FOLLOW US ON:
GET THE NEWSLETTER
CONTACT US
Krent Able’s darkly hilarious Nick Cave comics
05.05.2012
03:39 pm
Topics:
Tags:


 
As sardonic and dead-pan as its subject, London-based artist Krent Able’s “Dr. Cave” comics are a beautifully drawn and darkly hilarious series of adventures featuring rock n’ roll’s most lovable misanthrope.

Able is really quite brilliant. Visit his website and be prepared to have your mind blown. His work is a perfect balance of wit and stunning craft.

Able has a great idea for his images of Nick dancing with a duck and astride a monkey: “repeat it as a pattern, and then sell it as children’s wallpaper. Such a treat for the darling little ones!”

Yes, please.
 

 
Krent Able is a regular contributor to one of the smartest music mags on the ‘net, The Stool Pigeon.

 

Posted by Marc Campbell
|
05.05.2012
03:39 pm
|
Funtimes in Babylon: Father John Misty on Letterman, plus tour dates
05.05.2012
02:52 pm
Topics:
Tags:


 
Although I try to stay away from the Internet as much as possible on weekends, I would not be serving the interests of our Bay Area readers—and indeed points elsewhere—if I didn’t post this item, this morning, so that they still have a chance to catch a great rock show tonight.

I have many times raved here on Dangerous Minds about Fear Fun, the new album by former Fleet Foxes drummer Josh Tillman, released under the Will Oldham-esque nom de plume of “Father John Misty” on Tuesday. (The album’s release was preceded by two singles, “Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings” and “Nancy From Now On”). You can read past DM posts on FJM here, here and here.

Last night Tillman and his band played a smokin’ hot gig amid the dinosaur bones at the Natural History Museum in Los Angeles, that Tara and I attended. We were waiting in the will call line for tickets and I overheard the guys behind us talking about the headliner. It was obvious that both were musicians and that they knew Tillman. They were there for the same reason we were: “Josh’s album is like THE album for me right now,” one of them said. “I can’t wait to hear it played live tonight with a band.” That’s what I was feeling, too and my expectations were as (cough) high as I was. I have listened to Fear Fun in very heavy rotation for the past seven months—as I’ve written here before, it’s my favorite album of the year already—and I was blown away hearing it played live last night by an excellent, extremely tight, well-rehearsed band.

On Fear Fun there’s very much a “classic rock” feel, the album’s lush analog varnish being the work of ace producer Jonathan Wilson (who also plays on the album) and engineer/mixer Phil Ek (Fleet Foxes, Built to Spill). It gets said in every review that the FJM sound is a gumbo of influences like Waylon Jennings, All Things Must Pass and Harry Nilsson (and this is all pretty accurate) but live the songs have a swampy, confident, bluesy swagger that recalls the Stones circa 1972.  Lanky Tillman, arms flailing like a revival preacher hopped up on goofballs, led the band through Crazy Horse-like guitar rave-ups that took the music into the stratosphere at several points during the set. He’s got a great fucking voice, too. Dude sings like Roy Orbison.

Truly, last night’s Father John Misty gig at the Museum of Natural History was a terrific rock and roll show from a band that will playing “big rooms” and rock festivals soon. If you have a chance to see the upcoming month-long tour (which travels to The Bottom of The Hill in San Francisco tonight), I highly recommend it. This album is going to be HUGE, it was obvious last night watching half the audience singing along with songs that were released just days before. (The other half of the audience, I think might have been there randomly because the show was part of the “First Fridays” concert series at the museum, but from the first song, those folks were pushing to the front, too, to check out what was happening onstage. They were won over, quickly and easily. My wife even danced and she never dances anywhere, ever).

Anyway, mark my words, this current month-long tour might be the last time you get to see Father John Misty in a 200-300 capacity club. If you trust my tastes in music, then get in on the FJM action now, it’s like seeing Neil Young live after he left the Buffalo Springfield. Seriously. Tillman’s a major American artist, as America is about to discover. He’s going to be around for a long, long time.

