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[One sentence apiece, over and out, and out for the weekend ...]
Compare lineups and decide for yourself, but $40 for a Summer Strummer ticket and $35.50
for the Detour Festival?
My holiday weekend heavy-rotation handful: "The Ortolan" by the Deadly Syndrome; "Astronomy
for Dogs" by the Aliens; "A
New Hope" by Minipop; "Let Us Now
Praise Sleepy John" by Peter Case;
and "The
Brit Box," the four-disc box set coming in October from Rhino.
And,
by the way, the Deadly Syndrome
turned its song "Eucalyptus" into an arena-rocker last night at the Roxy.
People (and some of them may be your friends) are all atwitter over the new
Britney Spears "Gimme More," which is all glitch and heavy breathing and so
disposable I'm tired of it after streaming it once here.
It'll be almost like getting of town for the weekend -- Brian Jonestown Massacre,
Saturday and Sunday, at the Echoplex.
No explanation, but the Little Ones have cancelled
their West Coast tour dates with Voxtrot, including Sept. 23 at the Fonda.
PJ Harvey has scheduled a show Oct. 15 at the
Orpheum.
Imagine that, the Cold
War Kids, headlining the Wiltern, on Nov. 23.
Happy 30th birthday, Morning Becomes Eclectic (special programming all
weekend).
There's one of those nifty art space shows tonight with a pretty
strong lineup of locals; details here.
Stores like Urban Outfitters make me break out in a sweat, but I'll be stopping by to drop
$14 on the two-disc charity
compilation "Give.Listen.Help #4," which features tracks from the likes of
Patti Smith, Coldplay, Mew, Silversun Pickups, The Go! Team, Travis, Rilo Kiley, Band of
Horses, Interpol, Cold War Kids, Air and Blonde Redhead.
Happy long weekend
...
[Colleague Frank Farrar catches up with local favorites the Like:]
Fans showing up to hear old favorites from the Like at Spaceland on Wednesday were out of
luck. But there didn’t seem to be too many disappointed faces after the still-young
group’s energetic set cast entirely of new material. It’s been a couple of years
since the Like’s debut album, “Are You Thinking What I’m Thinking,” came out -- and that
CD recast songs on earlier EPs. No surprise, then, that the trio reveled in playing some
new stuff.
At one point during the typically casual, amiable show, singer-guitarist Z Berg
responded to an inquiring mind by promising that a new album “will come out after we
make it.” However, after the set, she said she expects Geffen will release it next year,
and the Spaceland set was just the second of two shows the band wanted to do before
going to Europe in October to record with producer Youth (the Verve, Crowded House).
Some of the new songs may have felt a little underdeveloped, and the first ones were
marred by a sound mix that came off like Rock Night in an underwater grotto. But once
that got cleared up, the band’s strengths came through: the Blondie-fied ’60s girl group
allure of “Release Me”; Charlotte Froom’s confident bass playing, especially on the
evening’s closer; Tennessee Thomas’ increasingly vital drumming (she sure likes those
toms); and Z’s upper-register vocals, which can give the music a particularly memorable
signature touch as it cascades from throbbing garage psychedelia and mid-’60s pop to
visions of prog and even a lilting, tamed-down ska line here or there.
“We’ve got a thousand new songs,” Z joked after the show. OK, narrow it down to the
500 best and you’ll have something.
Songwriter Scott Masson is not the first art-schooler to turn to pop music as a means
of self-expression. Indeed, the 28-year-old frontman of the Chicago quintet Office credits the year he spent at
Goldsmiths College in London, segueing from struggling painter to installation artist,
for changing his point of view.
“It taught me how to look at the world with a more critical eye and be more focused,”
the singer-guitarist says, remembering that as he emerged from undergrad school in
Michigan he was “kind of lost.” Speaking of his early musical excursions, he says, “I
was really only talking to myself rather than bringing in the world.”
