by Andrew Sacher

DOWNLOAD: oOoOO - "NoWayBack" (Ft. Butterclock) (MP3)

Sam Mickens w/ Zac Pennington at Ecstatic Music Festival (more by David Andrako)

Late last year, Sam Mickens announced a split 7" with Voice on Tape due out "winter 2011/2012." That 7" still hasn't been released but you can stream Sam's contribution HERE. However, he did release a single last week, "One Final Round"/"To Victory or Death," which you can stream and purchase at his bandcamp. The songs have a traditional ballroom pop feel led by organic pianos and horns, until halfway through "To Victory or Death," when the band kicks it up into a double time punk beat.

Sam Mickens, who performed Saturday night as part of the Ecstatic Music Festival, has a few more upcoming NYC shows this month. He'll premiere his "Micropatronage" piece with a string quartet at Roulette on February 16 with Jim Staley and Zeena Parkins and Loren Mazzance Connors (whose new album, A Fire, was scheduled to come out this week but has since been delayed). Tickets are on sale now. Sam will then play the same venue on Feburary 18 when he hosts a live taping of ESP TV, which is also part of Roulette's Experimental Love Festival along with C. Spencer Yeh, Little Women, Grasshopper, MV Carbon, and Amanda Long. The event was curated by Scott Kiernan and Victoria Keddie. Tickets are on sale now.

Sam Mickens will also celebrate his 30th birthday at Shea Stadium on February 23 with performances by Sam Mickens Ecstatic Showband & Revue (who recorded the new 12") and Sam Mickens Fourth World (feat. members of Deerhoof, Extra Life, and Cuddle Magic). The bill also includes White Ring and Mirror Mirror.

White Ring last played in NYC last month at Glasslands (1/21) opening for oOoOO (who just announced an EP). How was that show?

Speaking of oOoOO's EP, Our Living is Killing Us (due April 10 via Tri Angle), Stereogum recently premiered the first track, "NoWayBack," which features vocals from collaborator Butterclock. Her airy vocals and oOoOO's beatwork bring to mind some of Grimes' downtempo material and its easily oOoOO's best track yet. Grab an MP3 of the song above and stream it below.

All dates and stream below...

Continue reading "upcoming Sam Mickens shows & a new oOoOO MP3"

Not only is Bjork playing those four shows at Roseland, but they are in the round, and she's also playing six more at The New York Hall of Science in Queens in February. That's 10 NYC shows total! More details and exact dates below...

Continue reading "Bjork playing 10 NYC shows! Six at the New York Hall of Science! (four at Roseland) (in the round!)"

An image from Robert Longo's Pictures for Music (1979), which will be played alongside Rhys Chatham's Guitar Trio...

Since 1993 the record label Table of the Elements has staked its claim on a massive enterprise, intending nothing less than to rewrite the history of American music in the second half of the 20th century, and beyond. Its projects have focused on musicians whose light shimmers outside the frames of convention, and comprise a vital contemporary archive of experimental, minimalist, improvised and outsider musics.

The Table of The Elements is caling it quits after eighteen years, and will go out with the three-day Copernicum Festival at Issue Project Room that kicks off tonight (5/12). Electric harpist Zeena Parkins, M2 (improv duo made up of Mission of Burma's Roger Miller and brother Ben Miller), Agathe Max, and electronic musician Ateleia will round out the first night entitled "TotE from A - Z". Tickets are still available. Agathe Max will perform selections from the silver string, which is due on Table of the Elements in September.

Friday night (5/13), " Free/Not Free" night, will honor Rhys Chatham's 1977 opus Guitar Trio with projections by Robert Longo and a performance from The Lords of Tinnitus (Robert Longo, Jonathan Kane, Robert Poss, Ernie Brooks, Zach Layton, Adam Wills, Colin Langenus, Bill Brovold). Text Of Light (featuring William Hooker, Alan Licht, Nels Cline), Jon Mueller, and Peg Simone round out the lineup. Tickets are still available.

Finally, the Table of The Elements wraps up their celebration on Saturday, "Drone x 4" night, with the previously discussed Stephen O'Malley solo show with Jonathan Kane's February, a Tony Conrad / Gastr Del Sol performance film, and Igor Cubrilovic. Tickets are still available.

R.I.P. to Table Of The Elements, but at least they're going out with a bang.