May 5 Bottom of The Hill, San Francisco CA
May 7 Neumos, Seattle WA
May 8 Doug Fir Lounge, Portland OR
May 11 7th Street Entry, Minneapolis MN
May 12, Schubas Tavern, Chicago IL
May 14 The Legendary Horseshoe Tavern, Toronto ONT
May 15 Petit Campus, Montreal PQ
May 16 Brighton Music Hall, Allston MA
May 18 Mercury Lounge, New York NY
May 19 Knitting Factory, Brooklyn NY
May 20 The Rock and Roll Hotel, Washington D.C.
May 26 The Mohawk, Austin TX

Fear Fun is out now on CD and limited edition pink vinyl on Sub Pop Records. Until last night, I had not seen the deluxe “billfold” packaging, which includes two poster sized print-outs of an entire Richard Brautigan-esque novel written by Josh Tillman and an amazing cover painting by New York-based artist Dimitri Drjuchin. It’s a really slick, impressively wordy package (think Thick As A Brick as a digipak) and provides more than enough for fans to get lost in Tillman’s unique literary—and mythic—rock and roll vision. Clearly the label indulged the artist, but I expect they’ll make their investment back many times over (the package makes it worth investing in the physical product). You can stream the entire album here.

FJM appeared on Late Night with David Letterman earlier this week and at the end you could tell that Letterman really liked what he heard. David Letterman seems to be someone who it would be tough to impress, but his enthusiasm post-song was pretty clearly stated, three times.
 

 
After the jump, FJM session on KCRW’s Morning Becomes Eclectic…

READ ON
Posted by Richard Metzger
|
05.05.2012
02:52 pm
|
‘Three bad brothers that made history’: Chuck D pays tribute to the Beastie Boys
05.04.2012
04:23 pm
Topics:
Tags:


 
The Beastie Boys tore down the walls that existed between rock and rap and did so with such crazy grace and a seamless groove that nobody noticed until the deed was done that these white boys had brought uptown downtown and vice versa. Even people who up-until-then had no place for hip-hop in their lives found themselves smitten. And the hardcore haters were musically bum-rushed so swiftly by the sonic velociraptors from NYC that resistance was futile. Everybody ended up coming to the party and found it worth fighting for.

I remember hearing “Cookie Puss” on the radio for the first time in 1983 and wondering “what the fuck was that?” It defied all categories of music as I knew it…and I loved it. I immediately headed over to Sounds on St. Mark’s Place to buy the 12 inch single. I’d play it for my friends and got a kick at watching their amused and perplexed reactions. This shit was fresh - a simple keyboard and drum riff with some scratching and a taped crank call to a Carvel Ice Cream store melded into something hilarious and infectious and a lot smarter and pioneering than we knew back then - it heralded the coming of a band that played dumb but were possessed of a poetic irreverence that celebrated popular culture while subverting it - yeah, punk rock with a hip-hop sense of the beat. On the surface it sounded sloppy and off-the-cuff. In reality it was perfect. The Beastie Boys had a “fuck you” attitude wedded to a shitload of charm and craft. They elevated the ordinary with the lyrical deftness of a Jack Kerouac or Chuck Berry.

It was announced that Adam Yauch (MCA) died today. I know that what I’ve written reads like an obituary for the entire band. It’s not. Mike D and Ad-Rock are still very much alive and I suspect will continue to create new music, produce films and act, as well as taking up the torch for the plight of Tibet as Adam had done for the past two decades. When someone dies, it brings perspective and an opportunity to remind oneself of how much certain things have meant in one’s life. Adam’s death has given us the chance to appreciate what made his band so fucking amazing. Long live the Beastie Boys!

When the Beastie Boys were inducted into this year’s Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame, Chuck D was there to celebrate the legacy of one of hip hop and rock n’ rolls most innovative groups. The fact that Adam Yauch was too ill (physically speaking) to attend, made the evening all that much more significant.

Here’s Chuck D’s Beastie Boys induction speech on April 14:

  Get it! Get it! You know the Beastie Boys? Can we get a ‘Yeah’ to hip-hop? Can we get a ‘Hell, yeah,’ Cleveland? Hip-hop in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame before I turn it over because Def Jam, in the words of Billboard, is the last great record label. And this man behind me wants to finish it off because Chess is to electric blues as Def Jam is to hip-hop and this man helped build the house. So as a resident, can you give three and a half minutes to hip-hop and the Beastie Boys for me? Help me out ya’ll!

  [raps with audience] Now here’s a little story – I’ve got to tell about three bad brothers – you know so well It started way back in history with Ad-Rock, M.C.A., and number three – Mike D.

  I know I can read from the teleprompter but I wrote it down. I won’t take much of your time. There’s no adequate measure for the impact that the Beastie Boys had on rap music and yours truly, Public Enemy, during our formative years. Artistically, just like my man back here, they are our role models. They gave us some of our richest support and that’s uncharacteristic of the many advisors in this game. They led and lead by example.

