Liquid Liquid's Classic EPs Compiled, Expanded

No need to disperse with more effusive praise and historical diatribes about the importance of New York City post-punkers Liquid Liquid at the moment. It's been done, and besides, the band's material speaks volumes, even though relatively few volumes of the band's material exist.

Leave it to Domino to help remedy that situation with their May 19 release of Slip In and Out of Phenomenon, a collection of three of Liquid Liquid's landmark EPs: the self-titled debut, Successive Reflexes, and Optimo. The set comes jam-packed with bonus cuts aplenty, and it's being offered in both CD and triple-LP formats.

Though Liquid Liquid have seeped into the cracks of time, multi-instrumentalist Dennis Young still kicks out the jams most solidly, and he's got a pair of UK club dates to his credit on the way. Of note: he'll play Glasgow's Optimo Club, so named, of course, after the Liquid Liquid tune. [MORE...]

CSS Reveal Donkey Tracklist

Photo by Nilina Mason-Campbell

Donkey, the forthcoming sophomore set from the newly downsized CSS, now has a tracklist to call its very own. According to an NME.com report confirmed by Sub Pop, the album features such curiosity-piquing titles as "Reggae All Night", "How I Became Paranoid", and "Jåger Yoga". Contained within the set's 11 tracks is "Rat Is Dead (Rage)" which you can download for free right here.

NME.com also reports that the disc sports a love song written from frontwoman Lovefoxxx to her fiancée, Simon Taylor of the Klaxons, and also contains a song about yoga. You know, just in case the song with the word yoga in the title wasn't a dead giveaway.

Though "Rat" is the first we've heard from this Donkey, the first single will, in fact, be "Left Behind". Sub Pop will release that song as a free download on July 14, and it will be released as a proper single in the UK that same day.

Donkey is due July 22 in the States on Sub Pop and the day before in the UK from Warner.

As for CSS, they'll emerge soon enough, as that big ol' tour of theirs is live and in effect starting May 5 in Cardiff, Wales. [MORE...]

Stephen O'Malley's KTL Tours With Radian's Nemeth

KTL photo by Gisele Vienne

There's no time like the present for "Songs on the Death of Children", and that's just what the present holds for KTL. The experimental duo consisting of Stephen "Sunn O)))" O'Malley and Peter "Pita" Rehberg is currently touring "Kindertotenlieder", its namesake theatrical piece with the aforementioned dour translation. But the future...oh, the future! KTL's future holds a (hopefully) much cheerier North American tour.

The tour is a bite-sized affair, but support on some of the dates comes from KTL's Thrill Jockey labelmate Németh, aka electro-acoustic technician Stefan Németh of Radian and Lokai. Németh is touring in support of his recent solo debut, Film, and he has a pair of solo shows in May to go along with his dates on the KTL tour. [MORE...]

Dosh Tours, Snags Andrew Bird for Record Release Gig

Photo by Cameron Wittig

Drummer dude (and multi-instrumentalist/ songwriter) Martin Dosh is getting ready to release his fourth full-length, Wolves and Wishes, which features contributions from Will Oldham, Andrew Bird, Fog, and labelmate Odd Nosdam.

Anticon sics Wolves on us May 13, and Dosh has put together a North American tour with Anathallo in May and June to support the album.

The tour begins in earnest on May 16 in Milwaukee, but Dosh has a single date before then: a special record release party featuring quite a few of his friends. He's calling the event "The World of Dosh", and his good buddy Andrew Bird will be among the musical guests in attendance. [MORE...]

RZA, Wire, Junior Boys Play Futuresonic Fest
Also Dirty Projectors, HEALTH, YACHT

The Futuresonic Urban Festival of Art, Music, and Ideas (so many things!) will storm through 30+ venues in Manchester, England for its 12th year on May 1-5.

Headlining this year's fest are minimal post-punk legends Wire and Wu-Tang mastermind RZA in his Bobby Digital guise, and they're not the half of it. Also playing Futuresonic 2008 are Junior Boys, Dirty Projectors, YACHT, HEALTH, Venetian Snares, Luke Vibert, Flying Lotus, the Chap, Chris Corsano, and Skeletons and the Kings of All Cities, among others.

