by Bill Pearis

DOWNLOAD: Young Boys - Love Hits (MP3)

After a 7" in 2011 and a couple tracks released online last year, Brooklyn's Young Boys are set to release their debut album, New York Sun, next week (2/26). The quartet make gloomy, martial-beat post-punk with equal helpings of dissonance and melody. If you like Cold Cave or Merchandise (or '80s stuff like Lords of the New Church and Red Lorry Yellow Lorry) they are worth checking out. You can stream the entire album for the first time below and its mopey/catcy track "Love Hits" is downloadable above.

Young Boys have a couple local shows coming up. They play Saturday (2/23) at Death by Audio with You, Ritual Howls and Faten Kanaan; then their official album release party happens at Glasslands on March 3 with Xray Eyeballs and DJ sets by Brandon of Crocodiles and Punks on Mars. Advance tickets for the Glasslands show are on sale now.

Album stream below...

Continue reading "Young Boys releasing 'New York Sun' (stream the whole LP), playing shows"

Sandra Vu

Since you are so busy with Dum Dum Girls, do you find it difficult to balance both projects?

Yeah, it's really difficult actually. With Dum Dum Girls, we have a lot of stuff going on, but it's still hard to kind of perceive what we're going to be doing next year, for instance, and with a band you kind of have to know when you're going to be free way in advance--like six to nine months--and that's kind of why I have to do more DIY stuff, because then I can just do it when I have time and don't have to plan with a company or anything.

While listening to Sisu it sounds much different than Dum Dum Girls--sparse, dark, more synth. What would you say are the largest differences between the bands?

Probably the biggest difference is that we use a lot of synth and keyboards, where Dum Dum Girls is more straightforward rock 'n' roll. Dee Dee [Penny] and I have similar tastes in music, but it comes out different. She mainly writes songs with guitar and her voice, where Sisu could be inspired by a keyboard part or drum part, or guitar too, but I think you can tell it comes out differently. It's not a straightforward rock band. -[OC Weekly]

Cat Power has had some pretty eclectic openers for her shows of late: Xray Eyeballs have opened for the singer in NYC and Europe, and Angel Haze will do so at Terminal 5 on Tuesday (1/29). For a couple of her other East Coast shows -- tonight (1/28) in Richmond, VA and Wednesday (1/30) in Philly -- Chan Marshall has tapped dream pop combo SISU, the band fronted by Dum Dum Girls drummer Sandra Vu.

UPDATE: SISU now also playing the Terminal 5 show as well. Updated dates below.

While on the East Coast, SISU will play NYC as well, hitting Glasslands on Thursday (1/31) for a pretty sweet line-up that includes an "electric duo" version of Crocodiles as headliners, plus Punks of Mars and a Cassie Ramone solo set. Advance tickets are on sale.

SISU will be releasing new music soon via NYC label Mono Prism but in the meantime you can stream Demon Tapes Vol. 2 below.

Continue reading "SISU opening for Cat Power on tour, playing NYC w/ Crocodiles, Cassie Ramone & more (dates)"

by Bill Pearis

DOWNLOAD: BLURRY BITTERS - A CAKE SHOP BEST OF 2012 MIXTAPE (MP3)

Eddy Current Suppression Ring @ Cake Shop, June 2010 (more by Diana Wong)

One of the biggest, most genuine music fans I know is Andy from Ludlow Street indie rock club Cake Shop. He's an indefatigable listener and always turns me onto new stuff. Here we've got his "best of 2012 and live from cakeshop and recorded" which is topped by Parquet Courts' fantastic debut album, Light Up Gold. You can check out the full list of "21 AMAZING EXPERIENCES" below.

Andy is also a great maker of mixes, and I stil put in one he made for the Cake Shop/Slumberland 2009 SXSW showcase from time to time. Over at the Cake Shop blog, he posted a 2012 mix loaded with great stuff that you can download above and see the tracklist below. Highly recommend. Cake Shop had a successful Pledge Music campaign this year, signed a new 10-year lease, survived the Great Sandy Blackout, and I can't wait to see more bands there in 2013 (like maybe Obits on January 19) and beyond.

Andy from Cake Shop's Best of 2012 list and mixtape tracklist are below...