  The very first time the Beastie Boys headlined they toured, it was the ‘Licensed to Ill’ tour, they hit the road in January 1987. They invited us to join the bill in April 1987. The lineup was the Beastie Boys, Murphy’s Law, and Public Enemy. Watching them tear the house up just like 9,000 here tonight, tearing the house up, we learn so much the importance of a great stage show, just like my man back here.

  They made us rethink what we should do on stage and affirmed for us how important our own Beastie Boys, he calls himself Flavor Flav, might be to our success. In that way, the Beastie Boys literally helped us to get our act together by living up to more than their name night after night on the road.
  They were and still are one of the greatest live acts in music. How can we not learn from the way this group has challenged the dimensions in the music business? How they made up their own rules about what it means to be world class hip-hop heads.

  After ‘Licensed to Ill,’ the Beasties left the Def Jam label and broke with their producer Rick Rubin and still kept it going on. Everyone wondered and how many people were pessimistic about how the hell they were going to top their multi-platinum debut, ‘Licensed to Ill.’ But their second album, ‘Paul’s Boutique,’ broke the mold, and with it they accomplished everything they hoped for.

  They kept the band together through a challenging period when most groups would have broken up and gone home. They proved that they can produce themselves when too many folks wrongly believed they were puppets of marketing and production. And they insisted on maturity as a band and as human beings, when the easier thing for the band was to come back with a form that might have been ‘Licensed to Ill 2.0.’

  It was the courage and self-respect that we all learned from, and so right now we make sure we never take the easy way out just to repeat a hit record for a hit record’s sake: never to compromise our faith in ourselves and our artistry.  Besides they were the first hip-hop group on the World Wide Web in 1993, people.

  Two more minutes for hip-hop, people. One of the most – gotta sulk it in – the third hip-hop group ever. Gotta sulk it in. One of the most admirable qualities about the Beastie Boys is that they stayed so true to the game over the years. No matter what was going on with them or hip-hop culture in general, as far as I’m concerned, I quote myself, the trip towards individualism in hip-hop have come a play. Yes, I quote myself. In a [indiscriminate] art form.

  Yet through it all, the Beastie Boys remain a team of MCs, in the style of groups that inspired them – the Treacherous Three, the Crash Crew, the 2007 inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Grand Master Flash and The Furious Five. The 2009 inductees salute Run-DMC and Jay Master Jay. And let’s not forget the DJs throughout the years Andre, Dr. Dre, my friend DJ Hurricane, Mix Master Mike, and DJ Double R better known as Rick Rubin.

  And rock and roll fans’ still got to be a fan, it’s the same thing with hip-hop, the Beastie Boys have made a mountain for us all. Be together, play together, stay together, together forever.  A couple of paragraphs, one more minute for hip-hop, they ain’t got nothing on me. Sulk it in hip-hop and rap music it’s been around 30 years, gotta do it.

  Time and time again and in word and in practice The Beastie Boys honor hip-hop. As true musicians they move beyond drum machines and repetitive samples and sometimes pick up their own instruments. It’s their way of paying tribute to musicians who preceded them who built the foundations of hip-hop. More than many, many situations out there the Beastie boys have fought, in particular I’m thinking about somebody who wasn’t able to join us tonight, Adam Yauch, salute M.C.A. I feel him here tonight, you all feel him here tonight.

  And LL got more to say about that. He belongs here with the greatest. It was M.C.A. who committed the Beastie Boys through their lengthy campaign for freedom for Tibet. The campaign that not only helped the shining light on Tibet’s struggle for independence but allowed the Beastie Boys to move from fighting for their right to party to partying for their right to fight.

  Lastly, no matter what your lyrical subjects are on stage parodies, one thing the Beastie Boys never were to me was a joke. They remind us that this is a craft. We were talking about this on the side. This is a craft, this is not a hustle. And I couldn’t be more honored to induct this group along with this man behind me because they represent the best of the hip-hop/rap music idiom.

  I did love and always thank them for doing a hard work of paving those roads for musicians all over the world, and to rock, rap and roll on those roads, especially before people took us seriously as artists. Rap music is here to stay because it pays homage. So, may we all be as professional, distinctive, powerful as this group coming up right here and as this man. The Beastie Boys are indeed three bad brothers that made history.


Here’s more of Mister D talking about the Beasties, rock n’ roll and Bette Midler. April, 2012. It’s pretty much wonderful.
 

