DAVID BOWIE – ” Something In The Air ” Live Paris 1999 Brilliant Live Adventures
Posted: February 24, 2021 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSICTags: Brilliant Live Adventures, David Bowie, Elysée Montmartre, Emm Gryner, Gail Ann Dorsey, Holly Palmer, Mark Plati, Mike Garson, Page Hamilton, parlophone Records, Sterling Campbell
“Lived all our best times…” Some of you have successfully second-guessed Brilliant Live Adventures Number 5 edition, on account of it already having been released for streaming last year. The news is that it will be available for pre-order this coming Friday, 26th February, with a release date of 12th March on CD and double vinyl.
‘SOMETHING IN THE AIR (LIVE PARIS 99)’ The Fifth Release in the ‘BRILLIANT LIVE ADVENTURES’ Series of six single pressings of Live albums from the 1990s Vinyl, CD and Limited edition boxed sets to complete sets available exclusively via the The DAVID BOWIE OFFICIAL STORE & WARNER MUSIC GROUP’S DIG! STORE
On the 24th February 2021 London Parlophone Records is proud to announce the newest instalment of DAVID BOWIE ‘BRILLIANT LIVE ADVENTURES’, a series of six live albums from various 1990s era Bowie performances being released on vinyl and CD as limited one run only pressings. The albums and limited-edition boxes for both vinyl and CD to house the full collection will be available only via the David Bowie official store and Warner Music Group’s Dig! store.
The fifth in the series, out 12th March on CD and double vinyl, is “Something In The Air” (Live in Paris 99) a 15-track live album, featuring 12 previously unreleased recordings and three B-sides of singles from the ‘hours…’ album. The day of the show was a momentous one for Bowie, as that afternoon he was awarded the Commandeurs of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, the highest artistic honour that France can bestow.
The Elysée Montmartre performance was one of only seven full shows promoting the ‘hours…’ album. For this special limited run of gigs Bowie dug deep into his back catalogue making these shows particularly memorable. Standout tracks include ‘Can’t Help Thinking About Me’ first released in 1966 and not performed live in over 30 years, ‘Word On A Wing’ from Station To Station reinstated into the set after a 23-year absence, ‘Drive-In Saturday’ performed for the first time since 1974, and ‘hours…’ track ‘Something In The Air’ in its first live performance.
“Something In The Air” (Live in Paris 99) was recorded live at the Elysée Montmartre on 14th October 1999. It was mixed by Mark Plati, and features Bowie backed by Page Hamilton – guitar, Gail Ann Dorsey – bass, vocals, Mark Plati – guitar, Sterling Campbell – drums, Mike Garson – piano, keyboards, synthesisers and Emm Gryner and Holly Palmer – backing vocals.
To Be Released ON CD AND 2xLP 12th March.
SLOTHRUST – ” Cranium “
Posted: February 24, 2021 in MUSICTags: Dangerbird Records, Kyle Bann, Leah Wellbaum, New York, Slothrust, Will Gorin
Slothrust are back in our heads with sweet medicine for our hearts, sharing a brand new single and video, ‘Cranium’, out today on Dangerbird Records. As the band’s first release since 2019, it’s safe to say a lot has happened between now and then. With scores of viable candidates stepping up to claim the mantle of the ‘very saddest girl in rock’, the many skills of Slothrust bandleader Leah Wellbaum are put to much better use in other pursuits.
The new single vividly captures Wellbaum’s powerful voice as a songwriter, lyricist and guitar player and demonstrates an intellectual curiosity and emotional confidence that has deepened in scope as the band’s profile has steadily risen.
With bandmates Will Gorin (drums) and Kyle Bann (bass/keyboards) rounding out the trio’s essential framework, Wellbaum’s quirky visual and tactile inspirations come to life. “I think of ‘Cranium’ as an absurd mating ritual dance by one of those beautiful complex birds with iridescent tail feathers. Except instead of feathers, I am holding family heirloom tweezers and my hands are coated in honey. It’s sweet, but incredibly uncomfortable and definitely overbearing,” Wellbaum said of the new single.