--

In related news, Zeena Parkins is also on board for the upcoming Undead Jazz Festival as part of Zeena Parkins and The Adorables.

Roger Miller also has a show coming up as part of the Alloy Orchestra who will "perform its original live score to the newly restored version of Fritz Lang's Metropolis" in Prospect Park this summer.

Stephen O'Malley also has a show coming up in Pennsylvania.

The Table of the Elements fest lineup in list format, below...

Continue reading "the final Table of the Elements Festival is this week @ IPR, Alloy Orchestra plays Prospect Park this summer"

Founded in June 2010 the Undead Jazzfest is new kind of festival, bringing together an incredible array of artists from the new jazz and improvised music community currently exploding in New York City. With no headliners, affordable tickets, unorthodox venues and no drink minimums, the Undead Jazzfest aims to shake the public perception of what jazz can be today, celebrating the incredible music being made in a setting that is inviting to both the veterans and curious new fans.

Encompassing eleven venues over its four days (6/23 - 6/26), the Undead Jazzfest will feature appearances from more than 50 bands including names like Marc Ribot, Elliott Sharp, Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, Mountains and many others. The full list of participating bands is below. Four day passes are on sale for $45 until 4/28. The price increases to $50 after.

Undead Jazzfest is also responsible for curating another show outside of said festival, this one going down at Central Park Summerstage on June 11th with Medeski Martin & Wood, Josh Roseman's King Froopy All Stars and Jim Black's AlasNoAxis. It's one of many free 2011 Summerstage shows that have been announced.

AND, Undead Jazz presents a show at Le Poisson Rouge tonight (4/25) with Orchestre National de Jazz with Daniel Yvinec and John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble with special guests Theo Bleckmann , Kate McGarry and Uri Caine. Undead Jazz also presents Todd Sickafoose's Tiny Resistors and Mary Halvorson Trio at the same venue on May 18th.

Full Undead Jazzfest 2011 lineup below.

Continue reading "Undead Jazzfest 2011 lineup announced, tix on sale now, and other related shows too"

As previously announced, the 2011 Ecstatic Music Festival, presented by New York City's Merkin Concert Hall in association with New Amsterdam Records, is a showcase of imaginative collaborations between more than 150 genre-pushing composers, songwriters and performers who represent a new generation of artists combining diverse influences and techniques to explore the intersection of classical and pop music. All concerts will include premieres. The festival opens with a free seven-hour marathon on January 17, 2011, and continues with 13 additional concerts until March 28, 2011. All concerts will take place at Merkin Concert Hall.

The Ecstatic Music Festival 2011 is almost here. Subscriptions and single show tickets are on sale. The full updated schedule (tUnE-yArDs, So Percussion, Dan Deacon, Craig Wedren, ACME, Nadia Sirota, Buke & Gass, Doveman, Owen Pallett, Bang On A Can All-Stars, and more included), and a trailer, below...

Continue reading "Ecstatic Music Festival kicks off on 1/16, runs through 3/28 (updated schedule w/ tUnE-yArDs, Dan Deacon, Owen Pallett)"

by Andrew Frisicano

Grouper @ Terminal 5 in May 2009 (more by Natasha Ryan)

So we managed to sneak into Grouper's rare Brooklyn gig on Friday night and still aren't sure what we witnessed over the course of her main 60-minute set. (She also presented a new tape collage piece.) To be honest, the entire thing looked/sounded incredibly creepy, as if one of The Shining's redrum-happy twins suddenly learned how to sculpt dronescapes and acoustic something-or-others from an ancient keyboard and several effects pedals. It didn't help that the room was humid as hell--literally--with Issue Project Room's single, solitary fan getting switched off in the middle of the first 'song' because it was interfering with Liz Harris' signal. [self-titled]

Grouper's Friday, June 4th show at Issue Project Room was one of the events that opened the venue's Darmstadt series, which pairs new and old boundary-crossing music and art over the month of June.

Coming up, Matt Mottel (Issue's artist-in-residence) brings his jazz duo Talibam! to the venue for a free performance on Wednesday, June 9th. On Friday, June 11th, composer and tape artist William Basinski presents his piece "Vivian and Ondine" at a free show at 110 Livingston (Issue's new being-remodeled space).