Continue reading "Andy Bodor from Cake Shop's "21 AMAZING EXPERIENCES" of 2012, plus a year-end mixtape"

by Bill Pearis

Punks on Mars will release their new album, Bad Expectations, next week (10/30) on Zoo Music (the label run by Dee Dee of Dum Dum Girls and Brandon of Crocodiles). It's a 14-song, 28-minute glammy, power pop new wave mini-opus that should appeal to fans of King Tuff, Television Personalities and the dB's (Cheap Trick too), really packing a lot of hooks into its short running time. You can stream the very catchy "Showers of Pain" below.

Punks on Mars, now a four-piece, will play a record release party at Cake Shop on Sunday, November 4 with openers still TBA.

Continue reading "Punks on Mars ready new LP (stream a track), playing NYC record release show"

by Andrew Sacher

Japanese-born/Brooklyn-residing post-punk trio ZZZ's were formed this past March with Youkaku (guitar/vox), Yukary (bass/vox), and Lyn (drums), all of whom were members of Hystoic Vein, who broke up in October 2011. They've got three bleak studio recordings online at the moment -- the piercing, Yeah Yeah Yeahs-sounding "Suicide," and two drearier, yet equally dissonant cuts, "Dystopia" and "Cut it Out" -- all of which you can stream below. You can also check out a few live videos of other songs from their Fontana's show this past April, the chugging "Busy Bee," and the no-wavey "Hour Glass."

The girls will be playing a handful of local shows during and before CMJ. First they'll play Glasslands on Sunday (10/14) with Pony Bones and Electric Set (tickets). Then for CMJ, they'll play Cake Shop on October 17 with Hussle Club, I.R.O.K., Punks on Mars, Ghost Wave, Pyschobuildings, Half Undressed, Communist Daughter, and Blessed Feathers; the Sam Mickens-presented show at Bowery Electric on 10/18 (4 PM) with Blue Hawaii, TOPS, and Jack Ladder & the Dreamlanders; Grand Victory on 10/18 (9 PM) with The Netherlands, DON'T, Gentlemen, and Cinema, Cinema; and FreeCandy on 10/20 (905 Atlantic Ave, 2nd Floor) with The Suzan, Trabajo, 1200 Trees, and Unkle Yva Punkfaggot.

Those local dates are the only ones the band has scheduled at the moment. You can read them in list form, listen to those song streams, and watch those live videos below.

Continue reading "ZZZ's playing CMJ shows (dates, streams, live videos)"

Royal Baths circa now

Royal Baths are opening for Moon Duo tomorrow night (10/5) at Knitting Factory and the show will be their first with a new line-up that includes Lesley Hann of Friends on bass (who seems to have left that group, along with Matthew Molnar, if their most recent 285 Kent show is any indication). Tickets are still available.

If you can't make it tomorrow night, Royal Baths have a bunch of other shows coming up, including Sunday (10/7) at Bowery Electric (whose booking seems to be getting more interesting now that Sam Mickens has been handling some of the shows there) with Larkin Grimm, Behavior & M. Lamar; Wednesday (10/10) at Glasslands with Grooms, Dum Dum Girls offshoot SISU and Punks on Mars (tickets); October 16 at 285 Kent with Forma and the Golden Awesome; and a CMJ show at Cheap Storage on October 19 with King Tuff, Habibi, Turnip King and Total Slacker (tickets). Royal Baths tour dates are listed below.

Meanwhile, Royal Baths' Jeremy Cox features on Blasted Canyons' version of "Venus in Furs" that will be on the upcoming Castle Face Velvet Underground tribute album we told you about. That album is out November 6. Royal Baths most recent album, Better Luck Next Life, came out back in February.

Speaking of Total Slacker, the band have had a sad week with the death of their drummer Terence Connor in a hit-and-run. The band will pay tribute to him this Saturday (10/6) at Cheap Storage with a dance party featuring DJ sets from Weird Rivers, Cool Serbia, DOM, and Prince Rama. Suggested donation is $5 and all procedes go to Connor's family. More info here.

Continue reading "Friends' Lesley Hann joins Royal Baths who have a bunch of upcoming shows (dates)"

by Bill Pearis

Crocodiles at 4 Knotts 2012 (more by Chris La Putt)

Crocodiles' tour rolls through NYC tonight (Friday, 9/28) for a show at Bowery Ballroom. Tickets for that show are still available but if you'd like to go for free, we've got two pair of tickets to give away. Details on how to enter are at the bottom of this post along with a list of all dates.

The band are supporting their most recent album, Endless Flowers, which finds them widening their scope while still holding on to those Spacemen 3/JAMC roots. It's a good record. You can stream the whole thing at Spotify and check out the video for its title track below. Openers for this show are Punks on Mars and Alexis & Icewater.

