Keren Ann @ Joe's Pub on Election night 2k8 (more by Tim Griffin)

"La Ballade Of Lady & Bird," a project by Keren Ann & Bardi Johannsson, recorded live with the Icelandic Symphony Orchestra, was released on Sept 14th and is now available in most European countries. (Review in French)

New Album of Singer/Actress Emmanuelle Seigner "Dingue" written and produced by Keren Ann & Doriand to be released in January 2010.

Keren Ann is currently finishing an original soundtrack for French Film "Thelma, Louise & Chantal" by director Benoit Petre starring Jane Birkin, Catherine Jacob & Caroline Cellier. Soundtrack will be released in January, Film will be released in March 2010.

That's a bit of current news about Keren Ann who has two NYC shows scheduled for this month. She plays City Winery on Sunday, December 13th. Tickets are on sale. Then she's at Knitting Factory Brooklyn with Clare and the Reasons on Monday, December 14th. Tickets are on sale.

You can preview Keren Ann-written & -produced tracks on Emmanuelle Seigner's MySpace. Her Lady & Bird collaboration played a Paris concert in October backed up by the Lamoureux Orchestra. Tracks from their second, currently Europe-only record La Ballade of Lady Bird are on their MySpace.

Some Keren Ann videos below...

Continue reading "Keren Ann working on a soundtrack, playing 2 NYC shows"

by BBG

DOWNLOAD: Imaad Wasif - "Priestess" (MP3)

Imaad Wasif and Jack Lawrence, keepin' it gangsta

It's not just David Pajo. More than one artist has done time as a live member of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and much like Pajo, Imaad Wasif has also recorded with a few different bands (Lou Barlow, Folk Implosion, in addition to YYY's newest LP) and has a catalog of music of his own. The latest entry in the Wasif canon is his new solo LP, The Voidist, out NOW via Tee Pee Records and featuring "Priestess" (like the band) downloadable above. The LP, which was recorded with his supporting band Two Part Beast, features appearances from Dale Crover (Melvins) and Greg Burns (Red Sparowes) and was laid to tape by Chad Bamford (Weezer).

Imaad Wasif, who was picked by Jack White to open for The Raconteurs and Dead Weather based on his live show, will be in NYC to perform at three CMJ shows: an RSVP-only day party at Pianos on 10/23, the Tee Pee Records 2009 CMJ Showcase at Union Pool with Priestess (like the song), Nebula, Naam, Quest For Fire, Kreisor, Hopewell, Imaad Wasif with Two Part Beast and Weird Owl ($12, or use your CMJ badge), and the third is the showcase with Rain Machine, Sharon Van Etten, Violens, Threes And Nines and Stricken City at Bowery on 10/24 (tix here, or CMJ badges). The Tee Pee showcase is second Tee Pee event happening during CMJ, the first being their day party at Cake Shop on 10/22.

Besides his new solo LP, Waasif can also be found on the soundtrack to the Where The Wild Things Are as one of "the Kids" that make up Karen O & The Kids. Joining Karen O (YYYs), is the rest of her current band, Wasif, Bradford Cox (Atlas Sound, who is playing CMJ) Aaron Hemphill (Liars), Dean Fertita (The Dead Weather), and Jack Lawrence (The Raconteurs). Want a copy? I have TWO UP FOR GRABS as well as a pair of Vice mini-magazines with 24 artists' renditions of Where The Wild Things Are. More on how to win at the botton of this post. For some behind the scenes videos from the movie (which opens TONIGHT, check VBS.TV.

Nebula and Naam are scheduled to play the BrooklynVegan day party at Fontana's on 10/23 with Goes Cube, Ume, and Crystal Antlers (more on those additions later). The night show at the same venue on the same day will be done in conjunction with Relapse Records, and will feature Misery Index, Salome, Revocation, Black Anvil, Complete Failure, Howl, and Gloominous Doom.

