Rob Lowe, U.S. Maple Guys Form Singer, Issue Debut

Photo by Robert A.A. Lowe

A quartet of accomplished Chicago musicians has formed under the confusing name Singer to release its debut album on Drag City. Comprised of Rob Lowe (Lichens, 90 Day Men), Ben Vida (Bird Show, Town and Country), and U.S. Maple members Todd Rittmann and Adam Vida, Singer features "all four of these kids singing, harmonizing new chords over their communal cacapho-din," according to a press release.

Singer's debut album, Unhistories, will arrive March 25 via Drag City. And not only is it full of the band's vocal and instrumental interplay, it also supposedly "claims to address the homeless crisis with a physical solution." We smell an Obama running mate!

Singer have two hometown shows coming up in February. [MORE...]

Jaguar Love (ex-PGMG, Blood Brothers) Sign to Matador

Blood Brothers may have betrayed their blood oath by breaking up last fall, and Pretty Girls may now inhabit those Graves they made, but the spirit of both those raucous Seattle acts lives on in the previously mentioned Jaguar Love.

A trio, J-Love is comprised of ex-Brothers Johnny Whitney (vocals, piano) and Cody Votolato (guitar, bass), along with ex-Pretty Girl J Clark (drums, bass, keyboards). Having already caught the eye of Queens of the Stone Age, who took them on tour for a spell last year, Jaguar Love have since inspired the folks at Matador Records to sign them for a long-term, worldwide deal.

Jaguar Love join another act borne of the ashes (bones?) of Pretty Girls Make Graves on the Matador roster, the Cave Singers.

Look for the Clark-produced Jaguar Love debut full-length to arrive as soon as this summer. And while there are no finalized plans for Jaguar Love to stalk music-loving prey on the road right now, the band promises "Endless Amounts of Touring" kicking off March 14 in "Everywherepolis". We'll be there!

D'Angelo, Soulwax, Peaches Grace Prince Tribute Comp

Prince's appearance at last year's Super Bowl halftime show was the biggest and best combination of sporting and musical spectacle we've seen, and likely will see, in a while. (We seriously can't think of anything better. Radiohead opening the World Series with "The National Anthem"? Björk playing Wimbledon? Eh...)

Thus, Tom Petty as the Purple One's follow-up can't help but be a little disappointing, and it might force us to recreate Prince's rain-soaked antics by shutting our eyes and listening to "Purple Rain" on repeat for the umpteen millionth time.

Fortunately, Berlin's Rapster Records has given us an alternative point of entry into Mr. Rogers Nelson's catalog. It's a tribute compilation called Controversy, featuring songs like the title track, "Purple Rain", "Starfish & Coffee", and "She's Always in My Hair". Covering these songs: everyone from Soulwax, Hefner, Kode9 & the Spaceape, 7 Hurtz with Peaches, Susanna and the Magical Orchestra, Blues States, and Stina Nordenstam to the very Prince-like D'Angelo.

Rapster will release Controversy on February 4... the day after the Super Bowl. [MORE...]

Photos: Liars / No Age [Portland, OR; 01/28/08]

Photos by Nilina Mason-Campbell

Liars and No Age rocked the Wonder Ballroom in Portland last night, though Liars rocked in a slightly different manner than what we're used to. Angus Andrew, recovering from a back injury, placed three comfy chairs on stage and sat in them during various parts of Liars' performance. He also donned a red balloon around his waist for the encore.

Before the gig, No Age performed an in-store at Food Fight!, a local vegan grocery. While an actual food fight didn't break out, Dean and Randy did find plenty of ways to get rowdy.

More photos from Food Fight! and the Wonder Ballroom show, plus tour dates, below.

LIARS






NO AGE

NO AGE AT FOOD FIGHT!

[MORE...]

Count & Sinden Sign to Domino, Prep "Beeper" Single

If you haven't yet heard "Beeper", the infectious, ringtone-inspired ode to the two-way that's blown up many a spot lately, you will. The track, from Joshua "The Count of Monte Cristal" Harvey (whom you may also know as Hervé) and remixologist Sinden, must have really got into the heads at Domino, as they've signed the Count & Sinden to their fold. The duo will issue a UK single for "Beeper" March 24, and expect to craft a full-length by the end of the year. I can hear it now: "widget on my iPhone iPhone iPhone..."

The Count & Sinden have a few live dates together over the next few months and Sinden has quite a few by his lonesome, though you can never be too sure where these DJ types are going to appear. If only there were an electronic device with which we could contact them to find out more... [MORE...]

