Apples in Stereo Totally Amped for Fall Tour

As these things go, Apples in Stereo frontman Robert Schneider's foray into nerdiania at the Mathematics Association of America's MathFest earlier this month was a success. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Schneider himself even waxed a little geeky about it afterwards in a press release: "Going to MathFest was like summer camp at Disneyland for me! In my entire life, I've talked to three people about math." You must've been home-schooled, dude!

He added, "It was so amazing to have these scholars be truly interested in my mathematical ideas and thereby my music as well!" So expect to rub elbows with the leather patches sewn to the tweed blazers of Rob's newfound professorial fans on the Apples' upcoming U.S. tour, which has them hitting a good portion of the nation before October rolls around. [MORE...]

Institubes Labelmates Tour, Para One Has Epiphanie

Paris-based electronic imprint Institubes loves its babies, it really does. It's just that sometimes it needs a little time to itself to relax, you know? So the brass at Institubes are ponying up airfare and shipping label artists Para One, Surkin, Orgasmic, and Curses! over the pond, where they'll all make sure to be polite to their hosts, remain cautious around strangers, and call every chance they get. Right, kids?

And we'd be especially remiss if we didn't tack this onto the proverbial refridgerator of Institubes news: label stalwart Para One's 2006 LP Epiphanie will finally get a North American release September 11 via Naive/Ryko. Gold stars all around. [MORE...]

Photos: Revenge of the Book Eaters [New York, NY; 08/26/07]

Photos by Rich Orris; text by Jen Nathan

If there's one thing every teacher's pet daydreams about, it's revenge. On Sunday, the nerds had their day, at the second (and hopefully annual) Revenge of the Book Eaters extravaganza at New York's Beacon Theatre.

A benefit for Dave Eggers' tutoring program-cum-superhero haberdashery 826NYC, this musical celebration of all things literary featured such smarty pants as Feist, My Morning Jacket's Jim James, Grizzly Bear, Spoon's Britt Daniel, the New Pornographers' A.C. Newman, and Broken Social Scene's Kevin Drew.

The always erudite Demetri Martin kicked things off with an in-depth analysis of the finer points of farting on airplanes. Then Newman, America's favorite newly married Canadian, rocked out with a small symphony of back-up players, followed by Brooklyn's own Grizzly Bear. The band's ethereal set included a haunting take on Yellow House's "Marla", originally written in the 1930s by singer Ed Droste's grandmother. The set was rounded out by a vaguely creepy rendition of Paul Simon's "Graceland".

The highlight of the evening offered a glimpse behind the cape-filled shelves of 826NYC: Feist's dramatic reading of student work. The riveting adventures of a five-foot-tall peanut named Mystic Waters and his wife Jelly Taker could only be topped by Britt Daniel and A.C. Newman's joint cover of an Alex Chilton song.

The moral of the story? The geeks shall inherit the earth.

A.C. NEWMAN


FEIST


GRIZZLY BEAR






BRITT DANIEL (OF SPOON)


JIM JAMES (OF MY MORNING JACKET)


KEVIN DREW (of BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE)

[MORE...]

Ghostface, Cat Power Play Free Nike MFNW Gigs
Also Deerhunter, Grizzly Bear

Well, MusicFest NW, you win again. The Portland, Oregon powerhouse-- still going strong September 6-9 all over the city, still complete with an accompanying mix, still sporting a really friggin' good lineup-- has added even more fun to its plans.

Thanks to a Nike sponsorship, MFNW will offer three free daytime shows taking place at Audio Cinema, featuring a few acts that aren't even playing the festival proper. September 6 finds Cat Power and Bobby Bare Jr. joining forces, while the next day, it's total bros Grizzly Bear and Deerhunter. On September 8, same time, same place, Ghostface Kilcher and the Bronx close out the series.

The Ponys Join Spoon on Fall Dates

Even the buckingest of broncos need rest every once in a while, so the Ponys are taking a much-deserved break from touring at the moment. Their R&R will come to an end shortly enough, however, as they already have plans to tour North American this fall. The new dates also feature some band called Spoon on the bill.

Follow a lone college gig in early September, the shows with Spoon kick off in October. Our little Ponys are still out there in support of their third LP and first for Matador, this year's Turn the Lights Out. [MORE...]

Raconteurs Spill a Few New Album Beans

Gather 'round young folks, and let me tell you the tale of a little band called the Raconteurs. Once upon a time, a boy named Jack, he of the White Stripes, thought, "Side project?" At the same time his good buddy, one Brendan Benson, thought, "Escape from obscurity?" And so the Raconteurs (known to our Aussie readership as the Saboteurs) were born.

Flash forward to 2007 and the Raconteurs have one album in the can (last year's Broken Boy Soldiers) and another on the way. Thus far we only knew they were recording LP2 in Nashville and had enlisted the Hives' Howlin' Pelle to guest on a track called "Footsteps". Now we know, well, just a wee bit more.

As Jack White disclosed in a conversation between he and Brendan that appeared on the band's website today, "Ok, the time is right. The teurs have a lot of new songs in the works people, the writing and structure of them has dissipated and reinvigorated and many times over since we came home from our last shows." We gather there's an extraneous "and" in there, but we'll give Mr. White a pass. After all, he's a busy man.

J and B elaborate further:

Jack: But as we were saying, the new songs are coming together strong, I hate to even attempt to describe them...

Brendan: It would be like dancing about architecture.

Jack: Or singing about girls.

