London’s Visions festival has announced its first wave of artists for 2018.
HMLTD, IDLES, Chastity Belt, Nilüfer Yanya, Sampa The Great, Laura Misch, Blue Hawaii, Carla Dal Forno, Duds, Sports Team, Girlhood, Black Midi and Honey Harper are the first names announced who will perform at the one-day event on August 4th at various venues across east London. Further activities include a Dog Show, Record and Zine Fair, Street Food & Craft Beer Market, and Punk Rock Karaoke.
As we get ready for another host of rarities and re-releases set to be on their way for Record Store Day 2018, which comes on April 21st, we’ve just got news of three releases they’re all David Bowie and they’re all limited edition.
The first is a 3 x 12″ set Welcome to the Blackout (Live in London 1978) and it holds a whole host of secrets. The previously unreleased set offers fans a chance to listen back on history as we dive in to Bowie’s Isolla II tour and re-visit his dates at London’s Earls Court from’1978.
Welcome to the Blackout, a triple live album taken from Bowie’s Isolar II World Tour in 1978, to promote Low and “Heroes”. The singer ended the second, European leg of the tour with a trio of sold-out gigs at Earls Court in London from June into July, and while RCA’s mobile truck was on hand to record the dates, it was ultimately the live compilation Stage that became the first representation of the tour for mass audiences. Bowie and David Richards did, however, mix the tapes into a potential project in Montreux, Switzerland in the winter of 1979; that arrangement from the June 30th and July 1st shows is Welcome to the Blackout.
The performance features Bowie’s expanded band, with core members Carlos Alomar (rhythm guitar, George Murray (bass) and Dennis Davis (drums) joined by heavy-hitters including Adrian Belew on guitar, Hawkwind’s Simon House on electric violin, Utopia’s Roger Powell on keyboards and Sean Mayes on piano and string ensemble. (This band would follow Bowie to Montreux for the recording of Lodger in 1979.) None of this material has ever appeared on a Bowie-sanctioned release, although “Sound and Vision” (making its live debut) ended up on the unofficial 1995 collection RarestOneBowie.
The next is a 12″ single which features the full first recording of ‘Let’s Dance’ as well as a live version of the song. The final release is Bowie Now a previously only promotional album, only for the US, which is getting it’s first commercial release. It will feature tracks from both Low and Heroes .
The Bowie camp celebrated David’s birthday in 2018 with the digital unveiling of his original demo to the smash hit “Let’s Dance.” A longer version of that demo, as newly mixed by original producer Nile Rodgers, will make its physical debut for RSD on a new 12″ single. It’ll be paired with a rare live version of the same song, mixed by Bob Clearmountain and featured on the Serious Moonlight concert film.
finally, for rarity seekers and fans of Bowie’s Berlin trilogy, the 1978 promo album Bowie Now gets its first commercial reissue. This disc features album tracks from Low and “Heroes,” all sourced from Tony Visconti’s remasters of the albums as featured in last year’s box set A New Career In a New Town. The package is expanded to feature a new inner sleeve with a rarely seen image of the singer in Berlin in 1977.
The Releases
Welcome To The Blackout (Live London ’78) – 3 x LP unreleased live set
~ Let’s Dance (Full-length) – 12” single featuring full length version of the demo and live version
~ Bowie Now – White vinyl LP issue of US promo only compilation with new interior artwork –
In a unprecedented dive into the world of one of rock’s greatest icons, is making its final bow this year, opening this Friday (March 2nd) at the Brooklyn Museum in New York and running there through too July 15th. A trio of exclusive vinyl titles, will be made available at the exhibition’s shop, announced today, offering color variants of two rare releases and a live mini-album with several unreleased tracks.
First up is a reissue of “Time,” the third single from Bowie’s 1973 masterwork Aladdin Sane. Pressed on translucent silver vinyl, this replica of the U.S. single features an edit of the A-side, the album re-recording of 1970 single “The Prettiest Star” on the flip side, and a reproduction of the original, undistributed picture sleeve, featuring the iconic Aladdin Sane artwork.
