Big Freedia & crowd @ FFFFest 2011 (more by Tim Griffin)

today in NYC
* Risk! @ the Pit
* Brain Cloud @ Barbes
* Karsh Kale @ Highline Ballroom
* Glen Hansard @ the Met
* Dylan Fest @ Bowery Ballroom
* Questlove @ Brooklyn Bowl
* Ela Orleans w/ a Rooftop Film
* Bettye LaVette @ Cafe Carlyle
* The Donkeys, Citay @ Cake Shop
* Phyllis Chen, Cuddle Magic @ Barbes
* Big Freedia, Javelin @ Mercury Lounge
* Talibam!, Xalam Project @ Cameo Gallery
* Preservation Hall Jazz Band @ City Winery
* Jooklo Duo, Bill Nace @ Issue Project Room
* The Biters, The Booze, Wyldlife @ Maxwell's
* Aeroplane, JDH & Dave P @ Le Poisson Rouge
* Denman Maroney, Theo Bleckmann @ The Stone
* Adam Niewood & His Rabble Rousers @ The Stone
* French Horn Rebellion, Savoir Adore @ Glasslands
* The Ludlow Thieves, David Dondero @ Mercury Lounge
* Golden Animals, The Above, Boom Chick @ Shea Stadium
* Tribeca New Music Festival II @ Merkin Concert Hall
* El Jezel, The Whisperians, Birds in Weather @ Bruar Falls
* Noah Chernin Band, Takka Takka, Little Racer @ The Rock Shop
* The Prigs, The Yes Way, The Courtesy Tier, Monuments @ Pianos
* Across Tundras, Yorba Linda, Cavallo, Ominous Black @ Union Pool
* Ben Allison Band, Darcy James Argue's Secret Society @ Littlefield
* The Rassle, Ravens & Chimes, Living Days (Deli Fest) @ Brooklyn Bowl
* "Bhangra Dance Party" w/ Red Baraat & DJ Rekha @ Brooklyn Bridge Park
* Burning Star Core, Raft, Hiro Kone, Animal Hospital @ Public Assembly
* Menya, Tayisha Busay, Pomegranate, North, Jackpot Tiger @ Lit Lounge
* The Immaculates, The Splinters, Darlings, Household @ Death By Audio
* Bell, ARMS, Chairlift (DJ set), Bear In Heaven (DJ set) @ Knitting Factory
* Doveman, Rufus Wainwright, Sean Lennon @ Le Poisson Rouge
* Stornoway, Spirit Family Reunion, Sea of Bees @ Music Hall of Williamsburg
* Faith and Mark, Nidra, Teen Dreams, The Magick Report, False Positive @ Silent Barn
* Translations, Ravens & Chimes, ArpLine, Dream Diary, Prospector, Invisible Days (Deli Fest) @ Cameo Gallery
* Yc the Cynic, Add-2, Neak, Skotch Davis, Fresh Daily, The Black Sunn & 810, Sincerely Yours @ Public Assembly

Ravens & Chimes are not playing Cameo because Asher came down with pneumonia. Feel better Asher!

Lady Gaga and Good Morning America will be the reason there will be lots of people near Central Park Summerstage/Rumsey Playfield at 7am Friday morning.

Dylan Fest (night 1 of 2) tonight at Bowery features Norah Jones, Adam Green, Will Forte and Jason Sudeikis of SNL, Jesse Malin, Nikolai Fraiture (of the Strokes), Binki Shapiro (of Little Joy), Nicole Atkins, Tad Kubler (of the Hold Steady), Evan Dando, Reeve and Zane Carney, Danny Clinch, Adam Schlesinger and Jody Porter (of Fountains of Wayne), Sammy James, Jr. (of Mooney Suzuki), Ben Trokan (of Robbers on High Street), Steve Schiltz (of Longwave & Hurricane Bells), Antony Ellis (of Five O'Clock Heroes), Luke Rathborne, Jack Dischel (of Only Son), Josh Lattanzi (of The Lemonheads & The Candles) (Dylan Fest 2011) @ Bowery Ballroom.

Win tickets to see Fang Island tomorrow at Brooklyn Bowl on Facebook. We're also giving away a 3-day pass to the * Deli Fest shows at Brooklyn Bowl (starting tonight)

And congrats to the winner of the tickets to see Stornoway at Music Hall of Williamsburg tonight.

Big Freedia plays her first of two NYC shows tonight.

