Hot Chip Line Up New Single, Tour

Emerging all unexpected-like from the Dark comes "One Pure Thought", the latest single from mild-mannered electro-funkers Hot Chip's third LP. Due in UK stores in a number of formats May 12 from DFA/Astralwerks, all of its contents-- including a Christmas song B-side, and remixes from Dominik Eulberg and Hot Chip themselves-- will be available for download May 11.

Speaking of Hot Chip remixes, the boys recently got their hands on tunes by the Accidental and the Pharcyde, and their pal Grovesnor.

The Chip are in North America at the moment, gearing up for Coachella with a handful of club dates. They'll hit ATP vs. Pitchfork next month, which should help ease them into a busy European festival schedule for the hot season.

And come October, the Chip have a newly announced headlining UK tour to attend to. Now that's advanced planning. [MORE...]

Pitchfork.tv Seeks Camera Assistants for NYC Internship

Pitchfork.tv is seeking New York-based interns with experience in shooting and cinematography above all other areas of production. The ideal candidate will be well-versed in various SD and HD cameras, with lighting, mic placement, and live shooting experience a plus. Duties include (but are not limited to): prepping gear for shoots, white balancing, syncing, coordinating mic/line inputs, and monitoring audio recordings, as well as some actual shooting.

The position will exist predominantly in the field and will largely occur on evenings and weekends. Because many of our shoots take place at music venues, candidates under 21 cannot be considered. If you're interested and available, please send your cover letter, resume, and samples of your work (links only, no attachments please!) to jobs@pitchforkmedia.com with "Camera Assistant Intern" in the subject header. Deadline is this Friday, April 25 at 11:59 p.m. eastern.

Peter Moren Kicks Off North American Tour

A bearded, Bjorn and John-less Peter Morén launches his love affair with the North American continent tonight, April 21. The Swedish songwriter's tour comes on the heels of a bunch of European dates as well as the U.S. release of his solo debut, The Last Tycoon on Quarterstick.

As for the UK release of The Last Tycoon, that won't happen until May 5 via Wichita. (It's preceded by the single for "Reel too Real", out today.) At that point, the tour will be over, and Morén can return to recording the next PB&J album.

And hey look, Peter did a Daytrotter session posted last week. [MORE...]

T.V. Eye: April 21-27, 2008

Live music on TV this week:

Monday, April 21

NBC: Late Night With Conan O'Brien: Grizzly Bear

Tuesday, April 22

NBC: The Tonight Show With Jay Leno: Goldfrapp
NBC: Late Night With Conan O'Brien: She & Him with Yo La Tengo

Wednesday, April 23

NBC: Late Night With Conan O'Brien: Radiohead (sorta)
NBC: The Tonight Show With Jay Leno: Tegan and Sara
CBS: Late Show With David Letterman: Tokyo Police Club
ABC: Jimmy Kimmel Live: Vampire Weekend

Thursday, April 24

CBS: Late Show With David Letterman: Estelle
NBC: The Tonight Show With Jay Leno: Old 97's
FUEL TV: The Daily Habit: Tim Fite

Friday, April 25

NBC: The Tonight Show With Jay Leno: Prince
ABC: Jimmy Kimmel Live: the Swell Season
ABC: The View: Kate Nash
FUEL TV: The Daily Habit: Johnathan Rice

Saturday, April 26

PBS: Austin City Limits: Franz Ferdinand, What Made Milwaukee Famous

She & Him Postpone NYC Gig, Team With Yo La Tengo

Photo by Natalie Kardos

It seems illness has forced She & Him-- one M. Ward and one Zooey Deschanel-- to cancel tonight's set at New York City's Hiro Ballroom, which would've kicked off their all-too-brief touring plans. (Via Brooklyn Vegan.) All other dates on the tour are still on, as is their appearance on tomorrow night's episode of "Late Night With Conan O'Brien".

That "Conan" performance will be extra special because Deschanel and Ward will have an extra special backing band: Yo La Tengo. (Yo La's Ira Kaplan was also set to play piano with the A-Bones tonight when they opened for She & Him show at the Hiro. They won't be opening tomorrow's show.)

Here's the statement released via the band's publicist:

Due to illness, tonight's performance of She & Him at Hiro Ballroom has been postponed to a TBA date. We're still working out the details for the new date, but we ask customers to be patient and hold on to their tickets until a new date is announced, all tickets from the original date will be honored. We'll have more details very shortly, thanks for your understanding.