Imaad Wasif is also scheduled to play the Fog Rising festival on 11/7 in San Francisco with Witch, Ancestors, Red Fang, Black Math Horseman, and many others. More and that show, including tickets, are here.

Tee Pee showcase flyer, Imaad Wasif and Nebula dates, and a NSFW video for Imaad Wasif's "Redeemer" are below...

Continue reading "Imaad Wasif - new album, MP3, tour dates (CMJ) & Where The Wild Things Are (movie out today, win a soundtrack)"

"Thom Yorke and Flea's new supergroup will play a Radiohead song at their upcoming debut gigs in Los Angeles., it's been revealed.

The as-yet-unnamed band's drummer Mauro Refosco told Brazilian website Abril.com they will play Thom Yorke's 'The Eraser' album in its entirety, four new songs and one Radiohead track at the shows on Sunday and Monday (October 4 & 5).

It's rumoured the band will air Thom Yorke's song he wrote for the Twilight New Moon soundtrack, 'Hearing Damage', as one of the "new" songs." [gigwise]

LA Weekly is also reporting that their might be a secret Thom Yorke show at the Echoplex this Friday night, October 2.

The new Twilight soundtrack, as you may have heard, also includes tracks by many familiar names including Death Cab For Cutie, Muse, Sea Wolf, Grizzly Bear & Beach House's Victoria Legrand, Bon Iver & St. Vincent, and Editors...

Speaking exclusively to Gigwise, Editors frontman Tom Smith said: "The films aren't aimed at people our age but I look at the bands that we're next to on that soundtrack and it's just a good thing.

"It's not selling out, it's not putting your song on an advert or selling a product.

"It's just being part of something that, to me, as collective seems like a pretty attractive thing."

New Moon is the second instalment of the vampire franchise, which stars British actor Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart.

Cover art and tracklist below...

Continue reading "Thom Yorke's LA setlist, a secret show?, Twilight soundtrack"

Aside from getting married this week, Mr. Zooey Deschanel (aka Ben Gibbard) is keeping busy. He'll be playing a few shows this October with Jay Farrar of Son Volt in support of their new collaborative record, One Fast Move Or I'm Gone: Kerouac's Big Sur. The album, coming out Oct. 20th on F-Stop/Atlantic Records, is the soundtrack to a documentary on Kerouac's Big Sur. The songs, written specifically for the project, take their lyrics from the novel. The setlist for the four-date tour will include songs off the soundtrack and "other surprise material," and the band will conist of Farrar, Gibbard, Nick Harmer (Death Cab for Cutie), Mark Spencer (Son Volt) and Jon Wurster (Superchunk, Bob Mould, The Mountain Goats).

The NYC show is happening October 28th at Webster Hall. Tickets go on AmEx presale Wednesday, September 23rd at noon. General sale starts Sept. 25th at noon.

Jay Farrar was just in NYC Thursday (9/17) with Son Volt, who are currently on tour.

"The gig in New York was mostly a success. Although I'm confident that the sound in the house was solid, on stage it was loud and lacking in definition. Also, for some reason the lighting director decided to black out the stage in the middle of a song. Not sure what that was about.

Being that we were in NYC, we all stayed out too late and paid dearly the next day. Jay had it the worst, however, as he had to be up early to play on the radio." [Son Volt]

The trailer and more info on the film (which has guests that include Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Sam Shepard, Patti Smith and Tom Waits) and the album (with a video for its last song, "San Francisco")are below...

Continue reading "Ben Gibbard (married) & Jay Farrar (played Irving) made Kerouac's Big Sur soundtrack, playing shows (tour dates)"

There's a few of my songs in Drew Barrymore's directorial debut "Whip it". Drew was really nice, she flew me out to LA, we had a cup of coffee and she showed me some clips from the movie. Usually I say no to film synchs because you just get a short synopsis from someone's agent's agent, and I always feel awkward my song will end up in the wrong context. You know, I write my songs for specific people, I find it hard to find them applied to someone elses story. But Drew listened to my concerns and we discussed the scenes she had in mind.

