One of the most eclectic lineups in the US, Hopscotch Festival in Raleigh, NC, will be back for 2013 on September 5 -7. Pulling from all genres, this year's line-up includes names like Big Boi (who plays NYC tonight), Spiritualized, Sleep, Wolf Eyes (who have a new video), The Breeders (performing Last Splash), John Cale, Kurt Vile & the Violators, Gorguts, Inter Arma (who play NYC on Saturday), Double Negative (who played NYC this past weekend), Swearin' (them too), Pissed Jeans, Dan Friel, Waxahatchee and many many others. Three-day wristbands are on sale now with individual day tickets going on sale in June. Full lineup is below.

Continue reading "Hopscotch announces 2013 lineup (Big Boi, Sleep, Spiritualized, Kurt Vile, Wolf Eyes, John Cale, more)"

photos by Dana (distortion) Yavin

Sigur Ros / Bat For Lashes / Spiritualized

"It was a mixed bag for veteran acts on Saturday. On one hand, The Evens, featuring ex-Minor Threat and Fugazi man Ian MacKaye, drew a respectable (and respectful) Gobi Tent crowd early in the day; the Descendents' influential melodic-punk found a fairly large following at the Outdoor Theatre under the stars; and New Order brought a solid throng along for its night-capping Mojave Tent performance (despite going up against headlining Phoenix and post-rock favorites Sigur Rós, among others). But reunited D.C. garage-soul outfit The Make-Up, underground hip-hop icon El-P and British ska survivors The Selecter played to some of the weekend's sparsest audiences in the Gobi Tent." [Las Vegas Weekly]

UPDATE: Pictures from Sunday are HERE.

Saturday photos are in this post and continue below...

Continue reading "Coachella Day 2 Photos (Sigur Ros, Bat For Lashes, Major Lazer, Descendents, 2 Chainz, Phoenix, Postal Service, more)"

photos by PSquared Photography

Spiritualized @ Secret Project Robot 4/2/2013

Spiritualized surprised nearly everyone yesterday by announcing they'd be playing tiny Bushwick DIY space Secret Project Robot that night (4/2) as a warm-up to their West Coast tour that includes stops at both Coachella weekends. SPR let in maybe 150 people, and Jason Pierce and his band (which includes Oneida drummer Kid Millions on this go-round) ran though a dozen songs, including "Walkin' with Jesus" by Jason's old band, Spacemen 3 (It was on the setlist, but got cut).

Setlist, more pics and quite a bit of video from last night's Spiritualized show are below.

Continue reading "Spiritualized played Secret Project Robot (pics, video, setlist)"

Spiritualized @ T5, May 2012 (more by Dana [distortion] Yavin)

We thought this was an April Fools Day joke at first but apparently it's true. Spiritualized, whose West Coast tour (scheduled around Coachella) kicks off in Colorado on Thursday (4/4), have been practicing here in Brooklyn with new touring members Kid Millions (Oneida) and Brad Truax (currently in Interpol). They've decided to do a last-minute NYC show tonight (4/2) at Secret Project Robot! No advance tickets. Doors are at 8 PM, the show is at 9 PM and will be over by 11 PM. $10.

Whoah.

Click it for the bigger poster.

Spiritualized @ T5, May 2012 (more by Dana [distortion] Yavin)

Spiritualized had a great 2012, releasing one of the most acclaimed albums of their 20-year career and touring all over (including NYC back in May). Jason Pierce and company are coming back to America this Spring for another tour, hitting NYC this time at Webster Hall on March 19. No ticket info yet for that show but you can keep checking Ticketmaster.

UPDATE: Scratch that, the tour has been cancelled. No upcoming U.S. dates. Bummer.

UPDATE 1/11: Looks like the West Coast dates are happening. (Coachella would fit right in there too.) No East Coast though. Dates are listed below.

Continue reading "Spiritualized touring West Coast around the time of Coachella (dates)"

The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion released a new album, Meat and Bone, this year and we spoke to drummer Russell Simins to see what his favorite albums of the year were. There is some new stuff there, but a good chunk of the list is made up of reissues and uncovered lost recordings, and he's got some really interesting inclusions. Check out his full list below.

As mentioned, the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion will play a WFMU benefit (to help WFMU recover from Sandy damages) in NYC on January 13 at The Bell House with Jonathan Toubin, legendary Texas gospel funk group The Relatives (who also play Joe's Pub a day later with Debo Band), Dot Wiggin, and Di Dionyso. Tickets for that show are still available.

Russell's list below...

