photos by Amanda Hatfield, words by Jessica Timlin

S. Carey

I walked out of the flurries falling over 16th street Monday night and into the ballroom that is Highline where the right and left sides of the room are dedicated to tables, and the aroma of french fries was in the air. Openers White Hinterland aka Casey Dienel and Shawn Creeden, enthusiastically took the stage around 8:15. A decent group had gathered and stood silently, hypnotized by the sounds of Dienel's ghostly vocals looping and poignantly floating through the room. There were a few technological problems with wires from her keyboard falling loose so Dienel sweetly commented on our politeness, and suggested that we get rowdy by heading to the bar area to get our drink on (but the show was 16 and up, and the room wasn't exactly filled, so no rowdiness actually happened).

Despite the few sound issues, White Hinterland played a solid and lengthy set. There were projections of a light sky with birds flying, and white, glittered branches were collected in areas throughout the ballroom, so the place "truly look like White Hinterland," as Dienel pointed out. Their last song, a tasteful cover of Katy Perry's "Teenage Dream", was dedicated to Gretchen Jones (winner of Project Runway) who was in the crowd. Gretchen is a friend of the members of the band; she used their music as the accompaniment to her winning collection when it was debuted during Fashion Week.

S. Carey started their set with the album intro "Move," a mainly instrumental piece with Carey on acoustic guitar and the percussionist on vibes, running violin bows along the fronts of the strings to create mystical sound effects, accompanied by quiet vocal harmonies and strings. The band was nothing short of fantastic and transitioned into two more songs before stopping to speak. They then spiraled into the crescendo that was the song "Mothers." Bon Iver member Sean Carey, up from his keyboard, joined in a tumultuous beating of drums as upright bass player Jeremy Boettcher pounded out the deep soul of the song and viola player Mike Noyce helped carry the beautiful melodies. After the song, the band was met with an uproar of applause.

Although their set seemed short, they played their album All We Grow in its entirety. Sean also played b-side "Leave", and concluded the set with a cover of the Notwist's "Consequences."

Casey Dienel said that White Hinterland may play another show in the city come February. Both bands continue on tour. Roadtrip anyone? More pictures from the Highline show below...

Continue reading "S. Carey & White Hinterland played Highline Ballroom (pics) "

photos by Andrew St. Clair

S. Carey @ Public Assembly

Last here on his tour with The Tallest Man on Earth, S. Carey came back to town for CMJ to play a few shows including his label Jagjaguwar's showcase at Pianos, and our day party at Public Assembly on Saturday. His band included fellow Bon Iver band member Mike Noyce, and though I was running back and forth between stages, what I heard from their early afternoon mellow set sounded great. A few pictures from the day party, where S Carey played opposite Ted Leo on the other stage, are in this post.

S. Carey hits the road again in December with White Hinterland for a bunch of dates including Highline Ballroom in NYC on 12/13. Tickets are on sale. All dates with those pics below...

Continue reading "S Carey played CMJ (pics), touring w/ White Hinterland (dates) "

Marnie Stern will be one of the bowlers (but not one of the performers) at a Stereogum "Gumbowl" charity event tonight at Brooklyn Bowl. You can't watch her bowl yet, but you can go to the concert afterwards (that she is not playing)....

"While the doors have to be closed during the tournament in order to film it all for charitable posterity -- and be sure we'll present you with the footage -- we're celebrating afterward by throwing open the gates for a FREE CONCERT, headlined by Woods, and featuring an opening set from the 'Gum-beloved rising sextet Effi Briest, DJ magic from Ms. St. Vincent Annie Clark, and loitering by our celebrity bowlers, who may or may not still be wearing the sweet-ass bowling jerseys we're throwing on them. We want you there (if you're 21 or older (sorry, kids!))." - Stereogum

They had an RSVP for the concert part, but now they just say "THERE WILL BE SOME "TICKETS" AT THE DOOR! COME EARLY IF YOU WANT IN. DOORS OPEN AT 9PM". Brooklyn Bowl is a big place. The flyer is below.