Daily Show correspondant Wyatt Cenac is one of the comedians who will "tell true stories they never thought they'd dare to share in public stories they'd normally tell close friends" at Risk! at the Pit tonight. Maybe you caught Wyatt Cenac's new Comedy Central special "Wyatt Cenac: Comedy Person"? If not it airs again Friday, June 3rd at 10:58pm. Maybe you were there? Listen to Wyatt discuss his friend's 30th birthday and Medieval Times in a video below.

Modern Weepers play Mercury Lounge this Friday night.

The Dodos have a new video for "Companions." Check that out below...

Yuck appeared on Jools Holland. Check that video out below too...

What else?

Continue reading "What's going on Thursday?"

Rodrigo y Gabriela @ Terminal 5 in Sept. (more by Paul Bachmann)

For Sanchez and Gabriela Quintero the story begins with all the key ingredients for that quintessential rags-to-riches story - humble beginnings and of course, undeniable odds stacked against them - but that's not what makes this story so damned interesting. Growing up in Mexico City, that country's pinnacle metropolis of culture and arts, Rodrigo and Gabriela were exposed to music from an early age. As teenagers the two developed a keen love of music and eventually met when Gabriela joined Rodrigo's thrash metal band, Tierra Acida (Acid Earth). With ambitions of becoming serious musicians, they applied to a music conservatory, but having had almost no proper musical training both were denied entry. And so they continued their affair with Mexico City's rock scene. Yet opportunities were scarce, and success even scarcer. Years of unrequited pursuit left them frustrated and disheartened with their home city's music industry. So with about $1000 and no English skills whatsoever, the duo picked up and moved to Dublin, Ireland. Though it may have been by choice, the odds were certainly stacked against them, but Rodrigo y Gabriela weren't in music to play the odds.

It was all about the adventure. "We didn't actually want to be part of a record label anymore, especially when we first went to Europe. We were in a backpacking situation but we were happy," says Rodrigo of their early excursion to Europe, with a much improved English vocabulary now. "We were young and totally irresponsible; we weren't really worried about anything." [Jambase]

Rodrigo y Gabriela will headline Radio City Music Hall in NYC on April 29th. Tickets ($49.50, $39.50, $34.50) go AmEx presale Wednesday (1/13), "Internet Presale" Thursday (1/14), and then general sale on Friday (1/15).

As the above article points out, Rodrigo y Gabriela, though originally from Mexico, now reside in Ireland, home of Glen Hansard of The Frames and Swell Season. The Swell Season's 2nd headlining show at Radio City is coming up soon - January 19th to be exact (tickets). Josh Ritter opens. The Swell Season show is one day before Lady Gaga kicks off her four-night run at the historical venue, and it was recently leaked that Spoon will be playing there in March.

On New Years Eve, Rod and Gab participated in UK TV host Jools Holland's annual Hootenanny on BBC Two. Check out the videos and all dates below...

Continue reading "Rodrigo y Gabriela playing Radio City Music Hall, played Jools Holland's Hootenanny on New Years Eve (videos)"

by Bill Pearis

"Forty years ago, Seasick Steve was a hobo whose constant wandering brought him down here to the Deep South more than once. At 13, he had fled his home in Oakland, California, on the run from a violent stepfather who, in a fit of rage, had thrown him though the window of his mother's house. 'I had a moment of revelation,' he says. 'It was like I had been pushed right to the edge by what was happening to me, and I knew I was going to have to kill that motherfucker. Then, I suddenly thought: "No, Steve, it don't have to be like that. You don't have to end up in jail for one reckless act." It suddenly hit me that there was another way out. I could just run, and keep running. That way, at least my life would be my own.' ...

Seasick Steve's late success has surprised no one more than himself, and he tells me more than once that he doesn't really expect it to last but he's going to try to make himself 'some real money' while it does. Though both his songs and his persona trade heavily on his hobo credentials, he actually turned his back on the road way back in 1973. 'It just got too damn hard,' he says, 'and I knew if I kept on, I'd end up dead in a ditch somewhere.' The trajectory of his life since then is hazy and, one suspects, he plays down the semi-settled years, sensing correctly that his mainly young audience prefer the myth to the reality.

For the past 35 years, he has worked, on and off, in the music business, both as a hired session musician and as a studio engineer. Along the way, he has played with Joni Mitchell and, when he lived for a while in Olympia, near Seattle, in the late Eighties, helped produce albums for 'damn near every grunge group in America'. Though he has been married to his second wife for 27 years, and has five grown-up sons, Steve has had some trouble putting down roots in one place. 'I'm a settled hobo' is how he puts it, adding that he and his wife have lived in 59 different houses to date. They are currently based in Norfolk, which, he assures me, 'is a whole lot more exciting than Norway'.

