Hiatus and News

I haven’t been posting on here recently. I know, I have neglected you again, my dear blog. I have good reasons though…I think. School wrapped up and I am in the process of trying to get a teacher fired (sweet, huh) and I am in the process of training a couple people at work to help gear them into taking my job next summer when I finally break away for a while to wander into the non-profit sector. Musical things however, both writing about and performing, will be back in action soon. For now, you can read occasional live reviews by me via Up on the Sun; my most recent review of the 12/14 Shaky Hands/ Rural Alberta show and whatever else it is I have done lately. Some of my favorite ones from November include a live review of Atlas Sound (see: drama-train at the show!) and a live review of the awesome duo Fuck Buttons.

I have gotten a couple of e-mails this month from nice folks asking me to follow up on some Stellaluna news. As I mentioned on our myspace last month, we have finished recording and mixing our new record “Stellaluna and the Mango Tree,” which will be mastered sometime in January by Carl Saff in Chicago, IL., hopefully in time for a mid-February release. Show-wise, we just played out last show of the year at the Lost Leaf in Phoenix, AZ in support of our great friend Abe (Treasure Mammal)’s 7″ Release show. It was an amazing night! Andrew Jackson Jihad and Colorstore also played and it was a great way to round out the year. Stellaluna played 50 shows in 2009!

Stellaluna at Modified Arts with Kurt Vile by Manny Mares

Next up for Stellaluna:

JAN. 5th @ the Tribe- Phoenix,AZ w/ STEPHEN STEINBRINK, WISDOM TOOTH, and LIONEL O

JAN. 24TH @ the Trunk Space- Phoenix, AZ w/ THE PADDLE BOAT and more TBA

Oh, and for anyone who cares, we’ll be moving Apocalypse Nerd and everything else of mine to Los Angeles, CA on June 1, 2010…a lot of people already knew that, but for those of you who didn’t, now you do.

 

Q&A:Dave Longstreth of Dirty Projectors

A couple of weeks ago I got a chance to talk to Dave Longstreth of the Dirty Projectors. Here is an interview that I did for the Phoenix New Times blog. There should also be a little feature in this week’s issue out on Thursday.

Strongly recommended: Catching them at the Rhythm Room on Wednesday, October 28 with Golden Boots.

 

Moving backwards: Interview w/ Jeffrey Lewis

A couple of weeks ago I had the chance to talk to my pal Jeffrey Lewis of the Jeffrey Lewis band. They are currently on tour with Dr. Dog and played at Club Congress in Tucson. This was originally posted on the Phoenix New Times blog and I have cross-posted it here for anyone interested in reading it.

Q&A: PLAYING CATCH-UP WITH JEFFREY LEWIS

It takes a brave person to release an album of covers. Sure, Rod Stewart’s “Great American Songbook” had some sweet old school jams, not to mention the nostalgic tracks off of the infamous Pop Goes Punk compilations, and the growing number of indie artists covering hip-hop and Top 40 in their attempt to be ironic and/or relevant. However, in 2007 singer-songwriter Jeffrey Lewis raised the bar with his album “12 Crass Songs,” a beautifully arranged homage to one of his favorite bands.

A native New Yorker, Lewis has been continuously leaving his mark in the indie world for the past decade with his involvement in the anti-folk community; being closely associated with bands like the Moldy Peaches, as well as with his ever-so-clever comic books and “low budget films.” Most recently, Lewis has released a new album on Rough Trade Records entitled “Em Are I,” and has been touring relentlessly the past couple of years with the likes of the Mountain Goats, Stephen Malkmus, and Akron/Family. I caught up with Jeffrey this past week about shows, comics, our new President, and the Watchmen, as he and his band the Junkyard get geared up for their current tour with psych-pop sweethearts Dr. Dog.

AN: Every time I see you it seems as though your band name is in constant flux. I have seen you as the Jackals, the Jicks, and most recently as the Junkyard. Where did this tradition come from and why do you do it?

JL: Mostly the band name changes are because I started out essentially as a solo performer but as it’s evolved into more of a band project, it’s made more sense to differentiate it from my solo work to call it “Jeffrey Lewis and the…” something. But I’ve never felt like any one particular band name was really a perfect one, so we just come up with new ones all the time for fun. The band lineup itself if pretty fluid too, sometimes it’s a duo with myself and somebody else, sometimes I’m with two musicians, or three or four or more, so since I’m the only constant and the rest isn’t, it make sense for the name to reflect that.

AN: One of the band I was in was fortunate enough to play with you guys last fall in Phoenix and I remember you mentioning to me that you were going to be opening up for the Presidents of the United States of America. I looked at your calendar and it looks like you’ve been on tour for most of the time since then. How long have you been on the road this year?

JL: This year I’ve done a solo tour of Australia opening up for Darren Hanlon’s band. I’ve done a headlining tour of the UK and Europe with Jack, Dave, and Fletcher as my band and I have done shows in the US and Canada opening up for Au Revoir Simone…Now we’re about to start our US tour dates opening for Dr. Dog and I’ll have Jack and Dave in the band. We’ve toured with them a couple of times in the past and they’re a very inspiring live rock band, it’ll be really great to see them play every night.