Continue reading "Russell Simins' (JSBX) Top Albums of 2012"

Today Pitchfork posted the first half (well, first 30 albums) of their Top 50 Albums of 2012 list. There are some surprises on it, like Peaking Lights and Sharon Van Etten, who seemed more likely to end up on their Honorable Mentions list due to their relatively lower scores and the fact that most of the albums on this list were awarded Best New Music throughout the year. Cat Power and Hot Chip also make it, both of whose new albums seemed to have received less love from Pitchfork than previous releases by those artists. A Rustie Essential Mix also makes the list even though his actual album which came out last year didn't make their 2011 list. And of course the expected ones end up there too like Purity Ring, Julia Holter, Schoolboy Q, Miguel, and more. The remaining 20 will be revealed tomorrow (Friday, 12/21).

Check out their 50-30 picks below...

Continue reading "30 of Pitchfork's Top 50 Albums of 2012"

by Bill Pearis

Pitchfork just posted their much anticipated list of the top 100 tracks of 2012. The #1 slot went to... Grimes! Whether you thought the whole of her album Visions was good or not, it was hard to deny the charms of "Oblivion." (Having that great video didn't hurt either.) Do you think it deserved to top the list? If not then what song should've?

You can check out P4K's entire hot 100 of 2012 below.

Continue reading "Pitchfork's Top 100 Tracks of 2012 (Grimes' "Oblivion" is #1)"

by Bill Pearis

DOWNLOAD: Ex Cops - Wonderful Christmas Time (MP3)

photo by Nanci Sarrouf

Admission. Paul McCartney's "Wonderful Christmas Time" is easily my most-hated holiday pop song. Repetive, grating, plodding, and seemingly recorded by accident, the song makes me want to suck a candycane into a point and gouge out my eardrums. (Unlike, say, The Waitresses' "Christmas Wrapping" which I can listen to ad infinitum.) So it's a Christmas miracle that Ex Cops have taken this unfortunate Macca yuletide perennial and sped it up, turned it up and transformed it into a rough-hewn little indiepop charmer. We've got the premiere of the song right here in the post to download above or stream below. Merry Ex-mas.

Another present you're going to have to wait a bit for is Ex Cops terrific debut album, True Hallucinations, which hits January 22 via Other Music Recording Company. The band are playing a record release show at Glasslands that same day with Hunters also on the bill (tickets). After that, Ex Cops play Mercury Lounge on February 15 and tickets to that show are on sale at noon. You can see them sooner than that, though, as they were just added to tonight's Paul Banks show at Webster Hall (12/14) and tickets are still available.

Meanwhile Ex Cops' Brian Harding and Amalie Bruun have each submitted lists of their favorite songs from 2012. In a bit of daring, they both include their own single "You Are a Lion, I Am a Lamb" on their respective lists. Check them out below.

Continue reading "Ex Cops cover Paul McCartney, list Top 10 Songs of 2012, opening for Paul Banks + more NYC shows (dates, streams)"

Long-running UK music weekly NME has just published their Year-End issue and have named Tame Impala's Lonerism as album of the year, with Grimes, Frank Ocean, Crystal Castles and Alt-J rounding out the Top 5. Tame Impala offshoot Pond comes in at #7. Check out the entire Top 50 list below.

As mentioned before, Tame Impala just announced a 2013 tour, and will play Terminal 5 in NYC on February 19. Tickets for that show go on sale Friday (11/30) at noon.

NME's Top 50 LPs of 2012 are listed below.

Continue reading "NME Top 50 Albums of 2012; Tame Impala 'Lonerism' gets #1"

Iron Maiden @ Jones Beach the other day (more by Dana (distortion) Yavin)

today in NYC
* Brain Cloud @ Barbes
* Matt Doyle @ Joe's Pub
* Daniel Higgs @ Zebulon
* The Henry Clay People @ Brooklyn Bowl
* Sweet Street Symphony @ Manhattan Inn
* Alice Cooper, Iron Maiden @ Prudential Center
* Stevie Nicks, Marc Cohn @ Beacon Theatre
* Fruit Bats, Yellowbirds @ Knitting Factory
* Ricardo Gallo's Tierra de Nadie @ Joe's Pub
* Dead Mellotron, Stealing @ Mercury Lounge
* Cardinal, The Inner Banks @ Mercury Lounge
* Chris Rael, Rabindra Goswami, Ramu Pandit @ Barbes
* Hollows, Darlings, Boyhood, Graveyard Lovers @ Glasslands
* Doug Loves Movies Doug Benson Live Podcast @ Gramercy Theater
* Bryan and The Haggards, Eugene Chadbourne @ Vaudeville Park
* Day Eye, Sweet Dreams, VLADRM, DJ Box Of Burned Clothes @ Cameo
* Very Be Careful, Veveritse Brass Band, DJ Lamar Vannoy @ Littlefield

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"The Wizard of Oz" screens today for free in Bryant Park (at sunset).