And RZA and Wire aren't just performing! On May 1, RZA will participate in "An audience with the RZA", "an exclusive Q+A session" discussing "his life, work, and new album." Wire will appear "in coversation" with writer John Robb on May 3.

Label Shuffle: 4AD Absorbs Too Pure, Beggars Banquet

The mighty Beggars Group umbrella keeps quite a stable of stellar labels dry, including Matador, Rough Trade, XL, 4AD, Too Pure, and Beggars Banquet. But even under the mightiest of umbrellas, space is limited, and rather than leave any poor imprint to the mercy of the rain, the Beggars Group has decided to shuffle things around a bit.

According to a Billboard.biz report and a Beggars Group press release, the Too Pure and Beggars Banquet imprints will "not be used in the near future" as both artists and staff with each of these labels "migrate on to 4AD." This means Beggars Banquet gang heavies like the National, St. Vincent, Calla, Film School, and Tindersticks will get to tangle with Stereolab, Future of the Left, Scout Niblett, and the other kids from the Too Pure side of the tracks, all under the watchful eyes of the Mountain Goats, Blonde Redhead, the Breeders, and Scott Walker. Whatever you do though, do not tangle with Scott Walker. I mean it.

The newly beefed-up 4AD will get its first boost in 2008AD from Stereolab when the act's previously reported and chatted-up Chemical Chords LP arrives August 19 bearing the 4AD and Duophonic UHF Disks insignias.

So long, Too Pure and Beggars Banquet. It's been real.

Bikini Kill's Tobi Vail Hits the Road With the Old Haunts

Olympia, Washington trio the Old Haunts are in the midst of visiting haunts old and new on a U.S. tour. This is drummer Tobi Vail's first time on the road since her days in Bikini Kill, so these performances promise to be pretty special, especially the ones at such colorfully named venues as Stab Mountain and Spazzatorium Galleria.

UPDATE: DUE TO MISINFORMATION FROM KILL ROCK STARS, WE WERE LEAD TO BELIEVE THAT THIS TOUR WAS TOBI VAIL'S FIRST TOUR SINCE BIKINI KILL. IN FACT, SHE WAS ON THE OLD HAUNTS' LAST TOUR.

But getting Vail some air isn't the main reason for this tour. That'd be the Old Haunts' new album, Poisonous Times, which is out right now on Kill Rock Stars.

The Old Haunts' next show is tonight (April 29) in Phoenix. [MORE...]

Radiohead In-Studio Performance Headed to VH1

Couldn't tell you the last time I visited VH1.com, but nestled somewhere amid the T&A that's blowing up all over their homepage right now is one pretty exciting morsel of news: on May 3, VH1 will broadcast "Radiohead_In Rainbows_From the Basement".

The title tells it like it is: Radiohead will perform selections from In Rainbows on the program, direct from the confines of Nigel Godrich's famed basement studio. According to an At Ease report, we can look forward to "Bodysnatchers", "Nude", "Weird Fishes/Arpeggi", "15 Step", "House of Cards", and "Reckoner", plus non-Rainbows cuts "Optimistic", "Myxomatosis (Judge, Jury & Executioner)", and "Where I End and You Begin (The Sky Is Falling In)".

VH1 even has a clip of "Reckoner" up right now, and gosh does it sounds awful purty. Just the thing to get you even more stoked for that Radiohead tour, which finally kicks off early next week in Florida.

And hmm, live in-studio Radiohead performance, now why does that sound familiar...? [MORE...]

Robyn Kicks Off North American Tour Tonight
Self-titled LP out in the States right this instant

Happy National Robyn Day!

What's that you say? It's already International Dance Day? Well, hell, that's perfect. Robyn and dancing, two things worth celebrating.

