Album, recorded with Avetts producing and backing him up, is due next February.

By Blurt Staff

One unexpected highlight for BLURT of last weekend's MoogFest was having a chance to hear the new G. Love album in its entirety at an afternoon party on Saturday. Titled Fixin' To Die, it's set for release on February 22nd on Brushfire Records; it was recorded at Echo Mountain Studios in Asheville, NC, and produced by The Avett Brothers.

After a chance meeting in Boston last fall, G. Love and The Avett Brothers forged a friendship and bonded over their love of back road blues.  After performing together onstage and discovering their shared musical heritage, G. Love invited Scott and Seth Avett to not only produce his new album, but perform on it as well.

The result is a collection of G. Love originals, rearranged traditionals, and an unexpected cover of Paul Simon's "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover," the latter done up like a roots-blues nugget. The idea was to strip away all pretence and capture the original spirit and sound G. Love has cultivated over his entire career but never fully embraced until now. From the ragged jangle of its opener "Milk & Sugar" and floorboard stomp of Bukka White's "Fixin' To Die," over the loping lilt of "Home" and longing for "Katie Miss," through the greasy fried "Get Goin'" and moonshine reverb of "Heaven," it's an eye- and ear-opening record,. Period.

"It was an emotional recording session and I was truly blown away by the level of focus, care and passion Scott & Seth brought to it. It was a tremendously positive and encouraging experience. This is the most inspired I've ever felt making a record," G. Love said, in a statement.

Added Scott Avett, "There's a little bit of this record on all the previous G. Love records, you just had to look for it. This is the record we all knew he should make and he could make, but again, he had to open himself to the core to make it. That's the difference."

By Fred Mills

With the new Ryan Adams & The Cardinals album III/IV heading down the pipeline very soon, Adams has now announced the tracklisting for the double-LP archival set, which was originally recorded back in 2006. His label, Pax Am will commence taking preorders "shortly," we are advised, in vinyl, CD and digital formats, so you'll need to keep checking back to that site. The full tracklisting is below.

Pax Am has also announced the "standard edition" for his sci-fi metal album Orion is now available as well - a limited edition version was released earlier this year.

Side A

Breakdown Into The Resolve

Dear Candy

Wasteland

Ultraviolet Light

Stop Playing With My Heart

SIDE B

Lovely And Blue

Happy Birthday

Kisses Start Wars

The Crystal Skull

Users

SIDE C

No

Numbers

Gracie

Icebreaker

Sewers At The Bottom Of The Wishing Well

SIDE D

Typecast

Star Wars

My Favorite Song

P.S.

Death And Rats

Kill The Lights

Commandering the stage of storied venue the Starry Plough on Oct. 29, the psych-pop maestros showcase material from their new album and lots, lots more.

By Jud Cost

"We're here to play Norwegian Death Metal," announces a deadpan Dennis Davison to a couple of dozen Friday night customers at Berkeley's Starry Plough, a club that looks like it's stalled in the middle of demolition. And nobody gets up to leave. Which means they either aren't listening, or the singer for Los Angeles-based combo the Jigsaw Seen appears dangerous enough to take down license numbers of the departing and exact some form of revenge. It's probably the former, since the rail-thin, sharp-witted Davison and longtime partner in crime, guitarist extraordinaire Jonathan Lea, look like people who would trap spiders found in the bathroom in a jar and free them outdoors.

Their songs, too, exemplify the offbeat nature of the Jigsaw Seen, a band that survives by swimming upstream in trendy Tinseltown. Past major Jigsaw works "My Name Is Tom" and "Fiddlesticks" have glorified respectively a Peeping Tom/rapist and Wisconsin serial killer/Frigidaire poster boy Jeffrey Dahmer. Accompanied by keyboardist Joe Berardi, they have returned to the Bay Area for the first time in 15 years to ballyhoo their brilliant new album Bananas Foster" (Vibro-Phonic; reviewed here at BLURT), a work with more delightful nooks and crannies than Carlsbad Caverns.

"Does anybody have any particular requests?" asks Davison, knowing full well what the answer will be. Some young kid in a Giants ballcap hollers out "Crazy Legs!" as Davison points "bingo" in his direction. The same person had buttonholed the singer after soundcheck, and told him, "I get it. I get ‘Crazy Legs'!" Except that he had the lyrics all wrong, Davison points out.

