Los Campesinos! Bring their New Album’s Fatalistic Glee to the Road! Oh, Man!
By Melissa Muenz on 11-25-2008
Dangerously unbridled energy no doubt accounts for the speed in Los Campesinos!'s latest full-length album, We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed. Retaining the same urgency, the band is already making headlines again with the announcement of a 2009 tour. The tour takes Los Campesinos! across the country with openers Titus Andronicus, a Jersey indie rock outfit who also has a senselessly energetic sound, concluding with two dates in New York City (the band's U.S. home away from Wales).
Be sure to rock some caffeine before you go out.
Loney Dear is the Apple of Polyvinyl’s Eye and He Likes to Sit Down Be Cider
By David Nadelle on 11-25-2008
All marriages are happy. It's the living together afterwards that is difficult. It seems that every time your head has finally healed from the aftermath of toasting and celebrating one marriage, another has dissolved like so much “special day” champagne that once introduced the newly christened bride and groom. Sigh.
The same thing happens all the time in "the industry," but, thankfully, here is a union that seems charmed and that has the potential of being long-lasting and meaningful from the onset: Polyvinyl has signed the immensely talented home recording whiz Loney Dear to its roster! Loney Dear, the pseudonym for Jönköping, Sweden’s Emil Svanängan, will release his new album January 27. Dear John will be the fifth album for Svanängan and third to be released in North America (2007 saw the re-release of 2005’s Loney, Noir by Sub Pop and 2006’s Sologne by Rebel Group).
Here’s to the happy couple, and remember: a honeymoon should be like a table -- four bare legs and no drawers! Bah, my efforts are spent on all you wasted wedding crashers!
Dear John’s dear songs sear dongs:
1. Airport Surroundings
2. Everything Turns to You
3. I Was Only Going Out
4. Harsh Words
5. Under a Silent Sea
6. I Got Lost
7. Summers
8. Distant
9. Harm
10. Violent
11. Dear John
Svanängan practices polyamory, or group marriage, as well. But only when he plays live. Here is the list of upcoming Loney Dear “group” shows, including two December dates in New York and a just-announced 2009 American tour. Many gigs we be opening for confirmed swinger Andrew Bird
12.08.08 - London, England - Old Blue Last
12.10.08 - New York, NY - Mercury Lounge
12.12.08 - Brooklyn, NY - Union Hall
12.28.08 - London, England - St. Giles Church
01.29.09 - Northampton, MA - Iron Horse
01.30.09 - Boston, MA - Orpheum Theatre #
02.03.09 - Washington, DC - 9:30 Club #
02.04.09 - Atlanta, GA - Variety Playhouse #
02.06.09 - Orlando, FL - Plaza Theater #
02.07.09 - New Orleans, LA - House of Blues #
02.09.09 - Baton Rouge, LA - Spanish Moon
02.10.09 - Houston, TX - Rudyard’s British Pub
02.11.09 - Denton, TX - Hailey’s
02.12.09 - Austin, TX - Paramount Theater #
02.13.09 - Albuquerque, NM - Historic El Rey Theater #
02.14.09 - Tucson, AZ - Rialto Theater #
02.17.09 - Visalia, CA - Howie and Sons Pizza
02.18.09 - Los Angeles, CA - Orpheum Theatre #
02.19.09 - San Francisco, CA - The Fillmore #
02.20.09 - San Francisco, CA - The Fillmore #
02.21.09 - Portland, OR - Roseland Theater #
02.23.09 - Seattle, WA - Moore Theater #
02.24.09 - Boise, ID - Knitting Factory Concert House#
02.25.09 - Murray, UT - Murray Theater #
02.26.09 - Denver, CO - Ogden Theater #
02.27.09 - Omaha, NE - Slowdown #
03.01.09 - Chicago, IL - Schuba’s Tavern
# Andrew Bird
RIP: Robert Lucas, Former Frontman of Canned Heat
By Shane Mack on 11-25-2008
From Pollstar:
Robert Lucas, a former frontman of Canned Heat, died of an apparent drug overdose Nov. 23 at a friend's home in Long Beach, Calif., according to his former manager Skip Taylor.Lucas, 46, recently left Canned Heat to pursue a solo career. The singer, harmonica and bottleneck guitar player had two stints with the band between 1994 and 2006.
Canned Heat, whose hits include "Goin' Up The Country" and "On The Road Again," has had four frontmen in its more than 40-year history.
Lucas also performed with artists including Big Joe Turner, George Smith, Pee Wee Crayton, Lowell Fulsom, Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson and Percy Mayfield.
- Canned Heat official website
- Canned Heat Wikipedia entry
David Byrne Extends Tour, Brian Eno Extends Paid Vacation
By Nobodaddy on 11-25-2008
Steve Martin and John Candy they ain’t. You certainly won’t find Brian Eno traveling with David “The Next-Hardest Working Man in Show Business” Byrne this holiday season. It seems he had “other plans.” But I sure can tell you where you’ll find Byrne: the open roads of North America, where he belongs.
Apparently not content whatsoever with the notion of finishing up his 2008 tourdates and then going home to hang out and enjoy the fact that he’s, you know, “David Byrne” for a while, the talking and singing head has announced that he will add another string of dates to his tour of the U.S. and Canada that will carry him well into the new year. Totally oblivious to the fact that we at TMT already wasted some clever prose on what we thought was a complete tour (TMT News), Byrne will resume his 2-fast, 2-furious pace November 28 with a kick-off show in Buffalo, NY. The subsequent run will wrap up temporarily on December 13 in Miami, FL (looks like someone convinced him to at least try to see his loved ones this holiday season) before resuming again on February 18 in Seattle, WA. The tour will ultimately culminate with a show at New York’s legendary Radio City Music Hall on February 27. THEN THERE IS EVEN MORE TOURING (thanks Terry).
Byrne is, of course, not out there hocking shower curtain rings, exactly. Rather, he’s manically crisscrossing the country like this to support the recent release of that modest little old Brian Eno collaboration Everything That Happens Will Happen Today (TMT Review), released in August. So where exactly is Eno, then, you ask? Umm, my guess is probably somewhere a whole lot warmer... potentially tanning himself with sunlight reflected off of solid gold bars. Yeah. That’s my guess.
See? Not everything that happens will happen today:
