DOWNLOAD: Lee Ranaldo - "Off the Wall" (MP3)

M Ward @ Summerstage 2009 (more by Paul Bachmann)

Still no east coast dates to report for the reunited fIREHOSE, but they did announce a west coast run of shows, some of which are with M. Ward who also plays Coachella (not the first time friends Mike Watt and M. Ward will share a bill.) All fIREHOSE dates are listed below.

M. Ward however will head east as part of a set of just-announced May dates that include a NYC show at Webster Hall on May 11 with Lee Ranaldo. Tickets are not on sale yet but check ticketmaster for updates. All tour dates are listed below.

Speaking of Lee Ranaldo, he recently revealed the first song from his upcoming album, Between the Times & the Tides (out March 20 via Matador). The track is a relaxed R.E.M.-ish rocker called "Off the Wall." Download it above and stream it below.

Continue reading "M. Ward touring East Coast w/ Lee Ranaldo after West Coast tour w/ fIREHOSE (2012 tour dates)"

Anywhere L to R: Christian Eric Beaulieu, Mike Watt, Cedric Bixler Zavala

Anywhere began as a LA/SF collaborative project started by musicians Christian Eric Beaulieu (Triclops!) and Cedric Bixler Zavala. In early 2010 while in Los Angeles to perform at an art opening of mutual friend artist Sonny Kay, [Beaulieu] befriended Cedric (singer of The Mars Volta) who was DJing the event. The two exchanged numbers and... months later the pair met in Los Angeles, enlisted the mobile engineering talent of Toshi Kasai (Big Business) and tracked an album's worth of material in 2 days at The Melvins practice space in downtown Los Angeles. During that same visit Christian played live on "The Watt from Pedro Show" as the musical guest of Mike Watt (of The Stooges, fIREHOSE, Minutemen). After the show, before leaving San Pedro, Christian realized they needed bass on the new material, and boldly asked Watt if he'd contribute. Watt agreed immediately, and a few months later delivered the entire projects bass tracks. Returning to San Francisco, Christian decided to reach out to vocalist Rachel Fannan, who had recently parted ways with Bay Area psych rockers Sleepy Sun and had relocated to Los Angeles.

One of Mike Watt's many other projects, Spielgusher, also has an album coming out this month, and he's keeping busy playing shows as usual too. As previously mentioned, Mike is performing Minutemen songs as a duo with George Hurley at an ATP in the UK in March. Before then he also plays with the Missingmen in LA in February, and he's taking part in a memorial for his friend Doug Rockett in Memphis this Friday (1/13).

More importantly... We've already seen the lineup for Coachella 2012, so we know Anywhere WON'T be on hand for the festival (or Mike with the Minutemen), but Coachella WILL feature reunion performances from both fIREHOSE (with Mike Watt - their first show in 8 years) and, as you definitely know by now, At The Drive In (with Cedric Bixler Zavala). No word on any other scheduled fIREHOSE shows at the moment.

Omar Rodriguez-Lopez of ATDI (and Mars Volta) will also do double duty at Coachella. He's also playing the festival as part of Les Butcherettes (like he did at Fun Fun Fun Fest). Check out an NPR Tiny Desk Concert of Le Butcherettes below alongside a Le Butcherettes LP stream.

Continue reading "like ATDI, fIREHOSE are playing Coachella (Le Butcherettes too); Anywhere releasing limited 7""

The actual origin of Dos came about in the fall of 1985 when Watt and Kira, who were already dating, began improvising two-bass jams in their free time, sometimes recording these results into Watt's four-track recording machine.

The sudden death of Minutemen guitarist and lead singer D. Boon in a van accident on December 22, 1985, led to the end of the Minutemen and left Watt deeply depressed. Kira had parted company with Black Flag not long beforehand and moved to New Haven, Connecticut to attend Yale University. Watt considered abandoning music altogether. But intending to keep him playing after Boon's death, Kira and Watt began collaborating via four-track cassettes sent back and forth in the mail. The activity led to Kira flying back to California for the formal forming of Dos in September 1986.

They recorded their first album, an all-instrumental affair save for Kira's closing track, "Taking Away The Fire", almost immediately, and made their performing debut as Dos opening for ex-Black Flag guitarist Greg Ginn's instrumental group Gone that same week. Watt released Dos' eponymous first album, Dos on New Alliance Records, the label he had formed with D. Boon in 1981. Around the same time, Watt formed fIREHOSE; many of the songs on fIREHOSE's first album Ragin', Full-On, are actually Dos songs with lyrics added (by either Watt or Kira) and rearranged for a power trio format. -[Wiki]

Mike Watt is currently "trying his hardest" on bass for Iggy & The Stooges on the European Festival circuit, and will return in time to play a Dos album release party in his beloved Pedro, CA on July 16th. In addition to Dos and Iggy & The Stooges dates, Mike Watt will also team with George Hurley to play Minutemen covers at the Jeff Mangum-curated ATP in Minehead UK on December 3rd.

All tour dates and that Dos video is below.

Continue reading "Mike Watt band Dos releasing 'Dos y Dos' (video premiere)"

by Andrew Frisicano

Mike Watt and the Missingmen blasted through the entirety of Hyphenated-Man, Watt's third opera, as he's fond of saying, without a pause at their sold-out Monday show at Mercury Lounge, the second of two stops the band made in the NYC-area on its 50-plus-date tour.

For an album comprised of one- to two-minute songs, there's some humor in the fact that it's a 40-minute marathon live, spewed out in a continuous stream of riffs and digressions. The band---Raul Morales on drums, and Tom Watson on guitar---added grime and sweat to those movements, from the whispered "mouse-headed-man" to the violent "man-shitting-man," hitting their dynamic starts and stops with precision. Listening to their interactions, the vibrancy of Minutemen-derived sound has never been more apparent. As always, Watt delivered earnest, playful lyrics in his distinct working-class drawl.

For the encore, we heard some Tom-sung tunes, as well as Minutemen classics like "Toadies" and "The Glory of Man," before a goodbye to the too-short night: "The bottom line of the third opera is that life is for learnin'," said Watt. "So thank you for being in the classroom tonight."

Mike and the band are keeping a tour diary at Mike's site. Some of the many words Mike wrote about the NYC stop include...

I make my way through way packed room to stage - there's nels and mrs yuka, whoa... I am fucking nervous now, crimony! so glad there's a hand rail, so glad. I get up on stage and thank folks for coming on a work night and the other bands for letting us share the stage w/them. we bring forth the piece... fuck, no monitors - I know soundman kyle is trying as I give motions - at one point even a plea alongside a cussword even but to no avail. I fucking mime this entire gig. it is very difficult, very frustrating. I can't put nuance where I want, especial when the band gets tiny - even at those points, they're ain't shit. christ, you know I want "a poor carpenter blames his tools" to be more than a platitude but fuck, is this difficult. I do get the spiel to "stuffed-inside-the-drum" right but fuck if I can hear it. I do try hard not to let the sitch bum me out and connect much w/levity spirt w/tom and raul. "funnel-capped-man" has huge tom clams in one part but as bob-san later puts it "the clams were celebrated more than scorned" meaning he thought it was a good thing. astute analysis from bob-san. the nyc gig-goers are very respectful, very quiet in the quiet parts and such for the most part - big respect. I can see through the doors to the bar (even w/the busted glass taped up) and there's no one there, everybody's tuned into the gig. it's one of the most focused-in crowds for the piece, I think - one up there anyway and I'm thinking this is adding to the frustration of fucking miming it but I have to say I'm glad I didn't give in too much into getting panties bunched up over this bullshit non-existent monitor giving any vocal to me thing. I think I blow some clams in the last solo of the last part - fuck, in the last part of the last solo even... I let tom ring out the chord before I bring in the final - at least that one is ok. whew. the gig-goers are most kind and have us back - there's a way for me to get behind raul, righteous. this is where I like to be for the encores. we have fun, we thank the gig-goers.

Continue reading "Mike Watt released 'Hyphenated-Man', played it live"

by Michael Hill

After recently celebrating his 50th birthday, the maturing, former heavy rock front man is showing no signs of slowing down or mellowing out. He is not "aging gracefully," he is turning up the volume and raging full on.

Rollins first came to prominence in 1981 as the fourth singer of the seminal hardcore punk band Black Flag. After a brief tour of duty fronting State or Alert in his hometown of Washington, DC, he relocated to Southern California to join Black Flag. Rollins toured extensively and appeared on several recordings until the band broke up in 1986. He was back on the road the following year in 1987 with the Rollins Band which garnered modest commercial success during the 90's with "Liar" and "Low Self Opinion." After three lineups, the band parted ways in 2006.

During the Black Flag years, Rollins founded the 2.13.61 Publishing Company, basically a P.O. Box, where he published a series of folded and stapled self-publications. Ultimately, the roster would expand to include Nick Cave, Jeffrey Lee Pierce, and Glen E. Friedman among others. Additionally, he has acted in films such as David Lynch's "Lost Highway", "Feast" and "Heat"(where he shared a scene with Al Pacino) as well as appearances on television as a part of the cast of "Sons of Anarchy" and on his own IFC talk show.

These days, Rollins is mostly known for his unique brand of spoken word performance. Though, often times humorous, I hesitate to call it stand-up comedy; it exists in region where Lenny Bruce, Bill Hicks and Friedrich Nietzsche converge. It's part political commentary, part travelogue, part story telling session delivered with a high intensity pace the delivers the goods without fail. I've been witnessing these performances since the late 80's when the audience consisted of a handful of punk rockers congregating at some out-of-the way hole in the wall in a bad neighborhood. I caught one of his sold out dates at Joe's Pub in New York City, a nice place with reserved seating, food and a well-stocked bar.

Henry was kind enough to set aside some time in his schedule to talk to us. Read our chat below....

Continue reading "an interview with Henry Rollins"

Mike Watt & the Missingmen at Maxwell's last year (more by Lori Baily)

""hyphenated-man" is the name of my third opera, "contemplating the engine room" (1997) being the first one and "the secondman's middle stand" (2004) being the second...
whereas "...engine room" dealt w/my pop's life in the navy as a metaphor for the story of the minutemen and "...middle stand" was a parallel to dante's "comedia" dealing w/an illness that almost killed me in 2000, this third opera is quite different in that it has no standard narrative (libretto!) meaning no regular beginning-middle-end and is as it were "simultaneous" in the way a mirror from just inside my head - right in this middle-age moment of mine - was then shattered into thirty pieces and then each piece stuffed in the head to show a piece of my state of mind (or out-of-mind) as of now. "thirty tunes?" yes, they're little ones... actually they're "thirty parts" of one big tune.

oh, it was kind of trippy how this piece was actually made. I wrote all thirty parts on one of d. boon's telecaster - the black one he got in kent, ohio in 1984. now I'm not a very good guitarist but tom watson was quite the righteous man in his patience and determination to take the palsy demos I gave him and bring them to the piece." - Mike Watt

Besides the Mike Watt & The Missingmen dates, Watt will also hit the road for dates with Stooges, Hellride, Mike Watt & The Secondmen, and even play bass with Jandek in the coming months. All tour dates and some video is below.

