Chicago music is in a bit of a pickle. On May 7th, the Chicago City Council committee approved a plan to implement an ordinance that would require all venues with less than 500 fixed seats (read: 99% of venues) that host events to register with the city for an Event Promoter license. The cost associated with purchase of the license could cost establishments as much as $2,000 every two years. It would also require businesses to purchase liability insurance in the amount of $300,000–and that’s just the beginning of the regulation. The ordinance would also demand that event promoters be over the age of 21, submit to fingerprints and notify police seven days in advance of any event. Further, the definition of “event promoter” is so ambiguous that it puts at risk many more than simply the venue staff that could be subject to fines and penalties.
The cost incurred in paying these fees could serve as a pretty formidable obstacle for small venues and compromise the creative communities that they are centers for. Instead of supporting independent artists and local businesses, Chicago city government is on the cusp of making a decision that could effectively nullify the validity of Chicago’s music scene, fracture its creative communities and send young artists to other cities that welcome local music events.
If you live in or around Chicago, have lived there or simply understand the importance of preserving this city’s cultural richness, you can act. Send an email or make a phone call to a Chicago Alderman by clicking here or, at the very least, go to the Save Chicago Culture blog and leave a comment that will be submitted at the City Council meeting tomorrow–Wednesday, May 14–when they vote on the ordinance. Thanks for your support!
UPDATE: Thankfully, due to a “nearly unprecedented outpouring of concern,” according to Jim DeRogatis’s Sun-Times blog, the committee has scrapped their plans and are taking it all back to the drawing board. So Chicago is safe, for the time being at least. Thanks for listening, City Council!
We live in the era of the band reunion. It’s inescapable at this moment, and has grown in popularity over the past decade, to the point where we should just openly accept that any band we might have loved from the past, living or dead, is likely to start playing shows and recording somewhere near you. Sometimes it’s a cash-in, other times it’s a stab at eradicating mid-life crisis, and even rarer is the opportunity for a band to reconnect on a purely creative level and continue to tell the story, a la Mission of Burma.
That said, nothing could have prepared me for the news I just received, via MySpace: Hackamore Brick is playing a live show in New York City on May 15th. Who is Hackamore Brick, you ask? Merely a footnote to NYC rock ‘n’ roll history, on the influential side, but what a note: their wandering compositions, brusque stylistic shifts and soulful vocals, given the 1970 New York in which they existed so briefly, makes them the very first band to take direct influence from the Velvet Underground. Some of the band’s membership had allegedly met through the foundation of the Venus in Furs Society, the Velvets’ official fan club. They recorded a lone album with Lou Reed’s future producer, Richard Robinson, entitled One Kiss Leads To Another, for the Kama Sutra label back in ’71, followed by a single, both of which vanished without trace upon their release. But those records are beloved by a handful of crate-diggers (myself included–the LP is easily a Top 10 record of all time to my ears), rock historians, and fans of musical surprises from the annals of history. Ranging from heart-felt balladry (“Reachin’”) to radio-ready pop (“I Watched You Rhumba”), from progressive rock wandering (“And I Wonder”) to blistering proto-punk (“Zip Gun Woman”), their recordings are the missing link between the Velvet Underground and Television, groundbreaking rock bands that had no formal connections other than the willingness to deviate from the expected and channel a new breed of rock music. In 1971, such things just weren’t thought of. Time has seen to it that they remain forgotten, aside from the random blog post or bootleg CD.
On Thursday, May 15th, at Bar 169 in Chinatown, a handful of us are going to get to see original members Chick Newman and Tommy Moonlight have one more go at it. I couldn’t even guess as to how this will turn out, but those of us who still care wouldn’t miss it for the world.
There was a time when most of us looked to the future–a world of flying cars, teleportation and free-willed android babes that look like Sean Young and Daryl Hannah–with giddy anticipation. Now that the future is here, not only are cars still on the ground, but it’s difficult to discern the good from the evil, the authentic from the synthetic–much like Harrison Ford’s character in Blade Runner encountered.
