‘Born in the Summer’ is inspired by those early adolescent years of feeling awkward in your own skin and painfully self-conscious, yet knowing that someday those growing pains will recede, explains the press release.
The song is also the 8th track of Lael’s forthcoming album, ‘I’ll Be Your Man’, set to be released on July 10th
‘It started out as a heavy garage rock thing and became much more of a dance — some kind of hybrid,’ he said to the radio station. He also said he had been working on it for a few years so that the material is ‘pretty diverse,’ but ‘it’s a group of songs that fit together.’
‘[The album of home recordings] ‘will feel like you’re kind of hanging out with Kurt Cobain on a hot summer day in Olympia, Washington as he fiddles about. It’s going to really surprise people. Just to be clear, it’s not a Nirvana album, it’s just Kurt and you’re going to hear him do things you never expected to come out of him.’
It is a wild and abrasive thing, earth-shaking, wall-crumbling, playing with dissonance and twisting around distortion. The first track, ‘Acetate’, sounds like Nirvana meets the Pixies in a hairy bath of testosterone. There is so much rage and passion, such fuzz and buzz that ‘Swimmer’ explodes at your face like a Nepal bomb and ‘Spit You Out’ does exactly this… with disdain and fury.
The joyful tune sounds like an instant country classic for sure, and who could have thought that the drug revolution would have come from two octogenarians? (Willie is 81, Merle 78)… We live in a weed culture, and for once, we got grandpas for leaders!
GIRLPOOL! GIRLPOOL! Definitely the album of choice going into Spring. Though a new Florence Welch, a new Chris Stamey produced by Mitch Easter no less, Shelby Lynn (hope it is half as good as her sisters new album), Mumford And Sons, Best Coast, Ringo, Paul Weller, Brian Wilson… should be a fun season.
I prefer Dylan to Nathan, I’ve seen both bands a few times and Wavves can edge Cloud Nothings live but Dylan is a great songwriter and I think the synergy here might well be remarkable. Both of these guys are young, so keep your fingers crossed
Direct Current is always a little frail on hip hop, which is why it isn’t the only reference we use, but otherwise it does show a singular sensibility an a good peek at the Spring of our warmth an happiness. Pick of the litter? Best Coast. I loved their new single. Otherwise, Hot chip, Paul weller, Mumford And Sons, Metz II (a band I’ve wanted to see for awhile now), Beth Hart, The Wombats…
The band we loved to hate till we saw em live (twice!) and changed our minds are back again with a new album, the poetically named Wilder Mind and a tour, lotsa festivals it says here, Gentlemen Of The Road. When will this be happening? May 4, apparently. And apparently they are putting down their banjos for an electric sound.
The cover (above) is a “a 13th Century monastic symbol for the Virgin Mary” according to Stereogum who got the info from a website called God And Religion reconciled (here). That dead Mommies stuff might explain the McCartney angle a little, right? Mother Mary and Only One are not a million miles away conceptually or in tone
I thought let’s pass on the Knopfler track but then noticed which song it was and Knopfler channelling the Chieftains might be excellent but even if it isn’t, surely a Bobby Womack duet alone is worth the price of admission, plus Mavis Staples, Gregory Porter, Georgie Fame, Taj Mahal… these are good singers, these are guys we can imagine giving Van a little bit of competition.
What interests me today is the best named album of the year, All My Favorite Singers Are Willie Nelson by Astral Swans which, if it is half as good as its name, should kill. Astral Swans is Canadian Matthew Swan, and his “You Can carry A Sickness” is first rate (sounds like extreme loner to me but…)
Compared to the years of crap we’ve had to sit through, last years painful rotten and boring Everyday Robots for one, it sounds like Fidlar. Truthfully it is drone rock, maybe more Blur than anything else, but a hooky one, it is like a treadmill of a song going round and round and leaving you grinning at the slay em stadium steadyness of it all.
sounds like really weak “Runaway” plus SILENCE a la Yeezus but to less effect (it is more affected than effective) and Vic Mensa who is talented, like a rapping Frank Ocean and buddies with Chance The Rapper (plus, this is better than “Iconic”) playing the Pusha T role. Sia howling on a low track is weird but not terrible.
Because Direct Current’s taste is so different than mine (yes, I know, but one thing at a time) their list of new releases works as a litmus taste, I scan the list and check and check and check and more than three quarters of the time I check out. So let’s move merrily along: The Wombats, Laura Marling, Nellie McKay, Estelle, Juliana Hatfield Three, Martin Sexton, Texax… maybe I am being a little difficult but those are the ones that catchy my eyes on this list.
it says here he did the Original (incidental?) music? Good, this is what he killed off LCD Soundsystem for? Well, done Jimmy. Oh, and I dislike Haim on principle as wella s not much caring for the album OR the live show.