AN: The touring life can be tough. Sometimes you end up in cities that have never heard of you before, and then you’ll have a really amazing night somewhere close by. What is your advice for the young band or musician? What are some of your best/worst memories from being on the road?

JL: There’s too many touring stories to get into at the moment (though you can see a comic book I did about touring and a DVD documentary about one of our tours, both included in the recently released book “The Art of Touring)! My advice for anyone starting out is that it IS possible to do, and you can do it with very little money. Keep your expenses low and your operation simple…great music shouldn’t need a bunch of extra stuff anyway. Nowadays we’re [JLB] making more money than when we started, but I was never not making any money with it. I always had great things to sell for cheap, great songs to share with people, and no problem about sleeping on floors or on Greyhound buses or in cars with strangers.

 

Former Ghosts at Trunk Space- Live Review

Did a blog review of the Former Ghosts show at the Trunk Space on First Friday. Great show, sucks you probably missed it. In any case,  you can find out about it here:

Phoenix New Times: Up on the Sun Blog

ALSO: Electric Mustache takes far superior photos so you should check him out too.

 

Moving backwards- Titus Andronicus Live Review

DiscoballQueen (Janna) and Michael P. asked me to link them to my Titus Andronicus review from last week, which I guess they couldn’t find because it was posted by the music editor, Martin and credited to me within the body of the post. It is google-able, but Janna is totally lame and still couldn’t find it. I just think she’s lazy. Sorry, pal.

CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE PHOENIX NEW TIMES BLOG.

P.S- Whoever Warren Beaty is on the comments…you’re a funny one.

 

Stellaluna Update: The Beets, Kurt Vile, Lake, Karl Blau, the Finches.

Stellaluna has been changing a little bit these days. We have been playing more as a full band (and often switch to being electric) with Chase and Ryan on drums and bass respectively. We have been participating in tons of extra curricular activities, too. For one thing, Chase and I are back at school–everyone works, and so that is why we haven’t booked a tour for this Fall. Be sure to check out Chase’s other bands: Soft Shoulder, My Feral Kin, and sometimes as part of Stephen Steinbrink (French Quarter). Ryan’s also fronts Cardiac Party and has a freaking awesome new project called Timatimfitfit. Chase has an awesome zine called Lorum Ipsom’s Water Science, which you can buy off of his blog. I just started an amateur food blog for practice and fun called Make Spoons. I’m also releasing a sound-collage// found sound// all-out noise fit as my alter-ego Catholic Guilt. It will be a limited CD-r split with Flagstaff’s Killian Lord and should be out by November or so.

For those of you who have e-mailed me and the Tiny Panda e-mail address, I am sorry that most of our stuff if Out of Print and/or temporarily unavailable. You can still buy a copy of “My Heart is an Anchor” from www.folktalerecords.com and you might be able to find a copy of our earliest recordings (EEP! EP) at Stinkweeds or Revolver Records in Phoenix. Amoeba has told me that we’ve sold out of everything we sent over to them, so if you are in SoCal and want to try and find something that is Out of Print, I suggest you look to the Folktale Distro– they may be able to find something for you. Thanks a lot to those who have been writing to me both on e-mail and myspace. I know that I haven’t been able to meet some of you, but knowing that someone listens to our band (who isn’t friends with us!) is kind of amazing. To the people who followed through with my dare to send me your mailing address but haven’t gotten anything from me, feel free to shoot it over to me again. More than likely, I didn’t keep good track of it on myspace as I sent out 43 letters this year.

NEWS:

We’re cutting down on the amount of shows we play this season because of schedules, travel, school, and recording! We will be in the studio with jalipaz from audioconfusion in a few weeks. With that said, here are our next shows.

SEPTEMBER 14TH @ THE MANOR (Tempe, AZ) w/ THE BEETS (NY)

OCTOBER 27TH @ MODIFIED(Phoenix, AZ) w/ KURT VILE AND THE VIOLATORS (contact us for cheaper pre-sale tickets!)

NOVEMBER 17TH @ THE SMELL (Los Angeles, CA) w/ LAKE, KARL BLAU, THE FINCHES, DEVON WILLIAMS, AND RED PONY CLOCK.

 

Zeitoun: Read this book now, please.

With only a hundred some-odd pages to go, I’m a little anxious to tell everyone I know to read this book. Zeitoun is Dave Eggers’ latest non-fiction effort chronicling the lives of a Syrian-American family’s experience before, during, and after Hurricane Katrina. It is basically one of the best new books you will be reading this year. Released just last month, Zeitoun is a beautifully (yet still simply) told story that will touch your heart and open your eyes to the kind of every-day discrimination Muslim-Americans often have to face. Eggers’ prose is near-effortless and you will find yourself plowing through this read within only a few days. Read this book now, please.

 

I have been neglecting you again.

