The Faint Readies Gigantic Tour
After a split from their longtime home at Saddle Creek in May, along with an announcement that their latest album, Fasciinatiion would be released via their own blank.wav imprint, the five members of The Faint are gearing up to hit the road at the end of this month.
Fasciinatiion, due out August 5, is the Omaha, NE-based dance-punk band’s first album in nearly four years, following (or perhaps we should say dragging behind) 2004’s Wet From Birth. The band will first tour the new album around the U.S. and Canada before hopping the pond for a lengthy set of European dates, then down to Australia.
07/27 Des Moines, IA: People’s Court
07/28 Sioux Falls, SD: Ramkota Annex
07/29 Denver, CO: Ogden Theatre
07/30 Salt Lake City, UT: IN the Venue
07/31 Boise, ID: Knitting Factory Concert House
08/01 Vancouver, BC: Commodore Ballroom
08/02 Spokane, WA: Knitting Factory Concert House
08/03 Portland, OR: Crystal Ballroom
08/04 San Francisco, CA: The Fillmore
08/05 San Francisco, CA: The Fillmore
08/07 Los Angeles, CA: Henry Fonda Theatre
08/08 Los Angeles, CA: Henry Fonda Theatre
08/09 San Diego, CA: Soma
08/11 Austin, TX: La Zona Rosa
08/12 Dallas, TX: Palladium Ballroom
08/14 Atlanta, GA: Variety Playhouse
08/15 Carrboro, NC: Cat’s Cradle
08/16 Washington, DC: 9:30 Club
08/17 Philadelphia, PA: Trocadero
08/18 New York, NY: Terminal 5
08/20 Boston, MA: The Roxy
08/21 Toronto, ON: Opera House
08/22 Chicago, IL: Vic Theatre
08/23 Omaha, NE: Sokol Auditorium
08/27 Bristol, UK: Thekla
08/28 Manchester, UK: The Ruby Lounge
08/29 London, UK: Cargo
08/30 Dublin, Ireland: Electric Picnic
08/31 Argyll, Scotland: Hydro Connect Festival
09/02 Brussels, Belgium: Rotonde
09/03 Nijmegen, Netherlands: Doornroosje
09/04 Amsterdam, Netherlands: Melkweg
09/05 Berlin, Germany: Maria
09/06 Copenhagen, Denmark: Vega
09/07 Oslo, Norway: John Dee
09/08 Stockholm, Sweden: Debaser Slussen
09/10 Luxembourg, Luxembourg: Den Atelier
09/11 Paris, France: La Maronquinerie
09/24 Brisbane, Australia: The Zoo
09/25 Melbourne, Australia: Prince of Wales
09/26 Sydney, Australia: The Metro
Photo by Scott Dobry.
Sébastien Tellier “L’amour et la Violence (Boys Noize Remix)”
Sébastien Tellier is keeping busy this summer. His latest album, Sexuality, will hit American Apparel outlets on July 22 and be exclusively through the retailer, and the French songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and trilingual singer will also embark on a brief tour in support of the release. Of course, it wouldn’t be a proper album launch without a remix here and there, and Tellier has commissioned Berlin-based producer Alex Ridha, the man behind Boys Noize, to fashion a little reworking of this track. Here, Ridha cuts up the vocals, throws on the synth chords, and turns this number into an all-out party for the headphones.
Sebastien Tellier – L’amour et la violence (Boys Noize Remix)
Lagos, Nigeria: Then and Now
I’m driving through the back roads of upstate New York. Secondary roads named for the families that still live near them. Single-lane roads on which you’re passed by pickup trucks with gun racks. Roads leading past signs that read, “Jesus loves you–full range of bait and tackle.” Passing through one-stop-sign towns like Upper Lisle, NY, I’m blasting Sir Shina Peters & His International Stars from the new installment of Strut Records’ Nigeria 70 compilation series of monstrously heavy, funky Afrobeat.
