Earlimart Ready New LP, Tour

Earlimart will release their previously reported fifth album, Mentor Tormentor, on this coming Tuesday, August 21. The follow-up to 2004's Treble & Tremble will come courtesy of the band's own Shout! Factory imprint, Majordomo Records.

In an interview last fall, Espinoza told us that the album is "Sonically, really kind of different than anything we've done before. It's kind of all over the place. [There are] definitely three different kinds of feels to the album in terms of songwriting." Those feels: "typical pop...upbeat stuff," ballad-like songs incorporating strings and more lush orchestration, and straight-up rockers.

To celebrate the record's release, Earlimart will play not one but two record release parties in their native Los Angeles on August 17 and 21. Then they'll play dates here and there until they kick off a proper North American tour in late September, with Chicago band Office supporting. For the August shows, they'll be joined by the String Dream Team. [MORE...]

Vashti, Perhacs, Garcia Bernal Roll With Devendra
Plus: Black Crowes' Chris Robinson, Matteah Baim, Section Quartet

Photo by Lauren Dukoff

Seems Smokey won't be rolling down Thunder Canyon alone this fall! Indeed, Devendra Banhart has corralled quite the cadre of guest stars to enliven the reigning freak folk deity's latest musical enterprise, out September 25 on XL.

In addition to the previously mentioned likes of Noah Georgeson (who played and arranged a bunch of stuff and gets a co-production credit along with Devendra), Andy Cabic (Vetiver), Greg Rogove (Priestbird), Joanna Newsom's brother Pete, and others, gregarious Banhart also roped in some folk legends of another era: old pal Vashti Bunyan (vocals on "Seahorse" and "Loneliness") and Linda Perhacs (vocals on "Freely").

Then there's Black Crowe Chris Robinson (who plays the uke-like charango on "Samba Vexillographica"), Motorcycle Diaries/Babel/Y Tu Mamá También actor/heartthrob Gael García Bernal (vocals on "Cristobal"), Banhart BFF Matteah Baim (vocals on "Loneliness"), and string contributors the Section Quartet.

As if that weren't enough, how about the chatter on Billboard.com surrounding Stroke Nick Valensi's "contribution"?

"What I find exciting about his contribution," Devendra told the publication, "is that it requires actual physical human techniques-- meditation techniques-- to hear. It's almost like playing a record backwards, but there's no equipment necessary." Translation, courtesy of Devendra's publicist: Valensi dropped by the studio to hang out, but never laid anything to tape. You're a sly one, Devendra!

Give Mr. Meditation Techniques a good boxing about the ears for that one when he comes to your town this fall. [MORE...]

Radiohead Album May Very Well Feature Children
Although they may be adults by the time this thing comes out

Radiohead is for the children! Thanks to a link from Radiohead superfansite Ateaseweb, we have just learned that back in March, Colin Greenwood and perennial producer Nigel Godrich asked 30 children from Sutton Courtenay, England's Matrix Music School to assist them in recording a track for Radiohead's forthcoming LP.

They said yes:

The results, as you're aware, have yet to be heard by just about anyone on earth. Still, though, you may now add one more item to the scant array of details one can gather about the next Radiohead album: it's not coming out this year, and it will (probably) feature children. The photos posted from the session on the Matrix website aren't exactly packed with clues, though there seems to have been a lot of clapping involved.

To reiterate: Unless they care to dash the hopes of 30 schooolchildren, Radiohead LP7 will have at least one track featuring children slapping their hands together, possibly doing more than that. Gosh, I don't even have to hear the album; I can picture it in my mind!

Scott Walker Instrumental Album Due Next Month

Wait, another Scott Walker album? So soon?

Yep, so soon. It's not exactly The Drift II, but on September 24 in the UK, 4AD will release Scott Walker's And Who Shall Go to the Ball? And What Shall Go to the Ball? in a very limited, never-to-be-pressed again edition. Despite a mouthful of a title, ...the Ball? is a 25-minute-long, four-movement instrumental suite. It emerged out of Walker's score for a dance piece by choreographer Rafael Bonachela's dance company CandoCo. CandoCo, comprised of both able-bodied and physically disabled dancers, debuted the piece at Manchester, England's Contact Theatre in April.

Walker said of the music and its relationship to the unique troupe: "Apart from a slow movement given over to solitude, the music is full of edgy and staccato shapes or cuts, reflecting how we cut up the world around us as a consequence of the shape of our bodies. How much of a body does an intelligence need to be potentially socialised in an age of ever-developing AI [artificial intelligence]? This is but one of many questions that informed the approach to the project."

Scott has a bunch of UK tour dates plotted throughout Septem-- no, no he doesn't. Gotcha! There are, however, a number of CandoCo performances of the ...Ball? piece on the way, which we've lined up after the jump. [MORE...]