 
A crazy good performance of “Fight For Your Right” on the Joan Rivers Show in 1987 after the jump…

READ ON
Posted by Marc Campbell
|
05.04.2012
04:23 pm
|
The Beastie Boys when they actually *were* boys (and a girl) on cable access TV, 1984
05.04.2012
02:16 pm
Topics:
Tags:


Photo by Glen E. Friedman

An entire generation is sad today.

Adam Nathaniel Yauch, “MCA” (August 5, 1964 - May 4, 2012)

May he rest in peace.

In the video below, the Beastie Boys when they were all about 19 or 20 years old on the Manhattan Cable cable access program, The Scott & Gary Show on Valentines Day, 1984. Kate Schellenbach, later of Luscious Jackson, was a Beastie girl, playing drums in the group from 1979 to 1984, when they were basically a lighthearted punk band.
 

 
After the jump, an interview with the young Beastie Boys (and girl)

READ ON
Posted by Richard Metzger
|
05.04.2012
02:16 pm
|
The sound of Manhattan before it got boring: NYC No-Wave
05.04.2012
01:06 pm
Topics:
Tags:


 
Whitney Weiss curated this little slice of NYC No-Wave goodness for Network Awesome.

James Chance and the Contortions - “I Can’t Stand Myself ” (live)
Bush Tetras - “Too Many Creeps “/ In the Night (live)
Lizzy Mercier Descloux - “Fire” (on French TV)
ESG - “You’re No Good” (live at Danceteria, 1984)
DNA live at the Mudd Club (on TV Party)
Suicide - “Ghost Rider”
 

 
Via WFMU

Posted by Tara McGinley
|
05.04.2012
01:06 pm
|
Announcement: Texans Like Steak, Oil-Wells, Large Hats and Eno
05.04.2012
12:44 pm
Topics:
Tags:


 
I pretty much just posted this for the zany title. It’s from a NME article dated December 7,1974 by Chris Salewicz, which you can read here in its entirety.

Posted by Tara McGinley
|
05.04.2012
12:44 pm
|
‘A Lover Spurned’: French photographers Pierre et Gilles direct Marc Almond
05.04.2012
12:22 pm
Topics:
Tags:


 
Famed French photographers Pierre et Gilles directed this amazing—and seldom seen—promo video for Marc Almond’s “A Lover Spurned” in 1990. This is as much a work of art as it is a music video.

The clip co-stars the glamorous Marie France, the Parisian transsexual icon, as the spurned lover. Although Almond and France have recorded duets together, that is actually not her voice in the pissed off rap in the middle. Interestingly Almond enlisted actress Julie T. Wallace (who played the title character in the BBC revenge comedy The Life and Loves of a She-Devil) for that, adding a nice camp dog whistle for listeners who could hear it.

Pierre et Gille also shot the covers for the single and 12” releases of “A Lover Spurned” and the Enchanted album the song came from.  “A Lover Spurned,” produced by Stephen Hague, was a top 30 single in the UK in 1990.
 

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
05.04.2012
12:22 pm
|
Before Goldfrapp, before Kate Bush, there was Noosha Fox
05.04.2012
09:19 am
Topics:
Tags:


 
Noosha Fox is an Australian singer who, in the mid 1970s, fronted the British act Fox, who scored a handful of hits across Europe with their funk and reggae-influenced strain of glam-rock. After the band dissolved near the end of the decade, Noosha embarked on a moderately successful solo career; one of her tracks, “The Heat Is On”, ended up being covered by a solo Agnetha Faltskog of ABBA.

Fox’s tunes are great, and regularly entered high up on the British charts (as some of these clips will attest.) So how come I’d never heard of the fantastic Noosha until very recently?

Thanks to the website Lost Idols (and DM’s own Paul Gallagher,) here’s a bit more information on Noosha and the band:

The band was formed by Kenny Young (the man who got the credits for writing the song “Under the Boardwalk” for The Drifters in 1964). Lead singer of The Fox was Susan Traynor (from Australia) who earlier did backing vocals on Kenny Young’s solo album “Last Stage for Silverworld” in 1973 and also was in a band called “Wooden Horse”. The rest of the band included Herbie Armstrong (guitar and vocals), Pete Solley (keyboards), Jim Gannon (lead guitar), Gary Taylor (bass guitar) and Jim Frank (drums & percussion). Kenny Young played guitars, percussion and vocals. Susan became known as Noosha Fox and their first album “FOX” was a top ten hit in 1975.