Continue reading "Mike Watt releasing 'hyphenated-man', touring (dates)"

photos by Chris La Putt

"Saw a very briefly reunited Cibo Matto play "Birthday Cake". #my1999dreamcometrue #soooooawesome" - St. Vincent

Cibo Matto fans (like Chris) may have been a bit disappointed at Le Poisson Rouge last night (12/6). That's because the semi-reunited group only played four songs at the show which was billed as "Yuka & Miho cover Cibo Matto". Yuka Honda and Miho Hatori were backed by Thomas Bartlett (aka Doveman), Dougie Bowne, Doug Wieselman and Steven Bernstein (who also played the Bob Dylan event at the same venue one night earlier). After the four songs, a cake was brought out for Yuka who was celebrating her 50th birthday.

The show opened with a 15 minute noisy Nels Cline solo set followed by the Cibo Matto set, followed by a break before Floored by Four took the stage. As you know, Floored by Four is Mike Watt, Dougie Bowne, Yuka Honda, and Nels Cline. (there was more jamming after that - as Nels advertised there would be to the end the night - but Chris took off before the end).

The show was unofficially part of Wilco Week here in NYC which also saw Mikael Jorgensen playing with Yo La Tengo at Maxwell's last night while Jeff Tweedy, John Stirratt and Pat Sansone were not far away in Tarrytown (Jeff, John and Pat played a variety of NYC and Hoboken shows on the three nights prior).

Doug Wieselman plays again tonight, 12/7, at the Stone.

More pictures from the LPR show, two videos and the Cibo Matto setlist below...

Continue reading "Cibo Matto sort of reunited, Yuka Honda, Nels Cline, Mike Watt & friends jammed @ LPR (pics, video, setlist)"

Floored by Four @ Summerstage (more by Paul Bachmann)

The December 6th show at Le Poisson Rouge in NYC:

• is a 50th birthday party for Cibo Matto's Yuka Honda who used to be married to Dougie Bowne who she has a long history of playing music with, used to date Sean Lennon who she frequently collaborates with, and who is now engaged or married to guitar wizard Nels Cline of Wilco (Wikipedia says their wedding was scheduled for late November in Japan, so if that's true, congratulations to them!)
• will feature a live performance by Floored by Four aka Mike Watt, Dougie Bowne, Yuka C. Honda, and Nels Cline. It will be their 2nd live show ever which means their first must have been that Summerstage show with M Ward
• will feature a Nels Cline solo set "+ friendly jamming after 10:30pm"
• will include a set titled "Yuka & Miho cover Cibo Matto" which I assume means a Cibo Matto show, but without any of Yuka and Cibo's other band members?

Nels Cline will also be back at the same NYC venue on February 26th for "The Nels Cline Singers and ROVA perform 'The Celestial Septet'". Tickets are on sale for that too. All Nels dates below.

Will Nels Cline, Mike Watt, Yuka Honda, and/or Dougie Bowne play with Yo La Tengo at Maxwell's this week? I don't know, but it would be pretty cool.

Will Nels Cline's Wilco bandmate Jeff Tweedy play with Yo La Tengo at Maxwell's this week? Very likely.

Will Sean Lennon show up and play at all at LPR on 12/6? Maybe? Will Yuka Honda play with Sean Lennon and Charlotte Kemp Muhl aka The Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger at Rockwood Music Hall on January 8th? Maybe?

Can Yuka Honda, Dougie Bowne, Sean Lennon, and Nels Cline all be in the same room and everything be completely normal? Apparently?

Oh, and speaking of turning 50, don't forget tickets to Henry Rollins' upcoming shows at Joe's Pub go on sale Friday at noon.

Enjoy some birthday cake, with all Nels Cline tour dates, below...

Continue reading "Yuka Honda turning 50 -- Floored by Four w/ Mike Watt & her spouse Nels Cline playing 2nd gig ever, Cibo Matto show too"

J Mascis @ Summerstage in 2009 (more by Chris La Putt)

J Mascis has set to release his first solo acoustic album of new material (Martin & Me was a live acoustic LP with no new acoustic material), and first album for Sub Pop on March 15. The album is called Several Shades of Why and is his first solo release since 1996's Martin + Me. The tracklist is below.

As far as dates, all J has coming up at the moment is a performance on Saturday, November 13 at Prema Yoga to benefit Amma's charities. All proceeds from the show will be donated to Embracing The World, the humanitarian efforts of Mata Amritanandamayi Devi (Amma). Mascis will be joined on stage by Devadas and Tony Jarvis. Dinosaur Jr. will be performing Bug in its entirety at ATP in London on July 1.

In other Dinosaur Jr. related news, Lou Barlow has stated the following in a journal entry on his website dated 10/25/10:

I'm going to Japan on Halloween to visit a Mike Watt/Missingmen tour already in progress... play a few shows with them... THEN I'm going to Spain for Thanksgiving-time shows...
It doesn't seem possible for me to be home for more [than] a few weeks at a time... writing new songs doesn't seem possible either... I need home-time deluxe for that... to settle and spread my head
but there's talk of a new Dino record, I'll get something together if that happens... Also Sebadoh will be touring in support of the next 'classic' reissues: Bakesale and Harmacy... myself, Jason and Bob D'Amico... working those songs out should be fun, always is... February for Sebadoh tours, dates forth-coming.

Watt's tour just ended this past Sunday, but Tera Melos (who opened the October 17-22 dates) have just embarked on a US tour with Maps & Atlases. All dates, album tracklists and stuff below...

Continue reading "J Mascis is releasing a solo album, Sebadoh to tour soon, Mike Watt released an album in Japan & stuff"

Iggy Pop & the Stooges in Toronto for NXNE 2010

Iggy Pop and the Stooges played a free show in Toronto's Yonge-Dondas Square on Saturday June 19th, as part of the city's NXNE Festival. The show was controlled chaos in the middle of a very public section of the city that NXNE took over with a big outdoor stage for the duration of the festival. It would be like having a free, public Stooges show in the middle of Times Square, or Union Square, or at South Street Seaport even. The pictures here are from that crazy and amazing show (and are part of our slow drip of coverage from the fest...still more to come!).

