New Order (sans Hook) release Lost Sirens outtakes compilation
By Liz Louche on Nov 17 2011
The holidays are fast approaching. Is that magic in the air or just a New Order outtakes compilation? Hmm, let’s see. Is there a shroud of mystery swirling around this thing? Yes. Check. Is there a Peter Hook quote in the article? There will be, so yes. Check. Is there an intriguing note about a New Order reunion (sans Hook) tucked away toward the end of the story? Yes! Check! So, it’s both. Magic + New Order = Lost Sirens. That’s the name of the eight-track outtakes comp coming out on a veeeeeery mysterious as-yet-undisclosed date in December via Rhino Records.
So what kind of outtakes are we talking? I see you asking that. Are we talking outtakes from New Order’s little known Ace of Base covers session at Pickle Park in beautiful Fridley, MN? Nah, these are outtakes from when the band recorded 2005’s Waiting for the Sirens’ Call, and none of them — with the exception of “Hellbent,” which made its way onto Total, the New Order/Joy Division career spanning collection earlier this year — have been released before. Lost Sirens hasn’t been officially announced by the band yet, but our friends in Japan can order it from their country’s versions of Amazon and HMV. It’s also available from the fine Finns at RecordShopPx come December 14.
Quick! Somebody get a Peter Hook quote! Hook told Slicing Up Eyeballs, “It would be nice, from my point of view, to get rid of those tracks in the nicest possible way that would at last draw the line under the New Order split-up in 2006. It hasn’t felt clean in any way, to be honest. So I’m hoping the release of the last remaining material will make it a little cleaner.” We hope so, too, Peter Hook. We really do.
As hinted none-too-obliquely-at above, New Order will continued to soldier on, Hook or no Hook. The band is back to playing shows, with two gigs under their collective belts last month, and they plan to play London and South America in December.
Lost Sirens tracklisting:
01. Stay with You
02. Sugarcane
03. Recoil
04. Californian Grass (Doomy)
05. Hellbent
06. Shake It Up
07. I’ve Got a Feeling
08. I Told You So
• New Order: http://www.neworderonline.com
• Rhino: http://www.rhino.com
Dinosaur Jr. release limited-edition cassette trilogy (now if only someone would release some limited-edition cassette players…)
By Nobodaddy on Nov 17 2011
Whenever I think of indie rock’s cassette heyday and its inexorable connection to certain Dinosaur-themed entertainment vehicles, the first thing I think of is, of course, that show Denver The Last Dinosaur. But the second thing I think of… is that other show, Dinosaurs. But, for sure, the THIRD thing I think of is Dinosaur Jr. And luckily, they are the only ones of the three that have just announced plans to reissue their first three albums on cassette via Joyful Noise Recordings! I think!
While the original releases of Dinosaur Jr.’s first three records — 1985’s Dinosaur, 1987’s You’re Living All Over Me, and 1988’s Bug — on the Homestead and SST labels came in both cassette and vinyl, apparently only the vinyl versions were reissued last month on Jagjaguwar, possibly because Jagjaguwar hates the idea of you and your hipster friends showing up at parties with Apple earbuds plugged into General Electric-brand cassette recorders. Fortunately, though, Joyful Noise Recordings doesn’t hate that idea, because they like to make money. So, yeah, they’re going ahead and releasing those albums in a very limited (just 500 copies) “custom-built, screen printed wooden box, featuring the classic Dinosaur Jr. “monster” artwork.” With the exception of a Bug cassette reissue that sold out in like two seconds earlier this year, this is the first time these records are available on cassette since their original 80s releases. You know, because of what an inferior format this is.
The cassettes won’t be sold separately, and each was manufactured on high-quality, Ronald Reagan-grade chrome tape with purple, black, and white shells, respectively. But each will still come individually wrapped with eight-panel original artwork, which will make for some easy eBay-selling after you buy the box just for Bug and sell the other two. Speaking of buying things, the whole box costs $39 and is available for pre-order right over here. Orders will ship on December 9, so you’re all good for whatever religious, present-giving holiday you celebrate at the end of that month. But act fast, kids, because only 350 copies of the box will actually be sold online. The remaining 150 are only going to be available at the band’s upcoming West Coast dates. “What West Coast dates?” you ask? These West Coast dates.
Sha-booz-baazzzzzzz:
12.12.11 - Costa Mesa, CA - Segerstrom Center for the Arts
12.13.11 - Solana Beach, CA - Belly Up Tavern
12.14.11 - Los Angeles, CA - The Music Box
12.15.11 - San Francisco, CA - The Fillmore
12.16.11 - Portland, OR - Crystal Ballroom
12.17.11 - Seattle, WA - Showbox at the Market
12.18.11 - Vancouver, BC - Commodore Ballroom
• Dinosaur Jr: http://www.dinosaurjr.com
• Joyful Noise Recordings: http://www.joyfulnoiserecordings.com
The Bats’ new record Free All the Monsters fails to be released on Halloween but is still worth your while
By Erika H on Nov 17 2011
So you probably have that one friend who’s all about Flying Nun and New Zealand. You try to keep up, but all you have is a download of that In Love with These Times compilation and season 1 of Flight of the Conchords. You fall back on The Clean in conversation, and maybe last year you checked out the Verlaines CD reissues (if you didn’t… do it), but that smug sonovabitch still thinks he’s got one up on you every time he puts on a new record and talks about members going solo. Well, we’ve got one bit of news for you that your oh-so-cool, kiwi (bird)-loving buddy might not know. He probably tells you he’s got the whole discography for The Bats, but that’s when — BAM! You’ll lay it on him. The Bats are coming out with a another album.
