Dear ridiculously attractive person who just so happens to be looking at this webpage about Tasteful Nudes right now,

Hi. My name is Dave and this is my very first collection of essays. As you can probably imagine, it pretty much has everything. In fact, if you like stories about stolen meat, animal attacks, young love, death, naked people, clergymen, rock-n-roll, irritable Canadians, and prison, you have just hit a street called Easy because my book talks about all that stuff and a bunch of other stuff too.

Getting back to that prison thing for a second though, I can think of almost no place better to read my book than from within the confines of a correctional facility. For starters, you will definitely have the time. Also, cozying up with a good book in front of your fellow inmates is a great way to show them a softer side that for some reason no one ever wants to hear about in the yard.

Fear not though, non-convicts: my book makes for a solid read outside of prison too. At the beach, on the subway, while whitewater rafting, during couples counseling, under local anesthesia--I have personally seen to it that my book is totally readable in all these scenarios as well as most other scenarios out there today. It will make you laugh, cry, and maybe even think so much that it will make you forget all your problems while simultaneously creating a few new ones. In limited instances, it has been known to cause severe dehydration and the occasional groin pull, but honestly I don't know what that's about. That said, it's probably not a bad idea to keep a glass of water handy and really stretch things out before strapping yourself in for a literary thrill ride you will want to experience again and again until you are either dead or your eyesight fails completely, whichever comes first. In fact, if I end up being wrong about any of this stuff, you can kick me right in the privates. Also, I will send you a nice ham (serves twenty). In short, you really can't lose on this one.

Your man,
Dave Hill

Catch Dave live at The Rejection Show Valentine's Day Heartbreak Haven taking place at Littlefield on 2/14 with "Lizz Winstead, Dave Hill: The One Man Heat-Bringing Machine, Sara Benincasa, Mandy Stadtmiller, Eliot Glazer, Elna Baker, Adam Wade, Katina Corrao, Ted Travelstead, Tom Shillue, Jordan Carlos, Bridey Elliott, Giulia Rozzi, Liam McEneaney, Blaise Kearsley, The Defibulators, Colleen AF Venable, and pie by the slice by Daly Pie!", and then again at Littlefield on 2/18 for The Lindsey Buckingham Appreciation Society performs MIRAGE ... and more. Yes there will be Fleetwood Mac.

by Klaus Kinski

"I bought hummus at Costco. Now I have an intimidating amount of hummus. Every time I open the fridge, it eyeballs me. - Kurt Braunohler

The great Ted Leo closed out 2011 with a bang with sold-out full-band shows at the Bell House on December 30th and then on December 31st at Maxwells in Jersey. The comedically great Kurt Braunohler opened both of those shows, which is why I simply could not resist posting the troll-baiting tweet you see above.

Anyhow, it seems like Ted, aside from the benefit he's playing in Austin, is starting off the new year with a whimper because the Ted Leo calendar has absolutely nothing on it. Blankness. Bupkis. However, your man Klaus knows better. For example, it's a little known fact that Ted Leo will participate in the Rejection Show Music Series at Littlefield on Thursday January 19th at 8:00pm:

The Rejection Show Music Series gives musicians the chance to let loose, take risks, and perform songs that have yet to be heard, have gotten them through a time of rejection, or to simply cover their favorite songs of love, loss, and heartbreak. Featuring TED LEO performing excerpts from a musical that he penned, but has yet to be seen. The musical centers around the United Fruit Company, US corporate and military imperialism, bananas, and of course a love story! CORN MO performing songs based on the theme of Rejection, and more! Hosted by JON FRIEDMAN and featuring the REJECTION SHOW BAND.

I just read Gethard's book A Bad Idea I'm About to Do: True Tales of Seriously Poor Judgment and Stunningly Awkward Adventure (pictured above) and it was truly one of the funniest, most brilliant comedian-penned books I've ever read... more on that someday soon, but let me get back on track here...

Back to Ted... Your second opportunity to see Ted is at How Was Your Week? LIVE! on Thursday February 2nd at 8pm at the Bell House. How Was Your Week? is a podcast hosted by the unbearably funny and so f-ing on her game Julie Klausner (love that last name prefix!). This live Klausner experience will feature the absolutely brilliant Best Show on WFMU host Tom Scharpling, the incomparable Sandra Bernhard, as well as house band Ted Leo! There will be surprise guests too, trust me. This show gets Klaus Kinski's This WILL Sell Out guarantee, so buy tickets NOW.