The only release with unheard content is the Live In Berlin mini-album, pressed on translucent orange vinyl. Recorded at Berlin’s Deutschlandhalle on the Isolar II Tour in 1978, half of this excerpt from the set has been heard: three tracks appeared on a (since-deleted) streaming EP to promote the release of last year’s A New Career In a New Town box set, and one was the B-side to “Beauty and the Beast,” part of the Bowie camp’s ongoing 40th anniversary picture disc releases.
Finally, 2003’s iSelectBowie compilation – a frequent companion piece to David Bowie Is – makes yet another appearance at the exhibition, pressed once again on red vinyl. Created as a gift for The Mail On Sunday readers and released separately from the newspaper later in 2003, this alternate route through Bowie’s first two decades focuses primarily on album tracks, with a pair of exclusive cuts: a remix of 1987’s “Time Will Crawl” featuring re-recorded elements, and the opening to Bowie’s famed 1972 performance in Santa Monica, California – which wouldn’t be released officially until five years later. (Another special rarity: “Some Are,” a Low outtake available only on the 1991 CD reissue of the album.) As with previous issues (and the original newspaper itself), this pressing includes Bowie’s insightful song-by-song comments.
Featuring close to 400 pieces from Bowie’s own archive, including costumes, handwritten lyrics, original album art, photographs, videos and even paintings, David Bowie Is marks a stunning tribute to a legendary musician. The full rundown of each title to be sold at the exhibition is below.
Time (Single Edit) b/w The Prettiest Star (originally released as RCA Victor APBO-0001, 1973)
Live In Berlin (Parlophone, 2018)
Recorded live at Deutschlandhalle, Berlin – 5/16/1978
Tracks 2 and 4-5 released on Live In Berlin streaming EP – Parlophone, 2017
Track 3 released on “Beauty and the Beast” picture single – Parlophone DBBATB 40, 2018
All other tracks previously unreleased
iSelectBowie (originally released as EMI 50999 236640 2 9, 2003)
Tracks 1 and 3 from Hunky Dory (RCA Victor LSP-4623, 1971)
Track 2 from Diamond Dogs (RCA Victor APL1-0576, 1974)
Track 4 from Aladdin Sane (RCA Victor LSP-4852, 1973)
Track 5 from Young Americans (RCA Victor APL1-0998, 1975)
Track 6 from Low reissue (EMI CDEMD 1027 (U.K.)/Rykodisc RCD 10142 (U.S.), 1991)
Track 7 from Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) (RCA BOW LP 2 (U.K.)/AQL1-3647 (U.S.), 1980)
Tracks 8-9 from Lodger (RCA Victor BOW LP 1 (U.K.)/AQL1-3254 (U.S.), 1979)
Track 10 from Tonight (EMI America DB 1 (U.K.)/SJ-17138 (U.S.), 1984)
Original version of Track 11 from Never Let Me Down (EMI America AMLS-3117 (U.K.)/PJ-17267 (U.S.), 1987). Later released on Nothing Has Changed (Parlophone DB 64143 (U.K.)/Columbia/Legacy 88875 03098-2 (U.S.), 2013)
Track 12 from Live Santa Monica ’72 (EMI 50999 237663 2 7, 2008)
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Posted: March 1, 2018 in FESTIVALS, MUSIC
Tags: Chelmsford, Rize Festival
San Francisco’s The Love-Birds have been tearing up their local scene, breaking hearts and making fans across the city’s disappearing DIY spaces and proper venues alike since 2016. After releasing a 7-inch EP in early 2017 via local label Empty Cellar Records, they’re ready to unveil In The Lover’s Corner, their debut album & first release on their new home, Trouble In Mind Records.