Take Tod Machover, for example, a composer and the head of the Media Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Machover and his MIT colleagues are working on a frontier where technology teams with artistic expression. It is not immediately clear whether these efforts will eventually serve mankind or doom it. Machover and his group are composing music and designing a magnificently cutting-edge stage set for a production of their cyber opera, Death and the Powers. Machover’s opera is the story of a wildly-successful businessman, Simon Powers, who cannot countenance the inevitability of his own death and strives to live on in perpetuity by, in Machover’s words, “download[ing] himself into his environment. Turning his furniture, his books, his walls, everything into a living version of himself”. Powers endeavors to meld himself with all of his stuff and morph into a massive cyber organism called The System. As the story progresses, the entire set–in the process of evolving into a binary electronic mechanization of Powers–becomes the central character of the narrative. Once Powers has embodied the books on the wall-high shelves, they move in and out of their places in the stacks in sequences correlative to Power’s emotional experience. There is a forty-foot wide chandelier that is also an immense instrument comprised of piano strings that are played, or rather, manipulated by robotic gizmos.
Press hype blurbs for Death–as well as Machover himself–promise, from the story of Simon Powers, redeeming social commentary and the raising of important questions relevant to a civilization situated in a murky spiritual landscape. But it all rings a tad hokey. Even though Machover has already produced an opera based on legendary sci-fi author Philip K. Dick’s novel Valis, Dick is surely banging his head against the walls of his grave at this atrocious misappropriation and ironic misreading of his own peerless foresight.
One aspect of the entire sordid affair that certainly could not have been lost on the cynical acumen of Dick is that the funding of Machover’s dubious potential atrocity is provided by the Prince of Monaco. Yeah, that Prince of Monaco, the one from Monte Carlo, where the show will premiere in September 2009.
The tiny preview of music made available on Machover’s web page is typically spooky, trance-y and soundtrack-y. One clip consists of a simple harmonic drone tone from the gargantuan chandelier robot harp, and it sounds capable of emanating an absurdly deep rumble, commensurate with its size, that will surely jimmy loose a couple of fillings in a live setting. There will be human musicians as well, but the instruments they play will be emotio-sensitive, meaning they are designed to respond to the energy field emitted by the players’ bodies and represent that energy in the sound the instruments produce. Singers might even have available ingestible software chips that change the pitch and timbre of their voices. Vocals will also be run through processors capable of varying the register and affecting a singer’s tone in the same fashion as would a high-tech pitch shifter or a DJ scratching 12-inch vinyl on turntables. Machover and crew have also innovated an “army” of “opera bots” that provide a choral backing to the drama while they move about the set in drill-team-style, choreographed union.
Maybe it is all in good fun, but if we learned anything from Philip K. Dick, it is never to trust the guy who controls the robots.
Call your acid dealer. This news from the Butthole Surfers’ MySpace page: The band will reunite for a brief stretch of U.S. live dates, to be followed by a European tour. They’ll be playing with a large chunk of the original lineup, with bassist Jeff Pinkus and both King Coffey and Teresa Taylor on drums. (Paul Leary is committed only for the NYC show thus far, but may play other U.S. dates). This is the first time this lineup has played together since 1989. To further weird this out, the band will be joined onstage by the Paul Green School of Rock All-Stars. That’s right: teenage kids live on stage with the Butthole Surfers.
Just let that sink in for a moment. Maybe go back and revisit their live “Blind Eye Sees All” video, and imagine these guys with underage kids at a concert. Times have changed, but let’s hope the Butthole Surfers haven’t. Find out on these dates:
June 24 - Asbury Park, NJ - Asbury Lanes
June 26 - Washington, DC - 9:30 Club
June 27 - Philadelphia, PA - Electric Factory (w/ Sound of Urchin) (part of the Paul Green School of Rock Music Festival - 3 day passes w/ Devo and more available.)
