For England, 2007 was a year of reunions. Last year saw promoters rake in the dough by bringing acts like the Spice Girls, Take That and Echo & The Bunnymen back to the stage. While nearly fully responsible for disseminating trip hop—the morning-after-pill music for the 90s rave-on generation—Portishead surprised everyone by resurfacing on festival bills for this year's Coachella and last year's ATP. Even more surprising was the talk of a new album since their last release was about...
Troubadour Chris Bathgate has announced the follow-up to 2007's A Cork Tale Wake, releasing an mp3 from the forthcoming Wait, Skeleton. EP, out April 8th on Quite Scientific. The EP, which will be released in digital format, is also available in a limited edition hand-made hardcover edition, limited to 250 copies and available directly from Quite Scientific and at a handful of independent record shops. Wait, Skeleton. is comprised of three new songs and three re-worked/re-recorded versions of songs from...
I'm sure there are quite a few Death Cab and Postal Service fans out there, and for you, here's some "news." Frontman Ben Gibbard has announced a new side project called Just Jazzin'. Apparently, the name says it all . Gibbard says "there's just a side of me and my music that desires a lack of structure and Just Jazzin' does that for...
Ground Control's coverage of the Paid Dues Festival is in three parts. This is Part III. Click here to jump back to Part I or Part II. Back in the VIP area, the DJ spun stacks of records for the tired few who ponied up $100 bucks for the privelege, enough for eleven-hours of non stop music without falling back on some massive hard drive. A marathon achievement in itself (not to mention the sheer weight of 11 hours worth...
To put it mildly, most members of the underground music scene do not wear mainstream acceptance well. Maybe it’s simply a matter of too many eyes and ears on a musician at once that makes underground and independent musicians uneasy; under the big, bright lights, musicians that occupy what they consider to be small niches that shouldn’t, theoretically, get much attention and wither and dry up. Those that worry about that prospect should take heart however, because Kimya Dawson has...
For those that wouldn't necessarily search out the music of a man with a monocle, Daedelus is releasing a free mp3 of "Hrs:Mins:Secs" from his forthcoming Ninja Tune release Love To Make Music To, out this June. Having recently released Live at Low End Theory, from his live set in Los Angeles in July '07, Daedelus has returned to the studio for his first album of new material since 2006's Denies the Day's Demise. Fans who download the mp3 directly...
It has been four years since Alun Piggins released his sophomore album, Awaken The Snakes, but it isn’t as if the singer/songwriter has been inactive or suffered from a block that kept him from producing a follow-up. Rather, in the space between Awaken The Snakes and the tellingly entitled At War With The Elephants, Piggins has gone around the world a couple of times with former Rheostatics frontman Dave Bidini (the latest excursion is chronicled hilariously in Bidini’s book Around...
Boston’s very own experimental metal band 5ive announced a free download from their latest Tortuga Recordings release, Hesperus. The 40-second intro of “Gulls” sounds like it could belong on Frankfurt’s Mille Plateaux label—which might explain the association with Kid 606—but then a quick snare fill let’s you know real fucking fast that this is some dope-ass, drugged-out metal. Hesperus marks' the band's—consisting of Ben Carr (guitars) and Charlie Harrold (Drums)—third release...
Of the litany of instruments a rock band uses, the organ just doesn’t come to mind as a tool that would cause audience members to nod their heads in approval. Somehow, something like the triangle or the cowbell resembles that rebellious symbol so akin to rock much more appropriately. Then again, guys who like to skate around on ice and beat each other up have been listening to the organ for decades. This is where The Apes come in with...
Ground Control's coverage of the Paid Dues Festival is in three parts. This is Part II. Click here to jump back to Part I or here to read Part III . I wasn't prepared for Hieroglyphics. I'd seen the logo on t-shirts and stickers, I bought Handsome Boy Modeling School, which led me to Deltron 3030, but I didn't connect Del or the three-eyed face to Hiero. So I wasn't ready to get knocked on my ass by the Oakland...