Criminal Records announced today that Yo La Tengo will play a free in-store performance on Sat., Sept. 19 at 4 p.m., which just happens to coincide with the Other Sound Fest.
Yo La Tengo plays Variety Playhouse Sept. 1. $20. 8:30 p.m. Endless Boogie opens. 1099 Euclid Ave. 404-524-7354.
Stream Yo La Tengo’s Popular Songs.
(Photo courtesy Matador Records)
Sonic Youth played the Variety Playhouse on Mon., July 13, in support of their latest album, The Eternal. The Entrance Band opened.
Within the first few seconds of pressing play on The Eternal, Sonic Youth’s 16th studio album in nearly 30 years, the band sounds like it has been recharged. “Sacred Trickster” tears the album wide open with a visceral intensity that surges into “Anti-Orgasm,” bringing the album to a frenzied climax of noise and chiming, art-punk dirge.
Sonic Youth hasn’t rocked this hard in years, and the fire was sparked in 2007 when the group went on tour playing the 1988 masterpiece Daydream Nation. “After reacquainting ourselves with Daydream Nation, we were really surprised by the energy of some of the songs,” says guitarist and vocalist Lee Ranaldo. “At first we didn’t think it was such a hot idea, but revisiting those songs really inspired a lot of what’s going on with this record.” Continue reading.
See a gallery of images of both Sonic Youth and the Entrance Band performing at Variety Playhouse on Monday night.
Sonic Youth’s “Sacred Trickster” mp3
(Photos by Perry Julien)
>>The recent meltdown of lead singer Nathan Williams of Wavves continues to gather commentary from everyone. To refresh your memory, Ohmpark gives an interesting chronicle of the event and aftermath.
A few weeks ago, Wavves had a meltdown on stage at a big music festival in Spain which Pitchfork called “the most epic onstage meltdown a band of their small size could conjure”
>>Last year Matador teamed up with True Panther Sounds record label to help put out Girls’ debut 7″. The band is back at it again with a target release of September 22.
We are proud to announce the September 22 release of the debut full-length from Girls, entitled Album. The record will be released by True Panther Sounds, the label that released Girls’ debut 7?, “Lust For Life,” last year, in conjunction with Matador.
>>Shining Path, the Balkans and the Trashcans show is still creating quite the buzz amongst fans. 7″ Atlanta does a good job describing the show and an even better job of making you feel guilty for missing out.
The Trashcans shared the bill Friday at the Watch Yr Head House with a couple of awesome young bands.
The house is located off Memorial and has a basement in which the bands play and a barn-style garage for chilling in between sets.
>>If I had the money, I still wouldn’t carry a Gucci man-purse — no matter what Crunk and Disorderly says:
Titty Boi and Dolla Boy [collectivly known as Playaz Circle] were two of the more fashionable acts to perform at Birthday Bash this past weekend. And yes, that’s a fork dangling on Dolla’s chest. Tell mama the first thing that comes to your mind.
Sonic Youth’s umpteenth studio album The Eternal hit the streets yesterday via Matador Records, and it is a monster. The gorgeous John Fahey painting on the album’s cover sums it up in one circular and rhythmic motion.
The Eternal is a swirling mass of stark, guitar textures where persistent, avant-garde movements lure the senses into a familiar place before opening up to reveal the truly bombastic nature of the album.
Over the last decade albums such as NYC Ghosts and Flowers, Sonic Nurse and Rather Ripped have upheld the group’s legacy, but The Eternal is easily Sonic Youth’s strongest record in years. “Sacred Trickster,” “Anti-Orgasm,” “Antenna” and “No Way” evoke the energy, the darkness and the noise wrought with such early staples as “EVOL,” “Sister” and “Daydream Nation.” But what sets The Eternal apart is a uniformly brilliant batch of songs that find the band thrashing through chiming melodies, chops, feedback and drones, butted against the vocal back-and-forth of Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore who come across sharper and more energetic than they have sounded in quite some time. “Sacred Trickster” sets the machine in motion with urgency and an affinity for the noir side of bleak art for the sake of rock and roll, which is what Sonic Youth has always done best. More on this in the weeks to come.
