words & photos by BBG

What Cheer? Brigade @ Public Assembly

My Thursday night (10/20) during CMJ was mostly spent at the Ballistic Missle/Anchor Brain show at Public Assembly, with a stop at the Life or Death PR showcase at Cake Shop to catch an early set from the always enchanting Chelsea Wolfe. Pictures from Chelsea Wolfe's appearance that night (one of several, including Europa and our day party the next day), as well as pictures of noise-rock greats Vaz, ear-shredding spazz-noisers Doomsday Student (3/4 of Arab on Radar), marching band mayhem from What Cheer? Brigade (with Joey in tow), XDS, and the punishing 400 Blows are below.

Continue reading "CMJ Thursday night in pics (What Cheer? Brigade, Chelsea Wolfe, Vaz, Doomsday Student, 400 Blows & more)"

by BBG

Joey hands his resignation.....

Meet Joey. Joey teamed with Providence street brass band What Cheer? Brigade to concoct possibly the single greatest way to quit his job ever. Check out the video below.

What Cheer? Brigade will join 400 Blows (mems Crom, Big Business, Circle Jerks) at Public Assembly on 10/20 with XDS (Experimental Dental School), Doomsday Student (which features nameless members of some excellent Providence bands), Vaz, Ed Schrader's Music Beat, Whore Paint, and Big Digits. The Ballistic Missile/Anchor Brain CMJ showcase kicks off at 7PM and will set you back $10 or zilch with your CMJ badge.

Meanwhile 400 Blows will play Brooklyn TONIGHT at Death By Audio (10/18). 400 Blows will join Danny Sher/Travis Reuter/Evan Gregor, Alex Ward/Tim Dahl/Weasel Walter, and Fancy Space People (with Don Bolles of the Germs, Paul Roessler from the Screamers and others) at the DIY space, and $8 gets you in.

400 Blows welcomed the Sickness & Health LP earlier this year. Stream a pair of songs from that LP below, along with tracks by Doomsday Student (ruling) and others, that "Joey Quits" video and all 400 Blows tour dates...

Continue reading "What Cheer? Brigade helped Joey quit (viral video), playing CMJ w/ 400 Blows (who also play tonight & other dates)"

DOWNLOAD: Andrew Bird - Oh No (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: John Prine - Long Monday (Live) (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Calexico - Two Silver Trees (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: A.A. Bondy - I Can See the Pines Are Dancing (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Dawes - When My Time Comes (MP3)

Jim James @ Newport Folk Fest Saturday (by Laura Fedele for WFUV)

""I've always dreamed of playing at the Newport Folk Festival," Steve Martin said Friday night, "and tonight I am one step closer to that goal."

He was joking, of course -- the famous funny man was at George Wein's Newport Folk Festival, headlining the opening-night bluegrass concert at the International Tennis Hall of Fame before an estimated crowd of 2,300 people. But throughout his set fronting the North Carolina quintet The Steep Canyon Rangers, Martin's serious talent on the banjo was evident." [The Providence Journal]

Steve Martin played the opening night show. Saturday's sets included Sarah Jarosz, The Low Anthem, Nneka, Blitzen Trapper, Yim Yames (Jim James of My Morning Jacket) (Ben Sollee and Daniel Martin Moore joined him on stage too), Andrew Bird, O'Death (now back in action), and John Prine. I listed those because those are the ones NPR taped and have archived for streaming. Today's sets include Cory Chisel, Sharon Jones And The Dap-Kings, A.A. Bondy, Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Punch Brothers, featuring Chris Thile, The Avett Brothers, Horse Feathers, and Edward Sharpe And The Magnetic Zeros. I mention those because those are the ones NPR is streaming live today (and will also archive for future listening). Elvis Perkins and Dearland also play today, instead of Justin Townes Earle.

Some videos from the fest so far, especially of What Cheer? Brigade, below...

