Sweater rockers of the greater D.C. area, it’s time to start knitting! Slumberland has just announced a 20th anniversary concert at Black Cat.

Way back in 1989, when DC was still more of an all-hardcore-all-the-time kind of place, Slumberland Records took a chance and pressed its first 7″, What Kind of Heaven Do You Want, a compilation featuring DC-based indie-pop bands Velocity Girl, Black Tambourine, and Powder Burns. Since then the label has become one of the most beloved purveyors of twee and fuzzy music, releasing a slate of well-loved records by Stereolab, Rocketship, and, more recently, Crystal Stilts, and The Pains of Being Pure at Heart.

The anniversary concert will feature performances by label artists both new (Crystal Stilts) and old (The Ropers, Nord Express). Lineup details after the jump.
Read More “Slumberland Announces 20th Anniversary Show @ Black Cat” »

The Fresh & Onlys’: “Dude’s Got a Tender Heart”
San Francisco garage-psych band The Fresh & Onlys offers up a reverb-drenched nugget about a tough guy on wheels. Nothing especially mold-breaking there. But by the end of the first verse, it’s apparent that this dude’s wheels are only about 47mm in circumference. Narrative-wise, “Dude’s Got a Tender Heart, from the band’s new LP, Grey-Eyed Girls, is equal parts “Leader of the Pack” and “Sk8r Boi.” No matter, though: Strong men also rollerblade.

Harmonia & Eno: “Sometimes in Autumn (Shakleton Remix)”
England-born/Berlin-based producer Shakleton whips out a pen knife and whittles down this krautrock classic, composed by Harmonia and Brian Eno way back in ‘76. But where the original skewed new-age–calm and placid synths draped over a motorik rhythm–this remix tilts the vibe toward paranoia with sharp-edged dubstep-style percussion.

Malakai: “Shitkicker”
Bristol, England-based Malakai assembles vintage psych-rock via sample collage. “Shitkicker,” from the duo’s upcoming full-length Ugly Side of Love finds twangy guitars getting mashed up with still-dusty Merseybeat breaks.

Krallice: “The Mountain”
In comparison to Orthrelm, Mick Barr’s former band–known for its 40-minute carpal tunnel-inducing minimalist-metal composition OV–Krallice, his black metal group, is a pretty straightforward affair. But, again, only in comparison to Orthrelm. By any other metric, “The Mountain,” from the group’s forthcoming record Dimensional Bleedthrough, is still pretty bizarre. The bassist turns out a few traditional-sounding grunts for the vocals, but Barr’s riffs–so fast that sometimes it sounds like a skipping CD–are still without precedent. This is the music by which cubist Norsemen might vanquish Yngwie Malmsteen.

On Sunday, the New York Times ran an article about Jim O’Rourke, an underground overachiever who, in addition to recording his own solo music, has played in Sonic Youth and Gastr Del Sol, and worked in various other capacities with Wilco, Joanna Newsom, and Superchunk.

His latest project is the new solo album The Visitor, a recording that, at times, features as many as 200 tracks of instruments.

As one might imagine, an album such as this would require quite an intricate mix, which is perhaps why The Visitor will only be available on CD and vinyl—no digital download.

Read More “Has the Pushback Begun?” »

A while back I bought a big stack of Nigerian highlife 45s. It’s a genre I can’t profess to know very much about and many of these artists are nigh-ungooglable. Still they sound good. I ripped them into my itunes because 7″ vinyl is a frustrating format that will destroy your life with carpal tunnel syndrome. I then decided that the next logical and generous step would be to share this music with you, the internet. So here it goes. Be prepared to suffer through some pops and crackle, it puts hair on your chest. And if you were expecting me to post more about rap, we can split the difference and you can go learn about the first decade of Nigerian hip hop at Africanhiphop.com. Tracklisting and download link to the highlife comp after the jump. Read More “Mixtape: Noz in Nigeria” »

“We’re trying to have fun right now and not make it too serious,” Travis “Cobruhhh” Jackson, the drummer of D.C.’s noisiest party punkers The Points said yesterday, discussing the pitfalls of long-distance rock ‘n’ roll — Jackson moved to Blacksburg, Va., not long ago, and his bandmate, guitarist and singer George “Geo” White, now lives in Chicago. The geographic disruption may mean more planning, fewer shows, and less spontaneity, but to hear Jackson tell it, the band’s hard-partying (and, more centrally, hard-drinking) ethos remains the same.

