News

Bruce Springsteen and his new Seeger Sessions Band, Herbie Hancock, Etta James and Warren Haynes have been added to the lineup for the 2006 New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, which will be held April 28-30 and May 5-7 at the Fair Grounds Race Course.

As previously reported, Springsteen will on April 25 release an album featuring songs long associated with folk icon Pete Seeger. It is not known if the Jazz Fest appearance will be the new band’s first, but at deadline it is the first to be confirmed as part of a spring tour.

Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, Dave Matthews Band, Jimmy Buffet, Allen Toussaint with Elvis Costello, Lionel Richie, Keith Urban, Ani DiFranco, the Meters and Fats Domino are among the other superstars on the bill for Jazz Fest, which is moving forward despite New Orleans’ ravaging at the hands of Hurricane Katrina.

Source billboard.com.

Frank Black has wrapped work on a new solo album. The double-disc “Fastman/Raiderman” will arrive June 20 via Back Porch/EMI and is the follow-up to 2005’s country-tinged “Honeycomb.”

Among the musicians that lent a hand on “Fastman/Raiderman” were Steve Cropper, Spooner Oldham, the Band’s Levon Helm, Bad Company’s Simon Kirke, Cheap Trick’s Tom Petersson, Al Kooper and Rich Gilbert, a member of Black’s one-time solo band, the Catholics. Tracks confirmed to appear include “My Terrible Ways,” “Elijah,” “In the Time of My Ruin,” “Sad Man’s Song,” “Fitzgerald” and “Kiss My Ring.”

Source billboard.com.

The lineup has been confirmed for this year’s V Festival in the U.K., with Radiohead and Morrissey topping the bill.

The two-day event, which sold out all 130,000 tickets within hours of the March 3 on-sale, will take place August 19-20 at Hylands Park in Chelmsford and Weston Park in Staffordshire.

Beck, Faithless, Razorlight, Kasabian, Paul Weller, Fatboy Slim, Bloc Party, Keane, The Charlatans U.K., The Magic Numbers, Rufus Wainwright, The Go! Team, Gavin DeGraw, Fatboy Slim, and Editors are among the names set to appear over the weekend.

Last year’s V Festival featured close to 80 acts, including headliners Oasis, Franz Ferdinand, and Scissor Sisters.

Source pollstar.com.

Billboard.com reports “MMJ are roaring back to life this spring as the support act on the first leg of Pearl Jam’s North American tour. A number of high-profile festival appearances are also confirmed, including Coachella, Bonnaroo and High Sierra. In late summer or early fall, MMJ plans to make up dates it was forced to cancel in Europe after Jim James took ill, to hopefully be followed by a North American headlining run.

And while James says not to expect MMJ back in the studio until the spring of 2007, there will be new product to savor this fall. The band is finishing up work on a double-disc live album as well as a DVD, which will be released separately. Eschewing the straight-up “film the show” approach, the DVD follows a storyline that transports fans to an MMJ show in the middle of a forest (oddly enough, the “Z” track “Into the Woods” is not included).”

My Morning Jacket’s tour dates:

April 21: Nashville (Rites of Spring)
April 29: Indio, Calif. (Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival)
May 9-10: Toronto (Air Canada Centre; w/ Pearl Jam)
May 12: Albany, N.Y. (Pepsi Arena; w/ Pearl Jam)
May 13: Hartford, Conn. (New England Dodge Music Arena; w/ Pearl Jam)
May 16: Chicago (United Center; w/ Pearl Jam)
May 19: Grand Rapids, Mich. (Van Andel Arena; w/ Pearl Jam)
May 20: Cleveland (Quicken Loans Arena; w/ Pearl Jam)
May 22: Auburn Hills, Mich. (Palace of Auburn Hills; w/ Pearl Jam)
May 24: Boston (TD Banknorth Garden; w/ Pearl Jam)
May 27: Camden, N.J. (Tweeter Center; w/ Pearl Jam)
May 30: Washington, D.C. (MCI Center; w/ Pearl Jam)
June 1, 3: East Rutherford, N.J. (Continental Airlines Arena; w/ Pearl Jam)
June 16-18: Manchester, Tenn. (Bonnaroo Festival)
June 29-July 2: Quincy, Calif. (High Sierra Festival)

Tomorrow evening, (Friday March 10th) Billy Martin (Medeski, Martin and Wood, Illy B)will join forces with fellow percussion master Cyro Baptista for a special intimate show at Brooklyn’s Issue Project Room. The show promises to create “sound-scapes and rhythms-exotique.”

For more info see: issueprojectroom.org

Pearl Jam will return to the road May 9 in Toronto, a week after the release of its eighth studio album. As previously reported, the self-titled set will be the band’s first for J Records. First single “World Wide Suicide” is available for free download from Pearl Jam’s official Web site.

At deadline, only the first leg of the tour has been confirmed, with dates running through a June 1 and 3 stand in East Rutherford, N.J. Acclaimed rock act My Morning Jacket will support on this portion of the outing. The rest of the band’s 2006 touring plans will be announced in the coming weeks.

“World Wide Suicide” is off to a blazing start at U.S. rock radio outlets, clocking in as the track with the largest total audience at the format in the past 24 hours, according to Broadcast Data Systems.

