Mp3s: Ted Leo + the Pharmacists in Boston
Posted on April 3, 2007 at 9:52 am | No Comments
At any given moment, it’s more likely that Ted Leo and his Pharmacists are on the road than not. And with the recent release of “Living With The Living”, Ted will be hunting for cheap hotels and good vegan food all over the place, with North American shows in April and May, then a ton of European dates over the summer. Rinse, rest up, and repeat.
Boston’s been lucky enough to get no less than four (maybe five?) Ted visits within the past year as he readied material for the album, and two of them couldn’t have been more different from each other: a Sunday afternoon all-ages show at the small-ish Middle East Upstairs in Cambridge (an announced solo set that turned into a full-band surprise), and just a few months later, an opening slot for Death Cab For Cutie at the resplendent Boston Opera House. While seeing Ted and his band play is never less than worth it, it’s not tough to guess which set was more fun.
When I shared that Middle East set back in August, I deferred to Ted’s wishes that I hold off on posting the not-yet-recorded new songs. Regardless of how blown away I was by the first ever live performance of “The Lost Brigade“, the songs were still in their formative stages, and I was happy to oblige. But with the album’s arrival, the spreading of various live versions around the ‘net, and the many requests from ‘Nac readers, I thought it’d be alright to let them see the light of day. So along with the TL/Rx Opera House set below, you’ll also find the missing songs from that amazing August performance. Enjoy…
Live at The Boston Opera House
in Boston, Massachusetts
on Thursday, November 2nd, 2006
01. My Vien Ilin (fade-in)
02. Dial Up
03. Sons of Cain
04. Where Have All the Rude Boys Gone?
05. Me and Mia
06. Army Bound
07. Counting Down the Hours
08. Little Dawn
09. Timorous Me
10. Walking To Do
(Death Cab For Cutie’s set can be found here)
and the new songs from August 6th, 2006
at the Middle East Upstairs
in Cambridge, MA
(for the rest of the show, go here)
11. Sons of Cain
13. Some Beginner’s Mind
18. Army Bound
19. Unwanted Things
21. Who Do You Love?
23. Colleen
26. The Lost Brigade
Some Ted Leo links…
Ted’s own website, which should soon see a redesign, the band’s MySpace page, their Wikipedia entry, and the Touch & Go label page. Mp3s: “Sons of Cain“, courtesy of Touch & Go; an alternate version of “Bomb.Repeat.Bomb.(1954)“; No less than sixteen downloadable mp3s on Ted’s audio page. Video: The new clip for “Bomb.Repeat.Bomb.“; an older one for “Where Have All The Rude Boys Gone?“; and a link to a full Ted Leo YouTube search, where you can find a wealth of Ted footage. For some truly excellent TL video action, pick up the “Dirty Old Town” DVD on Plexifilm, which chronicles the Pharmacist’s 2003 visit to Coney Island for the Siren Music Festival. For a taste, check out this live clip of “Where Have All The Rude Boys Gone“. More Cowbell has a great write-up of Ted’s appearance with DCFC when hit the DAR Constitution Hall in DC a few days after the Boston stop. Ted Leo & the Pharmacists return to Boston on Friday, May 4th for a show at Avalon. Tickets are still available here. Opening up are tourmates Love of Diagrams. As ever, you can listen to all ‘Nac-hosted tracks on the Hype Machine.
postscript… If anyone has an issue with this live set being made available, just say the word (contact info in the ‘nac faq). Recorded with a Sony ECM-719 mic and a Sony MZ-RH10 minidisc, converted to .wav and then edited to 192kbps mp3s. Mp3s are made available for a limited time, and are not reposted once removed.
Monday Miscellany
Posted on April 2, 2007 at 12:19 pm | No Comments
Well, that was a week right there. Sorry about the relative silence, but I was too busy living life to write anything about it. Before I share a few mp3s below, here’s a quick run down…
Last Sunday night was a special screening of the upcoming (and, yes, freakin’ hilarious) film Hot Fuzz, from the creators of Spaced and Shaun of the Dead, at the Brattle. Director Edgar Wright, co-writer and star Simon Pegg, and co-star Nick Frost were all in attendance. Photos here. And I have one word of advice for anyone planning on seeing this film: If you happen upon a trailer for Hot Fuzz, for the sake of pete, AVERT THINE EYES. Seriously. It kills a few of the movie’s great moments, not that there aren’t many more to be had. I’ll actually be seeing it again when it opens on April 20th, because much of the dialog was drowned in laughter (or in heavy Brit accents). Monday I stopped by the first official Tourfilter DJ Night at River Gods, hosted by creator Chris Marstall with some assistance from writer Matt Shaer. The guys spent two hours each playing music from bands coming to the area in the next few weeks, and I hope that night was just the first of many Chris gets to program. Some good songs, good company, good fries, good times. (Without the songs, that sentence sounded frighteningly like a Mickey D’s commercial. “Food, friends, and fun!”.) Tuesday brought a special reception for one of my favorite mystery writers, Boston-based Robert B. Parker, held at the B.U. student union. After a brief speech, Parker took many questions from the audience and later sat down to autograph copies of his work, including his new Jesse Stone hardcover, “High Profile“. I’ll hopefully be writing up the appearance in a future post, along with audio of his Q&A. Wednesday night was Bloc Party and Albert Hammond Jr. at the Orpheum. Much more on that in a later post. Thursday, another rock show, at a far cozier venue: Stars of Track and Field, the Broken West, and the Long Winters at Great Scott. I’ll write that up soon as well. Friday, consecutive rock show #3: The glorious return of Sebadoh. Yes, words and sounds to follow. As great and unmissable as the Sebadoh show was, it absolutely killed me to know I wasn’t seeing Robyn Hitchcock at TTs that night. Did anyone out there reading check it out? How was it? No, wait, don’t tell me. Watching the new documentary “Robyn Hitchcock: Sex, Food, Death … & Insects” Saturday on the Sundance Channel made the missing that much more painful. If you’re even a minor Robyn fan, the doc is essential viewing.
