Holy crap you guys, my friend Tyson just notified me that according to their website, Bloc Party has announced that their third album’s release date is on October 28, but it will be available digitally Thursday.  As in this Thursday, August 21.  Titled Intimacy, you can preorder it here, be able to download it Thursday, have the disc mailed to you on October 28.  This is no single track being released a la Mercury or Flux.  This is a whole album.  I am dumbfounded.  Partly because when Ben and I met Kele in O’Hare two weeks ago today, he said they were finishing their tour, then returning to the studio to finish the album for next year. 

So, are they going to add tracks between Thursday and October 28?  Add polish?  OMGWTFBBQ.

*UPDATE: NME.com’s story says that the disc coming in October will have additional tracks unavailable for download.

*UPDATE 2: Here is the track list:

01 Ares
02 Mercury
03 Halo
04 Biko
05 Trojan Horse
06 Signs
07 One Month Off
08 Zephyrus
09 Better Than Heaven
10 Ion Square

Boy, this sure is a bombshell that BVaz informed me of last night:  On August 1, Los Campesinos! announced that they are set to release their second album…and second album of this year on October 13, 2008.  Titled We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed, their website news states that the album will be a 10 track affair.  Strangely enough, we haven’t reviewed Hold On Now, Youngster… on this here site, but it’s an excellent record.  I think BVaz likes it a little more than me, but we both agree that it is really good.  Anyways, here is the new track listing:

1. Ways To Make It Through The Wall
2. Miserabilia
3. We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed
4. Between An Erupting Earth And An Exploding Sky
5. You’ll Need Those Fingers For Crossing
6. It’s Never That Easy Though, Is It? (Song For The Other Kurt)
7. The End Of The Asterisk
8. Documented Minor Emotional Breakdown # 1
9. Heart Swells/Pacific Daylight Time
10. All Your Kayfabe Friends

I’m pumped about this one, folks!

I know I’m a little behind on this, but I got to check Yeasayer out for the first time at Lollapalooza last weekend (full writeup from BVaz and I forthcoming, oh yes).  I really loved both the sets they played and although it seems the bass player has made a clear effort to make himself appear as gross as possible (pictured above*), I still found it slightly hilarious.  Anywho, here are the newly announced tourdates (beyond their Myspace page dates); if you can catch them, do it.  (The only date in the US between today and 10/22 is at ACL.)

10/22/2008 Paradise, Boston
10/24/2008 Le National, Montreal
10/25/2008 LH Tavern, Toronto
10/26/2008 The Blind Pig, Ann Arbor
10/28/2008 Bottom Lounge, Chicago
10/29/2008 Turner Hall, Milwaukee
10/30/2008 Triple Rock, Minneapolis
10/31/2008 Gardner Lounge, Grinnell
11/19/2008 Richards, Vancouver
11/20/2008 Neumos, Seattle
11/21/2008 Aladdin Theater, Portland
11/22/2008 Bimbos, San Francisco
11/23/2008 Troubadour, Los Angeles
11/25/2008 The Loft, La Jolla
11/26/2008 Rhythm Room, Phoenix
11/28/2008 Sheridan House, Telluride
11/29/2008 Bluebird Theater, Denver
12/3/2008 Sixth & I Synagogue, DC
12/4/2008 1st Unitarian Church, Philly
12/5/2008 Music Hall, Brooklyn
12/6/2008 Music Hall, Brooklyn

*Photo Courtsey www.brooklynvegan.com

If you liked the Cool Kids’ excellently named EP Totally Flossed Out, then you’ll love The Bake Sale: seven of its eight songs appear on this 32-minute über EP (rest in peace, “Pump Up The Volume”.) However, the redundancy doesn’t diminish the radness: this is the hip-hop album of the summer.

The first five tracks jump out the speaker, starting with the most excellent “What Up Man”. Not only does this song add new context to my preferred email greeting, it also showcases all that is good with the Cool Kids: playful yet tight lyrics over a beat that’s concurrently retro and contemporary. It’s impossible to deny the positive vibes from a track with a call and response of:

“I left my kids at day care…”

“Pick ‘em up then!”

After the grooving “One Two” and “Mikey Rocks”, the Cool Kids channel golden age most overtly with they aptly-named “88″. Producer Chuck Inglish drops hits that sound like they originated from an 80s sampler, while he and Mikey borrow a Nas lyric for the chorus (and as evidenced by a certain Nets owner, that’s not a bad move.) The high-energy continues with “What It Is”; I still haven’t decided if this sounds more like a throwback to Big Daddy Kane or the Juice soundtrack. Either way, you can’t go wrong with rapid-fire hi-hats and give-and-take lyrics talking about how bad-ass you are.