Chris Gethard, who also plays Whiplash tonight (1/9), takes on fellow author Stephen King in the video below...

Continue reading "upcoming comedy shows w/ Ted Leo; Chris Gethard's book"

Josh Ritter at BookPeople in Austin in October (more by Tim Griffin)

Singer/songwriters Josh Ritter, John Wesley Harding (aka Wesley Stace), and Steve Earle are also authors, and all three of them put out novels this year. They'll be teaming up for "a night of talk and songs" at the Celeste Bartos Forum of The New York Public Library on Tuesday (12/6). Tickets for the event are on sale now.

Josh Ritter made a promotional appearance for his novel, which is titled Bright's Passage, in Austin this past October. As you can see above, it was also an event that included some music. Pictures and full recap, including a part where Josh says Wesley was one of his writing inspirations, HERE.

Ritter has also been added to the bill of the previously mentioned WFUV show, which is happening on 12/5 with Dawes, Mavis Staples and The Head And The Heart at Beacon Theater. Tickets are still available.

Dawes played Occupy Wall Street today and according to Rough Trade, they put out the 48th best album of 2011. They also have two more shows at Maxwell's after the Beacon show (12/6 and 12/7), but both are now sold out.

Steve Earle recently announced a residency at City Winery with Allison Moorer taking place from January 9 to February 6. Tickets for all five shows are still on sale.

All dates below...

Continue reading "Josh Ritter added to WFUV Holiday show @ Beacon Theater, appearing @ NYPL w/ Steve Earle & Wesley Stace"

words & photos by Chris La Putt

Butch Walkter in Brooklyn

"Well, I left the town of sinners, redneck priests and meth lab stalls
To find myself a few more just like me
The option's pretty skinny and the order's pretty tall
To swim the hippest waters in the sea

Somewhere in the sticky city, driving back and forth
I found myself a squat in Williamsburg
Nobody seemed the same sincerely this could be a curse
But everyone's the same with different shirts"

Members of Butch's backing band, the Black Widows, opened the Brooklyn show, as did Shovels and Rope (who have shared bills with Jason Isbell and the Felice Brothers in NYC over the past year). Pictures of the whole Brooklyn show are in this post.

Earlier that day Butch was on Leonard Lopate's show on WNYC discussing his new book Drinking with Strangers: Music Lessons from a Teenage Bullet Belt which is about his life as a musician and record producer. You can listen to the segment below. Want to ask Butch a question about it? The Daily Swarm is collecting questions for an upcoming Butch interview.

Pictures, videos, and Butch's WNYC interview, below...

Continue reading "Butch Walker wrote a book, jams w/ Brett Hinds of Mastodon (video), and.... Pink in Brooklyn (pics from MHOW)"

photos by Samantha Marble, words by BBG

If you were to give a shortlist of the greatest guitarists in rock n' roll, I am sure that names like Pete Townsend, Keith Richards, and Jimi Hendrix would be on the tip of everyone's tongue. Tony Iommi should probably be named in the same breath. The guitarist helped to create a genre and a movement with his work as axeman in Black Sabbath, and Heaven & Hell (aka Black Sabbath), and as a solo artist.

Tony Iommi swung by Brooklyn metal venue Saint Vitus from 3-4pm on the afternoon of Thursday, 11/3 (same day the unrelated Of Stardust event) to sign copies of his new book Iron Man. Pictures from the event are in this post and continue, along with a video of Tony answering fan questions two days earlier via Livestream, below...

Continue reading "Tony Iommi signed copies of his new book "Iron Man" at Saint Vitus in Greenpoint (pics)"

The petition has almost 40,000 signatures, but needs more. It reads:

The St. Mark's Bookshop, a vital Lower East Side cultural institution, needs a rent low enough to survive. Join the Cooper Square Committee petitioning Cooper Union, the bookstore's landlord, to give St. Mark's Bookshop a lower rent.

