to Austin, Texas by its storied songwriting tradition.  “Chicago is a very difficult place to leave, especially when it has embraced my music to the level that it has. But I found myself enamored with the contributions that Texas has made to the American songbook and I had to go see where it was born.”  The first album that he wrote there, ironically, would be recorded in Chicago at Engine Recording Studio with producer Brian Deck (Modest Mouse, Iron & Wine, Califone, etc). In addition to Pug, “The Great Despiser” features various acclaimed musicians, including Sam Kassirer (Josh Ritter, Langhorne Slim) on piano, organ and marimba, Califone’s Jim Becker on guitar,  as well as backing vocals from The Hold Steady’s Craig Finn on the album’s title track. “With this album, we finally created arrangements that can stand shoulder to shoulder with the lyrics.  It was a real privilege to work with musicians who were able to further the songs’ narratives with their instruments.  The songs were written in the same way but were realized with sharper color.”

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“The dude who made NYC dance parties fun again” — Brooklyn Ski Club

“I’m not one of the Schmucks who will lament over New York not being ‘what it used to be’, but I will say that we’re not fans of this dismal wasteland of Eurotrash tourists and guidos with polo shirts unbuttoned down to their navels grinding to the repetitive pounding of bad electro … Enter Jonathan Toubin, and his simple-yet-visionary approach to revamping the entire lanscape of New York and Brooklyn from midnight till the after hours. His New York Night Train parties have become stuff of sheer legend do to the simple fact that Toubin actually seems to care about what he is producing. His meticulous approach has paid off quite handsomely as pretty much each and every party with the Jonathan Toubin stamp on it seems to be the biggest party going on for that given night.” — Jason Diamond, Impose Magazine

The dawn of 2010 finds New York Night Train conductor/soul proprietor Mr. Jonathan Toubin the most popular, prolific, and highest-earning rock and soul DJ on the North American nightclub circuit — taking the 45rpm dance party to a whole new level conceptually, culturally, and commercially. Though known for “maximum rock and soul” dance club sets and multi-media “Happenings,” his Soul Clap and Dance-Off party has, in the last year, put Mr. T on the map as soul man and left a gigantic footprint on contemporary urban nightlife. Working over 600 gigs the last two years, Mr. Jonathan Toubin has managed to keep one boot in the counter-culture from which he emerged (punk bars, DIY basements, loft parties, art galleries, music venues, and shady afterhours spots) while crossing over to dance clubs, prestigious festivals, boutique hotels, museums, ivy league colleges, fashion parties, gay events, arena pop/rock shows, and even raves — receiving nominations for nightlife awards from the fancier side of New York culture in the process.

Jonathan Toubin conceived the Soul Clap and Dance-Off more than three years ago as a monthly outlet to play his soul 45s to a small north Brooklyn underground art/rock social community in the spirit of the mid-1990s indie/punk scene parties. He added a brief dance-contest to the mix to make the event more interesting. As this humble makeshift neighborhood underdog evolved into an institution, Mr. T employed the party’s popularity as a weapon against tired hit nights, 80s nights, and other mediocre contemporary dance culture — offering an alternative in the possibility of dancing to exciting music most of us have never heard before. The epic size, frequency, and geographical breadth of the Soul Clap the last couple of years has been a seed for a new wave of soul dance culture among indie rockers, punks, and hipsters first in Brooklyn, next in Manhattan, and, in the last year, around the world — garnering slews of imitators and developing a new nightlife economy everywhere from Portland, ME to Portland, OR, from Canada to Mexico and even as far away as the Middle East.

A label-owner/veteran musician/published academic/career journalist, Mr Jonathan Toubin began regularly DJing punk/garage/noise rock weekly at the Lower East Side’s legendary Motor City Bar in 2006. Within a year, Mr. Toubin was working nightly and mixing in eclectic genres (soul, jazz, psych, international styles, etc.). Casting mp3s, CDs, and eventually LPs aside to step up to the challenge of spinning exclusively in the biggest and baddest musical medium ever, the 45rpm vinyl record, New York Night Train’s conductor increasingly became known as a soul/garage 45 DJ. Focusing on dancers instead of collectors, cutting $1 commoners with $100 rarities with strategic pitching, sequencing, EQ-ing, and transitioning, Mr T distinguished himself from typical mod, garage, northern soul, and funk 45 retro-nights by developing a playfully unique DIY sound that growls meaner, thinks deeper, and runs faster. Almost four years of nightly gigging in a variety of settings has offered NYNT’s conductor a huge advantage over his peers in that his labor also served as an infinite laboratory regarding the subtleties of how, without playing hits, to make a variety of cultures and subcultures dance together — uniting even the squarest weekend dance floors under the undeniable power of his mixes.

2010 finds worldwide New York Night Train parties growing in quality, diversity, and popularity everywhere: the worldwide Soul Clap and Dance-Off parties, the weekly Shakin’ All Over Under Sideways Down! at Home Sweet Home, and the new monthlies Polyglot Discotheque at Secret Project Robot and Rocks Off Cruises Ya Ya Yacht circling Manhattan on the Half-Moon. Despite his success, Mr. T refuses to get comfy — embarking upon new series Happenings, debuting his new international 60s freakbeat format, launching his new web site/mp3 blog, working on his first commercial mix, and, in general, continuing to prove that nightlife doesn’t have to be boring.

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Fucked Up have the most perfect name for any band in rock history. In two words it bluntly states the truth that lies at the heart of the white noise maelstrom – things are different from what you expect.

Right from the start this Toronto band has been pushing musical and conceptual boundaries. Forming ostensibly as a punk band, they swiftly took on hardcore and twisted it into their own version, with a psychedelic edge, unexpected instrumentation like flute and keyboards, and songs stretched to perverse lengths.

They initially released a series of impossible to find 7” singles, all with related artwork that sometimes landed them in trouble, and sometimes looked like they came from the late 60s, when minds were melting with possibilities. There were also albums that continued this theme, each one more bold and adventurous.

Meanwhile, the band’s gigs took on legendary status. Frontman Damian Abraham’s nude stage dives and blood-strewn face were becoming a lunatic motif for a take on the hardcore genre that constantly upended assumptions: lyrics about plants and rebirth, moneys to charities for battered women. All the time, there was a sense of a narrative, and even in their loudest moments there was a deep intelligence to their music.

The narrative itself has come to full fruition on their new album, the 78-minute David Comes To Life rock opera, an album set to a play.

In the punk wars the rock opera was held up as the ultimate example of decadent capitalist-pig rock, the kind of opulent, navel-gazing fodder of faded rock dictators clinging onto power by their filthy fingernails and their tediously long records. It breaks the strict rules of punk and is precisely the reason why Fucked Up have presented this mammoth work.

Their whole history has been mashing ferocious but highly thought-out music with brilliant concepts and Situationist philosophy. They have now made their ultimate statement, tying up all the loose ends and question marks in this sprawling, yet consistently brilliant album.

In anyone else’s hands, David Comes To Life might be a disaster, but Fucked Up are in a different lineage – the concept album, after all, was invented by the Kinks or the Pretty Things and even the Who’s huffing-and-puffing Tommy and Hawkwind’s Space Ritual. You could even include some of the Crass albums as concept albums if you really thought about it – darkly powerful works that let you enter a parallel universe.

Though no less monumental, it is far more melodic than their breakthrough The Chemistry of Common Life. There are more female vocals, which work in perfect contrast to Abraham’s highly effective wounded bull growl. The band sound tighter and with more space for the flourishes and imaginative songwriting that entwine their love of fey British indie pop with heavy riffing, and some genuinely twisted turns. Perhaps most grippingly, the triple-guitar interplay between Mike Haliechuk, Josh Zucker and Ben Cook has risen to symphonic levels. They channel musicians from Angus Young, Pete Townshend and Noel Gallagher to Bob Stinson and Lyle Preslar with ease and grace.

The result is better than Sham’s That’s Life, less desperate than SF Sorrow, a finer cultural self reference than Arthur and Village Green, a better tribute to plants than Dopesmoker, and more a unmixable album than Loveless. But you can hear all these musical touchstones in David’s multi-layered melodic filigree.

And then there comes the story…

David Comes To Life is a story of lost love, global meltdown, depression, bombs, guilt and madness. Or is it? A modern day morality tale set to the dour backdrop of a British industrial town in the late 70s, it’s a four-part play that follows the dark moods and inner psyche of the titular hero. At the same time, the reliability of the narrator gets called into question, the tables are turned, responsibility shifts, and the story goes meta.

David loses his lover in a bombing during an undisclosed war . The story then turns into an internal dialogue between David and the narrator, Octavio St Laurent. The ensuing plot sees the roles and characters shapeshifting as the dialogue about love and hate battle it out. It’s a fantastically complex concept that somehow works. The mind-altering subject matter sits perfectly with the intense and at times gorgeous music.

Of course you could always ignore the backstory and just listen to a fiercely imaginative, powerful 78 minutes of blistering, melodic rock’n‘roll crossed with all manners of psychic weirdness. Your choice.

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Blouse is based out of a 6,000 square-foot warehouse in North Portland. The project started in the summer of 2010, after Los Angeles native Charlie Hilton met Patrick Adams in art school. They made a few home recordings and soon began spending nights at the warehouse recording with Jacob Portrait (Producer of Mint Chicks, Dandy Warhols, Starfucker). Having played music since their teens, the three found that there was something inexplicable in their coming together. After posting two demo tracks to Bandcamp’s website, the group was picked up by Captured Tracks out of Brooklyn, NY. A 7” single of Into Black was released at the end of March ’11 by Captured Tracks. Sub Pop Records will be releasing the second single for Shadow on May 31st.

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AU (pronounced ‘Ay-You’) is singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Luke Wyland. After recording his debut album peaofthesea under the name luc in 2005, the band came together as he began to perform live. Over a number of records and various live incarnations Wyland’s songwriting matured, from 2007’s softly-spoken Au to 2008’s acclaimed Verbs (Aagoo Records).

After the release of Verbs, the band solidified into the explosive live combination of Wyland (vox, keys, lapsteel guitar, sampler, electronics) and Dana Valatka (percussion).

What followed was two solid years of touring the US and Europe (with 140 shows in 2009 alone, playing alongside Deerhoof, WHY?, The Dodos, Akron/Family and more) and the release of their Versions EP – which stands as a document to the almost telepathic connection between these two master musicians. 

Returning to their hometown of Portland, OR in 2010, the duo holed up in the back of a friends garage for the next 2 years and set to task on what became a rebirth of sorts.

What resulted was Both Lights, their long awaited third album and first for Hometapes (US) and The Leaf Label (EU).

Released in April of 2012, it is the closest their recorded incarnation has yet reached to the blissful force of an AU live show and marks a dramatic shift in sound from Wyland’s older recordings. “A tight 40 minutes of compacted, runaway virtuosity…Everything’s so hyperactive that (AU) are balancing frighteningly on the precipice between genius and madness.” (BBC)

The live band has grown to permanently include Holland Andrews (Like A Villian) on vox, clarinet and keys and when possible the horn section of Reed Wallsmith (Blue Cranes) on sax and Nick Sweet and Anthony Meade on trombone.

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In the past, Portland, OR-based Starfucker (STRFKR) has received almost as much attention for its not-always accessible moniker as for its immensely accessible dance hooks. But, having flirted briefly with a couple of name changes, the group is now firmly settled on Starfucker and so the focus can rightly return to what got people talking in the first place: the quartet’s endlessly catchy, hook-laden pop.

And there’s no better place for that conversation to begin than with Reptilians, the band’s second album and first with Polyvinyl.

Lyrically, Reptilians focuses primarily on death and the end of the world, two intertwined subjects at the forefront of songwriter Josh Hodges mind following the passing of his grandmother.

Yet, amazingly, the record manages to be not the slightest bit depressing. In reality, it’s quite the opposite a trait likely attributed to the fact that the band, like British philosopher Alan Watts (whose lectures are excerpted at various intervals), believes death is responsible for giving meaning to life. For Starfucker, this comforting notion is expressed musically via vibrant crescendos, explosive drum beats, and layered synth melodies that drive a theatrical live show where dance party meets Roxy Music.

As such, Reptilians effortlessly marches from the stripped-bare psychedelia of “Born”, which conjures David Byrne’s ghost, to the funeral parade of “Bury Us Alive” (a track that greets death with open arms in a moment of animated celebration), to “Death as a Fetish,” where the title becomes a liberating mantra sung over an immediately hummable keyboard-driven loop.

Just as with the band’s previous two releases, Reptilians was written almost entirely by principal songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Joshua Hodges. This time around, however, the group’s sound is bolstered by the addition of Keil Corcoran (whom Hodges describes as a human drum machine) and producer Jacob Portrait (The Dandy Warhols, Mint Chicks). Hodges first recorded the album’s primary tracks in his bedroom and on the road while the band, rounded out by bassist Shawn Glassford, relentlessly toured the country this past year.

Then, Starfucker convened with Portrait at various Portland studios to record the drums as well as add a few final flourishes. The result is Starfucker’s most well-rounded and full-sounding album to date a blissfully buoyant affair that will have you dancing to songs about death while having the time of your life

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Born in Portland, OR in the year of our Lord, 2009, And And And is a 5 piece band of thieves and gypsies that play rock music that could possibly be compared to The Kinks and Pavement thrown into a blender and left for several days in the sun.

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Young Turks were formed in 2010 as a side project to several then-active bands. A lineup of acquaintances, turned best friends. 2 years, one 7″, and their debut full length under their belts, they continue to push forward into ground that seems oddly familiar. Hardcore has changed a lot in the last 10 years. Whatever semblance of punk has been erased, and anger is just an aesthetic. If it’s possible to push forward and backwards at the same time, they have found their formula for paying homage to their adolescent punk roots and realizing their contemporary ferocity.

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The Dimes are a folk-pop collective centered around guitarists/vocalists John Clay, Pierre Kaiser and Kelly Anne Masigat. The Portland, OR based band has released two full length albums and three EP’s to date on Timber Carnival Records.

Primarily known for their stellar songwriting, glowing harmonies and sixties-pop production, the band has broadened its sound of late, adding pedal steel, mandolin, harmonica and dobro to its recent recordings, evoking a sweeter California-country sound remeniscent of Neil Young’s Harvest recordings. Live, the group has grown to a 7-piece and has shared the stage with the likes of Liam Finn, Kathryn Calder (New Pornographers), The Head and the Heart, The Mother Hips and Todd Rundgren, amongst others.

Their most recent full length “The King Can Drink the Harbour Dry” was released in 2010 to strong critical acclaim from Spin, NPR, Allmusic and a host of online publications.

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If you were into Portland music in the early nineties, you likely heard of Pete Krebs, or at least one of his bands. Early on, this would have been the heavy-bass sounds of Thrillhammer, but a more likely encounter would have been a couple of years later with Hazel. Featuring the dueling vocals of Krebs and Jody Bleyle (later of Team Dresch), the group sounded a bit like X but with reversed roles—Krebs as lead to Bleyle’s backing. The band was among the first wave of Portland bands to get national attention in the early 90s, but didn’t fit neatly into either end of the dominating northwest grunge/riot grrrl dichotomy. Their creativity was fully on display in their live show, complete with a forty-something male interpretive dancer flailing around in a dress. The creative tensions that gave the band so much energy also spilled out more negatively on stage. In the end, Hazel fell victim to the politics of it all, having been signed and then largely ignored by Sub Pop.

After this, Krebs did solo work with the help of friend Elliott Smith. They played together on a split single, and later on Western Electric, an album that Smith produced. The result is a fascinating fusion of the two artists’ musical visions, low-key and eloquent with a gritty aftertaste. It ends with a crazed song, “Tom Waits and the Attack of the Crab Monster,” with Krebs playing “sqeaky door and sharpening knives,” and his compatriot playing “recyclables.” When Smith eventually left town for his tortured ascent, Krebs stuck around, pulling in a number of musicians for a local project he named The Gossamer Wings. Their 1999 album Sweet Ona Rose is one of my all-time favorites, with a wide range of instrumental moods and lyrics that read like poetry.

Over time, Krebs revealed the extent of his musical interests, leading an alternative country band called Golden Delicious, later joining with gypsy jazz band The Kung Pao Chickens. For a long time, Krebs could be found on Sunday afternoons leading Django-style jazz cabaret sessions, inviting strangers onto stage to play along. In 2004 he started another band which continues on, The Stolen Sweets, specializing in 1920s and 30s classics with stunning three-part vocal harmonies à la Triplets of Belleville. Add to this a number of other side projects and albums, and you find a musical career as prolific as it is eclectic. With as much talent as this, Krebs is much like an American version of Richard Thompson, with a similar trajectory of rock, folk, and jazz projects and a distinct lyrical style.

I was planning to end this post on the last note, all analytical but appreciative … Then, news from a couple weeks ago, of the “why didn’t I hear about this beforehand” variety—at a small Portland bar called Al’s Den, a show simply listed the names of Krebs and Jody Bleyle, without indicating that they would be playing together… not to mention that they would be playing with Hazel, including their interpretive dancer, who must be how old … who cares, it’s Hazel, back together! So now, ditching the analysis, reverting to spazzy fandom, and desperately hoping that the next time they play together will have a little more notice…

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“TWSM was formed in 2008 by Eric Ambrosius and Boone Howard as they rushed to record their debut lo-fi song disc Bonjour before leaving on a under-prepared, under-informed, under-financed single-speed bike journey to Canada. Torn achilles heels and a lost debit card ended their trip at a crack hostel in Vancouver, where the boys found a ride through Western Canada back to their home state of Alaska. Three years later after some truly awful house shows, train trips, off-and-on members, and moonlighting with other bands, the Milk finally caught their stride with the addition of Oregonian bass player Travis Leipzig in 2011 (when sister EPs Jesuses and SUH got the band their first stamps of blogosphere approval). Now TWSM’s scene-stoking, party-enhancing, friend-making mission is paying off with some gigs the boys used to refer to as “real shows.” The music is either riff-driven or slow-burning, but always focused on the songs… their 90′s-influenced, Dylan/Newman/Lennon ripoff, butt rock jam-out songs.”