Other charity bowlers include The Blow (who has a show coming up at Joe's Pub), Nick Islands Thorburn Diamonds (who has 3 NYC shows coming up), Alan Neon Indian Palomo (who has multiple NYC shows coming), and Tim Les Savy Fav Harrington (who has a scheduled Brooklyn show too). The full list of bowlers is also below.

If you want to catch Marnie Stern play live, her next show will be at Glasslands on Friday, June 18th along with White Hinterland, Anni Rossi, Translations and True Womanhood. It's not free, but you get a discount if you RSVP to that here.

Anni Rossi will also be playing Pianos the night before (6/17).

More info on the Gumbowl and flyers are below...

Continue reading "Marnie Stern bowls tonight (before the free Woods show), plays in June w/ Anni Rossi who has 2 upcoming shows"

by Andrew Frisicano

DOWNLOAD: Dosh - Subtractions (MP3)

Dosh @ Webster Hall in October '08 (more by Tim Griffin)

Drummer, electronics aficionado and Andrew Bird collaborator Dosh has a new record coming out on Anticon. Tommy, his fifth, is due April 13th. You can get its lead track, above.

Dosh has promised a full US tour for its release - at the moment only a few of those dates are announced (and listed below). Two are in NYC: Union Hall on Thursday, April 22nd and Mercury Lounge on Friday, April 23rd. Pulsing female-front pop band White Hinterland opens both. Tickets are on sale for Union Hall. Tickets go on AmEx presale at noon. General sale starts Friday (2/19) at noon.

Dosh will also be at SXSW. Details on that, all tour dates and album info are below...

Continue reading "Dosh announces new album (MP3) & 2010 tour dates "

The Kelley Stoltz (Sub Pop) show originally scheduled for Mercury Lounge tonight (April 9) is instead happening at Union Hall. Kelley is also currently on tour with The Dirtbombs.

Instead at Mercury Lounge tonight - 2 promising shows (early & late): Jason Collett of Broken Social Scene plays the early one. White Hinterland (with gear hopefully) and Throw Me the Statue play the late one.

photo of Bell by Alix Winsby

Bell (aka Olga Bell) is a musician from NYC. That might be how you know her, and/or maybe you downloaded that Radiohead cover she did, or maybe you saw her open for Au Revoir Simone, and/or maybe you read about her on Stereogum the other day. If you haven't heard Bell yet, go check out the songs streaming on her MySpace. If you're like me, Bjork will immediately come to mind. That's why I think Stereogum made a good choice when choosing Bell to cover "It's Oh So Quiet" for their ridiculously awesome-looking new "Post" tribute album called "Enjoyed"
(though I haven't heard it yet).....

Tracklist
1. Liars - "Army Of Me"
2. Dirty Projectors - "Hyperballad"
3. High Places - "Modern Things"
4. Bell - "It's Oh So Quiet"
5. Pattern Is Movement - "Enjoy"
6. Evangelicals - "You've Been Flirting Again"
7. Xiu Xiu - "Isobel"
8. Final Fantasy & Ed Droste (Grizzly Bear) - "Possibly Maybe"
9. White Hinterland - "I Miss You"
10. El Guincho - "Cover Me"
11. Atlas Sound - "Headphones"

Nuts... PLUS, the whole album will be a free download starting March 31st (like the REM & Radiohead ones before it). March 31st is also the day that Klaus Kinski and I are throwing our next edition of Rock 'n' ROFL at Pianos which, coincidentally, also happens to include Bell (aka BELL IS PLAYING ROCK N ROFL).

Takka Takka are playing the show too. It's not the first time they've shared a bill with Bell either, and that's NOT a coincidence. Bell contributed to the new Takka Takka album which is being finished as we speak - an album that takes Takka Takka in a completely new direction with a new sound and a significantly different lineup than who was in the band when their last release came out.

So, it's looking something like this....