Man Forever (Kid Millions from Oneida's new composition for multiple rock drummers) performs with composer/musicians Elliott Sharp, Zeena Parkins, Frank Vigroux and Hélène Breschand on June 25th. Tickets are on sale. Man Forever have a new record almost out, and the project will be touring this summer.

The self-titled debut - two monolithic, hypnotic improvisations for arrays of carefully tuned drums- is due out [June 22nd] in an edition of 300 LPs featuring hand-pulled screens on recycled record jackets from Jagjaguwar vinyl imprint St. Ives. The touring quintet of Kid Millions, YEAH YEAH YEAHS drummer Brian Chase, Oneida cohort and KNYFE HYTS drummer Shahin Motia, drummer Allison Busch of AWESOME COLOR, and SIGHTINGS bassist Richard Hoffman, will be augmented by local percussionists in each city.

(Oneida has a new record, Absolute II , due too.)

Man Forever plays tonight (June 8th) at the Tank with Dump (James McNew of Yo La Tengo), M&M and the New York debut of the Sloppy Heads (who have a new Kid Milions-produced 7", First Gasp, which you can download here as a ZIP). That show has tickets on sale.

Man Forever also headline a Monster Island show on Friday, June 11th.

The night after Man Forever at Issue - Zs, who just put out a new record, play Issue with sound/multimedia artist David Linton (on Saturday, June 26th).

Separate from Darmstadt is the venue's ISSUE Project Room's Sunday Concerts in the Courtyard series that'll be bringing a Sunday, June 27th lineup of Omar Souleyman (who plays Central Park the day before with Tinariwen) and CSC Funk Band (featured here) to the Old American Can Factory courtyard. Tickets are on sale. The other shows in that series are posted below.

On top of all that, Issue will be participating in the two-venue, 65th-birthday celebration for improv legend Anthony Braxton (father of Tyondai from Battles) happening on June 18 and 19th. It's at (Le) Poisson Rouge on the 18th and Issue on the 19th. Details, tickets links and video are below.

The full Issue/Darmstadt schedule, video from Zs' Gulf Coast benefit show at Shea Stadium on June 2nd, and more are posted below...

Continue reading "Darmstadt continues @ Issue Project Room, Man Forever, Zs, James McNew, Omar Souleyman & Anthony Braxton's birthday"

Photos by Lori Baily

Monday, December 1, 2008
7:00 p.m.

Film Screenings & Events
Thurston Moore Introduces Early Music Videos by David Bowie
Theater 1 (The Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 1), T1

Held in celebration of the recent gift from the David Bowie Archive of music videos to the Museum, this program presents a special selection of works by the celebrated musician, actor, and producer. Bowie, who began playing the saxophone when he was thirteen years old, worked as a commercial artist before studying mime and, later, playing in bands. In 1969 he co-founded Beckenham Arts Lab in South London, a crucible for experimentation that hosted artist studios, poetry readings, and events such as light shows, theatrical and dance performances, and puppet shows. For several of his videos, Bowie collaborated with the photographer and filmmaker Mick Rock, best known for his photos of 1970s glam and punk icons including Iggy Pop, Queen, the Ramones, Lou Reed, and the Sex Pistols. Thurston Moore, of the "No Wave" band Sonic Youth, provides commentary throughout the program.

More info and tickets for that are HERE. More pictures of Friday's show at Glasslands Gallery in Brooklyn (11/7), below...

Continue reading "a Thurston Moore/David Bowie MoMA thing & Glasslands pics w/ Zeena Parkins, Carlos Giffoni & C Spencer Yeh"

DOWNLOAD John Zorn - Lilin (MP3)

You know what really sucks? Peeping Tom sucks. (above video also seen on Stereogum & Blabbermouth)

Mike Patton (who I like less-and-less) is playing with frequent-collaborator John Zorn @ Tonic in NYC on New Years Eve, again.

Nels Cline (Wilco) is playing the John Zorn-owned NYC club The Stone on December 28th with Zeena Parkins (2 shows), and again on December 29th with Vinny Goila and Ken Filiano. Other Nels dates here.

The Stone has four special benefit shows coming up on December 25th (Christmas day) and December 30th (New Years eve-eve). The two shows on Christmas will feature "Many special guest and surprises", and for the shows on the 30th we should "Expect anyone and anything in this final 2006 Stone extravaganza!"

Review of Wolfmother's recent sold-out show at Hammerstein Ballroom here.