Modest Mouse, LCD Soundsystem and Raekwon performing at Pitchfork

Now I see where the extra money is going. So far, in addition to a reunited Pavement and St. Vincent, we’ve also got Modest Mouse, LCD Soundsystem and Raekwon of the Wu-Tang Clan as some of the big names in the festival– and they’re not even done announcing the line up yet! Also rumored is Real Estate, Neon Indian, and The Smith Westerns. Tickets begin going on sale today at noon via TicketWeb, with Three-Day Passes going for $90 and single day tickets going for $40. Below is the full line-up thus far:

Friday, July 16:

– Modest Mouse

Saturday, July 17:

– LCD Soundsystem
– Raekwon
– Here We Go Magic

Sunday, July 18:

– Pavement
– St. Vincent
– Lightning Bolt
– Cass McCombs
– Sleigh Bells

Alan Wilkis Gives “Ambling Alp” the Remix Treatment

With Yeasayer’s new album Odd Blood hitting shelves in less than a week, it’s appropriate to allow you to listen to a great remix of their single “Ambling Alp” provided by none other than Alan Wilkis. While keeping the integrity of the original, Wilkis gives the song an extra layer of depth with his funkier approach to the song. Download it here.

Top Albums of January

Believe it or not, 2010 has been off to a strong start already, with a stellar release just about every week. It’s been difficult to catch up, and it doesn’t look like February is going to be any less packed with terrific releases, so let’s take a look at the best albums from last month:

1. Los Campesinos! Romance is Boring
   Los Campesinos!’s best release is also the top one of the year thus far. Truly stunning from beginning to end.

   “There Are Listed Buildings”
   

2. Spoon Transference
   Don’t let the ramshackle edge fool you, not only is Spoon as strong as ever, the rough-around-the-edges feel adds a needed sense of improvisation to their sound.

   “The Mystery Zone”
   

3. Four Tet There is Love in You
   An absurdly gorgeous album, I’ve a feeling that There is Love in You will continue to grow on me as the year goes on.

   “Angel Echoes”
   

4. Charlotte Gainsbourg IRM
   Now I can finally stop thinking of her as the crazy woman from Antichrist, the Beck-produced IRM is a sultry, uneasy yet enrapturing album. A terrific album through and through, her father (the great Serge Gainsbourg) would be quite proud.

   “IRM”
   

5. Citay Dream Get Together
   These guys are a bit all over the place, but are an absolute must to watch this year– a great debut from a very exciting band.

   “Careful With That Hat”
   

Lollapalooza adds B.o.B., Drive-By Truckers and The Cribs

Speaking of local festivals, the names keep flowing on the Lollapalooza front, and while it’s nothing terribly exciting just yet, you have to give them credit for trying something different. Rapper/singer B.o.B. has long been considered (for better or worse) one of the bright spots in the next generation of hip-hop musicians, while both Drive-By Truckers and The Cribs have a number of admirable releases between the two of them. Also likely to be confirmed is the Japanese metal group X Japan, who has only recently begun performing in the United States despite being around for more than 25 years.

St. Vincent to Play at 2010 Pitchfork Festival

While Pavement has long been known to be the headliner for the 2010 Pitchfork Music Festival, it’s been revealed by Greg Kot at the Chicago Tribune that St. Vincent will be joining the indie vets as the lineup starts to trickle out. With tickets going on sale this Friday at noon, you can bet that there will be a healthy stream of rumors coming between tonight and tomorrow prior to Pitchfork’s initial release of band names. One thing is for sure, with $90 price of admission for a three-day pass, organizers are likely no longer looking to play second fiddle to Lollapalooza this year– so it’ll be interesting to see what other artists are lined up this year.

Los Campesinos! Romance is Boring

Quite simply, Romance is Boring is a brilliant album.