If The Bake Sale maintained this momentum, it’d be an instant classic. Unfortunately, the album slows a bit with the next three tracks. Individually, “Black Mags”, “A Little Bit Cooler”, and “Gold and a Pager” are all good songs (especially “A Little Bit Cooler’s” Street Fighter reference, but when sequenced together, the beats blend together too much.

The final two tracks break the monotony with a dramatic (well, not Love Below dramatic, but unexpected nonetheless) right-turn. “Bassment Party” takes a deep bass line and Miami-style groove while Chuck and Mikey talk about planning their party. Yes, it’s direct, but it’s an approach that works well for these guys.

Album-closer “Jingling” works even better. The rattle of car keys in-between sparse beats nicely bookends the vocal samples of “What Up Man”, and the flow on this track reminds me of a benevolent version of the Clipse. Even on their boast tracks, though, the Cool Kids stay light-hearted; here, they suggest that the haters meet them for lunch to stop their frontin’.

The Bake Sale demonstrates the Cool Kids’ production and rapping skills while also hinting at the potential for more innovative yet timeless songs. This album is well worth the purchase for even casual rap fans.

DBF rating: 85

Um, yeah, so holy shit you guys.  Ben wasn’t lying when he gushed about the awesomeness of Wolf Parade when he saw them in Chicago.  Wolf Parade is incredible live.  I didn’t have my proper camera on me at this show (just the iPhone - above, which is taking increasingly out of focus photos, for some reason), so I’ll let Ben do a full review of this show when he gets his computer up and running again from the move, but I want to encourage any of you who are in cities that Wolf Parade is destined for on this tour to drop what you are doing and go buy a ticket.  Like right now.

Until he writes up the show in full, you could check out the Last.fm page of the event and the existing photos of the event (currently only my 3 iPhone photos.  Sniffle.), and read Ben’s review of their album, At Mount Zoomer.  Upcoming tourdates (as Wolf Parade, Sunset Rubdown tour to follow thereafter):

07-25 Austin, TX - La Zona Rosa
07-26 Baton Rouge, LA - Spanish Moon
07-28 Atlanta, GA - Variety Playhouse
07-29 Raleigh, NC - Disco Rodeo
07-30 Philadelphia, PA - Electric Factory
07-31 New York, NY - Terminal 5
08-02 Boston, MA - Paradise Rock Club
08-09 Toronto, Ontario - Koolhaus

French Canada is zee best Canada, indeed.

Quick bit of info my friend Mark notified me of, click on this link with your iTunes open, and you can download a Lightspeed Champion live show with 6 songs for only $1.99.  If you aren’t familiar with Dev’s newest project, this is a perfect introduction - not much cash for a few great songs.  The setlist is as follows:

Everyone I Know is Listening to Crunk
Galaxy of the Lost
Dry Lips
No Surprise
Tell Me What It’s Worth
Midnight Surprise

If you would like to check out the prodigious amount of love that Lightspeed Champion gets on this here site, click the band name in the tag cloud on the right.  You can find the album review, two show reviews, and other goodies. 

Well I am in the process of moving so I can’t do any proper website updates for a little while, but in the meantime, I started a twitter for the site here and I will update with stuff from Pitchfork today, and also from Lollapalooza in a couple weekends when that happens. I also have a lot of my photo blogging still going on here. Once I get stuff organized next week I should be able to get some photos from the preview night and Pitchfork up.

As for yesterday at Pitchfork, I wasn’t there the entire day thanks to the rain and threat of rain, so I was there for a while in the afternoon and missed the morning sets and some of the night sets. From what I saw !!! was the clear winner of the day, and they just got the crowd bouncing and partying on every song, and really brought a level of energy that no one else had. I was really impressed with them. Vampire Weekend was kind of meh, they were alright. They played the songs just fine, but their sound is almost by definition a lack of energy sound, so that doesn’t really translate well into a festival. Hold Steady was pretty good as they always are. They are just a great festival band. Anyway, excited about today (Dinosaur!!!!) and hopefully the weather will hold out and it won’t be quite as disgusting as it was yesterday.

