Category — Albums

Pitchfork Media has already gotten around to compiling a 2008 list and its only July! Anyway, the list is for “Overlooked Records” and includes a personal favorite of mine…Earth’s “The Bees Made Honey In The Lions Skull” and others such as “Rook” by Shearwater.

They also included the newest release by The Mae Shi, who I think are terrible hipster crap, I think the record is meant to be overlooked. Different strokes for different folks I guess, check out it out for yourself..

Overlooked Records 2008.

Above is the cover art for Metallica’s new album “Death Magnetic” due out in September. James Hetfield recently revealed more info about the album’s title to VG TV…

“‘Death Magnetic’, at least the title, to me, it’s… It had something to do with… It started out as kind of a tribute to people that have fallen in our business, like Layne Staley and a lot of the people that have died, basically — rock and roll martyrs of sorts. And then it kind of grew from there. Thinking about death… some people are drawn towards it, and just like a magnet, some people are drawn towards it, [and] other people are afraid of it and push away. And the concept that we’re all gonna die sometimes is over-talked about and then a lot of times never talked about — no one wants to bring it up; it’s the big white elephant in the living room. But we all have to deal with it at some point. So that’s kind of the subject matter.”

He sounds a little confused about it himself. Once again, nothing from this album has been heard yet besides snippets teased on the bands official website. The album is supposed to be a return to older form for the band, supposedly featuring furious guitar solo’s by Kirk Hammett. This would make sense as the band has brought back their classic logo.

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Metallica haven’t even revealed the artwork for their forthcoming album “Death Magnetic” but they have already announced a deluxe coffin-style package. What? You ask, well here’s the info…

“In addition to the album, the package will include a disc of demos, a behind-the-scenes DVD chronicling the making of “Death Magnetic,” a T-shirt, a flag, guitar picks and a poster.

Also featured is a Metallica credit card with a code redeemable for a download of a “special European show happening in September.” This edition is only available from the band’s Web site.”

This is a cool idea on the bands part, if not a little extraneous. Although it makes a lot of sense, as I’m sure a lot of you out there, are still sticking with Metallica and would like to get extra stuff from the band. It is also worth noting that the band is including guitar picks in the package, as I’m sure they know a lot of their fans are guitar players themselves.

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Much-loved stoner/doom band Boris have recently embarked on their most comprehensive North American tour and are riding high on the success of their latest Southern Lord record “Smile”.

Guitar World related site, MetalKult, has great video footage of Boris at a one-off New York City show the band played just recently.

The video showcases the band playing the songs “Statement”, “Laser Beam”, “Buzz-In” and “Pink” with the guitarists playing a double-beck guitar, as well as a Gibson SG custom. Well worth checking out if you’re a fan.

Boris: North American Tour Dates

Boris with Torche, Clouds
07/01/2008: Baton Rouge, LA - Spanish Moon
07/02/2008: Gainesville, FL - Common Grounds
07/03/2008: Orlando, FL - The Social
07/05/2008: Atlanta, GA - The Earl
07/06/2008: Carrboro, NC - Cat`s Cradle
07/08/2008: Washington, DC - Black Cat
07/09/2008: Philadelphia, PA - First Unitarian Church
07/10/2008: New York, NY - Webster Hall
07/11/2008: Cambridge, MA - The Middle East

Boris with Torche, Nachtmystium
07/12/2008: Montreal, QC - La Sala Rosa
07/13/2008: Ottawa, ON - Barrymore
07/14/2008: Toronto, ON - Lee`s Palace
07/15/2008: Buffalo, NY - Tralf
07/16/2008: Cleveland, OH - Grog Shop
07/17/2008: Pittsburgh, PA - Diesel
07/18/2008: Detroit, MI - St. Andrews Hall
07/19/2008: Milwaukee, WI - Turner Hall
07/20/2008: Chicago, IL - Pitchfork Music Festival at Union Park

Boris with Torche, Lair of the Minotaur
07/22/2008: Omaha, NE - The Waiting Room
07/23/2008: Lawrence, KS - Granada Theatre
07/25/2008: Denver, CO - Marquis Theater
07/26/2008: Salt Lake City, UT - Urban Lounge
07/29/2008: Seattle, WA - Neumo`s
07/30/2008: Vancouver, BC, Canada - TBA
07/31/2008: Thu Portland, OR - Hawthorne Theatre
08/02/2008: San Francisco, CA - Great American Music Hall
08/03/2008: Los Angeles, CA - Echoplex

Gibson.com has a great, brand-new interview with Buzz Osborne of The Melvins up at their site. In this interview Buzz Osborne discusses, among other things, the recording of The Melvins new album “Nude With Boots” and his thoughts on music in general.

One thing I thought was very interesting about the interview is that he mentions using Fender guitars in places on the new album. Buzz Osborne is usually associated with Les Paul Customs, as many Melvins fans know. Excerpt…

“I used my ’69 Les Paul on the whole album supported by a Silvertone, Telecaster, and an early ’90s reissue Mustang.”

