Police possibly reunite for first tour since 8-to-the-Sixle; Sting changes his name back to Gordon,

By Gumshoe on

As comedian Dana Carvey once said, you have to have balls the size of Earth to change your name from G-G-Gordon to Sting. How the hell did he pull that off? If a friend of mine tried to tell me to call him ‘Dew-Drop' instead of ‘Jeremy' I'd probably drop a MEAN elbow right down on his head just to show him Americans don't put up with that SHIT. Because I'm tough, I could probably get away with it.

Pretentious names aside, we all know a Police reunion would/will be a HUGE deal, if only because we would be saved the agony of more awful Gordon (aka Sting, Dew-Drop) solo music. We also all know that rumors have been swirling like a carton of 'nilla-fudge ice cream. First, G-G-Gordon said the group is planning to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the release of Roxanne, a laff-tastic movie starring Steve Martin. They must really like that movie! The trio are also apparently preparing to Bust the world at the Grammys on February 11. I don't know why-the-flip they'd choose the clown-shoe'd Grammys as their point of entry though... why not something classy, like the Ace Awards, or maybe they could co-host the Emmys with Kelsey Grammar and the latest stripper he's dating? Or the Simpsons-curated Princie Awards? That would be nails. I predict right here and now that Skinner sweeps 'em...

Other rumors have The Police dew-dropping on Bonaroo Festival, which has gone from ‘ewwww, hippie smell-jam' to ‘ooooh, hippie smell-jam!' in a few short years, and embarking on a full-scale world tour, which would be announced the day after the Grammys performance. Of course, that's just what we'll be expecting them to do, so expect a bevy of twists and turns worthy of a '50s mystery thriller. In addition, Goooordon still has to complete his February-through-March Pied Piper tour in support of his solo lute album, so until then we'll just have to HURRY-UP-AND-WAIT for official announcements. [double-take] A fucking solo lute album? I wish I were making this up; really. But one thing is for sure: If The Police reunite before Chinese Democracy comes out, I will have won a lifetime supply of mini-reubens from a close friend (we made a bet in '95 see, and signed in our own blood... I'd like to see Goooordon make such a gutsy bet).

Chin Up Chin Up & Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin Tour To Bring Positivity Back to North America

By C. Schell on Feb 9 2007

Oh man, I cannot believe that Chicagoans Chin Up Chin Up & Springfieldians (thanks griffinkay!) Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin are going to tour together beginning February 15! This is going to be so great for everyone involved! These are two of the best bands! Have you never read a blog? Yes? Well, okay then, you know that this is so great. Both CUCU and SSLYBY put out records last year, and they were both great! Chin Up had This Harness Can't Ride Anything (TMT Review) and Someone Still put out Broom (Polyvinyl). Oh my stars, what a great time to be alive! Now these two bands, these two great big piles of amazing, are going to be sharing a stage for awhile. Now I know there is a God! Just kidding, I never doubted that the world is under the control of a giant man in the sky who gives you $0.25 for a baby tooth. Oops, wrong invisible, benevolent force. That aside, this is so great! Finally, some good news! No offense to the rest of the TMT stories, but man, this is exactly what the world needs now. Crap, I forgot that North America is not the world. It is all the world I will ever need, who else has things like CUCU & SSLYBY? Japan? Australia? England? Brazil? Egypt? Iran? Nope. Enjoy, North America!

By Chris Gliddon on Feb 8 2007

Hot on the heels of an apparent collaboration on Björk's collaboration-crazy upcoming record, Konono N°1, the artists behind 2004's excessively brilliant afro-pop record Congotronics (TMT Review), are out on the road, circulating the U.S. for a smattering of concert appearances. And if that wasn't a long enough and difficult sentence for you, then get a load of this adjective-laced ridiculousness called a sentence that doesn't have any purpose whatsoever!

The group, who hail from Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (that's in Africa, geography fans), have been making music with their salvaged instruments (constructed mostly from materials found in junkyards) since at least 1978. Their track "Mungua-Muanga" was recorded back in 1978 and appeared on a compilation called Zaire: Musiques Urbaines a Kinshasa in 1987. The afrobeat collective most recently played their masikilu music on the Congotronics 2 compilation.

It should also be noted they are playing the Coachella festival on the same day as Björk, as well as playing the Reykjavik Arts Festival (at which Björk has appeared in the past.) Does this mean that we will get to see a live collaboration, perhaps?

TIM BUCKLEY Tim Buckley “My Fleeting House” My Fleeting House | MVD Visual TMT News Story

By Mango Starr on Feb 8 2007

The following is my favorite press release of the year (so far), edited for bias and to fit the TMT format.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

TIM BUCKLEY

My Fleeting House My Fleeting House

Available on DVD

April 24, 2007 May 15, 2007

Through MVD Visual

My Fleeting House My Fleeting House is the first-ever DVD collection of performances of Tim Buckley. This essential DVD features rare live performances from various television TV shows and interview footage spanning his entire career.

The DVD has eleven 11 full-length songs, and three partial performances. This DVD also features insightful interviews with Larry Beckett (co-writer of many songs with Buckley), Lee Underwood (Buckley's guitarist), and David Browne (author of "Dream Brother: The Lives of Jeff and Tim Buckley" Dream Brother: The Lives of Jeff and Tim Buckley).

The footage spans his entire career, from 1967 to 1974, and includes unreleased video of interaction with Buckley on The Steve Allen Show The Steve Allen Show (1969) and on WITF's The Show The Show (1970). The footage is taken from various television TV programs from 1967 to 1974 right up to the time of his death in 1975. All but two of the musical clips are unreleased. As an additional oddity The clip of Buckley being interviewed on The Steve Allen Show The Steve Allen Show includes Jayne Meadows complimenting Buckley on his hair.