Fantastic Playroom by New Young Pony Club is a dance party album.  Nothing more.  Seriously, there is nothing more to it.  This album will indeed get people moving and the music itself is catchy and energetic, but there is no real depth to the songs and the lyrics go from borderline silly to downright laughable.  There really isn’t much more necessary to get an accurate overview other than that, to be honest - this record is a one trick pony.  Catchy dance music, no depth, terrible lyrics.  Full review, tourdates and MP3 samples after the jump.  [...Continue reading "New Young Pony Club - Fantastic Playroom"]

Marcus and I went to the former the Gypsy Tea Room (now The Door) to see Maps & Atlases on Friday night, and it’s apparent that the owners of the Door have done NOTHING to improve that venue; it’s still the same terrible sounding, awful dump that it always was.  At any rate, Maps & Atlases was very sharp and highly entertaining, and you can check out all of my photos from their show here.  This was my first exposure to M&A, other than clips on YouTube, and these guys have an interesting, rather ecclectic/experimental sound, but it comes together in a nice way.  More about that after the jump.  [...Continue reading "Maps & Atlases - The Door - 7/11/08"]

Two brothers… One speaks no English, the other learned English from watching “The Wide World of Sports.” So you tell me… Which is better, speaking no English at all, or speaking Howard Cosell?

Hey, Hoops, you ever notice how people die in alphabetical order?

I know, two movies.  However comparing these two movies in plot, character, and principles involved, it is the same fucking movie.  Don’t get me wrong, I am a fan of both of these, however both being Savage Steve Holland projects in autuerism, his only two movies in a slew of television shows, it appears Steve made two savage movies and realized he peaked early.  I will refer to these films as such,

[...Continue reading "Cinematic Throwback Thursday: Better Off Dead & One Crazy Summer"]

The Smiths - The Smiths - Rough Trade - 1984

Well, somewhat inspired by this forum post, I thought I would try to cover some of the albums on the list here on the Throwback Thursday feature. First I thought I would hit up one of my favorite bands ever, and one that I feel that their influence is very poignant and prevalent in today’s indie music scene. Of course I refer to the great Smiths, one of the really great and I think still underappreciated bands of the 1980s.
[...Continue reading "Throwback Thursday: The Smiths - The Smiths"]

Wolf Parade is just one of those bands that is just really fucking in the zone right now, with a superb album that is my favorite of ‘08 so far, building buzz around said album, and a big ole tour to go out and blow some minds, and they showed their prowess once again last night at the House of Blues in downtown Chicago. They are one of those bands that I would put in the indie ‘elite’ as far as bands that pretty much bring solid gold with everything they do, and that certainly includes their live show. Although it was a strange evening at the HOB, they melted many a face and generally blew me away once again.
[...Continue reading "Wolf Parade - House of Blues Chicago - 7/8/08"]

First they had the countdown last night, which revealed another countdown of sorts to a BBC radio show this afternoon, and the big reveal finally is a new single ‘Mercury’. It is certainly a different sound for them, with a driving drum beat, brassy horns, and a lot more voice modification on Kele’s voice than usual. Anyway, go to their website to listen to the track or to see the video for the track. I don’t know if this in any way indicates something about LP3, since it doesn’t directly say something about that, but they have done singles in between albums before (”Flux”, “Two More Years”) so who really knows. The single above can be preordered which includes a “Pioneers” membership. Their fan club thing used to be called “Marshals” as far as I remember, but now it looks like “Marshals” is free and “Pioneers” costs money like the old one did (confusing). Anyway, peep it out at their page.

With the greatness of the Pitchfork Music Fest coming up next weekend, I thought I would throw some fuel on the hype fire for it with some of the bands that will be blowing our minds come time for the festival. I already covered some more Dinosaur Jr. last Thursday so let’s hit up some of the other acts.
[...Continue reading "Mix Tape Monday: Pitchfork Music Fest Preview"]

The Helio Sequence is a band that has had several indy releases, and Keep Your Eyes Ahead, released by Sub Pop Records is a nice surprise when I threw it on the iTunes for the first time not too long ago.  Overall, Keep Your Eyes Ahead is an enjoyable and even record, in that the high points aren’t the most awesome, but the low points aren’t the most terrible music I have heard this year, either.  I think the album suffers a little from the fact that the lead vocals aren’t exactly world-class, but they are passable.  On the right tracks, they sound great…on the wrong type of song, they are a little lacking.  Singing ability aside, the lyrics are all pretty good stuff, if a little depressing to the downright heartbreaking as Keep Your Eyes Ahead is a breakup record, no doubt about it.  Hit the jump for the full review. [...Continue reading "The Helio Sequence - Keep Your Eyes Ahead"]