At long last, a new song for you. This one is called “Cranium”. And, there is a very beautiful (in my opinion) music video co-directed by yours truly and our amazing longtime collaborator, Adam Stone. This song is about wanting to serve love but not knowing the “right” way to do so— often offering too much, or something unwanted entirely. It is a promise to love both absurdly and impossibly with a heavy sprinkle of pain.
Thank you in advance for coming with us on this ride. Take some time to celebrate your mind and we shall do the same.
Released February 24th, 2021
Produced by Billy Bush
JAGUAR JONZE – ” Astronaut “
Posted: February 24, 2021 in MUSICTags: Australia, Brisbane, Deena Lynch, Jaguar Jonze
Jaguar Jonze is on the move, the artist otherwise known as Deena Lynch is working on her new year’s resolution: getting in her 10,000 steps a day. It’s an amusing sight, even through Zoom – she’s in an oversized pink cowgirl hat, chatting through AirPods and sipping a hot chocolate while cheerfully roaming the streets of north Brisbane. When faced with a more serious question, though, she stops dead in her tracks, and doesn’t move on until she’s done it justice.
As Lynch later admits, her resolution is a consequence of contracting COVID-19 in March of 2020, a year where “obviously, nothing went to plan”. She continues, “I now know that I have a new body from after COVID, which is riddled with fatigue. I can’t do what I used to anymore, which was to run on adrenaline and exhaustion.” Maintaining her mental and physical health is a daily struggle. And yet, Lynch is becoming more and more Jaguar Jonze – the titular ‘Antihero’ of her upcoming EP – each day.
Jaguar Jonze is an unforgettable stage name. It begs the questions: who could possibly have the confidence to go by such a name, and what could their music sound like? In her social media bios, Jonze dubs herself an “Eastern cowgirl howling at the rising sun”. You could call her music Spaghetti Western Pop: full of dusty twang and atmosphere, yet crisp, modern production. Her debut EP, last year’s ‘Diamonds & Liquid Gold’, introduced Jonze with an ambitious flourish, with songs ranging from the desperate and frenetic – ‘Kill Me With Your Love’, ‘Rabbit Hole’ – to the dreamy ‘Beijing Baby’.
Lynch wields supreme control when she sings: always dramatic, but never over the top. But her earthy voice doesn’t soar above the music, as most pop singers do: it sits embedded within the grit of her four-piece band. On stage and in the studio, Lynch is accompanied by Joe Fallon, guitar; Jacob Mann, drums; and Aidan Hogg, bass and co-producer, who helped imbue her sound with a deep, bluesy rock’n’roll swagger. Lynch attests, “I see us as like Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds. I am Jaguar Jonze – that is my alter ego. But the boys and their band sound also make up the soul of Jaguar Jonze. It is nothing without them as well.”
Hi friends! Today you can hear the B side of my new 7″, a song called “Party’s Over.” I’m so excited to share it with you!
New song and video out today, along with the limited edition 7” that includes “Orange Blossoms” as the A side! This is a song for remembering how good it feels to keep moving, letting the source of your discontent slide into the background till it blinks out like a distant star. A song for not just carving out your own path, but dancing down it. For accepting yourself for who you are. For casting aside the imagined ideals that scream at you like a neon sign: Never Enough. It’s a song for when you’re standing on the outside and you know you’re not alone. Out in this wide world, it’s a party where everyone is invited.
I wanted to write a song that would set my body into motion, propelling me away from the source of a dark feeling – the feeling of not belonging. How many times have I stood on the outside, wanting to be inside? This song is a reminder in those moments to keep moving, to feel your strength build with the distance gained, to not only carve out your own path but to dance down it. There is so much joy in releasing ourselves from what we think of as the center and discovering that the real depth of experience exists at the margins: a space that embraces our full complexity. That’s where the real party is happening.