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Celebrating 10-plus years of sample-obsessed production and relentless touring, Gregg Gillis returns with All Day, his fifth album as Girl Talk, and his most epic, densely layered, and meticulously composed musical statement to date. Continuing the saga from the previously acclaimed albums, Night Ripper and Feed The Animals, Gillis lays down a more diverse range of samples to unfold a larger dynamic between slower transitions and extreme cut-ups. With the grand intent of creating the most insane and complex “pop collage” album ever heard, large catalogs of both blatantly appropriated melodies and blasts of unrecognizable fragments were assembled for the ultimate Girl Talk record (clocking in at 71 minutes and 372 samples).

Since the release of Feed The Animals, things have flourished for Girl Talk. He’s played almost 300 shows and hardly taken a full week off from hitting the road. He’s playing even larger venues and making even more of a spectacle—he’s employed a small crew of toilet paper launching stage hands, who also propel confetti, balloons, and inflate oddly chosen props into the audience. For the New Year’s Eve show to ring in 2010, a team was hired to build a life-size house, with attention to fine details, on the stage at Chicago’s Congress Theatre. Described as the craziest house party ever, Girl Talk continues to please live audiences as the mass of sweaty bodies at his shows continually grows. Touring highlights from the last couple of years include the Vancouver Olympics, large festivals such as Coachella, Austin City Limits, Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza, V-Fest, Sasquatch, Rothbury, Monolith, Planeta Terra, and trips to Australia, Japan, South America, Europe, and Mexico.

Earlier this year, Girl Talk finally took a break from touring, festival dates, and college shows, in order to create an album that is being released immediately after its completion. While posting the album as a free download on the Illegal Art label’s site allows All Day to reach his fanbase quickly and with minimal cost, Gillis spent more time on this album than any previous release and considers it the most fully realized and evolved manifestation of the Girl Talk aesthetic.

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A biography of Holcombe Waller,
remembered, overheard and imagined as the case may be
by Alec Hanley Bemis

I’ve started to think of Holcombe Waller as the forgotten man. When we met in college, in the late 90s, he was the brightest whitest hope among us to save music forever. While the rest of our arty clique was still fucking around trying to find an aesthetic, a style, a sound to glom onto, he was already a veteran – still stoking the embers of an old school, you-can-only-make-it-in-Hollywood-style record deal. Holcombe had delayed his college education for a year, trying to cut hits in Southern California with the financial backing of a music equipment maker trying to extend their empire into the then-bloated yet still-burgeoning recorded music industry.

Soon enough there was a full stop to that – but that’s not where the story ended, that’s where the plot got thicker.

A (no joke) genius, both gifted and cursed with the voice of a seraph and perfect pitch, Holcombe began his university education by indulging an entirely different set of talents. He was that guy, the one taking graduate level physics classes in his freshman year. Given his penchant for transformation, of course, the freshman physics major became the sophomore art major, and soon enough he was diving into the evolving world of digital art production. Eventually, the straight As straight boy came out as something…more…erm…complicated, his interests cohering around artand music.

Back then three-fifths of the musicians who would go onto form The National were hovering around the edges of campus — one of them matriculated, the others just visiting. At the time, they were part of a band who, according to official histories, must go unnamed — and while their identity is not something I will reveal, what you need to know is that Holcombe is the one they looked up to for aid and guidance. Though he was quite busy in a key role with one of our school’s award winning a capella singing groups (we didn’t really get that part), Holcombe found time to produce two records by the then-thriving (now forgotten) band.

Upon graduation, a pair of albums by Holcombe were recorded and released in rapid succession – 1999′s Advertising Spaceand 2001′s Extravagant Gesture, both of which were drunk on influences he was still processing. Let’s just say that the soaring and tragic voice of Jeff Buckley was an appealing sound to emulate for someone cursed with a golden throat; and that Holcombe’s struggles with sexual identity and politics, and his fledgling efforts to learn guitar, made Ani DiFranco’s hard folk sound a natural interest.

Both of these early albums have since been partially disowned by Holcombe– though you can hear elements of both that make you wonder why – flashes of Bryce Dessner’s longing guitar playing throughout, a few songs that, when you hear them, don’t easily leave your head.

Frankly, all I remember about this time are off-campus apartments with Russian icons on the wall; funnydrunk parties and romantic fist fights happening off camera; and various other twenty-something mishaps. It was a dramatic and stressful time, and we were callow and ambitious and desperate and sensual and young. (Depends which one of us you ran into.) In subsequent years, I remember almost-serious attempts to sell our stories as a reality show to MTV. I’m quite sure it took Holcombe a decade plus to heal some of the scars.

***

The next time Holcombe popped onto the radar was with 2005′s Troubled Times, and that’s also where his current direction came into focus. Created in the wake of George Bush’s back-to-back elections and thematically dominated by thoughts about this state of affairs, the record was pissed off but in a smoldering mode, a record about the failure of unions both political and romantic. It alternated happy, hopeful, I-just-woke-up-next-to-this-wonderful-person songs with one literally called “Literally the End of the World.” It ends with “Hope is Everywhere” which features another member of our college clique, Mia Doi Todd. It’s a song so diaphanous and spare it’s more space than song and then…and then…there was more space.

What the hell’s Holcombe been doing the past six years?

In a phrase, he’s been “going deep” again. Soon after the release of Troubled Times, he began to investigate more seriously the area where the art and performance worlds meet. He spent time in New York City — participating in the hothouse salons and gender-bent performance nights curated by impresario Earl Dax and presented in various cabarets and warehouses, apartments and institutions. He was befriended by internationally renowned singer and artist Antony Hegarty; and, in turn, Holcombe befriended downtown performance icon Penny Arcade, a woman whose history extends from appearances in the films of Andy Warhol and Jack Smith to performances in illegal art spaces in Brooklyn circa now. He crossed paths with Ryan Trecartin, the art world phenom, and appeared in one of his much-admired video fantasias. In 2007, Holcombe dug into what it meant to be a songwriter, presenting Patti ♥ Townes, a work consisting entirely of classic songs by Patty Griffin and Townes Van Zandt. More than covers, Holcombe’s performances found him dressed as a drunken clownish angel, reappropriating the work of these songwriters’s songwriters to his own ends.

By 2008, all this work and research began to pay off with recognition from the gatekeepers of high culture. He won a five figure Mapfund grant to support Into the Dark Unknown: The Hope Chest, a new work of folk song theater in which he profiled the psychology of a generation defined by war, religious stratification and environmental catastrophe, yet whose reaction to this state of affairs is strangely passive. Consider it a series of response songs to John Mayer ‘s “Waiting On the World to Change,” perhaps?

Into the Dark Unknown (the theater piece) was funded by both the Rockefeller Foundation and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. It was co-commissioned and presented by Time-Based Arts Festival at the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art, Under the Radar at New York’s Public Theater, Seattle’s On the Boards, PuSh Festival in Vancounver, British Columbia, and San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Center. It was a big deal!

Holcombe would process this whole experience in 2009, teaching and collaborating with choreographer Joe Goode while serving as a visiting artist at the University of California, Berkley.

***

With Into the Dark Unknown, an album-length reinterpretation of these recent adventures, Holcombe has returned, in a way, to the world of pop – insofar as pop can be defined as the best place to present stuff this relevant to living, to a wide, “popular” audience. The music toggles between touching yet elliptical narratives of the sort made famous by Joni Mitchell or Harry Chapin, and the loopy spirit energy of a Van Morrison – though if Morrison defines soul and grit, Holcombe is all angels and air.

Every one of these songs is a snapshot, though the names and faces are often blurry. The only one I see clearly is Holcombe’s and I can read the horror and the love and the feeling off of his features.

I don’t know much, but I know you
You are the kind of magic always breaks my heart in two
The house all trashed, the wine uncorked
Maybe I should call you when I get back from New York

Yes, rhyme sort of dies on the page, but stories don’t. And if you take the above as a documentary presentation of some shitty glamorous night that you too once had, you’ll probably connect with it as strongly as I do.

A diva in the truest sense, Holcombe has made an album that is the product of many years of consideration and reconsideration, the kind of obsessive revisiting and revisioning that would do an Arthur Russell or Kate Bush or Glenn Gould proud. There’s an idealized sketchiness to these songs, a loose unraveling of the folk-rock chord – several songs are live recordings, to best catch a certain energy I’m sure – just as I’ll assure you any looseness is intentional. There must have been something about the sound of the room that day, or a particular face in the crowd that was treasured and remembered.

Into the Dark Unknown is the sound of a vocal acrobat that’s learned the wisdom of restraint — drones of various shapes provided by strings, acoustic guitars, ambient sounds and the fading strains of harmonies heard in echo. This music can be almost embarrassing to listen to, it’s so stripped bare.

It’s taken a certain range of experiences to get Holcombe this far, and I only hope I’ve done them justice. When Holcombe sings that he’s “Bored of Memory,” it’s only because he’s haunted by them.

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Defeater is a band recognized not only for their obvious musical talent, but also for their social awareness and environmental activism in a musical landscape plagued with insincerity and complacency. The Massachusetts-based band formed two years ago with the premise of utilizing a musical platform for good; whether it be starting an environmentally conscious company or writing albums about oppression and equal rights. With one full-length release under their belt (2008’s Travels) and an EP on the horizon (Lost Ground, in stores November 17, 2009), Defeater is once again releasing a musically precise and genre-bending album that will redefine the term “forward-thinking music”.

In early 2008, Defeater got together and teamed up with Topshelf Records to release their debut full-length titled Travels. Printed on 100% recycled materials, Travels was the first conceptual (and environmentally-friendly) piece from the band, unique in that each song read as a narrative chapter from a novel while creating an embellished piece of fiction set in post WWII America in a broken home. The release of Travels caught the attention of fans, labels, and press alike with Punknews.org hailing it as “a new artistic peak for hardcore.” With unrelenting buzz and critical acclaim surrounding the band, Defeater and Bridge Nine Records partnered up to re-release Travels all over the world in September of 2008. This re-release saw the band touring across the United States with the likes of Energy and End of a Year, across Europe with Comeback Kid, and throughout the UK with labelmates Polar Bear Club and Ruiner. Guitarist Jay Maas said, “The biggest highlight for us touring on Travels was meeting people around the country and world that have really connected with our music and/or lyrics. It’s weird how every now and then you can affect and impact a little pocket of people without knowing it. It’s a great surprise when that happens.”

Fast forward to 2009 and Defeater geared up to write and record their second conceptual release titled Lost Ground. A six song double 7″, this EP was written in a similar narrative style to Travels following a man’s journey from enlisting in the military to post-war life (the same man that listeners were introduced to on track 6 of Travels: “Prophet in Plain Clothes”). The writing process took several months, but “the refining and changing of songs and structures continues until the very last moment of recording. Nothing is ever done”, said Maas. The band spent the latter end of the summer tucked away at Getaway Recording Studio with producer/Defeater guitarist Jay Maas recording the new album. Maas commented on pulling double duty on the record as guitarist and producer by saying, “It’s nice to be behind an idea all the way from it starting in your mind to actually shaping the way it will be heard as a final product, at the same time there is a certain level of hair loss due to the overwhelming level of stress I tend to put upon myself. Recently a friend of mine went shopping for a belt and she complained that no matter where she looked she couldn’t find one because she already invented the belt she wanted in her head. Recording your own record is a lot like that. When the snare doesn’t sound exactly liked I thought it would when I dreamed up the record for the last year I have to do everything I can to sleep at night.”

The members of Defeater oftentimes work in various capacities around the band, as Maas is a hardcore impresario/producer of high profile bands such as Bane, Verse, Shipwreck and his own band at his self-operated Getaway Recording Studio, while drummer Andy Reitz is co-owner of a company called Greenvans. Greenvans is a van rental company that operates a fleet of Ford diesel vans converted to run on waste vegetable oil and bio-diesel. Each van is tour ready with a trailer included in the rental fee, specifically designed to appeal to touring bands. By renting a veggie oil powered van from Greenvans, a band saves thousands of dollars in fuel costs, not to mention the planet. When touring the country, Defeater travels in a Greenvan, ensuring that they always do their part. This will absolutely be the case as the band tours the world in support of the Lost Ground EP.

Lost Ground contains six new songs written in an anecdotal style following the homeless man from “Prophet In Plain Clothes” off of Travels. Lyrics were once again written by vocalist Derek Archambault and Lost Ground tells”…the story of how he [the character from ‘Prophet’] came to end up on that street corner. Lost Ground looks into the difference between how different races could all go to war fighting and dying for this country yet not all be treated with equal rights as citizens upon their return, and what kind of effects that inequality can have on a an honest person,” said Maas. This story-like approach to lyrics is another attribute of Defeater that sets them apart from many of their contemporaries. While incredibly introspective, Defeater’s lyrics don’t necessarily touch on lyrical standards and clichés like lost love or heartbreak. Maas went on to say, “I don’t feel like our lyrics are less introspective than anyone else’s, it’s just the words are reflective of people that aren’t us. There are a lot of our personality and experience laced inside of our characters but what I really like is the ability to write a compelling story that is full of emotional honesty yet retains total creative freedom.”

A much more melodic and dynamic album than previous efforts, Lost Ground is set to a volatile soundtrack of hardcore fury, punk melody, and metal technicality while the band explores some cleaner and bigger-sounding dynamics. Defeater has a lot to live up to on this EP since their debut received such stunning praise as “the perfect definition of modern hardcore” by Lambgoat.com and “…emotive hard hitting hardcore that crashes you like waves during a typhoon” by ScenePointBlank. And the Lost Ground EP does more than live up to Travels; it transcends it. Look for Lost Ground in stores on November 17th from Bridge Nine Records and catch Defeater at CMJ Music Marathon on October 22nd and on tour across the United States thereafter and throughout 2010.

Description

Punk rock.

Band Interests

Peet’s Coffe, In and Out Burger, Noodle’s & Co., Nando’s, Chili’s (Happy Hour $5 menu ONLY!), Fudruckers, Chipotle, Moe’s Southwest Grill, Three Amigos,

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Tell your folks: DON’T TALK TO THE COPS! DtttC’s deadly dance punks djblesOne and emeckscut loose, deep and wide with razor sharp moves and pointed pop sensibilities. Their sound is informed by pop, electro, punk, soul and hip-hop, with songs that are crazy catchy and melodic—hard to pin down, but very easy to dance to. On stage the group blend chaos and choreography—jumping, flashing, bugging out—whipping the audience into a grinning, dancing frenzy.

djblesOne is an accomplished dj/producer whose influential productions and DJ mixes have helped shaped the last decade of b-boy culture. His partner in crime, emecks, clocks in at only half his height but her larger than life style and pro dance moves bring outsized attitude to this dynamic duo. Their combined dance vision is abetted by hype man El Mizell, providing backup vocals and pops of energy to an already tight live setup.

Since unleashing their first album in March 2010, DON’T TALK TO THE COPS! have been all over the map. Notable performances include the Capitol Hill Block Party, Doe Bay Fest, Reverb Festival and City Arts Festival, along with house shows, fashion parties, mainstages and other festival appearances. The group just released their second album, Let’s Quit, on Greedhead Music. They plan to make love to your ears, eyes, and feet this year, so get ready.

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Mission Spotlight writes music about the modern American West. Inspired by the records of George Jones and the Byrds playing on their parents’ turntables, and influenced by the alt-country sounds of Whiskeytown, Daniel Romano and early Wilco, Mission Spotlight creates songs whose appeal spans generations. This is music for campfires and rainy Sunday mornings.

“For a debut EP, the Mission Spotlight’s Everything That Floats sounds damn mature. Frontman Kurt Foster sounds about ready to take his day job and shove it (without over-twanging) while Fasil Debeb and Ryan Lynn trade sweet, spacious guitar licks in a style reminiscent of Portland’s own Richmond Fontaine. The EP’s seven songs are substantive enough to make an impact, but they fly by quick enough to leave listeners wanting. That’s a pretty good first impression.” -Willamette Week

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Members of Crackerbash, Dharma Bums, Barnaby Woods and Guided By Voices combine forces to make you rock and shake…

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Rarely is so much meaning conveyed in the space of six letters. And with regard to Xiu Xiu, its applications are infinite: always relevant, always provocative, always surprising, always evolving, always glittering.

It’s fitting, then, that as the band (now comprised of Jamie Stewart, Angela Seo, Bettina Escauriza, Marc Riordan, and returning member Devin Hoff) marks a decade in existence, such a powerful sentiment would serve as the title of its latest album. At its core, Always symbolizes the mutual camaraderie with and deep dedication to each person who has internalized Xiu Xiu’s work, tattooed its name on their skin or soul, and throughout the past ten years made the band a part of their lives.

The origin of these intense, everlasting bonds is Stewart. His fearless lyrics have given voice to life’s most untouchable and taboo subjects, while his distinctively committed but hushed vocals crystallize and medicate their unsettling impact.

Those familiar with the band’s work will take particular note of the times Stewart re-visits profoundly personal accounts from his own life – most prominently on “Beauty Towne” (a not-so-uplifting postscript to the muddle of those depicted in “Clowne Towne” from 2004’s Fabulous Muscles) and “Black Drum Machine” (which finishes the narrative of incest and molestation begun on “Black Keyboard” from 2008’s Women As Lovers).

Elsewhere, Stewart’s willingness to broach any subject finds him confronting both the topical and the intimate in equally meaningful ways: “Gul Mudin” seeks to bring comfort to an Afghani teenage boy murdered for sport by American soldiers; “Joey’s Song” strives to do the same for Stewart’s brother in the aftermath of a family tragedy.