July 29 - New York City - Webster Hall
Here are some facts that may shock you about influential Canadian hardcore band D.O.A.: Over the past 30 years, D.O.A. have released 12 albums and sold one million copies; frontman Joe Shithead Keithley is the bestselling author of “I, Shithead–A Life In Punk” on Arsenal Pulp Press; and in 2003, Vancouver Mayor Larry Campbell declared December 21st to be “D.O.A. Day” in honor of the band’s 25th anniversary.
D.O.A. kicks off a tour in Canada in May and June, and expect them in the US later on this summer. For the tour, Keithley has teamed up with original bassist Randy Rampage and drummer James Hayden for a new album to be released this summer, produced by–another surprise–super-Canadian Bob Rock. Rock has produced albums for arena-fillers and indie acts alike, including Metallica, Offspring, Joan Jett, Subhumans, Young Canadians, Motley Crue, the Cranberries and many others. Rock also played bass on Metallica’s St. Anger.
D.O.A. will be releasing their 13th full length album Northern Avenger in December 2008, just in time for their 30th anniversary .
For more information on the D.O.A. 30th Anniversary Tour, go to www.suddendeath.com.
May 6th, The Casbah, Hamilton, ON
May 7th, The Dungeon, Oshawa, ON
May 8th, Call The Office, London, ON
May 9th, The Dominion, Ottawa, ON
May 10th, The Horseshoe, Toronto, ON
May 11th, Time To Laugh Comedy Club, Kingston, ON
May 12th, L3, St. Catherines, ON
June 9th, Wild Bill’s, Banff, AB
June 10th, The Doghouse, Medicine Hat, AB
June 11th, The Zoo, Innisfail AB
June 12th, TBA in Alberta
June 13th, TBA in Alberta
June 14th, P and Q’s, Ponoka, AB
Though many high profile bands have openly used alternatives to fossil fuels for their stadium tours, Radiohead is the first to ask fans to consider their transportation methods, and offer incentives to fans who try to reduce their carbon footprints.
Radiohead is one of the first high profile bands to commission a study from Best Foot Forward to definitively determine what the greater pollutants of touring might be. Best Foot Forward analyzed transportation methods both Radiohead and their fans for their stadium and theater tours in 2003 and 2006 (view a copy of the report here).
So, what is the biggest kick to the earth when it comes to stadium shows–those giant buses? The price of beer? Radiohead weren’t afraid to ask. Sadly, fans, it’s you. The 36 page report shows that fans’ travel to and from the shows accounted for the greatest proportion of the CO2 generated during each tour.
Following the report’s recommendations, Radiohead are encouraging fans to consider public transport where available, or to carpool. They don’t want you to stay home…just to think and consider reducing CO2 emissions where possible. Some of the venues have also helped by offering incentives to fans coming by public transport or in a car filled with fellow fans.
After the next Radiohead tour, the band will invite ticket holders to submit information on their methods of travel so further research can be done on carbon emissions and methods to reduce them–the ultimate in nerdy fan fun. Radiohead’s production team also plans to post news updates on how the band is trying to reduce their own carbon emissions on tour without losing any of the sound and fury that stadium shows typically demand.
Radiohead’s upcoming North American tour is sold out in many cities. For more info and ticket availability, check
www.radiohead.com/tourdates.
