The Roxy Music warbler sounds great, but disregards most of the band's early repertoire at the Fox Theater on October 14.

By JUD COST

Transcription of a fictional press conference immediately following the Bryan Ferry show at Oakland's Fox Theater on October 14, 2011.

Question: Mr. Ferry, Jud Cost of BLURT magazine, here. I seem to recall there were some pretty decent early albums by Roxy Music whose material was all but ignored tonight. By name: Roxy Music, For Your Pleasure, Stranded, Country Life and Siren. Any reason you didn't play these essential songs from those albums?: "Remake/Remodel," "Virginia Plain," "Do The Strand," "Street Life," "A Song For Europe," "Mother Of Pearl," "The Thrill Of It All," "Out Of The Blue," "All I Want Is You," and "Both Ends Burning."  Most of tonight's set list was apparently derived from Roxy Music's final album, Avalon from 1982, along with your recent solo release Olympia (Virgin).

Ferry: Next question, please.

We emphasize, this press conference did not take place. But the telling opening question was left hanging in the air long after the last notes from Ferry's two-hour concert had decayed, and the employees began sweeping up the debris left behind. 

It's not that Friday night's show was a travesty. Ferry, now 66, was in fine voice and brought along an excellent backing band. A guitarist, fully capable of duplicating Phil Manzanera's original fretboard flourishes, was joined by  a pair of keyboard whizzes who could have added any vintage synth and piano parts, even replicating Brian Eno's electronic smears when called for. The beautifully coiffed girl who noodled on tenor and alto saxes (a white plastic model a la Ornette Coleman) was no Andy McKay, but she sounded all right. Her soprano sax squawks were close enough to McKay's oboe to do the job. They hired a pair of female background singers tonight and even re-enlisted original Roxy Music drummer Paul Thompson. A few song endings were a bit ragged, but things got better as the evening progressed.

The few great early songs they did play - "Editions Of You," "Love Is The Drug" and "Casanova" ("Now you're flirting with heroin or is it cocaine?") - sounded terrific. It's just that most of them, along with stirring versions of John Lennon's "Jealous Guy" and Canned Heat's "Let's Work Together," were lumped into the lengthy encore, more than 100 minutes down the road.

Taken individually, the softer, more AOR songs from the Avalon period sounded fine. It's just that there were too many of them. And bombast was sometimes substituted for musical passion tonight. A fate similar to most of Ferry's blood-boiling Roxy classics befell his early solo work, as well. Groundbreaking covers of "A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall," "Don't Worry Baby," "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes" and "These Foolish Things" did not make the cut. And it wasn't as if Roxy Music, in its heyday, had played a large number of concerts in Northern California, so longtime fans had plenty of chances to soak up their adored repertoire. The only time Roxy Music made the scene here during their halcyon days was a solitary show at Oakland's Paramount Theatre, just two blocks away from the Fox, in February of 1976.

By the time the last great Roxy Music album, Siren, came out in 1975, punk-rock's midnight bullet-train was only a year away from changing everything. Major crop rotation was on the horizon. A hard rain would begin to fall on glam and prog-rock, and Roxy Music suffered the same fate as every ultra-hip musical act before it: It had outlived its time.

The stage presentation tonight was impeccable. After a projected image of a vintage lightbulb expanded to the breaking point, Ferry strolled out to an overpowering ovation, dressed in a smart, dark-colored business suit. Those glam-era, quasi-Star Trek jumpsuits never sat well on the man. After all, this is Bryan Ferry, the rock star with the Dirk Bogarde-like good looks, the closest we'll ever come to seeing James Bond in person.

Ferry was at times engulfed by an inspired background that constantly shifted from avant garde cartoons of harlequins and newsreels of South Pacific atolls engulfed in flames to vintage ballet film and real-time, black and white images of the players projected onto the background after first being stretched and dyed.

As for Ferry's unique set of pipes, we're talking about one of the most distinctive singing voices of the 20th century: a wispy tenor that borders on falsetto with just enough dry martini-soaked vibrato to make it an addictive substance. The classic early Roxy LPs featured haute couture models, usually reclining in various stages of undress. Two ladies performing interpretive modern dance routines to the music at the back of the stage achieved the same effect briefly during the encore by flanking Ferry and doing an updated version of go-go dancers in a cage from 45 years ago.

The bottom line for Bryan Ferry tonight is that it was a fine night, indeed, but with more judicious programming it could have been unforgettable. I was really looking forward to bellowing out "CPL 593H," the magical refrain from "Remake/Remodel," at the top of my lungs. I'd even written the number down on my palm just to get it right. It's a song about a futuristic love doll that might have been used in the soundtrack to Ridley Scott's 1982 film Blade Runner. "CPL 593H," it turns out, was the license-plate number of a car Ferry noticed, driven by a beautiful girl. Unfortunately, he also forgot a few more important numbers tonight.

