photos by Dana (distortion) Yavin

"This is the craziest time for The Smashing Pumpkins since the mid-'90s," says Billy Corgan over a cup of tea in his dressing room at New York's Terminal 5. "We just finished Oceania, but we don't know when it's coming out. We don't have management, and we don't have a record label. We don't know what we're doing or when we're doing it." [Music Radar]

Billy Corgan brought the latest iteration of Smashing Pumpkins to Terminal 5 in NYC on Tuesday (10/18), part of an ongoing October tour. More pictures & the setlist below...

Continue reading "Smashing Pumpkins played Terminal 5 (pics & setlist)"

Ray Davies has a new LP on the way entitled See My Friends due on November 1st. The release will see The Kinks frontman pairing with multiple bands to re-record, and sometimes re-imagine, Kinks songs. And these bands have names like Bruce Springsteen, Bon Jovi, Spoon, Black Francis, Metallica, Mumford & Sons... and the legendary Alex Chilton (RIP).

"This project came about almost by accident," says Davies of the project, which was kick-started when he recorded a version of 'Till The End Of The Day' in the summer of 2009, with Alex Chilton.

The full list of collaborators is below.

Davies is getting back on the road as well, though so far he just has scattered dates in Europe, and a newly-announced show in the United States. He'll be performing his 2009 LP The Kinks Choral Collection with the Dessoff Chamber Choir at the Wellmont Theatre in Montclair, NJ on November 26th. Tickets go on sale at noon today (10/8). NYC got that show in 2009.

All dates, the See My Friends tracklisting, and some video are below...

Continue reading "Ray Davies re-recorded Kinks songs w/ special friends, playing NJ & other dates "

"Umm, why is my phone lighting up today??? I appreciate the attention but I'm totally fine. And Knoxville we will rock you tonight full tilt!" - Billy Corgan

"Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan collapsed on stage during a gig in Florida on Thursday night.

During the band's performance of 1995 hit single Bullet With Butterfly Wings, the star fell to the ground.

Writing on Twitter later that night, the musician said: "That wasn't a stage move or clumsiness. That was me blacking out and wiping out."

The 43-year-old, who said he was bruised by the fall, gave no explanation for his collapse." [BBC]

Smashing Pumpkins play a sold out show at Terminal 5 on Monday. Video of last night's collapse, and other recent tour videos, below...

Continue reading "Billy Corgan collapsed on stage (but is fine) (video)"

DOWNLOAD: Smashing Pumpkins - Astral Plane (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Smashing Pumpkins - A Stitch in Time (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Smashing Pumpkins - Window Wake My Mind (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Smashing Pumpkins - A Song For A Son (MP3)

"The Smashing Pumpkins" are playing a string of "intimate" shows this July.

"The decision to play intimate venues keeps in line with the Pumpkins' "long-standing tradition of trying to start up new tours at smaller venues because it allows the band the opportunity to take some chances musically," explains Billy."

At those shows, the band (Billy Corgan plus guitarist Jeff Schroeder, drummer Mike Byrne and new bassist Nicole Fiorentino) will play "a balance of classics, a few obscure ones, and new 'Teargarden' material." Teargarden is the band's 11 EP project that'll eventually be collected as the 44-song work Teargarden By Kaleidyscope. The first of those four-song EPs, Teargarden By Kaleidyscope Vol.1: Songs for a Sailor, recently came out on Martha's Music/Rocket Science Ventures and is available above for free. You can also stream it below.

Billy Corgan & bassist Nicole Fiorentino

The NYC date is July 26th at Terminal 5 and an American Express ticket presale for that show will start Friday, June 11th at 10am. Public sale happens Monday, June 14th at 11am.

The Smashing Pumpkins tour Japan in August, and the band writes that they "plan to tour South America and Australia in 2010 and hope to return to the U.S. later this year." All of their currently announced tour dates, more info on the EP and a streaming player for it, are below...

Continue reading "'Smashing Pumpkins' released 1st of 11 EPs (free), playing 'intimate' shows - 2010 tour dates (Terminal 5) "

Billy Corgan former friend who used to hold a working relationship with Courtney Love is saying that he forbids her to release any songs they worked on together. "[If she does release them] it would be a real big problem, because I haven't given my permission," he tells Rolling Stone. Love has recently reunited her band, Hole for the release of the Nobody's Daughter album, to be released later this year preceded by the single, "Samantha." Corgan continued: "I have no interest in supporting her in any way, shape or form. You can't throw enough things down the abyss with a person like that." [Groovevolt]

Tickets are now on AmEx and "radio" presale for the Hole show at Terminal 5 (password = 1019RXP).