With the Sept. 25 release of Office’s debut “A Night at the Ritz,” Masson and
bandmates Tom Smith, Alissa Noonan, Erica Corniel and Jessica Gonyea will be bringing
themselves to the world, dance beats and cheeky humor intact. Office’s glammy
histrionics (think Pop Levi) and stuttery synths (think the Cars in stop-and-go traffic)
put a hip-shaking twist on boy-girl vocal pop. The album was almost five years in the
works. “Our greatest hits that no one’s ever heard,” Masson says with a laugh.
Office caught the attention of James Iha, who signed the band to his New
Line-affiliated Scratchie Records. Masson jumped
at the chance to work with the ex-Smashing Pumpkins guitarist “rather than some
business-type A&R man,” he says. “Plus, I just like the idea of a small label.”
||| Office performs Thursday night at the Roxy with standout local bands the Deadly Syndrome, Let’s Go Sailing and the Western States Motel as part
of Filter’s Revenge of the Sunset
Strip program. In late September, Office will tour with Earlimart, including Oct. 24 at the Troubadour. (no L.A. dates
listed, but Oct. 23 at the Casbah in San Diego). [Thanks to commenter Jenn, who pointed
out the Troub date that was not on Office's original schedule.]
||| Download: "The
Ritz."
Downtown L.A.'s newest block party will get a visit from Bloc Party on Oct. 6.
The British quartet will be one of the headliners for the second annual LA Weekly Detour Music
Festival , held within boogieing distance from Los Angeles City Hall. Tickets,
which go on sale at noon Thursday, are $30.50, Attendees get you four stages of
music, plus DJs and displays of art. This just in: Presale
tickets are $30.50, but that price expires at 10 tonight; regular tickets will be
$35.50.
There's a strong local contingent in the lineup -- Moving Units, Autolux, the
Aggrolites, the Deadly Syndrome and Nico Vega are on the bill. And plenty of others:
Justice, Satellite Party, Kinky, Comedians of Comedy, Turbonegro, Teddybears, the
Raveonettes, Shout Out Louds, Celebrity Skin, the Aliens, Busy P, Noisettes, Scissors
for Lefty, Johnossi and Augie March. Among the DJs: Franki Chan, Travis Keller and Bruce
Perdew.
Makes you want to start a band called the Street Closures.
◊ ◊ ◊
By the way, if your tastes run a little more neighborhood-y, the Eagle Rock Music Festival is
again scheduled opposite the Detour. Mia Doi Todd, the Pity Party, Chuchito Valdes,
Bodies of Water, the Front and the Mormons are among the acts playing the evening affair
along Colorado Boulevard.
Photo of Bloc Party from www.blocparty.com.
When I first saw and heard Driveblind, I was
pretty sure the sextet from Aberdeen, Scotland, could be the next big thing. Of course,
it was after midnight at a smarmy club on the Sunset Strip and I had not yet learned
it's best to check your critical thought processes with one of the uppity doormen. I was
seduced by Driveblind's leviathan anthems and Scottish accents -- not to mention that
they named themselves after a Ride song.
That was four years ago. The short story is: Driveblind signed to A&M, which
folded into Geffen, which never quite seemed happy with the album the fellows were
making, which delayed it seemingly interminably. Which happens. "Driveblind"
came out last October, a solid if overpolished effort, and whether it was the product or
the dearth of promotion, the album failed to gain the band any momentum.
Now Driveblind and Geffen are parting ways. "A mutual thing," guitarist
Nick Tyler says. "We're not happy; they're not happy."
And the band (a quintet with the departure of rhythm guitarist Cameron Taylor) is
striking out on its own. Driveblind headlines the Troubadour tonight, ready to
test-drive some new material that Tyler describes as "more upbeat." He adds,
"We're trying to shake the cobwebs off."
||| Stream four new demos on Driveblind's MySpace page. And Rehearsals.com has some
Driveblind stuff here.
||| Driveblind plays the headline slot at the Troubadour tonight; up-and-coming blues
band Back Door Slam performs at 9:30.