PB&J's Peter Moren Signs to Quarterstick for Solo Debut

Photo by Johan Bergmark

Writer's Block, pah! Peter Bjorn and John's Peter Morén seems to have suffered no such lack of inspiration in crafting his forthcoming solo LP. Titled The Last Tycoon, it's due out April 8 on Touch and Go imprint Quarterstick. (Interestingly, it's not on PB&J's U.S. label, Almost Gold.)

In a press release, Morén describes the album as having "the usual lyrical psychobabble, but with a direct and honest approach." Though it springs from tunes written by Peter for guitar, the album will be laden with instrumental flourishes from "strings, synthesizers, vibraphones, percussion, a musical saw, and even a drum machine or two." The Concretes' Daniel Värjö, singer-songwriter Tobias Fröberg, and string arranger Leo Svensson (of the Tiny) also helped out.

The Last Tycoon's tracklist hasn't been announced yet, but back in November, Morén mentioned "Social Competence", "This Is What I Came For", "Le Petite Coeur", and "I Don't Gaze at the Sky for Long".

The good/bad news, depending on your outlook: There's nary a mention of whistling involved.

Morén has a couple of California solo shows lined up, and plans to make his way down to Austin for South by Southwest. A small spring tour is in the works at the moment as well.

Peter Bjorn and John just ended their exhausting Writer's Block tour. In a post on their website, they claim to already be busy crafting its follow-up, with plans to tour in 2009. [MORE...]

Simian Mobile Disco Prep Another EP, Add Dates

Front page photo by Nilina Mason-Campbell

It's a good thing that Simian Disco of James Ford and James Shaw's is of the Mobile variety, because if it weren't, we'd have a heck of a time telling you about the latest additions to their forthcoming tour. Not to mention the logistics of booking the damn thing! Lucky for us, it moves, and when these guys come around, there is a pretty good chance you'll be moving right along with them.

Following a run of dates in their native UK and one in Paris, the dynamic duo that is Simian Mobile Disco will bring their hustle to North America as winter turns to spring. A handful of these will be "just" DJ dates, while others will feature the full-blown SMD live experience. SMD return to the UK in May for that Summer Sound System festival.

Something to note: a gig originally plotted for February 2 at Bristol, England's Thekla has been pushed back to Valentine's Day due to "circumstances beyond [their] control." Tickets for the cancelled gig will be honored at the rescheduled show.

Finally, it wouldn't be a SMD story without another new short-playing release from these two. Following the U.S. version of the "Hustler" single that hit Stateside shelves last month, the Clock EP collects four instrumental tracks and lands UK-ways via Wichita Recordings March 10. [MORE...]

David Byrne, Grizzly Bear to Join Paul Simon in Concert

Well we knew Jens Lekman, Julie Doiron, Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, and-- in all likelihood-- these guys were fans, but they're hardly the only ones.

Paul Simon, aka the guy who stole Annie Hall from Woody Allen, will be the subject of a series of star-studded concerts presented by the Brooklyn Academy of Music. "Love in Hard Times: The Music of Paul Simon" descends in April and consists of three separate programs touching on aspects of Simon's globetrotting songcraft.

"Songs from The Capeman", the first program, runs April 1-6 at the Harvey Theater and brings together Oscar Hernández and the Spanish Harlem Orchestra, Claudette Sierra, Obie Bermudez, Ray de la Paz, and more for a concert staging of Simon's 1998 Broadway show The Capeman. Little Anthony and the Imperials will make a special appearance as well.

"Under African Skies" is next, running April 9-13 at the Howard Gilman Opera House. David Byrne, Hugh Masekela, Cyro Baptista, Milton Nascimento, Kaïssa, Luciana Souza, and others will be on hand to help Simon and his band recreate tunes from Graceland and The Rhythm of the Saints. What, no Chevy Chase?

"American Tunes", finally, takes over the Howard Gilman Opera House April 23-27. The collaboration-happy Grizzly Bear will join the Roches, Olu Dara, and others to assist Simon as he spins through some of his more domestic fare.

So come on out and celebrate the adventurous sounds of Paul Simon. Just please take care not to sneeze all over his coke.

Gnarls Barkley Are The Odd Couple on New LP

Why, it's another pop culture reference! To a bygone T.V. show, no less! Gnarls Barkley-- Cee-Lo and Danger Mouse's totes postmodern R&B-space-pop thing you've probably heard about-- have slapped a name on the forthcoming follow-up to 2006's St. Elsewhere, and, well, it suits them nicely. The Odd Couple, the sophomore disc from the unlikely hitmaking team, will be released in April on Downtown/Atlantic. Though the real question remains: Is Cee-Lo a Felix or an Oscar?