This song is another product of my collaboration with Zubin Hensler, and the video was made with my partner-in-crime Kenna Hynes.
“Party’s Over” by Half Waif on Anti -Records
The HORRORS – ” Lout “
Posted: February 24, 2021 in MUSICTags: Faris Badwan, Joshua Third, The Horrors, Tom Furse, Wolf Tone/Caroline
It’s been four years since British synth-krautrockers The Horrors made our ears happy with their fifth LP called “V”. A first-class work of multi-layered-soundscapes. The Horrors’ EP “Lout” is a quick listen at only three tracks, and it doesn’t waste a second of fuzzy, thrashing sound. “Lout” is the British band’s first release of new music since 2017’s “V“, and is a chaotic and addicting outpouring of noise. From the pulsating synths on “Org” to the driving distorted guitar on the title track, The Horrors take no breaks from their intense, high-energy creation on their latest release.
A great Surpriiiise! that The Horrors are back to deafen/delight in equal measure. Our new song “Lout” is available to dissect, devour and destroy on all streaming platforms now. Taken from our upcoming EP, released in full on 12.03.21. Thank you to Lauren Laverne for giving it its first play today.
They’re finally back from wherever they were hiding. And how! New single “Lout”, the title-track from a new upcoming EP, is a mind-slashing, industrial drone that keeps on pounding and pounding until the wall comes down. Hefty stuff, folks! Just the way I like it, any day, any time!
The long-awaited return with a brand-new single “Lout” released on blood red 7” vinyl, strictly limited to 1500 copies worldwide.
According to lead singer Faris Badwan, “Lout is about the relationship between choice and chance, compulsive risk-taking and pushing your luck. As a band, particularly live, we’ve always had an aggressive side and as we began writing new songs it became clear that we were heading in that direction.”
This bold new sound is partnered with a striking visual aesthetic carried across the artwork, videos, upcoming merch collection and press shots, born from collaborations between the band and creative director Bunny Kinney, legendary beauty executive Isamaya Ffrench, videographer Jordan Hemingway and Loverboy designer Charles Jeffrey.
The Horrors the band returns to their roots with more of a Ministry/Nine Inch Nails edge. This three-song EP takes a sharp left turn from the band’s more recent albums which swam more in the pop/electronic pool and we’re happy to see the band embrace the heavier side of their sound.
CLARA MANN – ” Consolations ” EP
Posted: February 24, 2021 in MUSICTags: Bristol, Clara Mann, singer songwriter, UK
“Consolations”, my debut EP, is a collection of songs written over the last year or so, so-called because I wrote them to “console” myself, to find comfort when things were turbulent or when I felt somehow disconnected from world around me.
My music emerged from a world of books, paintings, and poetry, as well as a love of song, and for me, it is a weaving together of those loose strands, an assembling and mending of the fragments of the things I love, that might otherwise have remained scattered across my life and never quite have come together.
Released February 24th, 2021
Written and composed by Clara Man
FRANCIS LUNG – ” Bad Hair Day “
Posted: February 24, 2021 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSICTags: Francis Lung, Memphis Industries, Miracle, UK
“Bad Hair Day” is the first taste of his Francis Lung’s forthcoming second album, “Miracle” which is set for release via Memphis Industries on 18 June 2021.
“Bad Hair Day” is a relentlessly catchy and deceptively upbeat ode to hangovers and missed connections. Sonically, the song arrives as a fusion of power-pop and sunny art-rock where angular guitars dart around glowing melodies and quickfire percussion. “For me, [Miracle] is about the struggle between my self destructive side and my problem-solving, constructive side,” says Francis. “I suppose through a lot of these songs I’m dealing with these emotional problems, acknowledging the negative aspects of my behaviour instead of burying them, and providing an alternative point of view for myself”. Despite its serious subject matter, Miracle is far from austere in sound, marrying the cinematic, dreamlike quality of Francis’s earlier music with the pared-back charm of great singer-songwriters like Judee Sill, Jeff Tweedy and Elliott Smith.