The Stooges will be in the NYC-area for their Raw Power set at ATP NY over Labor Day weekend. They'll also be in Atlantic City on August 27th.

For the ATP NY show, Iggy and MVD Entertainment Group are running a contest for six winners to videotape the Stooges' set and interview Iggy at Kutscher's. To enter, you have to send in an HD-quality video with either questions for Iggy,or some kind of stunt as to why you should win. In addition to the ATP prize, the "fan shot footage, along with the contestant video submissions, will be crafted into a high definition longform program, which will be part concert film and part reality TV show about the journey of the fans." Part cool, part creepy. More details on the contest, and a video explaining it all featuring "Handsome" Dick Manitoba, are below.

In related news, Barney's New York will soon start selling Iggy Pop t-shirts that are part of the Archive 1887 collection...

"Archive 1887 t-shirts are made in Los Angeles from 100% cotton and feature artwork sourced from Sony Music's exclusive archives as well as the private collections of music's most important photographers. Each shirt comes with an online code that can be entered at www.archive1887.com to unlock a streaming playlist of the classic artists' music as well as background information on the images. Archive 1887 is sold at better department stores and specialty boutiques across North America as well Europe and Asia."

And in other related news, The Stooges have added three more songs to Rock Band (Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Wii). As of July 20th you can get "1969", "I Wanna Be Your Dog", and "No Fun" so you can be Iggy Pop in the comfort of your living room.

More pictures, video and the setlist from the completely mobbed NXNE free show (where many lost their shoes), and more contest details, below...

Continue reading "Iggy Pop (and the Stooges) played NXNE (pics), going to Barney's, playing ATP (interview him there), in Rock Band..."

"I am not exaggerating when I say that Iggy Pop's udder was 6 inches from my mouth tonight. Thank god for corporate VIP shows that let me in." -Klaus Kinski

"thank you upscale corporate New York assholes" -Iggy

The Stooges @ MHOW in Brooklyn - May 12, 2010 (iPhone pic by Ryan Muir)

Iggy Pop and the Stooges have public shows coming up that include NXNE in Toronto in June and ATP NY in the fall. Last night (5/12) they played a free, but invite-only show at Music Hall of Williamsburg (capacity around 600 lucky people) with the Virgins (who joined the Stooges on stage) and Free Energy.

Despite rumors that he was retiring, Iggy did stage dive. As you can tell from the above picture, Iggy also invited the crowd on the stage as usual, but during "Shake Appeal". The band consisted of Mike Watt, Scott "Rock Action" Asheton, Steve McKay on sax, and guitarist James Williamson who took over for the deceased Ron Asheton. The crowd was not actually as upscale corporate as Iggy pointed out - there was a mix of everyone including old punks and models. Some young punk rockers spotted in the audience included Ed Droste from Grizzly Bear and members of Dirty Projectors. The venue was decked out with old rock n roll photos. There was a VIP area upstairs and open bar and food. Before the encore, Iggy made mention of the fact that it was cool that nobody had to pay to get in. Thanks PP for the report. The setlist and more below...

Continue reading "Iggy Pop & the Stooges played Music Hall of Williamsburg "

DOWNLOAD: Shonen Knife - Super Group (MP3)

Shonen Knife kick off the North American tour for Super Group (their new album) today (10/16) with a show at Santos Party House. Joining them will be Miho Hatori's New Optimism and Shellshag. Tickets are still on sale.

The rest of the dates for their tour have been greatly updated. Their post-Fun Fun Fun Fest run in November with Jeff the Brotherhood now includes a Saturday, November 14th show at Maxwell's (with Girls At Dawn too). Tickets are on sale. The penultimate date on the tour is a November 18th show at Brooklyn Bowl with Jeff and Golden Triangle. Tickets are up for that.

All updated dates are below...

Continue reading "Shonen Knife kick off tour - updated dates, Santos Friday"

photos by Tim Griffin

Yesterday I wrote that "Iggy Pop, as well as Pavement (who are curating the other ATP UK weekend in May), are both rumored to be in the running for ATP NY in 2010." An hour later a commenter wrote, "heard the interview. iggy said they would be doing raw power upstate new york for atp next september...woops!!!!!!" A few hours after that, Iggy confirmed it while speaking at the Barnes & Noblie in Tribeca!

The NYC bookstore appearance was set up to promote a new book about The Stooges. Iggy joined author Robert Matheu who opened the night by talking about how he made the book, and how long it took him to secure 20+ year old images and negatives from photographers. Iggy did a lot of talking and they answered a lot of questions. Tim says, "He was asked about music that influenced him, and cited many types of music from Stravinsky and Dvorak to chanting to the Doors and and Louis Armstrong." Afterward they stuck around and signed autographs.

Iggy's ATP NY confirmation is not only the first artist announcement for the 2010 upstate New York festival, it's the first confirmation we have that it's even definitely happening at Kutscher's again. Iggy is also doing "Raw Power" in May for ATP in the UK, though unfortunately (obviously) without Ron Asheton (RIP)...

"Asheton, whose brother Scott is the Stooges drummer, died of a heart attack in January this year.

Pop, 62, told The Australian [in May] that he had plans to re-unite with the remaining Iggy and the Stooges line-up, with noughties Stooges addition Mike Watt on bass.

Pop said that while the original Stooges ended with Asheton's death, "there is always Iggy and the Stooges, the second growth of the band''.

"I had a meeting in LA last week with James (Williamson),'' Pop said. "It was the first time we had seen each other in 30 years. So we talked about doing something together. Raw Power would be the repertoire.''

The landmark album, mixed by Pop's friend David Bowie, has been cited by Nirvana's Kurt Cobain and many other rock stars as their favourite album and is considered one of the most influential in rock history, despite the fact that it sold so poorly on release.

Pop also revealed that Asheton had left six or seven "hard-driving rhythm tracks'' that could also be used in a future project."