The Points dropped a new seven-inch single this week on Jackson’s own Windian Records (City Paper’s own Aaron Leitko recently reviewed the six-minute song “Shout” for Pitchfork), and Geo and Cobruhhh are celebrating tomorrow night at DC9. After the jump, my condensed interview with Jackson.

Read More ““We’re Alcoholics”: A Quick Q&A With The Points” »

Not only is Dethklok getting its own video game, but Brendan Small’s once-imaginary band has somehow managed to arrange a 7-week tour with Mastodon, the most popular metal act to come out of Atlanta and Metallica’s current tour opener. Mastodon’s Crack the Skye hit the streets in March of this year, and Dethklok’s Dethalbum II drops Sept. 8.

High on Fire and Converge will open the 34 shows–one of which will be at GMU’s Patriot Center on Oct. 31.

Electronic Arts is sponsoring the tour (which is sort of odd if you consider the new Dethklok video game is a Konami product), thus every concert will have console stations where audience members can try out Brutal Legend, EA’s new video game featuring voiceover work by Jack Black.

More deets after the jump.
Read More “Dethklok and Mastodon Touring 34 Cities” »

Last month, mid-90s emo rockers Sunny Day Real Estate announced a reunion tour in support of their first two albums LP2 and Diary, both of which are being reissued by Sub Pop in September. (More on those special reissues at the band’s new official site.) The good news for Midatlantic emo junkies is that the tour will include a September 30 show at the 9:30 Club (buy tickets here).

New to Sunny Day Real Estate? Try “In Circles” (video below) off Diary. And for the latest from SDRE lead eccentric singer Jeremy Enigk, listen to “Mind Idea,” which Stereogum released in March. 

Crooked Beat sent along a list of the Adams Morgan stores top-ten sellers for May. I pass it along not so much for its tiny news value as merely a reminder. Maybe you’re like me and totally slept on the new Camera Obscura album (it’s….No. 1 at Crooked Beat). Or maybe you still do not own Neutral Milk Hotel’s classic (No. 9).

Read More “Crooked Beat’s Top Sellers For May” »

Who knew that the best way to enshrine Crosby, Stills & Nash would be to remove the harmonies?

Out today, CSN Demos covers some of the group’s more memorable early takes between 1968 and 1971, including rough cuts of “Almost Cut My Hair,” “You Don’t Have to Cry,” “Déjà Vu,” and “Chicago.”

As outtake/demo discs go, the appeal of CSN Demos is closer to that of the Beatles‘ Anthologies than of, say, the Exile on Main Street Outtakes. (The former offered substantial insight into the songs’ geneses, whereas the latter was a mash of B-takes and unmastered irrelevancies.) All of which is to say that the new disc accomplishes something of which only the best vaultstuffs are capable: re-illuminating the original takes while standing as a damn decent record in its own right.

Read More “Thoughts on CSN Demos:
Record review, streaming, and tour dates” »

Country musician Steve Earle once famously pronounced Townes Van Zandt “the best songwriter in the whole world, and I’ll stand on Bob Dylan’s coffee table in my cowboy boots and say that.” So how come the only people who ever give Townes his propers are his contemporaries and the odd independent filmmaker? Maybe because even when started started writing iconic country-folk standards, he stayed holed up in a tin-roofed shack outside Houston, planting flowers and playing to dive crowds. Maybe because his songs usually only became famous after being covered by other, more entrepreneurial country stars. Or maybe because his ambling melodies have been ground to grains beneath the tire treads of the endless Chevy commercial that is modern country music.

Earle has not forgotten Townes, though; and he’s doing his best to make sure the rest of us don’t either. His latest LP, Townes, is a 15-song memorial to his mentor. The album revisits some of Townes’ most characteristic tunes–including “Mr. Mudd and Mr. Gold,” which was the first Van Zandt song Earle ever played (he did it the night they first officially met, to stop Townes from heckling him), and “To Live is to Fly,” enduring ballad that doubles as the late singer’s epitaph.

Read More “Album Review: ‘Townes,’ by Steve Earle” »