photos by Amanda Hatfield and Chris La Putt

The 4Knots Music Festival went down on Saturday with sets by lots of bands at the South Street Seaport which literally caught on fire. It ended with a controverisal afterparty which started with a set by Kid Congo Powers. Those pictures are in this post. More below....

Continue reading "more 4Knots afterparty pics (mainly Kid Congo Powers)"

As you know, Siren Fest replacement 4Knots goes down at South Street Seaport this Saturday. Here are the times:

Main Stage
12:15 p.m.: The Smiling Lies
12:30 p.m.: The Fast Years
1:30 p.m.: Nick Waterhouse
2:30 p.m.: Bleached
3:30 p.m.: Hospitality
4:30 p.m.: Crocodiles
5:30 p.m.: The Drums
6:30 p.m.: Archers of Loaf

Skippers Stage
1:00 p.m.: Doldrums
2:00 p.m.: Devin
3:00 p.m.: Team Spirit
4:00 p.m.: Delicate Steve

Afterparty at Beekman Beer Garden (not free)
7:00 p.m.: doors
?:?? p.m.: DJ Jonathan Toubin
?:?? p.m.: Kid Congo Powers + The Pink Monkey Birds
?:?? p.m.: The Black Lips

Meanwhile Eleanor Friedberger, Ex Cops and Zambri play a free show at South Street Seaport on Friday (6:30pm).

Nick Waterhouse also has some other shows coming up.

Continue reading "free 4Knots Music Festival is Saturday (set times)"

Black Lips at Austin Psych Fest 2012 (more by Tim Griffin)

As mentioned, 4Knots Music Festival goes down at South Street Seaport on July 14 from 1-8 PM, but if you're looking to keep the party going, it's just been announced that Atlanta garage rockers Black Lips will headline the official afterparty at Beekman Beer Garden Beach Club with Kid Congo Powers and The Pink Monkey Birds. Though the festival is free and all ages, the afterparty is 21+ and $15 tickets go on sale Wednesday (6/6) at noon. The flier for the afterparty is below.

As discussed, the 4Knots Music Fest lineup includes Archers of Loaf, The Drums, Crocodiles (whose new LP, Endless Flowers is out today and streaming on Rolling Stone), Hospitality, Bleached, Nick Waterhouse, Team Spirit (who we just posted belated pics of), Doldrums, Devin (who plays Santos on Wednesday with The Cribs and Alex Winston) and more TBA.

4Knots afterparty flier, a list of all Black Lips dates and a video are below.

Continue reading "Black Lips headlining 4Knots afterparty in Beekman Beer Garden w/ Kid Congo Powers & The Pink Monkey Birds"

photos by Dana (distortion) Yavin

Dan Coxon: The new album sounds like the perfect soundtrack to a barroom brawl, preferably filmed by Quentin Tarantino. Do you have to work hard at getting that kind of intensity on the record, or does it simply come naturally?

Jim Jones: Most music doesn't mean anything until you invest some intensity into it - so that is a given. But the real trick is to try and get that intensity but also the keep the maximum degree of swing in there at the same time!

DC: Twelve bar blues feels like something of a forgotten format, maybe due to the likes of Status Quo degrading it in the Eighties. What drew you back to it?

JJ: It's true, it's a pretty fine line you have to tread to avoid falling into the same old cliches... but if you come at it from the right angle, you can find that the form still has some wiggle room. When you hear early Little Richard recordings they still sound vital... It's not the form, it's the presentation.

The Jim Jones Revue and Kid Congo Powers brought their intensity to Brooklyn on Saturday night (9/10) for a show at Music Hall of Williamsburg with Des Roar. Pictures are in this post. If you missed it, their ongoing tour comes back to the NYC-area on 9/18 at Maxwell's. More pictures from Brooklyn below...

Continue reading "The Jim Jones Revue, Kid Congo Powers & Des Roar played MHOW (pics)"

"Panda Bear is the project of Animal Collective member Noah Lennox. Tomboy, his long-awaited fourth album as Panda Bear, and follow-up to Person Pitch, is now complete and will be released on his own label, Paw Tracks on April 19, 2011.