“Factory Girls” chronicles the sexual objectification and desperate existence of Chinese female, migrant workers. “I Luv Abortion,” featuring perhaps Stewart’s most unhinged vocal ever, careens through the resolute heartache of a friend too young to be pregnant and seeks to personalize this most political issue.

But while such writing is worthy of reverence, Always’ most arresting moments lie in its sonic innovation – transforming avant pop elements from an undertone into a bright black focal point while adding new influences such a choral music, kraut rock and animal field recordings.

Produced by Deerhoof’s Greg Saunier (who also contributes drums and vocals to the album) and mixed by John Congleton (Antony and the Johnsons, Marylin Manson, the Roots) the album is positively vibrant.

Opening track and first single, “Hi,” is an immediate invitation for listeners to make their presence known, as Stewart commands you to voice the title refrain along with him: “If you are wasting your life / Say “Hi” / If you are alone tonight / Say “Hi.”

The song’s infectious, dance-worthy beat is only the first of many instances when Stewart’s unflinching lyricism is coupled with pure, singable melodies – the kind of pairings that bring into stark relief how often life’s worst moments are shouldered with a skewed, cheery grin.

Nowhere is this contrast more apparent than on the bittersweet duet “Honeysuckle,” a pleasantly uplifting cadence undercut by feelings of utter despair and hopelessness in Seo’s lyrics.

That such dazzling music can so seamlessly blend with such undeniably dark content is but one of the ways Always succeeds in accentuating the intent that is central to all Xiu Xiu creates.

During recording, Stewart saw a Bible verse spray painted on the wall of his gym. He interpreted the verse to mean, “Horror and beauty are the same; love and hate are the same, the tireless dread of our own lives and of living can be embraced with the same fervency as what we find beautiful.”

Composed of this essence, the album proves that perhaps the only six letters to carry the same weight as “always” are these: Xiu Xiu.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $12 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Vice Device is the distillation of a musical collaboration that began in early 2007, comprised of Portland, Oregon’s Andrea K, Bobby Kaliber and Nate Preston. Frequently performing multiple instruments in tandem, Andrea and Bobby layer pulsating synth melodies with charged vocals and split the responsibilities of drumming by each performing percussion with one hand. Lurching bass lines are intertwined to complete the band’s distinctive sound. Through reductive experimentation with analog synthesizers and live electronics, Vice Device create a raw and dynamic soundscape without the use of sequencers or backing tracks.

Vice Device’s vinyl debut, a split 7″ with Hot Victory, features the track “Skin” and is available August 5th, 2011 on Megathon Records and Sweating Tapes.

New 7” (“Breathless” b/w “I Sign My Name With An X”) out now on 2510 Records.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $13 at the door.  Doors open at 7pm.

Tyler is writing this biography. These are the truest things about him right now: He just woke up. He is thinking about breakfast. His neighbor’s dogs are barking and that makes him anxious. He needs to return his library books. He’s afraid that writing a biography about him self might mean that he’s taken a sad turn in his life, and this makes him anxious. He hopes that people will listen to and enjoy his music (that’s mostly why he created it), but if they don’t, then it’s alright. There’s so much music in the world- maybe too much, that it’s a lot to ask for people to spend their time listening to you over some one else. He doesn’t think that how old he is, or where he comes from, or what he looks like, or what other artists he’s played with should really matter in the grand scheme of things as much as breakfast and a walk. But, if it matters to you, you can probably find that information somewhere on the internet.
10/19/11

Red Bull Common Thread with Dinosaur Jr, Sebadoh and J Mascis
WWW.REDBULLUSA.COM/COMMONTHREAD

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It’s all but inconceivable that J Mascis requires an introduction. In the quarter-century since he founded Dinosaur (Jr.), Mascis has created some of the era’s signature songs, albums and styles. As a skier, golfer, songwriter, skateboarder, record producer, and musician, J has few peers. The laconically-based roar of his guitar, drums and vocals have driven a long string of bands–Deep Wound, Dinosaur Jr., Gobblehoof, Velvet Monkeys, the Fog, Witch, Sweet Apple–and he has guested on innumerable sessions. But Several Shades of Why is J’s first solo studio record, and it is an album of incredible beauty, performed with a delicacy not always associated with his work.

Recorded at Amherst Massachusetts’ Bisquiteen Studios, Several Shades… is nearly all acoustic and was created with the help of a few friends. Notable amongst them are Kurt Vile, Sophie Trudeau (A Silver Mount Zion), Kurt Fedora (long-time collusionist), Kevin Drew (Broken Social Scene), Ben Bridwell (Band of Horses), Pall Jenkins (Black Heart Procession), Matt Valentine (The Golden Road), and Suzanne Thorpe (Wounded Knees). Together in small mutable groupings, they conjure up classic sounds ranging from English-tinged folk to drifty, West Coast-style singer/songwriterism. But every track, every note even, bears that distinct Mascis watermark, both in the shape of the tunes and the glorious rasp of the vocals.

“Megan from Sub Pop has wanted me to do this record for a long time,” J says. “She was very into it when I was playing solo a lot in the early 2000s, around the time of the Fog album [2002’s Free So Free].  She always wanted to know when I’d do a solo record. [Several Shades of Why] came out of that. There are a couple of songs that are older, but the rest is new this year. And it’s basically all acoustic. There’s some fuzz, but it’s acoustic through fuzz. There’re no drums on it, either. Just one tambourine song, that’s it. It was a specific decision to not have drums. Usually I like to have them, but going drum-less pushes everything in a new direction, and makes it easier to keep things sounding different.”

There is little evidence of stress on Several Shades of Why. The title track is a duet with Sophie Trudeau’s violin recalling Nick Drake’s work at its most elegant. ‘Not Enough’ feels like a lost hippie-harmony classic from David Crosby’s If I Could Only Remember My Name. ‘Is It Done’ rolls like one of the Grisman/Garcia tunes on American Beauty. ‘Very Nervous and Love’ has the same rich vibe as the amazing rural side of Terry Reid’s The River. And on and on it goes. Ten brilliant tunes that quietly grow and expand until they fill your brain with the purest pleasure. What a goddamn great album.

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Snow Bud and the Flower People is the musical brainchild and long standing side project of Northwest Legend Chris Newman (Napalm Beach, The Untouchables, Boo Frog).  Snow Bud and the Flower People began one evening in 1985 when Newman wrote and recorded a batch of tunes on his 4-track singing the praises of the almighty herb.  The resulting cassettes quickly became underground classics spreading via word of mouth and garnering a cult following across the globe.  It was not long before Snow Bud were sharing bills with such heavy weights as the Pixies and Green River, putting out releases with such notable labels as Sub Pop and Tim Kerr and even landing a feature in the pages of High Times.

Over 20 years have passed since Snow Bud’s humble beginnings in 1985 and the band is still going strong.  Snow Bud and the Flower People have recorded a new album “Flashback” with the venerable Jack Endino.  Flashback is a redux of the original cassettes including a new single “Stoner Girl” re-envisioned in glorious hi fidelity.  Flashback is slated for release on 4/20/2012 on Cavity Search Records.

The antidote to popular taste Snow Bud and the Flower People turn out timeless and memorable classics in the key of weed.  This is 2+2=ROCK.  It just adds up, the songs are so good it’s as if they wrote themselves.  Better yet Snow Bud is no one trick pony and traverse a multitude of genres with astonishing ease and prowess.  This fits perfectly into the context of album rock.  These are records you want to listen to beginning to end and it’s always a wild ride.  If you don’t find yourself humming your favorite Snow Bud tune about now, you might be asking yourself why you’ve never heard of Snow Bud and the Flower People until now?  Chances are you’re too young, too old or too stoned to remember. If you think you might be missing out YOU ARE.  Listen to Snow Bud now, buy their records and go to their shows.  This is the killer shit!

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Mac DeMarco, formerly Makeout Videotape, is the anti-thesis to your stereotypical singer-songwriter. Disregarding the seriously somber moments, he replaces them with whimsical and youthful spontaneity, whilst retaining the endearing and subtle commentaries that exude his familiarity. Promptly after leaving his Edmonton garage for Vancouver he embarked on a North American tour accompanying fellow Canadians Japandroids on a grand voyage of enlightenment and alcoholic debauchery.

DeMarco’s a weird cat cultivating an affinity for occult imagery, nudity and social satire. But his most impressive trait is his undeniable and instinctual ability to compose magical pop jangles, of which he’ll likely refer to as “jizz jazz”. His dusted jams have garnished him accolades that are as ever-increasing as his song writing abilities; his sound rendering comparisons, but in a nomadic fashion alluding no distinct origin. Come March DeMarco’s debut solo EP entitled Rock And Roll Night Club will ramble into the great unknown guided by Captured Tracks, DeMarco’s inner Elvis a tow.

“Canadian rocker Mac DeMarco used to record under the moniker Makeout Videotapes (you might have come across that project’s undeservedly overlooked self-titled cassette last year). Now, he’s taking his own proper name to put out an EP on Captured Tracks, Rock and Roll Night Club. The thing drops March 20.” — Pitchfork

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Daniel Hindman and Sarah Versprille began writing songs together in 2009 while living in Brooklyn, NY. In 2011, between tours with Sub Pop’s Vetiver (who Versprille and Hindman play keyboards and guitar in respectively,) the duo packed up their lives, moved to Portland, OR and realized that it was time to put a name to the new project — Pure Bathing Culture was born. Through various serendipitous connections, multi-instrumentalist and producer Richard Swift heard their early demos and immediately invited them to record with him at his National Freedom studio in Cottage Grove, OR. On Pure Bathing Culture’s forthcoming S/T EP, out May 22nd, their elegantly smooth pop melodies embody the nostalgia of soft 80s dream pop with a freshness all its own.

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Bison’s mountain-top chamber music combines elements of alternative indie-folk with classical sensibilities, bringing a fresh inspiring sound to the folk genre. The music of this seven member band grew organically in the family living room and around backyard bonfires giving it a rootsy quality and yet the complex arrangements and refined strings seem just as appropriate in the symphony hall. With recent airplay on WROX (Norfolk, VA), the popularity of the band is expanding rapidly. According to the stations program manager, “Switzerland”, the first single from their Debut album has prompted the biggest audience response of any tune in his five years at the station.

Ben Hardesty’s (vocals and guitar) songwriting bears sonic resemblance to groups such as Fleet Foxes, Mumford and Sons and The Decemberists. Folkhive stated stated “Dare I say that Bison is to folk what Arcade Fire is to indie rock? Boasting 7 members and a sound seemingly born on the tree covered mountain tops of Virginia Bison lays down expansive and yet imminently listenable folk with an original feel I’ve not experienced in quite some time”. Incorporating traditional folk instruments with a reed organ, percussion and classical strings creates a unique hybrid sound that defies pigeon-holing the band. The blog “Independent Clauses” stated “Bison’s debut album Quill uses the seriousness of Fleet Foxes’ grounded sound as a framework, layering strings, bells and more on top. “Iscariot” and “The Woodcutter’s Son” have a darkly pastoral bent that recalls pre-The King is Dead Decemberists.” Bison has had the opportunity to headline the Norva (Norfolk, VA) as well as perform with the Virginia Symphony Orchestra.

The Daily Press (Newport News VA) said of Bison’s live performance, “The stars of [the] show did not disappoint. Bison skillfully performed complex arrangements and delivered songs with passion and sensitivity. The crowd sang along with the group’s local hit “Switzerland” and gave a warm reception to many other tunes. Bison is a unique musical outfit that creates an unusual energy on stage. The fact that so many local fans are embracing its sound is good news indeed.”

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $20 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

In 2003, Tim Showalter’s house burned down, his fiancée left him, and he resorted to writing songs on an acoustic guitar while living on park benches in suburban Philadelphia. Those events informed the entirety of his arresting debut, Leave Ruin, an album about loss and brokenness and lack of faith. But as affecting as it was, Showalter is leery of being stuck in the past. After all, the first word of that record’s title is “leave,” and one of the first thing he asks when contacted for this interview is, “Can we kind of re-do my bio? I don’t want to keep being the sad sack whose house burned down.”

These days, Showalter is happily married and comfortably settled in Philadelphia, and he’s staring down the release of his second record, Pope Killdragon, an album that’s even stranger and more singular. Where Ruin was stark and autobiographical, Killdragon – which features odd, laser-beam synthesizers and one bona fide stoner metal track – is wild and fantastical. Showalter either invents characters’ whole cloth, or takes an approach to history so liberal even Tarantino would give pause (John F. Kennedy authors a fable about a knight; Dan Aykroyd carries out a revenge killing for the death of John Belushi). It’s a bold, eerie, mighty work – though the man responsible for it couldn’t be more affable or good natured.

By J. Edward Keyes

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $22 at the door.  Doors open at 8:30pm

FIDLAR are slackers at heart. The only thing they really care about is skateboarding; trivial things like doing their homework and making the grade in school have little meaning to them. But when their adopted Vietnamese brother turns up dead after discovering an error in the shipping records at his place of work, FIDLAR begins to suspect something more. Refusing to accept the police’s theory of suicide, FIDLAR launches their own investigation, determined to uncover the truth of what really happened to their brother.

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Serious Business is a playful electro-pop-rap duo intent on coloring outside the lines. Jason Mampel provides a spectrum of analog synthesizers to beat heavy rhythms, accompanying his unique vocal style and Danny Diana-Peebles’ (AKA Neo G Yo) smooth rap. Their live shows are accompanied by Alex Boyce who provides live video programming. DJ Koolaid has recently begun conducting business with them, adding his skills and energetic energy to their already hyper, infectious performances.

Serious Biz has shared the stage with such national acts as Rye Rye, Ninjasonik, Japanther, Big Freedia, Flosstradamus, Jaguar Love, their own smiley face flag, and many local PDX greats including Guidance Councilor, Strength, Atole, and Breakfast Mountain.

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Guitarist/vocalist Joel Schneider’s (also of Absolute Monarchs, which are another new-ish local band to keep an eye on) muscular, dexterous guitar work melds quite nicely with drummer Ethan Jacobsen’s brawny but controlled timekeeping. I’m hearing maybe some Black Keys with a little more punk than blues, but that’s shooting from the hip, so don’t get all whiny about it if you end up not agreeing. Last night they tore through 10 meaty pieces of rock before declining requests for an encore because they didn’t have any more songs. Then they asked for shots of Tequila. (Grant Brissey) -The Stranger

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When (Artist Formerly Known as Epoxies’ Ray Cathode) Tim was asked to record a cover for a tribute album for now SF based The Punk Group, he didn’t hesitate to recruit three female voices to bring a different edge to the song.

Jessi Lixx started her singing career belting numbers from musicals in smoky halls across the country, while Miss Joseph had made a name as the bass player and sexy backing vocalist for The Bugs of Lightning. Double A had never had any musical experience until she was discovered by Tim while singing in the shower.

Impressed by their choral prowess and clapping abilities, Tim decided to take the three young ladies under his wing and share his composing and producing powers with the world. Thus the Suicide Notes were born.

Though ecstatic with the original recordings that ensued, the band was missing something: the raw thrill of the live stage and the musicians to help bring their Pop gems to life. Determined to have only the best, they set their sights on local Rock royalty Petey J Cool of Pure Country Gold fame, and Howie Hotknife (driving force of The Hotknives and ex-Mean Jeans four stringer) who, charmed by Lixx, Miss Joe, and Double A’s grace and harmonizing power, agreed to join the Suicide Notes with their guitar and bass excellence and turn them into a mean live machine!

Fueled by a love of cuteness and the macabre; melody and harmonies; and 60’s imagery tainted by blood and guts, Suicide Notes create a sound that’s been described as The Shangri-La’s doing it with the Ramones in the back of a hearse.

From the lycanthropic love triangle of “Wolf Couple”, to the self-titled “Suicide Note”, their lyrics touch on love, life and mundane things like a trip to the beach, twisting them into a nightmarish world where the listener is left with a smile… slowly freezing on their face.

Stay tuned for new recordings and live date announcements.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $13 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

A lush array of looping and vocal/violin gymnastics… Kishi Bashi’s debut full-length, 151a, is a bright and soaring avant-pop record written primarily on violin – Kishi Bashi’s main instrument which has brought him to record and tour with the likes of Regina Spector, Sondre Lerche, Alexi Murdoch, of Montreal and more.

Kishi Bashi collaborated with of Montreal’s Kevin Barnes on that band’s new album, Paralytic Stalks. This last endeavor he credits with some of his most recent musical growth, acknowledging that Barnes pushed him to new heights of creativity, forcing him to explore a broader use of his primary instrument: the violin. This experimentation affected his loop-based live show and led to him write more of the new record with violin rather than piano or guitar, loosening him from the grip of habit and expanding his palette. Kishi Bashi uses Japanese singing as another of many layers, doing so without any trace of gimmickry, and achieving what, to Western ears, must sound like an expression of the ineffable.

From the deconstructed doo-wop of “Wonder Woman, Wonder Me,” a 21st century transmission of Smile-era Brian Wilson to the menacing marriage of Eastern hues and Western operatics in “Beat the Bright out of Me,” this album is a mediation between opposing drives, offering possible reconciliation but never promising it. Kishi Bashi played and produced 151a entirely himself.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $12 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Without a doubt, Australian two-piece, DZ Deathrays are one of the most hotly talked about bands of the past year. After signing to Melbourne-based record label I OH YOU in early 2011, they’ve been releasing and touring relentlessly, introducing themselves to the world as one of the most brutal new bands on the scene.

After such an exciting year, one is left wondering – what is this band’s story? Where did they come from?