I know, I know I have been so behind on this thing. So behind, that I haven’t been able to tell you about how I was surprised at how accessible the new Dirty Projectors was (but still one of the most amazing records of the year). I also haven’t been able to tell you that after careful consideration, I have decided that I actually love the new Akron/Family record sans the first track which is just too jammy for my personal taste. I’ve also been too busy to tell you about how the new Bowerbirds is beautiful,but kind of a disappointment. I think my expectations were set a little too high and instead of submitting to the hype behind it, I have chosen to put it at the near bottom of the top 10 records of the year so far (still very much worth a listen though).  I’ll try and get caught up with some of this stuff soon…

Also, I am going on tour again! This time it is with none other than David J aka: Novi Split. He and I are going to be doing a week-long jaunt in the southwest starting in Los Angeles on July 26th at WOMEN (on Crenshaw and Washington) and then all over Arizona.

Tour dates are as follows:

<b>STELLALUNA/ NOVI SPLIT TOUR 2009 </b>

July 26 – Los Angeles // WOMEN (address)  w/ Big Whup, Voice on Tape, and more

July 27 – Phoenix // TRUNK SPACE w/ The Hum Us, Hello the Mind Control, and…

July 28 – Prescott// THE CATALYST INFOSHOP w/ Killian Lord

July 31 – Glendale // COPPERSTATE TAVERN (21+)  w/ The Hunger Artists

August 1- Tucson // DRY RIVER w/ Logan Greene and the Bricks, Great Job, Ralphene

July 26 – Los Angeles // WOMEN  w/ Big Whup, Voice on Tape, S. Pineda, and more.

July 27 – Phoenix // TRUNK SPACE w/ The Hum Us, Hello the Mind Control, and…

July 28 – Prescott// THE CATALYST INFOSHOP w/ Killian Lord

July 31 – Glendale // COPPERSTATE TAVERN (21+)  w/ The Hunger Artists

August 1- Tucson // DRY RIVER w/ Logan Greene and the Bricks, Great Job, Ralphene

You can find out more details here: Stellaluna Myspace

 

New Sounds: Grizzly Bear

I first heard the brand spankin’ new Grizzly Bear album “Vekatimest” about a month ago and am only now conjuring up my musical cauldron of trouble. As a whole, the Brooklyn-based quartet are all marvelous players who know how to write gorgeous pieces of music manipulating time signatures and harmonies almost like a second-nature. However, I do admit, that at first listen, my impression was “Yeah that sounds like a Grizzly Bear record.” Now here we are, one month later though, I am sitting in a semi-crowded coffee shop in downtown Phoenix trying to give the ole’ GB another go. This time the results are way tastier, as I have come to realize that the lukewarm stew that I had thought this album to be is actually a rather rich and flavorful jambalaya; full of secret spices that hit you when you least suspect it.

“Vekatimest” is like taking a culinary tour around the world in under 80 minutes. Featuring beautifully arranged vocal harmonies heavily influenced by Anglican traditional music as well as 60s doo-wop and good ole’ pirate shanties, this album is very pleasing to the ear. Intertwined with delicate details and a very prominent rhythmic presence (very well-produced drums, might I add), “Vekatimest” offers the listener the chance to hear a more accessible Grizzly Bear with a stronger sense of pop sensibility and composition. While there are just some songs off of their debut album “Yellow House” that just tug at my heart strings, this new effort shows us a more mature writing style for both Daniel Rossen and Ed Droste. Definitely on my top 10 for 2009.

Post script: Yeah I think it’s cool that Stinkweeds hosted a “listening party” at Lost Leaf for this last week. But…a) No one could hear the record because it was being played on horrible speakers at a nearly inaudible volume b) it seemed to have not been well-promoted as most people didn’t know what was going on there that night c) it was confused/jumbled together with the Lost Leaf 2 Year Anniversary so people got there when the anniversary started and missed the listening party d) who goes to a listening party when the sun is still out on a Tuesday evening? Party Foul for sure.

 

Great Northern// The Dears 5/21/09

So last week I had to cover the Dears at the Rythym Room. It was a rainy and humid Phoenix night and I was half-awake on our way there. Another Dangerbird band called Eulogies (from L.A, methinks) was supposed to be on the bill as well, but didn’t end up playing. Anyway, Great Northern opened and was really the only band that I actually felt like seeing. The first time I saw Great Northern was in 2005 at Filter’s staff Christmas party– I think that was the same time we launched a release party for some Brazillian Soccer documentary…but things like this are a blur to me these days. I remember them being very exciting and I also remember Alan Miller (Filter’s publisher) gushing about a bright future ahead.Needless to say, their set was solid, albeit too cold/impersonal at times, yet still charming.  It was definitely nice to see how they have developed over the years.

The Dears headlined the show and to be honest, I didn’t much care for them. Although their massive 5+ piece band were all very competent players in their own right, I feel as though their music has become the generic indie adult contemporary that I am just not that into. Vocally, Dears frontman Murray Lightburn was flawless; offering the audience a taste of incredible vocal control and range–however, it was not quite enough to satisfy my huger for something different and dynamic. Musically, the Dears sounded like a mish-mosh of cool keyboard sounds and ordinary (not orchestral like most people would argue) pop music. I mean, they had three guitars and I heard no real textures or fleurishes that made this band stand out–definitely not a good example of the so-called Canadian indie rennaissance.