Continue reading "Iggy Pop spoke @ Barnes & Noble in Tribeca (pics), performing Raw Power @ ATP NY in 2010!"

words by Andrew Frisicano, photos by Paul Bachmann

Saturday's balmy weather welcomed M. Ward to the Central Park SummerStage for one of the last stops on his tour behind his latest record Hold Time. Ward hits the road with Monsters of Folk this fall (a tour with two NYC stops), but at SummerStage the well-placed spotlight was all his (with not even his She & Him collaborator to be found).

He did share time with his band of skilled musicians, and many of his influences, to whom he paid musical tribute throughout the night. Ward opened with a solo acoustic rendition of "Sad, Sad Song," hitting the kick drum part out with his right hand. With the band on stage, M. Ward's smokey, paper-thin voice shared time with his golden riffs and the group's rich, early rock n' roll sound. That vibe - an early '60s kind of rockabilly swing - streamlined many of Ward's often idiosyncratic arrangements into a headliner-worthy set of hits.

Ward's unmistakable reference points along the way included Jerry Lee Lewis chops at the piano (where he sat for maybe half a dozen numbers) and Chuck Berry licks on guitar (with a cover of "Roll Over Beethoven" even). But maybe even more impressive than Ward's axe skill is his ability to cobble together a compelling 20-song set with very few lulls. All that in just under an hour. Add two encores, and the show still ended well before its 10pm curfew.

Floored By Four, in their debut performance, opened the evening with set of extended jams. Mike Watt casually walked along on bass, while Nels Cline, bold and upfront, ran his guitar through an array of effects that tweaked the sound in a number of novel ways. Keyboardist Yuka Honda layed down a harmonic foundation that at times veered into Twin Peaks territory. The group's set, like its members, walked the line between contemporary rock and more experimental forms. Perhaps most boldly, drummer Dougie Bowne ditched rock's inviolable constant beat at times, subbing unpredictable flurries of texture.

The commaraderie between Cline and Watt was evident as they joked around and cued chord changes with a head nod and a smile. (They've played together before in groups that include Watt's Black Gang and Banyan.) A clear highlight of their set was the closing jam, "Maggot Brain," a song periodically revisited by Watt and last on his solo debut Ball-hog or Tugboat?. The tune's opening incantation, delivered from Watt (who also sang the band's second number) set the stage for Cline's searing lead. His nickel-plated, sunset tone cut through several layers of crowd and foreshadowed (possibly surpassed) the guitar mastery to come.

More pictures, and a bunch of videos, below...

Continue reading "M Ward & Floored By Four @ Central Park Summerstage -pics"

by Andrew Frisicano

'Michelle' Watt w/ Black Fag 1/29/09...

Mike Watt is a musician seemingly without ego. He'll share a stage with anyone, and does - his upcoming dates have the bassist in no less than half a dozen settings. As you can see above, Watt even sat in on guest vocals with SoCal's Black Fag ('An absolutely FABULOUS tribute to Black Flag'). The group writes...

For those who haven't heard, Black Fag has extended an open invitation to all former members of Black Flag to join us on stage for a song of their choice at any of our shows.

The only requirement: they must perform in drag!

Mike Watt was never an official member of Black Flag, but his musical history is so intertwined with Black Flag's that we consider him an honorary member, so when we found out he'd be on the bill that night we contacted him to see if he would want to be the first to accept our invitation.

Mike Watt was recently in NYC for the "Double Nickels on the Dime" 25th Anniversary Party at the Bowery Poetry Club on Saturday, July 25th. At the variety-style show he played a selection of the band's songs on bass and did poetic reading (appropriate in light of the venue) of Minutemen lyrics. See videos of both below.

This Saturday, August 1st, he'll be debuting Floored By Four, his band with Wilco guitarist Nels Cline, Cibo Matto multi-instrumentalist Yuka Honda and ex-Lounge Lizard/"downtown" drummer Dougie Bowne. M. Ward headlines.

Nels is another musician who gets around quite a bit. Last night (July 30th) he was at the Stone in a trio called The BBC with Tim Berne on saxophone and Jim Black on drums (check out their initials for a clue about the name ).

"...Cline had a neat trick wherein he looped a watery guitar part through his electronic setup, and then used an octave pedal to get a distorted bass sound out of his guitar that he proceeded to play live over the loop. At other times, he went from solo line noodling to crunchy, unpredictable time-signature riffing that still kept heads bobbin'. There was flow there. Occasionally he had a scratch palette like Rage Against the Machine's Tom Morello, but instead of Bomb Squad-style guitar turntablism, it was spazzy like Christian Marclay. Meantime, Berne mostly kept to a subtle supporting role, coming out front most nakedly during the quiet interludes of the hour-long piece. Hopefully someone recorded this beast of a thing." [The Awl]

The show will be your last chance to catch Cline on his current run of NYC engagements. It'll also be your last chance to catch Scheinman for a while, as she'll be taking a break to have a child (that's due a little more than a month after the gig). Best wishes to her!

Check out the above-mentioned Watt videos, all Watt/Cline tour dates, below...