Formed in 2008 by Shane Parsons (vocals/guitars) and Simon Ridley (drums), the band which was then called simply ‘DZ’, was originally intended for house parties – a unique rule that was quickly broken due to their sheer popularity and demand. Not to mention the epic live shows which if continued to this day at house parties alone, would result in mass police raids. Their live show is one of their strongest assets, with most people leaving the venue dragging their dropped jaws behind them.

Consisting of only two parts, it may be hard for some to comprehend a mere two-piece with the ability to create such a massive wall of sound. But this is a feat which DZ Deathrays has been able to conquer with results fashioned from a statically charged mix of influences like Death From Above 1979, The Bronx, Justice, Sunn 0)) and Lightning Bolt. With this combination of musical mentors as ammunition, they create a blend of driving monster beats firing over an avalanche of guitar similar to the sound of a squadron of attacking Panzer tanks.

It was clear from the onset that DZ was going to be big. By mid 2010 they had released their first EP in Australia, Ruined My Life (Inertia / Uselesss Art) and toured the country over. They’d toured with Crystal Castles (who personally invited them), Dananananaykroyd, Ratatat and The View; played live with Biffy Clyro and The Temper Trap; and joined festival lineups such as Big Day Out, Parklife, Field Day, Sunset Sounds, Playground Weekender and more. They had been Unearthed by triple j and received personal kudos from Mark Ronson, saying he ‘loved’ the band.

It was obvious, at this juncture, to step it up a notch and introduce the band to the world stage. A move which would prove to be momentous, and a move that required a new band name. ‘DZ’ already existed in the form of a US based dubstep DJ. To avoid being confused for a dubstep band, they quickly changed their name to DZ Deathrays, thus a new phase was born.

DZ Deathrays’ first venture out of the southern hemisphere was to CMJ festival in New York in 2010. They quickly returned for SXSW in March 2011 and already, the buzz was brewing. They were blogged about by Jen Long from the BBC, and included in Blunt Magazine’s Top 40 bands to see at SXSW in 2011. That buzz fed through to the UK, where in May, they picked up a spot to play at The Great Escape and toured the UK with New York punk outfit Cerebral Ballzy.

Meanwhile back home, they partnered up with Melbourne based label, I OH YOU to release their 2nd EP, Brutal Tapes, a mix of studio and house party recordings as well as some remixes from Yacht Club DJs and Surecut Kids. With all the excitement in the UK, it was time to officially bring the recordings to the motherland, and that they did in style.

Their last visit to the UK in October 2011, saw them put out not one, not two, but THREEreleases.

1. Their EP Ruined My Life, out on Big Scary Monsters and Humming Records 2. A limited edition cassette version of the EP through the BBC’s Jen Long’s new label Kissability, through Transgressive. 3. A 7” of popular single “Gebbie Street” out on Too Pure through Beggars.

They backed it up with a UK/EU tour, playing with Male Bonding, Band of Skulls and joining the NME Radar Tour with Wolfgang.

The media reaction was off the chart. NME Magazine and Q Magazine had both placed them in their “Top 10 bands of The Great Escape,” before NME went a step further and gave them #8 in the “50 best new bands of 2011.” The accolades kept growing as BBC took the band under its wing, giving their song “Gebbie Street” a play on daytime radio with Fearne Cotton and Zane Lowe giving the band ‘Next Hype.’ They continued to receive radio play on BBC1, XFM, Artrocker Radio and even did live sessions for all three of those stations.

By this time in Australia, the band had signed a full record deal with I OH YOU and publishing with Mushroom. They’d been personally picked by Foo Fighters to play three of their stadium shows on their Australian tour, which they happily joined between playing sideshows with F*cked up and touring with Unknown Mortal Orchestra. Only one thing was next. The debut album.

They came back from the UK and went straight into the studio at The White Room in Mt Nebo (just outside of Brisbane). Produced by Richard Pike from PVT, the record is due for release mid-2012 and the media is absolutely busting for it. First single “No Sleep” got a world premiere on BBC1 by Huw Stephens, followed by an exclusive stream on the NME website. All of this follows the latest NME tout, placing the band at #4 in “20 Most Exciting Bands for 2012.”

News of the band has bled back to the USA, where The Death Set covered their notorious video for “The Mess Up” and it received attention on Pitchfork TV. The band will be backing it up with a return to North America for SXSW and Canadian Music Week in 2012, while at the same time, releasing their first EPs through 3|4 (USA) and Dine Alone Records (Canada).

As for the debut album release, watch this space for when and where you can find it in 2012.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $13 at the door.  Doors open at 7pm.

To Travels and Trunks

The thing about traveling is that you always end up back where you started. Ashes to ashes and all that big-picture stuff.

For Hey Marseilles, travel is as much a state of mind as location of body. This is a seven-piece Northwest band deeply rooted to its place of origin but equally anxious to get away, to see it all. Not escapism, but expansion: Listen closely to To Travels and Trunks and you’ll hear faraway places named not so much as a wish list but as incantation. The broader your horizon, the deeper your longing, the more genuine your experience.

And so, in 2008, three guys embark on a musical adventure instigated by one’s first melody on his brand-new used accordion. And, some months later, seven guys—the original trio plus a few old friends—get together in a garage in Seattle and record an album. To Travels and Trunks is both Hey Marseilles’ mission statement and its hazy dream put to music.

The Hey Marseilles sound is immediate, evocative, mostly acoustic, always emotive. It’s classically-trained brothers Sam and Jacob Anderson on cello and viola, their strings grand and mournful on To Travels and Trunks’ sweeping title track. It’s the wheeze and moan of Philip Kobernik’s accordion, simultaneously the gawkiest and most romantic of all instruments, opening the gorgeous “From a Terrace,” and his kid-at-a-carnival Rhodes on the 6/8 spin of “Gasworks.” It’s Nick Ward’s electric guitar on the epic “Calabasas,” stretching into the distance like an open road. It’s the Dixieland swagger of Patrick Brannon’s trumpet on uptempo lead single “Rio”—recently Song of the Day at NPR, Spinner.com, and KEXP. It’s a songwriter’s urgent expression via vocalist Matt Bishop, expanded with huge singalong choruses, unraveled by a virtuoso band’s sinuous arrangements. It’s modern vintage, a folk-pop jam session at a vanished cabaret on the Seine, an indie rocker’s fantasy of his grandparents’ first kiss.

By developing this sound—a process captured on To Travels and Trunks—Hey Marseilles discovered that the band isn’t any one of these things but all of them. And none of them, too: When Hey Marseilles headlined a holiday party at Neumo’s in Seattle, nobody expected MC Thomas Grey of local party-hop outfit Champagne Chamgpagne to spit a few bars over a Christmas-song medley, but there he was, and somehow it made sense. Just like the inclusion of their cover of Daniel Johnston’s “True Love Will Find You in the End” in the Starbucks-compiled Sweetheart 2010. Moments like that—and more, during Hey Marseilles’ headlining slots at local clubs and winning appearances at major Northwest festivals like Bumbershoot, Capitol Hill Block Party, Doe Bay Fest—keep fans guessing while rendering them true believers.

Because really, this is just a bunch of guys making the music they wanna hear. Because really, with a palette this colorful, anything—and anywhere—is possible.

Red Bull Common Thread with Dinosaur Jr, Sebadoh and J Mascis

WWW.REDBULLUSA.COM/COMMONTHREAD

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $25 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Sebadoh – A biography 

MEMBERS:
Lou Barlow – guitar, bass, vocals
Jason Loewenstein – bass, guitar, vocals
Bob Fay – drums, occasional bass, vocals on “I Smell A Rat”

WHERE FROM:
Massachusetts

WHERE NOW:
Still together

DATE FORMED:
1988

HOW FORMED:
Out of the ashes of Dinosaur Jr., Lou Barlow teamed up with his pal Eric Gaffney to make low-fi 4-track recordings. The duo made two albums, “Weed Forestin” and “The Freed Man,” and released both on cassette. They released “Sebadoh III” in 1991. Songs on that album were written by Barlow, Gaffney and a new recruit, bassist Jason Loewenstein. The name Sebadoh was chosen because it sounds like “We’re the best.” when played backwards on a four-track tape loop. In 1994, Eric left the band and was replaced by Bob Fay.

HIGHLIGHT:
Since each member of Sebadoh writes songs, their sound can be very different from one song to the next. Where once we heard three voice screaming at once, now they talk in harmony.

“Sebadoh remains the preeminent voice of indie rock – for instance, the intro to the first track, “It’s All You,” is an overwhelming reminder of the band’s supremacy. The song begins with an electric buzz, then kicks into a 10-second drum solo before the chiming guitars and desperate vocals come in, backed by a huge drum sound.” – CMJ online review of The Sebadoh

* Above Photo by Jens Nordström

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Phil Merwin met Gary Walden while they were both employed as ‘orderlies’ at a Mental Hospital in North Long Beach, Ca in 1987. They talked about a shared love of Black Sabbath, the bad brains, Flipper, and black flag, and they were found they were both members of the Sub Pop singles club. Eventually, they discussed starting a band. Gary introduced Phil Merwin to Preston Peck and Herb Gordon, and the band was formed. Many dirtclodfight lyrics came from conversations and experiences with patients at the mental hospital, and from Phil Merwin’s notebooks of poetry. The band cut their teeth at the club, Ugenes, in Pico Rivera where they played with ShoeGazer, L7, the Offspring, and Hole. They had more than a few standout shows with Clawhammer, Distorted Pony, Sandy Duncan’s eye, and the Paper tulips all over LA and Long Beach.

At the end of 1987 they wrote their first 7 inch, “the paper bag” EP. Al Flipside caught a few of their shows at Ugene’s, and made quick friends with band. Al decided to put out the first 7 inch on Flipside records in 1988, and this was followed with 3 more albums over the years on his label. The band was ecstatic to be part of the Flipside label/fanzine, as they grew up on the fanzine, and it meant a lot to them to carry that logo on their records. Fred Merwin, Phil Merwin’s twin brother, joined the band after Gary left before the recording of their first 7 inch, and has been on every release on lead guitar.

The interplay between the brothers Merwin on guitar became their ‘sound’, and was integral to the bands direction. They played a slower heavier version of punk with an odd ‘doors-like’ ethos hiding under the covers. They were not a typical Southern California punk band, at all. Their live shows were considered a heated battle of emotion and intensity, and garnered them a decent following locally, and on the road. Phil Merwin was known to pass out from screaming during shows, this was always both disturbing and ‘appreciated’ by fans. Phil’s screaming/spoken word/poetry/revivalist chanting became a trademark of their live shows and songs. The first album was ‘Everything that Isn’t, was produced by good friend Sean Greaves, and is regarded as a fan favorite with the song Brutal Flower becoming a staple request on the road for the band. The title track is a long bantering of spiritual dilemma solved through loud guitars and feedback laden baptism. They did many West Coast and Southwest tours, and one national tour after this album. This first record, also, formed a devoted following with fans in Australia, which eventually led to a 7 inch on Death Valley records out of Australia in later years, and picture evidence of kids in Australia with dcf tattoos!

The line up changed after the first album to include Bill Jackson on drums and Darryl Williams on bass. The songs changed into more complex, relentless dirges with strange pop ‘like’ elements thrown in. At this time the band started using experimental open and dropped tunings on their guitars, and found Darryl Williams and Fred Merwin contributing more to the song writing. This line up would put out their 2 final Flipside albums “Hunting Lesson” and “Suffering the Aftertaste” . Both of these releases were very well received, especially by other bands, and the band did many tours in support of them. They opened shows for TAD, Helmet, The melvins, Steel Pole Bathtub, the Jesus Lizard, and Rocket from the Crypt. They did many tours with Atomic 61, their brother band. Cavity Search and Feeble records co released a live 7 inch, LIVE in Texas, from one of their SW tours together. Atomic would go on to cover the dcf song, “the one that killed him” from the Hunting Lesson album during their live sets, and dirtclodfight recorded a version of Atomic 61′s “double boiler” along with a cover of John Entwhistle’s who classic, “Boris the spider” and this was released as a 7 inch on Truk records out of Costa Mesa, Ca, as a split 7 inch with the FH Hill Company. The song “I got crazy things” from their final Flipside release, Suffering the Aftertaste, was released by Death Valley records out of Australia as a split 7 inch with ChristBait, and was, also, included on the “the Devil You know/ The Devil you don’t” compilation released by KXLU’s DJ Mark Torres. This song was written by Williams, and it was the only dcf song Fred Merwin sang lead vocals on. Flipside, also released a 7 inch from the “suffering” sessions , the Denny 7 inch (named after the disturbing picture of Denny Swofford used on the cover), with the songs, “The rodent incident” and “…there might be a hole” included. Denny Swofford was co-producer of the Suffering the Aftertaste album, as well.

Because of their strong friendship over the years with Denny, dirtclodfight asked Denny and Christopher Cooper, co-owners of the Cavity Search records label out of Portland, OR, to put out their new album, “Hymnal”. Hymnal was recorded at Saturation studios on 2″ analog with Geoff Harrington at the board, and Merwin and Swofford producing. The band now had Chris Benton on drums, and Jason Locher on bass, as Williams left do sound for Greg Ginn. The content of this album had some of their most accessible songs mixed with their evolving heavy laden dirtclodfight sound. The album was a huge sounding record the band is still very proud of, and produced a crowd favorite in “Throttle Downer”. The band did 2 national tours to support Hymnal touring with Victims Family for 2 1/2 weeks, and a doing a few shows with No Means NO, the cows, and chokebore, and of course, Atomic 61. The band ended up moving to Portland, and were joined by Eric Johnson on drums. During this era they released a song called “Enduring you” on a compilation for Cravedog records, and they played many a great show at EJ’s in PDX with Mike Thrasher joining them on guitar. They did their last tour, a SW tour to SXSW with the Bali Girls in 1997, and then the band went into ‘remission’ for about 6 years.

Phil Merwin moved to Eugene, OR, and reformed the band with Austin Swartout on drums in 2004 as a duet. Austin has been Phil Merwin’s best friend since the age of 14, and the HUGEST dcf fan ever. Fred Merwin moved up to Eugene from Long Beach in 2006 to rejoin the band on guitar. With local Eugene friend, Rueben “the knife’ Markstrom on bass, the band recorded the album, “Healing in the key of free”. This era of the band found them producing the most ‘pop’ record they ever had, and performing some shows with only Minutemen covers in their live set. This line up opened for No Means No in 2006, and in 2010 with Phil’s son Zachariah playing bass. They have played sporadic shows in Eugene and Portland over the years, a few with Yob.

They are currently mastering an acoustic album, with Phil Merwin doing some old dirtclodfight songs solo, and some new acoustic songs. This medium has proved interesting for a band known for being very loud and intense, and Cavity Search has signed on to release the record in 2012. The band has plans to tour this summer, and hopes to record a new album titled, ‘The Main Sequence’ in the fall. Their new material is back to being very dynamic, and sordidly heavy, mostly instrumental, loud-soft, progressive, and sonic music. The band has been working this new material into its live shows recently, and is very excited about the new direction of the band, and the return of Jason Locher on bass.

Description“Disturbing” – my Mom.Band Interests

Yob.

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DIIV is the nom-de-plume of Z. Cole Smith, musical provocateur and front-man of an atmospheric and autumnally-charged new Brooklyn four-piece.

Recently inked to the uber-reliable Captured Tracks imprint, DIIV created instant vibrations in the blog-world with their impressionistic debut Sometime; finding it’s way onto the esteemed pages of Pitchfork and Altered Zones a mere matter of weeks after the group’s formation.

Enlisting the aid of NYC indie-scene-luminary, Devin Ruben Perez, former Smith Westerns drummer Colby Hewitt, and Mr. Smith’s childhood friend Andrew Bailey, DIIV craft a sound that is at once familial and frost-bitten.  Indebted to classic kraut, dreamy Creation-records psychedelia, and the primitive-crunch of late-80’s Seattle, the band walk a divisive yet perfectly fused patch of classic-underground influence.

One part THC and two parts MDMA; the first offering from DIIV chemically fuses the reminiscent with the half-remembered building a musical world out of old-air and new breeze.  These are songs that remind us of love in all it’s earthly perfections and perversions.

A lot of DIIV’s magnetism was birthed in the process Mr. Smith went through to discover these initial compositions.  After returning from a US tour with Beach Fossils, Cole made a bold creative choice, settling into the window-facing corner of a painter’s studio in Bushwick, sans running water, holing up to craft his music.

In this AC-less wooden room, throughout the thick of the summer, Cole surrounded himself with cassettes and LP’s, the likes of Lucinda Williams, Arthur Russell, Faust, Nirvana, and Jandek; writings of N. Scott Momaday, James Welsh, Hart Crane, Marianne Moore, and James Baldwin; and dreams of aliens, affection, spirits, and the distant natural world (as he imagined it from his window facing the Morgan L train).

The resulting music is as cavernous as it is enveloping, asking you to get lost in it’s tangles in an era that demands your attention be focused into 140 characters.

“Sometime” hit stores on October 11th with a second single to follow November 29, culminating in an early March EP release.

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Dear Reader,

I once came very close to dying (bug-bite, failed organs), and though my life was spared thanks to thanks to modern medicine and a kidney given to me by my father, nonetheless I live with a persisting sense that my time is borrowed. My resolution–what I intend to do with my finite allotment– is to reach some small, yet conclusive understanding of my life in particular and the world in general; an understanding accomplished, in part, through a combination of music and words.

The last record we made, Hunger & Thirst, is a record that purposefully confuses physical sickness with ontological sickness, i.e. that most desires are only symptoms of the desire to be someone else. This new record picks up where we left off, though this time “purposefully confusing” the idea of time as a place. It imagines that my past is a composite of old houses and apartment buildings, that my memories are these little artifacts strewn about, and then there’s me with a single candle, picking up the artifacts one at a time and examining them by the dim light.