And no, "Crazy Legs," is not dedicated to former L.A. Rams halfback, Elroy "Crazy Legs" Hirsch. Rather, it could be about surviving a dread disease by using its own impetus against it, like in certain Asian martial arts. Or it could explain the catch-and-release of spindly-legged arachnids. Only Davison knows for sure, and he's not talking.

The two big rockers from the new album, a glossy Arthur Lee/Love-like "Bertha Brilliance" and an angular Yardbirds-esque "This Is Where The Action Isn't" are mothballed tonight for the record's moodier gems that focus attention on Davison's extraordinary lyrics and Lea's complementary guitar work, filtered through a jury-rigged floor setup. "Most of those parts were played on vintage synthesizers on the album," explains Lea, who also sometimes accompanies Dave Davies of the Kinks. "I had to fiddle around with three different pedals to get close to the same sound."

Most of the set tonight is not for the mentally fragile. With Lea's bottleneck work and mandolin-like guitar, "Choreography Killed The Cat" has a few dark, Appalachian moments that might suggest throwing the wife and kids down the nearest well. Then there's the baroque-pop, synth-heavy sadness of "Melancholy Morning," a situation faced often by Davison when overcome by what he calls "the grey fog" of depression. Berardi, whose versatility on keyboards holds things together, shines on what sounds like drumsticks tapping on a plastic box to accentuate the repeated line "When I dropped your bones they rattled like fiddlesticks."

"Here's a song about the lost history of the canine race," says Davison, who volunteers his time at various Southern California dog-rescue missions. The epic waltz's inescapable sadness makes "You Look Like A Lot Of People" seem almost jolly by comparison. Once again, the Arthur Lee similarity arises in "People" with its bipolar love song/putdown nature. Though no clone of Lee's ethereal tenor, there's something unmistakably "Arthurian" about Davison's voice." Even he would probably admit it.

"People have asked me lately if maybe the show is too much of a downer," says Davison on the sidewalk outside the club afterwards, as the drizzle turns into light rain. It's a valid question. "Fruit Basket Upset," with its swaying marimba and Caribbean feel helped to temporarily brighten the mood like a frosty piña colada. But a few well-placed raga-rockers such as "My Name Is Tom" wouldn't have been amiss. Nevertheless, the current repertoire, some of the very best Jigsaw Seen songs ever, stands alone very nicely

But I do miss the young, hot-headed Davison who angrily tossed a fairly small amp into the crowd at an L.A. club almost 20 years ago. Neo-garage rockers the Fuzztones had refused to vacate the stage, leaving Jigsaw Seen only ten minutes to play before closing time. No one was hurt by the careening missile, since almost everybody had already gone home. Davison, usually the most quotable frontman since the glory days of Dan Hicks, apologized afterwards for running out of snappy stage patter tonight. "About halfway into the set, the grey fog settled in," he admitted, maybe hoisting himself on his own petard. A small price to pay, however, for unveiling these new masterworks - and probably correctible by prescription drugs.

Much-liked musician and Saint Etienne associate eventually turned to journalism.

By Fred Mills

Andrew Midgley, who in the early ‘90s was one-half of pop outfit Cola Boy, passed away suddenly last Thursday at the age of 45. According to British news reports, he collapsed at the gym.

Midgley had his moment of fame in 1992 when Cola Boy - Midgley plus Janey Lee Grace - hit the UK top ten with the luscious, ‘60s-tilting dance-pop song "Seven Ways to Love," written by Saint Etienne's Bob Stanley, a close friend. View the original video for the song, below.

 Later he moved out of performing and into music journalism, working in Manchester, Dublin, and eventually Edinburgh, where he was a fixture at the Edinburgh Evening News. He was a prolific blogger in recent years as well.

So - will this in fact BE the final LCD release?