Continue reading "Mike Watt w / Black Fag, Bowery Poetry, Summerstage Saturday, Nels Cline & a very pregnant Jenny Scheinman"

Bowerbirds @ Mercury Lounge 4/27 (more by Chris La Putt)

tonight in NYC
* DANCE
* Todd Barry @ Caroline's
* Tanya Morgan @ Southpaw
* The Roots @ Highline Ballroom
* Forro in the Dark @ Music on the Oval
* Toby from Youth Group @ Living Room
* Bowerbirds, Megafaun @ Bowery Ballroom
* Mahavishnu Project @ (Le) Poisson Rouge
* Stepping Off "The Corner" @ Rockefeller Park
* The Duhks, Red Molly @ Madison Square Park
* The Sundelles, Little Girls, Browns @ Cake Shop
* Juana Molina, Curumin, El G @ Central Park Summerstage
* The Church, Adam Franklin (Swervedriver) @ Irving Plaza
* Taigaa!, Your Nature, Susu, Pursesnatchers @ Death By Audio
* Handsome Furs, Dri, The Cinnamon Band @ Music Hall of Williamsburg
* Friend With Benefits (reading series) w/ Jeff Lewis, Dave Hill, more @ Bruar Falls
* Latin Alternative Music Conference w/ Los Hollywood, Domino Saints, more @ Mercury Lounge
* Telecult Powers, Totally Dad, Peopling, Manburger Surgical, Gay Bomb, Peter J. Woods @ Glasslands

Iron Man is screening for free as part of Riverflicks at Pier 54 and 14th St, while Reality Bites plays at McCarren Park's SummerScreen.

You have your choice of New vs. Old with both Jet at Gramercy Theatre and
Def Leppard, Poison and Cheap Trick at Jones Beach Theater happening tonight.

Juana Molina, Curumin and El G play a free show at the Central Park Summerstage tonight. Other free music includes a tribute to Miles Davis' On the Corner at Rockefeller Park, Forro in the Dark at the Stuy Town Oval, and The Duhks and Red Molly at Madison Square Park

The Church come all the way from Australia for their gig tonight at Irving Plaza with Swervedriver's Adam Franklin.

The Roots reside at Highline Ballroom.

Bowerbirds' Upper Air just came out yesterday on Dead Oceans. They play tonight with Megafaun at the Bowery Ballroom

Tonight at the Bruar Falls: "CAPESHOK and IMPOSE present: "FRIENDS WITH BENEFITS" a new reading series featuring stories from the world of rock and roll tour horror! featuring readings by JEFFREY LEWIS, DAVE HILL, CHRIS LEO, PEPI GINSBERG, ALICIA JO RABINS."

Andrew Bird is (essentially) on tour through November. See an interview with Bird on QTV and a performance of "Fits and Dizzy Spells," below.

On August 1st, Mike Watt (as part of the supergroup Floored by Four) will be opening for M. Ward (who will play without his own supergroup Monsters of Folk) at the Central Park Summerstage. Check out a Dirty Laundry interview with Watt, below.

What else?

Continue reading "What's going on Wednesday?"

by Andrew Frisicano

Dinosaur Jr. @ ATP NY 2008 (more by Abbey Braden)

Dinosaur Jr.'s ninth LP, Farm, is out today (as is the new record by their Jagjaguwar label-mates Sunset Rubdown). In support of that record, the band has a nearly-two-month North American tour planned for the fall. That includes a show at Pop Montreal among many other places. No NYC date has been announced as part of that tour, but that's probably because of Dino Jr.'s free Summerstage show with the Walkmen on August 16th, not to mention the sold out show at Music Hall of Williamsburg in Brooklyn happening this Thursday (6/25) with Screaming Females.

Joining Dinosaur Jr. on their October dates will be Lou Barlow + the Missingmen, a group that is, as speculated, Lou with Tom Watson and Raul Morales, the crew that toured with Mike Watt a few months ago (including dates supporting Dinosaur Jr.).

The Missingmen will continue to play with Mike Watt too, with scattered shows along the West Coast scheduled (see full dates below).

Watt is also gigging with his other groups. He'll play in August with the Secondmen (with that group's original members, organist Pete Mazich and drummer Jerry Trebotic).

Before that, Watt'll debut a new band at the August 1st Central Park Summerstage show. That group, Floored by Four, also includes Nels Cline, Yuka Honda and Dougie Bowne. M. Ward headlines the show.

Floored by Four has plans to record in the days leading up to the Summerstage show. To tally up Watt's recording projects, his forthcoming records include Hyphenated Man (w/ the Missingmen), a Black Gang (w/ Nels Cline) record, a new Secondmen disc and probably others.

One of Watt's finest records, the Minutemen's Double Nickels on the Dime, will be recognized at the Bowery Poetry Club for a 25th anniversary celebration of the album on Saturday, July 25th. The plans for the party are as follows...

Be prepared for the extreme unusual, with spoken word renditions of songs on the album, musical tributes, rare videos and recordings, and special musical guest stars, including the bassist for the Minutemen, Mike Watt.

Performers confirmed so far include Michael T. Fournier (author of Double Nickels on the Dime (33-1/3 press), New Jersey experimental indie rock band Twede Kamer, Worcester, MA Minutemen cover band Pillowman, mystery punk bassist The Bass Player from Hand Job, electro-poetic mistress Jackie Sheeler, Jazz piano cabaret duo Peter Carlaftes & Kayo, Warhol scenester Ronnie Norpel and punkster poet Kat Georges (author of Punk Rock Journal).

Continue reading "Dinosaur Jr. album out, touring w/ Lou Barlow & the Missingmen (dates) sans Mike Watt who is plenty busy"

Jeff Tweedy @ Beacon High School (more by Eric Townsend)

"Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy gave fans a scare Saturday night at the recently refurbished Fox Theater in Pomona when he declared, 12 songs into the band's set, that the Chicago-based act was "approaching the end of an era," and promised more details later.

Those aren't words to be taken lightly for Wilco followers. Depending on who's doing the counting, the group has had as many as six different eras since releasing its country-obsessed 1995 debut, "A.M." Yet its audience has remained loyal through a host of lineup changes, Tweedy and bassist John Stirratt being the only constants in Wilco's career.

While the comment raised concerns about a future without, say, the participation of local guitar slinger Nels Cline or rhythmic contortionist Glenn Kotche, the truth turned out to be nothing so worrisome. After 45 minutes, Tweedy revealed only that multi-instrumentalist Pat Sansone was turning 40." [LA Times]

"Due to production changes, field tickets have just been released" for Wilco's upcoming show at Keyspan Park in Brooklyn. Yo La Tengo is opening.