Songs as personal as these perhaps ought to be burned or buried rather than be paraded before an audience. But there is something transfigurative in playing music with so many close friends–what starts out as a solemn, solitary attempt is turned into something both communal and cathartic. I think we even have fun at times.

A New Kind of House (the title itself is borrowed from the brilliant poetry of Zach Schomburg) was artfully recorded on location (our house) by repeat-collaborator Paul Laxer; the artwork was beautifully realized by Ricky Delucco, and we have Tender Loving Empire to thank for so tenderly helping us put out a record a second time.

kyle ray morton / 01.11.2011

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From the first strikes of their angular yet melodic chords, it’s apparent that Touche Amore have awoken something long forgotten in the hardcore/punk genre. Bringing to mind the balance of rage and melody that “Revolution Summer” era DC bands Rites of Spring and Ignition once carried. Within each song they build an awe inspiring musical tension while impassioned vocalist Jeremy Bolm’s shouts resonate, ripe with intellectual introspection. This collective outpouring of traditional hardcore anger and emotional hardcore openness ultimately coalesces into something beautiful, vulnerable, and refreshingly real.

Shortly after their formation in late 2007, Touché Amoré released their demo 7″EP on the No Sleep label. After touring the West Coast in support of that release, they recorded their debut album “…To the Beat of a Dead Horse” in early 2009. The album was co-released by the 6131 and Collect (Geoff from Thursday’s vinyl only imprint) record labels, and was praised by kids and press worldwide as one of the best releases of the year. Soon after, they hit the road with a wide variety of bands including Converge, Coalesce, Thursday, Envy, and more. On the heels of these travels, Touché Amoré even managed to release a number of EPs, including splits with friends La Dispute and Make Do And Mend.

Deathwish are proud to announce the release of Touche Amore’s latest album, “Parting the Sea Between Brightness and Me”.

In February of 2011, Touche Amore piled into their beat up tour van in an Los Angeles suburb and set off on a twenty six hour journey to Eudora, Kansas. With a population of just over four thousand people, Eudora may be a peculiar place for a punk band to go, but nestled in its rural isolation is acclaimed engineer Ed Rose and his Black Lodge Studios (formerly Redhouse Recording Studio). There under Rose’s attentive ears, Touche Amore poured their patchwork soul into their latest work, “Parting the Sea Between Brightness and Me”.

In “Parting the Sea Between Brightness and Me”, Touche Amore’s creative formula is driven by emotional affect, not contemporary studio effects. In the purest form possible, raw shouted vocals and clean manic guitars fight for volume over roomy bass and percussion. Creating a sound that is shockingly simple as it is emotionally engaging. The serene and fragile opening notes of “Tilde” serve as the album’s introductory serenade before Touche Amore pound and jangle into the hook-laden song. And seconds later, when vocalist/lyricist Jeremy Bolm screams “…I’m parting the sea between brightness and me…”, a tone of desperation sets in that resonates throughout the duration of the album. His straight forward cries convincingly tell his own personal story. To some, this lyrical writing could read as a diary based purely in self deprecation, but his words cut and pull from a much deeper place in the heart. Serving as an open window into his constant soul searching amid life’s constant trials and tribulations. Songs like “Home Away From Here” and “Sesame” are great examples of this, infectious in their sound and moving lyrical spirit. While “Method Act” and the emotional “Condolences” show the band experimenting with epic leanings while maintaining their beloved trademark character. Without a doubt, Touche Amore’s “Parting the Sea Between Brightness and Me” is a stunning full length achievement on any scale. Proving that there is true beauty within the concept of artistic simplicity.

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Julia Holter’s second album, Ekstasis, is a collection of songs written across the span of three years in Los Angeles, California.

Holter’s songwriting stems from a mythological reverence of that which is incomprehensibly beautiful. Her Eating the Stars EP (2007) was a first attempt at musically transcribing this beauty, while discovering the honest enjoyment of unadulterated creativity. The anonymous authorship and shimmering gold detail of medieval illuminated manuscripts particularly inspired the ornately-orchestrated pop song mystery of Stars. Holter’s debut album Tragedy (Leaving Records, 2011) embraced similar strains of shimmer, but used sparser textures in a narrative context.

Ekstasis marks a return to the playful searching of Stars, but guided by newly-learned disciplines, slightly better technology, and nearly limitless home recording time. Formative experiences at Cal Arts studying with Michael Pisaro and in India singing with harmonium under guru Pashupati nath Mishra marked a slight detour for Holter in what started as a more traditional composition route. The trajectory leading to the creation of Ekstasis suggests her thirst for knowledge and experience.

While Ekstasis reflects the conventions of her classical training, the album is also uncannily, if unknowingly, poppy. Holter’s approach to crafting the songs of Ekstasis centered around what she describes as, “open ear decisions: what seemed to sound best for that moment.” This blindness to reference unintentionally steers Ekstasis along the experimental pop spectrum most commonly associated to New York’s Downtown music micro-universe of the 80s, specifically the works of Laurie Anderson and Arthur Russell.

With the blindness that leads Ekstasis, there are also many compositional methods at play. “Marienbad” was built while playing around on a Fender Rhodes with imagined imagery of topiary gardens and scenes from the song’s film namesake in mind. The entirety of “Boy in the Moon” – the Casio SK-1 noodles, melody, and lyrics – was improvised over a seven minute catharsis. The melody and lyrics for “Four Gardens” were written spontaneously while rearranging an older song on a loop pedal for a live performance. “This is Ekstasis” contains a bass line built from a medieval isorhythm technique, allowing it to maintain a sense of repetition, but shift slightly with every turn.

With each song, there is a unique story and approach, but all are united by the magnetism of the medieval manuscripts and Holter’s “desire to get outside of my body and find what I can’t define.” It took Holter stepping outside of her solely self-written and recorded body of music to engage fellow Los Angeles musician and friend Cole M. Greif-Neill in the final phase of Ekstasis. Greif-Neil added perspective and brought out the greatest sonic potential that each song secretly contained. Holter says, “The first time I heard his mix of ‘Marienband” the garden became so rich. Suddenly there were bright greens, the statues’ edges defined, the fountains pouring…”

Ekstasis is an album indulged in these beautiful, simple, unfolding life mysteries. “All of these fleeting images and muses are so important,” says Holter. “As with the manuscripts, when I see them, I hear voices. I am continually following the voices in the gold leaf. I can’t know them, but I will follow their beautiful song.”

Julia Holter’s Ekstasis will be released March 8th, 2012 as a 2xLP and CD, available later in the month digitally.

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I started Swans in 1982 in NYC. At the time, I had no musical skills whatsoever, just instinct and a need to make something happen. The music changed constantly over the years, and I’m gratified it reached, and continues to reach, a fair number of people. After 15 years, I decided to end Swans, as the name had become a burden and the associations no longer fit with what I wanted to do into the future. I started Angels of Light in 1999, and that’s my main musical focus now. I also run Young God Records and release (and sometimes produce) music by people whose music I enjoy.

Dozens of people came and went through the 15 years of Swans existence. These are the people that spring immediately to mind: Michael Gira, Norman Westberg, Roli Mossiman, Harry Crosby, Sue Hanel, Jonathan Kane, Algis Kizys, Jarboe, Ted Parsons, Steve Mcallister, Larry Mullins, Virgil Moorefield, Vudi, Joe Goldring, Ronaldo Gonzales, Vinnie Signorelli, Christoph Hahn, Ivan Nahem, Bill Rieflin, Bill Bronson, Phil Puleo, Anton Fier, Jenny Wade, Clinton Steele…and more…

PS – Jarboe was the longest-lasting Swans contributor of those listed above and contributed more than can be mentioned here. To learn more about her, go here: thelivingjarboe.com

Here’s some of the music that I enjoyed during the time of Swans: Throbbing Gristle, Psychic TV, The Stooges, Brian Eno, Teenage Jesus And The Jerks, DNA, The Contortions, Glenn Branca, Black Flag, early Pink Floyd, This Heat, Kraftwerk, Herman Nitsch, Cabaret Voltaire, Can, Public Image LTD., SPK, Ennio Morricone, Leonard Cohen, Nick Drake, and always, always Bob Dylan and The Beatles…ha ha! I’m sure there’s 100s more, but who cares and I can’t remember anyway… – Michael Gira / Young God Records 2008

Here’s 2 reviews/articles written at the time of Swans’ demise in 1997 

TOUR’S THE SWANSONG FOR GIRA
Text from Denver Post Jan. 16, 1997
By David Thomas

Bursting from the NY scene in the early 80′s, the Swans’ sound was so heavy, so threatening that listeners either fled in fear or joined the throng. There was never a middle ground. And there still isn’t. Over time, Gira’s sense of darkness deepened and in the process the songs turned into something delicate and beautiful while remaining frightening.

SWANS | 1/1/97 In the life cycle of rock music, most bands suffer endings poorly. Either they disappear suddenly under the force of a lost record deal or bleed out their musical force slowly in the public eye through endless reunion concerts and rehashed compilations.

Michael Gira will have none of that. At the beginning of the final tour of his band Swans, Gira took the time to discuss the end of a 15 year odyssey as one of contemporary music’s most highly regarded and overlooked bands. “I just want to have it discreet, finished and over, and I can move on. I have other ideas I want to do. I think it’s necessary,” he said by phone from Florida.

Bursting from the NY scene in the early 80′s, the Swans’ sound was so heavy, so threatening that listeners either fled in fear or joined the throng. There was never a middle ground. And there still isn’t.

Over time, Gira’s sense of darkness deepened and in the process the songs turned into something delicate and beautiful while remaining frightening. Like a slow-motion plane disaster, a lyricism emerged from the chaos.

New listeners and old discovered a rock band with as much richness and subtlety as a classical symphony orchestra.

Still, even with 15 years, 15 albums and mountains of gushing praise from fans and critics alike, Gira saw that it was time to write the final coda for his band.

“After 15 years of this grueling struggle with really no reward to show for it, the intelligent thing to do would be to move on,” he said.

Artistic triumph and personal despair mark the Swans. Claiming he would do and has done just about anything to record his creative vision, Gira found an enemy where you might expect an ally – the music industry.

“I loathe it entirely. We found our own little niche now, with our own business and good distribution system, so we’re able to survive on our own, I just can’t deal with it. I don’t go out to clubs. I don’t talk to A&R people; I don’t schmooze; I don’t do anything to try to advance myself in that way. I just can’t stand it anymore. I tried in the early days. Of course I was always pounding away. But there’s only so much you can take.”

Closing out the Swans’ catalog is “Soundtracks For The Blind.” If Gira has been seeking a high point on which to end the Swans, then this is it. Two CDs, packed with nearly 2 1/2 hours of music, the album is a scorching journey through passion and pain. The discs combine music with sounds and sonic interludes into something that strikes you as an actual sound track for an unmade movie. Highly experimental without ever becoming cerebral, “Soundtracks” works from the ambiguous emotional source where fear and excitement, love and lust, tears of happiness, and tears of sorrow mingle.

“I had recorded these songs from the last group from last year’s tour. And I had a lot of backlog of sound-track-like things, as well as boxes full of sounds, cassette loops and vocal loops from Jarboe, and all these narrative things that we have from very personal sources. And I decided that I wanted to pursue a direction that has sort of intrigued me after the last couple of albums. I made the whole album into a segue feeling, where everything bleeds from one unrelated sound to another,” he explained.

“The thing that interested me most about this album – not that I’m not interested in songs – but it’s more interesting to me to look at the way one thing works against something else than how they do individually. So it’s a process of listening to how it feels, what the experience is like going from something that is incredibly intense to something very gentle. Those juxtapositions interest me more than the things themselves.”

Once the tour is completed, Gira intends to release a summary set of Swans music in Double-CD sets, putting only the best of the band’s work into an accessible package for present and future fans. In addition, his label will issue experimental soundscapes by Gira under the name Body Lovers and another project of what Gira calls “long narrative songs” as the Angels of Light.

The re-issues and the new projects will continue to sustain both Gira’s voracious artistic appetite as well as reward those lucky enough to seek out his work or lucky enough to stumble upon it.

And as the Swans legacy fades into history, Gira can look back and see he did what he set out to do.

“I never had an aim except to make music, not to convince people of anything. I just had certain sounds I wanted to hear. I made them. Certain sounds, certain ways of performing them that would cause a certain experience to occur, in myself and/or the listener. And I made those things happen.”

NY Times

15 Baleful Years, Then Goodbye Cruel World
By JON PARELES
Published: January 27, 1997

”I love/hate you,” Michael Gira, Swans’ main songwriter and singer, told the crowd at Irving Plaza on Friday night. The sold-out audience had mustered for Swans’ last concert in of New York City, its hometown, somberly saying goodbye to the band after 15 years.

From the beginning, Swans have played stately, desolate, implacable songs that slammed home the certainty of suffering and death. Mr. Gira and Jarboe, the group’s keyboardist and alternate singer and songwriter, write about blood and pain, domination and corruption, God and the void. Through the years, they have set their lyrics to dissonant, gargantuan hard rock; to grim, machine-driven dance rhythms, and, most recently, to resonant drones. Although they anticipated the likes of Tool and Nine Inch Nails, Swans were never quite in sync with the pop market; they stood adamantly apart.

The sense of finality gave Friday’s concert even more bleak majesty. It was not a retrospective; the material was 1990′s Swans, a set of slow drones and primal utterances. For the first 15 minutes, there were no words at all, just tolling bass lines, sustained guitar chords and very gradual crescendos, heaving like tectonic plates. Eventually Mr. Gira began singing. ”I forgive you for your indifference,” he intoned. ”I wish you happiness.”

SThe songs were usually little more than a single slow riff, perhaps a chord or two, with steadily strummed guitar and unswerving drumbeats. There was some variety; one riff had the blunt thump of heavy metal, another was a waltz. Mr. Gira sang with sepulchral calm, while in her three songs, Jarboe was bluesy, breathy, then baleful.

The repetition held a sense of ritual as the band bore down, building and building the songs, filling the room with invisible waves of overtones from the unchanging chords. In some ways, the songs harked back to the late 1960′s, with echoes of Jim Morrison in Mr. Gira’s death-haunted baritone and the resonances of Pink Floyd in the music. But 1960?

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Kristian Matsson, aka the Tallest Man on Earth, is a 29-year-old songwriter from Dalarna, Sweden. The first recordings from the Tallest Man on Earth surfaced in 2006 via a self-titled EP released on the Swedish independent label Gravitation. Matsson followed this EP with his 2008 full length, Shallow Grave, an album that drew accolades from the likes of NPR and Pitchfork. Many in North America were introduced to the Tallest Man on Earth on a tour with Bon Iver, including a stop for two shows at the legendary New York City venue Town Hall. The Tallest Man on Earth was winning over audiences through powerful performances, taking the stage alone with his acoustic guitar and captivating the crowds night after night.

Fans continued to discover the Tallest Man on Earth through subsequent tours and word of mouth. In 2008 he visited KEXP’s studio in Seattle and in 2009 performed for NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert series, which continued to help inform audiences. He was still touring without a publicist or a North American record label, but fans were devouring his stunning performances, both as real-life audience members and internet voyeurs, scouring the web for new fan videos of shows.

In early 2010 Matsson signed with U.S. record label Dead Oceans and announced the release of his sophomore album, The Wild Hunt. Once again, it was a record rooted in songwriting and a deep folk tradition, with Matsson’s wordplay and deft guitar work at the center. Praises for the Tallest Man on Earth continued to build, and throughout the tour in support of The Wild Hunt and the follow-up EP, Sometimes the Blues is Just A Passing Bird, the crowds grew in fervor and size. He sold out venues like Webster Hall in New York City, The Fillmore in San Francisco, Shepherd’s Bush Empire in London and took the stage at festivals like Coachella, Green Man, Roskilde, Pitchfork and Sasquatch. The Tallest Man on Earth toured the world, with sold-out shows in places like Australia and South Africa. The word continued to travel. He also performed “King of Spain” on the legendary Jools Holland show.

Matsson spent the winter months of late 2011 and early 2012 in his home studio in Dalarna, recording There’s No Leaving Now, his third full-length album. It’s another stunning set, and in support of this new album the Tallest Man on Earth is headlining two sold out shows at Town Hall, returning to the stage where he opened for Bon Iver and took some of the first steps of his journey. The Tallest Man on Earth will be touring in 2012 and 2013 in support of There’s No Leaving Now.

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Hello dear, dear person,

Do you think that the “Rock Band Of The Year” should be a band that actually plays rock music?

T

Do you miss the sound of cheap guitar amps being captured by expensive microphones?

H

Do you want goosebumps from hearing 5 single-minded men with a telepathic connection slamming their instruments against each other and the floor?

E

Have you been to a concert by the latest saviours of music and been thoroughly underwhelmed by the performance and showmanship?

H

Are you interested in music built out of blood, guts and will-power, and not ones and zeros?

I

Does this make you think of The Hives?

V

Are you wondering what they have been up to the last couple of years?

E

By all means, read on…

S

Do you hear a swooping sound? Can you feel warm gusts of wind against your face? It is the phoenix rising from the ashes, and while one arm flaps vigorously, beneath the other he is holding a golden disc. He is coming closer… The disc says… LEX HIVES!!!

Yes, little reader, the world’s wisest musical council and international rock sensation, The Hives, are back! On June 5th, Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist, Nicholaus Arson, Chris Dangerous, Dr. Matt Destruction, and Vigilante Carlstroem will return with their fifth stunner — the 12-track contemplation of all law that is Hives – - Lex Hives. The term “Lex Hives” is a phrase derived from the ancient Roman practice of enacting a system or body of laws and accepting them as a standard. Thus, the 12 songs on Lex Hives make up the holy laws after which all life from now on must be lived.