May 5th - Cruzan Amphitheatre, West Palm Beach, FL
May 6th - Ford Amphitheatre, Tampa, FL
May 8th - Lakewood Amphitheatre, Atlanta, GA (Sold Out)
May 9th - Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre, Charlotte, NC (Sold Out)
May 11th - Nissan Pavilion at Stone Ridge, Bristow, VA Sold Out(Sold Out)
May 14th - Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre, St Louis, MO
May 17th - Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion, Houston, TX (Sold Out)
May 18th - Superpages.com Center, Dallas, TX Sold Out
August 1st - Lollapalooza Festival, Chicago, IL
August 3rd - Verizon Wireless Music Center, Indianapolis, IN
August 4th - Blossom Music Center, Cleveland, OH
August 6th - Parc Jean Drapeau, Montreal, Quebec
August 8th - All Points West Festival Liberty State Park, New York
August 9th - All Points West Festival Liberty State Park, New York
August 12th - Susquehanna Bank Center, Camden NJ
August 13th - Tweeter Center, Mansfield, MA
August 15th - Molson Amphitheatre, Toronto, Ontario (Sold Out)
August 19th - Thunderbird Stadium, Vancouver, BC (Sold Out)
August 20th - White River Amphitheatre, Auburn, WA (Sold Out)
August 22nd - Outside Lands Festival, San Francisco, CA
August 24th - Hollywood Bowl, Los Angeles, California (Sold Out)
August 25th - Hollywood Bowl, Los Angeles, California (Sold Out)
August 27th - Cricket Wireless Amphitheatre, Chula Vista, CA
August 28th - Santa Barbara Bowl, Santa Barbara, CA (Sold Out)
Last week, Live Nation gave Jay-Z (née Shawn Carter) between $100-$150 million in exchange for the next 10 years of his life, in the form of stock shares and promises of cash. The entertainment conglomerate will take control of his releases, his concerts and ticket sales, as well as bankroll Jay-Z’s own entertainment interest, Roc Nation, in a paternalistic arrangement conducted under the auspices of Live Nation.
Essentially, dude won’t be allowed to write a Valentine poem to Beyoncé without running it past the guys in legal before she reads it.
Jay-Z played his first post-deal concert on May 3rd at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey, ahead of a two-night Madison Square Garden stand that begins May 6 in New York City. It was part of the Heart of the City Tour, which he co-headlines with Mary J. Blige. The tour was already being produced by Live Nation, even as the new deal was being struck, so there were no immediate changes in the day-to-day routine.
Boardwalk Hall was sold-out, as are most of the shows on the tour, and the 20,000 faithful who came to the Atlantic City gig got exactly what they paid ridiculous sums of money to see–a highly predictable, seamless and stiffly professional big time showcase revue–a real snoozer. The sets of both Blige and Jay-Z involved immense backing bands with string and horn sections, live video feed to enable those in the nose-bleeds to feel as though they were actually at the show, pyrotechnics for those who enjoy deafening and jolting surprises, costume changes, and heart string-tugging video clips of Notorious B.I.G. as well as one of Jay-Z and Blige sharing their humble, platonic love, and giving each other props, etc.
With entertainment that is corporatized, commoditized and scripted out to such a level of exactitude, the average onlooker would not be able tell the difference between rapper Jay-Z and pop icon Elton John, or, hell, for that matter, even Céline Dion. In a deal where the money outstrips what was given in a similar arrangement to the vaunted Madonna last year by Live Nation, Jay-Z has–as the late comedian Bill Hicks would have put it–taken himself off of the the “artistic roll call, forever!” Jay-Z is now melded, at a mitochondrial level, with the dreaded and monstrous Corporatia. He is beyond anyone’s intervening reach. Allow the man some dignity in his passing and, please, look away.
John “Speedo” Reis, mastermind of San Diego’s Rocket from the Crypt and co-front man of Hot Snakes, has assembled yet another crew of forge-smithed journeymen, herded them into the van and has them on road. The new outfit, The Night Marchers, kicked off a thirteen-date, coast-to-coast, rock-venue luge ride last Friday in Mesa, AZ, and still have stops to make in Seattle, Denver, Chicago, Detroit and the major markets of the North East, in support of their debut release, See You In Magic (Vagrant/Swami), before crossing the pond for a run of UK dates in June.
Drummer Jason Kourkounis, ex- of Delta 72, who also sat behind Reis in Hot Snakes, boasts of the Marchers’ “all Greek rhythm section”, where he teams up with Montreal bassist, Thomas Kitsos. The line-up is rounded out by former Hot Snakes hand Gar Wood, who has traded the bass guitar he played in Snakes’ for one of the six-string variety in this new assembly.
The Night Marchers are considerably more straight-ahead than Hot Snakes, even reminiscent of a stripped down version of Rocket. Magic is a rapid-fire blast of one irresistible head-bobbing hook after another. The tunes on Magic endeavor to affect the end of hammering home these hooks by employing every instrument in the band as a percussion instrument. Guitars are beaten raucously as though by the right hand of a drummer pounding out a call to a battle march on his snare head.