This ain't your mama's kitchen utensil...

By Blurt Staff

Hailing from Austin, Texas, Bloody Knives (Preston Maddox (bass, voice, keyboards, samples, programming), Jake McCown (drums, noise, programming, art) and Jim Moon (sound manipulator) combine the sounds of heavy punk and industrial with blurry ambient electronics, atmospherics, and 8-bit glitches and melodies. 

Their 2010 debut album 'Burn It All Down' received rave reviews from the Austin press, and the upcoming singles/remix EP (featuring mixes from Dean Garcia (Curve/SPC ECO), the Crying Vessel and others), out October 28th, contains two new songs from the forthcoming album for Xd Records to be released in January 2012.

The band has dates coming up this month and next, and meanwhile, meet BLURT's new favorite video for their song "Disappear":

Catch 'em while ya can...


By Blurt Staff


We don't aggregate too many tour dates lately. Whjy? Because there's just too many damn tours to keep track of, and not enough time to copy down every single itinerary. We'd never get around to the, ahem, hard news if we did. With garage rock kings The Cynics, however, we'll make an exception.


Check our review of their latest album Spinning Wheel Motel....



Thurs 10/27 - OSHAWA, ON Canada - THE BOMBSHELL with The Ultimatemost High
Fri 10/28 - TORONTO, ON Canada - MITZI'S SISTER with Pow Wows and Dany Laj and the Looks
Sat 10/29 - LONDON, ON Canada - CALL THE OFFICE with The Matadors
Mon 10/31 - BROOKLYN, NY - LONE WOLF with Pow Wows and The Rats
Wed 11/2 - CINCINNATI, OH - NORTHSIDE TAVERN with Pow Wows and The Sights
Thurs 11/3 - CHICAGO, IL - BOTTOM LOUNGE with Pow Wows and HoZac Records ban
Fri 11/4 - DETROIT, MI - NEW DODGE with The Sights, Rocket 455 and Pow Wows + No Fun Records party
Sat 11/5 - PITTSBURGH, PA - 31^ST STREET PUB with The Sights and Pow Wow

Calexico, Giant Sand, Neko Case, Spoon, Robyn Hitchcock and others contribute tracks to a new compilation aimed at raising funds for victims of the Tucson tragedy. Listen to new songs from Giant Sand and Dead Western Plains, below.

By Fred Mills

January 8 seems so distant now, given all the turmoil and tumult that's gone down in the country - and on the planet - during the intervening 9 months. But the date of the mass shooting of 19 people in Tucson, by a presumably insane Jared Lee Loughner, that left six of them dead and Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in critical condition, isn't likely to be forgotten anytime soon in Tucson.

Stepping up this week, in fact, is Tucson's Fort Lowell Records, in partnership with Music Against Violence coalition, with the release Luz de Vida: A Compilation to Benefit the Victims of the Tucson Tragedy. It's a 12-song LP pressed on brilliant sunlight-yellow vinyl featuring a host of top-shelf local artists who contributed their music to the project to raise money for the Tucson Together Fund - an officially sanctioned benefit fund established to assist victims, families and witnesses of the Tucson tragedy. (Fort Lowell Records started up about two years ago as a 7" singles label; this will be their first longplayer.)

Did you know: Luz de Vida translates to "Light of Life."

Speaking to the Arizona Daily Star last week, Music Against Violence member Curtis McCrary noted that with "every cost sponsored so all of the proceeds from the sales, not it if has to go back to expenses. It all goes to the Tucson Together Fund." Added James Tritten of Fort Lowell Records, in an email to BLURT, "I am really hoping we can raise over $30,000 for Tucson Together Fund.  I think it is totally doable, and hope to be there before the end of the year."

MP3: Dead Western Plains "People Beat"

All of this is inspiring on multiple levels (not the least of which are the songs), and it hits home for yours truly in particular: I lived in Tucson from 1992-2001 and I think of the musicians I met and friends I made there often. Luz de Vida is about family in the most literal sense, and the musicians who've gathered here in service of that imperative are speaking in the most universal language of all. From the ethereal indiepop reveries of Dead Western Plains and the brisk martial crunch of La Cerca, to Calexico's elegant twang ‘n' strum, Giant Sand's sparse, dusty tale of tears and Tucson's "collective heart" and a haunting, slide guitar-fueled meditation on birth, life, dreams and beyond by the late Rainer Ptacek, there's a message being sent - and that message is hope.