Release Date: January 26, 2010
Record Label: Arts & Crafts
Rating: 98

The talent of Los Campesinos! has never been a question. The Cardiff-based band has come up with fresh and fun take on indie pop with unabashed exuberance since their inception– but the rate at which they’ve come up with quality material is beyond belief. With their third release in as many years, Romance is Boring, is by far their best release yet. The band embraces the darker undertone of their earlier albums and creates their most striking, memorable and far-reaching albums yet. “There are Listed Buildings” is as strong as anything else the band has written, while songs like “Plan A” and “I Warned You Not to Make an Enemy of Me” show how convincing the band can really be when showing off their edgier side. The lyrics are sharp and witty as ever, and the album never drags. There may not be anything as epic as “You! Me! Dancing!”, but there is so much to enjoy on this album that you really have to appreciate the tenacity with which Los Campesinos! approaches their music. Despite appearances, they don’t mess around when it comes to making music, and their tremendous growth in such a short span of time lends one to believe that the sky is the limit for this band.

Los Campesinos! - “There are Listed Buildings”

Franz Nicolay Leaves The Hold Steady

Sad news for Hold Steady fans, but it appears that everyone’s favorite mustached keyboardist has decided to call it quits after being in the band for five years. While no real explanation is given, it was apparently something that was in the works for a while. It’s unknown whether or not the band will look to replace Nicolay or go back to being strictly a guitar-oriented band, but the addition of Nicolay has certainly added a welcome dimension to their music over the past few albums. Best of luck to him and his future endeavors.

New Gorillaz – “Stylo” (feat. Mos Def and Bobby Womack)

Hot on the heels of being announced as one of the headliners for Coachella, a taste of their ambitious new material can also be heard now in the form of the song “Stylo” featuring Mos Def and Bobby Womack. Beyond how insanely cool it is to have the three artists occupying the same song, “Stylo” is actually pretty decent. Steeped in a churning electro-beat, it doesn’t seem as though “Stylo” would be a likely contender for the lead single honors (after all, there’s no Clint Eastwood reference), but it’s indicative of the intriguing direction the band will be taking this time around. Plastic Beach is slated for release on March 8 via Virgin Records.

Gorillaz Plastic Beach “Stylo”

Coachella 2010 Lineup Revealed

Coachella organizers always seem to have more than a few tricks up their sleeves every year, and once again the 2010 lineup is incredibly impressive to say the least. With Jay-Z, LCD Soundsystem, Them Crooked Vultures, Muse, Gorillaz, Pavement, Faith No More, Tiësto and Thom Yorke??? (the apparent name of his new band) all headlining and a slew of noteworthy second-tier acts, it’ll be hard for any other festival to match. It’ll be interesting to see if more Lollapalooza names begin to trickle out in response.  Tickets go on sale January 22 with weekend passes going for a cool $269. Full list of bands is below:

FRIDAY APRIL 16:

Jay-Z, LCD Soundsystem, Them Crooked Vultures, Vampire Weekend, Deadmau5, Public Image Limited, The Specials, Grizzly Bear, Passion Pit, Echo and the Bunnymen, Benny Benassi, Fever Ray, Grace Jones, She & Him, Erol Alkan, The Avett Brothers, Calle 13, The Whitest Boy Alive, The Cribs, La Roux, Yeasayer, Lucero, DJ Lance Rock, The Dillinger Escape Plan, Proxy, Ra Ra Riot, Deer Tick, Wolfgang Gartner, Aeroplane, Iglu & Hartly, Sleigh Bells, P.O.S., Baroness, Hockey, Little Dragon, White Rabbits, Wale, Kate Miller-Heidke, As Tall as Lions, Jets Overhead, Alana Grace, Pablo Hassan.