You can check out the full interview here.

Last week, I reported on the leak of some more disappointing songs from Guns N’ Roses still unreleased Chinese Democracy album by a guy named Skwerl (a former employee of Universal), via his blog. Now, it seems Axl Rose’ management is spending some serious time and money in investigating the leak, can’t have those songs released right?

I think Axl Rose might be trying to do the world a great service, by going to such lengths to prevent people from hearing this record for 15 years. God bless him for that at least. The ridiculous and retarded Chinese Democracy saga continues…more info courtesy of Stereogum.

“First, about Skwerl. The guy’s a web designer who used to work in Universal’s distribution department. However he insists the CD tracks came to him via an “anonymous online source.” Rock Daily gets some quotage:

Yesterday Skwerl was surprised to find himself face to face with two FBI agents who paid a visit to his day job. “It was kind of an ambush,” Skwerl tells Rolling Stone. “When I came back from lunch they were waiting in the lobby for me. It’s a little creepy they know where I work.” Two young FBI officers, who Skwerl describes as “Mulder and Scully types,” questioned him for 15 minutes about where he got the tracks and made plans to visit his house at 7:00 a.m. this morning.”I wasn’t sure if they were going to come by with a warrant and trash the place, like in the movies,” he says. “It was nothing like that.” The FBI officials wanted to see the original files, but Skwerl erased them last week per instructions from Axl Rose’s attorneys. Skwerl ultimately gave them second-hand files that are now widely available on the Internet.

The Cure has been playing live again recently and releasing new songs as singles. The band is out again pre-promoting the upcoming release of their new album on September 13th.

Now, courtesy of Stereogum, one of the new songs is available for your viewing pleasure via YouTube.

“As far as the singles go, “The Only One” was poppy, lovey, not offensive and “Freakshow” just kinda was. We haven’t heard a recorded version of “A Perfect Boy.” Same goes for new concert opener, “Underneath The Stars,” which is my favorite of the new material: A cascading, spacious, classic-sounding six-minutes-and-change slow builder that would’ve made sense, at least texturally, on Disintegration.”

I have to agree with them here, as this song features that classic Cure guitar work and has the ambiance that made all of their best songs work so well.

Check it out…“Underneath The Stars” live.

Guns N’ Roses haven’t released an album of original material since, oh around 1991. The band’s struggle to release their “Chinese Democracy” album have been pretty well publicized since 1994, when they began. The album remains unreleased.

Axl Rose has burned through around $14 million in production costs, supplied by Geffen/Interscope over the years, and has kicked out every original member of the band. He apparently recorded massive amounts of material, with an equally massive amount of musicians, a revolving door lineup.

Supposedly, he wanted the album to be one of the “greatest albums ever made”, whatever that means. This, to him, apparently meant layers of electric guitars, superfluous industrial noises and other somewhat ridiculous concepts. This is pretty apparent as large parts of mastered tracks have just now leaked.

Tracks had been leaked before, but not as complete as the current leak. Also, it appears this current leak features a few songs not previously leaked earlier. Needless to say, its a huge letdown, which I believe everyone expected. And at this point these “new songs” are probably 10 years old anyway. This album has become something of a running joke, something I thought Guns N’ Roses were anyway.

Here’s a link to Stereogum who have YouTube versions of 3 of the leaked songs.

A couple years back, Gnarls Barkley covered The Violent Femmes “Gone Daddy Gone” on their “St Elsewhere” album. Now The Violent Femmes have emerged from inactivity and released a cover of the Gnarls Barkley hit “Crazy”.

While “Crazy” has been covered by a lot of people and is pretty much played out at this point, the Femmes do it justice. It definitely sounds like a Violent Femmes original. This is also an interesting move as it could possibly be a sign that the band may work together again after several years of inactivity and in-fighting.

You can get more info about the release here, which includes more info, a sound clip and artwork. The entire song in streaming format and a video contest can be found on MySpace.

The song is also available for purchase on iTunes and in limited edition 12″ Vinyl format. The vinyl version comes with 2 bonus tracks, an instrumental version of the song and an acapella version. Crazy.

“Universal Music Enterprises (UME) says there are no plans to release Jimi Hendrix archival material as part of a recent agreement with Wolfgang’s Vault to sell vintage live performance downloads on the latter Web site.

As reported last week, Universal entered into an agreement with Wolfgang’s Vault that gives UME the opportunity to release certain live recordings by UMG artists. The master tapes originated from the archives of late concert promoter Bill Graham and were purchased in 2003 by Wolfgang’s Vault.”

This is unfortunate as Wolfgang’s Vault has access to hundreds if not thousands of legendary live recordings, ranging all the way from the 60’s up to the mid-to-late 90’s. Artists such as Nirvana, Led Zeppelin, The Who, and many more have all played Bill Graham events and therefore have a large amount of material in the vault. Hopefully Universal Music can work out an agreement as these recordings, I am sure, are quite interesting and historical.

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