Happy Tuesday. You might be jazzed about the Boss' announcements -- Bruce Springsteen
& the E Street Band are playing Oct. 28 in Los Angeles (venue TBA) and the very
rocking new single "Radio Nowhere" is available for free here -- but the fact that P.J. Harvey has new music on the way is great
too.
Harvey's new album, due Sept. 25, is titled "White Chalk." No U.S. tour
dates have been announced yet.
You can stream "Under the Ether" here.
◊ ◊ ◊
Are they really charging $30 for a ticket
($40 at the door) for the Summer
Strummer festival in Santa Monica on Sunday? I mean, Brett Dennen and Mat Kearney are nice singer-songwriters and
all, but the lineup is filled with acts who play around town a lot, draining a lot of
the cachet from their appearances there. Maybe people will be excited to see Duane Peters both play and skate.
Or maybe they'll just show up to ogle the emcee.
◊ ◊ ◊
Touts for Tuesday, Aug. 28
Crowded House and the
Greek and Gogol Bordello and the Fonda are the big shows, but there are plenty of club
choices: The Watson Twins and Everest play a benefit for the Circle X
Theater at Spaceland. ... No Age celebrates
the release of "Weirdo Rippers" with a 7 p.m. in-store at Amoeba. ... The Finches finish up a run of Tuesdays at
Bordello. ... The Amateurs and the Lonely Years play the Let's
Independent night at Boardner's. ... I See Hawks in LA headline at the Echo. ... And Map comes in from the Inland Empire to play
the Silverlake Lounge.
[It's good to have colleagues -- especially guys like August Brown who will tell
me what I missed at Sunday's second night of the F-Yeah Fest without sticking his tongue
out and going "nyah-nyah!"]
The latter night of F-Yeah Fest begged one
big question -- what constitutes punk rock in 2007? Is it the shirtless, Iggy-aping
sex-god sneer of Pissed Jeans' Matt
Korvette? The icy noise blasts of local chin-strokers No Age? Deerhunter's Bradford Cox picking a fight
via e-mail with freelance writer (and occasional Buzz Bands contributor) Jeff Weiss for comparing his band to Wyld
Stallyns?
Yes and no on all counts. The violent, physical sounds of the F-Yeah fest were on
their own terms invigorating, especially since the Eastside rock scene has gone belly-up
into tedious psych-folk and bizarre attempts at torch songs for underfed (and
undersexed) white kids.
But to coalesce it all into one loose scene, with its own designated weekend-long
showcase replete with a Dewars sponsorship, seems further proof that any danger in
underground music gets swallowed whole by omnivorous, consumptive hipsterdom before kids
can get anxious for the revolution.
What's the real cost of the special
packages to see Morrissey for all 10
nights of his run at the Palladium? Well, it's $391.50, as publicized. Plus $96 in
Ticketmaster convenience fees. And plus $20 for UPS delivery.
This apparently constitutes the promised "savings of over $50" over the
surcharges incurred by buying individual tickets. Makes my head spin. But it'll make Moz
fans' wallets open.
[One Illinois-born fiftysomething attends a show given by another
Illinois-born fiftysomething, and lives to blog about it:]
Given the way John Doe's music can inhabit
your brain -- I've been humming "Golden State" for almost two days straight
now -- it's no surprise how the X Man's presence carried the room Saturday night at
Safari Sam's. Playing in a steamy room to an appreciative crowd that spanned at least a
couple of generations, Doe and his parade of talented collaborators gave you a 90-minute
warm-and-fuzzy.
There was original material -- including a healthy dose of stuff from the album many
are calling his career-best, this year's "A Year in the Wilderness" -- there
were covers, there were rockers and folk songs, and there was even a moment of
reflection: "Having been taken for granted a couple times in Los Angeles," he
told the crowd, "this is nice to see."
