The Fat Angel Sings

Iron & Wine has announced “Who Can See Forever“, a new live record that accompanies a documentary concert film of the same name, set to arrive November 17th on Sub Pop Records.

The live record was once considered a staple of an artist’s discography. A document capturing a moment in time or perhaps reinventing older material as it was being given new life or perhaps showcasing a band at the height of their prowess, it was a standard release in every band’s catalogue. Recently, the internet has made bootlegging almost non-existent as bands specialize in offering board-quality downloads that can be equally as important as a band’s official releases. The live experience has always been the going-to-church portion of our communal experience, and the live record should capture that spirit and energy. With those goals in mind, Iron & Wine offer their first official live record with the career-spanning set “Who Can See Forever”.

Captured by director Josh Sliffe at Haw River Ballroom in Saxapahaw, NC, the soundtrack features 19 songs from Sam Beam’s 20-plus-year career. “Who Can See Forever” includes reimagined versions of Iron & Wine songs, including “The Trapeze Swinger,” “Boy with a Coin” and “Naked as We Came.” Initially intended as a live concert film, the film “evolved into a visual portrait capturing Beam during a creative outburst,” one that lasted four years and resulted in multiple Grammy nominations. 

“Who Can See Forever” is produced by Sam Beam and was recorded by his longtime live sound engineer Jelle Kuiper, “Who Can See Forever” Soundtrack, out on Sub Pop Records 11/17/23.

“See That Girl 1979-2000”, the newly announced Kirsty MacColl box set.  Kirsty fans have been reasonably well served over the years, when it comes to reissues, since Salvo put out 2CD sets of most of her albums just over a decade ago and Demon Music released a 5CD set called “Days 1988-1991” back in 2018. There’s also been numerous compilations.

And yet, as is often the way, “See That Girl”, which is a new 8CD package, manages to offer a massive 47 previously unreleased tracks! This includes a whole album, called “Real”, recorded in 1983 that Polydor never released.

The set looks great and is packaged just like the Bobbie Gentry or Richard and Linda Thompson boxes of recent years, in a 10-inch slipcase with a hardcover book and discs in gatefold folio/wallets.

It’s hard to write or even think about Kirsty MacColl without feeling that pang because she died so young and in such tragic and shocking circumstances. But this set was created in cooperation with her estate and it looks like a wonderful summary of her all too short life in music.

Kirsty released five albums during her lifetime – “Desperate Character” (Polydor, 1981), “Kite” (Virgin, 1989), “Electric Landlady” (Virgin, 1991), “Titanic Days” (ZTT, 1993) and “Tropical Brainstorm” (V2, 2000). “See That Girl” brings together 161 tracks recorded between 1979 and 2000 and has been compiled in collaboration with Kirsty’s estate. 

Other highlights include nine tracks from Kirsty’s 1992 Glastonbury performance, a Jazz Cafe set from 1999 and live performances originally recorded for BBC radio and television.

The eighth and final CD in this set features a selection of collaborations with other artists, as either singer or songwriter, and illustrates how in-demand and versatile Kirsty’s extraordinary talents were.

“See That Girl 1979-2000” will be released on 27 October 2023 via UMR.

‘The Masterplan’ is an extraordinary collection of B-sides originally featured on singles from Oasis’ era-defining first three albums, ‘Definitely Maybe’ (1994), ‘(What’s The Story) Morning Glory?’ (1995), and ‘Be Here Now’ (1997). Far from being inferior to the singles they backed, many of the 14 tracks that feature on ‘The Masterplan’ have become as cherished as the band’s biggest singles from that seminal period. Such was the quality, particularly from the first two albums, it has become a firm fan favourite over the years, even though everyone bought the CD singles at the time!

All of the Oasis’ studio albums went to number one in the UK but “The Masterplan” fell short, peaking at No 2, despite selling almost 122,000 copies in its first week of release.

The album includes tracks ‘Acquiesce’, ‘Half The World Away’, ‘Talk Tonight’, Oasis’ iconic live cover of The Beatles’ ‘I Am The Walrus’ and the epic title track. Noel has often described ‘The Masterplan’ as one of the best songs he has ever written.

Formats include CD, Heavyweight Black LP and limited-edition Silver LP, to celebrate 25 years.