By Blurt Staff / Photo by Josh Withers

This just in from the LCD Soundsystem camp, reprinted verbatim:

***

lcd soundsystem release 'the london sessions' on november 9th 2010 through dfa/virgin records, available exclusively on iTunes through december 6th.

 
 the london sessions is a unique 'john peel session style' 9 trk encapsulation of one of today's most acclaimed acts in perhaps their rawest and most original recordings to date.

the session itself was recorded in one day at the pool/miloco studios in south london on june 29th 2010, in the week following this year's triumphant glastonbury performance.  it was locked in order to record tracks for dissemination across the globe through the medium of contemporary rock radio; fans of lcd soundsystem will know that radio sessions are something that have never been a staple of the band's career thus far because of the belief in the necessity to maintain the highest quality of all sonic recordings released into the ether.

 
 the set which spans the breadth of their career to date, perfectly captures the intuitive live evolvement of lcd as a band. here nothing is replicated with computers, everything instead is recreated in real time, tougher, looser and less clinically. It features tracks from all of their studio albums to date, as well as long lost b-side classic 'yr city's a sucker' and is a must for any fan of the band. the tracks were subsequently mixed by james murphy in nyc at dfa's plantain studio & mastered by his longtime cohort bob weston in chicago.

 
 the tracklist is as follows:
 

 us v them
 all I want
 drunk girls
 get innocuous
 daft punk is playing at my house
 all my friends
 pow pow
 I can change
 yr city's a sucker

 
 since the release of 'this is happening', the speculation has continued to build that this is the final lcd album.

Dude's metal eye for the straight guy gives way to the straight ‘n' narrow world of born-again Christiandom in the recently published Mustaine: A Heavy Metal Memoir.

By John B. Moore

Megadeth founder and former Metallica guitarist Dave Mustaine is full of contradictions and many of them come out in his memoir.  His band Megadeth, along with other thrash metal founders like Anthrax and Slayer were seen as the antidote to the preening, style-over-substance genre of hair metal that hijacked the ‘80s music scene, yet throughout his book, Mustaine talks about band members who did not have the "right look" - either they didn't dress right or their hair was too short to fit into the image he had for his band. He even details a few makeovers he had to conduct over the years to get members looking just right (a sort of metal eye for the straight guy).

The larger contradiction revealed in Mustaine: A Heavy Metal Memoir (It Books), though, is Mustaine's admission that he is now a Born Again Christian. Yup, the guy evangelists throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s warned was a devil worshipper who would sacrifice your kids is now totting a Bible. Religion plays heavily in Mustaine's childhood: raised a Jehovah's Witness, he does admit to dabbling in Satanism briefly (though not actually coming right out and admitting to being a Satanist).

Contradictions aside, or perhaps because of them, Mustaine: A Heavy Metal Memoir is far more interesting than the standard heavy metal bio detailing years of banging groupies and hanging with Aerosmith (don't believe me, check out the recent memoirs from members of Motley Crue and Guns ‘N Roses - which are pretty hard to tell apart). 

He also opens up in great detail about his drug use, his numerous visits to rehab (17 to date), and his brief stint in Metallica, getting kicked out of the band mid-tour, and being asked to participate in the train wreck of the Metallica documentary Some Kind of Monster.

It's clear that Mustaine still feels betrayed by his former band and will be competing with them every time he takes the stage, walks into a studio or simply straps on a guitar.

Horrible band name, but awesome music.

By Blurt Staff

Bachelorette's My Electric Family introduced her pop sounds to new listeners all around the planet. Little did they know that there were more sublime Bachelorette songs where that came from - and not in the future, but rather, the past...

Drag City is now prepping vinyl-only reissues of her first two releases, "The End of Things" and Isolation Loops, the first time either of these records have appeared in analog form. Both vinyl releases will contain download codes. Watch for both on Nov. 16.

"The End of Things" appeared in 2005, a mini-LP. Here, Bachelorette (aka Annabel Alpers of New Zealand) sketched out her basic design, a bedroom version of hi-tech dance pop with an elastic sense of style under the surface, its scope a vision of emotional landscapes where the intimate can become the infinite in a sudden flash. This new vinyl version features new cover artwork, a complete departure from the original "The End of Things" design.

Isolation Loops was first released in 2007 by Electroplate Recordings and Mistletone Records. Bachelorette continued to fly over a full spectrum of popular music forms, from girl-group to psychedelic to torch to disco, always with an inventive ear for sounds and a gift for melody, scored with the chilly sounds of drum machines and keyboards.

