A Place to Bury Strangers Issue 7" Box Set, Tour UK

What in the hell is all that racket? Why, it's my brand new Vacancy Records-issued limited edition box set of three A Place to Bury Strangers 7"s! I mean, what else could it be?

That's right, another nifty little vinyl rarity from the Brooklyn sound-bombers is just waiting for your clicks right this very instant. Vacancy are crafting 500 sets of 7"s for three AP2BS favorites, backed with a trio of previously unreleased jams. Crafting very, very, slowly, it should be noted, as every one of these sets features hand screen-painted artwork by the band and Vacancy's Louise Fenton.

The sets are available for purchase on Vacancy's MySpace right this instant, though you're warned not to expect to receive 'em for a couple months yet.

Before the packages gets shipped, A Place to Bury Strangers have a handful of East Coast dates in early April, and their first-ever UK tour in May, including a stop at the recently sold-out ATP vs. Pitchfork festival. [MORE...]

DJ Shadow & Cut Chemist Bring "Hard Sell" to DVD
Add dates

With just one date left on the European leg of their "Hard Sell" tour, DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist have kept their beatmatching partnership alive with the announcement of a handful of Australian dates in April, as well as a couple of North American festival dates in July.

Unfortunately, live shows just don't last, unless they're recorded in one medium or another. Fortunately, Shadow and Chemist have documented the final installment of the so-called "Brainfreeze trilogy" (the other two being Brainfreeze and Product Placement) in long-lasting CD and DVD format, out now.

Featured on the Hard Sell at the Hollywood Bowl DVD is the duo's complete "Hard Sell" performance at the titular venue, exclusive interviews with both DJs, behind-the-scenes footage documenting how the show came together, a bonus featurette called Live in Arcata, and a 40-page booklet with photos and an essay. From the looks of things, this is Alive 2007 for hip-hop heads, except on DVD.

The CD, The Hard Sell (Encore), is a brand new version of the previously released (and now sold out) Hard Sell CD, recorded after the Hollywood Bowl gig (so it's not exactly a live document, sorry). According to DJ Shadow's web store, Encore "includes much of the material the duo had to scrap due to time constraints at the Bowl...and also a few routines deemed too complicated to attempt at the time!" [MORE...]

Apples in Stereo Compile B-sides, Rarities on Projects
Including "Colbert Report" jam!

Slick-pop aficionados the Apples in Stereo will release a collection of B-sides and rarities called Electronic Projects for Musicians on April 1 via Simian/Yep Roc/Elephant 6. Technically the follow-up to last year's New Magnetic Wonder, the compilation's curatorial spirit makes it more of a sequel to 1996's Science Faire.

Among Projects' treasures is "Stephen Stephen", the tune Apples frontman Robert Schneider performed for Stephen Colbert on "The Colbert Report" amid that Decemberists challenge hysteria a couple winters back.

The live landscape is fairly bare for the Apples, but their one scheduled date is a good one. It happens to be a just-announced July 20 appearance at this year's Pitchfork Music Festival. [MORE...]

No Age, Sunset Rubdown, Casiotone in 7" Series
Plus: Miko Miko, Abe Vigoda, Parenthetical Girls

David Horvitz knows him some bands. And the dude behind the Xiu Xiu and Sunset Rubdown Polaroid projects has assembled a smattering of these music-makers for a new parade of subscription-based seven-inches.

No Age, Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, Mika Miko, Abe Vigoda (the band, not the actor), Parenthetical Girls, and the aforementioned Sunset Rubdown will partake of the "David Horvitz 7" Picture Disc Series", which has its home on Brooklyn's Aagoo Records.

In addition to music (check out the tracklists for the first two singles below), each picture disc, being a picture disc, will feature, yes, a picture. The photos in question were taken by Horvitz himself, and indeed that's a Horvitz portrait of Casiotone's Owen Ashworth up there, looking all painfully alone on his celly.

"Now wait a minute!" you say. "A Casiotone picture disc with a David Horvitz photo? That sounds awfully familiar..." And you'd be right. This particular Casiotone release was originally discussed in these pages a few months ago. Good eye, my friend.

Each 7" in the bi-monthly series is limited to 500 copies, with a portion of that number allotted for subscribers, and the rest available in select stores and at merch tables. The Casiotone offering is out now, with Parenthetical Girls following in May, Abe Vigoda in July, Mika Miko in September, Sunset Rubdown in November, and No Age in January 2009. Viva la 7"! [MORE...]

M83 and Maps Remix Each Other on New Single

M83's sweeping synth sounds are like the audio equivalent of a moving landscape, so what better way to herald the release of new album Saturdays = Youth than with a sky-themed single?

Preceding Saturdays' arrival via Mute (April 15 in North America, April 14 everywhere else) is a split single with M83 and fellow skygazers Maps remixing each other's work. One side features the "M83 Mix" of Maps' "To the Sky" (from last year's We Can Create), while the other features the "Maps Mix" of M83's "We Own the Sky", a track from the new LP. The single is a limited edition 7" available online and at select UK independent stores on April 7 thanks to Sonic Cathedral.

Following its release, Anthony Gonzalez has plenty of M83 dates to worry about, so support for the single will fall to Maps' James Chapman. On April 30, Chapman will DJ for Sonic Cathedral at the Social in London. Also on the bill are Ulrich Schnauss, Airiel, and Autumn Chorus. [MORE...]

