Just in time for their latest tour, the Flaming Lips are set to release their first greatest hits collection on June 01, 2018. The vinyl version of this contains 11 tracks from the second half of their catalogue. The CD version is three discs for a total of 52 tracks and covers a lot of their earlier material as well. They’re also offering shirts and posters featuring the wild album art. I haven’t heard a lot of the cuts on the CD version of this, so I’m probably going to snag that.
Keep your mind open.
[I can’t predict the future either, but I can send you updates if you subscribe.]
The second day of Levitation Austinwas going to be a feast of bands from outside the U.S. The number of international acts that play the festival every year is one of my favorite things about it. I’ve discovered many great bands I wouldn’t have heard otherwise at Levitation Austin.
After a great brunch at the South Congress Cafe (which I couldn’t finish), the first of the six bands we’d see that day was Superfonicos – an Austin band of locals and Colombians who play a great mix of Afro / Colombian funk. They played to a crowd that seemed to grow larger with each track, as more and more people walking by the venue came in to hear who was dropping all that killer groove.
Superfonicos kicking off the party.
Following them were musicians all the way from Algeria – Imarhan. My wife and I have fallen in love with Tuareg music thanks to the Levitation festival, and this was our second time seeing Imarhan there. A lot more people were hyped to see them this time than when we saw them in 2016. It’s not that they were a bad band in 2016 – far from it. It’s that they’ve been working hard, touring a lot, and have a fine new album (Temet) that’s getting a lot of buzz. They had everyone moving and people behind me in the crowd were stunned by their bass player and lead guitarist.
Imarhan
Closing the night at Cheer Up Charlie’s were hometown heroes / aliens Golden Dawn Arkestra, who entered the venue through the crowd and billowing sage incense everywhere before they launched into a sun-worshipping funky freakout that had a packed crowd of dancing revelers all communing with other-dimensional beings. GDA never disappoint, and some people we met that night (one of whom was in a psychedelic band out of Chicago) who hadn’t seen them before thought the set was one of the coolest things they’d ever seen.
We then went over to Barracuda to see Chilean psychedelic rock outfit Vuelveteloca. Unfortunately, we missed the first half of their set, but what we did here was psych-rock as solid as the Andes.
NYC’s The Men followed, and they came out gunning. In the first two tracks I thought, “This might be the closest I ever get to an MC5show.” They even played some Captain Beefheart-like stuff by the end. They were loud and brash, which made the next set even weirder.
The final act we saw the second night was another Chilean band – Follakzoid. I’d only heard a couple tracks by them before coming to Austin, and they were good ones that bordered somewhere between shoegaze and psychedelia. I didn’t know what to expect from a live show, but I can tell you it about melted my mind. They played two tracks and an encore. The two tracks during their main set were about twenty-five minutes each of droning, repetitive (in a good way) space rock that is hard to describe. Imagine synth bass and riffs combined with drumming from apparently a human metronome (considering how long he kept those beats going) and maybe five different notes played in different ways and with different effects and levels of distortion and reverb. Sound weird? It was – wonderfully so. Sound like it shouldn’t be good? You couldn’t be more wrong. It was one of the best sets I saw all weekend, easily in the top three.
Up next, my wife tries to figure out the big deal about Slowdive, we bump into more musicians, and a laptop keeps giving someone fits.
It was our fourth trip to the Levitation Music Festival (which I still call the Austin Psych Fest now and then), and we were happy and eager to support it after the weather-battered and cancelled 2016 festival. That took such a toll that the 2017 festival in Austin was also cancelled. This needed to be a good bounce back for the Reverb Appreciation Society (who curate the festival) and the city of Austin. The city still remembered the series of bombings that plagued the city just a month earlier, so the town needed a morale boost. It worked. The limited number of deluxe weekend passes (which allowed access to all shows across the four days) sold out in minutes. No, I didn’t get any of them. I, like most of the attendees, had to buy tickets for individual shows.