Saturday: Sorry to say, I crashed. Hard. My big plans to see Chris Pearson at PA’s and Wheat at TTs fell apart as I fell into a deep weekend sleep. Fortunately, I have little doubt both of ’em will be playing around here again.
And with all that, my personal March went out like a over-active lion. This first April week isn’t nearly as hectic, but there’s some potential quality ahead: A Northern Chorus with the Twilight Sad on Wednesday night (gentle reminder: enter my ticket giveaway for that one), and Low with Loney, Dear on Saturday (for which I’m sadly missing the return of Shearwater).
I’m giving Low another chance to win me back, as my disappointment remains from the last time I saw them a couple years ago. I actually bought the tickets well before I’d heard their new album, and I’m sad to say I may have held off otherwise. I’m coming to terms with the fact that the Low I once loved dearly may be gone for good, with only their voices remaining to keep me connected. While I appreciate their studio experimentation in theory, I do long for shades of the Low of olde, the one that used organic instrumentation and actual guitar chords. There’s a tad too much technology in “Drums and Guns“, making it sound more like a Low remix album than a proper follow-up to “The Great Destroyer“. I miss Mimi’s tasteful drum-tapping, and Alan’s reverberating strums. That said, I’m still fairly curious to see how these songs come across live, and hope they leave the sequencer at home. Come Saturday, I’ll be sitting in the Somerville Theater with an open mind.
Here’s a little game of compare and contrast, Low-style…
(album version from “Drums & Guns”)
Mp3: Low – “Breaker” (Dub Plate)
(remix from the bonus pre-order 7″)
Mp3: Retribution Gospel Choir – “Breaker“
(from the out-of-print RGC tour EP)
Retribution Gospel Choir, for the unaware, is Low’s Alan Sparhawk and bassist Matt Livingston with drummer Eric Pollard, who are joined occasionally by Red House Painter / Sun Kil Moon man Mark Kozelek. That vastly different (and for me, far better) version of “Breaker” comes from their 2005 tour EP (on which their version of Low’s “Hatchet” also appears), and they’ve recently made their second tour EP available on Low’s merch page. Grab it before it’s gone as well. Hear some songs on their MySpace page. Could be that Low’s new(er) direction is related to Alan getting his guitar fix with RGC on the side.
Next Monday, a week from tonight, may just bring me back to River Gods in Cambridge for a listening party that will celebrate Caspian’s breathtaking new full-length, “The Four Trees”. Even though my pre-order arrived over the weekend (and made my weekend just that much better), I’d be happy to spend an evening among like-minded listeners and the Caspian crew as they play a few of their own selected faves. According to the band: “We’ll be spinning the new record plus all our favorite post-rock, indie-rock, sad-sap singer/songwriter, and anything else we feel like.” Sounds good to me.
Again, that’s on Monday, April 9th, 9pm at River Gods near Central Square. And if you missed the mp3 I recently shared from “The Four Trees”, here it is again…
Order up the album, which officially arrives on Tuesday, April 10th, from Dopamine Records, or grab it at the release party on Friday, April 13th at the Paradise, where Caspian will be supported by On Fire and Constants. Tickets here.
Former Catherine Wheel frontman and current solo guy Rob Dickinson has been candidly answering fan questions on his MySpace blog. In response to a question I asked about reissues or b-sides collections, he said…
“… there should be some “re-presentation” of Wheel material in the not-too-distant future. Too many people, myself and the band included, have questioned why we haven’t had a best-of or compilation record…or a live record…. or a further collection of our extensive, unreleased material. There’s so much to dive into as it to be almost bewildering. There is much to revisit and revisiting will be done…“
Good news indeed.
Progress on “Cinnamon Girl”, the upcoming girl-flavored Neil Young tribute record that American Laundromat Records is putting together, is coming along, with a new twist: a contest for a female-fronted act to contribute their version of Neil’s “Only Love Can Break Your Heart“. The winner would find themselves alongside artists like Blake Hazard, Britta Phillips, Kristin Hersh, Tanya Donelly, and The Watson Twins. Submissions are due by May 15th (details here), and the completed compilation is due out on October 3rd of this year.
While an official tracklisting may be a way off, word from the Throwing Music forum is that Kristin Hersh’s contribution will be a cover of “Like a Hurricane” with her rock trio 50 Foot Wave. Hearing their version can’t come soon enough. And the mere possibility of Tanya Donelly doing “Heart of Gold“? Takei says “Oh My“.
Margot & the Nuclear So and So’s are hard at work on “Animal!”, the follow-up record to last year’s “The Dust of Retreat”, and have been sharing in-studio progress reports via their MySpace blog. Among the studio updates is word that they’ll be offering up a new EP in June and doing some touring to keep us satisfied until the album’s ready for release. Mighty kind of ’em.
So I’ve ignored the conventional wisdom that music bloggers are better read than seen or heard, and made a quick guest audio appearance in the latest installment of something called Blog Fresh Radio. It’s a recently-launched music podcast that has various mp3 bloggers (including the proprietors of Ear Farm, Obscure Sound, and Lost In Your Inbox) introduce tracks by bands they dig and have featured on their sites. I intro’d Shearwater’s excellent “Seventy Four, Seventy Five“, and sure as hell hope I pronounced “Okkervil” and “Meiberg” correctly.
Alright, time to get this week’s live music post together. No rest for the wicked busy.