TSOOL at MHOW last night (Bill Pearis)

today in NYC
* So Percussion @ Joe's Pub
* Monks of Doom reunion @ Europa
* Allman Brothers @ Beacon Theatre
* Eli Paperboy Reed @ The Bell House
* Chris Thile's Punch Brothers @ Living Room
* Extra Life, Mi Ami & Mirror Mirror @ Silent Barn
* N.A.S.A. & DJ Stretch Armstrong @ Le Poisson Rouge
* Franz Nicolay, Spoonboy & Emily Brodsky @ the Delancey
* Medications, Edie Sedgwick, Miracles & Gold Drum @ Cake Shop
* Propagandhi, Paint it Black & Gimme Drugs @ Highline Ballroom
* The Soundtrack of Our Lives & Lissy Trullie @ Bowery Ballroom
* Janeane Garofalo, Paul F. Tompkins, Morgan Murphy & more @ 92Y Tribeca
* Tall Firs, Holly Miranda, Meridians & Sharon Van Etten @ Zebulon
* Ringo Deathstarr, The Depreciation Guild & Grand Mal @ Death By Audio
* Woods, Let's Wrestle, caUSE co-MOTION! & Home Blitz @ Monster Island Basement
* Throwing Muses, Screaming Females & 50 Foot Wave @ Music Hall of Williamsburg
* The Death Set, Team Robespierre, NinjaSonik, Totally Michael & Cerebral Ballzy @ The Shank

The Pogues were supposed to play tonight.

Tickets are on sale for the recently added Ratatat show at Terminal 5.

When I said Holly Miranda didn't have any shows between the other night at Mercury Lounge and the upcoming Bell House show with Nada Surf, I lied (well, actually her MySpace lied). She is scheduled to play tonight with Sharon Van Etten and the others listed above at Zebulon.

The Jesus Lizard are playing ATP NY.

Who is playing Central Park Summerstage and Prospect Park this summer?

Little Steven introduced TSOOL on state at MHOW last night. Lissy Trullie opens for them tonight.

Video of Billy Corgan testifying to congress, below...

What else?

Continue reading "What's going on Thursday?"

"Yeah, we're getting really good at mergers and acquisitions at this point, so we've had a lot of companies that we've acquired and had to integrate. But we're working on our ability to do this much quicker. We have to keep some of these systems distributed; sometimes you just can't directly integrate them. You've got to keep running them to better integrate them into the overall enterprise."
[Joe Manna, CIO of Live Nation]

"Mr. Billy Corgan was busy in Washington today, first appearing before the House Committee on the Judiciary in a hearing on the Performance Rights Act, then delivering a letter in support of the controversial Ticketmaster/Live Nation merger. You can read Billy's words to the committee here, but essentially Corgan told congressional leaders that radio should pay performers, not just songwriters, for tracks played." [Stereogum]

"Bono said he had no opinion on the mega-merger." [Chicago Sun Times]

"I had a long conversation with a promoter who told me that with regard to a show he was promoting, Ticketmaster was guaranteeing the secondary market for the act." [Bob Lefsetz]

"In a meeting last May with more than 100 ticket brokers, Ticketmaster's then-chief executive, Sean Moriarty, acknowledged that the ticketing giant had used TicketExchange to sell 160 Neil Diamond tickets over two shows at marked-up prices." [Wall Street Journal]

"No Doubt is sticking it to Ticketmaster by selling 10% of the tickets for its North American Tour directly to fans. The goal, according to Jim Guerinot, No Doubt's manager, is for fan club members to buy tickets instead of 2nd party distributors such as TicketNow, the legal scalping division of Ticketmaster. This is the same problem Bruce Springsteen and his fans have been pissed about for weeks." [New York Press]

"AEG CEO Tim Leiweke slammed the proposed Live Nation, Ticketmaster merger, saying that it is 'not good for the industry.'" [The Busines Insider]

"Come on! Only Gene Simmons got into this business for the money. The rest of you were enraptured by the music. Can't you get the public on the same page? Can't you turn everybody into a club rat? Can't we get everybody to go out and see live music on a regular basis? Or do we have to wait until the labels fail, independent promoters are broken and every ticket is sold on TicketsNow and StubHub?" [Bob Lefsetz]

Continue reading "Bono, Billy Corgan, No Doubt, Bob Lefsetz, AEG, others chime in on Live Nation & Ticketmaster"