‘The Masterplan’ charted at No.2 in the UK Official Album Chart UK selling over 122,000 copies in its first week.  It went on to be certified triple platinum and has sold over three million copies worldwide.

For a half-century, Bruce Springsteen has galvanized millions beyond the state lines of his native New Jersey – but there’s something about home that makes his work really special. Fans can and will debate which of his many, many live concerts have been the best – there’s a fair argument to be made that the best took place far from the tri-state area – and since 2014, Springsteen himself has offered ways to fuel the debates, releasing decades of live releases from the Thrill Hill archive and beyond as hi-res CD and digital releases on Nugs.net.

In 2019, Legacy Recordings – minders of Springsteen’s Columbia Records catalogue – started bringing the work of the Nugs team to a wider audience with “The Live Series”, a run of streaming-only compilations highlighting Springsteen’s concert presence from those available shows. Since then, a baker’s dozen of digital albums have been made available, often built around different themes and motifs in Springsteen’s songwriting: love, hope, introspection, the characters he wrote about, the times he played acoustic numbers, two volumes of cover songs, and even a special release earlier this year dedicated to the “Darkness on the Edge of Town” tour in honour of the album’s 45th anniversary.

Their latest “Live Series” release – timed just right with Springsteen’s 74th birthday tomorrow (Saturday, September 23rd) may be their most obvious yet – but thanks to a keen execution, it might also be one of their greatest.

It doesn’t take a genius to guess what “The Live Series: Songs of New Jersey” is about. Bruce still calls the Garden State home, even after a brief relocation to the West Coast, and the ghosts and geography of his old neighbourhoods weave their way through his songbook effortlessly. But this set really drives the theme home in more ways than one. While most of “The Live Series” is in strict chronological order and a tight 15 tracks apiece, “Songs of New Jersey” beefs things up to 20 tracks, and keeps the action squarely to venues in New Jersey and New York, showcasing how these songs come alive in the shadow of the places that inspired them.

This one can be taken as a history of live music in the New Jersey area. “Songs of New Jersey” opens with a thunderous, arena-sized rendition of “Born to Run” recorded at the Brendan Byrne Arena in East Rutherford in 1981; it closes with a rendition of “Freehold,” a song written during the promotion of “The Ghost of Tom Joad” (1995) but never released on a studio album, at a show on the very same stage in 1999, when The E Street Band began a triumphant reunion. (The venue was, by then, renamed the Continental Airlines Arena; it’s now used for film and TV production.) In between, there are no less than 11 more cuts from shows in the Meadowlands complex – either at Brendan Byrne/Continental Airlines Arena or, just across Route 120, the former Giants Stadium, itself torn down in 2010 and replaced by MetLife Stadium. Springsteen wrote the title track to 2012’s “Wrecking Ball” about that change, and performs it at MetLife that same year, as heard on this compilation.

More rarities abound on “Songs of New Jersey”, as well. You’ll hear a 1978 take on “Born to Run” deep cut “Meeting Across the River,” recorded at the now-closed Capitol Theatre in Passaic; a full-band rendition of “Nebraska” single “Atlantic City” from Newark’s Prudential Center in 2016; a cover of bandmate Steven Van Zandt’s “I Don’t Want to Go Home” (made popular by fellow Jersey Shore rockers Southside Johnny & The Asbury Jukes) during a solo acoustic gig in 1996; and a stirring rendition of “New York City Serenade,” rarely-played closer to 1973’s “The Wild, The Innocent and The E Street Shuffle”, at – where else? – Madison Square Garden in 2009, featuring a full string section and part of a surprise performance of the album in full.

Another pleasant surprise is the presence of three songs from Springsteen’s oft-debated 1992-1993 world tour – the one where he took his “Other Band” (featuring only keyboardist Roy Bittan retained from the E Street Band) on tour in support of 1992’s “Human Touch” and “Lucky Town” releases. The latter album is represented (“Local Hero”), but so too are albums known for a proliferation of E Streeters (Born to Run’s “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out”) or absence of anyone else (“Open All Night,” from the skeletal acoustic “Nebraska”). These three will surely keep the debate about those years going strong.