Over the past six months or so, Panda Bear has released a series of vinyl singles on different labels, including Domino, Paw Tracks, and Fat Cat, with the final single forthcoming on Kompakt. The Tomboy album will be a compilation of these songs, along with new ones that have not been released. Additionally, all the songs have been added to and newly mixed with help from Sonic Boom to give the album a wonderfully rich and warm sound. stay tuned for more details." [PRESS RELEASE]

It was back in September that we learned we definitely wouldn't be seeing Panda Bear's album in 2010, or maybe even anytime soon, so this is good news.

In related Animal Collective news, Animal Collective member Deakin will share a bill with Black Dice and Mirror Mirror this Saturday in Brooklyn at Secret Project Robot, a venue which is moving to a new location at the end of 2011. Meanwhile they have a full schedule at the current location. More details, more event listings (including a Knyfe Hyts residency) and this weekend's flyer below...

Continue reading "Panda Bear finished his album, Deakin & Black Dice playing Secret Project Robot (which is moving at the end of 2011)"

words and photos by Chris Gersbeck

Yo La Tengo played their third of eight Hanukkah shows at Maxwell's on Friday night (12/3), and this was probably the most anticipated due to strong rumors of Jeff Tweedy opening which turned out to be true.

Each Yo La Tengo Hanukkah show has an associated charity, and this night's was the Elsyian Charter School of Hoboken, so the show started with twenty or so children taking the stage to perform some Yo La classics. I almost felt bad laughing (as did everyone else) when they began singing "Stockholm Syndrome", but only because it was just so adorable. After performing "Sugarcube" and "Mr. Tough", the children parted the crowd to make their exit (they really did sound great by the way), and shortly after we were treated to an intimate and absolutely beautiful set from Jeff Tweedy.

Playing Wilco classics like "I Am Trying to Break Your Heart", and rotating through Uncle Tupelo songs and covers, Tweedy's voice sounded as great as ever. The crowd was clearly filled with his fans as well; many of them were singing along throughout. After closing with a stellar and, well I'll just say it, mind-blowing rendition of "A Shot in the Arm", Tweedy thanked the crowd and promised we would see him later. And that would definitely happen...

Eugene Mirman, who has always been one of my favorite standup comics, was the comedian guest of the night. The highlight of his set included revealing his fascination with the Tea Party, his subsequent registering on a Tea Party social networking site, and his printouts of legitimate Tea Party members profile pictures from that site. My favorite being simply a photo of a machine gun laying on a carpeted floor, the owner's toes only barely visible on the bottom of the photo. Wow. Eugene's reading of his favorite tweets, accompanied with a theremin, was also a great and hilarious way to end his set.

Eugene didn't join Yo La Tengo on the stage during the show like Tweedy would, but I'm not sure many people were expecting that anyway. Tweedy in fact performed nearly the entire initial set with Yo La, pleasing the crowd with a version of Wilco's "Jesus, Etc.", Bob Dylan's "One Of Us Must Know (Sooner or Later)" and quite a few of my favorite songs from Yo La Tengo's prolific catalogue such as "Can't Forget", "The Race Is On Again", and "I Should Have Known Better". For such a small room, they really get quite a big sound.

Yo La Tengo's encore was mostly a tribute to the late Alex Chilton, who has joined them on Hanukkah in the past. After Ira Kaplan stated that some of Chilton's most notable work was with legendary punk band the Cramps, he invited Cramps' guitarist Kid Congo Powers for a couple covers of his band. Ending the night on a particularly loud note, though I probably should stop standing right next to those gigantic speakers, Yo La Tengo said "we'll see you tomorrow!" and left the stage through the crowd.

Jeff Tweedy headlined Bowery Ballroom one night later, and Yo La Tengo continue playing Hanukkah shows at Maxwell's through 12/8 (the final night of Hanukkah). More pictures and some videos from the third night, below...

Continue reading "Yo La Tengo, Jeff Tweedy, Eugene Mirman & Kid Congo Powers @ Maxwell's (Hanukkah night 3 pics & video)"

Kid Congo Powers @ Spider House (BV-SXSW 2010) (more by Tim Griffin)

The next free Vice Garage show at Knitting Factory, Wednesday, July 28th, will feature the ex-Cramp/Bad Seed garage rocker pictured above, with support from the supercampy Hunx & His Punx. RSVP for it here (and for the show in Austin the next night).

