In the new video for Lie to Me , is hanging out in the backyard of a brokedown shack cluttered with stereo parts, a piano, a refrigerator, and a mean ol dog. Honestly, would we expect Tom Waits to hang out anywhere else? The mall?
A Lakers game? The clip for the rockabilly-ish rave-up is composed of strips of still photographs strung together to look like Waits is dancing as he mugs and struts through the tune. It s what I imagine we all look like when we re air guitaring in front of the mirror, except he has a real guitar, and is in front of a camera, and is famous.
The dog is not amused. Lie to Me is from the forthcoming Waits three-disc set Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers Bastards, due out on on November 21. , Waits will appear on Late Night With David Letterman and The Daily Show on November 27 and November 28, respectively.
Also giving away his trusty ukulele to one lucky, adventurous fan Less than a year ago, was taking up a day job and ditching the whole music thing for good. Now he s back to being Captain Prolific. As the charming Jens revealed in a recent e-mail to Pitchfork, he has already recorded a heap of new songs for his next record, technically the follow-up to his -stamped U.
S. debut, When I Said I Wanted to Be Your Dog. And speaking of dogs, he s also begun working with another Swedish Pitchfork favorite: .
In the man s own words:
I have recorded about 30-40 new songs here in Kortedala [an area in Gothenburg], where all my previous songs were recorded. But I feel that I can t work here anymore. It has turned into such a depressive and violent place.
People go to bed at nine and after that everything is dark and silent. I used to like that cause it meant I could go for endless walks without meeting a single person, but after having been mugged and beaten several times I m too scared to go out.
So to get away from that and to finish the record I ve headed over to my friend Sarah Assbring / El Perro Del Mar.
She s helping me with details such as vocal arrangments and sorting out the rotten apples. Her studio is right by the ocean.
I can t say much more than that, I hate reading about artists in the studio and I don t wanna be one of them myself.
I like to pretend that my songs record themselves during the night and when I wake up I will find it sitting on my bed with a cup of tea saying: Good morning, I am your new song. Noah Georgeson produced Joanna Newsom s The Milk-Eyed Mender and Devendra Banhart s Cripple Crow, and he has played guitar with Banhart in his band and on Vetiver s To Find Me Gone. He also dated Newsom and was in the band with her.
So he has something of a n u -folk pedigree. But Georgeson will make the transition from band member and behind-the-scenes guy to solo artiste with the November 28 release of his solo debut, Find Shelter, on .
Find Shelter was recorded in San Francisco, where Georgeson currently lives, and in his hometown of Nevada City, California, between 1999 and 2003, when he was living with Newsom in the room where she wrote most of Mender.
Prince-style, Georgeson is credited with having written, scored, arranged, recorded, and produced the entirety of Find Shelter, according to a press release. He sang and played guitar, piano, organ, and Mellotron on the album, and he conducted the Kite Hill Chamber Orchestra in the recording of the remaining instrumental parts.
s follow-up to his 2005 debut, the multi-platinum , is titled The Inspiration, and your favorite trapper s favorite trapper has assembled quite a crew to handle the album s production.
DJ Toomp produced the first single, , and Timbaland and the Runnerz also contributed tracks. A tracklist for the album has not yet been announced, but according to a press release, another track-- Child of God (Bury Me a G) -- has Jeezy envisioning his own death and judgment. Heavy!
Billboard.com reported recently that the album will also feature guest appearances by Ludacris, T.I.
, Keyshia Cole, Three 6 Mafia, and Young Buck.
Def Jam will release The Inspiration on December 12. Let it snow, man.
So apparently Sony has a music store. It s called and is very annoying to use. But if you wade through the confusion, download the Connect software, and pay four dollars, a brand new, exclusive digital EP can be yours.
(This is surprising, considering the fact that the Decemberists are signed to Capitol, part of EMI, which happens to be a competitor to Sony/BMG.) The EP features live versions of the Crane Wife tracks O! Valencia , The Perfect Crime #2 , and The Crane Wife 1 2 , as well as a cover of the country song Please Daddy (Don t Get Drunk This Christmas) , previously done by such superstars as John Denver and Alan Jackson.
I can t tell you what any of it sounds like though, since I m still afraid of rootkits and won t download the software. However, if you have Internet Explorer 6.0 or higher, you can read (perhaps unintentionally) hilarious quickie interview with the band.
Clearly, the Decemberists find this whole thing as stupid as I do:
CONNECT: Now describe the band s sound in your own words.
THE DECEMBERISTS: ROCK MUSICA! (to be said in a thick Russian accent) As previously reported, the Decemberists are on tour now.
s mainstream success was weird for about two months before everyone just accepted the ubiquity of Float On and got used to it, but seeing these videos of , , and played live at a couple of the band s recent West Coast shows reminds us that Isaac Brock and co. are still pretty weird.
All of their snaking guitar lines and deranged vocals remain intact, so much so that new member/ex-Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr is barely noticeable at first.
He s even got the outfit down. But make no mistake, that s Marr on the far left, playing guitar and adding occasional vocals to all of those songs, as well as this new song--exploring the softer side of the band--which they played at their show at L.A.
s Avalon on November 5. The 2007 release of We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank is now even more exciting.
As , Modest Mouse are still on tour and will be through the beginning of January.
Drones/Devs carry on with shows, scramble to secure equipment Fans of who turned out to show love to the Brooklyn act in Toronto, Chicago, or Minneapolis recently may have come home a little surprised and disappointed. The -signed five-piece were forced to pull out in the midst of their fall tour with Melbourne, Australia s and Berlin-based due to vocalist and former Rollerskate Skinny dude Ken Griffin s full blown upper respiratory infection, according to a (who knew sick qualified as a current mood ??
) on the band s official .
Tours get cancelled all the time for a variety of reasons, but this one s particularly sticky, because it leaves the Sons tourmates-- both of whom travelled from overseas and plan to forge ahead sans the Sons-- without a backline (club-speak for drums, amplifiers, and other equipment a small band cannot afford to travel with) for the remainder of the tour. Lots of people cover .
But how many of them do it alongside one of Dylan s mentors and one of his most important followers? That s exactly what s will do tonight at New York City s Lincoln Center, when she performs Knockin on Heaven s Door accompanied by Ramblin Jack Elliot and Patti Smith. This is part of the , which also features Cat Power, Ryan Adams, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Sonic Youth s Lee Ranaldo, the Roots, Jay Farrar, Allen Toussaint, Bob Mould, and many, many more.
In celebration, Matador released the eMusic exclusive EP Another Side of Jennifer O Connor this week. It features a solo acoustic cover of Dylan s To Ramona as well as three previously unreleased new songs: the full band, lo-fi indie I Never Loved You and (Take Me on a Ride Around The) Sun , as well as the solo acoustic Waste My Time . Shara Worden, aka artist , has had quite a year already, releasing her debut album and touring with her buddy Sufjan.
But it s not over yet.
On December 5, Worden will release an iTunes-only EP featuring four versions of the Workhorse track Disappear : the original, an alternate recording, and remixes by Stakka and James McAlister. Also included will be the previously unreleased B-side The Lace Handkerchief .
Worden is on a headlining tour of North America now, and she will join forces with DeVotchKa in December to complete her dates.
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