The extra-long set reminds the listener of the ongoing vitality of The E Street Band, which has changed shape in recent years: seven tracks capture the band after the 2008 passing of keyboardist Danny Federici, while five feature Jake Clemons’ unenviable task of filling in for his late uncle Clarence on saxophone. (By that point, The E Street Band – which had already welcomed Nils Lofgren, Patti Scialfa, violinist Soozie Tyrell and Federici’s replacement Charlie Giordano into the fold – had expanded into a traveling caravan featuring three additional horn players and a quartet of soulful backing vocalists.) But, to paraphrase a statement the singer was keen on making after Clemons’ passing, they’re here if we are. “Songs of New Jersey” offers The E Street Band at its best and brightest over several generations.

Debates about Springsteen’s latest tour have certainly burned bright: the dynamic pricing issue caused fan site Backstreets to shutter in protest, and fans seemed particularly irked by what was seen as a relatively static setlist between shows. But those bumps in the road, past or present, can’t overshadow what the music of Bruce Springsteen – with or without The E Street Band – means to so many. And “The Live Series: Songs of New Jersey” is a strong reminder of how heart-stopping, pants-dropping, house-rocking, booty-shaking and life-changing these songs have been for so many.

Bob Dylan made a surprise appearance at the Farm Aid Benefit show last night, performing three songs with a backing band that included Mike Campbell, Belmont Tench and Steve Ferrone of the Heartbreakers. The black-clad Dylan walked onstage without any introduction and played a short but intense set. 

Playing electric guitar instead of the keyboards and grand piano he has favoured at his own recent shows over the past two decades, Dylan opened with “Maggie’s Farm” from his 1965’s “Bringing It All Back Home”. He then performed the 1965 single “Positively 4th Street” and closed another 1965 song, “Ballad of a Thin Man” from “Highway 61 Revisited”. He left the stage as quickly as he arrived, without saying anything to the crowd.

It was the first time Dylan had played “Maggie’s Farm” since 2009 and the first time he played “Positively 4th Street” since 2013. While he is famous for significantly re-arranging his most famous songs in concert, Dylan stayed surprisingly close to their original sound on these songs.

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers served as Dylan’s backing band on his 1986 True Confession and 1987 Temples in Flames tours. Campbell and Tench were in the band at that time, Ferrone joined in 1994.

It was Dylan’s onstage comments at 1985’s Live Aid concert about American farmers needing financial assistance that inspired Willie Nelson to stage the first Farm Aid later that same year.

“I hope that some of the money … maybe they can just take a little bit of it, maybe … one or two million, maybe … and use it, say, to pay the mortgages on some of the farms and, the farmers here, owe to the banks,” Dylan said. His question did not sit well with Live Aid organizer Bob Geldof. Angry that Dylan was taking the focus off the victims of the 1983-1985 Ethiopian famine Live Aid was organized to help, he labelled them “crass, stupid and nationalistic.” But Nelson felt differently. “The question hit me like a ton of bricks,”

Neil Young and John Mellencamp helped Nelson launch the now-annual event, which has to date raised over $64 million to support family farms and a sustainable food system. Farm Aid’s guiding board now includes Dave Matthews and Margo Price, and Saturday’s bill also featured the Grateful Dead’s Bobby Weir & the Wolf Bros. featuring the Wolfpack, Lukas Nelson, Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats, Allison Russell, The String Cheese Incident and Particle Kid. Also on the bill: Clayton Anderson, The Black Opry featuring Lori Rayne, Tylar Bryant and Kyshona, the Jim Irsay Band, featuring Ann Wilson of Heart, Native Pride Productions and the Wisdom Indian Dancers.

Nearly 10 years in the making, “The Task Has Overwhelmed Us” is the long-awaited fourth volume in The Jeffrey Lee Pierce Sessions Project series. Conceived in 2006 by the late Gun Club titan’s guitarist Cypress Grove, the Project has always aimed to highlight Pierce as one of America’s most fascinatingly influential singer-songwriters of the last century while propelling his outpourings into modern times by placing it in the hands of former collaborators, friends and fans. Following 2009’s “We Are Only Riders”, 2012’s “The Journey Is Long” and 2014’s “Axels and Sockets”, “The Task Has Overwhelmed Us” presents stellar interpretations of tracks from Pierce’s Gun Club and solo canons along with fresh works constructed from rehearsal skeletons, previously unheard lyrics, songs only performed live. Taking song ideas without lyrics and words looking for musical settings gave rise to what Cypress Grove calls “Frankenstein songs.”