At some point our conversation drifted away and I think we were talking about monkeys, and it just struck me right there and then how surreal my life has become. And how absurd it is when anyone expects any kind of real compensation in this business. Compensation for what ? I've been touring on and off like crazy, I've put so much work into recording and writing. And in the end what I make my money from is talking to Drew Barrymore about monkeys...

The soundtrack is compiled by Randall Poster, who put together the soundtracks for the Wes Andersson movies among others. His soundtracks are like amazing little jukeboxes of random goodies. I haven't seen the movie but it seems to be falling smoothly into the category of American movies about teenage love and alternative sports. From Breaking Away to Bring It On. -Jens Lekman

Jen (who's now cured of swine flu) contributes the song "Your Arms Around Me," originally on 2007's Night Falls Over Kortedala, to the soundtrack. Joining him on the comp are The Breeders, Peaches, Little Joy, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, and more. It comes out September 29th on Rhino. Album art and tracklist are below.

The film itself stars Ellen Page and is about roller derby. Its trailer, which includes a nice chunk of Weezer's "Pork and Beans," is posted below...

Continue reading "Drew Berrymore movie 'Whip It' stars Jens Lekman (songs) "

DOWNLOAD: Califone - Funeral Singers (MP3)

On the set of All My Friends Are Funeral Singers

Califone, whose latest album All My Friends Are Funeral Singers is due out October 6 on Dead Oceans, has confirmed nationwide tour dates this fall including stops in Chicago, New York, and Philadelphia, among others. The album marks the highly anticipated follow-up to 2006's Roots & Crowns, which The New York Times calls "enthralling." All My Friends Are Funeral Singers is the companion piece to a feature-length film of the same name written and directed by Califone frontman Tim Rutili. In select cities on the upcoming tour the band will incorporate a full-length presentation of the film into the shows, performing a live, interactive soundtrack to the movie.

The Chicago-based band consists of multi-instrumentalists Tim Rutili, Jim Becker, Joe Adamik, and Ben Masseralla. On All My Friends Are Funeral Singers, the band employs a wide range of instrumentation and electronic effects to create a dense collage of sounds. Instruments range from the traditional (guitar, violin, banjo, percussion) to the unusual (optigan, stylophone, baritone ukulele, mbira, thumb piano). Longtime collaborator and producer Brian Deck (Iron & Wine, Gomez, Modest Mouse) says, "Califone have found a sound unlike anyone else, and are able to draw otherworldly sounds from very common instruments."

The NYC show is October 23rd at 92YTribeca (during, but maybe not part of, CMJ), and it is one of the mutlimedia events that will include the film. Tickets are on sale. New song for download above. Full tracklist, cover art, the movie trailer, and all tour dates, below...

Continue reading "Califone - new album/soundtrack on Dead Oceans, MP3, 2009 Tour Dates (where sometimes they'll play with the film) "

Karen O @ Lollapalooza 2009 (more by Paul Birman)

"DGC/ INTERSCOPE TO RELEASE WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE MOTION PICTURE SOUNDTRACK: ORIGINAL SONGS BY KAREN O AND THE KIDS. ALBUM OUT SEPTEMBER 29! LEAD SINGLE "ALL IS LOVE" OUT DIGITALLY AUGUST 25! MOTION PICTURE IN THEATERS OCTOBER 16!

Inside Karen O is a Wild Thing - as singer for the Grammy-nominated Yeah Yeah Yeahs, her wild thing is in your face, vulnerable, obnoxious, tender, exciting... a self-proclaimed "spazoid." However, to Oscar-nominated Where the Wild Things Are director Spike Jonze, Karen O and her music possess a child-like innocence, a guileless charm that put her exactly on the right emotional wavelength to sonically capture the highly-anticipated film.