Alpersis wandering the world at present, moving around as she works out the music for the new Bachelorette album, due for release in the Spring of 2011.

Early LPs get a buffing and shining, and even a limited edition red vinyl treatment.

By Fred Mills

Rhino has announced it will be reissuing Tom Waits' classic 4-album Asylum Records run from the early ‘70s this December on vinyl. 180-gram/original packaging editions of  Closing Time, The Heart Of Saturday Night, Nighthawks At The Diner and Small Change. They arrive Dec. 21, but get this: you'll also be able to nab limited edition (just 1000 copies of each) red wax versions of that LPs directly from Waits, i.e., at www.tomwaitsstore.com. (Pre-ordering has already begun, and these are sure to be sellouts.

Here's some background hype - all true, marketing matters aside - about each record, courtesy Rhino, to bring you newcomers up to speed. Full tracklistings follow....

***

Waits' debut Closing Time arrived in 1973 when the singer-songwriter was 23 years old. A number of artists covered songs from the album, starting a trend that would continue throughout Waits' career. "Martha" was recorded by Tim Buckley and frequently performed by Bette Midler, while the Eagles recorded a version of "Ol' ‘55" for the band's 1974 album On The Border.

After touring with several artists including Frank Zappa, Waits returned the following year with The Heart Of Saturday Night. Bones Howe produced the album and would go on to produce Waits' next five albums with Asylum. The album was included in Rolling Stone‘s list of the "500 Greatest Albums of All Time."

For his third release, Nighthawks At The Diner (1975), Waits recorded a double album of new music live in front of an audience at the Record Plant Studios in Los Angeles. The album features Waits setting up many songs by telling the stories behind them, a practice that remains an integral part of his live show to this day. Waits recorded this record with a jazz combo consisting of Mike Melvoin (piano), Pete Christlieb (tenor sax), Jim Hughart (bass) and Bill Goodwin (drums).

Released in 1976, Waits recorded Small Change at Wally Heider's studio in Hollywood. The album opens with "Tom Traubert's Blues," one of the singer's most enduring songs, and features memorable cuts such as "I Wish I Was In New Orleans," "Bad Liver And A Broken Heart" and "The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me)."

CLOSING TIME

Side One

1.        "Ol' '55"

2.        "I Hope That I Don't Fall In Love With You"

3.        "Virginia Avenue"

4.        "Old Shoes (& Picture Postcards)"

5.        "Midnight Lullaby"

6.        "Martha"

Side Two

1.        "Rosie"

2.        "Lonely"

3.        "Ice Cream Man"

4.        "Little Trip To Heaven (On The Wings Of Your Love)"

5.        "Grapefruit Moon"

6.        "Closing Time"

THE HEART OF SATURDAY NIGHT

Side One

1.        "A New Coat Of Paint"

2.        "San Diego Serenade"

3.        "Semi Suite"

4.        "Shiver Me Timbers"

5.        "Diamonds On My Windshield"

6.        "(Looking for) The Heart of Saturday Night"

Side Two

1.        "Fumblin' With The Blues"

2.        "Please Call Me, Baby"

3.        "Depot, Depot"

4.        "Drunk On The Moon"

5.        "The Ghosts Of Saturday Night (After Hours At Napoleone's Pizza House)"

NIGHTHAWKS AT THE DINER

Side One

1.        (Opening Intro)

2.        "Emotional Weather Report"

3.        (Intro)

4.        "On A Foggy Night"

5.        (Intro)

6.        "Eggs And Sausage (In A Cadillac With Susan Michelson)"

Side Two

1.        (Intro)

2.        "Better Off Without A Wife"

3.        "Nighthawk Postcards (From Easy Street)"

Side Three

1.        (Intro)

2.        "Warm Beer And Cold Women"

3.        (Intro)

4.        "Putnam County"

5.        "Spare Parts I (A Nocturnal Emission)" 

Side Four

1.        "Nobody"

2.        (Intro)

3.        "Big Joe And Phantom 309"

4.        "Spare Parts II And Closing"

SMALL CHANGE

Side One

1.        "Tom Traubert's Blues (Four Sheets To The Wind In Copenhagen)"

2.        "Step Right Up"