Doe, sweating through his dress shirt and justifiably magnanimous with his praise of his
side players, gave back as much as he soaked up. I chuckled at one point when he seemed
to get ahead of himself -- for some reason I thought of the jokey T-shirt that a local
rock band gave me last fall for my 50th birthday. It said: "Middle age is all the
rage."
I'm sure that Friday and Saturday, when he is fronting X at the House of Blues
Anaheim, that'll be even more of a joke. But at Sam's on Saturday, in the genial company
of members of Dead Rock West (drummer
Bryan Head, bassist David J. Carpenter and vocalist Cindy Wasserman backed him after
playing an opening set), Doe's songs were as vital as anything you'll hear from anybody.
Kathleen Edwards joined him to duet on "Golden State," and Dave Alvin brought
his estimable guitar talents onstage for a few numbers.
And I don't think anybody took one note for granted.
◊ ◊ ◊
Postscript: Doe also got a boost from Dead Rock West keyboardist Phil Parlapiano, who
filled in for ailing Doe regular Nick
Luca. Amazingly, Parlapiano hadn't rehearsed any of the songs he played on.
Luca, by the way, has an album coming out Sept. 25 by the quartet that bears his
name. It's titled "Fractions;" he'll play the Knitting Factory on Oct. 23.
||| Stream a nice acoustic version of "Golden State" here.
Photos: Top, John Doe duets with Kathleen Edwards; above, Doe with Cindy Wasserman,
Dave Alvin and David J. Carpenter (background). By Kevin Bronson / LAT.
[Colleague Liam Gowing sends me this little narrative from Saturday's opening
night of the F-Yeah Fest in Echo Park:]
It was an evening of treble-heavy highs and one deep low at the first night of F-Yeah
Fest 2007.
The Echoplex was the spot to be for the “traditional” punk bands: Toys That Kill tore it up with thrashy pop-punk
imbued with Bro-down choruses that seem to go hand in hand with a South Bay ZIP Code.
Likewise, the Fleshies, who added a glam
edge to their gobbing-and-spitting anthems.
The real weirdness, however, was upstairs at the Echo, where Bobby Birdman was doing his thing --
crooning mellifluously over gloppy, canned digitalisms -- with an endlessly oddball
approach that evoked Bjork fronting 8-Bit. Love it or hate it, it was, in a word,
singular. I for one, was down with it.
Up next at the Echo were the Mae Shi, who
were explosive and fun as usual. Powered by the magical, funk-a-licious Omnichord --
yes, the children’s toy -- “Run to Your Grave” was just one of the sing-a-long,
clap-your-hands and-stomp-your-feet standouts. The crowd really went nuts for the
anarchic closer, “HLLLYH,” however. There was crowd-surfing -- like legitimate,
triumphal, festival-style crowd-surfing -- which was a quite a thrill to see at the
Echo.
Leaving the Echo behind in a race to see Greg Ashley -- he of the giant pop
obfuscation that is “Medicine F* Dream” -- I was waylaid by an iconic act of guerilla
rock 'n' roll that goes back as least as far as the Beatles’ “Let It Be”: A sloppy,
scrappy little quartet from Garden Grove called AM, which had neither applied for nor been
invited to play the festival, set up on the sidewalk two doors down from the Echo and
began to play an impromptu set of good-times garage-rock. Explaining the tactic, co-lead
singer Fonzie said, “[Heck with] venues, [heck with] shows. We’ve got a portable
generator!”
But what should have been a nice little diversion became an ugly little incident when
two bouncers from the Echo decided that the foursome posed a clear and present danger to
the festival and attempted to shut it down. Taking a cue from Ringo, the kids kept
playing despite some unnecessarily aggressive alpha-male posturing. Instead of waiting
for the end of the song to issue his decree, however, one of the muscle-bound bouncers
actually tackled singer-guitarist Felipe mid-riff, railroading the skinny non-threat
against the iron security gates along Sunset, knocking his guitar -- and probably his
spine -- right out of tune. That was the end of that.
Shame on you, F-Yeah Fest. Of all fests, you should know better.
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