UPDATE: The April 22 show has been moved from the Hiro Ballroom to the larger Webster Hall.

When they're not flaunting the ampersand, Zooey's got plenty of film stuff in the works, while M.'s lining up the festival appearances, with dates at Outside Lands, Austin City Limits, and the Pitchfork Music Festival. [MORE...]

Photos: Man Man / Yeasayer [Minneapolis, MN; 04/18/08]

Photos by Jon Behm

Contorting faces, clash-happy colors, and copious facial hair were the orders of the day at Minneapolis' Varsity Theater this past weekend, as Man Man and Yeasayer swept through town as part of that big friendly joint tour thing they've been doing.

With all the dates that remain for both parties-- including a few recently-added Man Man in-stores-- it's looking like nobody will have a chance to shave until at least mid-May.

MAN MAN




YEASAYER



[MORE...]

Radiohead to Go "Green" on "Conan O'Brien"

T-minus two weeks remain before Radiohead finally launch their 2008 tour in support of In Rainbows, a tour oh-so-many Pitchfork news stories in the making. Now for some folks out there, two weeks may feel like two eternities when it comes to Radiohead. These folks would be delighted to learn, then, that they actually need wait a mere two-sevenths of an eternity for Radiohead to grace their very living rooms in live form! Yay!

Yes, Radiohead will be the musical "guest" on NBC's "Late Night With Conan O'Brien" this Wednesday, April 23. We qualify guest with quotation marks because, well, Radiohead will not be physically present in Conan's NYC studios. Rather, they've taped an exclusive live performance of Rainbows cut "House of Cards" to air on the program.

The reason? NBC is celebrating Earth Day (April 22, yo) with a whole week of eco-friendly "green" go-getting. Given Thom Yorke and Co.'s well-documented passion for the subject, the band has decided to spare Mother Earth the carbon footprint of a couple needless transatlantic flights and do their "House of Cards" thing from the comfort of their home country. Well played, gentlemen!

In other news, all that Best Of action hits in early June, and residents of West Palm Beach, Florida have until May 5 to find a bicycle. [MORE...]

4AD Reveal New Version of Atlas Sound's Blind
Atlas Sound line up dates with Animal Collective

Front page photo by Matthew Taplinger

As previously mentioned, the European release of Let the Blind Lead Those Who Can See But Cannot Feel, the debut LP from Bradford Cox's Atlas Sound project, will be a bit beefier than the American version, released earlier this year on Kranky. 4AD's version comes with a bonus disc of new material.

The half-dozen-item tracklist includes the recently Forkcasted "Another Bedroom", and the new label-appropriate cover art (from longtime 4AD-affiliated graphic designers v23) is what you're looking at up there.

Fittingly, the disc arrives amidst a flurry of live European activity from both Atlas Sound and the post-hiatus, Microcastle-crafting Deerhunter. All parties involved will head over the pond in May for dates, with Atlas Sound picking up a slew of gigs opening for Animal Collective. Deerhunter have a few scattered gigs to their credit as well, including their set at next month's ATP vs. Pitchfork festival. [MORE...]

Weezer Reveal "Red Album" Tracklist, Bonus Cuts
Release date pushed back a week

For the third time in their decade-and-a-half of band-dom, Weezer will issue a self-titled LP containing ten tracks and referred to colloquially by the primary color of its design scheme. Yes, Weezer-- or "The Red Album"-- is due June 24 (pushed back a week from our last report) in the US on DGC/Interscope, and right now, we've got the tracklist.

Should you opt for the "deluxe" U.S. edition of the disc, you'll be treated to four bonus cuts: "Miss Sweeney", "Pig", "The Spider", and "King".

And, should your patience for fresh new Weezer jams be wearing thin, know that first single (and recent Forkcast fodder) "Pork and Beans" will be released digitally this week.

And don't forget, Rivers Cuomo is still asking for your assistance in writing a new sawng. They're up to the lyrics. (If "Pork and Beans" is any indication, he sure needs a lot of help.-- Ed.) [MORE...]

