Sessanta, an untraditional tour that sees Puscifer, A Perfect Circle, and Primus joining forces, and sharing band members, is slated for April of 2024.
The Western U.S. outing is a resurrection, and expansion, of the 2014 Los Angeles event, Cinquanta, which was originally a one-time only celebration. Much like that fabled evening, which commemorated Maynard James Keenan’s landmark 50th birthday, Sessanta celebrates the Puscifer and A Perfect Circle frontman as he turns 60.
Sessanta’s unique format sees the musicians from the trio of bands joining each other’s performances throughout the concert. While each group will have their own distinctive set, the players will continually transform as the night unfolds.
“It took some massaging, and some long days in rehearsal, but we managed to seamlessly pull off this three-song rotation at Cinquanta, my 50th birthday shows, at The Greek Theatre in 2014,” says Keenan of the seven-date run that also sees A Perfect Circle’s first live performances since 2018. “Bands aren’t used to simultaneously sharing the stage with other bands, but if anyone can do it, it’s Primus, A Perfect Circle, and Puscifer.”
Tickets are on-sale now, with VIP options available via Tour.puscifer.com.
Recorded live in Glasgow, Scotland in 1995, Julian Cope‘s Barrowlands is almost seventy minutes of Cope and his four-piece band (Richard “K-R” Frost – bass and vocals, Michael “Mooneye” Watts – lead guitar and vocals, Mark “Rooster”Cosby – drums, Timothy “Thighpaulsandra” Lewis – vocals, piano, Mellotron 400, and synths) performing what was a three-hour set that’s been whittled down to this album. It marked a heavy synth influence on Cope’s live shows, as he’d recently acquired a vintage 1966 Mellotron 400 and dove head-first into synth-psych.
As a result, the live show is a wild freak-out (as, I’m sure any Cope concert is) heavy on synths and keys, but not skimping on raucous guitar riffs, tight bass, or near-panicked drum beats.
The album opens with blasting versions of “East Easy Rider” and “Spacehopper” before they slow things down a bit on “Nineteen Ninety-Five” (which Cope dedicates to a rowdy man in the crowd as Cope offers to throw him some meat). It’s a song that encourages us to open our minds and explore, and the heavy piano chords behind the message have a hint of danger to them (and the journey).
“Sleeping Gas” is downright manic, with Mooneye’s guitar sounding like an industrial saw one moment and a thrash metal solo the next. “Don’t Take Roots” is wonderfully loopy, and tracks like “Leli B.” and “Passionate Friend” (a Teardrop Explodes track, no less) keep the crowd rowdy. “Torpedo” features Cope’s unique voice supported by Thighpaulsandra’s Mellotron chords. Cope’s vocals can go from crooning to punk rage and then dreamy stylings that almost become spoken word pieces. “Torpedo” is a good example of this last one. “Julian H. Cope” is a solo acoustic track that’s like a warm-up before the sonic blast of “Out of My Mind on Dope & Speed.”
“Double Vegetation” sounds even better live than I’d hoped. Cope’s band brings a strange, haunting energy to it. Afterwards, Cope tells the crowd there won’t be an encore. “It’s really hard to go offstage after three hours and then come back,” he says. , claiming there will be only two more tracks. There are actually four.
“Reward” is first, another Teardrop Explodes classic. “It’s coming to an end,” Cope says before he and his crew launch into “Hanging Out & Hung Up on the Line.” Cope’s vocals take on an angry snarl while Mooneye’s guitar buzzes like someone just threw a beehive on the stage. “World Shut Your Mouth” roars with heavy bass from Frost and Thighpaulsandra’s synths are at times bright and other times skronky. The album ends with Cope’s wild, trippy, frenetic classic “Reynard the Fox” – which must have caused a near riot when they played it at this show because it’s like ending a marathon with a kickboxing match. It’s always been one of Cope’s best songs, and getting a live version of it on this record is a treat.
The whole thing is a treat if you’re a fan of Cope’s work. I hope the Archdrude releases more live cuts. He’s a bit of a hermit nowadays, and has mostly given up the rock life, but maybe, just maybe, he’ll come out of hiding and surprise us.