MY GENERATION (1965), A QUICK ONE (1966), THE WHO SELL OUT (1967), TOMMY (double) (1969), WHO’S NEXT (1971), QUADROPHENIA (double) (1973), THE WHO BY NUMBERS (1975), WHO ARE YOU (1978), FACE DANCES (1981), IT’S HARD (1982), ENDLESS WIRE (double) (2006)
MY GENERATION (1965), A QUICK ONE (1966), THE WHO SELL OUT (1967), TOMMY (double) (1969), WHO’S NEXT (1971), QUADROPHENIA (double) (1973), THE WHO BY NUMBERS (1975), WHO ARE YOU (1978), FACE DANCES (1981), IT’S HARD (1982), ENDLESS WIRE (double) (2006)
Here in New York it is Tuesday afternoon, that is a State of Emergency and I am rushing like crazy to hit the road and get home… just like Mark Knopfler (well, we are both hitting the road. So this cut and paste from Sacks and Co PR firm should be forgiven because if I die…? Right?
“It was a real privilege to make this album. I’ve wanted to do something like this for a long time but was never brave enough to approach 30-piece complicated arrangements and refine them down for a 5-piece band. That’s the key to all these performances.”
Lisa Ramey has unbelievable pipes, she doesn’t sound like the UK soul singers working the EDM side of pop soul all over the UK, she sounds old fashioned, and funky and the horns are blasting like a mutated Maceo. The title track is masterful and “Teacher” sounds like the Small Faces with a female Steve Marriott soundalike.
If rock and roll had another name blah blah bloody blah blah, either you are losing your mind over this or you don’t know enough about rock and roll. No way, man, this is heaven. Wanna know what to buy me? Buy me this and then leave me alone for a mo
It sounds worse than it reads. It is terrifyingly terrible. Toto are stupendously overblown. If punk rock didn’t exist it would have to be invented to blow this vloated pop off the face of the earth. It makes U2 sound like the Ramones.
“America induces this fear in me. It’s so vast and so complicated. I feel like I’m here as a weird voyeur, watching it in a really strange way to make sense of it. Like the landscape of the desert, then you go four hours further north and you’re in the lush mountainous forests. You feel dwarfed by the country”
leaked from her studio, if it isn’t a new song it sounds like it could be. the wooah wooahs sound like Riri’s signature all right, and the sentiment is kinda underplayed, it doesn’t smack you, more like an observation. she doesn’t do high octane drama now does she?
It’s a tradition, seven years and counting, Pitchfork compile their upcoming album releases, we steal it and repost it taking time to insult a website as smug as smug can be, with all their taste in their mouth as they write scads of bewildering words about bands no one will ever hear
Le Tigre has always dealt with issues concerning the LGBT community, plus JD has released a song called ‘Let Them Out Or Let Me In’ in support of the Pussy Riot girls when they were imprisoned after their performance in Moscow’s Christ the Savior Cathedral.
Allison Moorer has had and somewhat upsetting five years, from marriage to Steve Earle, to the Dukes tour, an album, a son, sadly born autistic, and now a new album in which she details the heartbreak. Otherwise, look how quiet it is till late January! Let’s hope there are some surprises out there.
Now don’t get me wrong there are nostalgia tours, and I have even found myself busting out ‘From Under The Cork Tree’ now and then but I cant exactly imaging camping out to see them any longer. Their five minutes are up but with families and bills to pay its time to make more music launch tours and get cracking.
rock nyc’s resident B-52’s fanatic Michael Malone must be salivating as he reads this the great Queen Of The Beehive Kate Pierson is releasing a solo album. One of the most distinctive personalities in rock and roll, if Kate didn’t exist John Winters would have had to invent her
“Damon and Adele had a chat about her new album and they could work together in future. He has produced and written brilliant pop songs for Gorillaz and slower material for acts such as Bobby Womack. He has advice to give from 25 years in the business.”
After nine years of offshoots, most of them good and two of them, Wild Flag and Corin Tucker Band, better than that the Clash of riot grrrls, and circa Dig Me Out, the greatest rock and roll band in the world, have played everything out till they are back together.
Ellie? Weren’t they dating and then broke up and then she ended up with Eddie Sheeran and dumped him and he wrote a song about it? or am I thinking about two other people? Ed wrote “Don’t” about Ellie dumping him for a 1D guy… Ps she is currently dating the bassist for McFly.