The biggest change for the festival this year was that it was no longer held at Carson Creek Ranch and its three outdoor stages. The 2018 festival was held in multiple venues in downtown Austin – Stubb’s BBQ, Emo’s, Cheer Up Charlie’s, Empire Garage, Barracuda, Beerland, the Mohawk, Volcom Garden, and Hotel Vegas. My wife said she preferred the festival this way, as it gave us more places to relax between (and during) sets and more options for food. We rented an apartment via VRBO that was a ten-minute drive from the venues and the Spot Hero parking app became our best friend over the course of the four days. We never paid more than $10.00 for parking for an entire night while in Austin.
I had five shows slated for the first day of the festival (Thursday). The first was Ron Gallo. I hadn’t seen Mr. Gallo and his crew since I saw them open for Screaming Females in a small Fort Wayne, Indiana show. I was keen to see how big of a crowd they’d get since they’d achieved notoriety with their first record and toured with the Black Angels. I’m happy to say they had a good crowd at Stubb’s and were a great opening to the festival. They encouraged us to create our own reality and that everything will be okay.
Ron Gallo at Stubb’s BBQ.
We headed out for dinner after their fun set, and I started two trends that continued the entire weekend. The first was finding pennies. I found at least three every day we were in the city. It bordered on bizarre. I don’t know why Austin apparently has no use for pennies (and even quarters), but I’ll happily take them.
We ate at Daruma, a great ramen bar in downtown Austin. We started the second trend of the weekend there – Meeting musicians. A group of six sat at the bench-like table with us and we learned they were a self-described “gospel / hip-hop” band called Kings Kaleidoscope from Seattle who were playing in town that night. We also learned there that our broth was probably made by the bass player and / or drummer for Holy Wave, who were playing a record release party that night. We didn’t catch them, because we wanted to get back to Stubb’s to see Ty Segall. We got back a bit earlier than we’d planned, and ended up catching Parquet Courts‘ set first.
Parquet Courts at Stubb’s BBQ.
They played a loud, energetic set, but it sounded like they were being heckled by multiple people in the crowd who either wouldn’t shut up between songs or kept yelling out requests. A couple band members told them multiple times to cool it.
Ty Segall came to shred. Every song seemed designed to burn the Stubb’s stage to the ground. He had some problems with the lighting, however, and had to tell the light technician to change the lighting and stop strobe lights and projections because he couldn’t see the rest of the band from his position on stage. My wife asked, “Shouldn’t all of that had been established in his contract ahead of time?”
Ty Segall at Stubb’s BBQ. That’s him shredding on the far right.
We missed his encore because we went to Barracuda to catch Virginia stoner metal powerhouses Windhand. We got there about halfway through their set, and they were already melting faces. My wife asked if the bass player’s hair covered his face because their music had melted it. It was a reasonable question, considering how heavy their riffs were.
Windhand throwing it down like a titanium gauntlet at Barracuda.
Unfortunately, we missed the set by Christian Bland and the Revelators, but we did get to Beerland to see Austin’s own Ringo Deathstarr. They’re local shoegaze legends, and I’d wanted to hear them for a while. Despite the Beerland sound engineer not being able to keep some microphone feedback in check, Ringo Deathstarr put in a solid performance. Their drummer has serious chops. I left wanting more.
Ringo Deathstarr at Beerland.
We got back to the apartment around 2:00am, which was another trend that would continue all weekend. It was a good first night, and we were happy to be back.
Up next, a day of funk, garage rock, and Chilean psychedelic freak-outs.
Keep your mind open.
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All Them Witches begin them summer tour today. They’re playing with Primus AND Mastodon May 6th – June 3rd. Tickets are on sale now. Catch them if you can. They’re great live.