Continue reading "Newport Folk Fest continues, NPR is streaming it "

by Bill Pearis

DOWNLOAD: Nana Grizol - Galaxies (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Naza Grizol - For Things That Haven't Come (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: The Futureheads - Struck Dumb (MP3)

Sky Larkin @ Pianos during CMJ (more by Bryan Bruchman)

It's not the most action-packed of weekends in TWII land. Stars is sold out, as is Kings of Convenience and Delorean, no twee indiepop from Denmark, or San Francisco garage rockers. So I'm gonna start with mentioning that terrific Leeds, UK trio Sky Larkin (who played one of our CMJ day parties last year) have finished their second album, Kaleide, and it'll be out in August. Like their first album, Kaleide was recorded in Seattle with John Goodmason. But the results this time seem a little more muscular and confident.

Hear for yourself: the band are offering up a free, downloadable EP featuring the album's swell title track (pronounced "collide"). You do have to give up your email address to get it but they're nice folks and I'm sure they won't do anything nefarious with it. Either visit their website or use the download widget at the bottom of this post. Hopefully we'll get the band over here again soon.

Nana Grizol

OK, so what's going on this weekend? Athens, GA's multitudinous Nana Grizol are in town tonight (6/4), playing Silent Barn on their way back from the Primavera Sound festival and we should be glad to have them.  Their wide-eyed folk pop reminds me just a little of much-missed '90s band Small Factory, There's a similar approach to the songwriting, even if the arrangements add about 15 more people (depending on the night) to the mix. You can download two tracks from their latest album, Ruth, at the top of this post. They are super-charming live.

Adding to the fun (and sheer number of musicians onstage at any one time) at Silent Barn are Providence, RI's What Cheer? Brigade which is a 19 piece brass ensemble whose sound is "an aggressive mix of Bollywood, The Balkans, New Orleans, Samba and Hip-Hop, played with the intensity of metal." There's also locals The Eskalators, and Boston singer/songwriter Greg Mullen. Sounds like a pretty fun, probably sweaty, night.

The Futureheads @ Pianos in 2008 (more by Jason Bergman)

The Futureheads play Maxwell's tomorrow (6/5) and Bowery Ballroom on Tuesday (6/8). Like a lot of people, I was a huge fan of their first album, and felt the two following albums were a little too straightforward (and overproduced) for a band who got popular on quirky charm. Some of that off-kilter-ness is back on the band's new album, The Chaos, which I think is easily their best since that first one. They've kind of become a modern, Northern England version of The Knack. Which is a good thing as far as I'm concerned. Check out "Struck Dumb" at the top of this post.

The band played Music Hall of Williamsburg earlier this week, it was probably the eight or ninth time I've seen them live, and I have to say even when I'm not crazy about whatever record they're touring at the time, they are always worth seeing live. Singer/guitarist Barry Hyde is as manic as ever, guitarist/vocalist Ross Millard provides the punchlines, and the band are tight as hell, and nail those four-part harmonies. And "Decent Days and Nights" and their amazing cover of "Hounds of Love" still sound brilliant.

Athlete

While we're reminiscing about 2004... Athlete play the Bell House tomorrow (6/5). They are not remotely cool anymore, but I have great affection for their debut album, Vehicles & Animals, an exceedingly pleasant bunch of mid-tempo, head-bobbing Brit indie tunes, all of which seemed to have been based on Pavement's "Carrot Rope." It's still a good album to clean the house to.

I saw them at a half-full Mercury Lounge back in March 2004 (they played with, um, Razorlight if memory serves) and remember them being charmingly nerdy. I'm still a bit baffled how/why a year later they turned into Snow Patrol. They're pretty huge in the UK but America has never caught on, but I'm sure that the Bell House will be full of ex-pats and Anglophiles. I'm half tempted to go, if for nothing else than to hear "El Salvador" or "You Got the Style."

After Brooklyn they continue on a month-long North American tour in support of their new album Black Swan, which isn't half bad. All tour dates are at the bottom of this post.