MP3: Giant Sand "Recovery Mission (Radio Edit)"

See elsewhere on the BLURT site for our review of the album. It is also available as a digital download that expands the musical selection to a whopping 37 tracks, many of them previously unavailable. Included are the above-mentioned artists plus Neko Case, Spoon, DeVotchKa, Jimmy Eat World, John Vanderslice, Robyn Hitchcock, Mark Growden, Ozomatli, Meat Puppets, Rachel Flotard & Jon Rauhouse, along with Tucson locals Rich Hopkins, Salvador Duran, Silverbell, Al Perry, Tracy Shedd, Lenguas Largas, Sergio Mendoza y La Orkesta, and many others. (The LP includes a download card for access to all the tunes.)

Incidentally, on Saturday, Oct. 22, there will be an album release party for Luz de Vida held at Tucson's Rialto Theatre (whose general manager is Curtis McCrary mentioned above, also from the Music Against Violence coalition). Performing at the show will be Joey Burns and John Convertino of Calexico, Kiss & the Tells, Reno Del Mar, Mariachi Luz de Luna, Tracy Shedd, Hairsprayfireandgirls, La Cerca, Golden Boots, Silverbell, Rich Hopkins and Tom Walbank. The concert, like the album is a benefit for the shooting victims - more details at Fort Lowell Records - with proceeds going to the Tucson Together Fund.

One night only... watch the film trailer, below.

By Blurt Staff

As previously announced, next week, October 24th, Reprise will release The Bridge School Benefit Concerts 25th Anniversary Edition - a three-DVD set and a two-CD collection that feature unique live performances from many of the artists who've performed over the past 25 years at the  Annual Bridge School Benefit Concerts organized by Neil Young and his wife Pegi Young. The DVD and CD packages will be released just after this year's Bridge School Benefit Concerts, which will held at the Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View, CA, on October 22nd and 23rd. The Bridge School Benefit directs all proceeds to The Bridge School. Click here for more information and how to donate directly to The Bridge School.

The film features quite a few heavy-hitters, including Bruce Springsteen, Patti Smith, Pearl Jam, David Bowie, Bob Dylan, Paul McCartney, The Who, Tom Petty, Simon and Garfunkel, Neil Young and Crazy Horse performing rare, acoustic versions of songs never heard anywhere else. To celebrate the release, the concert film from the DVDs will screen in theaters in select cities for one night only on the same day, October 24th. For ticket information, click here (cities/venues listed below).

The Bridge School Concert Film will screen at the following locations - Oct 24th at 7:00PM:

Atlanta                           Midtown

Austin                           Alamo Drafthouse Lakecreek

Boston                          Kendall

Chicago                        Century

Dallas                           TBC

Denver                          Mayan

Los Angeles                  The Laemmle Santa Monica

Madison                        Sundance

Milwaukee                     Oriental

Minneapolis                   Edina

New York City               Sunshine

Philadelphia                   Ritz Bourse

Pleasantville, NY           Jacob Burns

Portland, ME                 Nickelodeon

Portland, OR                 Hollywood Theatre

San Diego                     Hillcrest

San Francisco               Embarcadero

Santa Cruz                    Nickelodeon

Santa Rosa                   Summerfield

Seattle                          Harvard Exit

Silver Spring, MD          AFI Silver Theatre

Washington, DC          E Street

One more good reason to have your email added to a mailing list...

By Fred Mills

"Dear Tom Waits Fan," began the email in the inbox this morning. "You are invited to be one of the first people to listen to the new Tom Waits record, Bad As Me. Go to BadAsMe.com and enter the following unique code, you will only be able to preview the record until this Friday..."

Bad As Me, of course, is the new Waits album that drops next week, Oct. 24, via Anti-. No doubt quite a few people received the "listening party" invite today, and no doubt quite a few more are in the process of firing up the album stream too: when you enter the aforementioned code it will also provide you with five additional codes to pass along to friends.

Don't worry if you're not among the chosen people, however: if you were not previously on the Waits mailing list just go to the BadAsMe.com site and click the link that says "Request An Invite" then enter your name and email.

And then sit back and see if the good Mr. Waits' website servers crash today...

Keep your eyes peeled for the new print issue of BLURT, due on newsstands in a few weeks - we'll have some choice Waits coverage to share with you.

EP hits iTunes on Nov. 1, followed by physical release a week later.Watch videos, below.

By Blurt Staff

Roots-pop songbird Lissie will release a new EP Covered Up With Flowers on November 8^th via Fat Possum. The EP is a collection of five cover songs, featuring her versions of Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance", Kid Cudi's "Pursuit Of Happiness", and Metallica's "Nothing Else Matters" (live videos of which have garnered more than five million combined views on YouTube).

Covered Up With Flowers also includes two new covers: Her soulful, rootsy take on Joe South's "Games People Play" and a haunting version of Nick Cave's "The Ship Song". The EP will be available exclusively on iTunes a week prior to release, beginning November 1^st.

Lissie's critically-buzzed  debut full-length Catching A Tiger was released by Fat Possum in 2010. A followup is reportedly in the works.