SATURDAY, APRIL 17:

Muse, Faith No More, Tiësto, MGMT, David Guetta, The Dead Weather, Hot Chip, Devo, Coheed and Cambria, Kaskade, 2Many DJ’s, Major Lazer, Dirty Projectors, Gossip, Z-Trip, The xx, John Waters, Les Claypool, The Raveonettes, Mew, Sia, Camera Obscura, Tokyo Police Club, Porcupine Tree, Old Crow Medicine Show, Aterciopalados, Bassnectar, Frightened Rabbit, Dirty South, Flying Lotus, Corinne Bailey Rae, Pretty Lights, Shooter Jennings, RX Bandits, The Almighty Defenders, Edward Sharp and the Magnetic Zeros, Craze & Klever, Zoe, The Temper Trap, Portugal. The Man, Band of Skulls, Girls, Beach House, Steel Train, Frank Turner.

SUNDAY, APRIL 18:

Gorillaz, Pavement, Thom Yorke????, Phoenix, Orbital, Spoon, Sly and the Family Stone, De La Soul, Julian Casablancas, Plastikman, Gary Numan, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Sunny Day Real Estate, Yo La Tengo, MUTEMATH, Deerhunter, Infected Mushroom, Club 75, Matt & Kim, The Big Pink, Gil Scott-Heron, King Khan and the Shrines, Florence and the Machine, Yann Tiersen, Little Boots, Miike Snow, Talvin Singh, Ceu, B.o.B., Babasonicos, Owen Pallett, The Glitch Mob, Mayer Hawthorne, Local Natives, Rusko, The Middle East, Hadouken!, The Soft Pack, Kevin Devine, Paparazzi, Delphic, One EskimO.

Spoon Transference

Suddenly, there’s such a thing as progression through regression.

Release Date: January 19, 2010
Record Label: Merge
Rating: 93

Spoon is a band who, up until the release of Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, occupied a place on the fringe of mainstream. As their lead single “Written in Reverse” indicates, Spoon clearly didn’t concern themselves with the added level of success. As a matter of fact, they essentially stripped all the extra elements added over the years and  instead chose to allow all experimentation to come directly from the main parts of the band. No horns, no fancy production, just raw, unfiltered music. Truthfully, the band hasn’t sounded this rough around the edges since Kill the Moonlight, and in a lot of ways, that’s a good thing.

The opening “Before Destruction” begins with a simple drum beat with a droning synth, before constantly deconstructing itself and building up again. It’s an admittedly odd choice for an introductory track, but it unfolds the listener into the isolated, almost claustrophobic world of this album. A mostly mid-tempo affair, with the only real “rocker” songs being the wonderfully catchy “Is Love Forever?” and the aforementioned “Written in Reverse.” For a band that is known for being a well-oiled, minimalist machine, the songs are incredibly loose with a lingering quality– you find yourself still digesting the previous track while the next song begins.

It’s worth noting that the likely cause of this semi-new approach to Spoon’s music is that the album is exclusively self-produced by the band, so it was essentially the guys being left to their own devices. Instead of leading to a disastrous affair, it instead plays to the bands strengths which is turning the studio into an experimental lab and constantly tinkering with their ever-evolving musical palette. The result is a subtle, at times exhilarating, such as the guitar jam at the end of “Written in Reverse,” or the haunting vocals on “Who Makes Your Money.” Other highlights include the edgy “I Saw the Light” and the piano ballad “Goodnight Laura.”

Suffice to say, most people are going to be relatively split on this album. The loose, primitive approach to the album certainly won’t be for everyone, even Spoon fans. That being said, Transference is a bit like witnessing an artistic exercise– you know there are aspects that aren’t wholly necessary, and it can appear from the outside as being a slightly pretentious release because of that, but if you simply take a step back and enjoy the ride for what it is, you’re in for a real treat. Transference is the sound of a band embracing their most integral parts and allowing their music to breathe freely within the framework of an album.

For a band that has spent the better part of a decade perfecting minimalist rock, embracing the unpredictable is a pretty risky, and in this case a highly rewarding, move. Transference won’t hit you over the head in greatness the way they have in the past, but this is an understated masterpiece all the same.

Spoon - “Written in Reverse”