Nat Baldwin, David Longstreth and Brian McOmber play Black Flag
Delicate Steve plays the Minutemen
Ted Leo plays Minor Threat
Titus Andronicus plays the Replacements
Tune-Yards plays Sonic Youth
Dan Deacon plays the Butthole Surfers
St. Vincent plays Big Black
Wye Oak plays Dinosaur Jr
Buke & Gass plays Fugazi

No, that's not a list of what happened in a weird dream last night. That is the LINEUP of a NYC show at Bowery Ballroom on May 22nd in celebration of the tenth anniversary of Michael Azerrad's "classic history of the '80s indie underground", Our Band Could Be Your Life (a book everyone reading this site should probably own!)

To quote show co-presenter Tiger Mountain Presents, "some of the best bands in contemporary indie music will play songs by each of the 13 bands in the book."

"For years, all kinds of people -- musicians, people who run labels, concert promoters, journalists, whatever -- have told me that they've been very inspired by Our Band Could Be Your Life and the bands it profiles, which is incredibly gratifying and totally unexpected," says Azerrad. "The tenth anniversary of the book was a great occasion for the current generation of bands to celebrate these pioneers."

More bands & guest hosts TBA. Tickets are $25 & go on sale Friday, 3/11 at noon.

Meanwhile the book will also be the topic of a panel discussion at SXSW that Merrill Garbus aka tUnE-yArDs (who is also playing the festival) will speak on.

Ted Leo is headed to Austin too, an appearance at the BrooklynVegan official SXSW showcase included.

Delicate Steve and Wye Oak are going to SXSW too. Wye Oak can be found at the BV/KF/Partisan day party at Swan Dive on Friday, 3/18. Wye Oak will also play Bowery Ballroom as part of a tour in April.

St. Vincent plays Big Black. I just felt like saying it again!

Continue reading "'Our Band Could Be Your Life' 10th anniversary show lineup (Big Black, Black Flag & Fugazi songs will be played)"

by Andrew Frisicano

DOWNLOAD: Lou Barlow + the missingmen - Losercore (MP3)

Lou Barlow + the missingmen (guitarist Tom Watson and drummer Raul Morales - Lou's touring band who do great things with Mike Watt too) have released a new EP = Sentridoh III, out now digitally through Merge (physical copies will be at shows). About the record, the label writes:

Described by the band as "an almost live representation of the Lou Barlow + the missingmen live show", = Sentridoh III is another step forward for Lou Barlow, and his first release with new backing band the missingmen. With new cuts, rocking reworks of songs from Lou's latest solo record Goodnight Unknown, and a hauntingly beautiful cover of Skip James's "I'm So Glad", = Sentridoh III is sure to please fans new and old alike.

You can get a track from it above, or stream the EP in full at Merge.

Lou will be touring the Western US with the missingmen this June. They go on tour with Wye Oak in August and September. That tour visits NYC for a Mercury Lounge show on Wednesday, September 1st. Tickets go on AmEx presale Wednesday at noon. General sale starts Friday at noon.

Before that Wye Oak will be at Siren Fest and 50% of the band, Andy Stack, plays with Jonathan Meiburg of Shearwater at the Whitney on June 25th.

Tracklist for the EP (the cover is above) and all tour dates are below...

Continue reading "Lou Barlow & the Missingmen released an EP (stream it), touring w/ Wye Oak & playing other dates "

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.

See a video of Watt + Black Fag taking on "Police Story," below.

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]

On August 4th, he'll be playing with NYC violinist Jenny Scheinman's Mischief and Mayhem, as a quartet with Jim Black (again) on drums and Matt Penman on bass. Tickets for that are still on sale.

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"