Nels Cline has three non-Wilco NYC shows coming up. One of those shows is the previously-mentioned M. Ward Central Park Summerstage gig where Nels will play in a band with Mike Watt, Yuka Honda, Dougie Bowne. That foursome is called Floored by Four, and according to Mr Watt, they "plan to record a album the two days before the gig." Add it to the list. All Nels dates below...

Continue reading "Wilco played the Fox Theater (setlist), more NYC tix released, Nels Cline & Mike Watt are Floored by Four"

The lineup is coming together for Pop Montreal 2009 (September 30th to October 4th). Confirmed acts include Butthole Surfers, Fever Ray, Dinosaur Jr., Lou Barlow + The Missingmen, Loudon Wainwright III, Teenage Jesus & the Jerks, Thee Oh Sees, tUnE-YaRdS, to name a few.

Those interesting choices (like Lou Barlow with some configuration of Mike Watt's band?) are just part of the fest's usually-strong lineup. Full lineup so far, below...

Continue reading "Pop Montreal 2009 - initial lineup (Fever Ray, Os Mutantes, Butthole Surfers, Lou Barlow + the Missingmen...)"

words by Andrew Frisicano, photos by Lori Baily

Mike Watt and the Missingmen (drummer Raul Morales and guitarist Tom Watson) played the first of two NYC-area shows Thursday, May 7th at Maxwell's in Hoboken, NJ. Tonight (Friday, May 8th) the group visits the Mercury Lounge.

At Maxwell's, Watt kicked things off with a terse "1-2-Surf's up" before launching into an opening group instrumental. Watson on guitar faced-off against Watt on bass, with Morales pounding out the measures between. But the drum kit was anything but neutral territory: on more than one occasion Watt egged on Morales by crashing the cymbals with his hands, and spent most of the 4-or-so Watson-sung tunes perched behind drum set before stumbling across stage toward his own mic.

Tom Watson's guitar playing was a definite highlight. He spanned a spectrum of styles, from the pop-punk of the band's Roky Erickson cover, "Sweet Honey Pie," to the closely comped funk of the Minutemen numbers (which included Double Nickels tracks "One Reporter's Opinion," "Anxious Mo-fo," and "Toadies"). Watson, like Watt, channels the free-wheeling ideals of punk into a musically divergent direction; most times his sound was more "downtown" guitar than Johnny Ramone. Solos and oblique noises squeaked over Morales' even-handed drums in starts and stops, while across stage Watt ratcheted up the neck of his short-scale bass.

Watt on bass was unhinged but on point as he alternately strummed and slapped through the setlist, which mixed new tunes, older Watt material (Ball Hog b-side "The Big Bang Theory") and copious covers. I didn't catch all the cover songs, but "Ex-Lion Tamer" (Wire) and "Little Johnny Jewel" (Television) were two, with many more tucked in. The band took few breaks, and the vocals came out till Watt was beat red.

In total, the gig was something of a career primer with a definite look toward the future. Watt closed the set with his usual -- an emphatic "start yer own band."

More pictures from the show below...

Continue reading "Mike Watt & the Missingmen @ Maxwell's in NJ - pics"

interview by Chris Bilton, intro by Andrew Frisicano

Bassist Mike Watt has been in New York since Sunday, at work recording his fourth solo album, hyphenated-man, at a studio in Williamsburg. Watt is accompanied on that record, and on his current, nearly two-month tour, by the Missingmen -- drummer Raul Morales and guitarist Tom Watson.

NYC-area audiences finally get a chance to hear what Watt and the band have been up to when they play tonight, May 7th at Maxwell's in Hoboken. That's the first of two NYC-area shows; the second comes Friday, when Mike Watt and the Missingmen play the Mercury Lounge (openers include Lite, Kahoots and John DeVries of Agitpop). Tickets are still on sale.

The Missingmen project is just one of Watt's many efforts as a bandleader (to say nothing of his sideman gigs for the Stooges, J. Mascis and others). Another of those Watt fronted bands, the Black Gang (a project with Wilco guitarist Nels Cline), also recently cut a record. Release dates for both are TBA, but there's no lack of activity on the horizon. Cline and Watt are slated to open an August 1st show at the Central Park Summerstage, with M. Ward headlining.

EYE WEEKLY writer Chris Bilton spoke with Watt in mid-2008, where they discussed the bass player's storied history and busy future. That interview has remained on his hard drive until now...

Continue reading "an interview w/ Mike Watt (who is in town now) "

Summerstage in 2008 @ Born Ruffian show (more by Ryan Muir)

Constantines will open the Tuesday, June 30th Explosions in the Sky show at the Central Park Summerstage. Tickets for that show, which does cost money, are still on sale. More EITS dates HERE.

UPDATE: I'm told Constantines is not 100% confirmed for Summerstage.

M. Ward is playing Summerstage this summer as well. His Saturday, August 1st show is free -- and the openers are... Mike Watt and Nels Cline. It's not clear yet whether the duo will actually be playing together, separately, or as The Black Gang. As previously mentioned, "[Watt's] upcoming recording plans include...a separate project to be done with the black gang (Nels Cline from Wilco and Bob Lee), about what he calls 'my autumn.'" Last year some studio footage of Watt & Cline in the studio was posted to YouTube. You can watch that below.

Before all that, Mike Watt, with the Missingmen, has a huge tour planned for late spring. It kicks off on April 17th and runs straight through to Sasquatch Fest on May 24th, with a few days off in early May to record in Brooklyn. It's around that time that Mike appears at both Maxwell's and Mercury Lounge

Nels Cline is in NYC as we speak - continuing with a set of dates this weekend (April 10th-12th) at the Blue Note as part of the Jenny Scheinman Trio.

All Constantines tour dates and Black Gang Videos below...