MAY 3 • Rose Music Hall • COLUMBIA, MO MAY 4 • Slowdown • OMAHA, NE
MAY 6 • Red Rocks Amphitheater • MORRISON, CO ^ MAY 8 • The Criterion • OKLAHOMA CITY, OK ^
MAY 9 • White Oak Music Hall • HOUSTON, TX *
MAY 10 • South Side Ballroom • DALLAS, TX ^ MAY 11 • Austin 360 Amphitheatre • DEL VALLE, TX ^
MAY 12 • Walmart Arkansas Music Pavilion • ROGERS, AR ^
MAY 14 • BJCC Concert Hall • BIRMINGHAM, AL ^
MAY 15 • Nashville Municipal Auditorium • NASHVILLE, TN ^ MAY 16 • Fox Theatre • ATLANTA, GA ^ MAY 18 • Portsmouth Pavilion • PORTSMOUTH, VA ^
MAY 19 • Charlotte Metro Credit Union Amphitheater • CHARLOTTE, NC ^
MAY 20 • Red Hat Amphitheater • RALEIGH, NC ^
MAY 22 • Diamond Credit Union Theatre • READING, PA ^
MAY 23 • Artpark Amphitheater • LEWISTON, NY ^
MAY 25 • Cool Insuring Arena • GLENS FALLS, NY ^
MAY 26 • Bold Point Park • EAST PROVIDENCE, RI ^
MAY 27 • Maine State Pier • PORTLAND, ME ^
MAY 29 • Blue Hills Bank Pavilion • BOSTON, MA ^
MAY 30 • Penn’s Landing – Festival Pier • PHILADELPHIA, PA ^
JUN 1 • Stone Pony Summerstage • ASBURY PARK, NJ ^
JUN 2 • Pier Six Pavilion • BALTIMORE, MD ^
JUN 3 • Ford Amphitheater at Coney Island Boardwalk • BROOKLYN, NY ^
JUN 6 • Mascotte • ZURICH, SWITZERLAND
JUN 7 • Caribana Festival • CRANS-PRES-CELIGNY, SWITZERLAND JUN 8 • Download Festival • NEWBURY, UNITED KINGDOM
JUN 8 • Best Kept Secret • HILVARENBEEK, NETHERLANDS
JUN 9 • Donnington Park • NEWBURY, UNITED KINGDOM
JUN 10 • Donnington Park • NEWBURY, UNITED KINGDOM JUN 11 • AB Box • BRUSSELS, BELGIUM
JUN 13 • Backstage Halle • MUNCHEN GERMANY
JUN 14 • Nova Rock • NICKELSDORF, AUSTRIA
JUN 15 • Z-Bau • NUREMBERG, GERMANY JUN 16 • Maifield Derby Festival • MANNHEIM, GERMANY
JUL 14 • Ballard Seafoodfest • SEATTLE, WA
OCT 14 • Aftershock Festival • SACRAMENTO, CA
^
w/ Primus and Mastodon * w/ Mastodon and Mothership
“…his work is grounded in political awareness and confident poetics. Yet more than anything, he seems interested in conveying his own personality through his music—both as a recording artist and as an entertainer.” — Noisey
“If you’ve yet to experience the jubilance of Ric Wilson, jump back and get familiar with one of our favorite young guns in the game. — Okayplayer
“He may be just old enough to drink, but it feels like he’s been making music for decades.” — Mass Appeal
“With his witty wordplay laid over soulful instrumentals, Wilson produces some of the most exciting new music to come out of Chicago.” — Chicago Tribune’s Red Eye
Chicago’s own nouveau disco-rap superstar, RicWilson, is pleased to announce his new EP, BANBA, out May18th on Innovative Leisure. A 22 year-old community activist and artist based on the Southside of Chicago, Ric got his start with the legendary YCA (YoungChicagoAuthors), the Chicago-based storytelling and poetry organization which helped launch the likes of Saba, JamilaWoods, ChanceTheRapper, VicMensa, MickJenkins, Noname, and many others. The EP’s first single, “Split,” premiered earlier this morning via Noisey.
“I wrote ‘Split’ in the middle of a relationship that was going south,” says Ric. “The song is about how sometimes the best decisions you’ll make in life are the ugliest and hardest, but the healthiest for you.”
BANBA is Wilson’s first release since 2017’s acclaimed Negrow Disco EP (stream here). “When I dropped out of college to do music, I caught myself trying to explain the music I do in a different light than what it really was because I was scared of other people’s perception of my ‘rap music,’ Ric says. “I feel like people don’t appreciate rap as an actual art form, which is insane because there’s an art to rhyming, every beat is a colorful canvas and every lyric and rhyme is a stroke of mine.”