The album eases into view with the first track, “Again”; it’s gentle acoustic strum augmented by guitarist Eli Wald’s chiming electric twelve-string. From there the listener is treated to dynamic, life-affirming power-pop; bell-ringing, fuzz stompers (”River Jordan”), warm, carefully crafted fragile pop (”Clear The Air”, “Failure and Disgrace”), and urgent, crystalline rockers (”Hit My Head”, “Weak Riff”). The Love-Birds approach their craft with a classicist’s ear; with nods to their Seventies originators as well as Nineties torch-bearers, composing near-perfect future classics that ooze with subtle, interesting melodic twists and hummable, finger-pricking hooks that are instantly memorable. Aside from mastering by Norman Blake (Teenage Fanclub), In The Lover’s Corner is a decidedly local affair, with album art by Shayde Sartin (Fresh & Onlys, Sonny and the Sunsets) and recorded in two sessions, one with engineer Glenn Donaldson (Art Museums, Skygreen Leopards) and another with Kelley Stoltz.
releases May 25, 2018
The Love-Birds are:
Charlie Ertola: Bass
Eli Groshelle: Drums & Percussion
Thomas Rubenstein: Vocals & Guitar
Eli Wald: Vocals & 6 / 12-string Guitars
Greta Van Fleet is an American rock band formed in 2012. The band members are Josh Kiszka, Jake Kiszka, Sam Kiszka, and Danny Wagner. They were signed to Lava Records in March 2017 and in April the band released their debut studio Black Smoke Rising EP. The debut single, “Highway Tune”, topped the American harts last year.
A second EP From the Fires, containing the four songs from Black Smoke Rising and four new songs, was released on November 10th, 2017, alongside a second single, “Safari Song”. The band’s heavy rock sound is strongly influenced by the work of Led Zeppelin, with lead vocalist Josh Kiszka having a voice that has been compared to Robert Plant’s .
Their debut EP titled Black Smoke Rising was released April 2017. It’s is planned to be the first of three EP’s that will make an album when all released. They started touring in May 2017 to promote the EP with the UK band The Struts. In addition to the four tracks from Black Smoke Rising, A new double EP From the Fires features the new recordings “Edge of Darkness” and “Talk on the Street”, as well as covers of Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come” and Fairport Convention’s “Meet on the Ledge”. The four new tracks were recorded in September 2017 at Rust Belt Studios in Detroit . The second single, “Safari Song”, was also released.
The Band
When vocalist Steve Marriott left to form Humble Pie, his three Small Faces bandmates regrouped with Jeff Beck Group axeman Ron Wood and singer Rod Stewart. With the name shortened to Faces, the U.K. quintet made an auspicious debut in 1970 with the album release “FIRST STEP”, a title that made sly reference to the beginner’s guide to guitar that Wood holds in the cover photo.
First Step was the first album by the then British group re named Faces, released in early 1970. The album was released only a few months after the Faces had formed from the ashes of the Small Faces (from which Ronnie Lane, Kenney Jones and Ian McLagan hailed) and The Jeff Beck Group (from which Rod Stewart and Ronnie Wood hailed.) The album is credited to the Small Faces on the cover , The album cover shows Ronnie Wood holding a copy of Geoffrey Sisley’s seminal guitar tutorial First Step: How to Play the Guitar Plectrum Style.
But there was nothing inexperienced about any of these musicians, and their chemistry and superb performances are evident on each of the 10 tracks. After an ace cover of Dylan’s “Wicked Messenger” the material is all original, with songwriting duties spread fairly evenly among the members; with a pair of instrumentals and such fine tracks as “Around the Plynth” Other highlights include Ronnie Lane’s folksy “Stone”, the hard-rocking “Shake, Shudder, Shiver”, “Three Button Hand Me Down” (on which both Lane and Wood play the bassline, affording the track a unique sonic quality in the Faces catalogue), and the soulful “Flying”.
it’s a consistently enjoyable collection. Faces were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2012, and the journey that brought them there begins with FIRST STEP.
In August 2015, the album was reissued in a remastered and expanded form, including two previously-unreleased bonus tracks recorded shortly after the album’s release, “Behind the Sun” and “Mona the Blues” (although the latter was remade by Lane and Wood in 1972 for their Mahoney’s Last Stand film soundtrack).