BrooklynVegan & Klaus Kinski present
The unofficial & unauthorized "Enjoyed" release party
(aka Rock 'n' ROFL II)
@ Pianos in NYC
on March 31, 2008

7-8 pm: DJ David Bruno AND all the free Newcastle you can drink

8-9 pm: comedy by Will Franken, Larry Murphy, Kumail Nanjiani, Sean O' Connor and Reggie Watts

9-10 pm: music by Bell
10-11 pm: music by Takka Takka
11-12 pm: music by TBA (** can't announce yet, but it's good **)

also: $3.00 Svedka lemon drops all night AND a 2nd hour of free Newcastle (time TBD) (that's 2 hours of open bar). All that for just $10. Tickets are on sale.

---

Related story: I put together a whole bunch of shows during CMJ. One was on Saturday October 20th at Pianos, during the day, upstairs & downstairs. The Maccabees were the last band to play downstairs. Doveman, Erik Friedlander and Craig Wedren were playing upstairs at the same time. Jefferson, who was there in a semi-official capacity to take pictures, wanted to shoot the Maccabees, but ended up missing them because of the upstairs lineup.

By the time he came back down, the Maccabees were already long gone and the next, unrelated show had started. He really didn't know the difference and started taking pictures of (who he thought was) the Maccabees. Eventually he figured it out and realized he'd just discovered Bell.

When Jefferson and I finally reunited, I think I said something like (now on like no sleep and 4 days into CMJ), "Where the hell have you been? Did you even see the Maccabees? We have to go see Santogold. Let's get out of here." He said something like, "Dude...chill. I was shooting this girl Bell. She was great." I think then by the next day I totally forgot about it, and it wasn't until I recently showed him the already-booked March 31st lineup that he pointed out that he had some never-before-seen Bell pictures (aka the ones you see in this post.....below) (the end)....

Continue reading "BELL is playing Rock 'n' ROFL w/ Takka Takka & TBA +++ Stereogum, a Bjork tribute & some pics from CMJ"

DOWNLOAD: White Hinterland - Dreaming of the Plum Trees (MP3)

Casey Dienel's debut album, Wind-up Canary was the album I most listened to in 2005, eventually making my list of year-end favorites. This week she returns with a full band named White Hinterland, and their album Phylactery Factory offers a bigger, deeper sound to back Dienel's intricate, subtle lyrics.

Two indie rock stalwarts drop albums this week. Stephen Malkmus is back with the latest Jicks album Real Emotional Trash, and former Twilight Singer and Afghan Whig Greg Dulli brings us the Gutter Twins' Saturnalia (a collaboration with Mark Lanegan).

Other discs I can strongly recommend include the The Felice Brothers' debut album, Kathleen Edwards' Asking for Flowers, Jim White's Transnormal Skiperoo, Mia Doi Todd's GEA, The Ruby Suns' Sea Lion, and the Weird Weeds' I Miss This.

Two reissues are worth noting, the Sun City Girls' You're Never Alone With a Cigarette (Singles Volume 1) and a remastered edition of Whiskeytown's Strangers Almanac (ocmplete with bonus tracks).

Continue reading "Largehearted Boy's Interesting CD Releases This Week"

Continue reading "White Hinterland's gear stolen in NYC"

DOWNLOAD: White Hinterland - Dreaming of the Plum Trees (MP3)

White Hinterland (aka Casey Dienel), not to be confused with Hinterland from Canada who has a new album out February 19th.), has a new album out on Dead Oceans on March 4th. That's an MP3 from it above. There's more streaming at MySpace, and there's a live show TONIGHT (Feb 8th) at Cake shop with Inlets, and with Angel Deradooran who sometimes plays with Inlets, and who is currently in Dirty Projectors. Then White Hinterland is going on tour with Taken By Trees (aka Victoria Bergsman from the Concretes), and that includes the show February 22nd at Hiro Ballroom which is on sale. All dates below....

Continue reading "White Hinterland (not Hinterland) - new CD, MP3, 2008 Tour Dates (tonight & w/ Taken By Trees)"