Oasis, Killers Remake Sgt. Pepper's, God Knows Why
Why oh why couldn't it have been Wings' Back to the Egg? If 1967 chamber-pop masterwork Sgt.
Pepper s Lonely Heart s Club Band isn t the finest album ever recorded, it s not far from it. For evidence, peep every critic s poll ever, or simply take out your copy (you do own Sgt. Pepper, right?
).
On June 1, Sgt. Pepper turns 40.
, in bizarre, ill-advised tribute to that otherwise momentous occasion, has commissioned thirteen bands to cover the venerable album s songs, with the results being aired June 2. The bands will use the Beatles original recording equipment and Beatle engineer Geoff Emerick will oversee the project.
Roughly half of the bands have been announced so far: (no shit!
), (erm, okay), , (...
getting colder), , and . Durr!
Look, I m sure these things seem like a good idea in boardrooms or over a few pints; there s money to be made, the source material won t suffer for these fools, and there s a fairly good chance Oasis will pull something worth hearing out of their inevitable take on the title track.
But unless they peg Radiohead for Within You Without You or Olivia Tremor Control for Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite or Jesus H. Christ for Lovely Rita, there s no way the finished product will be anything but a bold experiment in screwing up an otherwise perfect thing.
I can t be the only one who remembers the . will reprise their one-time role as backing band on their upcoming tour with the California songwriter. In May, the band will join him on his first East Coast dates in over a year, where they will open for him and perform as his backing band at each show (except for May 3 s gig at the Tribeca Film Festival, where they ll only play as McCombs band).
Two dates of Arbouretum s own April tour will also have them opening for McCombs. Speaking to RollingStone.com s Rock Roll Daily blog today, NYC man-about-town and label honcho revealed that he will most certainly not be a factor in the recently announced .
I m not part of the current Smashing Pumpkins album or tour, claimed Iha. I haven t spoken to Billy [Corgan] in years.
Instead, Iha s working on another solo record and devoting time to helming the imprint he co-heads with Adam Schlesinger of Fountains of Wayne, , which recently put out Stroke Albert Hammond, Jr.
s own solo dabbling.
Apart from Corgan himself and possibly his drummer and BFF Jimmy Chamberlain, it s been frustratingly unclear just who will be part of that dadgum Pumpkins reunion. Guess we ll find out when the thing ignites at May 22 s inaugural reunion gig in Paris, then gets consummated with the July 7 release of .
Perhaps Billy s spent the post-Zwan years creating clones of himself to back him, because dude would totally do something like that.
Since we , the Pumpkins have added a September 8 engagement at Montreal s Osheaga Festival. July 10, dream-popping foot-looker will release his third LP, the gauzy Goodbye, on .
Canned in his native Kiel, Germany, Goodbye reflects a period of steely, self-imposed isolation as a kickstart to creativity; kind of like Bowie s Low, or Liars Drum s Not Dead, or Scorpions Wind of Change, or basically every other record ever recorded in Germany. Before the Goodbye comes the fond hug of the Quicksand Memory EP, due May 22. Quicksand features an edit of Goodbye s Medusa , a collaboration with Rob McVey of UK act (for which Schnauss plays keys), and a pair of remixes of older Ulrich songs by Cocteau Twin Robin Guthrie.
Catch Schnauss on the ones and twos at London s Roxy Bar April 14.
At s first show in their Portland hometown since making an unexpected splash in the UK-- not to mention -- front-woman Beth Ditto admitted to being nervous. But it didn t show, as the band charged through its set at the with energy to spare.
Beth went barefoot mid-set for Standing in the Way of Control , the band s UK breakout hit and the song that really galvanized the crowd at Wednesday night s gig. Keeping a gaggle of four girls on stage with her, Beth and the Gossip launched into a live rendition of their cover of Aaliyah s Are You That Somebody , and at the insistence of the audience she also rapped Timbaland s verse. Hot!
The Gossip spread the word on a handful of dates this month, then join up with the tour-- featuring Cyndi Lauper, Debbie Harry, Erasure, Dresden Dolls, and more-- this June.
For as much as their record rocks, few bands validate the you gotta see em live! thing as much as .