To compose music for the film, O enlisted friends and fellow musicians she believed had the musical intuition that would bolster her intent to marry sound to vision. Dubbed Karen O and the Kids, the kids include Tristan Bechet (Services), Tom Biller (co-producer with Karen O and member of Afternoons), Bradford Cox (Deerhunter), Brian Chase (YYY), Dean Fertita (The Dead Weather), Aaron Hemphill (Liars), Greg Kurstin (The Bird and the Bee), Jack Lawrence (The Dead Weather), Oscar Michel (Gris Gris), Imaad Wasif (New Folk Implosion), Nick Zinner, (YYY) and an untrained children's choir." [Where the Wild Things Press Release]

As the press release says above, the song "All is Love" is out today. You can listen to it at MySpace.

In related news, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs are playing Music Hall of Williamsburg in Brooklyn on September 29th. That's six days after their much larger Manhattan show at Radio City Music Hall which sold out, I am told, in less than a day (UPDATE: There are a few random single tickets still available for Radio City at the moment, so not completely sold out yet)... I'm sure the MHOW show will sell out in less than a minute when tickets go on sale Friday at noon (2-ticket limit, will call only, opener TBA).

Some related videos below...

Continue reading "Yeah Yeah Yeahs add MHOW show - Karen O & the Kids made the Where the Wild Things Are soundtrack (single out now)"

...to talk about The Death of Bunny Munro

"The lead singer of the Birthday Party, the Bad Seeds, and Grinderman, Nick Cave has been performing music for more than thirty years. His album Murder Ballads has sold close to one million copies. In addition to his previous novel, he has authored King Ink, a collection of lyrics and poetry, and the screenplay and score for the film The Proposition. He recently composed the soundtrack for the film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's The Road. Born in Australia, Cave now lives in Brighton, England."
[Barnes & Noble, Union Square, NYC - September 14, 2009]

Regina Spektor, who also has a show coming up at Radio City, is appearing at the same book store in August.

Nick Cave & Warren Ellis are releasing White Lunar, a double CD set...

Nick Cave and Warren Ellis have been creating music together for more than fifteen years, with The Bad Seeds, Grinderman and The Dirty Three. More recently, they have collaborated on soundtracks for such films as The Proposition (2005) and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007). White Lunar, a two CD set to be released by Mute on September 22, 2009, contains music they composed from the aforementioned films, along with a selection of their cinematic scores, including rare and previously unavailable material.

Dirty Three are playing ATP NY, Bowery Ballroom, and other places in September.

Arctic Monkeys played a Nick Cave cover at Highline Ballroom last night. An official video of them doing that, a video of Nick reading from the book, and the track breakdown for the Nick & Warren CD, below...

Continue reading "Nick Cave releasing double CD, will be in NY in September..."

DOWNLOAD: Living Things - Oxygen (MP3)

Dee Dee?? (Living Things @ Highline / more by Leia Jospe)

St. Louis garage rockers Living Things are about to appear as one of their hero bands, the Ramones in the now-filming The Runaways, the biopic about the groundbreaking 70's all-girl hard rock group led by Joan Jett. Kristen Stewart of Twilight fame plays Jett, with Dakota Fanning as Cherie Currie and Academy Award-nominated actor Michael Shannon as the band's "Svengali" Kim Fowley...Living Things have already recorded a cover of "We're A Happy Family."

In addition to having a useful resemblance in attitude to the punk progenitors, the band has a direct line into the production - singer Lillian Berlin is the husband of the film's writer and director Floria Sigismondi.

That makes two Twilight actors with roles as rock stars in upcoming movies. Living Things' new record, Habeas Corpus came out earlier this year on Jive Records. A track from it is posted above.

In other movie news, the The Sun UK reports that "drug-guzzling shock-rocker" Marilyn Manson will be filming a musical, "Goth-inspired" version of Cinderella with Harry Potter's Emma Watson. 500 Days of Summer, starring She of She & Him, has an indie rock soundtrack that includes Feist, The Black Lips, and She & Him. Funny People, in addition to featuring characters wearing indie rock t-shirts, also has an indie-friendly soundtrack. Oh, and Patton Oswalt is a Big Fan.

