New Villager

There was a band presale Tuesday morning, but Ticketmaster tickets go on AmEx presale at noon today (2/2) for the Fleet Foxes show at United Palace. General sale starts Friday.

Tickets also go on AmEx presale at noon for the PJ Harvey show happening at Terminal 5. OOPS: No AmEx presale on this one. Tickets on sale Friday at noon.

Suckers are headlining a show at Bowery Ballroom on February 25th with Prince Rama and NewVillager. Tickets go on sale at noon. The show is a full week before Prince Rama kick off a tour with Amen Dunes at Glasslands (also on sale).

NewVillager recently signed with IAMSOUND (home of Salem who just announced some shows too). Check out NewVillager's video for "RichDoors", the first single from the upcoming album, below...

Continue reading "Fleet Foxes, Suckers, Prince Rama & NewVillager tickets"

by Andrew Frisicano

Los Angeles pop duo Kisses, Jesse Kivel (of the band Princeton) and singer/keyboardist Zinzi Edmundson (and a drummer live), are coming to New York for the first time for CMJ. Their shows for that include a Tuesday, October 19th IAMSOUND showcase at Santos and a Saturday, October 23rd show at Arlene's (a Forcefield PR/Windish show). For the Santos show, Men, Salem (last seen at Milk Studios) and Restless People are also on the bill, and tickets are on sale.

I guess that the Santos show will be Kisses' defacto album release gig, since their debut, The Heart of the Nightlife, comes out the same day on This Is Music.

With Kisses, the first thing to note is Kivel's bass-heavy, sometimes-loungey voice (basically unchanged from his singing with Princeton, if you know that). Its sound, combined with the music's '80s-nostalgia, compares favorably to Jens Lekman. Like Jens, Kivel has an ear for retro sounds, which he arranges variously as Muzak-inspired ballads, Arthur Russell disco burners and funk jams (one song, "Midnight Lover," could be on the new Chromeo, including its killer kicker of a chorus "I would like to take you out for a nice steak dinner"). The lyrics have a (slightly put-on) lonely-upper-crust perspective, and play between earnest and ironic (the words are supposedly inspired by a stint Kivel had writing reviews of holiday destinations he never visited).

I caught the band at what (unknown to me then) was their second show ever at the Echoplex in Los Angeles the night before FYF Fest. I partly wound up there because on my way through San Francisco, I saw the the members of Kisses blown up huge on the cover of the free weekly SF Bay Guardian, a really strange amount of pre-any-live-show buzz for the band's still TBA show there in November.

At the Echoplex, they played second on a four-band bill before Hawnay Troof and Stereo Total. The jitters were pretty obvious, though the band sounded good with their hard-hitting drummer and ample help from their programmed backing track. There's no problem with using a backing track, per se, but it was just a bummer to have some of the best hooks - a marimba run, a frantic Hammond solo, their defining bass pulse - played by a faceless laptop. The crowd got into it by asking questions, respectfully answered, between songs. "You guys are good!" blurted one person, almost incredulously, before asking when the record came out.

They'll have some more time to work out the show on the fly with October gigs in the UK and Japan. Until the record, there are two singles (with remixes) you can check out now.

Live videos from those first two shows, an official music video for their single "People Can Do The Most Amazing Things" (one of the record's least dancey songs) and all tour dates (LA, NYC, Japan, and Europe twice) are below.

Continue reading "Kisses played their 1st shows in CA, coming for CMJ (tour dates, videos, album info, more) "

DOWNLOAD: Salem - Frost (MP3)

photos by Erez Avissar

Salem...

On a series of breathy, claustrophobic EPs and singles beginning in 2008, Salem-- the trio of John Holland, Heather Marlatt and Jack Donoghue -- has been honing an oozy, cold style; a pastiche of several strains of pessimistic music: there are hints of noise-rock and shoegaze, as well as the stamp of the Houston rap pioneer D.J. Screw, who slowed records down until they became gummy and desperate.

It's not fun, this sound. And onstage it was even hazier. All three members took turns out front. Mr. Holland, who never took off his ski cap, sang, gripping the microphone hard, with hands heavy with rings. Ms. Marlatt -- who has a sweet voice, very well hidden -- was smoking while she played her keyboard, and smoking when she sang. (But hey, so were people in the crowd.)

She helps enliven "Redlights," one of Salem's best songs, which on Tuesday night was like M.I.A.'s "Paper Planes" as heard through thick earmuffs, all low end and distortion but maintaining the hypnotic cyclicality of the beat. [NY Times]

The above review is from the group's show at Glasslands on January 5th, which is also the source of the pictures here. Salem will be releasing their first full length album later this year on IAMSOUND Records. More details will be announced later. More pictures from the Brooklyn show below...

Continue reading "Salem played Glasslands (pics), releasing CD on IAMSOUND"

DOWNLOAD: Cut Off Your Hands - You and I (MP3)

The EP is streaming at AOL. It is for sale at Iamsound (not to be confused with Insound). The story is at BrooklynVegan.