There's also chatter about some entity known as "little jack" who seems to call all the shots for these guys, as well as talk of Benson and Raconteurs bandmate Patrick Keeler "starting a two piece band on the side."

All of this may or may not be true, for as Jack admonishes, "Don't believe everything you read. Fact of business; don't even believe all the things I tell you when it's just you and me in the room.

"If little jack's there though, then it's all true."

Annnnnd there you have it!

Non-story, you gripe? Well here, have some White Stripes dates. [MORE...]

Daft Punk Live Album Details Revealed
Sold separately: robot spaceman play-along collector's set

Photo by Kirstie Shanley

Sure, the title alone probably won't inspire much desire to hit the dance floor. But, much like the show from whence it comes, Daft Punk's forthcoming live album Daft Punk Alive 2007 has considered just about every other detail in the pursuit of the boogie, short of the thing coming with a DVD.

Although it has yet to be confirmed, Spin.com reports that the disc will be released November 20 in America on Virgin, and will collect 27 tunes (32, should you opt for the bonus encore disc) recorded live in Paris this summer. The hits-laden set also comes with the previously reported Olivier Gondry-directed, fan-filmed video for "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger", as well as a 50-page "digi-book" featuring photos from the tour. Ah, memories.

Daft Punk have added a few shows to their 2007 itinerary, which, as you know, includes a set October 27 at Las Vegas' Vegoose festival. They'll hit Japan for three shows in December-- Osaka on December 6 and Tokyo on December 8 and 9. [MORE...]

Numero Group Spawns New Asterisk Label

Welcome to Asterisk, a new imprint from the Numero Group dedicated-- or so they say-- "to illuminated, omitted, footnoted, and unattested sounds." Continuing in Numero's fine tradition of crate-digging and beat-mining, this here Asterisk has announced a multifarious trio of inaugural releases, all out September 25, that sound awful good on paper.

Hartford, Connecticut's Johnny Lunchbreak-- described as a kind of Velvets/Modern Lovers thing-- were originally rediscovered in 2004 on an obscure acetate and reissued in a limited run on LP. Asterisk hunted down the original tapes, and the record became Appetizer/Soup's On.

The Four Mints' Gently Down Your Stream began its life as an LP on the Columbus, Ohio Capsoul label-- which, as you may recall, was the first obscure soul label whose catalog was anthologized by Numero. But when Asterisk happened upon some prime unreleased Four Mints cuts, they moved on bulking up the original Gently Down Your Stream LP.

Boulder, Colorado folk collective Propinquity's self-titled (and only) album also gets a reissue, with its ten original tracks supplemented by a couple unreleased cuts and a few from a 1971 compilation. Group member Carla Sciaky herself showed up on Numero's Wayfaring Strangers comp, a successful find that spawned this reissue.

Additonally, Asterisk will release a self-titled disc by Boscoe November 6, though we know nothing about it beyond the release date and tracklist. Those cats don't even have an All Music Guide entry! More like Most Music Guide, eh? [MORE...]

Spoon Expand Their Tour Some More

Photo by Autumn De Wilde

With their next tour set to kick off September 5 in Seattle, Spoon just can't keep themselves from tweaking the thing. Last week, they changed their D.C. venue to accommodate an opening slot for the Shins, and now, they've added dates in Chicago, Tulsa, and Fayetteville, Arkansas, among other places. [MORE...]

Photos: Black Lips' Middle East Summer Vacation Part 2

Tuesday, we shared a few Polaroids the boys of Black Lips snapped and captioned on their recent Middle Eastern vacay. As promised, here's the second (and final) installment of the series, which finds the Lips finding magic in Jaffa, disproving hundreds of years of geographical science, and running into an apparently universal ailment: a busted animatronic pizza mouse. Hey, it still beats the hell outta the Jersey shore.

Check out more vacation video footage here. Good Bad Not Evil, the Lips' latest good, not bad, maybe a touch evil LP, can be yours September 11 from Vice.

Left: "In Jaffa, during a full moon and Jupiter is in the 7th hour, trees mysteriously levitate a la David Blane"

Right: "Kibbutz! Livin freedom, breedin demons, token weedom."

"We tried to take these kids to chuck e' cheese for some slices afterwards, but it was closed for repairs"
[MORE...]

Annuals Announce Autumn Adventure

Photo by Charles Harris

North Carolinian whippersnappers Annuals will hit the road this fall with Atlanta pals Manchester Orchestra for a co-headlining tour featuring the Never and the New Frontiers on select dates.

The tour begins October 27 in Annuals' home state, but they have a single date in Iceland beforehand on October 2.

Meanwhile, the band is in the process of writing songs for the follow-up to their debut, last year's Be He Me. [MORE...]

Depeche Mode's Gahan Shares Solo Disc Details

Much was said about Depeche Mode frontchap Dave Gahan's second solo album in our late-June piece about it, but the hallmarks of any good album-preview item-- a release date and a tracklist-- were, sadly, absent. Consider this, then, our proverbial doctor's note: Hourglass drops October 23 via Mute/Virgin, and a digital single for "Kingdom" will come August 27.

Everything else we said about Hourglass last time 'round still rings true, though a couple of the songs we mentioned would be included on Hourglass either didn't make the final cut or have taken on fancy new titles. Nevertheless, you may take a gander at the full, final Hourglass tracklist behind the jump, maybe peep the clips of Dave in the studio not working on Hourglass in the download section, then resume your usual brooding ritual accordingly. [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.)