A pic from the set of The Runaways movie, with Living Things tour dates, and some trailers, below...

Continue reading "a film about The Runaways starring Living Things as The Ramones + Marilyn Manson in Cinderella & other movie news"

1. Paul McCartney - Great Day
2. Coconut Records - Wires
3. Robert Plant and the Strange Sensation - All The King's Horses
4. James Taylor - Carolina On My Mind [live]
5. Warren Zevon - Keep Me In Your Heart
6. Adam Sandler - Real Love [live]
7. Neil Diamond - We [early take]
8. Wilco with Andrew Bird - Jesus, etc. [Live Summer '08]
9. Adam Sandler - George Simmons Soon Will Be Gone
10. Coconut Records - I Am Young
11. Maude Apatow & Larry Goldings - Memory (from Cats)
12. Warren Zevon - Numb As A Statue
13. Ringo Starr - Photograph
14. John Lennon - Watching The Wheels [acoustic]

There was a screening of "Funny People" in NYC yesterday. "Funny People is the new Judd Apatow movie that stars Seth Rogan, Adam Sandler, Leslie Mann, and Raaaaaaaandy. As you can see in the track listing above, the soundtrack features a live Wilco song that was recorded when they were playing shows last year with Andrew Bird who joined them on stage. Some video examples of that below.

Wilco came to NYC this week to play a big show at Keyspan Park in Coney Island (7/13). That show also featured many special guests including Leslie Feist who most likely flew in mainly to join Wilco for their appearance on the David Letterman show which aired last night (7/14), but was recorded yesterday afternoon which gave Jeff Tweedy plenty of time to make it over to the movie screening (which he was spotted at). Letterman video below...

Continue reading "Wilco - w/ Feist on Letterman (video), w/ Andrew Bird on the Funny People Soundtrack (Raaaaaaaandy.......)"

Fellowship of the Ring live @ Royal Albert Hall April 14th & 15th, 2009

The music of Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring is being performed in full with the film at Radio City Music Hall in NYC on October 9th and 10th.

Beneath an immense projection of Peter Jackson's film, the 21st Century Orchestra, under the direction of Maestro Ludwig Wicki, will perform Howard Shore's entire Academy Award-winning score. Joining them will be the acclaimed voices of The Collegiate Chorale, The Brooklyn Youth Chorus, and soprano Kaitlyn Lusk.

Tickets for the October 9th and October 10th shows are on sale, and nerds fans coming in from out of town for the shows, and even those who are local, will have plenty of other Tolkien activities to keep them busy while they are here. "FOTR Weekend in New York City" will include the official release of Doug Adams' new book The Music of the Lord of the Rings Films, discussion with Tolkien linguist David Salo, who translated all choral lyrics for The Lord of the Rings scores, and more! Details at TheRadioCityLOTRconcert.com.

The NYC performance is one of several Lord of the Rings - Live to Projection concerts happening around the world. The score's composer, Howard Shore, has conducted some himself, including a performance in April by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, who played on the film's soundtrack. The orchestra is planning an April 2010 performance of The Two Towers in the same space.

Ludwig Wicki, who will be leading the orchestra at Radio City, recently conducted The Two Towers in Germany. The conductor was profiled by a German newspaper, where he described the rigors of conducting music synchronized with a nearly three hour movie...

The trick: Wicki has not just the score in front of him but a laptop as well. There he sees the movie - and more: This is everything he needs and what's confusing the rest of us: colored stripes that move from the left side of the screen to the right, white flashing punches and figures. To quote the movie: One screen to rule them all.

There are almost no breathing pauses for the orchestra and the conductor (the choir has a bit less to do): the movie runs for about three hours, the music for about 2 hours and 40 minutes. "That means, you can barely relax. You're permanently under high tension." conductor Wicki illustrates. Of course, even if there's no music you have to pay attention, otherwise you'd miss your cue. [translated at themusicoflordoftherings.blogspot.com]

More from that article, with live clips of the Lord of the Rings Symphony, which is a reworked version of the music from all three films, below...