The St. Mark's Bookshop has a long tradition in the Lower East Side and serves an admirable and increasingly rare function. St. Mark's is struggling to pay the market rent that Cooper Union is charging them at 31 3rd Ave. A significant rent concession by Cooper Union could save this irreplaceable neighborhood institution.

by Klaus Kinski

If you like music, comedy, literacy, food, eyeglasses, politics, small vintage leather messenger bags, journalism, the literati, people taking notes, men who sit with their legs crossed a little too tightly, and Molskine journals, then I bet you were all over BV's recent post about the 2011 New Yorker Festival which features events taking place all over the city from September 30th through October 2nd, 2011. At least, I hope you were all over it because tickets for a majority of the events semi-sold-out shortly after they went on-sale on September 9th. I say "semi-sold-out" because, well, there are actually a few opportunities to get tix between now and showtime. According to The New Yorker Festival website:

Friday, September 30th, at SVA Theatre: Ten per cent of tickets to all events will be available at the theatre, at 333 West 23rd Street (between Eighth and Ninth Avenues). Tickets will be sold on Friday, September 30th, from 12 noon to 4 P.M. First come, first served.

At the door: A limited number of tickets will be sold at the door to each event one hour before start time, with the exception of Morning at the Frick, Come Hungry, the Cartoon Caption Game, Beyond Words, High on the Hog, Inside the Artist's Studio, and Sunset on Spruce. First come, first served. Cash only.

On Sunday, October 2nd, Nancy Franklin will moderate an exclusive "Bluth family reunion" panel, featuring the creator of "Arrested Development," Mitchell Hurwitz, and the cast: Will Arnett, Jason Bateman, Michael Cera, David Cross, Portia de Rossi, Tony Hale, Alia Shawkat, Jeffrey Tambor, and Jessica Walter.

The event will take place at Acura at SIR Stage37 (408 West 37th Street) at 4 P.M. Tickets are $30 and will go on sale here beginning at noon E.T. on Wednesday, September 21st.

Swoon. So now, besides Radiohead, I have yet another show to worry about not getting tickets to.

In other Arrested Development-related news, Alia Shawkat, famous for her role as Mae "Maeby" Fünke, has been moonlighting as a jazz vocalist. On Thursday September 22nd 2011, Alia makes her debut as a jazz vocalist when she hits the stage at Littlefield in Brooklyn. Supercute! opens. Tickets are on sale now!

Complete New Yorker Fest schedule below...

Continue reading "New Yorker Fest adds Arrested Development reunion (the TV show!), more ways to get tix..."

by Tim Griffin

Bob Mould @ Book People in Austin

This past weekend marked the 19th anniversary of the Sugar classic Copper Blue (check out The Decemberists covering "If I Can't Change Your Mind"). Those curious about the life & times of Sugar's mastermind Bob Mould can head to one of Bob's upcoming shows where he'll be reading from his bio See a Little Light: The Trail of Rage and Melody in addition to playing live music. Bob does this in NYC at The Bell House on November 3rd Tickets are on sale. All dates are listed below.

Bob did somethng similar at Book People in Austin, Texas on July 24th (pictures in this post). The singer/songriter opened by speaking on his family and turbulent childhood, his upbringing in upstate New York (Malone), and also talked about his realization at a young age that he was homosexual. It was apparent early on that he needed to get out of his small town in order to "...have a life". A scholarship to Macalaster College in St. Paul, Minnesota gave him that escape in 1978, where he met Grant Hart and Greg Norton. They formed Hüsker Dü in March of 1979.

Mr. Mould warmly read several excerpts from See a Little Light: The Trail of Rage and Melody that included insights into his solo career, as well as his time spent with Hüsker Dü and Sugar. He also shared the significant impact Kurt Cobain's death had on his view of the music industry, which would come up again in the Q&A sessions with the audience. Mr. Mould acknowledged how difficult it is to identify who can own and share responsibility in these situations (when a question was raised on his thoughts about Amy Winehouse's recent passing).

He covered a lot of ground and many excerpts throughout the hour-and-a-half reading, including his music and influences, an uncomfortable 1994 SPIN article about his sexuality, and current happiness and comfort as a 'Bear' and exploring and developing his identity as a homosexual man (an opportunity he hadn't been able to pursue during his younger years). He shared two pieces of advice about being gay: "You can't come out soon enough." and "It's never too late to come out." He went on to encourage those in similar situations to find someone safe to talk to help sort things out.

The session ended with a second Q&A that focused to a great degree on his current musical tastes. He shared some of his current favorites - pulling out his iPhone to make sure he didn't miss any.

"I am now a victim of iTunes... If I don't have iTunes in front of me it just becomes 700 bands that... especially when somebody asks me I sort of freak out..."