Yes, the group has been issuing pop songs from the land just to the side of the Down Under for years now (about 29), and their eighth studio album is slated for release November 22 from Flying Nun. Free All the Monsters (safely not an homage to Destroy All Monsters) was recorded just outside Dunedin, New Zealand, in an old Victorian insane asylum that Ghost Hunters is just dying to visit for an episode. With the new album, there are the usual incestuous connections that go with Flying Nun territory: singer Robert Scott is the bassist for The Clean (old news), but Dale Cotton, the producer for Free All the Monsters, has also worked with The Clean.
Watch the video for “In the Subway” here, and check out the tracklisting below.
Free All the Monsters tracklisting:
01. Long Halls
02. Simpletons
03. Free All the Monsters
04. See Right Through Me
05. Its Not the Same
06. In the Subway
07. Fingers of Dawn
08. Space Junk
09. On the Bank
10. Canopy
11. When the Day Comes
12. Getting Over You
• The Bats: http://www.thebats.co.nz
• Flying Nun: http://www.flyingnun.co.nz
Mouse on Mars return with stereophonic Parastrophics, their first album in six years
By Mike Reid on Nov 17 2011
While to some the 1990s may represent a period nostalgically defined by classic shows on Nickelodeon and an embarrassingly widespread infatuation with scrunchies and plaid shirts, from a melodic perspective, it marked the popularization of true electronic dance music. Enormously influential record labels such as Warp, Planet Mu, Ninja Tune, and Rephlex all saw their foundations rise during this decade, and each remains steadily active to this day — a testament to the enduring appeal of the hundreds of artists who were and are catering to a global desire for music centered around the synthesizer and the drum machine, and facilitated by what was, at the time, the increasingly relevant personal computer. Just one of many outfits to appear on the scene during this period was Mouse on Mars (Jan St. Werner and Andy Toma), who brought a more playful take on the traditionally less accessible style of electronic music known (for better or worse) as IDM. Following this month’s Paeanumnion performance in London, on February 28 the duo from Germany will release their first studio album in six years and their 10th overall, Parastrophics, via Modeselektor’s Monkeytown Records.
In the intervening years since the release of Varcharz (TMT Review) back in 2006, St. Werner and Toma haven’t just been enjoying the local landschaft. According to a press release, both produce independently for their Sonig label, while St. Werner specifically “has worked on solo records under several monikers, written pieces for classical
instrumentation and electronics, did music for installations, and acted as the Artistic Director of the Amsterdam Institute for Electronic Music, STEIM.” Just two years ago, the band relocated their studio to Monkeytown’s headquarters in Berlin, and began work on Parastrophics — an album described as “glamorous, funky and deep.” I’m not sure how prevalent golf-related idioms are in German society, but I believe we can consider that Par für den Kurs.
• Mouse on Mars: http://www.mouseonmars.com
• Monkeytown: http://www.monkeytownrecords.com
Jeff Mangum’s Orange Twin Field Works Vol. 1 getting expanded vinyl reissue in 2012 (the same year that John Cusack will outrun several natural disasters)
By Squeo on Nov 16 2011
A few years after In the Aeroplane over the Sea was released, just as the first few packages of poetry and panties were being mailed to his home, NMH’s Jeff Mangum took a summer trip to Bulgaria to attend the Koprivshtitsa Festival, a gathering of thousands of Bulgarian artists and amateur musicians making a racket all over town for three days straight. Mangum brought along a tape recorder and gave the festival some Alan Lomax-style love, capturing bits of folk songs, instrumental drones, jingling dancers’ bells, crowd noise, and other incidental sounds, which he then edited together into a sprawling, ecstatic half-hour collage, released on CD as Orange Twin Field Works Vol. 1 in 2001. The CD sold moderately well and got a number of Neutral Milk Hotel lovers briefly interested in world music and field recordings before retreating back to indie rock (which they were then karmically punished for by the formation of Minus the Bear).
Now, with Mangum fever (and Mangum himself) sweeping the nation, it seems like a good time to turn another crop of indie folks on to the “out sound” of the “real world,” and thus plans are in place to reissue Field Works Vol. 1 on vinyl — in expanded form! Co-released by “the compilation kings” Mississippi Records and Social Music Records and Tapes, the reissue will come in a full-color, deluxe tip-on sleeve with new cover art, and will include a bonus 7-inch with additional Mangum recordings, plus an insert detailing the recordings and their circumstances.
Unfortunately, a release date is still very tentative with all of Jeff’s recent activity, but Yeti’s Mike McGonigal tells us “pretty definitely” that the Field Works reissue will be available “within a year.” So at the latest, we’ll all have at least a few weeks to take in that bonus material before final galactic alignment.
• Jeff Mangum: http://walkingwallofwords.com
• Social Music Records and Tapes: http://socialmusicrecords.com