Here are Pearl Jam’s tour dates:

May 9-10: Toronto (Air Canada Centre)
May 12: Albany, N.Y. (Pepsi Arena)

May 13: Hartford, Conn. (New England Dodge Music Arena)
May 16: Chicago (United Center)
May 19: Grand Rapids, Mich. (Van Andel Arena)
May 20: Cleveland (Quicken Loans Arena)
May 22: Auburn Hills, Mich. (Palace of Auburn Hills)
May 24: Boston (TD Banknorth Garden)
May 27: Camden, N.J. (Tweeter Center)
May 30: Washington, D.C. (MCI Center)
June 1, 3: East Rutherford, N.J. (Continental Airlines Arena)

Source billboard.com.

Slayer has lined up a new batch of tour dates as the group’s original four members work on their first album together in more than 15 years.
The tour starts on the ominous date of 6/6/06, and is dubbed The Unholy Alliance Tour – Preaching to the Perverted.
Arenas and amphitheatres in 17 U.S. cities are booked through late July, with more dates to be added soon.
Lamb of God, Mastodon, Children of Bodom, and Thine Eyes Bleed will support.
Slayer’s Tom Araya, Kerry King and Jeff Hanneman haven’t recorded an album with drummer Dave Lombardo since 1990’s Seasons In The Abyss. Paul Bostaph, who handled drum duties through most of the ’90s, left the group after 2001’s God Hates Us All.
“Dave’s been back with us, playing live, for a couple of years now, and we’re all looking forward to recording together again,” Araya said.
“It feels really good being back with the same guys I started out with,” Lombardo added. “The chemistry is definitely there, that’s the exciting part of it, to capture that chemistry again. And that’s what is happening.”
Slayer is recording in a Los Angeles studio with longtime associate Rick Rubin in the executive producer’s chair. The band plans to have the album out this fall.
The upcoming shows will be the group’s first road trip since headlining the Jagermeister Music Tour in late 2004. That same year, they also toured with Slipknot and Ozzfest.

Source pollstar.com.

The Dresden Dolls will release their sophomore album, “Yes, Virginia,” April 18 via Roadrunner. It’s the follow-up to their 2004 self-titled debut, though some of the songs here have been waiting in the wings for close to six years.

“I’m an impressionable songwriter, I don’t set things in stone,” head Doll Amanda Palmer tells Billboard.com. “We liked to shape and polish these songs over time.” The 29-year-old pianist/vocalist says she allowed herself “more simplicity” on the album and moved away from the Dolls’ signature cabaret sound.

“As a younger songwriter, I felt the need to over-complicate things to sound more impressive,” she says. “On this one, there’s three-chord songs. And they sound f*cking great.”

Source billboard.com.

Common, Sonic Youth, Matt Costa, Tortured Soul are the latest round of additions for Bonnaroo 2006. This is the second Bonnaroo appearance for Sonic Youth, who played the music & arts festival in 2003. This will be the first appearance in Manchester, TN for Common, Costa and Tortured Soul.

For more information, visit the festival’s website.

How does a band like Stereophonics follow up five studio albums and four consecutive number one albums in the UK? They release a live package that showcases their career in a way that few bands can. On April 18, Stereophonics are set to release Live From Dakota on their own imprint label, Vox Populi Records. After reaching a crossroads in North America, Stereophonics have jumped at the chance to go it alone with a DIY approach. Live From Dakota is a 2-disc compilation featuring 20 tracks spanning all five of the bands albums and captures the best of their 2005 world tour.

Their fifth album, ‘Language. Sex. Violence. Other…’, heralded a fantastic return to form, sending them out on tour in front of sell-out crowds all over the world, including over 200, 000 fans in the UK alone. The last year has been so successful, the band felt the need to celebrate it in a special way: their first live album.

“We didn’t want to do a greatest hits package or anything like that,” says Kelly. “We wanted to do a live album because it feels like a celebration of the year we’ve had and also of the ten years that this band has been going. I wanted to put this out as a souvenir, for the fans and for ourselves, because I wanted to capture the moment where we’re all really into the band again. To not share that would be silly. The feeling and excitement in the band hasn’t ever been as strong as this which is why we’ve never done anything like this before.”

The energy and raw feel of Stereophonics live has been perfectly captured on these recordings. “Even just when we were rehearsing it felt really energetic, gritty and in your face. As soon as we started playing with Javier it felt so natural. We felt like a unit onstage – it was like the old gang mentality,” adds Richard. “The shows last year were among the best we’ve ever played.”

“If you’ve never been to one of our gigs before, then this will make you want to come. If the only perception you have of us is from a few singles on the radio, then this will totally change your mind.”
-Kelly Jones

Track listing:

Disc One:
1. Superman
2. Doorman
3. A Thousand Trees
4. Devil
5. Mr. Writer
6. Pedalpusher
7. Deadhead
8. Maybe Tomorrow
9. The Bartender and The Thief
10. Local Boy In The Photograph

Disk Two:
1. Hurry Up and Wait
2. Madame Helga
3. Vegas Two Times
4. Carrot Cake and Wine
5. I’m Alright
6. Jayne
7. Too Many Sandwiches
8. Traffic
9. Just Looking
10. Dakota