3.        "Jitterbug Boy (Sharing a Curbstone with Chuck E. Weiss, Robert Marchese, Paul Body and the Mug and Artie)"

4.        "I Wish I Was In New Orleans (In The Ninth Ward)"

5.        "The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me) (An Evening With Pete King)"

Side Two

1.        "Invitation To The Blues"

2.        "Pasties And A G-String (At The Two O'Clock Club)"

3.        "Bad Liver And A Broken Heart (In Lowell)"

4.        "The One That Got Away"

5.        "Small Change (Got Rained On With His Own .38)"
6.        "I Can't Wait To Get Off Work (And See My Baby On Montgomery Avenue)"

At Tralf Music Hall in Buffalo on Oct. 16, the Scottish band charmed a modest but enthusiastic crowd.

Photos/Text By April S. Engram

After touring the Northeast with label mates Twilight Sad earlier in the year, it was questionable if the Scottish quartet would make a hasty return. Luckily, We Were Promised Jetpacks were not quite finished touring in support of their 2009 debut These Four Walls. The band's reputation of putting on impressive live performances preceded them and was proven more than accurate.

Jetpacks took a detour from their support of Jimmy Eat World to host a headlining show at Buffalo's Tralf Music Hall. Though the quaint venue was not full to capacity, the band definitely put on a passionate show for their equally zealous fans. Yet the opportunity to see the talented group was almost lost as the road to Buffalo proved a troublesome one for the Jetpacks: the musicians had to battle an immobile tour van, and the previous night the gents relied on the kindness of a fan to make their Boston show. Fortunately all was mended in time for Buffalo.

When singer Adam Thompson, guitarist Michael Palmer, bassist Sean Smith and drummer Darren Lackie finally graced the stage the crowd gathered for instrumental opening track "A Half Built House." After playing a few high octane numbers, "Conductor," and "Quiet Little Voices," Thompson took a moment to address the audience. "How's the van?" a fan shouted to which Thompson admitted that the break down was due to someone putting the wrong grade of gasoline in the van. "We won't admit who did it," he joked as Smith pointed to Lackie. "He didn't do it," Thompson continued, "but we'll blame him since he was there." He quietly readied his guitar and the band leapt into another track.

And thus continued the congenial night; audience members loudly sang and shouted along with Thompson, they clapped and cheered with the music and the more inebriated supporters danced about and tried to get their neighbors to do the same. Every song performed by Jetpacks was as perfectly executed as those on These Four Walls; however, this was a longer set for the band. Thompson noted that it was a change of pace to play 12 songs versus seven so the band played several unreleased songs expected to appear on their upcoming album.

The night was filled with fast paced, punk rock tracks like "Moving Clocks Run Slow," "This Is My House, This Is My Home," and "Roll Up Your Sleeves." We Were Promised Jetpacks' lengthy performance closed with the obvious crowd (and personal) favorite, "Short Bursts." Before beginning the number Thompson thanked everyone for coming, to which the grateful fans thanked them for coming to Buffalo. "We'll be Facebook friends," he joked. And though Lackie's abuse of his drum kit led to a split drum stick after just two songs, "Short Bursts" truly exemplifies the drummers lightning fast beats as he slaughtered his cymbals.

The crowd happily shouted the closing words and cheered, as Jetpacks laid down their instruments and departed. They did not return for an encore, but the kinetic hour of explosive music had definitely pleased all.

Get laid with E-butts.

By Blurt Staff

For some reason our inboxes are getting flooded with spam for E-cigarettes - you know, those that advertise "no tar, no tobacco, no ash, no smell." Hopefully no lung cancer, too, but that's not specifically mentioned.

All the ads tend to show some sexy babe (like the one above; raise your hand if you spot the visual contradiction), of course; some things in advertising never change. Obviously if you are in a bar and you plug in your E-cigarette charger you will GET LAID. We hear some of the airlines are even going to let people puff, or whatever you do with one of these gizmos, while in flight.

And with SXSW coming up, thinking about how we always come back from Austin smelling like an ashtray thanks to all the smoke clouds we have to wade through, wouldn't it be awesome if all you music fans out there took to E-butts like pigs to mud. Of course... you could also all just grow the fuck up and stop, period. Didn't your parents tell you smoking's bad for your health, you little turds?