She & Him Line Up Brief Tour

Photo by Natalie Kardos

It's not much, this She & Him tour, but hey, these are busy folks. Singer/songwriter M. Ward and actress/singer/songwriter Zooey Deschanel have lined up a little bi-coastal tour in support of their debut, Volume One, recently released on Merge. The pair will link up in New York April 21, perform on "Late Night With Conan O'Brien" the following evening (April 22), make their way to L.A. April 29, and then finally land in San Francisco in mid-May.

As for She, well, she's probably gonna have to spend some time promoting that M. Night Shyamalan flick she's starring in this summer (she must work well with dudes named M., huh?). Him is gonna have to re-learn all his own songs for a pair of festival appearances he's got lined up this summer. Where to, M.? Well, to Outside Lands in San Fran way way off in August, as well as that there recently expanded Pitchfork Music Festival in Chicago in July. [MORE...]

Photos: Sunset Rubdown / Blood on the Wall / Ecstatic Sunshine with White Williams [Brooklyn, NY; 03/27/08]

Photos by Jason Bergman

"Are there any Masons in the house?" queried a member of Sunset Rubdown during this set, prompting a few raised hands and a lot of chuckles. They were, after all, playing Brooklyn's Masonic Temple, as part of a three-date North American outing and prelude to their spring European excursion. Spirits ran high during the performance, and one lovestruck fan even presented Sunset's Camilla Wynn Ingr with some roses. Aww!

Blood on the Wall and Ecstatic Sunshine, joined here by White Williams, opened the show. Hope you remembered to bring your Polaroid film!

SUNSET RUBDOWN






BLOOD ON THE WALL




ECSTATIC SUNSHINE [ft. WHITE WILLIAMS]

[MORE...]

Barry Adamson (ex-Bad Seeds, Magazine) Preps New LP

Barry Adamson-- one-time member of Magazine and Nick Cave's Bad Seeds, film composer, and solo artist in his own right-- will lend his visage to the cover of yet another solo album. The follow-up to 2006's Stranger on the Sofa is called Back to the Cat, and it will come out via Central Control on March 31 in the UK and April 22 in the U.S.

Adamson has a run of UK dates between the album's release dates, and May and June hold sprinkles of shows in Europe, NYC, and Australia. [MORE...]

B-52's Remixed by CSS, Scissor Sisters, Plan Tour
Join up with the True Colors tour

With the way they've been acting, you'd never know that the B-52's are almost two decades down the road from the "Love Shack". This week, Astralwerks released Funplex, the Athens icons' first album in 16 years, and the B-52s' show no signs of slowing up any time soon.

First up is a trio of remixes of Funplex's title track from the likes of CSS, Peaches and the Scissor Sisters, available right this instant through iTunes. Then there's the band's club tour, which kicks off in Boston in late April following a few scattered gigs beforehand (including one tonight in British Columbia).

And then there's their co-headlining spot on this year's True Colors Tour, where they'll join Cyndi Lauper, Tegan and Sara, Regina Spektor, Joan Jett, Andy Bell of Erasure, and others on a lineup that changes as often as Fred Schneider switches suits.

Welcome back, B-52's! Yours is a much more welcome re-emergence than that of those planes you're named after. [MORE...]

Tony Allen, Vieux Farka Toure on African U2 Tribute

A handful of prominent African musicians-- Vieux Farka Touré, Les Nubians, Angélique Kidjo, and others-- have joined together to put new spins on some U2 classics for In the Name of Love: Africa Celebrates U2.

Aerosmith's Joe Perry joins Sierra Leone's Refugee All-Stars on "Desire", while former Fela Kuti musical director (and Damon Albarn's the Good, the Bad & the Queen bandmate) Tony Allen serves up an "Afrobeat translation" of "Where the Streets Have No Name".

The disc emerges April 1 from Shout! Factory, and a portion of the proceeds from each sale go to The Global Fund, "the world's largest international financier of the fight against AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria." [MORE...]

Vladislav Delay Reissues 2001's Anima, Forms Quartet

Originally released in 2001 on the Mille Plateaux imprint, Vladislav Delay's Anima marked a shift for the noted electronic whiz kid with the many monikers. Gone, in large part, were the well-choreographed, sequencer-led compositions of old, replaced by live instruments, long takes, and a minimum of post-production and overdubs.

Delay's own Huume label will reissue Anima in full on May 13, with a tantalizing new extra. Delay took to the studio earlier this year to craft a ten-minute remix of Anima's single track, paring the hour-long original down to a more manageable size.

Delay has a number of tour dates over the next few months in Europe, the UK, and Japan, including a few shows that find him debuting the Vladislav Delay Quartet. Apart from Delay, the group features Pan Sonic's Mika Vainio on electronics, Derek Shirley on the bass, and Lucio Capece on reeds. [MORE...]

Ray Davies Embarks on North American Tour

Ray Davies-- you know, from the Kinks-- has lined up a handful of North American tour dates in support of his second-ever solo LP, Working Man's Café, out now on V2 in the UK and New West Records in the U.S.

And, not to sound like those Beatles jokers over in Forkcast, but that's big news. I mean, Ray Davies! You know, from the Kinks! Live and in person! He might even play "Waterloo Sunset" or something! See? Pretty exciting, this one. The dates kick off tonight (March 28) in San Francisco, with a pair of UK gigs to follow in June.

Oh, and the Kooks recently laid down their forthcoming Konk in Davies' studio of the same name. [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.)