The stellar roll-call of contributors features the recurring core of Nick Cave, Debbie Harry, Mark Lanegan, Lydia Lunch, Youth, Jim Jones, Warren Ellis, Mark Stewart, Hugo Race, Cypress plus Mick Harvey and J.P. Shilo and even Jeffrey himself from original tapes.

These are joined by new bloods including Dave Gahan, Suzie Stapleton, Duke Garwood, Pam Hogg, The Coathangers, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club’s Peter Hayes and Leah Shapiro, Humanist, The Walkabouts’ Chris Eckman, Jozef van Wissem, Jim Jarmusch, Chantal Acda and Welsh space-rockers Sendelica with vocalists Wonder and Dynamax Roberts.”

The Jeffrey Lee Pierce Sessions Project “The Task Has Overwhelmed Us” out September 29th, 2023 on Glitterhouse Records.

Wilco have shared a new song called “Cousin.” It’s the title track from their forthcoming Cat Le Bon–produced LP, due out later this month via dBpm. They’ll support the album with a U.S. tour, kicking off later this month.

Wilco previously shared “Cousin’s” “Evicted” in August. The new album is out September 29th and follows last year’s “Cruel Country”. “I’m cousin to the world,” Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy confesses. “I don’t feel like I’m a blood relation, but maybe I’m a cousin by marriage.” Produced by the singular Welsh artist Cate Le Bon, “Cousin” marks the first time since “Sky Blue Sky” that Wilco have handed the reins over to a producer outside their immediate circle of collaborators. Le Bon’s influences — among them the inclusion of saxophone, cheap Japanese guitars, and a cinematic, new wave-style drum machine — drive the album into the future.

The result is Wilco’s most pointed and evocative album, one related but not tied to our present moment, truly new ground for a band that has tested musical boundaries throughout its lengthy career. Longtime admirers of each other’s work, Wilco and Le Bon first met at the band’s Solid Sound Festival in 2019, where they formed an immediate connection, inspiring Tweedy to invite Le Bon to the band’s famed Chicago studio, The Loft, in 2022 to work on “Cousin”.

Le Bon pushed the band to take risks, repurposing Wilco’s established strengths and challenging them to oppose habits — all the while maintaining what has, for the last 30 years, defined Wilco as a band, their fearlessness, made possible by musical virtuosity and the secret language only a family shares. “The amazing thing about Wilco is they can be anything,” Le Bon says. “They’re so mercurial, and there’s this thread of authenticity that flows through everything they do, whatever the genre, whatever the feel of the record. There aren’t many bands who are able to, this deep into a successful career, successfully change things up.”

On “Crying, Laughing, Waving, Smiling”, Slaughter Beach, Dog start on the outside of something and doesn’t really try to get inside The first single—and the album’s second track—“Strange Weather,” sets up this seeking early. “How am I still unsure?” Ewald questions, across an upbeat arrangement laced with rounds of percussion and scratchy, quietly moody guitar instrumentation reminiscent of Abbey Road-era Beatles.

Jake Ewald formed Slaughter Beach, Dog in 2015 as a means of fighting writer’s block while writing songs for his main band at the time, Modern Baseball, and the project – now featuring his former Modern Baseball bandmate Ian Farmer on bass, Adam Meisterhans on guitar, Logan Roth on keyboard, and Zack Robbins on drums – has since released four LPs as well as multiple EPs and live albums. At the beginning of the pandemic, Ewald relocated from his longtime home of Philadelphia to a house in the Poconos, filling his time with long walks, surrounded by nature, and listening to classic songwriters like Neil Young, Randy Newman, and Tom Waits. 

There’s a sense of drifting across the album, a soft indie-rock escapade through city streets, small towns and diners. The songs are full of Americana imagery and richly detailed scenes vivid enough to take in—and taking them in feels incredibly easy when the music has such a gliding, soaring quality. “Engine” is one of the clearest examples—an easygoing but troubled odyssey through the desert, the woods, bars and a family reunion—as it boasts such an even-keeled rhythm of soft taps and drum beats, so much so that you might not even notice that it’s nearly nine minutes long.

