Monday Music Miscellany
Posted on November 5, 2007 at 7:07 am | No Comments
A little Monday morning miscellaneousness…
Ida‘s long-awaited follow-up to 2005’s “Heart Like A River” has a release date and a title: “Lovers Prayers” will be out on Polyvinyl on January 29th, 2008. Cannot wait.
Update: Ladies and gents, we have a track list…
Ida’s “Lovers Prayers” will give us…
1. Lovers Prayers
2. The Weight Of The Straw
3. The Love Below
4. Willow Tree
5. Worried Mind Blues
6. Gravity
7. For Shame Of Doing Wrong
8. First Light
9. Kora
10. Surely Gone
11. The Killers 1964
12. See The Stars
13. First Take
14. Blue Clouds
The vinyl version will also include a bonus track titled “Lolo Sang”.
Sid over at Too Much Rock caught Ida (performing as a trio with Dan, Liz, and violinist Jean Cook) when they played Schuba’s in Chicago back in late August, and you can check out some photos here, as well as a live clip of the band covering a Neil Young song…
Mp4 Video: Ida – “Albuquerque” (Neil Young)
The venerable Middle East is celebrating 20 years in the live-music business by hosting one hell of a show this coming Saturday night. Check out the bands playing: Hallelujah The Hills, The Thalia Zedek Band with Chris Brokaw (yes, this is as close as we’ve gotten to a Come reunion), M.G. Lederman (ex-Victory at Sea), Empty House Cooperative, Reid Paley Trio, Helms, IV Diffusion, and Drug Rug. Now that is a party, and also a benefit for Stephen Fredette (heplayed lead guitar for Scruffy the Cat, is currently in Pony, and was recently diagnosed with lymphoma), as well as a means to mark the 50th birthday of the one and only Mr. Billy Ruane. Word is he’s responsible for that lineup, and if so, well done, sir. Tickets here.
Speaking of Chris Brokaw, did you catch him on Jimmy Kimmel’s talk show the other night, playing guitar alongside Thurston Moore in his backing band? Very cool to see him get a little bit of teevee-time.
National Public Radio has kicked off a brand new series of video podcasts called “Project Song”, in which they document an artist composing and recording a new song from start to finish within 48 hours, with someone fairly f’in fantastic: The Magnetic Fields‘ Stephin Merritt. It’s a true treat to see Merritt sit down at a piano and start to pull together a new song called “The Man of a Million Faces“. Here’s a direct link to the 10-minute video, the first half of which shows how the song came together, with the second half being the entire song set to footage of Stephin recording it. I thought about extracting the song’s audio as an Mp3 (and I have no doubt that more traffic-hungry music blogs will take care of that), but it’s more rewarding to watch it come together on its own. Brilliant stuff, and I can only hope NPR is able to keeps the caliber of future “Project Song” contributors as high.
The Magnetic Fields next album, “Distortion”, arrives on January 15, 2008 thanks to Nonesuch Records. Merritt & Co. have also scheduled their first batch of shows in support of the disc, pre-sale tickets have already gone on-sale, and quickly disappeared for the two general admission Somerville Theatre shows. I was able to snag one for the February 15th date (missed out on the Valentine’s Day one), but Boston-area fans still have a chance: the rest of the tickets should be on sale through Ticket$%#^er within the week. Just keep an eye out here.
NPR also keeps the fine concert simulcasts coming with recent (and now archived) broadcasts of live sets from Stars (download full concert Mp3) and the New Pornographers (download full concert Mp3). Both shows are from late October at DC’s 9:30 Club.
If you haven’t picked up Bottomless Pit‘s new debut, “Hammer Of The Gods”, what exactly are you waiting for? Order the cd from the newly-christened Comedy Minus One record label here, or the gorgeously thick vinyl (which includes a cd with all the songs) right here. The Village Voice’s Sound of the City music blog has a great Bottomless Pit write up if you need more convincin’.
This first official pre-release Mp3 from Nada Surf‘s upcoming “Lucky” album (due out in early February on Barsuk) reveals that it may be their slickest sounding recording to date. It’s pretty, polished, and another damn good slow-pop song…
Allston’s own Broken River Prophet played a 35-minute live set on WMBR’s Pipeline program the day before Halloween, and you can download the entire thing as a 32MB Mp3 right here. Something to tide you over until they get an album out.
Speaking of tiding us over, Seattle’s The Sea Navy has let a couple lo-fi demos out of the vaults to bide time until their next album, which will be out in 2008. Those demos are…
Mp3: The Sea Navy – “Is That It“
Mp3: The Sea Navy – “Branches, Leaves, Fruit, Seeds“
Over on the Twilight Singers MySpace page, there’s a new recording of Greg Dulli performing a live cover of Jose Gonzalez’ “Down The Line” at a Seattle benefit show early last month.