Despite having produced nine studio albums, three live albums, and many “best of” compilations, My Fleeting House My Fleeting House is the first-ever authorized collection of Buckley’s visual performances. Several segments on this new collection have not been seen for over thirty 30 years. MVD Visual has secured the best possible, first-generation video sources for the compilation, including footage from American, British, and Dutch television, and also a forgotten feature film. This DVD has the full approval of the Estate of Tim Buckley.

Buckley was an experimental a vocalist and performer who incorporated jazz, psychedelia, funk, soul, and avant-garde rock in a short career spanning the late 1960s and early 1970s. He often regarded his voice as an instrument, a talent most exploited he used on his albums Goodbye and Hello, Lora, Goodbye and Hello, Lorca, and Starsailor Starsailor. He was the father of musician and singer Jeff Buckley, also known for his three-and-a-half octave voice, who died in 1997. Buckley released his debut album Tim Buckley Tim Buckley on Elektra in 1966. A folk-rock album, it contained psychedelic melodies written with input from Beckett. He went on to release Goodbye and Hello (1967), Happy Sad (1969), Blue Afternoon (1969), Lorca (1970), Starsailor (1970), Greetings from L.A. (1972), Sefronia (1973), and Look at the Fool (1974).

Born in Washington DC, Tim Buckley lived for 10 years in New York before moving to southern California. During his childhood, he was a fan of Johnny Cash, Hank Williams, Nat King Cole, and Miles Davis,} although country music was his foremost passion. He left school at 18 with twenty songs written with Larry Beckett under his belt — many of which later featured on his debut album. Mothers of Invention drummer Jimmy Carl Black introduced Buckley to Herb Cohen, and he quickly got him signed to Elektra record company. He also met guitarist Lee Underwood around this time, who became a big part of nearly all of Buckley's artistic endeavors.

On June 28, 1975 after returning from the last show of a tour in Dallas, Buckley snorted heroin at a friend's house. Having diligently controlled his habit while on the road, his tolerance was lowered, and the combination of a small amount of drugs mixed with the amount of alcohol he'd been consuming all day to celebrate the tour's end was too much. His friend took him home thinking he was merely drunk. He was put to bed by his friends, who told his wife that he'd also used some barbiturates. As she watched TV in bed beside him, Buckley turned blue. Attempts by friends and paramedics to revive him were unsuccessful. Reportedly, Buckley's last words were "Bye Bye Baby," delivered in a way reminiscent of the line in Ray Charles' "Driftin' Blues." Buckley was just 28 years of age. (Boring.)

Arranged in chronological order, My Fleeting House My Fleeting House traces the evolution of Buckley’s music, voice, songwriting, and backup bands.

DVD extras include a 12-page booklet of unreleased Buckley photos, an album-by-album review by Underwood, Beckett, and Browne, and Beckett (also a poet) reciting “Song to the Siren.” My dick is hard.

Tracklist:

!!! Plans Intimate, Three Night U.K. Tour; Just Keeps Adding Dates

By Squeo on Feb 8 2007

Hey guys, down here. I was too exhausted after formatting all these tourdates to scroll back up to the top and write an intro. My vision was blurring and my feelings toward !!! were weakening, but through it all, I knew it would be worth it just to see the smile on that 13-year-old Dane when he finds out that, yes, his love interest's favorite band is not only providing a new album, Myth Takes, but is even coming to the esteemed Voxhall Theatre, now giving him a legitimate excuse to ask her out on the date of all dates. Oh, how the whole town of Aarhus will be healed by their love! Or at least up-in-arms over Nic Offer's hip thrusts.

Daughters Tour, and If You Think They’re Gay it Says More About You Than it Does Them

By Gumshoe on Feb 7 2007

I interviewed Lex from Daughters once. He wouldn’t give me his last name at the time, but it’s Marshall. He wouldn’t tell me his last name ’cause he’s a liar. A GODDAMNED LIAR. Er, wait, he’s not a liar per se, he’s just sick of all the harassment from Spin and Rolling Stone, always asking him to be on the cover of their respective magazine, always on his balls about some Fan-tabulous pictorial or some photo op with the kids from Real World Santiago or that bitch from Garden State. You know, that darth vader chick. Lex, which is short for Alexis, HATES that shit, and he spreads his buttcheeks for NO ONE.

He also loves microphones. I saw him live once and he deep-throated his mic like Jenna J taking down a floppy dinosaur cock. Early the next week an associate said the show was “too gay,” referring to this and other stunts, but I tend to disagree. If we want our frontment of today to truly blow our minds, pun intended, they need to have the freedom to suck, shuck, jerk, milk, fondle, stroke, slurp, gargle, and flat-out KNOB the mic all they want. Well, except for the gurgling, that’d be pretty tough to do unless you got one of ‘dem new Shure mics. Those things melt in your mouth, not your hand and are better than Liquid Paper!

But back to biznass: While Alexis shields his face from the cameras and avoids the titties of teenyboppers and smitten reviewers, his heavy-as-metal band Daughters will be on tour with the likes of Chinese Stars, Pelican, Russian Circles, The Locust, and Cattle Decapitation, the latter of whom will be passing out ‘Axe Grant’ leaflets due to my news article last week about pushy vegetarians. Well, they would be if they gave a shit, anyway... they never return my letters!

Ask Lex Diamonds his REAL last name at the following tourdates:

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