"Ghostbusters" plays for free in Coney Island on the beach, near West 10th.

"The Runway" screens for free, as part of the River to River Festival, at Elevated Acre (55 Water St., Manhattan). 6pm doors. 8pm start.

No "Whiplash" tonight because UCB is closed for DCM hangover. UCB East is showing a (sold out) movie though.

4th of July is coming. Here's where to watch the NYC fireworks.

The Spy Music Festival continues.

Aesop Rock has a new video for "ZZZ Top" off of his upcoming LP, Skelethon. His tour in support of the album brings him to NYC for a show at Irving Plaza on August 3. Check out the new video below.

Spiritualized have released a new video for "Little Girl". Check it out below...

What else?

Continue reading "What's going on Monday?"

photos by Chris Graham and Rae Graham

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah/Feist

Before the release of their 2011 album, "Hysterical," Clap Your Hands Say Yeah had been inactive for three years, but they were as lively as ever on Monday afternoon. Blowing through tracks from all three of their albums, Alec Ounsworth and company charged through a set full of guitar-based indie rock that catered heavily towards their fans. But judging by the crowd's response, even those who were unfamiliar with the band were enticed. After playing Sasquatch! 2006 on a much smaller stage, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah's triumphant set had the crowd, well, clapping their hands and saying "yeah!"

Mogwai (who have upcoming shows with Balam Acab) were supposed to play that day but they cancelled last minute and were replaced by Deer Tick who came on to play a set of covers.

Pictures of Day 1 are HERE, Day 2 are HERE and HERE, Day 3 are HERE, and more from Day 4 below...

Continue reading "Sasquatch 2012 in pics - Day 4 (Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Feist, Beck, Spiritualized, SBTRKT, Shabazz Palaces & more)"

photos by Dana (distortion) Yavin

Three or four chords, a handful of verses and a brazen guitar line are all Jason Pierce, a k a J. Spaceman, needs for songs that can heave along for a good 10 minutes without wearing out their welcome... While Mr. Pierce rasps out his vocals, the keyboards swell, backup singers deliver oohs and la-las, and guitars work themselves up toward scrabbling tremolo and feedback. Amid it all, Mr. Pierce presents himself as a disillusioned hedonist, a sufferer with himself to blame, a lost soul: alone in the vast turmoil of the music, mourning lost chances and wishing for more.

On albums like this year's Sweet Heart Sweet Light, the band's seventh in 20 years, Spiritualized deploys a large cast: strings, horns, singers, free-jazz saxophonists, all taking their place in the music's tidal crest and ebb. Onstage things were leaner, with a five-man band and two female backup singers. Yet the music grew just as colossal -- perhaps even more so, with fewer distracting details in the grand expanse. -[NY Times]

If you miss thje shows, look for streaming audio via NPR from Spiritualized's appearance at 9:30 Club in DC last night (5/10). Spiritualized also appeared on Letterman on May 7 (the same night as T5). Watch that, along with more pictures and the setlist from the NY show, below...

Continue reading "Spiritualized played Letterman & Terminal 5 with Nikki Lane (video, pics & setlist)"

by Bill Pearis

DOWNLOAD: Nikki Lane - Sleep for You (MP3)

If you're heading to see Spiritualized on their current North American tour (like tonight's show at Terminal 5) you might want to get there early to check out Nashville's Nikki Lane. Her album Walk of Shame came out last fall on IAMSOUND records and is indebted to '60s classic country. (Wanda Jackson is a common comparison.) You can download "Sleep for You" from it at the top of this post and watch the video for it (and "Gone Gone Gone") below, or stream the whole album on Spotify.

Check out photos from the Nikki Lane and Spirtualized show in Chicago here. All Nikki Lane / Spiritualized tour dates and some videos are below.

Continue reading "Nikki Lane opening for Spiritualized on tour (dates & MP3)"

"There's a strange alchemy at work in Spiritualized, the band Jason Pierce has fronted since 1990. On its surface, the music mines many of the same themes, musical or otherwise, again and again, over and over, album after album. There's nary a Spiritualized song that doesn't touch on God, drugs, love, or typically a blurry mix of all three, while the music itself consistently recalls no less than the Velvet Underground recast as a gospel-blues outfit, amped up and dosed with melancholy..." [Chicago Tribune]

Nikki Lane opens for Spiritualized at Terminal 5 tonight. Check out pictures and the setlist from the Chicago show.