Sonic Youth plays the Variety Playhouse with the Entrance Band on Mon., July 13. $25. 8p.m.
The second annual Record Store Day is gearing up to take place this year on April 19th, and is looking to be bigger and better than last year, flailing economy be damned.
Like last year one can expect a plethora of cool, limited edition vinyl records to surface for this day in honor of the mom and pop record shops around the country. This week Matador unveiled the first glimpse of what it has in store this year.
In honor the 2nd annual Record Store Day, we’ll be releasing the following limited edition vinyl titles, only available at independent retailers taking part in RSD.
OLE-864-7 Jay Reatard “Hang Them All” 7″ b/w Sonic Youth – “No Garage”
OLE-865-7 Sonic Youth – “Pay No Mind” (Beck cover) b/w Beck – “Green Light” (Sonic Youth cover) 7?
OLE-855-1 Pavement Live In Germany LPWe’re making 2500 each of the above. After they’re gone, as the Bard Of Hookset, NH [G.G. Allin] might’ve said (if he collected records), tough fuckin’ shit.
Apparently Matador didn’t get enough hate mail from all of the disgruntled record buyers who were cut out of the ridiculously limited Jay Reatard 7-inches with which the label taunted the world earlier this year. Granted there are 2500 of each of these records, so your odds are a little better this time around, but the hype machine is already churning.
For today’s Roll Call we call out Jennifer O’Connor.
Who are you?
I am Jennifer O’Connor.
Describe yourself in three words.
Honest. Loving. Sleepy.
Who — dead or alive — would you most like to meet?
Kanye West.
Who would you most like to slap in the face?
No one.
What song do you wish you had written?
“When Doves Cry.”
Elvis Costello or Elvis Presley?
Costello.
LP, CD or MP3?
Like them all. But probably CD.
If you could start one trend, what would it be?
Song-driven music gaining popularity.
If you could end one trend, what would it be?
Style-driven music waning in popularity.
With whom would you most like to play a game of spin the bottle?
Jennifer Beals or Mark Ruffalo.
“Here With Me” MP3
“Valley Road ‘86″ MP3
Jennifer O’Connor plays the 5 Spot on Thurs., Feb. 5. $10. 8:30 p.m. 1123 Euclid Ave. 404-223-1100.
(Photo by John Von Pamer)
The fourth single in Matador’s series of limited-editions by Jay Reatard is a split 7-inch with Atlanta’s Deerhunter. The A-side is Jay covering Deerhunter’s “Flourescent Grey,” and the B-side is Deerhunter covering Jay’s “Oh, It’s Such A Shame.”
The record will be in stores on July 22. Matador’s webstore preorder date and time will be Mon., July 14 at 3:00 p.m. EDT. (Bastille Day).
All six 7-inches in the series will be compiled on an LP/CD to be released this fall.
TIMES NEW VIKING: Who needs a keyboard stand when you’ve got a bucket of paint and a box of vinyl records? (All photos by Chad Radford.)
From the days of Pere Ubu and Devo on through Brainiac and Guided By Voices, middle Ohio has long been a fertile breeding ground for skewed hybrids of art-damaged punk and pop sounds.
Two trios from Columbus, Oh., Psychedelic Horseshit and Times New Viking passed through town last night to uphold the Buckeye state’s tradition at Eyedrum. After opening sets from Atlanta acts Tree Creature and Gold Painted Nails, as well as Sydney, Australia-based duo Naked On the Vague, Psychedelic Horseshit played a ramshackle set with drums and keyboards balanced on paint-splattered buckets.
On record, both Psychedelic Horseshit and Times New Viking shroud their respectively short, lobbed songwriting in a haze of lo-fi fuzz. At Eyedrum, the noise factor was an equalizer that served as a booster for both bands’ secretly catchy melodies.
Most notable was the transformation that came over TNV. The group’s recently released third full-length (and first for Matador Records), titled Rip It Off, sounds like it was recorded on a boom box. But when played live, the scratchy fidelity of each song melts away to reveal a wealth of rapid fire drumming and immediately catchy hooks.
The album is by no means a hard sell, but live the songs are propulsive, fun and much more compelling.
PSYCHEDELIC HORSESHIT