Today, Southern California-bred musician Zooey Celeste signs to ATO Records, announces his debut album, Restless Thoughts, out November 3rd, and presents the lead single/title track. Produced and recorded by acclaimed artist Nick Hakim at his Brooklyn studio, Restless Thoughts centers on Zooey’s hypnotic baritone vocals, often set against a strangely potent backdrop of sparse drum-machine beats and droney guitar tones. The result is a fully-realized soundscape, a darkly ethereal palette which Zooey classifies as astral-pop. Restless Thoughts takes its title from a song inspired by a particularly dramatic scene in Zooey’s novel, a metaphysical thriller narrated by the character of Zooey Celeste. “It’s a scene where the father of the protagonist has destroyed his marriage and left his daughter behind, and he’s going to meet his mistress and driving in a very suicidal headspace,” he explains. “He gets into a car accident, and two-thirds of the way into the song he’s floating above his body and watching as they’re trying to resuscitate him.”
Like many of the album’s songs, the gorgeously chilling track took shape in the throes of the novel-writing process. “I’d write a chapter and pick up my guitar and start writing songs based off the scenes I’d just finished,” says Zooey. “It’s funny because it’s the first time I’ve ever allowed myself to write from the perspective of a character, but it’s also the most authentic thing I’ve ever made in my life.” Stream Zooey Celeste’s “Restless Thoughts” Restless Thoughts is the real-life manifestation of its creator’s alter ego — an astral shaman responsible for leading the newly departed into the great beyond. After dreaming up the character of Zooey Celeste in a feverishly written novel he refers to as “somewhere between Quentin Tarantino and the Bhagavad Gita,” Zooey began working with longtime friend Nick Hakim (whose production credits also include Lil Yachty and Lianne La Havas) to create this ideal soundtrack for nocturnal driving, an immediate conduit for lasting transcendence. Alongside Hakim, Zooey enlisted a wide array of guest musicians to flesh out the sound of Restless Thoughts, including Unknown Mortal OrchestrabassistJake Portrait, drummer Abe Rounds (Andrew Bird, Blake Mills, Devandra Banhart), and Columbian-Canadian singer/songwriter Tei Shi. Mastered by Heba Kadry (Ryuichi Sakamoto, Björk, Julianna Barwick), Restless Thoughts endlessly drifts between avant-punk and chamber-pop and lo-fi psychedelia, quickly drawing the listener into a sustained dream state.
Naming J.D. Salinger, Iggy Pop, and Tyler, the Creator among his inspirations, Zooey started writing songs at the age of eight after hearing The Beatles for the first time. Along with studying poetry and creative writing, he later took up guitar, piano, and harmonium and played in a series of indie-rock-leaning musical projects that ultimately proved unfulfilling. “We’d finish a show and it would be the best show we’d ever played, and I’d feel physically sick afterward,” he says. “People liking it made me feel bad, which is probably because I knew I wasn’t being my most authentic self.” After a seven-year stint in New York (where he first connected with Hakim), Zooey spent several years in Hawaii and devoted much of his time to surfing—an essential part of his life since early childhood. “I got addicted to surfing bigger waves at Sunset Beach on the North Shore and had a near-death experience where I went through a coral reef, and it changed my life in a lot of ways,” he says. “It took the air out of the wanderlust I’d felt for a long time, and brought me closer to the things I’d been running away from. Because of that, music went from being an escape to a base of reflection where I’m able to really sit with my emotions and process them and be totally honest with myself about what I want from life.”
With the release of Restless Thoughts, Zooey hopes to instill the audience with a similarly expanded sense of possibility. “Making this record showed me that if I’m not going beyond what the world has handed me as options, then I’m not being creative,” he says. “I went as far as I could with the process of self-exploration, and I felt fully supported in that—almost like everything was a little bit fated, or we were tapping into something in the ether. I’d love it if that inspired other people to go off and do whatever they feel compelled to do, and let themselves be completely entranced by it.” Pre-order Restless Thoughts
Next week Patio will release their sophomore LP Collection. Produced by Nate Amosof Water From Your Eyes, the album will be released on Fire Talk Records, and is the follow up to their acclaimed 2019 debut LP Essentials, the album has so far seen the release of three singles, “Sixpence,” “Relics” and “En Plein Air,” which have seen praise from outlets like Rolling Stone, Stereogum, Paste, BrooklynVegan and Clash among many others. Today, the band are sharing a final preview from the record, a dub-inspired dance track entitled “Inheritance.”