The previous Vice garage show featured the reunited Oblivians. Tonight (7/21) Jack Yarber/Oblivian plays a Brooklyn show with his own band at Southpaw. Tickets are still on sale.

Kid Congo Powers will be back in New York, as part of his September tour dates, for a show on Friday, September 17th at Brooklyn Bowl with the K-Holes. Tickets ($5) are on sale.

And another band that played our SXSW day show at Spider House in March, UK's Jim Jones Revue (ex-Thee Hypnotics), is in NYC for four shows this week: Thursday, July 22nd at Mercury Lounge, Maxwell's on July 23rd and Knitting Factory on July 24th. More info here. (And on top of that, they open Smashing Pumpkins' sold-out Terminal 5 show as part of Spin25 on July 26th along with Kill Hannah.)

Updated Kid Congo Powers & Jim Jones tour dates, flyers and videos are below...

Continue reading "Jim Jones & Jack Oblivian here, Kid Congo playing w/ Hunx"

photos by Tim Griffin

Kid Congo Powers (aka Brian Tristan of The Gun Club, The Cramps and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds) was one of the many artists who played the BV/Anso show at the Spider House during SXSW this year. And like The Beets earlier this week, here are the long lost pictures from that show along with news of some new tour dates.

You can catch Kid Congo Powers at Brooklyn Bowl on September 17th. More dates and pictures below...

Continue reading "upcoming Kid Congo Powers shows & belated live pics "

by Andrew Frisicano

Jim Jones Revue...

Speaking of the BrooklynVegan/AnSO Thursday day party at Austin's Spider House (full schedule here), London's Jim Jones Revue will be taking to one of the stages (right before Cheeseburger). The garage rock powerhouse, whose first record came out in 2008 and who are currently working on a new album with producer Jim Sclavunos from The Bad Seeds/Grinderman, will be making their US debut at the festival.

Since forming The Revue in 2007, Jim Jones - the jet-fuelled ex-Thee Hypnotics vocal powerhouse - has led his band through a hurricane of live shows and the recording of their first, bone-shattering LP. [Their February 4th set at London's Jazz Cafe] was predominantly made up of material from that album: a relentless meld of flame-grilled rock'n'soul and punk-R&B. In fact it's rumoured that the Jazz Café had to hold back on the band's usual volume for fear of broken eardrums and complaints from the entire postcode.

What makes the Jim Jones Revue such an exciting live prospect is their heady mix of quality songs and unpredictability. Their mining of the pre-1960 rock'n'roll sound serves them well. You feel that you've lived with these songs for a long time, yet, in a live setting, their material doesn't feel constrained by category. It just makes you stand up and listen before knocking you off your feet. [Mojo]

On the same stage will be Kid Congo Powers (aka Brian Tristan of The Gun Club, The Cramps and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds)...

WOW. The Kid did it again. All the uber cool chops and camped up suss we've come to know and love from this true legend. Yep that's right Legend, an over used word in describing musicians for sure but hell when you've spent your life playing with three of the greatest front men of all time - Lux Interior, Jeffery Pierce and Nick Cave - you must have done something right. No one can tell me its not a justified description for someone who was in not only one LEGENDARY band but three - The Cramps, The Gun Club and Nick Caves Bad Seed's.

These days Kid Congo is hipper than ever with his own band The Pink Monkey Birds, who's charming, sexy mix of 50's Rockabilly, 60's Garage Trash, 70's Vegas Lounge Muzak, 80's Post Punk all put together with an authentic Hispanic twist - serves up some serious cool medicine both on record and live. [Splash One]

The two acts also team up again for an official showcase with The Bellrays and more at Prague later that night. Both have other shows on the docket as well. Videos of both (including Jim Jones at the above-described gig) and their full Austin schedules are below...

Continue reading "Jim Jones Revue (ex-Thee Hypnotics) & Kid Congo Powers (ex-Cramps/Nick Cave/Gun Club) playing SXSW, other shows"