Photos by Chris La Putt

"Now, it's bad enough to subject your audience to about 40 minutes of abrasive, deliberately off-putting music, but it's even more uncool to come back for an encore that mocks them for not being 100% with you, and feeling disappointed for not hearing more of what they expected to hear from a show billed as a 20th anniversary concert. In conventional show biz logic, if you're going to go that far, you should at least leave the audience with a crowd-pleaser. In Billy Corgan logic, you come out and perform one of the lesser songs from your best-selling album, and then finish off with a song that mixes disingenuous hippy-dippy "everyone is beautiful!" lyrics with improvised sarcastic rants that outright diss the city you're playing in, mock the fans for paying to see your band, and tell your visibly disappointed audience that you'll see them in hell. It was full-on douche-tastic passive-aggression. It's as if he set out to do this heel turn, and purposefully alienate as much of the audience as possible. Well, it worked. Believe me, unless you've witnessed other shows on this tour, it's unlikely you've seen a more defeated audience exit from a rock show." [Fluxblog, night one]

Pictures from Friday (11/7), and setlists from both of the shows they played at the United Palace in NYC, below...

Continue reading "Smashing Pumpkins @ United Palace Theatre, NYC - night two pics & both setlists"

Michael Stipe in Santiago, Chile - Nov 4, 2008 (Loretín)

Girl Talk announces a new president in Milwaukee - Nov 4, 2008 (leslie!!)

Where were you when Obama was announced the winner last night? After spending some time in Rockefeller Center with thousands of people and NBC, I was actually at (le) poisson rouge in the West Village when CNN made their announcement (on two large screens). Everyone went nuts and started dancing while music like "We are the Champions" was blasting through the soundsystem (I guess McCain supporters knew to stay away from events like these?). Kyle was at The Bell House with a similar experience. Oprah was in Chicago's Grant Park (home of Lollapalooza). Ryan was wondering if Clues were ever going to go on. Others were at other concerts...

Girl Talk played Milwaukee. R.E.M. was in Santiago while Madonna performed in San Diego. Smashing Pumpkins were up in Toronto and Bad Brains had a hometown show in DC. Videos from those shows and more below...

Continue reading "Where were you? Obama's win in concert, and other, videos "

"We fought hard for the right to be in control of how our music is used, to avoid situations like this kind of crass commercialism and exploitation. Labels like EMI are no longer running the show, and we won't be bullied by those in the 'old' music business who consider every artist to be easily expendable. Those days are over." --Billy Corgan

Continue reading "the Smashing Pumpkins are suing Virgin Records "

undisputed wes reports....

After first revealing themselves in Paris the other day, the reunited new Smashing Pumpkins played their third new-lineup-first-gigs-since-2000 show today (May 28, 2007) at the legendary Pinkpop Festival in the Netherlands. It's the oldest annual festival in the world, and has been running for 38 years straight in a town not far from where I grew up.

Billy w/ the new James Iha* @ Pinkpop 2007 (CRED)

* Jeff Schroeder formerly of The Lassie Foundation

Billy Corgan @ Pinkpop 2007 (CRED)

The new bass player* @ Pinkpop 2007 (CRED)

* Ginger Reyes formerly of the Halo Friendlies

Other artists at this year's Pinkpop included Iggy & The Stooges ('Electric Chair' live video), Arctic Monkeys, Muse (awesome pic, live fan video of 'Invincible'), Scissor Sisters, Five O'Clock Heroes (interview, pic), Snow Patrol pic, live fan video of 'Shut Your Eyes'), Maximo Park ('Apply Some Pressure' live video), Linkin Park, Macy Gray (here hilariously labeled as Amy Winehouse), The Fratellis ('Chelsea Dagger' live video), Evanescence (painful live video), Korn ('Freak on a Leash' and 'Blind' live video), Dave Matthews Band 'Don't Drink The Water' live video), The Kooks ('Sabbator' live video), The Magic Numbers ('I See You, You See Me' live video), Maria Mena (live acoustic sessions video, Paolo Nutini (55 to 1 live video, Wolfmother (Woman live video), Gogol Bordello (2nd band in this live fan video with annoying intro), Razorlight ('In the City' live video), Marilyn Manson (pic), 30 Seconds To Mars (video), and more here, and here.

Oxfam took even more pictures. Amy Winehouse was scheduled to play but she called in sick. What else is new?

Most bands allowed their performance to be streamed live on Dutch radio except for 30 Seconds To Mars (potentially REALLY embarrassing?), and The Smashing Pumpkins (nervous because it was their third show?).