Inspired by classic 80s bands like Pylon, Bush Tetras, and New Order, “Inheritance” was conceived as a shadowy sister song to “Relics,” utilizing a dense network of cultural and historical references to further explore the idea of generational trauma. As the band explains: “Inheritance” summons the forces of southern Italian folklore, weaving together myths, stories, and allusions to family history, cult 80s punk, and Proto-Renaissance art.” Together with producer Nate Amos — a “musical genius” who became the band’s “perfect fourth brain” — “Inheritance” allowed Patio to experiment with in-studio improvisation. Tasked with the job of crafting a dance-floor-ready “remix,” Amos added unexpected sonic flourishes like drum effects, piano crashes, and jagged sounds from a bucket of screws. In support of the release the band will be embarking on a European tour date supporting Deeper in the fall. Full details on those dates and the band’s New York release show and London headline gig can be found below. Patio’s Collection is available for preorder HERE
The story behind King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard‘s October 2022 album, Changes, is a bit of an odd one, but which King Gizz album doesn’t have an odd story behind it?
Changes was recorded over five years in various studios, houses, and other places, and it was supposed to be the last album of their 2017 project to release five albums in one year. However, the songs they’d crafted so far didn’t fit in with the project they had in mind, and the last album they put out in 2017 ended up being Gumboot Soup.
They never abandoned Changes, however, and kept coming back to it as something they felt they had to finish. The album is built around the concept that every song on the album is changing key practically all the time. The band kept tinkering with the record until they felt they had it right and finally released it just in time for Halloween last year.
The thirteen-minute, three-second opener, “Change,” is the record’s diving board, plunging you into this weird, constantly shifting world. Change is the only constant, after all. The song is a lovely, floating bit of psychedelia that carries you along a winding river which might not end until you’re in the ocean, but that’s okay with you as you’re okay with whatever life rolls at you by this point.
The bouncy keyboards of “Hate Dancin'” are a funny contrast to Stu Mackenzie‘s lyrics about how much he hates dancing, because the song is highly danceable. Cookie Craig‘s funky bass on “Astroturf” will perk up your ears. The guitar on “No Body” sounds like wax melting down the side of a candle.
“Gondii” dives into the band’s love of electronica with its synth-beats and 16-bit video game rhythms. “Can’t get a message to my brain. I can’t control myself,” Mackenzie sings as electro-hi-hats sizzle around him. I think that lack of control is meant for the dance floor. You’d think a song titled “Exploding Suns” would be some thrash metal track on one of their albums like Infest the Rats’ Nest, but instead it’s a mellow track best suited for meditation and zoning out with a pair of headphones and warm tea (which means it’s lovely). The album ends with “Short Change,” a nearly instrumental that runs through the constant key changes throughout the album, reminding us that change is ever-flowing and something to float along with rather than fear.
Don’t fear this album either. It’s not a bad place to start if you’re new to the Gizzverse.
Keep your mind open.
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One of the most interesting things about Shame is how they find new ways to re-examine themselves on each record. Drunk Tank Pink was about being forced into sometimes frightening introspection during the pandemic, and now Food for Worms has the band looking outward at the world and each other.
“You’re complaining a lot about the things that you got given,” sings frontman Charlie Steen on “Fingers of Steel” – a song about being straight-up with your friends, especially when they don’t want to hear it but need to hear it. You can’t control the results, of course, but at least you were honest. “Six Pack” is almost a story of madness brought on during pandemic lockdown. “You’re just a creature of bad habit. You got nothing and no one to live for,” Steen sings in the middle of the track, making you think he’s lost it, but then the whole band comes in with bonkers fury to bust him out of the (mental) room in which he’s trapped.
“Yankees” is one of the few (barely) subdued tracks on the album. The guitars drift in and out of the track like they’re walking back and forth through a bead curtain. It drifts nicely into “Alibis,” which sears across your speakers like a match thrown onto a trail of kerosene. “This time, I have no use for alibis,” Steen sings, letting us know that he has no intention of hiding his intentions.
“Adderall” is a tale from the perspective of someone dependent on medication just to manage everyday tasks (“It gets you through the day…”). Steen’s vocals take on a simple vulnerability and Sean Coyle-Smith‘s guitar floats back and forth from frantic to relaxed. The vocal vulnerability continues on “Orchid,” in which Steen takes on a bit of a crooner style, not unlike Protomartyr‘s Joe Casey singing sometimes heartbreaking lyrics like “We’re tourists in adolescence. We’re lovers in regression.”