The album opens with ‘Bad Hair Day’, a relentlessly catchy—and deceptively upbeat—ode to hangovers and missed connections. “I’ve been calling on you all night /But I never get through, I just get in the way” Francis laments; “I am a cloud in the sun’s light/Whatever I do, whatever I say.” Elsewhere, the title track finds him pondering the fickle nature of the music industry: “I think of [Miracle] as acknowledging and even encouraging the feelings we’re not supposed to succumb to – giving up, giving in – just because it can be comforting to hear it from someone else. ‘Why am I climbing these social ladders and jumping through the hoops of this creative industry? Does this make me happy?’”
These themes of longing, and lacking, missing and being missed, reoccur throughout Miracle. “When I die/Will I be missed/Or am I missing the point?” asks ‘Say So’; while ‘Lonesome No More’, inspired by the Kurt Vonnegut book of the same name, begs the question: if loneliness was eradicated, would we miss it? By confronting these feelings, Francis is able to move forward, as triumphant album closer ‘The Let Down’ proves. Its lyrics serve as a call to action, as Francis wills himself (and the listener) to ‘Get up/Get something going/Do something, do it/Do it now’
Miracle was produced by Francis in collaboration with Brendan Williams (Dutch Uncles, Matthew Halsall, Kiran Leonard) and Robin Koob (who co-arranged and performed strings). The opportunity to take creative control was one Francis relished. “I’m quite bad at delegating” he admits, noting that he played every instrument except strings on Miracle. The result is a cohesive, deeply personal record, which is as vital as it is vulnerable. “I don’t want to be defined by my anxiety, my depression or any history of substance abuse,” Francis says, “but I do want to reach out to other people who have had similar experiences, especially if it’s in a way that helps them feel a little better. To me, this music is celebrating healing as much as it focuses on the darker sides of the human psyche.”
Francis Lung, the uber-talented Manchester singer songwriter (& former Wu lyf man), to the dinked fold. Despite its serious subject matter, ‘miracle’ is far from austere in sound, marrying the cinematic, dreamlike quality of Fancis’s earlier music with the pared-back charm of great singer-songwriters like brian wilson or elliott smith & the prog-like maximalism of b.c.camplight or field music. the album opens with ‘Bad Hair Day’, a relentlessly catchy – & deceptively upbeat – ode to hangovers & missed connections & from here on in, we are besotted.
Released February 24th, 2021
The MOUNTAIN GOATS – ” The Jordan Lake Sessions: Volumes 1 and 2 “
Posted: February 23, 2021 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSICTags: Durham, John Darnielle, Merge Records, North Carolina, The Jordan Lake Sessions: Volumes 1 and 2, The Mountain Goats
John Darnielle has written almost 600 songs now, and some of them are very sad, dealing with hard drugs and tragic ends, hurting yourself and others, sicknesses of both body and brain, off-brand alcohols. They are told in beautiful, unnerving, specific detail because he is a very good writer, and also some of them are just true stories about his own life.
The Mountain Goats released this live collection, The Jordan Lake Sessions: Volumes 1 And 2, on Bandcamp today via Merge Records. The recordings come from a pair of virtual concerts the band conducted at Manifold Recording in Pittsboro, North Carolina in August of last year.
The Jordan Lake Sessions: Volumes 1 And 2 follow The Mountain Goats’ 2020 studio release, “Getting Into Knives”, which arrived in October. The new live collection — featuring John Darnielle (vocals, guitar, piano), Peter Hughes (bass), Matt Douglas (keyboards, guitar, saxophone, piano) and Jon Wurster (drums) — contains 36 carrer-spanning songs the band recorded over the course of two virtual concerts on NoonChorus, which became one of the livestream platform’s highest-attended online concerts to date.
