Karen O

Over the Weekend (Apr. 20 Edition)

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News, new music, and other fun stuff as you celebrate today’s “holiday”…

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame had its induction ceremony this past weekend, and while we won’t be able to see the concert for a couple of months, bits of news have been floating around and low-quality video of some of the performances have surfaced.  The various performances for Lou Reed’s induction are probably the most intriguing, with Beck performing “Satellite of Love” and Karen O with bandmate Nick Zinner taking a stab at “Vicious”.  Of course, no story that mentions the Hall would be complete without mentioning the countless times the committee has failed, so after reading about the specifics of the induction process enjoy a slideshow that argues for the inclusion of 40 other artists.

We are excited for the release of Built to Spill’s latest album, Untethered Moon, tomorrow, and to help our readers get in the mood, we are sharing Consequence of Sound’s 10 song summation of the band as well as the group’s latest video for “Never Be The Same”, a sequel of sorts to the previous “Living Zoo”.

The sight of goofy old people dancing is always fun, which is why it was also the basis for another recent video, “Lonesome Street” from Blur.

Fucked Up has released the B-Side to their yearly EP release based on the Chinese Zodiac, with Pitchfork providing the stream.  Year of the Hare will be released on June 16, but you can listen to “California Cold” now.

We usually do not discuss press releases from the Norway Ministry of Culture, but their announcement over the weekend that the country will shut down FM radio stations in the next two years caught our attention.  Some of my fondest memories are from my time working at a small FM alternative station, so in spite of the fact that in the specific case of Norway this seems to be a smart way to move forward (the fact that they only have five stations as a nation as well as the prevalence of Digital Audio Broadcasting channels seems like it will not be a particularly disruptive shift), it is still jarring to read.  Let us hope that they come up with a way to update all those car stereos before the change is fully implemented.

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Over the Weekend (Dec. 22 Edition)

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Some videos and lists and other fun stuff as you continue to put off Christmas shopping…

Last week we said farewell to one of our favorite late night comedy shows with the end of The Colbert Report, but that wasn’t the only great program that finished its run last week.  The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson was underrated for the entirety of its run, as few could match the creativity and anarchic spirit of its host.  Craig ended things with a bang on his last show, and it was nice to see this tribute at the top of his show.  Here’s the official video, though it’s missing an excellent second half as seen in this link.

The “Bang Your Drum” performance was an excellent followup to the latest rendition of the annual holiday tradition of Darlene Love performing “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home”) on The Late Show with David Letterman.  Of course, what really takes the performance to another level is the bari sax solo, but all the musicians are worthy of praise.

Once again, we have even more lists for your consultation.  Cokemachineglow has multiple lists for top albums, and then there are best videos lists from Vulture, PASTE, and Buzzfeed.  While there are several good selections, I’m surprised to see the absence of our personal pick for best music video of 2014, the haunting “Story 2” from clipping.

Song Exploder has an excellent interview with members of The National, who discuss the creation of “Sea of Love” for Trouble Will Find Me.  They really go deep into the making of the song, so all those budding songwriters out there should take note.

In a bit of unsurprising news, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs are “on a bit of a hiatus” according to Karen O.  But it sounds like it’s just down time and not anything signalling the end of the band, which is great.

The Replacements have released some new music, and to say it’s different than what you would expect would be an understatement.  Pitchfork has the link to the 25 minute jazz improve piece “Poke Me In My Cage”.

Daniel Kessler from Interpol’s side project Big Noble just released their first music video, providing a visual accompaniment to the soundscape “Stay Gold”.

And a melancholy farewell to Joe Cocker, who possessed one of the great voices in rock history.  His cover of “With A Little Help From My Friends” was a huge part of my childhood, and I’m sure millions of others could say the same thing.

Catching Up On The Week (Sept. 26 Edition)

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A few #longreads for your weekend as hipsterdom reaches its apex with a Pabst-sponsored music festival in Portland, Oregon…

One of the bands appearing at the Project Pabst festival this weekend is hometown heavy metal act Red Fang.  They may be local, but they also have a worldwide reach, as evidenced by a recent interview that an Indian metal publication conducted with guitarist Bryan Giles.

Portland's most identifiable landmark is a sign with its name.

Portland’s most identifiable landmark is a sign with its name.

