----
Read the full coverage of MusicfestNW here, where you can also find more videos.
SHRIMP SCAMPI: Fleet Foxes and Blitzen Trapper Interview Each Other
Thee Oh Sees Tour, Hopefully Honor My Request To Not Change Name to The Oh Say Can You Sees
Talk about great track record. Just take a look at Jon Dwyer's basic list: Pink & Brown, Coachwhips, and OCS/The Ohsees/Thee Oh Sees -- all pretty damn great. His current project, Thee Oh Sees, has not only experienced a few name changes (more like tweaks), but it has also gone through just as many modifications in sound. From its early sparse acoustic songs to the haunted, slow-psyche molasses rock sound of 2008 LP The Masters Bedroom Is Worth Spending A Night In (TMT Review), the band has maintained a high level of quality.
If you are a regular reader of TMT, you already learned how to be a fan, so it is time to take that knowledge and put it to good use. The band is going on a month-long tour of the USA, and unless you live in some out-of-the-way place (like Denver or Detroit), then the tour will likely hit near your town. You could also buy some new stuff, like the band's recently released live CD+DVD, Thee Hounds Of Foggy Notion (Tomlab). This live recording is a collaboration between the band and director Brian Lee Hughes, filmed around the time of last year's Sucks Blood LP.
Thee Hounds Of Foggy Notion tracklist:
Best Buy Snags Napster for $121 Million, Lehman Bros. Upset It Didn’t Switch Industries Overnight
Monday, September 15 was a bit of a free-for-all in the land of the big boy businesses, but the weirdest bit of news is this: someone actually paid for Napster, and even weirder, Napster came with 700,000 subscribers. 700,000 people still actually use Napster, though I would be curious to find out how many of those people still think 56k is cutting edge. I suppose there's gotta be a population somewhere that's stuck in the Dark Ages of the internet. Anyway, the lucky bidder -- at $121 million -- was Best Buy, which has ruffled industry feathers as of late with its venture into the world of musical instruments (TMT News), vinyl (TMT News), and local music (TMT News).
$121 million is roughly double Napster's estimated stock market value, so Best Buy must have a pretty good master plan as to how it'll make a nearly-dead digital music service work. However, it's keeping on current CEO Chris Gorog along with most of the other HUs, the same folks whose investors threatened to take over the company if Napster didn't stop hemorrhaging. Best Buy hopes to use Napster's current resources and staff to expand its digital presence in all forms of media, but it has a unique set of variables to deal with first. Napster currently sells DRM-free individual MP3s, but users who want to access a $13/month subscription catalog get DRMed. Also, Napster currently offers free and on-demand MP3s through free.napster.com, which probably won't make the cut. Hmm. Out of those 700,000 subscribers, I'm 100% positive that 99.9% of them will be cheesed off unless Best Buy can find a good solution for it all. The plot thickens... I know I'll be keeping an eye on this one.
RIP: Richard Wright of Pink Floyd
From an article by The Associated Press:
Richard Wright, a founding member of the rock group Pink Floyd, died Monday. He was 65.Pink Floyd's spokesman Doug Wright, who is not related to the artist, said Wright died after a battle with cancer at his home in Britain. He says the band member's family did not want to give more details about his death.
- Richard Wright online memorial
- Richard Wright Wikipedia entry
- Pink Floyd official website (UK)
- Pink Floyd official website (US)
- David Gilmour official website
Dungen Storms the U.S. with Flute Solos in Tow
If you're like me, you're probably bumming hard on the fact that you never got to see Jethro Tull in their prime. Well, never fear, as Gustav Ejstes plays a psychotically mean flute, looks like he just dropped by to say hi on his way to 1974, and is bringing his band Dungen to our shores this fall.
Dungen, probably the most technically proficient psychedelic rock group currently functioning, will storm the U.S. with brain-melting visuals, a slew of new material, and courtroom evidence that you actually can jam out without ever having to resort to the dreaded "white blues" (I'm looking at you, half of Bonnaroo). No word yet on opening acts, but I had the privilege of seeing cock-rock champs Cheeseburger open for them in 2005. Hopefully this year's tour will be up to those standards.
This fall's tour is in support of their forthcoming Kemado Records release, 4, expected September 30. The new joint is, um, actually not their fourth record. Technically, it's their sixth, which is too bad considering the aforementioned "forthcoming" would've been a killer, monumentally creative pun. Well, Ian Anderson would've chortled on one leg, anyway.
Band from Brooklyn Plans Fall Tour! This Time It’s Yeasayer!
For many people, this band was the sound of summer. For others, the sound of Urban Outfitters. And for still more people, they were simply the band that released that album with the kinda nu-ravey, kinda creepy cover where the person's head is all a bunch of wires or cables or something, and the chest is made out of blonde gleaming hair. Hair! They are, as I'm sure you were able to tell instantly from that intro, Brooklyn's Yeasayer. Now that we've gotten through the whole intro thing and are rapidly coming to the mid-section and dramatic conclusion of this story -- because let's face it, there's not much of one! -- you'd be right to assume that Yeasayer are preparing to embark on a fall tour.
That's right! They are! They are going to so many places too -- maybe they are going somewhere near you? Why not take a look at the following dates, slip into a cozy Urban Outfitters novelty tee, and get ready to contemplate the meaning of that album cover! It's a person with cables for brain! Cables! What could that even MEAN?
*Chairlift