Chiselled into the melted wax cake 33 1/3 long-player, Lex Hives will be released on The Hives’ own label Disques Hives. Self-produced, self-played, self- released, and self-promoted, these 12 songs are not built to fit just anyone. These are not songs that sound equally good played on an acoustic guitar by the campfire. This is not music. This is compressed carbon hidden in the earth’s crust for millions of years and unearthed, to be placed in your eardrums.

–– Lex Hives took a year and a half of thinking and 3 months of recording.

–– Lex Hives is slightly over 30 minutes long. This is not short. If recorded by

some other band it would have been 45 minutes.

–– Lex Hives has exactly the contractually specified 12 songs.

–– Lex Hives has a booklet for the first time depicting the workstation at Hive Manor.

–– Lex Hives was mixed by Grammy Award winner Andrew Scheps, Dave Sardy and Joe Zook, because only the best will do and California is nicer than Sweden in February.

Born almost two decades ago in 1993 in Fagersta, Sweden, The Hives have long been a rock ‘n’ roll force to be reckoned with. Their debut, 1997’s Barely Legal, shot thru the punk community like a runaway locomotive, with faster-than-fast blistering punk that had the punks cheering and raising bottles and cans, but left most of the mainstream going, “Oh… well… uhm what?”. With 2000’s more studio-wise Veni Vidi Vicious, and the UK smash Your New Favourite Band (a compilation of songs from Barely Legal, VVV and the A.k.a I-D-I-O-T EP), however, The Hives wrote the book on the decade’s garage-rock success together with the likes of Detroit’s The White Stripes to name but one of many.

Your New Favourite Band even went not silver, gold or even multi-platinum, but diamond, thanks to the hits ‘Hate To Say I Told You So’, ‘Main Offender’, ‘Supply And Demand’ and ‘Die, Alright!’ These songs blew people’s brains out and the boys in black and white got their first taste of radio and music television airplay.

The world had crumbled and now greeted The Hives with open arms, endearing letters and red carpets, while hymns and children were produced in their honour. This black-and-white phenomenon toured constantly for three years and no-one wanted it to end, but the boys had decided to record again as they could not let go of the idea of reinventing not only rock ‘n’ roll but also themselves.

Their third and – as the band had decided in their early teens with the black-and- white logic (no pun intended) of zealous youths – last record – as no band to their knowledge had ever made more than 3 good records in a row – 2004’s Tyrannosaurus Hives, successfully patted down the earth around the flag they’d placed atop this measly globe. With further hits like the unstoppable ‘Walk Idiot Walk’, ‘Two-Timing Touch & Broken Bones’ and ‘A Little More For Little You’, they once again repeated the cycle – “release new Hives record, conquer world by touring, repeat”. And, God knows, like marauding vikings with much better dress sense, they conquered!

With 2007′s mindblower The Black and White Album, on which they messed with the ‘Hives voice’ by for the first time entertaining the notion of outside influence, in the shape of music producers such as Pharrell Williams, Jacknife Lee and Dennis Herring, The Hives landed a fish so big not even Mother Earth could swallow it. The second big bang was a fact, and that, folks, was exactly what the first single/hit song from the album stated – ‘Tick Tick Boom!’ Once again the success cycle was repeated, and after the 400 gigs and 25 nights in hospitals that followed that record, The Hives again felt that three years on the road was sufficient. Even if they did manage to extend their live universe with visits to previously uncharted South American lands like Chile, Argentina and Brazil, they decided it was time to hit the studio again. It was time for the Big Kahuna, the Colossus of Rhodes, the greatest wonder the world had ever seen! It was time to present the laws of The Hives. It was time to write –– Lex Hives!!!

Perhaps having acquired a taste for working with big-shot producers on The B&W Album, they this time decided to track down the five biggest names in popular music for the job. The names that came up? Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist, Nicholaus Arson, Chris Dangerous, Dr. Matt Destruction, and Vigilante Carlstroem. The five members of The Hives knew that in order to make the boat rock, one needed the ones who’ll rock the boat (simple Hives logic). Said and done, The Hives curled up in their patented fetal studio position and in the next two years hunkered in the rock & roll laboratory – various laboratories, in fact, including Atlantis, RMV and Decibel in Stockholm, and legendary Hansa in Berlin – and meticulously built what now is named Lex Hives!

Blistering proof of the band’s quest can be found with the lead single, ‘Go Right Ahead’, gives us The Hives moving into glam-punk territory, and is the first Hives recording, together with its Lex Hives album mate ‘Midnight Shifter’, ever to feature brass. Emerging from the glam sax-laden overdub jungle like the winners they are, The Hives come out swinging their machete guitars with a track that leaves no-one clueless as to what the message is –– “PARTY like there is no tomorrow, you crazy fucks!”

As Lex Hives sails hot off the press along the Disques Hives conveyer belt, The

Hives themselves are once more ecstatic to be alive and set free again and are readier than ready to return to the world stages – beginning with an appearance at this year’s Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival (Weekend One: April 13th-15th / Weekend Two: April 20th-22nd). On Monday, April 23rd the band will make their return live appearance on the Jimmy Kimmel Live outdoor stage (ABC 12am/11pm Central).

In special celebration of the world’s new favourite holiday, Record Store Day, the band will release the limited edition 7-inch single for ‘Go Right Ahead’ that features the unreleased track ‘1000 Answers’ on Saturday, April 21st, 2012. Fast forward to June 5th – Lex Hives Day, remember? – and a deluxe edition will feature bonus tracks recorded and produced by Queens of the Stone Age’s Josh Homme.

Louder. Bolder. Prouder. More convinced than ever. The Hives are finally out of the dark ages and steering toward the light.

This is THE LAW. The Law that is Hives. LEX HIVES!

The laws of nature are pale in comparison and The Hives demand nothing but

complete obedience.

www.TheHivesBroadcastingService.com

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The Drowning Men – A biography 

With their sleeve-length tattoos and stevedore swagger, one might mistake the members of The Drowning Men for blue-collar dockworkers in their hometown of Oceanside, CA. Perhaps they were longshoremen in another life, but in this one they are every bit a rock and roll group in the classic sense, a band of brothers who joined together to form an extended community and a family.

Formed in 2006 by grade school friends Nato, Rory, and James, the Drowning Men amplified their initial sound by adding Todd on bass guitar and Gabriel on keyboards. The line-up complete, the band proceeded to experiment with their multi-flavored musical influences, blending folk and roots Americana with sing-along sea shanties and pirate chants, with side forays into Eastern European ethnic folk delivered with the rhythmic complexity of a Brecht-Weill opera.

“I love theatrical melodies and swells, and the purity of folk music from around the world”, explains Nato, the band’s main lyricist and songwriter, whose personal influences include Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen, and the bleak poetry of Nick Cave, who’s novel “And the Ass Saw the Angel” inspired the band’s name.

With a pair of self-released efforts under their belt — 2007′s “Kill the Matador” EP and 2009′s full-length, “The Beheading of the Songbird” — the band recently signed with Los Angeles based indie Borstal Beat Records, who out of the gate are giving The Beheading of the Songbird a proper release worldwide as the band lay down the tracks for their upcoming 2012 full length release.

“The Beheading of the Songbird” has the timeless conceptual feel of such contemporaries as Arcade Fire, The Decemberists and My Morning Jacket. Lyrically it is a ray of light in the midst of the harbingers of doom, a clear-eyed look at how the power of rock has been co-opted and eroded. Songs like the single “Rita” (“Cuz while I’m sewing my own heart/I feel those threads as they fall apart”), “Songbird” (“No more shall I hear him sing again”), and “Caroline, You’re a Mess” (“Well, I hear all the reasons/And I’m sick of all of them”), tell the album’s story with a cohesive and at times spooky design. On “Courageous Son,” they tackle the American dream with an eye towards how immigrants come here with hope, though all too often discovering that “This is the wishy washy land/That you hold so dear/This is the final cure/This is America.”

After honing their live chops by touring with the likes of Flogging Molly, Alkaline Trio and The Airborne Toxic Event, The Drowning Men will soon re-enter the studio to start recording a new album with producer Billy Mohler whose past project include the Smashing Pumpkins’ Jimmy Chamberlin, Samantha Ronson, Macy Gray and Jon Brion.

The Drowning Men’s music is a glorious melting pot for our uncertain times, centered on fighting the good fight, being the last bastions of hope and survival in a world rapidly coming apart at the seams, and refusing to go under as the rising tide threatens to envelope. Every night, they play their instruments as if their — and your — lives depended on it.

“We like to position ourselves as your last bit of hope,” concludes Nato. “Being on-stage and playing music ‘in the moment’ is what it’s all about for us.” The Drowning Men have just thrown us all a life-saver. Take them up on it.

Nathan “Nato” Bardeen: Vocals, keyboards, guitar, mandolin
James Smith: Guitar, vocals
Todd Eisenkerch: Bass, vocals
Rory Dolan: Drums
Gabriel Messer: Keyboards, vocals

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“Sure, they have these Dick Dale-the-Cramps surfing guitars, these unexpected turns inside their 60s-inspired pop hooks, these jumpy rhythms sometimes injected by exotic tempos, but, like the antics of their frontman, the sound often explodes in all directions and miraculously safely lands on its feet…”

Shriek your greetings to the new kings and queens of
The Spaghetti Western Jungle anthem; the hungry
dictators of Not-Quite-Gentrified-Ghetto-Pop. Dante
Vs Zombies materialized out of thick air in September
2009 and in that thin slice of time have become surreal
outlaws of the live “Sing-n-Dance-along”.

Reactionary pundits counter that they forced Buddy
Holly and Screamin’ Jay Hawkins to play on the first
Siouxsie And The Banshees album. Level headed
moderates (aka trembling cowards) point out that this
is the only possible mutant baby of its members which
feature key players from The Starlite Desperation, Jail
Weddings, Swahili Blonde, Raw Geronimo, The Detroit
Cobras, Brass Tax, Easy Action and We Break Cameras.
(Proponents of the “factoid” seem to enjoy pointing
out that they probably live in the eastern portion of Los
Angeles).

Beginning with their first two releases (Yes I’m
Stalking You/Branded By Nuns and Oblivion/The Bible
Belt on Infrasonic ) DVZ has assured The Conglomerates
that they will assassinate, by messy beheading , at
least two backwards assumptions about music no
longer being fun or universal, and will relentlessly
continue the terror on a regular basis, until the
so-called “world” complies with their vision, or ends
up on it’s knees.

Either outcome is acceptable.

If you still don’t believe them, meditate upon the following :

Dante White-Aliano (The Starlite Desperation,Swahili Blonde, Detroit Cobras, Raw Geronimo, Gabriel Hart and the 4th Wall, Lost Kids): vocals, guitar, marimba, percussion
Jeff Ehrenberg (The Starlite Desperation, Easy Action): drums, percussion, vocals
Gabriel Hart (Jail Weddings, The 4th Wall, Starvations): guitar, vocals
Jada Wagensomer (Jail Weddings, Brass Tax): bass, vocals
Matt Polley (We Break Cameras): guitar, vocals
Laena Geronimo (Raw Geronimo, Swahili Blonde, The Starlite Desperation, The Like): bass, violin, percussion, vocals, keyboard

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The band was conceived during a homecoming of sorts—not in the heat of a romantic dalliance, but a brotherly collaboration. Prodigal sons return and find themselves playing proud papa to a Sad Baby Wolf. 

It was autumn of 2010 and Marty Crandall had just been “let go” from a little group you may have heard of—The Shins? —all amidst a painful buzz of gossip-mongering. No doubt it was a welcome relief to be back in his dusty hometown surrounded by open sky, family, and old friends. An old friend with roots in the Albuquerque music scene of yore (i.e., the mid-90s, when the Shins were Flake Music and headbangers and zinesters still rifled through albums on vinyl at Bow Wow Records) was seriously ill and hosting a benefit concert to offset medical expenses. Hot air balloon pilot and fellow-former-Shins guitarist Neal Langford was a natural collaborator for what they assumed was a quick, one-off gig. Along with another long-time buddy and musician, Jason Ward, and Marty’s brother Maury on drums, they pasted together a set of two covers and two originals. It was a slap-dash rush to compose the new songs, yet they found that it felt oddly, exhilaratingly effortless. The feeling persisted through the performance. The Sad Baby Wolf began singing to Papa Marty: Maybe you should come home more often…

And so he has. He usually stays at Ward’s house in the Rio Grande North Valley, on an acre with cottonwood trees, goats, dogs, and chickens. The two sit outside with their acoustic guitars and animals milling about, each adding details to the outlines of new songs. It has been a loose, hierarchy-free process from the outset. When the full band convenes to rehearse with Ward, Langford, the brothers Crandall, and bassist Sean McCullough lending exuberant backbone, the songs can undergo unexpected evolutions.  What might have started out in the backyard sounding like vintage shoe gaze with some country lilt soon slides into darker terrain when Jason, who comes from a heavier rock perspective, riffs on it. In Neal’s hands the songs progress down loopy, psychedelic detours, and Maury might add an unexpected beat that completely shifts the emotional movement.

Marty’s lead vocals are not polished or shimmering. They rise plaintive and vulnerable above the bracing wall of guitar sound. His melodies—like those lent by the instruments—bend and melt almost out of tune. But it’s defenselessness that can lure, particularly when braced by such muscular musicianship. As a band, they’re still nascent, not fully formed, and they seem to be celebrating it. They’ve only recently begun thinking of themselves as a concrete entity with a visible horizon; a full album early next year, hopefully, and more gigging. The wolflet still cuts its milk teeth. Beware of fangs and talons quivering in wait.

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LIke an explosion, DBC unleashes on assault of screaming synthesizers, demonic beats, laser lit fog and passionate singing akin to a Black Mass given by Morrissey.

The Dangerous Boys Club is the baby birthed by Aaron Montaigne (singer), Mac Mann (Synth/electronique Organ) of the legendary 90′s harcore bands Antioch Arrow and Get Hustle. Started in the fog of Portland Oregon in 2009, DBC adopted Mark Burden (bass) of Silentist / Glass Candy and Sam Ott (electronique drums) of Year Future to create a very Unique experimental / pop / noise / dark wave inspired by Roxy Music, Soul Side, Suicide the Misfits and David Bowie.

in 2010 DBC released “VRIL” on Nathan Howdeshell of the GOSSIP’s Portland lable Fast Weapons and toured the west coast numerous times and tour of the east coast playing with bands such as Cold Cave, Salem, The Soft Moon and Bronze.

DBC’s second full release “PRIS” will be released on DAIS records in spring 2012 and will be touring the states and Europe.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $15 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm

Coming up on a year since their debut self-titled LP release, The Soft Moon presents Total Decay. Luis Vasquez continues to conjure a sound fueled tempest that intoxicates with its own post-apocalyptic dust in this new EP, which will be released on Halloween, fittingly. What began as a side-project has quickly gathered a cult following that has culled a spotlight in its own right, no longer in a cloaked corner.

After two stirring 7 inches and a full album, it was apparent that Vasquez is digging his own niche, an intimate well-spoken whisper, carrying a heavy load of synths that creep and drums that command an uncontrollable pull from within. This intimate peak into another world, Vasquez’s mind, has garnered a number of comparisons to some of the most iconic and influential bands of the post-punk and krautrock movement.

Live, the band takes on Justin Anastasi and Damon Way to help transform the listening experience cogently with an array of sound and light effects that translate the energy of the recordings.

Total Decay solidifies that The Soft Moon is on its own path, not to be compared. Just listen, hold the shadow of his hand on this journey into the darkness, as he whispers directions through the obstacles, to the light.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $15 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Big Freedia (pronounced “Free-da”) is the undisputed “Queen Diva” of Bounce Music, and performs six or more times a week in various venues throughout her home town of New Orleans.

Bounce Music is an original urban music rising up from the intimate and fun-loving nature of the New Orleans housing projects which dominate the city’s street culture, and Freedia performs a derivative of Bounce reserved for self-proclaimed “Sissies” (a locally used name for biological men with varied and ambiguous sexual identities) that has risen to prominence in recent years and features explicitly gay and cross-dressing musicians and themes.  Big Freedia, like other “Sissy” artists, has achieved mainstream success with several New Orleans hit singles such as “Gin in My System” and “Azz Everywhere!” from her albums “An Ha, Oh Yeah” (1999) and “Queen Diva” (2003).  Freedia began her musical career almost 15 years ago at the Walter L. Cohen High School in New Orleans, where she was enlisted as choir director from her Sophomore to Senior years.  She sees her performance as a Bounce artist as an extension of this work, often interacting in a call and response/teacher and student, fashion with her audiences.

While also running a successful decorating business (for which she counts the Mayor’s office as a client), Freedia recently developed a musical about her life entitled “Catch That Beat” which featured cameo appearances by a who’s who of New Orleans Bounce artists alongside the story of her upbringing in New Orleans 3rd Ward.  Since 2009 Freedia has begun traveling outside the city regularly with her dancers and live DJ, Rusty Lazer, playing to audiences on the East and West Coast alongside (or onstage with) artists such as Spank Rock, Ninjasonik, Japanther, Monique and many more.  Big Freedia has always acted as a mentor for many younger artists and is currently at work on her third album. This year Freedia performed on the West coast with New Orleans band Galactic, recreating her collaboration on the critically-acclaimed 2010 album “Ya-Ka-May”, and at North By Northeast alongside Kid Sister, De La Soul and her New Orleans neighbors Quintron and Miss Pussycat.  Freedia will be performing at FYFest in Los Angeles soon, and will share the stage with Major Lazer at MusicfestNW in Portland this September.  Later appearances are planned for the Windish Agency Showcase at CMJ and Fun Fun Fun Fest in Austin.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $13 at the door.  Doors open at 7pm.