Pitchfork has an extensive interview with Adam Granduciel of The War on Drugs, discussing the creation of his group’s brilliant new album Lost in the Dream and all the personal struggles he endured.  Be sure to check out also this performance that the band did for The Current, featuring a cover of Bob Dylan’s “Tangled Up in Blue” (which is a perfect fit for the band).

Jeff Tweedy talks with The Quietus on the making of Sukierae with his son Spencer, discussing musical experimentation and lyrical processes among other topics.  And because I missed it when it first was published, I’m linking to another recent interview from The Quietus, this time with Karen O.

Joey Santiago talks about the legacy of the Pixies with Diffuser, and it’s always worth hearing from the legendary guitarist.

And because it’s not enough that people discuss the twentieth anniversary of Dookie, Consequence of Sound has a roundtable examining the impact of American Idiot ten years later.  I’m just glad someone stood up for Warning, which I feel is an underrated Green Day album.

And finally, some new music: after a week of dropping various hints, Thom Yorke announced the release of his second solo album, Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes, which is now available for purchase on BitTorrent.  It’ll definitely be making my weekend playlist.

Catching Up On The Week (Sept. 12 Edition)

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Some #longreads and a handful of other assorted goodies for your weekend…

We always appreciate it when people write articles about Teenage Fanclub, especially those pieces which talk about how underrated the group and their special brand of power-pop was.  The AV Club urges readers to listen to Songs From Northern Britain in particular, and hopefully that inspires people to pick up the rest of their fantastic catalog.

Noisey interviews Interpol as they return to New York in support of El Pintor, and gets the band to open up a bit about the departure of Carlos as well as the band’s new mindset.  It’s definitely worth reading if you’re a fan.

Stereogum has another twentieth anniversary retrospective ready to go, this time taking a look at Notorious B.I.G.’s seminal debut, Ready To Die.

There’s a cool video making the rounds called “100 Bass Riffs: A Brief History of Groove on Bass and Drums”.  It’s a great way to explore the development of music in the last fifty years, and the musicians will impress you with not only their pure skills, but their memory and stamina as well.

Pitchfork interviews Karen O for their 5-10-15-20 feature, as she explains how certain songs affected her over the course of her life.

NPR’s Drum Fill Friday has Jim Eno from Spoon as their guest picker, and I had a real tough time with this one–see if you can do better than 2 out of 5.

And finally, take a look at why “Grandmaster Flash” keeps trending on Facebook.  Unfortunately, it’s not due to everyone re-posting “The Message”.

Over the Weekend (July 28 Edition)

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New videos perfect for a lazy summer day and more…

Karen O released a video for “Rapt” from her upcoming solo release, Crush Songs.  The song is a delicate lo-fi bitter ode to love, while the video sees Karen O floating underwater.  That should be enough to intrigue you.

This weekend saw an unexpected collaboration, as Jack White popped up at a Beck concert, and White joined in for classics like “Loser”, “Pay No Mind”, and “Where It’s At”.  The video at Pitchfork gives an incomplete view of what happened, but the glimpses that we see make it seem like a fantastic partnership.  Their respective tours mirror each other a bit, so perhaps this we’ll be only the first example of a possible union.

And we’re sure most of you saw how the internet had fun with Jack White enjoying himself at a Cubs game last week, and SPIN did their part by comparing how much fun Eddie Vedder had with the Cubs last week as well.

Check out this solo acoustic performance from Adam Granduciel of The War On Drugs, performing “An Ocean In Between The Waves.”  The performance shows that even without all the gauzy synths and hazy atmospherics of the album recording, it’s a damn good song that’s still extremely powerful.

The group clipping. has gotten a lot of attention for its experimental take on rap and for being one of the few hip-hop acts on Sub Pop, and they had the music world buzzing last week with their latest video, for “Story 2”.  The song is a harrowing tale of a father’s returning home to find a tragedy has occurred at his house, with the style and flow changing as the terror increases once the father realizes what happened.  The video follows the same storyline, though it’s shot to show only the father’s lower body, which makes it all the more unsettling.  It’s probably one of the best videos you’ll see this year.

And last week saw the 25th anniversary of the seminal album Paul’s Boutique by the Beastie Boys, and Uproxx celebrated with the video of their performance on “Soul Train”.  Not only that, but Rolling Stone reported that a mural dedicated to the guys will be shown at the location memorialized by the album cover.  The RS article now includes a link showing the mural.