Gnarls and them have been lighting up the internet over the last 24 hours as a leak of presumptive lead single "Run" hit the blogs yesterday. The track appeared on missionfreak.com with a few tongue-in-cheek warnings against copping the thing ("give it a download and see if you turn into the Cowardly Lion"), and Gnarls' own MySpace bulletins have been peppered with references and links to the track. The most recent, titled "GB LEAKED", simply features a link reading "Hurry up and DIGG this before it's pulled." Whatever you say, crazy basketball player band!

In other Gnarly news, Danger Mouse recently wrapped production work on the Black Keys' Attack & Release, while Cee-Lo joined Boards of Canada in crafting Solange Knowles' next one. Billboard.com also reports that Danger Mouse is working with Tricky collaborator Martina Topley-Bird on her forthcoming album The Blue God and with a band called the Shortwave Set, who have also been lucky enough to rope in both Van Dyke Parks and John Cale as collaborators on their new LP.

M83 Talks New Album, New Direction, 1980s
"There is no irony at all in my musical relation to the 80s. I really can cry when I listen to Kate Bush or Simple Minds."

After a low-key debut and two records of scintillating, maximalist end times anthems-- plus last year's ambient detour Digital Shades Vol. 1-- M83 is all set to tone things down a bit. Saturdays = Youth, the analog wizard's new LP for Mute (due April 15 in North America, April 14 overseas), exists as a post-apocalyptic hangover of sorts and also heralds a new direction for the M83 project.

We caught up with M83's center of gravity Anthony Gonzalez to discuss this change, the non-ironic influence of the 1980s, and what else we can look forward to this year from M83.

Gonzalez puts it bluntly: "I think repetition is death. So the new record [has] a different path and a different focus." Yet, as he's quick to add, "It's different but it's from the same mold.

"I don't think this record is a betrayal for M83 fans. I just wanted to make something different and I hope they will like this new departure, because I think the fans were waiting for something else too."

Saturdays serves, in a sense, as a year zero for Gonazlez. As he tells it, "I felt like Before the Dawn Heals Us was a kind of conclusion to everything I had done before-- like electric crescendos and rock and tragic lyrics-- and I needed some fresh air. I spent a long time trying to find and to love this new direction of mine."

For this so-called new direction, Gonzalez looked both inward and backward, to the decade of Reaganomics, larger-than-life coiffures, and new wave: the 1980s.

"I just wanted to make [this record] more personal," Gonzalez explains. "I'm fed up with all these albums paying tribute to the 80s because, in general, the 80s are really treated as kitsch and as a cheesy decade-- and people love that. But for my part I consider the 80s in a really serious way, and there is no irony at all in my musical relation to the 80s. So yeah, I really can cry when I listen to a Kate Bush song or Simple Minds." [MORE...]

Photos: Super Furry Animals / Holy Fuck [Brooklyn, NY; 01/25/08]

Photos by Matt Ziegler

The nutty Welshmen in Super Furry Animals headed to Brooklyn on Friday night for the second stop on their North American tour in support of latest album Hey Venus!. The crowd at the Music Hall of Williamsburg let down their guard long enough to act as silly as the guys on stage; maybe they were just happy that the band let them pick the set list? Canadian crazies Holy Fuck opened, giving the Furrys a run for their money in the wackiness department.

The Holy Super Furry Fuckin' Animals trek continues tomorrow night in North Carolina. The bands part ways in mid-February, with Super Furry Animals picking up Times New Viking and Holy Fuck joining forces with A Place to Bury Strangers. [MORE...]

Patrick Wolf at Work on DVD, New Album

Photo by Kathryn Yu

Patrick Wolf is having a busy retirement. His most recent spurt of activity will almost certainly thrust him into the public eye once again sometime soon. The glammy Brit songwriter is working on two releases: a DVD and a new album, according to a MySpace blog post today.

The DVD seems likely to see the light of day first. It's a live document of Wolf's recent finale show at London's Shepherds Bush Empire, directed and shot by photographer Brantley Gutierrez. According to his MySpace blog, Wolf just finished mixing and producing the show's audio for a Virgin television special, which will air an abbreviated version of the concert.

Then there's the matter of Wolf's follow-up to last year's excellent The Magic Position. In his own words, Wolf is "loading up my old laptops, generating beats and writing, typing nonstop at the piano keys and computer keys, trying to communicate some of the journeys, misadventures, and experiences from the last couple of years since The Magic Position was completed. Slowly recovering and returning to a more regular private rhythm of life. Trying to remember how to live outside of hotels and six different airports each week is a lot more confusing and tricky than I expected, but life is showing me marvels and slowly vitality, inspiration, and productivity are returning to my days and nights."

Cheers to that.

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.)