Kano to Drop Sophomore LP, Tour

"Grime" as a genre tag is fairly meaningless at this point, but a fair number of the individuals who formed the once-cohesive-seeming scene are still worthy of attention in 2007. Kano is one of the most talented and under-recognized MCs of the bunch, and it's a shame that his forthcoming sophomore album, London Town, doesn't seem to have a release outside of the UK.

But at least the follow-up to 2005's excellent Home Sweet Home exists and will hit UK shelves soon-- September 10 via 679, to be exact. Even sooner than that, the album's first single, "This Is the Girl"-- featuring Craig David (!)-- will arrive on August 27.

In addition to the regular CD version of London Town, 679 will also release a limited edition CD/DVD featuring an exclusive Kano interview, the video for "This Is the Girl", and footage of Kano in the studio with Mr. David.

Kano has a short tour this fall as well, starting September 26 in Sheffield, England. Unfortunately for his Stateside fans, even his tour is UK-only. Free Kano! [MORE...]

Mekons Make Natural Return With New Album, Tour

Celebrating a whopping 30 years together as a band, Mekons will release their first full-length proper since 2002's OOOH! on August 21 via Touch and Go/Quarterstick.

The album is called Natural, and it comes complete with a nice little two-week tour this fall, which kicks off September 27 in Milwaukee.

Among the band's many side projects and solo gigs (all of which you can check up on here), Sally Timms will play local Chicago TV station/PBS-affiliate WTTW's Fun and Run children's event on August 26, and Jon Langford will perform at Chicago's Celtic Fest on September 15. [MORE...]

Songs of Green Pheasant Return With Gyllyng Street

Preliminary reports suggest Gyllyng Street, the new album by Duncan Sumpner and his Songs of Green Pheasant, tries a few new bells and whistles. It pulls an unlikely R. Kelly move, for one, doubling up on old boy's typical four-track attack with eight glorious plug-ins of sonic leg-stretching.

That's a lot of shake-up for a dude who barely gave us time to appreciate last winter's Aerial Days mini-album before laying Gyllyng Street on us.

You can feel the glorious growing pains right along with your boy Duncan August 20, when the new album drops in the UK, Europe, and so forth from FatCat. It'll follow in the U.S. September 18. [MORE...]

Max Roach R.I.P.

Max Roach, the jazz drummer, composer, bandleader and educator whose approach to rhythm had a profound effect on music in the second half of the 20th century, died of an unspecified illness at his home in New York last night. He was 83 years old.

Born in Newland, North Carolina in 1924, Roach and his family settled in Brooklyn in the late 1920s. An early interest in music was encouraged, and he was drumming with bands by the age of ten. Roach is one of the last surviving members of the generation of musicians who came to prominence in New York in the 1940s and set in motion the influential jazz style that came to be known as bebop. Both Roach and fellow drummer Kenny Clarke were ubiquitous on the scene, which also included saxophonist Charlie Parker, trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie, and pianists Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk, among others.

With its faster tempos and adventurous use of harmony, bebop was arguably the first jazz movement to position itself as art rather than entertainment. Roach, building on the innovations of Clarke, strove to free his instrument from its timekeeping role, establishing the drums as an improvisational voice and exploring the textural properties of percussion.

Roach continued to be identified with the first wave of bebop musicians his entire life, an association that peaked upon the release of the landmark Jazz at Massey Hall, a 1953 album featuring Parker, Gillespie, Powell, and bassist Charles Mingus (the album was released on the Debut label, an artist-run imprint started by Roach and Mingus). But he never stayed in one place for long and his music continued to evolve.

During the 50s and 60s, Roach became involved in the civil rights movement, and his activism was reflected in his work. His controversial and ambitious 1960 album We Insist! Freedom Now Suite, which directly addressed oppression in the United States and Africa, became a classic of both jazz and political art.

Roach was a relentless experimenter, working in virtually every setting, from solo to percussion ensembles to duets to big bands. He joined the faculty at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst as a professor in the early 70s and taught at the Lenox School of Jazz. In 1988, he was the recipient of a MacArthur foundation "genius grant," the first jazz musician to receive the award. An outspoken commentator and intellectual who could give a great interview, Roach occasionally drew connections between jazz and the rhythmic innovations and political consciousness of hip-hop (he appeared onstage with Fab Five Freddy and a team of breakdancers at a concert in the early 80s).

Frank Black Covers Waits, Roxy Music on iTunes EP
New Black Francis album gets tracklist, release date

His Black Francis alter ego is set to release Bluefinger via Cooking Vinyl on September 11 (September 3 in the UK), but Frank Black won't allow the recently issued 93-03 retrospective compilation to be the only thing he puts out this year.

Black has added to his repertoire with his own exclusive-to-iTunes EP, the creatively titled Live Sessions. Available now, the EP features Black originals "Massif Central" and "Manitoba" alongside covers of Roxy Music, Tom Waits, and the Good, the Bad & the Queen. Quick turnaround on that last one!