As for the EP’s cover, it’s “an ode to Basiqaut and Hebru Brantley who are my favorite visual artists,” says Ric. I want people to feel like they’re in a Basiqaut and Brantley-inspired painting when they’re listening to this EP.”
THE GOON SAX ANNOUNCE NEW ALBUM, WE’RE NOT TALKING, OUT 9/14 ON WICHITA RECORDINGS
LISTEN TO THE FIRST SINGLE “SHE KNOWS,”
CATCH THEM IN NEW YORK, LOS ANGELES, & CHICAGO
Freshly signed to Wichita Recordings, Australian trio The Goon Sax announce a brand new album,We’re Not Talking, due out on September 14th on Wichita Recordings. They will also be heading to the US for their first ever mini-tour in June.
Today they shared the first single, “She Knows”, which marries sublime indie-pop with frenetic, scratchy post-punk. The song is full of surprising angles and jagged sounds to create a perfectly awkward pop gem.
Taking the lead on this track is James Harrison, who explains further about the song: “‘She Knows’ has become a very fast song, which took us a lot of practise to be able to finally hit and strum our instruments fast enough, with a lot of string breaking. I hope it makes people energetic and excited to listen to, its a song about losing hope, stubbornness and heartache. Im not sure if its our saddest song, but maybe if you lock yourself in your room for a couple of days and only listen to it you might not feel so happy, it is also okay if you feel happy to this song! Even better!!!”
The Goon Sax are James Harrison, Louis Forster and Riley Jones from Brisbane, Australia. Still in high school when they made their first album Up To Anything in 2016, their brand of awkwardly transcendent teenage guitar pop took them into end of year lists for BBC 6Music, Billboard and Rough Trade, and earned them raves from the Guardian, Pitchfork, Spin,Uncut, Rolling Stone and elsewhere.
The Goon Sax toured UK and Europe twice on that record, played shows with Whitney, US Girls, Twerps and Teenage Fanclub, graduated school, and then turned their focus to album number two. They flew to Melbourne to record with James Cecil and Cameron Bird, respectively former/current members of Architecture In Helsinki.
New album We’re Not Talking shows how much can change between the ages of 17 and 19. It’s a record that takes the enthusiasms of youth and twists them into darker, more sophisticated shapes. Relationships are now laced with hesitation, remorse, misunderstanding and ultimately compassion. Lines like, “When the bus went past your house and past your stop my eyes filled with tears” and “I’ve got a few things above my bed but it feels so empty, I’ve got spaces to fill and we’re not talking,” are quite simply heartbreaking.
Drummer Riley Jones really comes to the fore here, joining Louis and James in singing lead and writing songs for the first time, making the band the musical equivalent of an equilateral triangle (the strongest shape in physics). After the album was recorded, Louis spent some time being bohemian in a freezing Berlin apartment, but they are now all back in Australia, and keeping busy playing shows with Angel Olsen, Perfume Genius, and Protomartyr.
Delivering brilliantly human and brutally honest vignettes of adolescent angst, The Goon Sax brim with personality, charm and heart-wrenching honesty. We’re Not Talking is a record made by restless artists, defying expectations as if hardly noticing, and its complexity makes it even more of a marvel.