Continue reading "Lord of the Rings music is coming to Radio City Music Hall"

by Black Bubblegum

Jim Jarmusch & Bill Murray

Director Jim Jarmusch, a musician himself, is no stranger to using modern music in his films. In 1994, Neil Young provided the soundtrack to his unique take on the western, Dead Man starring Johnny Depp. In 1999, RZA handled soundtracking and acting duties for his samurai epic Ghost Dog: The Way Of The Samurai. 2003's Coffee and Cigarettes starred Iggy Pop, Tom Waits, GZA, RZA, Jack and Meg White among others. And there are other examples (see comments).

Jim, not a stranger to Doom either (he featured a track by the recently-reunited Sleep in the movie Broken Flowers), continues the exploration in 2009 with his new film, The Limits of Control. This one will feature, in addition to a possible track by The Black Angels, Southern Lord artists Boris, sunn 0))) & Boris, and Earth! According to a post at The Playlist, Jim chose it all himself as well...

"I have a file of the music that I think is appropriate atmospherically for each film, and that has inspired me even before shooting. I pick the music, so there's no music supervisor per se...When I was writing 'The Limits of Control,' I was already imagining using some things from Boris and Sunn O))), and Earth and The Black Angels. I made [director of photography] Chris Doyle CDs so he could listen to Boris; you could categorize Boris as a psychedelic/noise/metal band, but they're just so original." - Jim

The soundtrack (to be released on Lakeshore Records) contains the following burners:

Continue reading "The Limits of Control - new Jim Jarmusch movie features music by Boris, sunn 0))), Earth..."

LOS ANGELES, Feb. 24 -- Mike Patton (Fantômas, Faith No More, Mr. Bungle, Peeping Tom and the forthcoming Mondo Cane amongst others) has just completed his first major motion film score for the film "Crank 2: High Voltage" (Apr. 17 release).

While Patton has often dabbled in film whether it was lending his voice to the creatures in "I Am Legend", his score for the indie film noir short "A Perfect Place" or Fantômas' film scoring interpretation via The Director's Cut, this marks his first proper film score.

Created during the latter half of 2008, Patton holed up in a Los Angeles studio and eliminated all other projects during the recording, a point worth noting as he is well known for being one of modern music's most prolific artists.

Patton has also provided vocals to several videogames including "Bionic Commando," "Portal," "Left 4 Dead," and "The Darkness." He also lent his voice to Adult Swim's Metalocalypse (character name: Rikki Kix). Patton just wrapped up a trek across Australia with Fantômas as part of the Big Day Out festival. His upcoming schedule includes a performance with labelmates Zu (Mar. 19 @ Great American Music Hall in San Francisco), the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival on Apr. 17 with Rahzel (ex-Roots beatboxer) and the highly anticipated reunion tour with Faith No More in Europe this summer.

!!!
To quote the Daily Swarm, "Seems the PR company feels scoring the latest Jason Statham sequel is bigger news than one of the most inventive heavy bands of the 80s and 90s reuniting after 11 years."

--

In related news, the pre-Patton frontman of Faith No More, Chuck Mosley, "is currently recording a new album at Ante Up Audio recording studios in Cleveland, Ohio. Multi-platinum producer/engineer Michael Seifert (Tori Amos, Regina Spektor, Dave Matthews, Bone Thugs 'n Harmony) is currently working on the new release with Chuck. The album is sure to please fans new and old, with a mix of hard rock and acoustic numbers." (thx Klaus)

Continue reading "Mike Patton scores film... Faith No More reunion confirmed?"

M.I.A.'s baby boy (Pink is the New Blog)

M.I.A. who wouldn't risk her health to perform on the Oscars, and Peter Gabriel who wouldn't compromise his integrity to perform on the Oscars, lost the title of "Best Song" to Slumdog's Millionare's "Jai Ho", the song credited to A.R. Rahman who also won a few minutes before that for the entire soundtrack too.