Thurston, Ranaldo, Cluster, Tony Conrad Do No Fun

You've got your Fun Fun Fun Fest in the fall, which is indeed all sorts of fun. But in spring? There's always No Fun Fest, which, on title alone, seems a bit miserable.

But what's in a name, really? For fans of noise, skronk, or, uh, noise, 2008's No Fun Fest ought to prove quite a blast. From May 16-18 at New York City's little Knitting Factory, the loud crowd will storm both the Main Stage and the Tap Bar, and the resulting reverberations will probably remain in your ears until No Fun Fest 2009.

Thurston Moore will of course appear, this time with Monotract's Nancy Garcia. Lee Ranaldo, too, presenting his "Blind Piece #2". Other highlights include krautrock/kosmiche legends Cluster, Burning Star Core, Keith Fullerton Whitman, Tony Conrad (with M.V. Carbon), Astro (aka Hiroshi Hasegawa of C.C.C.C.), Religious Knives, Nautical Almanac, Alan Licht, Demons, Hair Police, Illusion of Safety, and No Fun label head and fest organizer Carlos Giffoni.

Check out the full lineup here. See, that was a little bit of fun, wasn't it?

EPMD Hit the Road

Legendary rap troupe EPMD will take to stages this week for a handful of live dates in a handful of Midwestern metropolitan areas (plus one date in NYC). Joining the consummate Brentwood businessmen on the brief jaunt are throwback funkers Connie Price and the Keystones and turntablist DJ Haul.

The Scion Live Metro tour-- the first four dates of which are free to attend if you RSVP right here-- kicks off tonight (April 21) in Minneapolis, and that not-so-free show in New York follows this weekend. [MORE...]

Jay Reatard Preps Next 7", Chaos Erupts at Toronto Gig

Two down, four to go! Jay Reatard has revealed the details for his second 7" single-- of a proposed six-- for Matador Records. "Painted Shut" comes backed with "An Ugly Death" and arrives in the U.S. May 20 and the UK the day before.

"Painted" follows up April's "See/Saw" seven, although the UK won't see "See/Saw" and its B-side "Screaming Hand" until May 19, aka the same day "Painted Shut" lands over there.

And speaking of screaming hands, one of those landed on some dude's face in Toronto late last week, courtesy of Jay Reatard himself. Jay and co. were playing a gig at the city's Silver Dollar on April 17 when the whole band/crowd dynamic just basically went to shit.

First we take you to YouTube, for footage of Jay jacking some stage-invading, visibly substance-addled youngster in the face and tearing his shirt to shreds Björk-stylee:


Yikes dude!

Jay then announces "I'm done!" and starts packing up his gear, prompting a Silver Dollar booker, also visibly addled by one substance or another, to take the mic and dis Jay mightily. Bad vibes all around.

Determined to make amends to fans while also sharing his take on the unfortunate turn of events, Jay posted the following message to his MySpace the day after the incident:

Last night's show in Toronto got completely fucked up. The Silver Dollar holds 190 people but Craig Laskey the promoter let 350 people in there. That's cool if there's some sort of security or crowd control - we don't need people getting so wild they jump on stage and smash our gear - but that's exactly what happened. Right when we started playing someone pushed the monitors right on top of Stephen and on to his pedals - breaking them, people were throwing beer bottles at us, [and] someone jumped onstage and smashed my pedals, another guy took a full pitcher of beer and dumped it all over the rest of my pedals, and then threw it right at my Flying V, breaking the pickup and the input electronics. After three songs all our gear was smashed and unusable. Even when shit gets that crazy at [a] Circle Jerks show there's at least some security but when I asked Craig Laskey about it before the show he told me "I thought you guys were a garage band." When we couldn't play anymore I hung out and talked to people, refunded people's money out of my own pocket, and tried to borrow gear and finish the set a bit later but [booking agent] Dan Burke wouldn't get off the stage, too busy talking trash about me.

I'm getting really sick of shit like this happening. We'll come back in Toronto soon and do a free show to make it up to the real fans in Toronto. And we'll steer away from greedy promoters who don't have any control of their shows and who don't care about doing right by the audience.

So there you go. Please rock out responsibly as Jay Reatard plays both ATP vs. Pitchfork in May and the Pitchfork Music Festival in July, plus a mess of other shows in the U.S. and all over London. And for a live Jay Reatard gig gone right, head over to Pitchfork.tv. [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.)