Dischord Records founder and Fugazi frontman Ian MacKaye participated in a debate/discussion with Sonic Youth frontman Thurston Moore at the Brooklyn Book Fair, yesterday. According to Billboard.com MacKaye and Moore discussed issues ranging from advertising and record sales to a packed audience. An excerpt from Billboard’s piece on the discussion…

“In response to the moderator’s use of the word “Google” as a verb, MacKaye began the panel with a rant about the danger of language being a branded commodity. He then discussed his band’s now-legendary $5 cover policy, saying that there are always ways for the music industry to be more efficient. At the same time, he encouraged the audience to support artists by buying their music and seeing their shows.”

“Finally, the pair addressed the hot-button issue of indie bands associating with brands. MacKaye claimed the notion that working with brands was the only way to expose music is a conceit created by advertisers, and that all bands have a choice as to whether or not to sell their songs.”

This event seems like it would’ve been really cool to attend, it doesn’t say whether or not the audience got a Q&A type setup with MacKaye or Moore but one would expect something like that to occur. It would be great to see a video or hear audio of the event, if I find out its been posted somewhere I will definitely re-post that here.

Dischord Records is set to release a compilation of tracks by the band Faraquet. If you don’t know of the band they were around from 1997 until 2001, they preceded Medications and featured Devin Ocampo and Chad Molter as well.

The band was known for angular guitar parts and strong hooks, and have been described by some reviewers as a cross between Fugazi and King Crimson.

The compilation entitled “Anthology 1997-98″ is available exclusively through Dischord Records online in CD, LP and MP3 formats and will be available everywhere else on July 28th. Working on the compilation re-established an interest in the band and they have reunited.

I strongly recommend checking out this band if you haven’t yet.

Source.

I’ve been listening to the band Spirit Caravan for a while now, they were my first introduction into the “stoner rock” genre. I got their “Jug Fulla Sun” album which was released on Fugazi bassist - Joe Lally’s Dischord Records imprint label, Tolotta Records.

The album pretty much has a typical stoner rock sound, very Black Sabbath of course. Something about it though makes it endearing, it has a sincerity to it that you hear in most of lead singer Wino’s other work as well. This album was the first I heard though to make me aware of a lot of other bands within this genre as well as Wino’s previous band the legendary Obsessed, who with a handful of others arguably created the template for the stoner rock genre. Anyway, it is something worth checking out…

The Obsessed

Spirit Caravan

This story is kind of old at this point, but a lot of people probably haven’t seen it. There is a new hot sauce out named after the legendary Washington D.C. hardcore punk band Minor Threat. The sauce is called…get ready… “Minor Threat” Hot Sauce, due to it being only mildly spicy.

The makers of the sauce knew how anti-commercial Fugazi/Minor Threat frontman Ian Mackaye is. Still, through certain connections they approached the Dischord Records founder with the idea. After trying the sauce he agreed to let them use the name “Minor Threat” but not the above modified artwork they had prepared.

Minor Threat: The Sauce

Minor Threat Turns Condiment