April 29, 2008 is the day that Robyn's fantastic 2005 self-titled LP finally, finally, finally hits Stateside record stores from Konichiwa/Cherrytree/Interscope. And if that weren't enough, tonight's also the night that Robyn kicks off a brief but exceedingly welcome run of North American tour dates. Robyn takes the stage at Boston's Paradise for the first of 11 intracontinental gigs, including a recently added stop at the Virgin Megastore in New York. She'll also make her first Stateside television appearance on the "Late Show With David Letterman" this Thursday, May 1.

Since it's been years since Robyn's initial Swedish release, the set's American counterpart is a little-- okay, kind of a lot-- different. The tracklist's been shifted around a tad, just about every subsequent song you've heard Robyn do in the last three years makes an appearance, "Bum Like You" and "Robotboy" have a bit more pep, and the Christian Falk-produced "Dream On" appears to be stripped of the backing vocals from the Ark's Ola Salo. Whatever-- it still rules, and I am totally gonna go buy a copy after work.

Once her North American trip wraps, Robyn's headed to the UK for a run in June and a newly added stop at the Perfect Day Festival. Oh, and if you haven't yet, take a gander at Pitchfork contributor Nitsuh Abebe's recent chat with Robyn over there at Pitchfork.tv. [MORE...]

Twilight Sad Rework Autumns Tracks on New EP

Those upstart Scotsmen in the Twilight Sad are as intent on soundtracking our summer as they were on comforting us through those Autumns and Winters. On June 10 in the U.S. and June 9 in the UK, Fat Cat will release the EP Here, It Never Snowed. Afterwards It Did. It will be available digitally and on vinyl in the UK and digitally in the U.S. (a vinyl U.S. version is in the works).

The EP features the previously unreleased title track, a cover of a Daniel Johnston and Jad Fair song ("Some Things Last a Long Time"), and re-workings of four tracks from their 2007 LP. Instrumental contributions come from My Latest Novel's Laura McFarlane (violin) and Aereogramme's Campbell McNeil (bass), and it was recorded and mixed by Iain Cook of Aereogramme.

Touring has slowed a bit for the Twilight Sad, but they still have a handful of shows scattered across the spring and summer. And if you'd like to help the band out while they're on the road, but aren't heading to Dunfermline, Scotland or Gdansk, Poland any time soon, check out Insound's Give More Get More program. [MORE...]

Photos: Wulapalooza: Blitzen Trapper / The Blow / Panther [Salem, OR; 04/26/08]

Photos by Nilina Mason-Campbell

Wulapalooza packed in several of the Pacific Northwest's finest over the weekend at Salem, Oregon's Willamette University. Blitzen Trapper, the Blow, and Panther left the dingy club settings they typically haunt to embrace the sunny outdoors and the verdant surroundings of WU's Brown Field. Nothing like a little color to further enliven these already energetic acts.

Blitzen Trapper










The Blow






Panther



[MORE...]

David Bowie Reissues 1972 Live Set

Put to tape the night of October 20, 1972 in the midst of David Bowie's first U.S. tour, David Bowie: Live in Santa Monica '72 is the stuff of bootlegger legend. The Santa Monica Civic Center gig was broadcast as it happened over the Los Angeles airwaves on the now-defunct KMET, and it served as Bowie's first live American radio appearance. On July 8, Virgin/EMI will reissue the out-of-print set digitally and on limited edition CD and 2xLP.

At the time of the show, Bowie was fresh off the release of his landmark Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust album, and his band the Spiders From Mars (Mick Ronson, Trevor Bolder, Mick Woodmansey, and Mike Garson) was in top form. Even Bowie himself is pretty proud of the gig some three and a half decades after the fact. In a press release, he states, "I can tell that I'm totally into being Ziggy by this stage of our touring. It's no longer an act; I am him."

The set features Bowie and the boys blasting through tracks from Ziggy Stardust and its glamtabulous predecessor, Hunky Dory, as well as covers of Jacques Brel's "My Death" and the Velvet Underground's "Waiting for the Man". He also offers a preview of his next work: "The Jean Genie" from the then-forthcoming Aladdin Sane. Guy was on a bit of a roll back then, huh? [MORE...]

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