It was in the Norwegian town of Notodden, however, that he found himself living four years ago. There he started recording a bunch of songs on a four-track tape machine. He was recovering from a heart attack that had left him feeling 'hopeless and helpless', and tells me he 'didn't have no big plans for the songs 'cept for giving them to my wife'.

The results found their way to his old friend, Joe Cushley, a DJ on internet radio station Resonance FM, who passed them on to the small British independent label, Bronzerat Records. Towards the tail end of 2006, Seasick Steve got a call from the BBC, who wanted him to appear on Later... with Jools Holland. Though he had no idea who Jools Holland was, he was persuaded to perform one song, 'Doghouse Boogie', on his New Year's Eve Hootenanny. It caused a stir in the studio, and an even bigger one online. A few days later, Seasick Steve's website collapsed under the weight of several thousand hits. The most unlikeliest cult star of the Noughties was born: an ex-itinerant pensioner who played the shit out of a three-stringed guitar miked up with gaffer tape. [The Guardian, September 2008]

After wowing the UK and Europe for the last two years, Seasick Steve is bringing his Three String Trance Wonder, One String Diddley Bow and Mississippi Drum Machine to the All Points West festival (Friday July 31, same day as Beastie Boys / Yeah Yeah Yeahs), as well as two small shows in the NYC area: July 29 at Mercury Lounge (tickets on sale tomorrow [6/5] at noon, Amex Presale as we speak) and August 8 at Southpaw (no advance tickets yet Tickets for that are now on sale too). Video of that famed Jools Holland appearance, plus a couple more videos and tour dates after the jump...

Continue reading "Seasick Steve playing NYC shows & All Points West"

An ambulance was called out to British Sea Power's Leeds gig last night (January 23) after a 12 foot fall floored over-exuberant cornet player Phil Sumner.

According to reports, Sumner plunged 12 feet after he'd climbed an amp stack during the encore of 'A Rock'. The hapless musician decided to jump off but instead of landing on his feet he ended up chinning himself. The result was unconsciousness and a nasty cut.

He was then rushed to hospital by ambulance.

Suffering concussion, a broken molar and stitches to his chin, it's anticpated that Sumner will make a full recovery. How attractive he finds leaping from amps in future is anybody's guess.

This isn't the first example of ill health to have struck the band. Drummer Woody is currently recovering after slipping his disc while using a dustpan and brush. [XFM]

Don't worry, Phil is doing okay. In fact, BSP have already played more shows since the incident. That includes their televesion appearance on Later with Jools Holland. Check out the videos of that at the end of this post.

British Sea Power's new album Do You Like Rock Music? is out this week (in US/Canada). You can listen to the whole thing at MySpace or Spinner. Then catch them live on one of the many shows they're playing in North American from February 25th-May 18th. That includes some dates with Colourmusic, others with 1900's, SXSW, and a final leg with the Rosebuds. NYC shows are (with the Rosebuds) at Bowery Ballroom on May 10th and Music Hall of Williamsburg the day after that - no tickets yet. All tour dates (and those videos) below.....

Continue reading "British Sea Power - new album stream, 2008 Tour Dates (w/ the Rosebuds, 1900's), Jools Holland videos"

Albert Johnson (born November 2, 1974), better known as Prodigy, is an American rapper and one-half of the hip-hop duo Mobb Deep with Havoc........On October 9, 2007, Prodigy plead guilty to unlawful gun possession charges. Since this was his third gun conviction, he was facing a fifteen-year sentence, however, he has struck a plea bargain giving him a commuted sentence of 3 1/2 years. Prodigy maintains the search of his car was an illegal search prompted by a traffic violation, and unwillingness to cooperate with the police in a buy and bust operation targeting rapper 50 Cent. [Wikipedia]

* Prodigy's going away party is @ BB King's
* Super Tuesday crowned no nominees
* The Spice Girls are playing Nassau Coliseum
* The Dillinger Escape Plan is playing Conan
* Heath Ledger's death caused by accidental overdose
* Cat Power & Dirty Delta Blues are playing Terminal 5
* listen to Cat Power on WNYC

Videos from Cat Power's recent appearance on Jools Holland below. What else?

Continue reading "What's going on Wednesday? (Prodigy)"

Cat Power live on WNYC

I mentioned seven posts ago about how Thao Nguyen ran into Cat Power at a radio station, and then in the last post I posted Thao's radio broadcast, and now here's Cat Power's. Cat Power (Chan Marshall) was also recently seen watching Radiohead with Feist and Mary J Blige.....

Continue reading "Cat Power on WNYC & enjoying Radiohead on Jools Holland"