You can also catch Spiritualized on Letterman tonight.

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What else?

Psych rockers The Brian Jonestown Massacre have a slew of upcoming international dates this year including Austin Psych Fest next month. After heading overseas to Australia in May and Europe in June/July, they'll return to North America for an East Coast run in August which culminates in a NYC show at Webster Hall on August 25 with Magic Castles. Tickets for that show are on AmEx presale now and go on sale to the general public on Friday (4/13) at noon. All dates are listed below.

The Brian Jonestown Massacre are to set to release their thirteenth full length album, Aufheben, this year on May 1 via 'a' Records. The lineup for this album includes original members Anton Newcome and Matt Hollywood, along with Will Carruthers (Spiritualized), Constantine Karlis (Dimmer), Thibault Pesenti (Rockcandys), and Eliza Karmasalo providing additional vocals. Check out album track "I Wanna Hold Your Other Hand" below, along with the album artwork and tracklist.

In related '90s neo-psychedelic bands news, you can stream the new Spiritualized album, Sweet Heart Sweet Light, on NPR.

AND, the Dandy Warhols announced a tour and album too.

All Brian Jonestown dates, stream, album art and tracklist below...

Continue reading "The Brian Jonestown Massacre announce tour & new album; Spiritualized streaming theirs"

Listen to the almost 9-minute "Hey Jane" below...

Continue reading "listen to a new Spiritualized track (album out 4/17)"

"Following last year's 10th anniversary, which crushed previous attendance records and set a new mark for the speed with which tickets sold out, the Sasquatch! Music Festival unveils its 2012 lineup which once again features 4 days of music. The festival, hailed as "a model of well-paced programming...in a four-day schedule as efficient and natural feeling as an expertly built algorithm" by NPR Music while Wired notes, "leave the landscape out of it and Sasquatch! has a lineup to kill for," runs May 25-28 (Memorial Day Weekend) at The Gorge, the internationally acclaimed concert venue carved in the basalt cliffs high above the Columbia River Gorge in Quincy, WA."

Continue reading "Sasquatch! 2012 lineup announced (Bon Iver, Jack White, Beck, Tenacious D, Shins, Portlandia, Spiritualized & more) "

Sonic Boom w/ Panda Bear at MHOW in 2011 (more by Amanda Hatfield)

Sonic Boom aka Peter Kember of Spacemen 3/Spectrum/E.A.R., has had a busy last two years, producing MGMT's Congratulations and playing live with them in 2010, and producing Panda Bear's Tomboy and playing live with him in 2011. Now, he's kicking off 2012 with his own show in NYC at Knitting Factory on March 30. Tickets are on sale now.

Sonic Boom's ex-Spacemen 3 bandmate Jason Pierce has an upcoming tour and album with Spiritualized which hits NYC on May 7 at Terminal 5. Tickets are on AmEx presale now and go on sale to the general public on Friday (2/3) at noon.

A live video of Sonic Boom below...

Continue reading "Sonic Boom schedules a show; Spiritualized tickets on sale"

Spiritaulized at Radio City in 2010 (more)

Psych rockers Spiritualized announced last year that they've signed with Fat Possum in the US and Domino imprint Double Six in the UK to release their new album, Sweet Heart Sweet Light, their first since 2008's Songs in A&E. The album was initially set for a March 19 release date but according to an interview with SPIN, the release is being pushed back a few weeks and will likely come out in late March or early April. Spiritualized frontman/main person Jason Pierce said:

had the rather foolish idea last November that I could deliver the record that's been sent out and keep working on the real version. I'd meet the delivery date they need for reviews and things like that and nobody would be any the wiser that I'd be carrying on with the mixing. [The new version of the album] is quite different. People say that all the little mixing moves I'm doing now are just for myself, but to me they're no different than the mixing moves I did at the start of the process. Balancing things is what mixing is. Some bits are more realized and closer to what I wanted them to sound like, but I'm in the unenviable position now where the [album] that's out there isn't finished.

Spiritualized already have a number of UK dates scheduled in support of the album, and they've just announced a North American tour, including a NYC show happening on May 7 at Terminal 5. Tickets go on sale Friday (2/3) at noon with an AmEx presale starting Wednesday (2/1) at noon.

All currently known dates and Sweet Heart Sweet Light tracklist below...

