What with all the chatter about Sweden on this here website, it s easy to forget that other Scandinavian nations made a serious Stateside splash in 2006 (an indie-sized splash, but still). Among them: Denmark, who graced us with Pitchfork faves Figurines and Mew, as well as ( Oh nah Boon ), who ve been kicking it for a while now and released ( ) last year to generally positive reviews.
The octet-- comprised of four boys and four girls, which means they ll kick your band s ass at square dancing-- finally makes its way to the U.
S. and Canada this spring, playing a spate of shows throughout March which climaxes with some appearances. What s more, they re bringing along one hell of a secret weapon in their quest for Scandinavian domination: Sweden s potty-mouthed chanteuse , who will open most dates, sharing coy, heartfelt balladry from her 2006 U.
S. re-release, ( ).
Frida s poodle-dance soundtrack hits shops across Sweden on January 24, thanks to the -run imprint .
It s called Frida Hyv o nen Gives You: Music from the Dance Performance PUDEL and there s no word quite yet on Secretly Canadian s U.S. release.
Here is part of the plot description for the forthcoming film , directed by Martin Hynes and starring Lou Taylor Pucci, Zooey Deschanel, and Jena Malone: Left with an aching instinctual itch to explore America after a traumatic loss, a curious teenager named Mercer suddenly steals a car in Oregon and develops a life-altering telephonic connection with the forgiving and mysterious girl he took it from. As he sets out with her phone calls as guidance, Mercer s motives find focus as he travels across the postmodern highways of the former Wild West to seek self-knowledge and a sense of belonging. Does that sound like a movie you d want to see?
No? What if you read that paragraph again..
.while listening to the rustic indie-folk stylings of ? You can just feel the tumbleweeds, the stares off into the distance, and the sexual tension, right?
Yeah, this movie is totally going to suck. But at least it ll have good music, as Ward has made his first foray into film music with the score for The Go-Getter. It premieres at the Sundance Film Festival later this month, and Ward will perform at the festival to celebrate.
But Park City is just one stop on Ward s current world tour. He s in Australia right now, with a couple of gigs in New Zealand scheduled for next week. Then, it s back to North America for a brief run of solo shows.
, will release Ward s To Go Home single on February 20. It features guest appearances by such luminaries as Neko Case, Jim James of My Morning Jacket, and Howe Gelb of Giant Sand.
Just in time for us folks up north to don our long underwear, -- electrified Portland spunk-rock trio and creative force behind , -- will take to the road beginning this February.
Hutch Harris and company have announced seven dates thus far, most in the Jesus-freaked U.S., one in comely Canada.
Best of all: unlike that had our trusty Thermals playing second banana to Emomaha s and that band s black-haired, black-hearted minions, this little adventure has the hard-working trio headlining the smallish, dingy dives they were born to play, in front of the crowds they ve been dying to sweat all over. And they ll be joined by ers for most dates. So come out, bring your friends, and for crissakes people, move around!
Here s something to get yr motors running: 2007 is gonna kick major ass! exclaimed Thermals bassist Kathy Foster in a recent . Let s make it GREAT, ok?
! we re gonna start it off right by working on new songs in january and february before leaving for tour. get your juices flowing too!
don t put off what you wanna do any longer. Chew on that, kiddies. MP3: Talib Kweli, Madlib Team for Free Album Seems and resolved to be more generous and giving in 2007, and they re wasting no time with that.
Today the pair delivers Liberation, a nine-track digital-only LP featuring MC Kweli and producer Lib, -- cover art and all-- on Stones Throw s .
A lo-fi affair full of soulful samples and plenty of name-dropping on the part of Kweli, Liberation includes guest verses from Consequence and Strong Arm Steady and should whet appetites a little bit until Talib drops Ear Drum, his new LP, originally slated for release late last year. It s now set to land later this month via Kweli s own imprint, under the mighty Warner Bros.
umbrella.
But don t whet those appetites too much. Wrote Kweli on his , Some fans will say [Liberation] is the sound they want to hear from me all the time.
If so, congratulations, you got your wish. However, do not use this to speculate what Ear Drum will sound like. It is a different project with different influences.
Oh, and add kindness to the list of Kweli resolutions. Shout out to my brother Madlib, wrote the MC in the same MySpace message, for being so creative and inspirational, and for giving me a canvas to paint on. This project was inspired by his consistency.
..In this era of over produced and over marketed product, Madlib leads the pack of independent artists who could care less about all of that.
We ll toast to that. In October, the semi-cryptic Classic will be touring this spring 2/25/07 rarr; 4/07 appeared on s website. And now, Lou Barlow, Eric Gaffney, and Jason Loewenstein have revealed the dates that will be filling in that gap-- and extending it.
(The trek includes a stop at , as ) In an update on his site, Barlow commented on a week of recent Sebadoh practice sessions in Los Angeles, as well as s holiday trip to the UK , an upcoming five-song solo CD EP ( It sounds more like old-school Sentridoh than anything I ve done in awhile. A big murky mess..
.I love it..
.That ll be out in Spain sometime soon. ), and Speaking of Dinosaur Jr.
, they currently have one performance scheduled. And it s..
. a Nike Skateboarding shoe release party taking place at Tampa, Florida s Cuban Club on January 19. No kidding, designed a for Nike.
Yeah, apparently aging indie rock legends have the same cache as basketball stars and rappers these days. Dinosaur Jr. also has a full-band , , on its way May 8 via .
As previously reported, the trio also plans to drop a currently untitled album produced by Mascis and mixed by this spring. Finally, a bunch of Sebadoh The latest Paris Hilton escapade? Or.
..the new video?
the latter! Though not particularly raunchy, this clip for Ebb Tide taking a dip in the ocean. Director Jennifer Parsons sea shots alternate with footage of Oldham, bathed in said blue light, crooning the song into the camera while making funny New York I love you, but you re bringing me down.