Comprehensive Frank Black fansite FrankBlack.net has some tiny tidbits about a couple of other Black projects as well. First, Black's rumored collaborative project with Eric Drew Feldman (Captain Beefheart's Magic Band, Pere Ubu) is on hold for now, and second, there is a Black collaboration with his wife Violet called Grand Duchy that seems to have an album called Fort Wayne on the horizon. The very distant horizon, we imagine.

Finally, Black has a single show scheduled for October 5 at Eugene, Oregon's WOW Hall. [MORE...]

Create Les Savy Fav's Video, Then Go See Them Play
Or, in Headline-Speak: Les Savy Fav Announce Video Contest, Tour

It seems Les Savy Fav have been surrendering the reigns to the ol' workhorse of late. First, they asked their fans to sing on their record, and now, they're actually paying people to stand in for them in a video. I guess you can't spell Les Savy Fav without "lazy," eh? Er, wait.

In truth, these recent overtures smack more of a purposeful breakdown of the barrier between artist and fan than a clever disguise for lethargy. (Besides, anybody who's witnessed this band in action knows that they have more energy than a kitten hyped up on Sparks.)

Les Savy Fav are giving weekend Gondrys essentially carte blanche in a contest to create the clip for "The Equestrian" from their forthcoming album Let's Stay Friends. Entries must be a performance of the song, with lip-synching and at least some attempt to mimic playing instruments. Save that arty, impressionistic mess for your Decemberists thesis, Sally Gradschool; Les Savy Fav want you to rock! Or, at least, pretend.

The winner-- based on the most views on YouTube, where videos are to be uploaded-- will receive full bragging rights, plus $1000 and a bitchin' trophy. Videos are due by September 18, so you oughta get crackin'. Full details are available here.

Even if you don't win, the consolation prizes are choice: Let's Stay Friends is out that very day in the U.S. on French Kiss Records, and October 1 in the UK on Wichita. And the band's touring, too, with European dates trickling out since last we spoke on the subject. [MORE...]

Does It Offend You, Yeah? Sign to Almost Gold
Sebastien Grainger (ex-Death From Above 1979) Supplies Vox for New Single

The Almost Gold label's been awfully choosy in who they've signed, and being particular has paid off. Peter Bjorn & John and Calvin Harris have blown/are blowing up, and things look mighty good for Chicago duo Walter Meego, whose first full-length is due on the label by year's end.

So raise those hopes pronto for Does It Offend You, Yeah?, the cheeky Reading-bred electronic twosome that's the latest find for the Columbia Records subsidiary. They've generated a significant amount of excitement overseas via remixes for Bloc Party, Muse, and the Raconteurs, not to mention mixes like this one.

The group, currently working on a debut album for release next spring, already have a notable in their corner: new single "Let's Make Out" features ex-Death From Above 1979 belter Sebastien Grainger on the come-ons. "Let's Make Out" is available now as a free download (see below), and if you live in the UK and sign up for their mailing list, they'll send you a limited edition 5" vinyl single. On September 17, it will be released on a proper 7" and 12" in the UK. (They're on Virgin in the UK; the Almost Gold signing is for the U.S.)

Does it Offend You, Yeah? are also some tourin' fools, and they're out on a massive UK jaunt presently. [MORE...]

Deerhoof Extend Tour, Reveal Dedication Film Details
Cat Power, Strokes, Lightning Bolt, Au Revoir Simone, Fischerspooner also on soundtrack

Step aside Lil Weezy. There's a new Dedication in town, and this one features brand new music from Deerhoof. We're referring, of course, to the previously mentioned film from actor-turned-director Justin Theroux, which hits theaters on August 24.

Dedication stars Billy Crudup and Mandy Moore(!) as a neurotic writer and batty illustrator, respectively, and it looks certain to strike a chord among the Garden State/twentysomething set. In the life-altering Shins role, then, are Deerhoof, who contribute several new songs to the film. Those tunes include a pair of suites recorded with film composer Edward Shearmur, and the "Dedication Mix" of "Matchbook Seeks Maniac"-- set to appear on a forthcoming Kill Rock Stars 7", as you may know-- which sprung from Theroux's desire to have a Jesus and Mary Chain-esque tune for his film's closing credits (how novel!).

The soundtrack to Dedication is set to hit stores September 11 via Commotion/Koch, and also features previously released music from Cat Power, the Strokes, Lightning Bolt, Fischerspooner, and Au Revoir Simone.

And that's hardly the only thing astir in camp 'Hoof of late. The Cali trio have also added quite a few dates to their tour, which now extends into early November, affording them many a Friend Opportunity before the year is up. [MORE...]

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? You will remain completely anonymous, unless we are given your express permission to reveal your identity. (Please note that publicists, managers, booking agents, and other artist representatives are generally exempt from this rule, but will also be granted anonymity if requested.)