Josh Finerty‘s bass on “The Fall of Paul” is vicious, almost like a growling bear staring at you from across a fire-lit campsite late one cold night. The drums on “Burning By Design” will instantly cause rampant dancing whenever it’s played live. They propel the song, and the whole band, like a foot stomped on an accelerator pedal, and yet Steen is already looking ahead to what new things the band can craft (“I don’t care about the songs that use these chords, I am sure there’s plenty more, but I know they’re not the same.”).
“Different Person” is about the ever-changing dynamics of friendships (a running theme through the album), and how some friendships you think will last forever don’t, and how others you never thought much about at first turn out to be the best ones in the end (“I guess you’re changing. It had to happen eventually.”). They remind us of this one last time on “All the People” with lyrics like “All the people that you’re gonna meet, don’t throw it all away, because you can’t love yourself.”
Hold onto your friends, and they’ll help you hold onto yourself before you, and they, become food for worms. Everything is impermanent, even friendships, but we can enjoy them while they last.
I love the American Southwest, particularly the Mojave and Sonoran Deserts. I once heard an Arizona writer, whose name has long since drifted from my memory, describe the energy of the desert as this: “The desert will reduce you.” I can’t put it any better than that. Detroit proto-punks Protomartyr, however, have summed up that growth-by-reduction philosophy well on their new album, Formal Growth in the Desert.
The album comes after a lot of changes for the band, particularly for lead singer and lyricist Joe Casey. His mother died after a long battle with Alzheimer’s disease, leaving Casey in his Detroit family home alone for the first time in years. Then, repeated break-ins of his home made him reconsider the town he loved and if he should stay there. Personal safety and less stress won the debate, and he moved out of the home and dove into his journals for some of his most personal lyrics yet.
“Welcome to the haunted Earth,” he sings to open the album on “Make Way,” – a song about death and how it changes everything for everyone, even if they never knew the deceased. “For Tomorrow” is one of Protomartyr’s most straight-up post-punk tracks in a few years with Greg Ahee‘s guitar chords taking on weird angles and sharp edges throughout it.
The desert metaphor is in plain sight on “Elimination Dances,” in which Casey says, “In the desert, I was humbled.” Yep. It does that to you. So does the death of a loved one. The song creeps around you (largely due to Scott Davidson‘s excellent bass riffs on it) like grief always waiting at the edge of a room or in a quiet moment. Casey’s vocal delivery on “Fun in Hi Skool” (a song about how school pretty much sucks) is some of his fiercest on the whole record. “Let’s Tip the Creator” is the band sticking their fingers in the eyes of mega-corporations who continually screw over employees in pursuit of profits.
The album’s centerpiece is “Graft Vs. Host,” which was written in the early days following Casey’s mother’s death. He wonders what it will take to find happiness afterwards, almost if there’s some sort of procedure he can have to remove the grief. “She wouldn’t want to see me live this way,” he says. He’s right, but he knows that’s easier said than done. It’s a lovely track that will hit hard for you if you’ve lost someone close.
“3800 Tigers” references the Detroit Tigers playing over a century from now and how we’re also slowly killing all the remaining tigers on Earth. “Polacrilex Kid” has Casey wondering if he can be loved while hating himself. Alex Leonard‘s relentless drum beats on it reflect the pounding in Casey’s brain as he tries to figure out his self-imposed riddle. “Fulfillment Center” is a song about Amazon workers unionizing to get things as basic as restroom breaks, and “We Know the Rats” makes reference to the break-ins at Casey’s home (“Could’ve happened to anyone. They came through the back room.”). You can tell Casey still has some smoldering anger over it and how the wheels of justice often turn slow.
Casey is still wondering if he can find love on the roaring track “The Author,” and, delightfully, the recently engaged frontman finds it on “Rain Garden,” in which he sounds like he can relax and step into a new light (“My love…Make way for my love.”) over the next dune in his metaphorical desert.
I need to mention the thematic feel of the album. Greg Ahee has spoken about how he was scoring films and listening to a lot of Ennio Morricone while Formal Growth in the Desert was being crafted, and the album moves along like a film beginning with tragedy and ending with hope. It’s brilliant.
I was delighted to get an e-mail from Guillame (guitar) and Romauld (drums) of Birds of Nazca from Nantes, France wondering if I might like to hear their new stoner / doom / heavy psych EP Héliote. Um…Yeah!
