Mp3s: Throwing Muses + 50 Foot Wave live
Posted on September 4, 2006 at 2:33 pm | No Comments
I feel a somewhat close connection to the work of Kristin Hersh, from her Throwing Muses days, through her solo albums, and her most recent trio, 50 Foot Wave. It’s not just because I’ve been religiously listening to her songs and buying her ouput for over 15 years, but also because her music is semi-sort-of responsible for my fatefully finding Amie. It was May of 2000, and while the Muses hadn’t been a band for a few years, they surprisingly reappeared to play something called ‘The Gut Pageant‘ (named for a KH song) here in Cambridge, MA. Solo songs from Kristin, a ‘special surprise guest’ (in the form of Mr. Bob Mould), and a closing set from a reunited Throwing Muses that included appearances by former Muses Tanya Donelly and Fred Abong.
It was for the fans, and not only did they show up, they came from far and farther; not just from the west coast, but the U.K., Australia, the Netherlands, even a couple from Japan. There were so many overseas travellers that a get-together was held at Somerville’s Abbey Lounge the night before, a chance for some familiar Muses messageboard names to be put with faces, and it’s there that I first met Amie. The next night, just before the Muses hit the stage at the Middle East Downstairs, she asked if she could stand in front of me against the upper level railing. And we haven’t been apart since.
The whole event was a special one, the stuff of long-lasting memories; there was a real sense of community not just between the fans, but between us and the TM crew as well. My already high respect for K and Billy (her husband, manager, and primary organizer of all TM-related shows) grew quite a bit that weekend, and it probably goes without saying that I’ll never forget it. So we were more than a little psyched to hear that the Muses would reunite yet again for a few dates this year, during the same summer as our 5th wedding anniversary, and that one show would be in the very same room we were in six years ago. Not only that, but Kristin and bassist Bernard Georges would be pulling double-duty, as 2/3 of openers 50 Foot Wave.
The long line outside the Middle East was filled with many familiar faces, some I’d seen at other area Kristin shows over the past few years, others not since the Gut Pageant. That whole weekend came rushing back as we headed down those stairs, and yeah, Amie and I stood in our exact same spots for the show, up against the railing where it all began.
While I recorded the night with permission, I learned that Billy was able to pull together a last-minute ‘official’ recording setup, and would be making the live sets available online at the Throwing Music site. So as not to take away from any possible sales over at TM, I’m just going to offer a couple tracks from each band here on the ‘Nac, and encourage you to head over and grab the offical mp3s when they’re available (which should be any day now update: official bootleg now available here). Until then, here’s a couple live Throwing Muses songs, recorded from the audience at the Middle East on Friday, August 11th, 2006…
Throwing Muses – ‘Soul Soldier‘ (live)
Throwing Muses – ‘Shimmer‘ (live)
The Muses’ setlist from that night…
01. Hazing
02. Soul Soldier
03. Start
04. Furious
05. Shimmer
06. Los Flamingos
07. Fear
08. Shark
09. Colder
10. Mercury
11. Pretty Or Not
12. Hate My Way
13. Bright Yellow Gun
14. Speed & Sleep
15. Mexican Women
16. Vicky’s Box
17. Beaencore…
18. Pearl
19. Mania
And two songs from 50 Foot Wave…
50 Foot Wave – ‘Long Painting‘ (live)
50 Foot Wave – ‘Clara Bow‘ (live)
50 Foot Wave’s setlist as well…
01. Bug
02. Long Painting
03. Clara Bow
04. Pneuma
05. Hot Pink, Distorted
06. Bone China
07. Fuchsia
08. Lavender
09. Dog Days
For comparisons sake, check out a soundboard recording from the same show, a preview mp3 that will soon be available on that ‘offical bootleg’ over at the Throwing Music online store…
And finally, some links before I leave you…
Read this great post on Kristin Hersh’s blog, in which she shares a story and email from my drumming hero, David Narcizo, as they decided which songs to play at the summer shows. Abby was at the show, and took a few photos. Writer Bobby Hankinson from the Boston Globe was there as well, and provides this glowing review. Take advantage of all the complimentary mp3s that Throwing Music offers from the Muses, 50’~, and KH at their Free Music page. Grateful customers can make a donation there, or buy something else at the TM online store.
the fine print… If anyone has any issue whatsoever with these live mp3s being made available, just say the word (email link at bottom left). 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 will not be available again once removed.