Realizations come at every turn. First, it’s striking that this music older than I am should seem so boldly new: The guitar riffs that loop like today’s back-to-basics, roughshod sampling styles; the impossibly tight, electronic snare drum; the “retro” purity of a simple synthesizer. And it’s striking that here, in one of the whitest and most rural parts of the Northeastern United States, music made by urban Africans more than 30 years ago should shake with such ferociously contemporary, or perhaps such essentially timeless, fervor. “This is me, Tete Muo Bu Muo,” Tony Tete Harbor announces at the beginning of a song, “expressing [his] loneliness.” Harbor’s band, The Star Heaters of Nigeria, begin a melancholy rhythm and impoverished moan that I’m certain could bear meaning to some upstate pickup-truck pilot, driving past the farm his grandparents once owned, on a road that shares his name, to a job at a cafeteria in Cortland or a Starbucks at Cornell.
But therein lies the magic of Afrobeat. Much like reggae or hip-hop, it’s music that has escaped its temporal and cultural bonds to become something bigger than its players and singers, more meaningful even than its own sound and vision. The truth of Afrobeat is spoken in rhythms and contexts, irrespective of linguistic and political boundaries. It’s a truth of the rebelliousness of survival against social, cultural, and economic odds, as sermonized on Eddie Okwedy’s collection-ending “Happy Survival.” It’s a truth similarly expounded upon by Lagos Shake, a new collection of contemporary electronic remixes and re-cuts of Tony Allen’s modern Afrobeat classic, Lagos No Shaking.
Lagos Shake goes to prove that what reggae and dub were to the punk and post-punk generations, Afrobeat might be to the globalized post-electronic funk pandemic. As punk found limitless rebellious potential in reggae’s translucent rhythms, the likes of U.K. grime-ists Newham Generals and baile funkers Bonde Do Role dig into Allen’s rhythm-scapes to conceive a new non-verbal rhetoric of frenzied catharsis. Egyptian jazz master Salah Ragab and Chicago’s Hypnotic Brass Ensemble bring a heavy, spacey, Sun Ra vibe to Allen’s work, while Carl Craig and Diplo twist and tweak tunes into fader-pushed rhythmic obscenities. The overall effect is one of possibilities and options contains within a rhythmic language that, while once so new and bold, now seems not only familiar, but universally vital–almost circulatory in its relationship to contemporary music’s existence.
That Afrobeat would survive past the heyday of its singular driving force, Fela Kuti, was never assured. That it would flourish as never before under the legacy he left–his drummer and co-conspirator Tony Allen, and his children including Femi Kuti–is even more surprising. But with the stream of re-releases like Nigeria 70: Lagos Jump, and an ever-expanding global scene of critically lauded new bands (Antibalas, Kokolo, NOMO, Mifune–all just in the Eastern U.S.), what should no longer be surprising is that Afrobeat has become the shibboleth that dub once was; the password to a vast musical underground, be that on the streets of São Paolo or the clubs of London or New York. Long live the Punky Afro Party.
Zune Launches Joy Division Content
We have to give props to Zune for being all over the map in many a tasteful way. This year alone has seen an exclusive track from Hot Chip, a contest hosted by Bun B and his Rap-A-Lot imprint, and films by the likes of Friends with You, Three Legged Legs, Santogold, and Chromeo.
Next up, the Microsoft-owned company will release exclusive Joy Division content in a 3-party video podcast available for free download. In these clips, former bassist Peter Hook chats music, youth, and gives some of his personal reflection about the late Ian Curtis.
In addition, the Zune Marketplace store will feature Joy Division’s entire catalog, as well as two Hook-curated Guestlist features, in which he handpicks tracks that inspired original Joy Division material.
Now if we could just download the Zune software to our Macs.
