2004

Fans who pick up “The Wilco Book” on Nov. 15 will be treated to an exclusive bonus CD with 12 previously unreleased songs recorded during sessions for this year’s Nonesuch album “A Ghost Is Born.” Among the cuts are an alternate version of album track “Hummingbird,” “Pure Bug Beauty,” “The High Heat,” “Barnyard Pimp” and “Diamond Claw.”

The tracks showcase the more experimental side of Wilco’s sound, including “What Good Am I,” which was recorded in February 2003 in a hotel room in Perth, Australia. “Barnyard Pimp” blends a studio improvisation session with a tour bus jam, while “Rottnest” features only former member Leroy Bach on piano and Mikael Jorgensen on laptop computer. Closer “Hamami” finds band members utilizing screws, coins and chunks of metal as percussion instruments.

Jorgensen calls “Diamond Claw” “technically and musically my favorite piece of recorded music that came out of the sessions for ‘A Ghost Is Born.'” As for album contender “The High Heat,” he notes, “This particular drum sound isn’t my favorite; it’s rather unsophisticated. However, the feel and atmosphere of the tune trumps and technical issues that I have.”

As for the 160-page “The Wilco Book” (Picture Box Inc.), it sports previously unseen images of Wilco by photographer Michael Schmelling, essays from band members and authors such as Rick Moody, paintings and assorted other visual images. The tome will retail for $29.95.

Fans who pre-order the book from Wilco’s official Web site by Sept. 30 will be eligible to win an autographed reprint of a photo from the volume.

The group’s latest lineup has also recorded its first song, “Just a Kid,” for the upcoming “Spongebob Squarepants” soundtrack, due in November. The cut sports backing vocals by frontman Jeff Tweedy’s son Spencer’s band, the Blisters.

In related news, Wilco bassist John Stirratt and his sister Laurie (ex-Blue Mountain) will on Sept. 21 release “Arabella,” their debut album for Broadmoor Records. The set boasts contributions from Tweedy, Bach and Wilco drummer Glenn Kotche, as well as John’s Autumn Defense colleague Pat Sansone.

Wilco kicks off an extensive North American tour in support of “A Ghost Is Born” Tuesday (Sept. 14) in Columbia, Mo. Calexico, Joseph Arthur, Fiery Furnaces and Deerhoof will support at various stages.

Here is the track list for “The Wilco Book” CD:

“Pure Bug Beauty”
“This Is New”
“Diamond Claw”
“This Is New (The Explanation)”
“What Good Am I”
“Here Comes Everybody”
“Hummingbird” (Soma version)
“The High Heat”
“Doubt”
“Barnyard Pimp”
“Rottnest”
“Hamami”

i] Source billboard.com.

ATO Records is proud to announce the October 12, 2004 release of the North Mississippi Allstars first-ever live album, entitled Hill Country Revue. This amazing live set was recorded at this year’s Bonnaroo Music Festival on June 11th, and features guest appearances from R.L. Burnside, Jim Dickinson, Chris Robinson, JoJo Hermann, Otha Turner’s Rising Star Fife and Drum Band and others. To support the new album the boys will head out on the road for a fall tour beginning September 16th. The “Shake, Holla & March” Tour, which includes stops in New York, Washington DC, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, will have opening acts The Dirty Dozen Brass Band and The Rising Star Fife and Drum Band.

What occurred that late afternoon in Tennessee defies description but is plain to hear in the grooves of this once in a lifetime set. Onstage with Jim Dickinson, R.L. Burnside, Duwayne Burnside, Garry Burnside, Cody Burnside, Otha Turner’s Rising Star Fife and Drum Band as well as Widespread Panic’s JoJo Herman and ex-Black Crowes singer Chris Robinson, the Allstars played host to history as they connected the dots between the past and future of the mighty sounds of the Mississippi hills. From the opening track “Shake ‘Em On down” to the closer “Going Down South,” the show was full of genuflections to past hill country legends like Burnside and Fred McDowell, yet also contained nods to the endless possibilities of the future as when Allstars guitarist/singer Luther Dickinson introduced Chris Robinson to sing on Ry Cooder’s “Boomer’s Story” (a song produced in 1972 by Jim Dickinson). By the time Otha Turner’s Rising Star Fife and Drum band joined the foray, two-dozen musicians were onstage invoking the spirit of the hill country as never before. Imagine two generations of two regional blues families grooving together, proving this music’s vitality will be assured for generations to come.

The North Mississippi Allstars built their reputation as the most intriguing act to emerge from the loam of Southern blues and roots rock before they had even started on their first album. Formed in 1996 by brother’s Luther and Cody Dickinson (Drums, Vocals) and Chris Chew (Bass), the band has released four critically acclaimed albums and one ep – 2000’s Shake Hands With Shorty, 2001’s Phantom 51, 2003’s Polaris, 2003’s Tate County Hill Country Blues and the 2004 ep Instores & Outtakes – and have a pair of Grammy nominations, thousands of miles racked up on their tour bus and a legion of dedicated fans to show forit. Nick Tosches hailed the band as “a formidable and mesmerizing force,” while Rolling Stone’s David Fricke described them as “pureeing historical precedent into exuberant modernism – manic cotton field psychedelia.”

The “Shake, Holla and March” tour dates are as follows:

September
16 Baton Rouge, LA Varsity Theatre17 Houston, TX Meridian18 Austin, TX Antone’s19 Austin, TX Austin City Limits Festival21 Ruston, LA Rabb’s22 Jackson, MS Hal’s and Mal’sv23 Oxford, MS The Library24,25 Athens, GA Georgia Theater

October
5 Greenville, SC The Handlebar6 Winston Salem, NC Ziggy’s7 Asheville, NC Orange Peel8 Richmond, VA The Canal Club9 New York, NY Irving Plaza10 Northampton, MA Pearl Street12 Providence, RI Lupo’s at The Strand with Ratdog*14 Boston, MA Paradise15 Washington, DC 9:30 Club16 Philadelphia, PA TLA17 Pittsburgh, PA Mister Smalls19 Morgantown, WV The Pulse20 Columbus, OH Newport Music Hall21 Ann Arbor, MI Blind Pig22 Madison, WI Barrymore Theatre23 Minneapolis, MNCabooze 26 Missoula, MT TBD28 Seattle, WA Showbox29 Portland, OR Crystal Ballroom30 Eugene, OR WOW Hall31 Aracata, CA Kate Buchanan Hall

November
3,4 San Francisco, CA The Independent5 Los Angeles, CA House of Blues6 San Diego, CA Belly Up7 Tuscon, AZ City Limits9 Durango, CO The Abbey Theatre *10 Colorado Springs, CO 32 Bleu11 Denver, CO Cervantes12,13 Boulder, CO Fox Theatre

* Without Dirty Dozen Brass Band

Ernie Ball, a pioneer maker of rock’n’roll guitar strings used by legions of artists from the Rolling Stones to Merle Travis, died yesterday (Sept. 9) at his home in San Luis Obispo, Calif. He was 74. Ball had suffered an ongoing illness, the mortuary handling services announced.

Music stars from B.B. King to Metallica have used his strings and instruments over the past four decades. Beginning with a small music shop in the San Fernando Valley, Ball built a business with annual sales of $40 million and a worldwide reputation. Along the way, he bucked traditional thinking in the music business.

“He changed the way people thought of guitar accessories, and how they sold and marketed them, and to this day the Ernie Ball way is the industry standard,” his son, Sterling Ball, said in a statement.

In 1958, Ball opened a shop in Tarzana that, uniquely, sold only guitars. “Sales reps would come in and say, ‘Ern, you’ve got to sell clarinet reeds, drum sticks, valve oil, blah blah blah,'” Ball once recalled. “And I’d tell them, ‘I just want to sell guitars.'”

In 1962, complaints from customers that they couldn’t find lighter-gauge, flexible strings for their rock’n’roll instruments prompted Ball to create and sell sets of strings he called “Slinkys.” They were a hit. He later branched out into instruments and accessories, buying the Music Man electric guitar company in 1985.

Today, Ernie Ball items are sold in more than 5,000 music stores in the United States and exported to more than 70 countries.

Source billboard.com.

U.K. rock act PJ Harvey has begun lining up dates for a fall North American tour, beginning Oct. 1 in Minneapolis. Ten shows are set, with more to be added. Tickets for some shows begin going on sale today (Sept. 9); visit the Polly Jean Harvey-led band’s official Web site for full details.

The group is touring in support of its latest Island album, “Uh Huh Her,” which debuted in June at No. 29 on The Billboard 200 and has sold 102,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The set was recently among the nominees for the 2004 Shortlist Music Prize, which will be handed out Nov. 10 in Los Angeles.

Here are PJ Harvey’s tour dates:

Sept. 9: Cambridge, England (Corn Exchange)
Sept. 11: Birmingham, England (Carling Birmingham Academy)
Sept. 12: Bristol, England (Carling Bristol Academy)
Sept. 14: Brighton, England (the Dome)
Sept. 15: London (Carling Apollo Hammersmith)
Oct. 1: Minneapolis (First Avenue)
Oct. 2: Chicago (Riviera)
Oct. 3: Indianapolis (Vogue)
Oct. 6: New York (Hammerstein Ballroom)
Oct. 9: Boston (Avalon)
Oct. 10: Philadelphia (Electric Factory)
Oct. 11: Providence, R.I. (Lupo’s)
Oct. 13: Washington, D.C. (9:30 Club)
Oct. 14: Detroit (State Theatre)
Oct. 15: Toronto (Phoenix)

Source billboard.com.

Black Crowe’s guitarist Rich Robinson will be touring for a month this fall in support of his solo debut – Paper. Tour Dates are below.

9/16/04
Poughkeepsie, NY –

The Chance
9/17/04

Providence, RI –
The Call

9/18/04
Portland, ME –
The Big Easy

9/19/04
Hartford, CT –
Webster Theatre

9/21/04
Asbury Park, NJ –
The Stone Pony

9/22/04
New York City –
Hiro Ballroom @ The Maritime Hotel

9/24/04
Philladelphia, PA –
NXNW

9/25/04
Vienna, VA –
Jammin Java

9/26/04
Baltimore, MD –
The Funk Box

9/28/04
Detroit, MI –
The Magic Bag

9/29/04
Cincinnati, OH –
20th Century Theatre

9/30/04
Bloomington, IN –
Uncle Festers

10/02/04
Rockford, IL –
Kryptonite

10/03/04
Chicago, IL –
The Double Door

10/04/04
Milwuakee, WI –
Shank Hall

10/05/04
Minneapolis, MN –
Ascot Room @ The Quest

10/08/04
Urbana, IL –
Canopy Theatre

10/13/04
Cleveland, OH –
Agora Theatre and Ballroom

10/15/04
Buffalo, NY –
Nietzsche’s

Capitol is prepping the release of a new John Lennon compilation of acoustic recordings and an expanded, remixed and remastered version of his 1975 covers album, “Rock’n’Roll.” Both are due Nov. 2 and were supervised by the artist’s widow, Yoko Ono.

The 17-track “Acoustic” collects favorites from the former Beatle’s solo career, including “Working Class Hero” and “Watching the Wheels,” as well as live acoustic renditions of the “Sometime in New York” songs “Luck of the Irish” and “John Sinclair,” and his peace anthem “Imagine.”

Seven of the acoustic cuts will be officially released here for the first time: “Well Well Well,” “God,” “My Mummy’s Dead,” “Cold Turkey,” “What You Got,” “Dear Yoko” and “Real Love.”

“Rock’n’Roll,” Lennon’s homage to the artists and songs that inspired him as a teenager, emerges with four bonus tracks. Added are the same versions of Rosalie Hamlin’s “Angel Baby” and Phil Spector’s “To Know Her Is To Love Her” that were included on the posthumous 1986 Lennon release “Menlove Avenue.” Although that collection also included Lennon’s run through “Since My Baby Left Me,” an alternate version appears here.

Rounding out the new inclusions is a reprise of Lloyd Price’s “Just Because,” which boasts a different ending than the original “Rock’n’Roll” version, in the form of a Christmas message to his former bandmates Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, Ono and the people of Great Britain.

The rest of “Rock’n’Roll” is made up of the remixed and remastered versions of Lennon’s faithful interpretations of such classics as Gene Vincent’s “Be Bop a Lula,” Fats Domino’s “Ain’t That a Shame” and Buddy Holly’s “Peggy Sue.” Four tracks stem from aborted 1973 sessions with Spector, while the balance was produced by Lennon himself.

In addition to the bonus tracks, the reissued title’s booklet offers a new selection of black and white photographs.

Here is the “Acoustic” track list:

“Love”
“Working Class Hero”
“Well Well Well”
“Look at Me”
“God”
“My Mummy’s Dead”
“Cold Turkey”
“I’m a Man”
“Luck of the Irish” (live)
“John Sinclair” (live)
“Woman is the N*gger of the World”
“What You Got”
“Watching the Wheels”
“Dear Yoko”
“Real Love”
“Imagine” (live)
“It’s Real”

Here is the “Rock’n’Roll” track list:

“Be Bop a Lula”
“Stand By Me”
“Rip It Up/Ready Teddy” (medley)
“You Can’t Catch Me”
“Ain’t That a Shame”
“Do You Wanna Dance?”
“Sweet Little Sixteen”
“Slippin’ and Slidin'”
“Peggy Sue”
“Bring It on Home/Send Me Some Loving” (medley)
“Boney Moronie”
“Ya Ya”
“Just Because”
“Angel Baby” (bonus cut; from “Menlove Avenue”)
“To Know Her is to Love Her” (bonus cut; from “Menlove Avenue”)
“Since My Baby Left Me” (bonus cut; alternate version of “Menlove Avenue” track)
“Just Because (Reprise)” (bonus cut)

Source billboard.com.

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