Brandon of Crocodiles' wife, Dee Dee, will be playing with the rest of Dum Dum Girls at Europa on Sunday (9/30) with Chez Deep and Starred, and tickets to that show are still available. It's a record release show for their terrific new End of Daze EP. DDGs will be back opening for The Walkmen at Terminal 5 on October 18 (tickets).

Meanwhile, DDG drummer Sandy's band, SISU, play Glasslands before that on October 10 with Grooms, Royal Baths, and Punks on Mars (tickets). Bleeding Rainbow were on that bill originally, but seem to have dropped off. (They do have other shows in NYC though.)

Continue reading "Crocodiles are on tour, in NYC tonight (win tix!); Dum Dum Girls here this weekend too"

by Bill Pearis

Bleeding Rainbow at Brooklyn Bowl, 8/29/2012 via @brooklynvegan Instagram

Philadelphia's Bleeding Rainbow played Brooklyn Bowl last night with Oberhofer and Heavenly Beat and had a pretty good set, rocking more of a shoegaze-meets-X vibe now that they're a four-piece, playing songs mostly from their terrific new album, Yeah Right, which recently got moved from an October 2012 release to January 2013. You'll have another chance to see them before that as the band just announced they'll play Glasslands on October 10 and tickets for that show are on sale now.

Some of you may want to go just to see openers SISU which is Dum Dum Girls drummer Sandra Vu's band who make gothy postpunk/shoegaze a la Lush or Slowdive (with a slinky dash of Siouxsie perhaps). I caught them at SXSW this year and thought they were pretty good, despite their drummer being MIA. SISU's debut album is due out any minute, but in the meantime you can stream their Demon Tapes, Vol 2 EP below (and download it for free from Bandcamp). No other SISU tour dates at the moment but seems like a long trip from L.A. just for one show and CMJ just a week later.

Also playing are new wave fans Punks on Mars who just released a new single, "People Talk," on his Bandcamp which is also a free download and streamable below. If you like King Tuff or Jay Reatard or the Knack you should check 'em out.

Streams are below.

Continue reading "Bleeding Rainbow played Brooklyn Bowl, playing Glasslands w/ SISU (Sandra of DDGs) and Punks on Mars (streams)"

photos by Amanda Hatfield

Dum Dum Girls @ Music Hall of Williamsburg

After playing a secret show at Cake Shop one night earlier Widowspeak, The Babies, and Punks on Mars played a much larger and public show at Music Hall of Williamsburg on Tuesday (2/7), but this time Dum Dum Girls were dressed all in white!! Proof is in this post.

Dum Dum Girls (usually all in black) and Windowspeak with continue their joint tour with another area show at Maxwell's this Saturday (2/11). Tickets are still available.

Widowspeak have also announced a Glasslands show with Mac DeMarco who is signed to Captured Tracks whose SXSW showcase Widowspeak is also playing.

More pictures from MHOW, including a shot of the headliner's setlist, below...

Continue reading " Dum Dum Girls wore WHITE at Music Hall of Williamsburg w/ Widowspeak & Punks on Mars (pics)"

photos by Jessica Amaya

Dum Dum Girls @ Cake Shop - 2/6/12

As hinted earlier and then 100% confirmed before showtime, Dum Dum Girls & Widowspeak layed Cake Shop last night (2/6) with The Babies, and Punks on Mars. It looked like both Widowspeak and Dum Dum Girls were sporting new bass players. Here are some pictures.

Three of the four bands (sans The Babies) will play again at Music Hall of Williamsburg tonight (2/7, tickets) and at Maxwell's on 2/11 (tickets). Both NYC-area shows are part of a larger tour for Dum Dum Girls/Widowspeak. All DDG dates, including the recently-announced Sasquatch, and more pictures from Cake Shop, below...

Continue reading "Dum Dum Girls & Widowspeak played a secret show @ Cake Shop w/ the Babies & Punks on Mars (pics) "

"Harsh Realm" are headlining Cake Shop tonight/Monday (2/6) after sets by The Babies and Punks on Mars. UPDATE: now there is also a "TBA" 4th act on the bill too.

In other news, Widowspeak kicks off a short tour with Dum Dum Girls at Music Hall of Williamsburg Tuesday night (2/7). Punks on Mars (aka Ryan Howe) open the Brooklyn show too, and tickets are still on sale.