WE’RE NOT TALKING TRACKLISTING
1. Make Time 4 Love
2. Love Lost
3. She Knows
4. Losing Myself
5. Somewhere In Between
6. Strange Light
7. Sleep EZ
8. We Can’t Win
9. A Few Times Too Many
10. Now You Pretend
11. Get Out
12. Til The End
THE GOON SAX TOUR DATES Tue. May 22 – Berlin, DE @ Kantine am Berghain w/ Frankie Cosmos Wed. May 23 – Hamburg, DE @ Aalhaus w/ Frankie Cosmos Thu. May 24 – Ghent, BE @ DOKbox w/ Frankie Cosmos Sat. May 26 – Paris, FR @ Petit Bain w/ Frankie Cosmos Mon. May 28 – Manchester, UK @ Gorilla w/ Frankie Cosmos Tue. May 29 – London, UK @ Sebright Arms Fri. June 1 – Sun. June 3 – Chicago, IL @ Do Division Street Fest Sun. June 3 – Chicago, IL @ Subterranean Wed. June 6 – Brooklyn, NY @ Union Pool Sun. June 10 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Echo (PART TIME PUNKS)
PRAISE FOR UP TO ANYTHING
“This is the sound of growing up smart” –Pitchfork
Los Angeles’ Crystales, named after a glass cathedral in Orange County, California, play a skillful style of shoegaze dream rock on their debut self-titled album. The tight connections of the band mates (brothers Nick and Billy Gil on guitar and vocals, neighbor Jason Hanakeawe on drums, and cousin Tony Infante on bass) only help amplify their skill set. It’s always good to hear new, good shoegaze, and Crystales fit the bill.
The album opens with a daring song titled “Boring.” Trust me, the album isn’t. The song’s about a boring wanna-be lover and how draining it can be to socialize with someone who can’t take the hint. The sunny guitars on it seem to give the song’s subject a chance at romance, however. “Séance” is just as bright, and I love the way the fuzz kicks in during the chorus like an unexpected wave knocking you over on a beach.
I also love that there’s a song called “Kate Blanchett” on this album, and that it’s one of the hardest rockers on the record. Who doesn’t have a crush on her? “Lie Awake at Night” takes a stroll into a psychedelic park on a sunny day and is about someone missing their lover. It’s secretly melancholy, but the wall of dream pop sound hides it well. Countering its love lyrics is the heavier “Shoggoth,” which refers to a Lovecraftian monster that can drive people mad just by looking at it. Is it any coincidence that Infante’s bass is prominent throughout the track and thuds like a fearful heartbeat? “When It’s Over” is brash and bold but it still keeps that shoegaze fuzzy edge that runs throughout the album.
“Ariel” is the sound of southern California road trips with the top down and the front passenger trying to make out with you while you’re driving. That shimmering sound continues on “Donkey” and “I Don’t Care.” “I Don’t Care” isn’t as apathetic as its title would have you believe, but it is about cutting ties with a lover who holds you back from your potential. “Agrias” lures you into a bit of a trance, and the closer, “Honora,” brings back some hard-edged crunch to the guitars to send you off feeling like a bad ass.
This is a solid debut. I’m loving the resurgence of shoegaze in the last few years, and bands like Crystales are giving us fans of the genre a lot to love.
Otherwise known as Thee Oh Sees and OCS, Oh Sees are a wild psych-rock band whose lineup goes through changes seemingly with every record but the hard, driving energy of their music never alters. Both of their Levitation Austinshows at Barracuda on April 28th and 29th are sold-out, but you still might be able to get tickets for their show at Austin’s Hotel Vegas on April 30th (which is a charity benefit show, no less). These shows are sure to be nuts, so get to one if you can.
Keep your mind open.
[Oh, I see you haven’t subscribed. Don’t wait any longer. You’ll feel better afterwards.]
Synth-punk weirdos POW!are playing Levitation Austinat Barracuda on April 29th at 10:50pm. It’s a sold-out show at with them opening for Oh Sees. They pay a quirky, catchy brand of electro-rock that I think will be a treat live. I hope you can make it.
Austin’s own Black Angelsnot only play Levitation Austinagain this year, they also help curate the festival every year. The psych-rock heavyweights will close Stubb’s BBQ on April 29th. I will see them at any opportunity, and it’s rare I get to see them in front of a hometown crowd. Their set will be one of my favorite moments of the festival, I’m sure.
Just in time for their latest tour, the Flaming Lips are set to release their first greatest hits collection on June 01, 2018. The vinyl version of this contains 11 tracks from the second half of their catalogue. The CD version is three discs for a total of 52 tracks and covers a lot of their earlier material as well. They’re also offering shirts and posters featuring the wild album art. I haven’t heard a lot of the cuts on the CD version of this, so I’m probably going to snag that.