I Keep Coming Back
Posted on August 31, 2006 at 12:32 pm | No Comments
I have an immense backlog of things to pass along, from new stuff to “in case you missed it” links, so I’ll skip the pre-post small talk…
I’ve been sitting on this news for a couple months, and it hasn’t been easy. Now that’s it’s public, I can finally say… the Afghan Whigs are going back into the studio. When their upcoming (and now delayed until ’07) Rhino ‘best of’ retrospective, ‘Unbreakable’, was announced, I hoped-against-hope that they’d get together and record a few new songs for it, as the Replacements did the same for their Rhino collection. Like the ‘Mats, the Whigs will be using a different drummer for their tracks, and my fingers are crossed that it’ll be ascot-master Bobby Macintyre of Dulli’s touring Twilight Singers. That guy’s amazing. Proof: Stream some Twilight Singers live sets.
I’ve got a special little spot in my musical heart for the Housemartins, a band I completely obsessed over back in the day (although my fixation didn’t follow singer Paul Heaton to his post-Housemartins band, the Beautiful South). Anyway, Hull’s fourth best band is also resurfacing, although not to the studio… they’re just returning to the new release shelves with a compilation of all their old BBC recordings, including songs from a 1987 Nottingham concert. The full tracklisting…
The Housemartins
�Live at the BBC�1. Drop Down Dead (John Peel 21/07/85)
2. Flag Day (John Peel 21/07/85)
3. Stand At Ease (John Peel 21/07/85)
4. Reverends Revenge (Janice Long 6/11/85)
5. Shelter (Saturday Live 04/01/86)
6. People Get Ready (Saturday Live 04/01/86)
7. Over There (John Peel 06/04/86)
8. Caravan Of Love (John Peel 06/04/86)
9. Happy Hour (John Peel 03/06/86)
10. Heaven Help Us All (John Peel 03/06/86)
11. Pickin’ The Blues (Peel Show Theme Tune) (John Peel 03/06/86)
12. Mercy (Janice Long 11/12/86)
13. So Glad (Janice Long 11/12/86)
14. He Brought Me Out (Janice Long 11/12/86)
15. Sunday Isn’t Sunday (John Peel 03/11/87)
16. Build (John Peel 03/11/87)
17. We’re Not Deep (Glastonbury 29/11/86)
18. Me And The Farmer (Glastonbury 29/11/86)
19. The People Who Grinned Themselves To Death (Nottingham Concert 30/09/87)
20. The Light Is Always Green (Nottingham Concert 30/09/87)
21. The World’s On Fire (Nottingham Concert 30/09/87)
22. We’re Not Going Back (Nottingham Concert 30/09/87)
23. Johannesburg (Nottingham Concert 30/09/87)
24. Five Get Over Excited (Nottingham Concert 30/09/87)
According to the press release, it’ll be out on September 18th in the UK. Not sure about a U.S. release, but it’s still worth import prices. Thanks for the heads up, for the records.
From UK radio sessions to US radio sessions: NPR has had a fairly impressive summer of in-studio artists and live broadcasts, so many that I haven’t had time to listen to ’em all. To link just a few: Sleater-Kinney, Camera Obscura, the Long Winters, Mates of State, the Stills, and the Essex Green. Whoever’s in charge of audio scheduling over there, give ’em a raise. Especially if they also picked Midlake’s ‘Roscoe‘ as a recent ‘song of the day‘.
Speaking of Sleater-Kinney, it’s worth checking out Superchunk/Portastatic/Merge main-man Mac McCaughan’s brief goodbye to them over on his blog. Grab mp3s from S-K’s very last show at RySpace while you’re at it.
Another artist featured on NPR over the summer was the where-you-been World Party. I’ve been a Karl Wallinger admirer since the first time I saw him sitting at a piano in the Waterboy’s ‘The Whole of the Moon‘ video in 1986, and was saddened to read about the aneurysm he had back in 2001. That was in the wake of being fairly screwed over by his backing band and record label (who, behind his back, recorded and released one of his songs with Robbie Williams), and even worse, his longtime manager passing away. It took him awhile to recover from the physical and mental hardship, but he reemerged earlier this year to put out the long-finished album ‘Dumbing Up‘ in the U.S. (which was out years ago in the UK), released on his own Seaview Records imprint, as well as remastered versions of the World Party back catalogue. While ‘Dumbing Up’ didn’t do much for me, now that Wallinger’s back in the game (the band played Bonnaroo this summer), I’d imagine he’ll be spending lots more time in his home studio.
