June 2005

Steve Earle, Mary Gauthier and Tift Merritt are the top nominees for the fourth annual Americana Honors & Awards, each receiving three nods from voting members of the Americana Music Association. Buddy Miller received two nominations.

Earle, Merritt and Miller are nominated for artist of the year along with John Prine.

Album of the year nominees are Earle’s “The Revolution Starts Now” (E-Squared/Artemis), Gauthier’s “Mercy Now” (Lost Highway), Merritt’s “Tambourine” (Lost Highway) and Miller’s “Universal United House of Prayer” (New West).

In the song of the year category, the nominees are Earle’s “The Revolution Starts … Now,” Gauthier’s “Mercy Now,” Mark Heard’s “Worry Too Much” and Merritt’s “Good Hearted Man.”

Gauthier is also nominated in the new/emerging artist of the year category along with Hayes Carll, the Duhks, Tom Gilliam and Martha Wainwright. Instrumentalist of the year nominees are Alison Brown, Jerry Douglas, Sonny Landreth and Gurf Morlix.

The awards show will be held at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium on Sept. 9 and broadcast live on both XM and Sirius Satellite Radio. A cable television deal is also in the works.

Source billboard.com.

Liz Phair will spend the summer touring stripped-down, acoustic versions of material from her last four albums and previewing some new material as well.

The indie-rock mamma took a unexpected turn last year with an album that was more pop than rock and a persona that was more sex kitten than rocker grrrl.

Phair took the raised eyebrows in stride and is expected to release a new album in September.

She’ll road-test some of the new tunes in a club tour that launches July 26, three days after her Lollapalooza appearance, at Boston’s Paradise.

La Liz will go from there to gigs in Philadelphia; New York City; Alexandria, Va.; West Hollywood, Calif.; Seattle; Portland, Ore.; and San Francisco.

The tour includes two-night stands in the Big Apple, Philadelphia and San Francisco.

Source pollstar.com.

Canadian rock act Broken Social Scene’s highly anticipated new album has been christened “Windsurfing Nation” and is scheduled for an Oct. 4 release via Arts & Crafts, Billboard.com has learned. The set is expected to feature such tracks as “Handjobs for the Holidays,” “Superconnected,” “Shoreline” and “It’s All Gonna Break.”

The group recently completed a European tour and has a handful of North American shows on tap this summer, including a previously announced July 14 appearance in New York with the reunited Dinosaur Jr.

Source billboard.com.

Trey Anastasio, along with launching a brand new website has announced an eight date summer tour, that follows a performance at the 10,000 Lakes Festival in Detroit Lakes, MI and preceeds his October 6th date opening for the Rolling Stones at Scott Stadium in Charlottsville, VA.

The run begins August 4th in Boston, MA and ends August 13th at Red Rocks in Morrison, CO. Hasidic reggae singer Matisyahu will open five of the shows with Gov

An exclusive Flaming Lips track titled

Three more pop concerts around the world are being arranged for next month’s Live8 charity event, according to Irish organiser Bob Geldof.

The pop star-turned aid activist, who was receiving an honorary degree in Dublin, said concerts in Tokyo, Toronto and Johannesburg on July 2 would be formally announced on Friday.

While the South African concert had long been planned, the others were hastily arranged to put pressure on the Japanese and Canadian governments to increase assistance to Africa, Geldof was quoted as saying by Britain’s Press Association newswire.

“Three weeks ago Europe agreed, unbelievably, to double aid, throwing the ball back to the Yanks (Americans), the Japanese and the Canadians.,” he said.

“So that forced me now to do, which I didn’t want to do, a concert in Tokyo, Toronto, which we are announcing tomorrow.”

The Johannesburg concert would be officially introduced by ex-South African president Nelson Mandela, if he was healthy enough, Geldof added.

Other concerts have already been announced for the same day: in London — at which Paul McCartney, Elton John and REM, among others, will appear — Philadelphia in the United States, Paris, Rome and Berlin.

Geldof, who organised the massive Live Aid fund-raising charity concerts in 1985, hopes the latest event will raise awareness of African aid issues ahead of the G8 leaders’ summit in Gleneagles, Scotland, starting four days later.

Source yahoo.com.

The opening act for the Rolling Stones