You can hear "Jai Ho" in the video below...

Continue reading "M.I.A didn't win the Oscar, but Slumdog Millionare still did"

Slumdog Millionare's soundtrack does it again.

Continue reading "Slumdog Millionare's A.R.Rahman wins Best Score -------------- Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto"

Guillaume Yann Tiersen (born 23 June 1970) is a French musician and composer known internationally for composing the score to the Jean-Pierre Jeunet movie Amélie.His music is recognized by its use of a large variety of instruments in relatively minimalist compositions, often with a touch of either European classical music or French folk music, using primarily the piano, accordion or violin together with instruments like the melodica, xylophone, toy piano, ondes martenot, harpsichord and typewriter. He has been compared to musicians Chopin, Erik Satie, Phillip Glass and Michael Nyman [Wikipedia]

Yann Tiersen is going on tour! A tour that includes North America and which includes an April 16th show at Irving Plaza in NYC. Tickets are on sale.

Other cities on the tour include Montreal, Toronto, Chicago, Minneapolis, Seattle, Denver, Salt Lake City, Portland, San Francisco, and LA. On May 15th he's playing the Breeders-curated ATP Festival in Minehead. Back in 2003, musicOMH wrote this review of one of Yann's live shows...

He began his set on grand piano - and his piano pieces are rarely other than delightful. What wasn't obvious from listening to his albums was instantly so here - it isn't someone playing melodica or accordion with him as he tinkles the ivories. Oh no. He plays both instruments at the same time.

After each track, rapturous applause greeted him as he shifted between piano, melodica, accordion, violin, viola, bass, guitar and even vocals. A rare chance was afforded to the audience to hear a solo viola piece, Qu'En Reste-t-il? from L'Absente, in which at any moment sparks could have flown from the instrument as Yann fiddled for all he was worth. Here was a man making electricity spark from an acoustic instrument before our very eyes. His playing was enough to make members of his audience weep at its beauty.

All tour dates below...

Continue reading "Yann Tiersen - 2009 Tour Dates (Irving Plaza, ATP UK)"

I just saw the animated Disney movie Bolt. Like the critics said, it was really great, and not just because it's completely in 3-D.

I won't post any spoilers, but the film is about a dog named Bolt (John Travolta) and his human Penny (Miley Cyrus). In additon to the score, there are basically two full songs in the movie. One is actually sung by John and Miley. That comes at the end. The other, by Rilo Kiley's Jenny Lewis, is during a (what I think was a) major scene of the movie. It completely surprised me. I wasn't 100% sure it was her, but the credits confirmed it, and then the credits confirmed that the child actress is also assistant director which had me leaving the movie thinking she had that job, though IMDB points out that she is the voice of a character called "assistant director" (which makes more sense I think).

The Jenny and Miley songs are both on the soundtrack which is otherwise all John Powell's score. Not on the soundtrack: Motorhead's "Dog Face Boy" which has a quick cameo in the movie (no spoilers). The Jenny Lewis (new) and Motorhead (old) songs, and another video that ties them together nicely, below...

Continue reading "Jenny Lewis barking at the moon in Bolt, Motorhead too"

L.C.H.C - Liberty City Hardcore

Liberty City HardcoreDJ: Jimmy Gestapo
Genre: Hardcore Punk

Tracklist:
Murphy's Law - "A Day In The Life"
Maximum Penalty - "All Your Boyz"
Underdog - "Back to Back"
Leeway - "Enforcer"
Sick Of It All - "Injustice System"
Cro-Mags - "It's The Limit"
Sheer Terror - "Just Can't Hate Enough"
Bad Brains - "Right Brigade"
Killing Time - "Tell Tale"
Agnostic Front - "Victim in Pain"

That's just the hardcore channel. Justice, Les Savy Fav, !!!, LCD Soundsystem and even Cheeseburger are among those who made it on the new video game soundtrack too.