Milo Greene Biography The four voices of Milo Greene weave and blend into one voice, creating songs that live and breathe simultaneously as many and as one, with the breadth of an omniscient, collective consciousness. These melodies invoke long drives down the California coast, and the feeling of leaving home. There is something meditative about it, as though it asks to be listened to alone and given one’s full attention. The lyrics are vague enough to be questioned, yet specific enough to conjure certain smells, tastes and feelings, the idea of an intimate moment and the implicit sadness present in all things simply beautiful. Guitar lines swell and recede as ocean waves would. A slight dissonance can be sensed underneath a seemingly passive exterior; a tension can be found in passing tones that invoke jazz harmony and the sense of waiting for something really big to happen, a sense of growing inevitably older while grasping at the threads of youth. It is the perspective of someone looking back on life or lost love, of standing on a mountaintop overlooking a vast landscape. There is the sense that everything becomes clearer at a distance, less emotionally tumultuous and perhaps more meaningful. When the songs reach their closing, the listener is like a dreamer waking from a dream that can only vaguely be remembered.

Red Bull Common Thread with Dinosaur Jr, Sebadoh and J Mascis

WWW.REDBULLUSA.COM/COMMONTHREAD

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Dinosaur Jr. is widely recognized as one of the most significant American rock bands of all time. Preceding Nirvana by several years, Dinosaur Jr. was instrumental in bringing the crashing sounds of lead guitar back to indie rock. It wasn’t just the band’s signature metallic haze that made an impression on listeners; front man J Mascis’ effects-laden guitars were wrapped around some of the best songwriting of the decade. The first three albums, Dinosaur, You’re Living All Over Me and Bug, are now considered cult masterpieces.

When the original line-up of Mascis, bassist Lou Barlow and drummer Murph re-formed in 2005 for select live dates it was apparent that the years apart had not eroded any of their vitality. It was natural that Dinosaur Jr. would then begin to work on new material. With the release of Beyond in 2007, the band continued its march towards rock greatness. The follow-up, 2009′s Farm, was released on the band’s new label, Jagjaguwar. Farm is Dinosaur Jr.’s first double LP and the fifth full-length record by the original line-up. The twelve new tracks are propelled by the energy of one of America’s greatest living rock bands hitting their stride.

In 2011, the band played the classic album “Bug” in its entirety at a series of critically acclaimed shows. Parts of the “Bug” tour were recorded for the series “In The Hands Of The Fans,” and a DVD was released in early 2012. Dinosaur Jr.’s first three albums were also re-released on vinyl by JagJaguwar in October of 2011

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $12 at the door.  Doors open at 7pm

MEMBERS:
Jody Bleyle – drums, vocals
Pete Krebs – guitar, vocals
Fred Nemo – dance
Brady Smith – bass

WHERE FROM:
Portland, Oregon

DATE FORMED:
1991

HIGHLIGHT:
In 1993, their album “Toreador of Love” hit the indie rock scene with a punch.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $12 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

California native Ramona Gonzalez first began her transcendent minimalist dance-pop escapades in the privacy of her own home in Los Angeles. With the aid of her multitrack cassette recorder and whatever keyboards, drum machines, and other instruments that were available to her, she very quickly developed her own unique sound and began performing live in the L.A. area under the moniker Nite Jewel.

Later teaming up with Cole M. Greif-Neill (formerly of Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti), the Nite Jewel act became four piece live act, touring alongside the likes of Little Dragon, DaM FunK, and James Blake. The Nite Jewel sound has been likened to that of a warped, lo-fi version of Late-80’s Freestyle Electro sensation Debbie Deb and has also found appeal among not just the ‘indie rock’ & ‘experimental’ crowd but also among avid listeners of hip hop, funk, disco, & soul. While very fond of these aforementioned genres and artists, Nite Jewel gathers much of her inspiration from the likes of L.A. Free Music Society’s experimentalist Tom Recchion, obscure UK new age electro-acoustic duo Woo, and the sublime ambient electronic music of groups like Germany’s Cluster and Italy’s Sensations Fix. Nite Jewel never hesitates, however, to cite 90’s R&B pop groups such as TLC & SWV as influences who left an indelible mark on her music sensibilities as a teenager.

In 2009, Nite Jewel self-released her debut album Good Evening, recorded with the assistance of longtime collaborator Cole M. Greif-Neill. Good Evening was met with critical acclaim and was taste-making record store Other Music’s fourth top-seller of 2009.

In summer of 2010, Nite Jewel received critical acclaim for a remix of Caribou’s “Odessa” and of “Die Slow” by noise rock band HEALTH.

In August 2010, Nite Jewel released a six song EP in August 2010 entitled Am I Real?, in collaboration with Cole M. Greif-Neill and Daniel and Andrew Aged from Teen Inc..

Nite Jewel signed to Secretly Canadian in June 2011.

Nite Jewel is currently collaborating with DaM-FunK, among others, and working on her second album set for release in the winter of 2012.

Over the past few years, LA’ s Nite Jewel has honed its pop-funk craft across releases from Italians Do It Better, Mexican Summer and LA’s own Gloriette Records. In that time, her airy but often distant voice has found new gravitas and charisma. Meanwhile, the synth lines have gotten more agile and the bass pops tighter and tighter. The stuttered 80s synth R&B melodies unfold into one another here in ways both giddy and deceivingly nonchalant. This maturation and evolution will all come to a head in early 2012 when Secretly Canadian will release Nite Jewel’s proper full-length follow up to her brilliant 2008 LP, Good Evening.

Admission with MusicfestNW Wristband or $13 at the door.  Doors open at 8pm.

Alaska is a most unlikely origin for the five young men who comprise the Builders and the Butchers. Between 2002-2005, each of the members that would eventually form the band moved to Portland from Alaska pursuing music as a means of escaping subzero temperatures and the endless winter darkness. Soon after moving to Portland Ryan Sollee, singer songwriter and guitarist for The Builders, immersed himself in pre-1950′s American music, and started writing Southern Gothic themed story-songs “I was raised on Punk Rock but when I moved to Portland I discovered American Roots music, I felt as though there was similarities between the two styles. They are both genres that you cannot passively listen to, they almost evoke a response or an immediate reaction from you.”

It was a typical rainy Portland afternoon at Ray Rude’s house (who plays “drums” in The Builders), hanging with friends when Ryan decided to show them what he was working on. Something clicked that afternoon and within minutes everyone in attendance found something to play. Alex Ellis happened to have an old acoustic bass, and Harvey Tumbleson had borrowed a Mandolin, Ray sat down at the piano and they just started playing. Paul Seely joined the band a week later as a drummer and instrumentalist and the Builders and The Butchers were born.

Starting innocently enough as a fully acoustic rambling bunch, seeking out audiences on street corners and outside of venues, make no mistake this is not another story of busking come good, The Builders were not looking for money nor were they looking for fame, they were just playing the music they wanted to on their own terms. The band didn’t work out parts on these early songs, they were developed playing on the street, and this philosophy carries through today, by choosing to develop songs live or at rehearsal. Ryan Sollee says “Something special happens when we get in a room and try to work out a song. If I come in with a developed song it never seems to sound as good or it does not sound like The Builders.” In particular it was at these performances that Ray and Paul worked out their unique “deconstructed” drum style.

They played in the rain and cold of Portland winters until instruments were warped and broken, then one day the Builders sold out and booked a real show, then another, and crowds soon were seeking the Builders out. At the early shows it was hard to distinguish the band from the audience, nothing was mic’d or amplified, and seemingly everyone in the audience had a shaker, washboard, or were just beating on the wall and singing. All in attendance saw something special happening, a Portland audience was having fun, singing along and participating, the music demanded a celebration. Within a year, the Builders would win the Willamette Week’s “Best New Band of 2008″ and Seattle Sound’s “Best Live Performers 2008″and completed supporting tours with the Helio Sequence, Brand New, Langhorne Slim, Amanda Palmer, Dax Riggs, Murder By Death and Port O’Brien.

The Builders don’t pay homage to old America, they channel it. All of the basic instruments are there, acoustic bass, drum, guitar, banjo, and mandolin. They mix gospel, blues, and bluegrass and howl desperate story-songs that latch onto your brain and demand immediate attention.

The timeless sound of their songs, harkens back to a time long passed in music, but reflecting the dark times of the present. Their self-titled debut was released in 2007 and showcases the bands early raw sound. Their latest release titled “Salvation Is A Deep Dark Well” is a much more complete work showcasing the bands full potential. On Salvation, the Builders worked with producer Chris Funk from the Decemberists who brought with him a throng of expertise, patience, instruments, and some of the best musicians in Portland. Salvation record combines the immediacy of the Builders early work with more a developed songwriting, each one with its own personality and story to tell. In the vein of the Southern Gothic tales Ryan weaves stories of struggle with the usual cast of characters God, the Devil, soldiers, branches, wind, rain and hell fire. The record starts with a piano chord and an eerie wind escalating into the thunderous “Golden and Green”, stomp and grinds its way through “Devil Town” and “The Short Way Home”, to the Spanish tinged “Barcelona and “Raise Up”, and the soaring chorus of “In The Branches”, ending with a lesson of hope in the gospel homage”The World is a Top”.

The story of “Salvation is a Deep Dark Well” is that there’s joy and celebration through the darkness, there’s light in the hardest of times, and when you reach the bottom may salvation light your way.

The Builders & The Butchers
Track By Track by Ryan Sollee

Golden and Green

I wrote this song after watching “In the Realms of the Unreal” about Henry Darger who was a reclusive artist from Chicago, who worked his entire life as a janitor and wrote a 15,000 page fully illustrated novel. His life story and the plot of his life’s work I found so captivating that I wanted to write a song about it. The story of the song intertwines his life with the plot of the story, the “Vivian Girls” are the main hero’s and a General named Manley is the villan. This was the most fun song to record on the record and definitely one of the strangest Builders songs so we decided to make it the first track.

Devil Town

A song I brought to the rest of the Builders thinking it was mediocre at best, the song was transformed when Ray and Paul added the drums and suddenly I realized it’s potential. The interplay of the clicks on the bass drum rim, and the mandolin give the song a cool off kilter momentum. It’s probably one of the hardest hitting Builders songs and a common first track of a set list.

Short Way Home

The only song on the record where melodica is featured, Paul is playing it like a harmonica through a lot of the song, which really works with the banjo. The stompy tempo and call and response vocals are more similar to the early builders work. This is one of two songs that we used the 15 person Flash Choir on, when the song breaks down they sing a harmonic, “Ahhhhhhhhhh”.

Barcelona

This is one of several songs I’ve written about the Spanish Civil War, recently I spent some time in Europe and visited Barcelona and attempted capturing the feeling of being there in this song. Harvey and Sebastian (who played a lot of the trumpet that’s on the record) came up with the mandonlin/trumpet flourish on the chorus and Paul along with our friend Victor mimicked the line.

Hands Like Roots

This song was written and recorded for the first record, but never sounded like it fit. For “Salvation” we added pump organ and violin which fills the song out. It’s a tough song to pull of live since to play all the parts we’d need a sixth person.

Down in This Hole

This song is about being locked up in a small town that feels like a prison. I wrote it after a heavy doses of Tom Wait’s, wanted to write a song where the last line of the first half of the verse was the first line in the last half. The piano driving the song is played by Paul, who originally wrote this on melodica, in the studio started working out the part on piano, we all looked at each other and said, “no do that, that is amazing.”

Raise Up

This is the other song on “Salvation” that’s about the Spanish Civil War, this song also blends some apocalyptic imagery. The rim shots on the bass drum and Alex’s bass line drive the song forward with a swing that’s unique to any other Builders song. The mariachi section near the end was pulled off by countering the mandolin melody with a counter melody of 3 trumpets and violin.

Vampire Lake

This is one of the oldest Builders songs, it was recorded 3 years ago, but didn’t go on the first record, “Salvation” needed another simple straight fast rocking song so we included it here. There is a slight lyrical change that probably only the original Builders fans will catch, the original version of the song is on the split LP we did with Loch Lomond.

The Wind Has Come

The Builders only real ballad, when Chris Funk approached me originally to produce the record, he inquired if we had ever written a ballad, at the time I had just written this song and I emailed him a demo of it. At home he scored out a violin, viola, and cello string arrangement and our friends Analisa and Emily Tornfelt, and Amanda Lawrence laid down the parts. Ray has a cool meandering clarinet part and Harvey is strumming Baritone Uke through the whole thing. The booming bass sound was attained by putting one bass drum in front of another and putting a mic behind the second one. There is also French horn, Organ, Bass and Bass Clarinet on this song, definitely the most involved composition on the record.

In the Branches

Chris had the idea to blend “The Wind has Come” and this song using several violin tracks creating an eerie chord. This song is set in the same time and storyline as

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Music critics and fans agree, Redd Kross is back and delivering their signature brand of genuine rock ‘n roll with a vengeance.

“A purer explication of rock and roll’s essence would’ve required Jimi Hendrix and Keith Moon playing Chuck Berry songs while James Brown’s sweat poured from the sky.” —SF Weekly

Founded 34 years ago in Los Angeles during the first wave of LA punk rock by brothers Jeff and Steven McDonald (then respectively 15 and 11 years old), Redd Kross cut their teeth opening for Black Flag at a middle school graduation party. Their debut recordings caught the attention of Rodney Bingenheimer, who quickly became a fan as he spun their Ramones inspired songs like “Annette’s Got The Hits” and “I Hate My School” on the world famous KROQ.

Their following releases maintained roots still firmly planted in punk, but the band started to experiment with different musical elements and band members. Redd Kross boldly broke new ground by intuitively and inventively mixing their eclectic inspirations in song and performance. They understand and embrace the esoteric commonalities between the Partridge Family and the Manson Family; the Beatles and Black Sabbath; The Osmonds and the New York Dolls. The result was a band that was ahead of their time – daringly original, artistic and uncontrived. “Teen Babes from Monsanto”, “Born Innocent” and “Neurotica” became precursors to the Seattle bands of the 90’s, as well as becoming an inspiration to many indie and alternative rock bands world wide.

“Neurotica was a life changer for me and for a lot of people in the Seattle music community.” —Jonathan Poneman, cofounder of Sub Pop

“(Redd Kross) are definitely one of the most important bands in America.” —Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore

In 1990 the band released their major label debut, “Third Eye”. Taking their obsession with late 60’s bubblegum am radio to a new level, the song writing matured with more complex arrangements, harmonies and lush production. Redd Kross had their first single chart “Annie’s Gone”(#16 billboard modern rock), and began to tour with notable artists such as Sonic Youth, The Go-Go’s, The Posies, Jellyfish, The Lemonheads, and the HooDoo Gurus.

Robert Hecker took leave as lead guitarist and the McDonald brothers were joined by Eddie Kurdziel (guitar), Brian Reitzell (drums), and Gere Fennelly (keyboards). They released the critically acclaimed “Phaseshifter” album in 1993 featuring the hit songs “Jimmy’s Fantasy”, “Lady In The Front Row”, and a raucous cover of Frightwigs “Crazy World”.

Redd Kross toured relentlessly for the next several years, appearing on television sets across America performing on the Jon Stewart Show (pre Daily Show), Conan, and the Tonight Show. The band began working their magic on UK festival stages such as Redding Festival and Finsbury Park, and did a US arena tour with The Stone Temple Pilots and Meat Puppets.

In 1997, Redd Kross released one of their most polished albums, “Show World” featuring the perfectly crafted pop single, “Mess Around”. After supporting the album by touring with Sloan and the Presidents of the United States, the band went on a much needed hiatus. Fans wondered when they would return, and things seemed more uncertain after the untimely passing of guitarist Eddie Kurdziel in 1999.

The McDonald brothers launched www.ReddKross.com and began to reconnect with their fans and make new ones. They experimented with the new medium just as innovatively as they do with their music – Steven McDonald released an online only mashup album called “Redd Blood Cells” by adding bass tracks to the White Stripes album, Jeff McDonald began podcasting (“Hit It!”) before iPods or podcasts were invented, and also released a web based video series (Bitchin’ Ass”) far ahead of YouTube.

Redd Kross reissued their classic “Neurotica” album as they worked on a variety of other projects including “Ze Malibu Kids”, “The Steven McDonald Group”, and worked in various capacities with other bands on stage and in the studio such as the Donnas, Turbonegro, Imperial Teen, Anna Waronker, be your own pet, fun., Sparks, Tenacious D, Beck and OFF!

In 2006, Jeff and Steven announced their reunion with the “classic Neurotica” line up – and were joined once again by guitarist Robert Hecker (IT’s OK) and drummer Roy McDonald (the Muffs). Redd Kross have been playing to enthusiastic audiences at sold out select shows and festivals such as the Azkena Festival, Coachella, and Pop Montréal.

“Researching the Blues” is the highly anticipated new album. It is their first new album in 15 years and will be released on Merge Records August 7, 2012.

—Jonathan Krop 2012

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Moonface is singer, songwriter, keyboardist, Spencer Krug, known previously by his former bands Sunset Rubdown, Wolf Parade, Frog Eyes and Swan Lake.

The name originated in 2009 with the Sunset Rubdown limited 7-inch “Introducing Moonface.” It was a mere two songs that Krug wrote and recorded alone in his Montreal home, which was never intended to make any big waves, but which resurrected in Krug a love for home-recording, and planted the idea that he would use the name “Moonface” for all future solo work. The following two albums were made in the same way, written and recorded alone, in Montreal, when he wasn’t busy with other projects. They were “Dreamland EP: Marimba and Shit-Drums,” released in 2010, and “Organ Music, Not Vibraphone Like I’d Hoped,” released in 2011, both on Jagjaguwar.

By spring of 2011, both Sunset Rubdown and Wolf Parade had wound down their activities to nil, allowing Krug to focus strictly on Moonface. Having had his fill of working alone, he started collaborating again with other musicians, reserving his freedom to use Moonface as a vehicle for anything he wrote or performed, solo or otherwise. Moonface went live, and “Organ Music” was toured throughout North America in 2011, with the help of Krug’s friend Michael Bigelow.

