Hey Hey CMJ, How Many Boys Did You Kill Today?

By David Nadelle on 03-06-2007

It has all the characteristics of a classic hard-boiled mystery novel: a robbery or murder (extra marks for setting it in a locked room in a remote country house); the single, eccentric but irresistible, hard-drinking, hard-loving gumshoe; a monkey-boy lackey doing grunt work or a mousey assistant who consistently solves the crime; the uptown slut who puts on airs and always seems to get laid despite looking like she's been ridden hard and put away wet; a mess o' bungling cops and a mess o' false and "least likely to" suspects. Maybe an unnecessary butler or two.

Actually it has very little of that. But that doesn't mean the life of incurable, mind-maiming recorder and performer John Wiese is any less convoluted than those found in the most ingenious of whodunits. But it is a dunit rather than a whodunit, by someone who does it more than others. When it comes to Wiese, maybe it is best to just throw the info out there and hope it sticks.

The most exciting news is the imminent release of Wiese's debut album, Soft Punk, on Troubleman Unlimited (when you click on this link be sure to check out the message/plea from Wolf Eyes' Nate Young). Wiese wrote us to say he has also been playing a lot with C. Spencer Yeh and hopes that some of that will see the light of day soon and has collaborated with the Japan-improv entity Pain Jerk for an upcoming Harbinger album. The reissue of Remote Whale Control by Sissy Spacek is out now on Misanthropic Agenda.

And there's live news, too. Wiese will be the perfect aural antidote to lovers of fancy-pants foppies when he hits the U.K. in April and May for dates with Yeh, Evan Parker, Tim Barnes, Yellow Swans, Metalux, John Edwards, and Culver. Look, I have nothing against the vast majority of British bands; I just don't see the need for some of them to dress up in a pantaloons-and-ascot combo or as a modern day "Artful Dodger" just to fetch the morning paper. He will then head to Israel at the suggestion of a recently-befriended BBC orchestra conductor to play a couple of shows where he will try to seek out Menahem Golan movies (true) and stalk Roni Superstar (possibly not true). I will only suggest the Golan rock/disco, sci-fi, "futuristic" (set in 1994!) musical The Apple... but I secretly hope he already owns it.

Of course Wiese will be at this year's No Fun Fest in Brooklyn on May 18, as Sissy Spacek. The mouth-watering four-day event has quickly become an annual rite of passage for outlaw fans to see an appallingly appealing crowd of characters, conflicts, causalities, complications, changes, crises, and closures (the "seven C's" to all would-be sleuth writers out there).

$ Honed Bastion, Logic Probe, and Fetal Distress

% Evan Parker, C. Spencer Yeh, Tim Barnes, Yellow Swans, Metalux, John Edwards, and Culver

^ as Sissy Spacek w/ Incapacitants, Carlos Giffoni, Raionbashi & Kutzkelina, Anti-Freedom, Mouthus + Axolotl, Grunt, Princess Dragonmon, and Charlie Draheim

By Jspicer on 03-05-2007

I remember when I first laid hands on A.M., and what a marvelous experience it was. As a teenager, I was *gasp* a member of BMG, or was it Columbia House? Anyway, that's not important. What is important is the hours I would spend not doing homework, choosing to weed through wafer-thin catalog after wafer-thin catalog looking to discover something different, which I suppose is hard since I was after all a member of a generic clearing house. However, one glorious day, the cover of Wilco's A.M. rose above the rest of the CDs, and a new fan was born. Subsequent Wilco releases were always met with much anticipation and eager money-dropping on release days. Oh, what splendid Tuesdays those were.

Imagine my glee (and that of a far greater, more diehard crop of fans who scare me a bit) to find out Wilco is blessing us with Sky Blue Sky, the band's first studio album since A Ghost is Born three years past. And while the band's message board fanatics warred about which songs would make the final cut and which ones were unworthy by citing recent live performances and bootlegs, Wilco pushed ahead, persevered, and have now delivered a bona fide tracklist.

It seems as if that's old news -- as if I'm missing something. Ah, Wilco previewed Sky Blue Sky Saturday night to an eager internet audience streaming the album in its entirety. If you missed your chance to hear the album or just didn't give a damn, you can make up for it if you fly to Australia and Europe with the band as they prepare to unleash the new batch of songs on an unsuspecting foreign audience. That is, after all, what this news bit is about. I'm here to do a little dance, make a little love, stall a bit, and then give you the info in such a rush that I will probably forget to even comple

Sky Blue Sky tracklist: