With their Sub Pop debut, The Great Destroyer, Low enlists the services of David Fridmann (Flaming Lips, Mercury Rev) to give them a kick in the realm of an aggressive guitar rock record.
Indie rock outfit the Shins have begun confirming dates for a spring North American tour, beginning with an April 11-12 stand in Minneapolis. Shows are on tap through April 29-30 in Asheville, N.C., but additional gigs will be added.
The group is not expected to hit the studio to begin work on its third album until later this year, with an eye on a 2006 release via Sub Pop. “It seems to be not very effective for me to try and write new songs out on tour,” frontman James Mercer told Billboard.com last November. “I’m so out of sorts, just being in a hotel. We never have time, either. You’re either recovering or you’re in a van driving.”
The Shins’ sophomore album, “Chutes Too Narrow,” peaked at No. 5 on Billboard’s Top Independent Albums chart and has shifted 293,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan.
Here are the Shins’ tour dates:
April 11-12: Minneapolis (First Avenue)
April 13: Milwaukee (Eagles Ballroom)
April 14: Chicago (Congress Theater)
April 17: Toronto (Kool Haus)
April 21: Providence, R.I. (Meehan Auditorium)
April 23-24: New York (Webster Hall)
April 27: Philadelphia (Electric Factory)
April 28: Norfolk, Va. (NorVa)
April 29-30: Asheville, N.C. (Orange Peel)
Source billboard.com.
Chicago has long been recognized as fertile grounds for hard work and liberal, free thinking. From Wicker Park
Guided by inspiration from his journey to Iraq, Palestine and Israel this past summer, musician/poet/activist Michael Franti heads to Kingston, Jamaica to team up with legendary godfathers of riddim Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare, Chris Blackwell, founder of Island Records and long-time Beastie Boys collaborator, Jack Johnson producer, Mario Caldato, Jr.
This dream team of riddim, beats and progressive innovators can only take the soul-inflicted and politically conscious music of Michael Franti to the next level. Sly and Robbie have produced and performed on countless records over the past 30 years from Peter Tosh to Grace Jones, Simply Red, Mick Jagger to No Doubt. For Franti, the duo will perform and produce live drum and bass parts lending their distinct sound to the record. Kingston based percussion players, Uzziah “Sticky” Thompson, drummer “Bongo” Herman, keyboardist Robert Lynn and Spearhead band members, Carl Young and Dave Shul are featured as well.
Moved by Franti’s music, message and live performances over the past several years, Chris Blackwell steps into the studio with Sly & Robbie for the first time in over 30 years, since his work on the Grace Jones albums, taking on a creative role as executive producer.
Chris Blackwell signed performers ranging from U2, Bob Marley, Black Uhuru, Cat Stevens, Tom Waits to Franti’s own Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy on Island which emerged as one of the most progressive labels in the industry. In addition, Blackwell produced many albums for Bob Marley and the Wailers, Jimmy Cliff, Grace Jones, Joe Cocker and Steve Winwood. Perhaps more importantly, Blackwell’s long affiliation with Bob Marley proved him to be a primary force in introducing reggae into the global pop mainstream. Continuing his innovative instinct, Blackwell launched his Palm Pictures audio-visual label that broke ground by focusing on the DVD format–once again being ahead of the game.
Filling out the team is Brazilian-born producer Mario Caldato, Jr, producer and mixer for such artists as Bebel Gilberto, Beck, Tone Loc, but best known for his work on the Beastie Boys’ Paul’s Boutique, Check Your Head, Ill Communication and Hello Nasty. Mario C brings his history of hip hop and love of Jamaican music into the project, but most recently and what interested Franti was his nurturing, organic production of Jack Johnson’s On and On and the newly released In Between Dreams.
At the engineering helm is Robert Carranza whose wide array of projects includes Bjork, Jack Johnson, Los Lobos, Eels, Supergrass and Luscious Jackson.
Franti and Blackwell chose to record the album in Jamaica to tap into Kingston’s raw heartbeat. Many of the songs for the still-untitled record were written shortly after Franti’s journey into the war zones of Iraq, Palestine and Israel this past summer. This trip not only inspired a new album, but Franti’s directorial debut and first feature-length film titled, I Know I’m Not Alone, which closed the independent film festival, Slamdance, to a sold out audience and rave reviews and is due for a release along side the new album. The album is scheduled for a fall 2005 release via Palm.
HIM’s emergence in America seems to be penned firmly to the back of skater- turned-reality show deviant Bam Margera, who immortalized the band’s heart-a-gram logo on skateboards, clothing, and even in ink on his uncle Don Vito’s back.