And that s mostly on account of the enormous distance between your culture-paved streets and the geometric avenues of the Second City-- and the fact that you re constantly getting kick-ass-to-the-max festivals like this one.
festival kicks off January 4 in Brooklyn and runs through the end of the month, bringing together pretty much anyone who s anyone in boundary-pushing music these days, and tossing in some film and poetry for kicks. All experiments in sound and vision go down at the , which will host showcases all month long from a number of respectable labels, including Thurston Moore s , , , , , , and .
Among the performers: Bark Haze (featuring Moore and Andrew MacGregor, aka Gown), fellow Sonic Youther Lee Ranaldo, guitar composer Rhys Chatham (performing with his Guitar Trio All-Stars ), drone violinist Tony Conrad, Charmalambides Christina Carter, Sunburned Hand of the Man (scoring some films), Ira Cohen (reading poems), mad drummer Jonathan Kane s February, crazed harpist Zeena Parkins, Sun City Girl Sir Richard Bishop, Loren Connors/David Daniell/Greg Kelley, No Neck Blues Band, MV+EE, Lau Nau, Function, Lichens, Ethan Rose, and Badgerlore. Scope the complete lineup and schedule .
Following his last month, Dave Sitek has found a new outlet for his pent-up creative energy: a The band will hit the road in March, crossing the U.
S. and Canada through late April.
Somehow I missed the Cast Your Kids in a Video contest, which is a shame, since my kids love them some Shins, but lookee here!
The video for the band s Phantom Limb , first single from Wincing the Night Away (January 23, ), thrusts our fair Shins and America s children into the throes of various tragic historical situations. Situations that, yes, changed lives-- but hardly for the better. Irony!
Maybe.
Kids and Shins portray Joan of Arc and her army, vile conquistadors, oppressed native peoples, and the ill-fated members of the Donner party in the -directed clip. It s rather charming because 1.
) the whole thing is set up and dramatized like a play, and 2.) such dire circumstances are pretty much the last thing the Shins music evokes. Incongruity can be fun.
Also fun: the digital age. And in an effort to reconcile the technological advances our science hath wrought with the rampant nostalgia for all things vinyl, those jolly elves at Sub Pop will package all LP copies of Wincing the Night Away with a magical golden ticket which you may redeem-- at no additional charge-- for Wincing in mp3 format. what Merge Records and a bunch of other labels are doing right now.
And not a bad idea, if you ask us.
Finally, our boys will wince the away, appearing on the sometimes funny NBC program January 13, along with Jake Gyllenhaal of Donnie Darko and Brokeback Mountain fame.
Finally finally, there s a pretty fantastic Shins interview on the main page right now.
You know you want to . For the past two weeks, the Pitchfork news team has been on our annual Mexican vacation, swimming in the ocean, sipping margaritas, and building beach bonfires out of stacks of bad promo CDs. (Sorry, .
) However, just because we re busy rubbing suntan lotion on one another s backs doesn t mean the music world stops generating news, though we would prefer if it did. So here s a brief wrap-up of some of the more notable happenings that took place since December 15, 2006 and today. Happenings that weren t as notable as or , that is.
Happy new year! The week before the break, a mysterious advertisement appeared on our website, bearing only the phone number 1-866-NEONBIBLE and a link to . Assuming it was some cheesy viral marketing campaign for a Christian youth movement or a car (Dodge Neon, maybe?
) or something, we ignored it. Turns out it was an ad for the new album, titled, yes, Neon Bible. Calling the phone number got you a static-y, almost unlistenable version of the song Intervention .
Thankfully, on December 28, in all of its orchestral, over-the-top glory became available as an benefiting the nonprofit health care group . The Neon Bible track Black Wave/Bad Vibrations also became available as an iTunes download benefiting Partners in Health, albeit accidentally. According to a post from Win Butler on the band s , someone from Merge Records mistakenly put the track on iTunes on December 26.
Thanks, dude. The band also added five shows at Judson Memorial Church in New York City to their residencies in London and Montreal. Tickets go on sale January 5, but they probably somehow sold out already.
According to Google, Cassadaga is some sort of spiritual cult thing involving communicating with the dead. How emo! Cassadaga is also the name of the forthcoming album, due out on April 10 on .
It will be preceded by the Four Winds EP on March 6, which includes the title track and five non-album B-sides: Reinvent the Wheel , Smoke Without Fire , Stray Dog Freedom , Cartoon Blues , and Tourist Trap . Unlike previous Bright Eyes albums, which have featured Conor Oberst surrounded by a large cast of characters, the band is a three-piece on Cassadaga: Oberst, producer Mike Mogis, and Nate Walcott. As , the album also includes cameos from M.
Ward, Gillian Welch, and Janet Weiss of Sleater-Kinney and the Jicks. A Bright Eyes tour is in the works for February. Pitchfork s , Swedish indie pop trio s , will be released in America on February 6.
It s coming out on the brand new label , which is a partnership between Scott Rodger, manager of Arcade Fire and Bjork, and Isaac Green of StarTime International. The U.S.
version of the album includes the single version of Let s Call It Off , as well as a bonus disc featuring the original take on that song as well as Ancient Curse , All Those Expectations (Weak Remix) , Self-Pity , Sitar Folks , and the Beyond the Wizard s Sleeve Re-Animation version of , Young Folks . PB J also scheduled two New York City shows, one at the Mercury Lounge on January 29 and one at the Bowery Ballroom on January 30. Do you have a news tip for us?
Anything crazy happen at a show you attended recently? Do you have inside info on the bands we cover? Is one of your favorite artists (that's not somebody you know personally) releasing a new record you'd like to see covered?
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