It appears that Roger Taylor of ‘Queen’ added backing vocals to the track ‘Survival’ on Fox’s ‘Tails of Illusion’ album. Queen were in the same studio recording ‘A Night at the Opera’.

What happened then?

Noosha Fox (Susan Traynor), had a solo career when she left the band (1977) during the late 70s and early 80’s. She only had one minor hit with “Georgina Bailey”. Herbie Armstrong and Kenny Young moved on to a band called Yellow Dog and later Armstrong worked with Van Morrison in the late 70’s and early 80’s.Kenny Young has been working as a Record producer. Now Herbie is running a Restaurant together with his Swedish-born wife Elizabeth, in Hampshire called The Fountain Inn & Thai Restaurant. the rumour says they combine their talents in running one of the best eating places in the area.

Pete Solley joined Whitesnake on keyboards in 1977 for Snakebite. He’s also played with Procol Harum, Mickey Jupp and many more. He has also produced records for Oingo Boingo, Motorhead and Romantics. Jim Frank worked as an sound engineer for Alice Cooper (“Welcome to my nightmare”) and Peter Gabriel’s first solo album to mention a few. Jim Gannon played with the band “Black Widow” and also did some vocals on Alice Cooper “Goes To Hell”.

Not bad post-pop careers there, not bad at all.

Fox are one of those acts who have been unfairly booted into history’s dumpster, casualties of a cultural shift that saw extravagant glam rock relegated to just an embarrassing phase. Although undoubtedly an influence on a whole generation’s burgeoning sexuality (check out the YouTube comments on any of her/their clips,) ask anyone under the age of 40 who Noosha Fox is and you’ll get a blank stare and an itchy scalp.

That’s a real shame, because Noosha and her band were fantastic. With her very distinctive look and sound (silent-cinema star and pinched-nose temptress, respectively) Noosha Fox predated the far-out kookiness of Kate Bush by a good four years, and seems to have been a huge influence on the band Goldfrapp, who have basically re-interpreted her look and sound for the electronic age.

Of course, maybe Fox passed me by because I am not a child of the Seventies. If any of our readers have any memories of the great band/singer, do feel free to share them in the comments. In the meantime (while I try and track down a “best of” album,) here are a selection of Noosha and Fox clips:
 
Fox “S-S-S-Single Bed”
 

 
After the jump, more music by Noosha and Fox, including “Imagine You, Imagine Me”, “Electro People”, “The Heat Is On” and more…

READ ON
Posted by Niall O'Conghaile
|
05.04.2012
09:19 am
|
Nick Cave assistant to the fire-juggling unicyclist?
05.04.2012
07:01 am
Topics:
Tags:

Nick_Cave_Fire_Juggler_Assistant
 
Nick Cave assistant to the fire-juggling unicyclist?

Mr. Cave lends a hand to a German unicycling, fire-juggler, on the New Road, Brighton.
 
Previously on Dangerous Minds

Nick Cave Star Fleet Commander?


 
Via @BrightonArgusJo
 

Posted by Paul Gallagher
|
05.04.2012
07:01 am
|
DOOM speaks!
05.03.2012
08:40 pm
Topics:
Tags:


MF Doom illustration by Veenom

God knows what a “Red Bull Music Academy” is supposed to be, but there is, or was, one in Madrid, apparently, and for some reason that usually reticent wordsmith DOOM (née MF DOOM), swung by it last year to submit to an unprecedented over-an-hour-and-a-half filmed interview – probably just in return for a complimentary crate or two of that weird energy drink.
 
Now this doesn’t make for much of a visual spectacle, particularly when the interviewer spins a DOOM tune, and so subjects the viewer to a lot of half-hearted head-nodding from the attendant academy ‘undergraduates’ while DOOM peers mournfully off into the middle distance (thinking of all that Red Bull, no doubt). It makes for great audio though, and not just because of the wonderful music; here, in his butter-moist tones, our finest living lyricist (give or take) all but opens up, discussing, among other things, KMD, the making of Operation Doomsday and Madvillainy, rhyme style, writer’s block, and synaesthesia (unsurprisingly, for DOOM, “sounds have colors”).
 

 
More after the jump…

READ ON
Posted by Thomas McGrath
|
05.03.2012
08:40 pm
|
Page 566 of 856 ‹ First  < 564 565 566 567 568 >  Last ›