ROAR, are the self-described “art-pop” project of Phoenix-based artist Owen Evans, He is one of a handful of bands from Phoenix that are quickly making it into one of the best music scenes in the country. Jeff Rosenstock credits folk-punk stalwarts AJJ with helping to quietly build a burgeoning punk scene in Arizona’s largest city. “There’s just a real cool crew, it seems like they’re all buddies with AJJ and I found out about them through those guys…they really paid it down to other bands in their world and tried hard to turn that into cool shit for Phoenix,” Rosenstock says. “ROAR is the band I’ve most tried to get people to listen to.” (Another of those Phoenix acts Rosenstock also loves: the now L.A.-based Diners.)
This is a Dense, detailed, and inspiring listen. A total thing of beauty. There have been very few days this year that I haven’t listened to “Hope” at least once.
This album is eclectic and beautiful, quickly became one of my favorites of the last year.
Brooklyn-based musician Elise Okusami has been making music since an early age, cycling through a series of bands throughout the years. In 2016, she started putting songs out as Oceanator, and the following year released the project’s debut EP. On the side, she also drums for bands that include the Adventures Of The Silver Spaceman and Vagabon (she plays on the latter’s Infinite Worlds album. In April, Okusami is releasing the second Oceanator EP, which is called Lows, an accurate title for the roller coaster of emotions that it exhibits.
Lead single “Mistakes” is red-hot in its intensity — each instrument sounds like it’s projected from underneath a layer of volcanic ash.
Oceanator “Lows” out April 13, 2018 on Tiny Engines
Elise Okusami, who has played drums in Vagabon and the Adventures of the Silver Spaceman, also makes shimmering indie rock as Oceanator. Okusami layers her lovesickness and loneliness over an unexpected backdrop of bubbly 1980s synthpop and crisp percussion. – Pitchfork
This coupling of introspective reflection and boisterous intensity quickly establishes itself as the Oceanator trademark. – Various Small Flames
The great curls that sprout from the top of Okusami’s head are merely metaphors for all the musical seeds this talent has planted over the years. – Tom Tom Mag
Oceanator proves to be a project with a surprising amount of range, depth, understanding, and versatility. – Heartbreaking Bravery
Shame thrives on confrontation. Whether it be the seething intensity crackling throughout their debut LP “Songs of Praise” or the adrenaline-pumping chaos that unfolds at Shame’s live shows, “Of the 70 bands I saw at this year’s festivals the band Shame seemed to mean what they played more than any other.”
Comprised of vocalist Charlie Steen, guitarists Sean Coyle-Smith and Eddie Green, bassist John Finerty, and drummer Charlie Forbes, the London-based five-piece began as school boys. From the outset, Shame built the band up from a foundation of DIY ethos while citing The Fall and Wire among its biggest musical influences.
Utilizing both the grit and sincerity of that musical background, Shame carved out a niche in the South London music scene and then barreled fearlessly into the angular, thrashing post-punk that would go on to make up Songs of Praise, their Dead Ocean Records debut. Think tightly wound, jittery guitars, mile-a-minute hi-hat and an exquisite bleakness from “Gold Hole,” a tongue-in-cheek takedown of rock narcissism, to lead single “Concrete” a song about an unhappy relationship that will have you beating on your steering wheel, It embodies this sound perfectly and already gives us hope for the best of 2018. The song detailing the overwhelming moment of realizing a relationship is doomed, to the frustrated “Tasteless” taking aim at the monotony of people droning through their day-to-day, Songs of Praise never pauses to catch its breath.
Songs of Praise, the debut record from South London post punk titans Shame, couldn’t have received a better response on its release in January. Lauded for their political, sometimes aggressive and always lively punk-blues, Shame are riding high on their success, but trying to keep level headed. “We try to walk the tightrope between praising ourselves and degrading ourselves, because we don’t want to lean too far either side. We’re just enjoying the flame while it flickers!” says singer and lyricist Charlie Steen.
Steen is full of ideas, quick to laugh and with an anecdote fit for every occasion. So it’s unsurprising that he’s a lyricist, eager to put a story to everything and with the sharp wit required to make every story enticing. For Steen, the key to a good song is a gripping narrative, Bob Dylan and Squeeze rank highly on his list of music’s best storytellers and are among many of the musicians he first heard via his parents’ record collection.
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