Going to see Bob Mould acoustic at the Paradise Lounge here in Boston tonight? See ya there. I’ve actually got a spare ticket if anyone out there’s up for a Monday night out…
[Live MP3s] The Waterboys acoustic in Boston
Posted on November 2, 2007 at 2:12 pm | 1 Comment
I’ve got a bit of a backlog of live recordings to share, so I’m going forego my “once a week” tradition and just let them loose as they’re ready…
I’ll admit up front that I lost complete track of Mike Scott and his Waterboys for oh, about fifteen years or so. I initially discovered them as many on U.S. shores likely did, back when U2 invited them along to open some dates in the mid-80’s, and kept playing their songs as tour intro music for months afterwards. I think the first time I heard “The Whole Of The Moon” (which I still count among my favorite songs) was waiting for U2 to take the stage in Montreal in 1987, and picked up the Waterboys’ third album (and last featuring future World Party frontman Karl Wallinger), the sweeping “This Is The Sea”, shortly after that gig. My love for that record (yes, when it was actually a record) prompted me to grab their self-titled 1981 debut and the sophomore “A Pagan Place”, though I was not nearly as struck by those two, nor by 1988’s “Fisherman’s Blues”. I liked them well enough, but found myself going back to “This Is The Sea” far more frequently.
By the time 1990’s “Room To Roam” came out, my musical tastes had drastically transformed, and the Waterboys fell off my radar until a two-disc remastered version of “This Is The Sea” was issued in 2004, inspiring me to finally replace my well-worn vinyl copy. In the intervening years, I discovered the band had released a few more albums, a couple of greatest hits collections, as well as a live disc.
Which brings us to the Waterboys, present-day. Mike Scott and his mates are still making music, and in August released a new disc called “Book of Lightning” on Decca Records (it came out in the UK in April). The five-piece (a lineup that has changed a bit over the years) just kicked off a short North American tour for the album last night here in Boston, with a stop tonight at Webster Hall in NYC, and winding up in San Francisco on the 13th. While I didn’t see them play here last night, the band is back on my mind after a free, WBOS-sponsored acoustic show they put on at the First Act Guitar Studio back in late August. Mike was joined by longtime collaborators Steve Wickham on fiddle and Richard Naiff on keys, and the trio ran through a full set of songs, most from the new album, with a few old ones and an excellent Willie Nelson cover as well (alas, no “Whole of the Moon“, but I won’t fault them for skipping the obvious). No doubt about it, Mike Scott still has that voice, and as when Dinosaur Jr. played an in-store earlier this year, I’ve got much respect for a band who will give it their all for even a small (and non-paying) crowd. No three-or-four-song token performance was this.
During an in-set anecdote, Mike off-handedly said “… just as people might bootleg this concert”, and he was right on. Here’s the full Waterboys set. Tour dates are below, and I’ll share a couple of Mike’s anecdotes down there as well…
Live at First Act Guitar Studio
in Boston, Massachusetts
on Thursday, August 30th, 2007
01. Everybody Takes A Tumble
02. You In The Sky
03. Strange Arrangement
04. She Tried To Hold Me
05. Nobody’s Baby Anymore
06. The Crash of Angel Wings
07. It’s Gonna Rain
08. Red Army Blues
08. Angel Flying Too Close To The Ground (Willie Nelson cover)
10. The Return Of Jimi Hendrix
11. Bring ‘Em All In (stopped)
12. Bring ‘Em All In (slower)
A couple of anecdotes…
And some links…
Friday, Nov. 2nd, 2007
Webster Hall, NYC
Saturday, Nov. 3rd, 2007
Keswick Theatre, Glenside, Pennsylvania
Monday, Nov. 5th, 2007
The Music Hall, Toronto, Ontario
Tuesday, Nov. 6th, 2007
Park West, Chicago, Illinois
Friday, Nov. 9th, 2007
Moore Theatre, Seattle, Washington
Saturday, Nov. 10th, 2007
Commodore Ballroom, Vancouver
Sunday, Nov. 11th, 2007
Aladdin Theatre, Portland, Oregon
Tuesday, Nov. 13th, 2007
The Fillmore, San Francisco, California
Stream all ‘Nac-shared MP3s on the Hype Machine.
the fine print… If anyone has an issue with these MP3s being made available, just let me know (my contact info in the ‘nac faq). Live sets recorded with a Sony ECM-719 mic and a Sony MZ-RH10 minidisc, converted to .wav and then edited to 192kbps MP3s. Files are made available for a limited time, and are not reposted once removed.