Continue reading "new Spiritualized album coming (but not the one that was already sent out), North American tour announced (dates)"

...with a choir and an orchestra with strings and horns. Mindblowing, mesmerizing, massive, epic, surreal, amazing, glorious, fantastic, "Best Concert Ever", "I can Die Happy Now"... whatever adjective you choose, Spiritualized was it at Radio City Music Hall on Friday night. Jason Pierce and band performed their most acclaimed album, 1997's Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space, in NYC's swankiest venue, followed by a 2-song, 'spellbindingly sensational' encore of "Out Of Sight" and "Oh Happy Day" to close out the setlist.

The Friday night show was the fifth of five ZYNC-presented SPIN 25th Anniversary shows (the other four were all at Terminal 5). And thankfully there was an online stream, so those who couldn't be at the concert, could still experience it live, and can probably experience it later since the whole thing is sure to show up in various bootleg forms including on YouTube fairly soon. Speaking of the stream, since it's Friday night and the show just ended and we won't have any real pictures anytime soon, a whole bunch more stream screen caps that still give you a good idea of what it looked like, continue below...

Continue reading "Spiritualized played Ladies & Gentlemen @ Radio City..."

It's a busy week for big NYC shows. The Flaming Lips are here for two performances, starting with the gig tonight/Monday at Central Park SummerStage. Oneida opens. The Flaming Lips show Tuesday night at Terminal 5 is part of the Spin25 series of gigs running each day this week.

Spin25, sponsored by American Express's new ZYNC card (as you can see in the picture above), kicks off with Smashing Pumpkins tonight at Terminal 5, and continues with Flaming Lips on July 27th, the Black Keys on July 28th, the National on July 29th (all at Terminal 5), and Spiritualized on July 30th at Radio City. Show openers are listed below (Spiritualized, which has no opener, is the only one with tickets available currently).

THIS WEEK AT TERMINAL 5
7/26 - Smashing Pumpkins @ Terminal 5 (w/ Kill Hannah & The Jim Jones Revue)
7/27 - The Flaming Lips @ Terminal 5 (w/ Fang Island)
7/28 - The Black Keys @ Terminal 5 (w/ Lee Fields & The Expressions & The Whigs)
7/29 - The National @ Terminal 5 (w/ Suckers & Kurt Vile)
7/30 - Spiritualized playing Ladies and Gentlemen (TICKETS)

You can also watch the shows online: SPIN & ZYNC are streaming them.

Several of the above bands have more shows this week too. The Black Keys play two SummerStage shows with the Morning Benders on July 27th and 28th (the second being the an early show on same night they play T5). Those two shows are also a tour kick-off for the two bands. All dates below.

The National also play Celebrate Brooklyn on Tuesday, July 27th with Beach House opening. They'll be back in September for a show at Wellmont Theatre with Owen Pallett who opens both Arcade Fire shows at MSG next week.

Contest details and dates below...

Continue reading "SPIN 25 this week (win tix, stream the shows) ++ it's a busy week w/ more Black Keys, Flaming Lips & National shows too "

The Flaming Lips in Poughkeepsie in April (more by Ryan Muir)

Remember the five Spin 25th Anniversary shows announced in March? Here they are:

7/26 - Smashing Pumpkins @ Terminal 5
7/27 - The Flaming Lips @ Terminal 5
7/28 - The Black Keys @ Terminal 5 (a late show)
7/29 - The National @ Terminal 5
7/30 - Spiritualized playing Ladies and Gentlemen in its entirety @ Radio City Music Hall

The Spin shows are sponsored by American Express Zync, just like the National @ BAM show that happened in May.

The National have other dates (including Radio City June 16th) coming up. The Flaming Lips and the Black Keys both play Central Park SummerStage around the time of the T5 shows. In fact, the July 28th T5 show is late show following one of the Black Keys SummerStage shows.

Some related recent videos below...

Continue reading "Flaming Lips, Black Keys & the National, Smashing Pumpkins & Spiritualized playing SPIN 25th birthday shows (on sale now)"

by BBG

Spiritualized at Pitchfork 2008 (more by Elizabeth Weinberg)

Spiritualized have confirmed that they will be playing Radio City Music Hall on July 30th. They've also confirmed that they will in fact be playing all of their landmark Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space. It will be their lone North American date, as well as the last performance of the LP in it's entirety. Spiritualized recently reissued Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space with tons of bonus material.

Tickets will go on pre-sale on June 11th (Friday), and then general sale on June 14th (Monday). The previously discussed ticket link is gone. More details are forthcoming.

Spiritualized recently played all of Ladies & Gentlemen... in it's entirety at the Matt Groening curated All Tomorrow's Parties in Minehead. Video from that show, as well as video from Iggy & The Stooges, Boredoms, and James Chance & The Contortions, are all below....

Continue reading "Spiritualized confirm Radio City show ++ check out some videos from the Matt Groening-curated ATP they played"