Between Eddie Argos ridiculous ad-libs and his band s high-energy guitar assault, one can t help but leave an Art Brut gig with a big smile pasted across his or her face. Unfortunately, up until now, you probably had to dwell in or near one metropolis or another to experience Eddie and Co. live and raw.
Now you can laugh and rock along without moving your arse from the couch.
Way back in January of this year, Germany s snuck out an Art Brut DVD titled Talking to the Kids. The disc collects footage from a live show recorded January 24, 2006 at Cologne, Germany s Stollwerck, along with several music videos, photos, behind the scenes footage, German TV appearances, and other goodies.
Of course if you don t speak German, you might find the narrated portions a bit hard to follow, but we ll take live Art Brut any way we can get it. And we ll be able to get it much more easily come May 22, when Cobraside Distribution makes Talking to the Kids available in the United States.
That snappy band, meanwhile, has its revenge with , out June 26 in the U.
S. via , and likely the day before overseas via . Catch them on a brief States/Canada foray later this month, or in the UK thereafter supporting Max i mo Park and eventually headlining.
Summer 2007 is shaping up to be quite busy for . Surprise, surprise. Is this guy ever not busy?
In addition to touring with percussionist in support of their latest collaborative record and under his alias, Hebden has two new albums due on shelves in the coming months.
The Sun, out June 19 on CD and LP on in the U.S.
(and on Text in the UK and in Europe), is the years-in-the-making new album from , Hebden s band with bassist and drummer Sam Jeffers. The follow-up to 2001 s , The Sun features ten songs ranging in length from 38 seconds to almost eight minutes. Post-rock-tastic!
(Temporary Residence plans to reissue Happiness on limited edition double LP in celebration of the occasion.)
As Jeffers told Pitchfork in an , Fridge s new music features a stronger strain of improvisation and freeness running through it than ever before. Maybe even a contrast between some quite tight, rhythmical stuff, and loose, no-rules music-- often in the same track.
And speaking of improvisation and freeness, in August, Norwegian label will release Fire Escape, a collaboration between Hebden and freak/folk/avant/noise troupe . Sunburned spent four hours in the London studio the Exchange last year, following Hebden s lead as he arranged the amorphous band into different subsets. Hebden made suggestions for what the band played, and they improvised from those suggestions.
Hebden then reassembled and remixed an album from tracks of those session. Sunburned co-founder John Moloney explained to Pitchfork, He would be like, I want two of you guys: Play drums and bass now. Everyone play flutes now.
All vocals. OK, a couple of piano pieces. It s a bit like our older stuff, crossed with a Can record or a dance record.
It s pretty cool.
Mirah, Mudhoney, Timony on DeSoto Kiddie Comp
Plus: Channels, Tara Jane O'Neil, Anna Oxygen, the Cassettes, Georgie James Kids these days don t know how good they got it. When I was a lad, there were no , no (not to mention no ), and certainly no indie rock compilations made specifically for the juvenile set.
Lucky for this generation, -- no strangers to -- will amass 14 youth-friendly tracks, call it Play, and release it digitally April 14 with an iTunes exclusive track from DeSoto s faithful .
Technophobic child-havers-- who probably don t get their music news from websites, come to think of it-- can check their local dime stores and medicine shoppes for an old-fashioned CD copy of Play on May 22 sans the aforementioned Dismemberment Planner s parenthood-jam. The comp promises to be adult-friendly, too, but if my occasional channel-changing happenstance with has taught me anything, kid songs register as intolerable to virtually all ears over the age of eight.
Although maybe those Wiggles just suck. Those looking to get buck with bambinos in tow can check out comp-gracing and at Bethesda, Maryland s Glen Echo Park April 22.
Apostle of Hustle Move Quickly Through U.
S., Canada Every day they re hustlin ; -- whose more-than-solid release is still warm in North American stores and, as of March 26, white-hot in Europe-- will pack their darting guitars and chattering drums for a plethora of April and May dates, including a handful with matin e e idol and fellow extended family member .
, the Apostles ran a remix contest for Nowhere s leadoff track My Sword Hand s Anger .
The votes are in, and Canuck thinktank will see the upside of Anger when their take on the track appears on the tune s digital maxi-single (alongside a live version of same) April 10. Do you have a news tip for us? Anything crazy happen at a show you attended recently?
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