Xavier Rudd has been known to dabble around with a few instruments. Well, maybe a few is an understatement, as he keeps himself so encircled on stage, he resembles a coin-dropping carnival act. But after hearing this multi-instrumentalist, it’s tough not to take him quite seriously.
George Scott, founding baritone of gospel vocal group the Blind Boys Of Alabama, died yesterday (March 9) at his home in Durham, N.C., according to a statement. He was 75.
“We’re grateful to the Lord for letting us have George for as long as we did,” says Blind Boys leader Clarence Fountain, who was one of the last people Scott spoke to before his death. “He and I grew up together and sang together from little boys to old men. George was a great singer, he could sing any part in a song. We loved him and he was one of the ‘Boys.’ He lived a life of service and now he’s gone on to his reward.”
Born George Lewis Scott in Notasulga, Ala., the artist met Fountain and Jimmy Carter in 1936 at the Alabama Institute for the Negro Blind. Three years later they formed the traditional gospel singing group, which Scott also accompanied on guitar.
In recent years, the group enjoyed a resurgence in popularity and recently won the best traditional soul gospel album Grammy for “There Will Be a Light” (Virgin), recorded with singer/songwriter Ben Harper. The set featured Scott singing lead on the album’s opening track, “Take My Hand.”
Though Scott retired from touring last year, he continued to record with the group and will be heard on its new album, “Atom Bomb,” due Tuesday (March 15) from Real World Records. No changes are planned in the Blind Boys touring schedule, which picks up again with a March 18 showcase at the South By Southwest Music Festival in Austin, Texas.
Funeral services will be held March 15 at Monumental Faith Church in Durham. His family has asked that mourners make donations to the American Diabetes Association or send flowers to the city’s Holloway Funeral Home.
Scott is survived by his wife Ludie Lewis Mann Scott, his mother Hassie Lou Scott and his sister Benzie Jackson.
Source billboard.com.
For sale: perhaps the world’s finest and biggest pictorial history of jazz and American music. Must be kept together.
Frank Driggs, a former jazz journalist and record producer, started buying jazz photos from collectors more than half a century ago. After word got out he was a top collector, musicians often gave him pictures.
“For filmmakers who often visit hundreds of tiny archives to make a documentary you can’t appreciate enough the value of a collection that contains so many photos,” documentary filmmaker Ken Burns told Reuters.
Driggs was the single biggest supplier of pictures for “Jazz,” the 17-hour television series by Burns.
Driggs’ nearly 80,000 photos range from 1898 shots of ragtime’s Scott Joplin and Tom Turpin to portraits of big bands at since-closed Harlem and East Village haunts of the 1950s.
To read more, please visit yahoo.com.
Cartoon quartet Gorillaz will on May 24 release its sophomore Virgin album, “Demon Days.” A video is in production for first single “Feel Good Inc.,” featuring De La Soul. Album track “Dirty Harry,” which features what sounds like a children’s choir, has been making the rounds on the Internet for several weeks.
The brainchild of Blur frontman Damon Albarn and “Tank Girl” creator Jamie Hewlett, Gorillaz comprises the characters Noodle, Murdoc, 2-D, and Russell who inhabit a virtual world on Gorillaz.com.
The 15-track “Demon Days” is the follow-up to Gorillaz’s worldwide smash self-titled debut, which has sold more than 1.54 million copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan, and six million worldwide, according to Virgin.
Accurately described as “darker” and “more intense” than its predecessor, but no less eclectic, the album was co-produced by Albarn and Danger Mouse. “Last Living Souls” is marked by acoustic strumming and piano melodies, while “Kids With Guns” threads a sample of Salt-N-Pepa’s “Push It” through a multi-faceted musical backdrop.
The collective puts a weird spin on seductive soul with “Every Planet We Reach Is Dead,” while “White Light” starts off in similar territory as Blur’s raucous “Song 2” before being interrupted by an angelic interlude. For an extra dash of oddness, actor Dennis Hopper offers spoken-word intonations atop “Fire Coming Out of a Monkey’s Head.”
The London Community Gospel Choir can be heard on the title track, while guest spots by Blondie’s Deborah Harry, rock legend Ike Turner, the Happy Mondays’ Shaun Ryder and underground rapper MF Doom are sprinkled throughout other cuts.
Here is the track list for “Demon Days”:
“Intro”
“Last Living Souls”
“Kids With Guns”
“O Green World”
“Dirty Harry”
“Feel Good Inc.”
“El Manana”
“Every Planet We Reach Is Dead”
“November Has Come”
“All Alone”
“White Light”
“DARE”
“Fire Coming Out of a Monkey’s Head”
“Don’t Get Lost in Heaven”
“Demon Days”
Source billboard.com.