I am really psyched for The Art Of McCartney, an elbow live (they were so great at Webster Hall earlier this year), really interested to see if Devon Allman can step into the family business, Bob Dylan’s complete “The Basement Tapes”, Neil Diamond back t his pop roots, Brian Wilson, TV On The Radio were great earlier this year but not sure about the album, and, er, Jerry Lee Lewis!!!
CNN, I didn’t say new Bowie album ‘soon’. I quoted THE MAN who said ‘More Music Soon’ on Bowienet. That music is Sue.” Ergo, the new song we already know about. I am guessing Bowie is so rich he is happy not hitting the road and as Tony noted, he didn’t lift a finger to promote The Next Day.
Taking a cue from the rebellious, feminist-punk contemporaries that her messaging has often been compared to (Kathleen Hanna, Beth Ditto), Lowell’s brand of pop conveys the urgency of her subject matter, but her melodies keep songs accessible, optimistic and fun
The other thing to keep in mind here is the following: since the Kinks digital output has been disastrous and since just about every single album the band have ever made deserves a deluxe version, let’s hope the band start sorting out their past history before they are too late to do it.
Does it mean Ryan Adams made a classic rock album? I am sorry to say I am not overly excited about the idea although I may change my mind with repeated listenings… Why making a Petty album when you are Adams?
If you feel like it, you can now listen to another track of Julian Casablancas + the Voidz’s upcoming album ‘Tyranny’, and after ‘Human Sadness’, the 11-minute epic number that Julian released on YouTube about a week ago, here is ‘Where No Eagles Fly’, which debuted on BBC Radio 6 on Monday morning.
Here is a little clue for all you pop pickers. If a buncha tier ones get together to do a tribute album and if they haven’t named some charity organization for whom it is in aid of, the charity is the tributing partner. In this case Paul McCartney, who might need many things, for one thing he could be with being 25 years old again, but he sure don’t need money and that’s all there is to it.
After kicking it in the head a coupla weeks ago, Direct Current decided hey, maybe retirement isn’t all its cut out to be. It isn’t easy to walk away, it digs too deep. So their gain and ours, so here is their list of upcomign releases and obviously 1989 is the one we are moost excited for but also: both alt j tracks are really good. Jerry Lee, Haerts, Annie Lennox, Jackson Browne, Prince, Gerard Way and Abba at Wembley in 1974!!
The playing is clean, immaculate, perfect, very controlled, very at service to the song and where Dan gets his hands dirty is on the vocal tour de force, amazing blues singing that barrels down on song after song and reaches its, and Angels n Devils, zenith with “Wade County Jail”
In 2012, and despite a lousy live show, I called Justin Townes Earle’s Nothing’s Gonna Change The Way You Feel
I have a really really bad feeling about this one. rock nyc have already voiced serious concerns about the T Bone Burnet (the man who gives bad taste a bad name) produced high concept album, where in big time pop stars of a certain type, let’s call em Americana follies wherever they might come from, write the music to recently discovered Bob Dylan lyrics from when he was 26 years old.
This is very thrilling stuff as far as I’m concerned and I can’t wait to see if he can pull off a second album as drastically brilliant as his first. Smith and FKA twig, both UK stars by the way, are the sound of 2014 and the sound of 2014 is melancholia mixed with desire. It uses EDM but it isn’t EDM, and if its roots are in soul that is only at the deepest level.
Let’s pass on the repulsive kiss the throat comment (I mean let’s pass on it now) and let’s assume Presley didn’t make it to the studio (plus: getting permission from Sony for anything Presley related is a bitch, so it probably helps that she records for columbia) , some of this sounds like it might be of interest. Stevie and Babyface to name but two.
“Diana is too smart to ever oversing so I guess if your idea of fun is the jazz singer gliding though heavy emotional outbursts like “Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word” be my guest. But as to why a woman who sing Gershwin should want to sing Finn I had no idea. I just wish she wouldn’t – Grade: C
“Sam is our top choice. He has the profile, cool image and astonishing voice to record a Bond theme. And there is only so long we can hold out for Adele. Daniel Craig was pushing for her because she did such a great job last time around.”
I hated Russell’s work with Damon and Bobby Womack, but otherwise the man obviously knows his shit, and XL is a great label. It gave us Adele and it gave us Tyler The Creator so, OK, some A&R man, that Russel. Anyway, for their 25th Anniversary XL are releasing a career spanning album or four
ary Kemp, who wrote all their material, became an actor and Tony Hadley didn’t make it as a solo star and every now and then they’d come back together and in 2009 they released an album of remixes but in 2014, for their quarter century, we are getting an album of new material