Continue reading "Mike Watt & Nels Cline opening for M Ward @ Summerstage, Constantines touring, opening for EITS in Central Park?"

by Andrew Frisicano

Mike Watt and Iggy Pop @ Terminal 5 (more by Lori Baily)

As previously reported, Mike Watt is heading out on the road with The Missingmen to debut songs off his third studio album Ten and Tweny Don't Make Fifty, which the band will record May 5th on a three-day break in Brooklyn. The touring line-up is "Tom Watson on guitar, Raul Morales on drums and Watt on bass and spiel."

The band comes to Maxwell's in Hoboken on May 7th (tickets still on sale) and the Mercury Lounge on May 8th (tickets on sale).

Also Mike...

[Watt's] upcoming recording plans include...a separate project to be done with "the black gang" (Nels Cline from Wilco and Bob BLee), about what he calls "my autumn." Much of his time in recent years had been occupied touring and recording with the reformed Iggy & The Stooges; sadly Stooges guitarist Ron Asheton died of natural causes late last year.

On Préliminaires...Iggy sings the standard "Les Feuilles Mortes (Autumn Leaves)," originally covered by the likes of Yves Montand and Edith Piaf, while the New Orleans-influenced "King of the Dogs" -- with a jazz arrangement featuring trumpet, trombone and clarinet -- tells the story of a dog named Fox who explains "how cool it is to be a dog, and how much it beats human life." There's also a version of Antonio Carlos Jobim's bossa nova standard "How Insensitive (Insensatez)."

"At one point, I just got sick of listening to idiot thugs with guitars banging out crappy music. I've started listening to a lot of New Orleans-era, Louis Armstrong, Jelly Roll Morton type of jazz. And I've always loved quieter ballads as well," says Iggy. "There are some guitars on the album. Only one song is vaguely raucous; three have jazz-like instrumentation."

Check out the full press release with a video of Iggy Pop explaining the album plus a snippet of "King of the Dogs" - with jazzy instrumentation, and all Mike Watt + the Missingmen tour dates, below...

Continue reading "updated Mike Watt album & tour info, a new Iggy Pop album"

mike watt & the missingmen

I put the missingmen together in the summer of 2006 in order to bring forth my third punk rock opera "hyphenated-man" (the first two being 1997's "contemplating the engine room" and 2004's "the secondman's middle stand"). whereas "...engine room" dealt w/my pop's life in the navy as a metaphor for the story of the minutemen and "...middle stand" was a parallel to dante's "comedia" dealing w/an illness that almost killed me in 2000, this third opera will be quite different in that it has no standard narrative (libretto!) meaning no regular beginning-middle-end and will be as it were "simultaneous" in the way a mirror from just inside my head - right in this middle-age moment of mine - was then shattered into thirtynine pieces, each showing a piece of my state of mind (or out-of-mind) as of now. "thirty tunes?" yes, they're little ones. too heavy to really hear minutemen stuff for many years, I had to face myself and get the nerve up to hear it again when I agreed to let keith scheiron and tim irwin make the "we jam econo" documentary (many thanks to them and all who helped out on that). I even did a few gigs w/george hurley w/us as a duet doing the old tunes and it was trippy for me, like I was digging on how "econo" those tiny tunes were - no filler, right to point. a big influence was those little creatures in those old hieronymus bosch painting - I read a theory about them maybe being visualizations of proverbs or aphorisms and me, not knowing much about sixteenth century dutch/flemish culture, made up my own meanings! -Mike Watt

UPDATE: All upcoming Mike Watt shows are Missingmen dates.

Dates includes May 7th at Maxwell's in Hoboken (tickets on sale now), May 8th at Mercury Lounge in NYC (tickets on sale at noon), a bunch of other headlining dates, and a bunch of shows opening for Dinosaur Jr. (J Mascis and Mike Watt together again).

There's a small gap in Mike's schedule at the beginning of May. I thought maybe new dates would show up, but according to an update I got from Mike himself after I first published this: "in the middle, may 3-4-5 has me three days in the studio w/them to record my third opera at tony maimone's studio in brooklyn (studio g)." Them = the missingmen. Also, Mike's calling the trip "'prac for the 3rd opera' tour 2009."

Dinosaur Jr's. tour starts not long after SXSW..

Having recently signed with Jagjaguwar, Dinosaur Jr will be hitting the road in April to road test new material in a town near you in cozier environs than you might expect. For the fortunate fans who score tickets to these select shows, they will also receive either a limited edition, tour-only 7" or a digital download code with the purchase of a ticket. The songs on this release were recorded live during a Pitchfork.tv feature at J Mascis' own Bisquiteen Studios.

Continue reading "Mike Watt touring with & without Dinosaur Jr. - 2009 dates"

photos by Bao Nguyen

"In the three-year history of this festival, no act has ever been late - not even by a few minutes. It always impressed me that the artists maintained enough professionalism to be on time and the organizers insisted on a tight schedule.

So who does Lil Wayne think he is?

His scheduled start time was 3:50 p.m. Around that time, a roadie came out to test a guitar. Not a good sign....

...So, finally, just past 4:30, His Highness appeared, walking onto the stage in a tight white T-shirt, black jeans, shades and a University of Texas baseball cap as if he had all the time in the world. Without anything resembling an apology, Wayne started rapping along to the pre-recorded version of "Full Clip," his jeans already halfway down his thighs....

...With that, he announced he was going to "blow ya alls minds," the radio friendly hook of "Lollipop" began and Kanye West - on deck for tonight's closing slot - raced out to rap a few verses....

...I did make it down to the other stage in time to see Iggy Pop, plastered in sweat from head to toe and, as usual, displaying his unbelievably ripped torso (dude is 61!!)." [MyTimesDispatch.com]

Continue reading "Iggy Pop vs Lil' Wayne @ 2008 Baltimore Virgin Fest - pics"