By all reports from the early shows, it sounds as though Reis’ new outfit might well be worth catching if they are coming thorough your patch of weeds.
April 30 - Seattle, WA - Chop Suey
May 2 - Denver, CO - Larimer Lounge
May 3 - Omaha, NE -Waiting Room,
May 4 - Chicago, IL - Shuba’s
May 5 -Detroit, MI - Magic Stick
May 7 -New York, NY - Mercury Lounge
May 8 -Boston, MA - Middle East
May 9 -Philadelpha, PA - Warehouse Show
May 10-Baltimore, MD - Ottobar
Who would ever think these two goofy dudes from New Zealand would top the charts? Well, on April 27, Flight of the Conchords (née Jemaine Clement and Bret McKenzie) beat out Mariah Carey and were in fact, number one on iTunes.
Fans of the show should remember that the duo (who call themselves “formerly New Zealand’s fourth most popular guitar-based digi-bongo a cappella-rap-funk-comedy folk duo”) also won a Grammy: This Distant Future (Sub Pop) won the award for Best Comedy Album.
Newer fans and die-hards have a rare chance to see the duo live, as they tour to support their latest self-titled album, also out on Sub Pop. And if you’re among the uninitiated, check out the video below.
For more info: http://www.conchords.co.nz
Flight of the Conchords - 2008 Tour Dates:
May 5 - Tower Theater, Upper Darby PA
May 6 - Town Hall Theater, New York NY
May 7 - Town Hall Theater, New York NY
May 9 - Lisner Auditorium, Washington D.C.
May 10 - Michigan Theater, Ann Arbor MI
May 11 - Riverside Theater, Milwaukee WI
May 13 - Orpheum Theatre (Mpls), Minneapolis MN
May 14 - Chicago Theatre, Chicago IL
May 15 - Ellie Caulkins Opera House, Denver CO
May 26 - Sasquatch! Festival, George WA
May 27 - Nob Hill Masonic Center, San Francisco CA
May 30 - Orpheum Theater, Los Angeles CA
One of the coolest and most diverse hip-hop package tours is ready for you to lace up your Adidas and bounce on over: Rock the Bells 2008 (which last year featured a reunion of Rage Against the Machine) will showcase the music of A Tribe Called Quest, Nas, Mos Def, De La Soul, Rakim and a reunited Pharcyde. Other acts on the bill include Method Man and Redman, Raekwon, Immortal Technique, Dead Prez, Spank Rock, Jay Electronica, Murs and more. Supernatural, B-Real (Cypress Hill) and Scratch will serve as MCs on the main stage. There are only a few female artists on the bill, but they’re all earning attention for their work and are pushing boundaries of hip-hop: Santogold, DJ Amanda Blank, and, freshly signed to Downtown Records, Kid Sister.
Kids, tell your parents that this hip-hop tour should be fun and only fun. Murs was quoted on rollingstone.com as saying, “Some people don’t want to give hip-hop tours a chance, thinking it’s a violent art form. But Guerilla Union found a way to make a real nice, peaceful, hip hop festival that is like Heaven on Earth.”
Check out these angels in America (and one Canadian date) later on this summer. For tickets and other info, visit guerillaunion.com
July 19 - Chicago, IL @ First Midwest Bank Amphitheatre
July 20 - Toronto, ON, Canada @ Molson Amphitheatre
July 26 - Boston, MA @ Tweeter Center
July 27 - New York, NY @ Jones Beach Amphitheatre
Aug 2 - Miami, FL @ Cruzan Amphitheatre
Aug 3 - Philadelphia, PA @ Susquehanna Bank Center
Aug 9 - Denver, CO @ Coors Amphitheatre
Aug 16 - San Francisco, CA @ Shoreline Amphitheatre
Aug 23 - Los Angeles, CA @ Glen Helen Amphitheatre
Aug 30 - Vancouver, BC, Canada @ Venue TBD
