2006

As noted on the John Brown’s Body official website, bassist Scott Palmer has lost his battle to cancer, and passed away Wednesday afternoon.

“Our bass player Scott Palmer passed away today at 12noon. As you may know, Scott was diagnosed with cancer in January of this year. As the bass player for JBB since 2002, Scott was immediately a family member within JBB, blessing us with his great warmth, humor, charm, and of course monstrous bass playing. We are sad beyond words to have lost him today. Condolensces can be sent to Scott’s family:

Mr. and Mrs. Vince Palmer PO Box 148 Pultneyville N.Y. 14538

R.I.P. Scottie – we love you.”

johnbrownsbody.com

Los Angeles band Particle will give North American audiences a taste of its new sound this summer, with tour dates booked into early October.
The concerts include June and July dates in the Western U.S., with Detroit, Chicago and Cleveland on the map for August. A cross-country run is booked for September, followed by dates in Ohio and North Carolina the following month.
The group will be joined by the U.K.’s Ozric Tentacles for a handful of shows in mid-July. The itinerary also includes gigs with Soulive and Blues Traveler.
The band will be playing Street Scene in San Diego on July 4, and the very next day they’re at Lollapalooza in Chicago. Two more prestigious festival stops – Bumbershoot in Seattle and Summerfest in Milwaukee – are also on the schedule.
Particle – which fuses rock, funk and electronic elements into a jammy style it calls “funktronic” – added vocals for the first time last year with the addition of new members Ben Combe and Scott Metzger, who both play guitar and sing.
Combe and Metzger replaced former guitarist Charlie Hitchcock, who either left or was kicked out in early 2005, depending who you ask.
In July, the band will release a double-disc concert CD and full-length DVD titled Transformations Live, which documents its first shows as a five-piece earlier this year.

Source pollstar.com.

Indie rock acts Wolf Parade and Frog Eyes will team for a host of North American tour dates later this summer, beginning Aug. 4 in Ottawa, Ontario. Wolf Parade vocalist/keyboardist Spencer Krug will be pulling double duty at the shows, having rejoined Frog Eyes earlier this year after an extended break from the group.

Here are Wolf Parade/Frog Eyes

The Village Voice, the nation’s largest alternative weekly newspaper, is excited to announce the addition of Scissor Sisters, Serena Maneesh, Man Man, The Rogers Sisters and Deadboy & The Elephantmen to the line-up for the 6th Annual Village Voice SIREN MUSIC FESTIVAL

In celebration of the July 18 release of its new Lost Highway album, “Another Fine Day,” rock supergroup Golden Smog will take the stage for a July 23 show at First Avenue in Minneapolis and a July 26 engagement at the Bowery Ballroom in New York.

And while “Another Fine Day” features contributions from Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy, Soul Asylum’s Dan Murphy, Big Star’s Jody Stephens and the Jayhawks’ Gary Louris, Marc Perlman and Kraig Johnson, it’s unclear at deadline which artists will be playing at the two shows.

The band had been virtually dormant since wrapping a tour behind 1998’s “Weird Tales,” but last year, Louris, Perlman, Murphy and Johnson played a handful of Golden Smog dates sans Tweedy. A Lost Highway spokesperson says more shows are possible in the fall, although nothing is yet confirmed.

Source billboard.com.

Beck has finished recording his next studio album and will release it this fall via Interscope. While there is no official street date for the as-yet-untitled effort, it comes only a year-and-a-half after his last full-length set, “Guero,” hit stores.

According to Beck’s Web site, the new album was produced by Nigel Godrich, who has been behind the boards for such prior releases as 1998’s “Mutations” and 2002’s “Sea Change.”

Beck will be previewing new material this month during a 10-date North American tour, which also visits Tennessee’s Bonnaroo festival. In August, he will hit the European festival circuit and open two dates for Radiohead in Edinburgh and Dublin.

Source billboard.com.

Rock trio Oysterhead is hoping to mount its first tour since 2001 later this year, drummer Stewart Copeland said during a teleconference with journalists today (June 6). As previously reported, the group, which also features guitarist Trey Anastasio and bassist Les Claypool, will return to live duty later this month at the Bonnaroo festival in Manchester, Tenn.

Oysterhead’s lone album, “The Grand Pecking Order,” was released in 2001 by Elektra. The trio spent Memorial Day weekend rehearsing at Claypool’s California home in preparation for Bonnaroo.

“The plan was always to be an intermittent band and come down from the mountain every five years or so,” Copeland said. “It’s a shoot from the hip sort of thing – not tour, album, tour, album. We come together when we goddamn feel like it. [But] the Bonnaroo invitation came at the right moment. As soon as the three of us are together, all kinds of stuff starts to happen.”

Copeland is thrilled that playing with Oysterhead exposes him not only to different audiences but unique approaches to his craft. “In my world you have to have a song and you play songs and a set list, for that matter,” he said. “We actually do have songs and lyrics [but] we use those songs to leap out from. It’s a whole new thing for me to get that buzz from an audience that’s expecting a brand new piece of music. If we reach those pinnacles, reach those surges, that will enliven the bus ride back to Nashville!”

In related news, Copeland revealed that his documentary “Everyone Stares,” culled from home movies shot during the Police’s heyday, will play on Showtime in August and then arrive on DVD a month later via Universal Music Enterprises.

The DVD will include extra material such as backstage footage with “a different vibe,” according to Copeland. “You can see [guitarist] Andy [Summers] scowling at me. It’s band life that I didn’t have room for in the movie.” “Everyone Stares” will also be screened during Bonnaroo.

Source billboard.com.