Stream: �What Does it Mean Now?� (wma hi / wma med)
QT Video: �What Does it Mean Now?�
Read: 2006 BBC Interview
Stream: May 2006 live set on NPR
Another swell Essex Green studio session, this one on KEXP. Songs played: ‘This Isn’t Farm Life‘, ‘Penny & Jack‘, ‘Rue de Lis‘, ‘Cardinal Points‘, ‘Sin City‘, and ‘Don’t Know Why (You Stay)‘.
My favorite part?…
Chris: ‘It’s too early in the day for rock and roll‘.
Jeff: ‘But is it too early for “60s retro-pop”?‘.
Check out a bunch of nice photos (and autographs… rockstars!) from that previously mentioned Essex Green NPR broadcast (which was live at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, PA, over at Hugh Shows. Hugh’s also got some great shots of Cat Power & the Memphis Rhythm Band in Pittsburgh from back in July.
Here, lemme rapid-fire some new music links at you…
- New Robert Pollard MP3: ‘Supernatural Car Lover‘ (thx Donewaiting)
- New songs from The Hero Cycle at their MySpace page.
- Rolling Stone shared the Arcade Fire covering New Order’s ‘Age Of Consent‘.
- Listen to a fairly rare track from Ida on their MySpace page called ‘Jackson‘. It was previously available only on the Japanese version of their ‘Heart Like A River‘ album. By the way, if you’re wondering why that October date I have listed for a long-awaited Ida appearance at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston isn’t listed on the MFA concert site, the band says that ‘unexpected logistical hurdles arose’, so confirmation is taking a bit longer than planned. I sure as hell hope that show works out.
- Ex-Swervedriver and current Toshack Highway frontman Adam Franklin covers Wolf Parade’s ‘Shine A Light‘ on his MySpace page. There’s a Hendrix cover and a demo over there, too.
- This one you’ll have to hunt for: There’s a rare Margot & the Nuclear So & So’s track called ‘Cheap Motel Room‘ on a disc that’s included with the new issue of Alternative Press. That’s gotta be the first time I’ve ever linked, or even mentioned, the long-since relevant AP.
- There’s a nice new Earlimart mp3 called ‘Answers & Questions‘ over at So Much Silence.
- The Twilight Singers have posted something called the ‘Lo-Fi Mix’ of their song ‘I’m Ready‘ on their MySpace page. Whatever they call it, I think it might be a better mix than the album version.
- Brainwashed has a fantastic 20 minute video feature on Beirut, which is mostly live footage from their first Boston appearance, plus an interview with Zach Condon. NOTE: One of the links on that page points to the wrong Quicktime video, so here’s the correct Beirut video link.
- A spiffy new pop song from The Loud Family over on their MySpace page called ‘Mavis of Maybelline Towers‘.
- If you haven’t yet, go grab the great new Portastatic track, ‘Sour Shores‘. That’s the song that’ll lead off their next album ‘Be Still Please’, which is out in October.
- I Am Fuel, You Are Friends shared up a new Nada Surf song called ‘I Like What You Say‘. It can be found on the soundtrack that no one I know bought, for a movie that no one I know saw.
I’m planning on writing more about this, but for now: Go check out the excellent Band in Boston podcast. We’ve needed something like that around here for a long time, and I’m very glad that it not only exists, but is being done so well. Cheers to that.
I’m not even halfway through the things I want to write about, but I think it’s time to let this one fly. I’ll end with free stuff…
I’ve got an extra copy of ex-Pedro the Lion and current-Headphones/solo guy David Bazan’s super-fine 10-track EP, ‘Fewer Moving Parts‘ for giveaway, so drop me an email (link at lower left) with a subject line of ‘Gimme Bazan!’ before the end of the day Monday. Include your mailing address (U.S. or Canada only), and I’ll randomly pick a winner on Tuesday morning. Easy enough.
Not familiar with Mr. Bazan? Shame on you. Get yourself over to BrooklynVegan and read a recent interview with the man himself.
Oh, and if you discovered the Almanac thanks to that recent Boston Globe online feature on area audioblogs, I welcome you. If you’re here because of the print version of said article, well then, I’m sorry you had to see that way-too-close-up photo of me on a Saturday morning. Hey, at least it didn’t go digital.