In April of 2012, Jagjaguwar will release the third major Moonface effort, entitled “With Siinai: Heartbreaking Bravery.” It was recorded in Finland, fall of 2011, after Krug had the idea to enlist the skills of some Scandinavian friends, who make up the Helsinki-based rock band, Siinai. They are as follows: Matti Ahopelto, Markus Joensuu, Risto Joensuu, and Saku Kamarainen. The album is a sort of “return to rock” for Krug; a new kind of experiment wherein he abandoned the stripped down instrumentation used on the two previous albums (marimbas, drum machines, and an electric organ, respective to the album titles themselves), and embraced the heavy, droning, prog-rock sound of Siinai, the five of them working together to turn the band’s instrumental jams into foundations for his vocals. The beginning stages of the album happened over the internet, with Krug still in Montreal. Then, upon his arrival in Helsinki, fine tuning of the songs began, to be realized completely at Petrax Studios, a recording facility disguised as a farm about an hour north of the city. It was produced, engineered, and mixed (in Berlin) by Jonas Verwijnen and Antti Joas, of Kaiku Studios. Moonface and Siinai will be touring “Heartbreaking Bravery” throughout the U.S. and the E.U. in 2012.

Moonface is now Krug’s main focus and primary creative outlet. He is currently working on the next album with the above mentioned Michael Bigelow. The album is, as of yet, a pop-percussion experiment, the title and release date of which are both yet to be determined.

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Nocturne is the follow up release to Wild Nothing’s critically acclaimed debut ‘Gemini’.

Ask Jack Tatum what ‘Wild Nothing’ means and he’ll answer: ‘a contradiction’. In 2010, 21 year old Tatum released one of the finest cult pop records of the summer whilst ensconced in his senior year of college in Blacksburg, VA, a small mid-atlantic town better known for producing football fans and engineers than musicians. Tatum lives in contradictions. You’ll often hear Wild Nothing referred to as a ‘one man pop band’. Jack creates in the studio, alone. On the road, he’s with a band. There are two Wild Nothings.

The critically acclaimed debut ‘Gemini’ was underpinned with summery childhood longings, and shot through with the instant dichotomy of anxiety and almost whimsical paranoia. The album, which was home recorded by Tatum and rooted heavily in 80’s indie-pop, quickly gained popularity throughout the internet. Tatum assembled a band of Virginia friends and hit the road for the first time. ‘Gemini’ showed a promising future for a songwriter who wore his influences on his sleeve while still approaching pop craftsmanship in his own way. When asked about it in regards to ‘Nocturne’, Jack states:

I don’t think it’s going to be a secret to anyone that I care about pop music, but it’s definitely more my sense of what pop music used to be or even what pop music would be in my ideal world.

The new album ‘Nocturne’, is a window into Tatum’s “ideal world” of pop music. Written largely while living in Savannah, GA during 2011, the songs that became ‘Nocturne’ speak to a new Wild Nothing where the lines between Jack’s influences and personality have been further blurred. The album features some open references to past music just as ‘Gemini’ did, but it’s also an album that feels much less rooted in anything in particular and, well, more adult.

‘Gemini’ was written before there were Wild Nothing fans or even a live band; ‘Nocturne’ is different. With an unexpected fan base to turn to, Jack spent more time perfecting his craft. The obsessiveness of ‘Nocturne’ is inherent in it’s gentle harmonies, orchestrated synths, wandering voice, and songs that speak of his post-Gemini experiences as he explores new paradoxes of pop.

And yet Nocturne’ isn’t obvious, it is a strange and distinctive musical beast, the product of an obsessive pop vision that creates its own reality.

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Trust is Robert Alfons and Maya Postepski.

Formed in 2009, the Toronto-based duo released its first singles, “Candy Walls” and “Bulbform,” on Brooklyn-based Sacred Bones Records in 2011 before signing with Arts & Crafts for the 2012 release of their forthcoming debut full length, TRST.

In the last year they’ve performed with DFA1979, Crystal Castles, Austra, Balam Acab, Glass Candy, and Hercules and Love Affair.

Tales of lust, wax, and erotomania carry along on a dense black vapor of speed, space and tears. Trust is a pop hit factory buried deep in the mud.”

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In November 2009, the members of Adelaide, Australia’s Atlas Genius set about building a studio where they could write and record music for their newly formed band. For two years, brothers Keith, Steven, and Michael Jeffery devoted their days to constructing their dream studio and spent their nights performing songs by The Police, The Beatles and The Rolling Stones at local pubs to pay the bills. “We really got down and dirty with drywalling and literally laying the floorboards, and at the same time we were taking a couple of days a week to focus on writing songs,” recalls Keith, Atlas Genius’s vocalist/guitarist. The studio was designed and outfitted by the brothers with the help of their father (who comes from a music and engineering background). Once the studio was complete, the first song that Atlas Genius finished was a song called “Trojans,” which they wrote, recorded and produced in collaboration with their friend Darren Sell. After many weeks tweaking the song, Michael insisted that the song was ready to be heard outside of the studio walls.  Within an hour, “Trojans” was on SoundCloud for sale via TuneCore on iTunes, Amazon and Spotify worldwide.

“We had begun to think that music was a pipedream and we had all gone back to university to pursue more realistic careers” says Keith. “We’d had such a long slog of playing late nights and working all day, and it felt like we didn’t really have anything to show for it.” But then, in the midst of cramming for their Fall 2011 semester final exams, Michael discovered a Neon Gold post praising “Trojans” as a song sure to “invade your head, all dressed up in a clever disguise of earnest vocals riding a hooky riff.” Checking the band’s email account for the first time in over a month, Atlas Genius found that dozens of record labels, publishers, lawyers, booking agents and management companies from all over the world had contacted them.

“We were trying to focus on school, but it was just impossible,” recalls Keith. “So we said, ‘There’s something going on here. Let’s get back to the music.’” The band added Manager, Jonny Kaps from +1, to their extended family to navigate all of the interest as the band focused on writing and recording more songs.

Quickly named an iTunes Single of the Week in Australia and New Zealand, “Trojans” reached #4 on Hype Machine by the end of May. In August, SiriusXM Satellite Radio’s Alt-Nation discovered the song on a blog and decided to give it some spins. There was an immediate reaction from listeners, and in September, “Trojans” was placed into heavy rotation, where it maintained a top-five position on the listener-generated Alt-18 countdown and peaked at number one for 4 consecutive weeks in January 2012. “Trojans” began selling over a thousand tracks per week on U.S. iTunes and soon climbed to 40,000 sales – all with zero promotional efforts from the still-unsigned Atlas Genius.

“Knowing we had this audience that was waiting on new songs, we had a much greater sense of purpose than we had before,” says Keith. “It was really exciting to know that there were people who wanted to hear more of our music.” Although labels were clamoring for the band to come to the U.S. and play a series of showcase gigs, Atlas Genius turned down those offers in favor of staying in Adelaide to keep writing and recording new songs. In February 2012, after months of communicating with numerous labels via Skype, the band chose to travel to the US in order to make their label decision.

“We’d never been to America before,” says Keith. “We flew in at night and saw this sea of lights, and it really became apparent to us how massive this country is. It was pretty intimidating – like ‘How do we fit into all this?’” In April 2012, the band returned to the U.S. having made their decision to sign with Warner Bros. Records. “We felt a connection with them,” notes Keith. “Everyone there feels very creative and dedicated to the music.”

The band’s first release from their new label home, the three-track Title TK(produced, engineered and mixed by the band) captures Atlas Genius’s singular combination of sophisticated musicality and warm, wistful spirit. Infused with a classic sensibility, each of the songs would fit seamlessly if somehow slipped into a long-treasured mixtape. On the shimmering “Symptoms,” for instance, taut keyboard riffs mesh with urgent acoustic strumming before the band bursts into a gently frenetic, guitar-drenched chorus. Meanwhile, “Back Seat” blends its pulsing bass throb with a sweetly infectious beat and tender vocals that alternately soar and sigh. And on “Trojans,” Atlas Genius begins with a restrained guitar melody and vocal (“Take it off, take it in/Take off all the thoughts of what we’ve been”) before giving way to the handclap-accented, harmony-soaked refrain and lush yet kinetic bridge.

With Title TK completed, Atlas Genius is now holed up in its studio and working on wrapping up its first full-length album. “It’s still surreal,” says Keith of all that’s happened over the past year. “I think when we were very young, we had hopes that something like this might happen one day,” he continues. (Thanks largely to encouragement from their Beatles fanatic parents, who encouraged the three brothers to begin playing music by age 14.) “But then you grow up a bit and it seems less and less likely. So when we put ‘Trojans’ out, we figured it would be a success if maybe a hundred people heard it.” “So many bands focus on the promotion aspect of the process instead of the music,” says Keith. “All of our efforts go into making the songs as good as they can be. We don’t want to force our music onto anyone. Our goal is to write songs that we love and we hope they connect with other people too – be it 100 or many more.”

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School Of Seven Bells are back with their third release, Ghostory, out February 28 on Vagrant Records/Ghostly Inernational. The highly-anticipated album finds the band’s lineup has evolved along with the music; formerly a trio, the band is now a duo: guitarist/producer Benjamin Curtis and vocalist Alejandra Deheza.

Recorded in-between tours, Ghostory exemplifies a fervent progression of SVIIB’s growth as artists, preserving the common themes found on their last two releases but exposing them in different fashions. The familiar ethereal and enigmatic tones are omnipresent, surrounded by layers of influences from ’80s pop, shoegaze and ambient electronic sounds. However, Ghostory comes with a story in mind; the tale of a young girl named Lafaye and the ghosts that surround her life.

“Everyone has ghosts”, says Alejandra Deheza; “They’re every love you’ve ever had, every hurt, every betrayal, every heartbreak. They follow you, stay with you.” This detailed storytelling is evident from start to finish on the record, weaving a tale that moves between a fervent synthesized adventure and spacious lyrical euphoria. Tracks like “Love Play” and “Show Me Love” create a hauntingly indelible atmosphere that grab attention with the ambitious wordplay in the center of it all. Surrounding tracks like “Lafaye” and “Scavenger” entice the vibe of previous School of Seven Bells releases with their steadily dance-centric tempo and uplifting melodic progressions. Ghostory flows seamlessly and effortlessly, a result of the shared songwriting process.

“Ghostory is our most collaborative music to date,” describes Benjamin Curtis, “Alley (Alejandra) and I have always written our music together, but always independently and on our own time. We knew we wanted to do something that was more sensual and spontaneous than anything we had ever done before, and that meant writing together in a room, coming up with ideas quickly and immediately reacting to what the other person was doing.” Within Ghostory, the story of both Lafaye’s and the band’s journey will be told.

School Of Seven Bells formed in 2006 as a trio (including Claudia Deheza) and released their debut full-length, Alpinisms, on Ghostly International in 2008. The group’s appeal grew exponentially, with their signature sounds stemming from pieces of electronic subgenres and shoegaze bands before them. By 2010, the group released the critically acclaimed Disconnect From Desire on Ghostly International and Vagrant. Ghostory is truly their defining work, beautifully crafted and haunting, with the story of Lafaye permeating the psyche long after the music stops.

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Neck of the Woods sees Silversun Pickups lighting out for the territories, stretching the boundaries of their exhilarating psychedelia with confidence, invention, and undeniable ambition. Having long made their bones as masters of widescreen power, the Los Angeles-based band’s third Dangerbird Records album takes their filmic vision to another level entirely – this is full-on IMAX rock ‘n’ roll, in stereoscopic 3D and Sensurround. From the low-frequency thrust and motorik pulsebeat that drives “Mean Spirits” to the mesmerizing first single, “Bloody Mary (Nerve Endings),” the album fairly detonates with high definition creativity. Roomier rhythms and judiciously applied electronic shadings form a blissed out base camp for the band’s electrifying aural adventures, the elegiac landscapes of Neck of the Woods revealing an unbridled expansion of the already impressive SSPU sound.

“There’s a playfulness,” says singer/guitarist/songwriter Brian Aubert, “a certain kind of freethinking experimentation that we were fooling around with. We wanted to just let it all fly.”

Silversun Pickups – that is, Aubert, bassist Nikki Monninger, keyboardist Joe Lester, and drummer Christopher Guanlao – emerged with 2005′s Pikul EP and soon caught the attention of the wider world with the following year’s Carnavas. That collection (featuring the breakthrough single, “Lazy Eye”) only barely prepared the way for the band’s blockbuster second album, 2009′s Swoon. Tracks such as “Panic Switch” and “The Royal We” established Silversun Pickups as a potent force in 21st Century Rock, further confirmed by an 18-month tour that included innumerable headline dates, festival sets, and a 2009 Grammy Award nod for “Best New Artist.”

The new album’s genesis began as Aubert visited cities and hamlets from Italy to Iceland while on a brief hiatus from the non-stop touring that followed Swoon. Aubert’s European impressions fueled a ream of new songs and late night home demos, quietly recorded as his wife slept in the room next door.

“I got this feedback loop going on in my head,” he says, “thinking that these are just towns people are from. It might look kind of magical to me, but I’m definitely an outsider looking in. This is just normal for them, and in a lot of ways, it’s very much the same as where I grew up.”

While undeniably proud of Swoon and its world conquering success, Silversun Pickups also knew that the album had only touched upon their music’s infinite possibilities. When the band eventually reconvened in their Silverlake rehearsal space, all involved were determined to take a more open attitude towards their songs, giving their imagination full, unbridled rein.

“We immediately said, no matter how these songs come out, let’s try to catch up with them and not try to squeeze them down,” Aubert says. “Let’s see how and why they are the way they are. Instead of pushing them in unnatural directions, let’s let them breathe. Even if we find them strange, let’s try and figure them out.”

To fuel the project with a fresh energy, the band decided to collaborate with a new producer. The goal, Aubert says, was “to throw something into the mix that might make us feel odd, in the same way the demos and the music we were thinking about were making us feel odd.” They met with a number of top studio hands before realizing that they had already found the right man for the job in Jacknife Lee, whom they had previously encountered while contributing guest vocals to their pals Snow Patrol’s most recent collection. Lee brought both infectious energy and an atypical recording model to the table, offering the band legroom to improvise and invent without constraint.

“Jacknife said, ‘Let’s get in there, set up everybody’s stuff, and just attack this record from the ground up,’” Aubert says. “That’s exactly what we wanted to do. We weren’t really interested in making a record where we rehearsed everything over and over again, then came in and laid it down. We wanted to be able to screw with things.”

In TK, Silversun Pickups embarked on ten weeks of sessions at Lee’s studio in Topanga – which, as kismet would have it, was Aubert’s childhood hometown, providing flashbulb memories that offered ironic counterpoint to his already dislocated lyricism. The recording pushed the band to the brink, imbuing them with both aesthetic intensity and increased unity.

“It kept everybody involved the entire time,” Aubert says. “Christopher said to me, ‘This is the most involved I’ve been on any of our albums,’ because his drums were set up all ten weeks. Usually the drummer is there for the first seven days and then he’s gone. This time, we never knew when he’d have to add something all of a sudden.”

SSPU pulled apart their swelling songcraft, rending their trademark reverb and distortion to reveal a grander, more dreamlike sound. The oblique duality of Aubert’s songs is matched by a similar sonic tack, simultaneously glacial and volcanic, intimate and overwhelming. The skyscraping scope promised by their previous albums is amplified on such tracks as the closing “Out of Breath,” its multi-layered volatility daubed with unconcealed angst and ill-tempered aggression.

“We wanted to play with negative space,” Aubert says. “We’re always trying to achieve dynamic, but sometimes it gets lost in the shuffle. This time we just pulled things in different directions and made things crisper and more angular. We wanted the louder stuff to sound cranky.”

Epic though they may be, songs like “Here We Are (Chancer)” retain the “nakedness” of Aubert’s home demos, even so far as incorporating many of his original drum machine tracks. Even as they developed synthetic textures and electronic components, the band were resolved that the album would retain what Aubert calls “the human sound in the machine.” That elemental humanity informs Neck of the Woods to its very core as Aubert unpacks evocative imagery that reverberates with the recognition of his transitory place in the universe and the realization that he is least at home in his own hometown.

“These songs started forming in places that were completely foreign to me,” Aubert says, “and then ended in the place that I grew up, an environment that could not be more familiar. I went through my whole childhood and teenage years in the weeks we were there making the record.”

Beginning with the unnervingly hypnotic “Skin Graph,” Neck of the Woods boasts a wintry, suspenseful quality that Aubert links to such cinematic manifestations of dread as The Shining and Let The Right One In. Songs like “Make Believe” and “The Pit” – with its bluer than “Blue Monday” beats – are desultory and somewhat adrift, haunted by memory and the inability to escape one’s past no matter what heights you ascend to in adulthood.

“There are certain things about growing up that are horrific,” Aubert says, “things that are inside you, that make you up – those are the things that intrigue me the most.”

Silversun Pickups are now preparing to take this powerfully personal work on the road, marking yet another manifestation of the multiple contradictions of being in a band.

“This is the moment where the introverted side is gone,” he says. “Everything is going to be big from here on in. You’ve got to get out of your head, because for this part of it, that’s the last place you want to be.”

From inception to fruition, a series of happy accidents led Silversun Pickups to the transcendent Neck of the Woods. Every step on the journey was marked by true synchronicity in action – the stars aligned, clouds parted, the cosmos smiling down upon the band. For their part, Silversun Pickups take a more pragmatic view.

“Some people believe in The Force,” Aubert says, “but I’m more like Han Solo – I think it’s just dumb luck! We definitely prepared for if the luck came, but that doesn’t mean that anything we did necessarily had that much to do with how well things went. I don’t know what we did to deserve it, but we’re thankful.”