Po Po

And one last show of interest. Tonight (6/4) at Glasslands is a pretty good bill, headlined by low-fi Philly duo PO PO. Also playing: Light Asylum who I've written about a bit before and you may have seen open for LCD Soundsystem last month at Music Hall of Williamsburg; enigmatic local band Translations whose songs on MySpace sound pretty good; and underheard Brooklynites (and Soft Pack cohorts) The Sundelles.

And one last little note of shameless plugging. If you're looking for something new to listen to, over on Sound Bites I post a weekly downloadable Summer Fridays mix during the warm months. This is the third year I've done it and this week's has new tunes from Foals, Beach Fossils, Django Django, Young Friends, Radio Dept, plus some oldies (B-52's, Lulu, Air Miami + more) as well.

That's it for this week. Flyers, videos, that Sky Larkin download widget, and tour dates are below.

Continue reading "Sky Larkin, Nana Grizol, Futureheads, Athlete, PO PO, Summer Fridays mix tapes & more in This Week in Indie"

[On new record Li(f)e] Sage Francis' biting and sardonic wordplay now further empowered by talented musicians including producer Brian Deck (Modest Mouse, Iron and Wine) and Jim Becker and Tim Rutili of acclaimed Chicago outfit Califone. Francis has also enlisted a roster of uniquely talented songwriters including exGrandaddy frontman Jason Lytle, Chris Walla of Death Cab for Cutie, Tim Fite, members of Calexico, DeVotchKa, and Mark Linkous of Sparklehorse - each of whose compositions were then interpreted by Francis and the band. [Sage Francis news]

Sage Francis plays SXSW on March 18th then takes a break until May when he launches a North American tour stretching from Boston on May 12th to NYC's Webster Hall on June 25th. Joining him on the road will be B. Dolan and Free Moral Agents (a group that features Ikey Ownes of the Mars Volta). Tickets to Webster Hall go on AmEx presale starting Wednesday, March 10th at noon. General sale starts Friday at noon.

The album, with the Shepard Fairey cover art posted above, comes out May 11th on Anti-/Epitaph Records. All tour dates and videos (including one of Francis collaborator B. Dolan and Providence's What Cheer? Brigade street band performing a song off his new Fallen House, Sunken City live) are below...

Continue reading "Sage Francis - new Anti-album & 2010 tour dates"

by Black Bubblegum

Growing at ATP NY (more by Zach Dilgard)

Growing and their bleeps, blorps, and bloops will team up with the killer guitar loop-stravaganza of The Psychic Paramount for a show at Death By Audio on June 26th, one of a pair of NYC shows for Growing. The gigs will serve as a warm-up for the band that recently became a trio (Sadie Laska of IUD is now a member of Growing) before they head out to jolly ol' England in the tail end of July.

The second NYC date for Growing is on July 10th, where the band will join Javelin, Devin Flynn & Gary Panter, Kokomo and headliner What Cheer? Brigade at Market Hotel.

The What Cheer? Brigade is a rowdy 19-piece brass band from Providence, RI. We play Luddite Hardcore, loud, mobile music requiring no electricity. We are a party band, and our sound incorporates elements of the following musical traditions: Bollywood, Balkan, New Orleans, Samba, and punk...

In short, WCB is a band in the high school drum major sense, similar to their west coast counterparts Extra Action Marching Band, playing loud originals as well as covers such as Salt n Pepa's "Push It" and The "$25K Pyramid Theme" in the video below. The band also has a few MP3s for stream and download. Their Brooklyn show is one day before they play the 2009 Whartscape Festival in Baltimore.

IUD will team up with Bloody Panda (who have Summon on the way) and the incomparable Jarboe for a show at Santos Party House on June 27th, the same night as the Growing DBA gig.

All dates and videos below...

Continue reading "Growing (now a trio), Psychic Paramount, What Cheer? Brigade, NYC shows, Whartscape 2009 & other dates "