After a brief intro, we’re smacked in the face with the rolling, rumbling, rocking “Inti Raymi” – which has you wondering how just two people can put out so much heavy sound. “Spheniscus” calms the guitars a bit, but it’s a bit of a feint as the track builds to a pulse-quickening space rock jam about two minutes into it. Soon, it’s like flying a spacecraft through the rings of Saturn like you’ve been doing it for years. The EP ends with “Gucumatz,” spanning over nine minutes and taking you beyond Saturn with its expansive guitar chords and low gravity drums.
This is all in just three songs. It makes you wonder what kind of cosmic power they could unleash in a full album. Let’s hope they do soon.
Keep your mind open.
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The inimitable King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard announce their first 2024 North American tour dates, all 3-hour marathon sets. Following the release of PetroDragonic Apocalypse — their latest album and “end times thrash metal concept album” (The Needle Drop) — as well as this year’s recently-wrapped sold-out residency tour, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard’s newly announced dates will bring their acclaimed marathon sets back to North America, including stops in New York, Chicago, Austin, TX and Quincy, WA at the legendary Gorge Amphitheatre (which, at a capacity of 21,600 tickets, will be the band’s largest headline show to date). General on sale begins today Friday, September 15th at 12pm ET. A full list of dates is below. Tickets will be available at kinggizzardandthelizardwizard.com
KING GIZZARD & THE LIZARD WIZARD TOUR DATES Sat. Aug. 17, 2024 – Forest Hills, NY @ Forest Hills Stadium Sun. Sept. 1, 2024 – Chicago, IL @ Huntington Bank Pavilion at Northerly Island Sat. Sept. 14, 2024 – Quincy, WA @ The Gorge Amphitheatre Fri. Nov. 15, 2024 – Austin, TX @ Germania Insurance Amphitheater
While you were busy doom scrolling, Lowell, Massachusetts rapper / DJ / MC / radio show host / actor / mack / all-around cool dude D-Tension taught himself how to play a guitar and made a rock record – Tales from the Pub. It’s an album entirely played and sung by him and made up of songs based on his life both as a teenager and as a grown man dealing with everything from existential ennui to calling out a possible murderer.
“No Name Song” is instantly relatable to everyone, as it’s about not being able to remember someone’s name within thirty seconds of meeting them. D’s guitar work is loud, sizzling, and echoes his frustration as he tries to remember the name of a hot girl. “Charlie” is the song about the aforementioned suspected murderer – a rich guy who seems above the law while women associated with him have been found in a local river. D, for one, isn’t standing for it any longer (“And when you see Charlie, tell him that I’m on my way. And when you see Charlie, tell him that I know where he lives.”).
D has mentioned in interviews how fellow east-coasters The Smithereens were an inspiration for some of the tracks on the album, and I can hear some of Pat DiNizio‘s vocal influence on “Alone.” “MAGAHAT” is a fun punk track about D discovering a girl he likes is a Trump supporter. Getting back to The Smithereens, Jim Babjak‘s guitar influence comes out on “Other Side of the Road” and in one of D’s best solos on the record.
“Ghost Me” covers one of D’s favorite songwriting subjects – girls who did him wrong. In this track, he professes that he still cares for a gal who ditched him and is willing to meet her again even after she’s been gone for ten years. His guitar work gets psychedelic on “Woodrose,” much to my delight. Crank that reverb!
“Tell me, how we gonna get that magic back?” D asks on “I Love You Anyway,” in which he ponders how to reignite the spark in his relationship but is willing to stick it out through the tough times. “(They Were) In Love” brings in some doo-wop for good measure for a funny song about how weird love is in modern times…yet it’s really as weird as it’s always been.
The White Stripes are another influence D-Tension has mentioned for Tales from the Pub, and that can be heard on “I Give In” with its jangly guitar riffs and simple, raw drum beats. The closer, “The Airport Song,” is one D wrote when we was fifteen-years-old. It’s a fun track about how the airport is a great place to meet girls from all over the world and all different sizes, shapes, races, and religions. It’s easy to picture a teenaged D-Tension standing wide-eyed in Boston airport as gorgeous women keep passing him.
It’s a fun look into D-Tension’s brain, and you can tell he had fun making this record. I’m sure he has more tales to tell, and I can’t wait to hear them.