For an album with such a relaxed, shade-dappled feel, the lyrics make up something almost surprisingly restless. On “Strange Weather,” it’s “I don’t wanna think about you anymore”; on “Summer Windows,” it’s “I wish that I could tell you what I’m thinking about.” But, by “Easter,” this searching resolves into something that does indeed feel like death—or, at the very least, a dream. Guided along by steady guitar strums and lullaby-gentle vocals, the divine finds its way into Americana here, in a trombone, in an offering of potluck casserole, on a black sand beach. There’s no attempt to communicate through words on “Crying, Laughing, Waving, Smiling”, so nothing can fall short.

Across these songs, love is something felt through someone’s presence next to you: reading a sign, their hand on a drink next to your own. That’s what these lovers and characters are maybe feeling, and that’s the wordlessness these songs offer

Föllakzoid aiming with each record to fill longer spaces of time with fewer and fewer elements. And like the best techno, kraut, and psychedelia have proven throughout time, sometimes the most minimal framework is the strongest container for transcendence. Which is what Föllakzoid have achieved with “V,” an immersive opus that takes the listener on seductive journey straight to the dance floor.

“V” is the fifth album from the long-running Chilean psychedelic and experimental outfit Föllakzoid. Leader Domingæ and remote producer AtomTM worked on the album over the course of a month, editing and layering dozens of stems. The latest in a series of albums released with Sacred Bones, it follows 2019’s “I”.

The creative perspective of the band has always been about unlearning the narrative, musical and visual paradigms that shape physical and digital conceptions, in an effort to make a time-space metric structure that dissolves both the author and the narrative. As the creative project of queer and trans artist Domingæ, the band has had a unique experience navigating the psychedelic rock scene.

Unlike past Föllakzoid records, that were done in single takes with the full band, their latest record “V” took a month to construct out of more than 70 separate stems. Guitars, bass, drums, synthesizers, and vocals, were all recorded in isolation and producer Atom™, who was not present for recording, was then asked to re-organize the four sequences of stems without any length, structural restrictions or guidelines.

The inherent possibilities were endless yet bound together by the inner logic of the game itself and by the spirits of the players. “V” is the exercise of telling an elaborate story about nothing, with the smallest number of words necessary. The story is one of the electricity and code which we inhabit – or which may inhabit us, and can be imagined through heart-pounding bass, skittering beats, head swirling melodies, and an ominous allure that feels at times like genuine hypnosis.

released September 22nd, 2023

Like so many of the most essential rock bands, The Gaslight Anthem have a rare gift for finding glory in the inescapable pain of being alive. On their new album “History Books” – their first new music in over nine years – the New Jersey-bred four-piece bring their soulful breed of punk to ten thrilling songs exploring everything from mortality to mental illness to the more precarious dimensions of human connection.

In the tradition of their seminal sophomore album “The ’59 Sound”, The Gaslight Anthem’s sixth full-length ultimately achieves the tremendous feat of hitting every raw nerve while endlessly inspiring wildly triumphant singing-along. “A lot of this record is questioning all the bad stuff we see in the world and the difficult things we go through in life, and asking how to deal with it,” says vocalist / guitarist Brian Fallon, whose bandmates include drummer Benny Horowitz, bassist Alex Levine, and lead guitarist Alex Rosamilia. “I think the answer is that we’re all in this together and that somehow makes it okay, even when it’s anything but easy.

”The first release from their own Rich Mahogany Recordings (a label distributed via Thirty Tigers), “History Books” finds The Gaslight Anthem working with acclaimed producer / engineer Peter Katis (The National, Interpol, Death Cab for Cutie) and recording at his Bridgeport, CT-based Tarquin Studios. Featuring a guest appearance from longtime Gaslight Anthem champion Bruce Springsteen, “History Books” matches its unfussy yet gracefully crafted sound with the force-of-nature energy that’s defined the band since getting their start playing basement shows back in the mid-aughts.

“Making this album clarified that we want to keep doing what we’ve always done – because no one else can do it in quite the same way, and that’s something I’ve started to become very proud of,” says Fallon. “At the end of the day it’s just rock-and-roll music, but I really do believe it can have a positive impact on people’s lives. I think there’s so much beauty and magic in that.”

The main message of the album is empathy.