Dave Grohl. Ryan Adams and Death Cab For Cutie’s Ben Gibbard are among the artists gathering in Los Angeles this fall to honor punk pioneer Bob Mould. Mould’s legacy is
Back in 2002, the large-scale music festival landscape in the United States was virtually nonexistent. So when Superfly Presents and AC Entertainment announced plans for a multi-day, jam-friendly fest, named
The Sasquatch! Festival will return to The Gorge in George, WA over Memorial Day Weekend boasting a lineup jammed packed with indie faves who are on major labels such as Wilco, the Flaming Lips (performing The Soft Bulletin plus more), Modest Mouse, Death Cab For Cutie, Chromeo, The Decemberists and the Foo Fighters.
Four-day all-inclusive passes are currently available for $285.
[via Pitchfork]
READ ON for the full initial lineup…
The lineup for this year’s Coachella dropped early this morning and it’s no joke. Goldenvoice put together a well-rounded bill that starts with headliners Arcade Fire, Kings of Leon, The Strokes and Kanye West and includes HT faves The Felice Brothers, Tame Impala and Trampled By Turtles.
Here’s a look at the lineup in poster form…
Coachella 2011 takes place at Empire Polo Club in Indio, CA on April 15 – 17. Tickets go on sale this Friday at 10 AM PST.
READ ON for an A to Z (or ! to Z) rundown of the bill…
Since we’ve spent the entire week recounting our favorite albums of 2010, and quite frankly you’re probably tired of reading about them, seemed like a no-brainer to end the week
For the second consecutive year, we concocted an innovative little experiment for our year-end Best Albums list. Instead of picking the old fashioned way, we opted for something a little different: a collaborative, collective list that incorporates the opinions of everybody here at HT.
To begin, we devised an all-encompassing list of well over 100 nominees, whereby most everything our contributors recommended made this list. Then, we invited our crew of writers to independently and blindly vote on each album within the list on a scale of 1 to 20 (20 = epic). We ended up with varying degrees of familiarity for the nominees as some folks voted on just about everything, while some ranked just a few. From there, we deployed our egghead algorithm for rating albums: (two times the average rating) + (the total number of votes). At that point, we took the top 25 highest scores and presto: Hidden Track’s 25 Best Albums of 2010. No bullshit, no big opinions; just the results.
Let’s kick off our week long countdown of our favorite albums of 2010 with numbers 25 through 21…
25) Sleigh Bells – Treats
Key Tracks: Tell ‘Em, Infinity Guitars
Sounds Like: Electric Guitars and Cheerleaders
The Skinny: Sleigh Bells came out of nowhere in 2010 to emerge as a break out of the highest order. Despite being a just a duo, the boy-girl tandem of Derek Miller and Alexis Krauss manage to slug out bombs with their stomping beats, cutting guitar attacks and anthemic vocal hooks. With Treats, Sleigh Bells have created a genuinely unique twist on amped-up party music.
READ ON for the next four albums in our countdown…
As we continue to do some more end of the year house cleaning around HT’s home office to get it all tidied up for 2011, I figured it was about time to continue with a tradition around these parts by taking a look at my favorite six albums of the last half of the year with the Top 6 Of The Last 6…
Prior to his success as a solo artist, José González fronted the indie-rock band Junip in the late ’90s in his native country of Sweden. The short-lived group released a lone 4-song EP, before going their separate ways, mostly in part because of their label’s interest in González’s own material. The singer-songwriter regrouped with his off-again, on-again band mates deciding to record their long in the works full-length debut. The album features González’s familiar Nick Drake drenched in reverb vocals backed by a hypnotic mix of psychedelic folk-rock that draws its influences from jazz, electronica and Indian ragga-style rhythms.
READ ON for the rest of my Top 6 Of The Last Six…
In our never-ending quest to dig up great bands whose tickets cost less than a corned beef sandwich at Katz’s, we bring you another round of Blips. Blips highlights some great bands that are largely still in their larvae stage, but will soon morph into their beautiful butterfly. In this edition, we have some really cool new music, so take a sec, poke around the bands’ various websites, and see what you think of these four under the radar acts…
Best Coast
In music critics never-ending quest to label every sub-genre we now have something called “chillwave”. While I won’t wax poetic on that subject, one of the acts that have been lumped into this ever growing movement – along with the likes of Neon Indian, Beach Fossils and Memory Tapes – is Best Coast (whether they actually like it or not). The two-piece act, fronted by Bethany Cosentino, have been garnering a lot of much deserved blog attention over the last year after releasing a series of much buzzed about 7-inch singles. READ ON for more on Best Coast and three other acts…
As we previously reported, Primus will return to the road this summer for their first headlining tour in four years. The quirky funk-rock act is wasting no time in lining
The summer concert season is upon us and the Hidden Track staff know that it’s virtually impossible for us to afford every show we want to hit, and still be able to pay our insanely expensive New York City rents. Luckily for us, there are a plethora of fantastic free concerts throughout the summer that don’t cost a dime. We decided to weed through all the listings and present to you our 3rd Annual NYC Free Summer Concert Picks. Let’s take a look…
HT Recommends: She & Him / Oakley Hall
Where: The Beach @ Governors Island
When: Sunday, July 4, Beach Opens At 10 AM, Show 4 PM
Official Info: She & Him make music for an eternal springtime, when the temperature is warm enough to go riding with the top (or at least the windows) rolled down and the radio turned up. They occupy an alternate universe where the saddest of songs feel as warm as sun showers; the rain may be coming down, but somewhere nearby, everything looks bright. What began as a fascinating, no-strings attached collaboration on 2008’s Volume One has evolved into a bona fide, touring band, and She & Him are here to stay. Zooey Deschanel and Matt Ward are as comfortable and complementary a musical pair as Les Paul and Mary Ford; hearing them again on Volume Two feels like getting together with two old friends. This time, the harmonies have grown more angelically layered, the string arrangements more dramatic, the songwriting even sharper and more confident. But, as with Volume One, the prevailing mood is bittersweet, dreamy, and romantic.
Other Free Shows At Governors Island: 6/5 – Yeasayer, 7/3 – Portugal. The Man / Alberta Cross, 7/10 – Lucero, 7/16 – Caribou / Phantogram / The Chain Gang of 1974, 8/8 – Josh Ritter & The Royal City Band / Justin Townes Earle / Dawn Landes & The Hounds, 8/14 – Neon Indian, 8/15 – Dr. Dog / Cheif
READ ON for the rest of our list of free summer concerts in NYC…