J*DaVeY “Slooow”
Often referred to as a cross between Prince and the B-52s, J*DaVeY is always pleased to serve up a mix of funk, soul, hop-hop, and electronic music on their releases. The latest number to arrive from the Los Angeles-based duo is “Slooow,” and as its name suggests, this is a smooth, sultry affair that features funk-driven basslines and slinking synths. Not to be forgotten are the vocals here, which add a sexy, R&B-style flavor to the number.
Flying Lotus Los Angeles
One sign of a great beatsmith is when his compositions inspire you to forget about any daily stress and just get lifted away. Such is the case with Flying Lotus and his absorbing sophomore LP (and first for Warp), Los Angeles. There’s little doubt that trendy clothing chains will be using this stellar album for background music, but these instrumentals represent true forward-thinking headphone hip-hop with the off-kilter yet sturdy drums, a wide range of collaged cosmic samples, and just enough silky vocal contributions. Flying Lotus is best here at creating celestial sounds (“Beginners Falafel,” “Golden Diva”) though when he opts to crank up the bpms up and get glitchy (“GNG BNG”) he doesn’t disappoint.
Radioactive Man Growl
Stepping out of his demanding role as the other Lone Swordsman, Keith Tenniswood is finally able to release his latest solo effort on his own Control Tower imprint. Growl stacks up 11 cuts of machine-driven electro, analog to the core and step-sequenced like nobody’s fuckin’ business. With the exception of Andrew Weatherall’s cameo on “Double Dealings” and Dot Allison’s marginally tolerable murmuring on “Nothing at All,” the album is built with the kind of box-banging electro Tenniswood is known for. From the nasty, mechanical shuffle of “State of That” to the silken synth amperage of “Dalston to Detroit” and “Up in the Air,” Tenniswood shows us what all those knobs and blinking lights can really do in the right hands.
Nike Brings Boredoms’ 88 Drummers
When Boredoms finished up their 77BoaDrum event last year, in which 77 drummers headed down to Brooklyn Bridge Park to perform an exclusive song by the Japanese noise-rock outfit, speculation pretty much began immediately afterward on what the band had in store for 2008.
The answer has finally come, in the form of 88BoaDrum. Yes, this means a new 88-minute song will be performed by, yup 88 drummers. Nike Sportswear will present not one, but two of these events, each to take place on August 8.
The Los Angeles show starts at 8:08 p.m. PST at the LA Brea Tar Pits. The New York performance, which Gang Gang Dance will conduct on behalf of the Boredoms, is set to start at 8:08 EST at the Williamsburg waterfront. Both events are free and open to the public, though you’ll still have to obtain a ticket to attend. One ticket per person maximum.
Treibstoff Announces Remix Contest
Cologne’s Treibstoff label is known for crisp, angular, and pulsing minimal techno releases by artists like Robert Babicz, Gabriel Ananda, Rob Acid, Maetrik, Falko Brocksieper, and Cio D’or. Since 1997, the label has issued 80 releases and established itself as a major German electronic music outlet alongside the likes of Kompakt and Traum.
Label co-founder Marcel Janovsky began producing in the late 1980s, inspired by Kraftwerk and the emerging Euro club sound. He honed his ears and DJ skills by playing Chicago house and learning hip-hop scratch techniques. After founding Treibstoff (German for fuel) with partner René Breitbarth, Janovsky released several singles including the “Spring” and “Liebe auf Zeit” EPs.
In recognition of the Cologne DJ and producer’s continued popularity and contributions, techno web portal FOEM has announced a remix contest for Janovsky’s track “Okay,” which Janovsky describes as his vision of how techno should sound in 2008.
What do you think it should sound like?
Contest organizers at FOEM say remixes should be “subtle euphoric and trippy, with hypnotic grooves, building up for the peak hour with a permanent balance. Keep it simple but lovely, clean and modern, with small melodic phrases and healthy grooves.” Get contest information and song elements at FOEM’s site.
The contest deadline is September 30, 2008 and winners will receive at least one Treibstoff vinyl release.