In no particular order - Tame Impala, Warpaint, Best Coast, No Age, Dum Dum Girls, Elite Gymnastics, Unknown Mortal Orchestra (which he played on his phone), Yuck, Fucked Up, Groove Armada, The Weakened, Bass Drum of Death, The Raveonettes, Foo Fighters (he appears on their new album), Michael Cassette, Holy Ghost, Crystal Castles...

A book signing followed. More pictures from that event with all upcoming dates (not counting Bob's DJ gig at Highline Ballroom tonight), below...

Continue reading "Bob Mould reads from his book, discusses life & plays music (upcoming dates & pics from Austin)"

by BBG

Hold on tight, the following post may make the internet completely collapse upon itself. Christopher Weingarten, notorious blogger/tweeter (as 1000TimesYes) and ex-drummer of Parts & Labor, welcomed his latest book Hipster Puppies over the summer. In celebration, Weingarten is throwing two upcoming events. The first is a (rescheduled due to hurricane Irene) "Hipster Puppies instore" at Sound Fix Records this Saturday (9/10). "Bring a dog, get a dollar off a book." Chris will be DJing. Flyer below.

The second, more my style, is a release party on September 21st at Public Assembly with live musical appearances from Zs, Burning Star Core, Mountains, and Dinowalrus, all of which appear on the Hipster Puppies: New York Cassette which is also celebrating its release that night. Limited to 350 copies, this 87-minute tape is available for purchase or for free to the first 50 people to buy tickets. Tickets are on sale now.

Zs

In addition, Zs will also celebrate their own release of a Sky Burial cassette, "an extremely limited 18-minute sound collage of lo-fi recordings snatched from the band's European encores". Available in two editions, a golden mirror finish and a white one (limited to 50 and 150 respectively), the release is the first of a trilogy of recordings for Zs that will include a 2x7" called 33 and an LP entitled This Body Will be a Corpse. Look for the LP on Playbutton and the 7" on Northern Spy (who will release many upcoming Zs recordings) but in the meantime, stream "33" and a snippet from the Sky Burial below.

Zs is also scheduled to play a release show for 33 in November (details forthcoming) as well as the first night of the Spy Music Festival going down on Oct 1st (at Shea Stadium) and 2nd (at Zebulon). Zs will join Bird Names, Colin L. Orchestra, Dan Melchior und das Menace, Neptune, Eleven Twenty-Nine, and Haunted House for the first night, while the second night will feature appearances from The Spanish Donkey, Hubble, Angels in America, Weyes Blood, and Zaimph. The shows are in celebration of record label Northern Spy's first anniversary. Full details on the festival are below.

In related news, Sam of Zs also is a member of Diamond Terrifier, who will play The Gutter on Sunday (9/11) with Charlie Looker (Extra Life), Patrick Higgins, and Eric Wubbels. $5 gets you into this 21+ event of avant-garde experimentalism. Stream an excerpt from Diamond Terrifer's forthcoming Himalayan Appalachia below, and look for it on limited cassette on 9/17.

Extra Life also have a show coming up at Glasslands.

All streams, Spy Music Fest details, Zs dates and stuff below...

Continue reading "Hipster Puppy events, limited cassettes, Zs, Spy Music Fest"

The Jayhawks at Webster Hall in January (more by Kurt Christensen)

The Jayhawks are currently on a European tour that ends later this month. After that tour, they'll play a few dates in their hometown of Minnesota before heading out a North American tour in October and November. Many dates do not have openers announced but a few are with Tift Merritt. The NYC show, which takes place on October 21 at Beacon Theater is with Rosanne Cash. Tickets go on sale Friday (8/5) at noon with an "Internet Presale" starting Wednesday (8/3) at noon.

The tour is in support of the Jayhawks' new album Mockingbird Time which will be released September 20 via Rounder. The album is their first since 2003's Rainy Day Music and was produced by Jayhawk Gary Louris. It's also their first album with the classic Gary Louris and Mark Olson-led line-up since 1995's Tomorrow The Green Grass. Check out the lead single, "She Walks In So Many Ways" below.

Rosanne Cash some of her own upcoming dates, including some readings on her book tour for Composed, which she released on July 26. Her book tour hits NYC twice this month. The first time on August 9 at Barnes and Noble Union Square and the second on August 11 at PowerHouse Arena in Brooklyn.

All dates and Jayhawks single below...

Continue reading "Jayhawks releasing new LP, touring, playing Beacon Theater w/ Rosanne Cash who wrote a book (dates)"