Mountain Goats mastermind John Darnielle detailed
Like a lot of bands, we thought, we have to figure out some way to play together, it is unnatural for us to not be playing together, it feels weird and wrong, and it also feels weird and wrong to not be playing for the people who dig what we do, that is a huge part of who we are, it’s a circuit, you know, an energy transfer, it’s the coolest thing and we’re lucky to have it and then the pandemic came in to remind us just how lucky. And also there’s the I-try-not-to-be-talking-about-this-stuff issue of how playing live is our paycheck, it is how we make ends meet, it’s the gig. So we booked a studio that had cameras, and I put together a couple of set lists, and we played two shows in two days and then we put the shows up on sale; and the Mountain Goats Massive showed up, in truly humbling numbers, and the whole groove felt really emotional for us—and, it seemed to me, for the audience, too. There is an immense loss for me in this time away from the stages and rooms which are, in many ways for us, home. I miss the people who bring our music to life, so much.
And so a lot of people, like a lot, in the chat during the show, and in various @’s across social media, said, Hey buddy, what if there were a live release of some kind, I’d buy that, and I thought, well, cool, I’ll look into it; and we did indeed do that, and here it is, but I wanted to make it “pay what you like” on release day: because you people who already paid to see these shows, you are the people who literally put food in our children’s mouths this year. If you feel like you’re done paying for these shows, then we are cool with that, zero pressure. But!! if you’re in good shape, and your own job has figured out a way to let you report to the workplace in 2020, and you’re in a position to pay for these shows, then we are deeply grateful, it has been pretty harrowing to be banned from all clubs for a whole year. The news on the wire however is that a vaccine is coming which will unban us from clubs around the world, and, friends, when that viral ban is lifted, please know that there will be few places to hide from the Mountain Goats. We will rock them in the steel towns, and in the coastal towns, too; and on the cities of the plains, and in the oases of the desert, lo, we shall rock them, and then rock them even harder, at serious Deep Purple levels of rocking, the head-nodding, hair-flying style, at which many will say, I have been rocked, and indeed I wondered if my time of rocking were past, but it has returned this day with gale force. May that day speed hither with all due haste! Finally, if you are a reclusive Howard Hughes type reading these words, and thinking, What if “pay what you like” means I just throw an absurd amount of money at the Mountain Goats, well, friend, we’re glad to meet you. Please be assured that your gesture will be met by JD with similarly absurd gestures, as for example fulfilling his dream of commissioning a translation of the book Elfriede Jelinek got the Nobel for, but which still hasn’t been published in English twenty years later, for crying out loud.
Anyway that’s the news! Here’s two shows! We’re proud of them! If you wanna pay us for ’em, we won’t complain! We will see you next year!
Released December 4th, 2020
John Darnielle – vocals, guitar, piano
Peter Hughes – bass
Matt Douglas – keyboards, guitar, saxophone, piano
Jon Wurster – drums
Recorded live in studio at Manifold Recording in Pittsboro, NC, on August 8th & 9th, 2020
WOLF ALICE – ” The Last Man On Earth “
Posted: February 23, 2021 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSICTags: Blue Weekend, Wolf Alice
It’s been a while, 4 years in fact. We quite literally could’ve had 4 babies each in that time but instead we’ve grown out two mullets, gathered a few wrinkles, downloaded TikTok, deleted it and then downloaded it again and now finally we’ve made you some new music. We think it’s our best stuff yet. it doesn’t get much bigger than this! after 2017’s mercury prize-winning stunner, ‘visions of a life’, our anticipation for Wolf Alice’s third album couldn’t be higher. its predecessor showed an unwavering boldness & desire to constantly play around with genres, working through moods of shoegaze, fuzzy punk, moody pop rock & understated, emotionally charged lighter-wavers. the cherry on top is the limited indies only transparent red lp!,
Sweet Annie Mac will be premiering our new single ‘The Last Man On Earth’ from 6pm tomorrow on BBC Radio 1.
Lets tune in together, hope you’re ok out there we have missed you so so much. xxx Our third album ‘Blue Weekend’ will be released on the 11th of June.