Tracklisting:

Pursuit Of Happiness (Kid Cudi cover)

Bad Romance (Lady Gaga cover)

Games People Play (Joe South cover)

Nothing Else Matters (Metallica cover)

The Ship Song (Nick Cave cover)

Special ticket offers and more.

By Blurt Staff

Sigur Rós' live film and double live album, i Inni, arrives in North America on November 15^th on XL Recordings. Now, the band has announced Inni will be screened at select theaters throughout North America prior to its release, Screening dates (starting next week) and locations are below.

Some of the U.S.'s best independent record stores are participating in an exclusive, limited pre-order/ticket bundle offer for Inni screenings.  Those pre-ordering Inni (in any physical format:  2CD/DVD, Blu-Ray/2CD, or 3LP/DVD) at their local independent record store will receive 1 complimentary ticket to the official screening of Inni in their town, and will receive their copy of Inni on November 15^th.  

A list of participating stores is below, with more to be added soon, along with the screening dates and locations.

Screening dates:

10/20                            Honolulu, HI @ Hawaii International Film Festival

10/27                            Montreal, QC @ ex-Centris 

10/28-11/4                     Toronto, ON @ Bell Lightbox (Toronto International Film Festival)

10/28-11/4                     Los Angeles, CA @ Downtown Independent

10/29                            Seattle, WA @ The Neptune

10/30                            Los Angeles, CA @ Downtown Independent

11/4-11/6                       Vancouver, BC @ Vancity Theatre

11/4-11/10                     Portland, OR @ Living Room

11/5, 11/11-11/17           New York, NY @ IFC Center

11/7, 11/27-11/28           Austin, TX @ Alamo Drafthouse at the Ritz

11/7                              Nashville, TN @ Belcourt

11/8-11/9                       Winnipeg, MB @ Park Theatre

11/9                              Iowa City, IA @ The Englert

11/9                              Oklahoma City, Ok @ OKC Museum of Art

11/10-11/12                   Columbia, SC @ The Nickelodeon

11/10-11/13                   Windsor, ON (across from Detroit) @ Windsor Film Festival

11/11-11/15                   New Orleans, LA @ Zeitgeist

11/11-11/17                   Lincoln, NE @ Ross Media Arts Center

11/11-11/20                   Phoenix, AZ @ Filmbar

11/14                            Quebec City @ Le Cercle

11/15                            Chicago, IL @ Lincoln Hall

11/15-17                        Wichita, KS @ Murdock Theatre

11/16                            Harrisburg, PA @ Cinema Center

11/18                            Grand Rapids, MI @ Wealthy Theatre

11/18-11/19                   Dallas, TX @ Inwood Theatre

11/18-11/24                   Providence, RI @ Cable Car

11/19                            Phoenix, AZ @ Filmbar

11/23                            Silver Spring, MD @ AFI Silver Theatre

11/25-12/1                     Minneapolis, MN @ Saint Anthony Main

11/28-12/4                     Atlanta, GA @ Cinefest

12/1-12/2                       Bloomington, IN @ Indiana University Cinema

12/2-12/3                      Philadelphia, PA @ International House

12/2-12/4                       Santa Fe, NM @ Center for Contemporary Arts

12/2-12/8                       San Antonio, TX @ Bijou

12/5                              Traverse City, MI @ State Theatre

12/13-12/14                   Ottawa, ON @ Bytowne

Stores:

Seattle, WA @ Easy St & Silver Platters http://easystreetonline.com/ / www.silverplatters.com

Los Angeles, CA @ Origami http://www.origamiorigami.com/

Los Angeles, CA @ Vacation http://vacationvinyl.com/ 

Nashville, TN @ Grimey's http://www.grimeys.com/

Austin, TX @ End Of An Ear & Waterloo http://endofanear.com/ / http://waterloorecords.com/

Oklahoma City, OK @ Guestroom http://guestroom-records.com/

New York, NY @ Other Music http://www.othermusic.com/

New Orleans, LA @ Euclid  http://www.euclidnola.com

Grand Rapids, MI @ Vertigo http://www.vertigomusiconline.com/ 

Providence, RI @ Armageddon Shop http://www.armageddonshop.com/

Phoenix, AZ @ ZIA http://www.ziarecords.com/

Atlanta, GA @ Criminal http://www.criminalatl.com/Home

October 10 and the Doug Fir Lounge in Portland, Ore., brought a split indie rock ticket, one part of it great and the other part ho-hum.

By Tim Hinely

This was Veronica Falls' first trip to the West Coast and they did not disappoint. Their new self-titled debut on Slumberland has all of the pop kids talking about it and with good reason. They've injected a healthy dose of electricity into the pop scene with dark (yet hooky) that have really resonated with just about everyone. The band is made up of two guys and two gals and the two men (guitarist and drummer) usually provide the backing vocals while the other guitarist sings most of the lead vocals and the other female (the quiet bassist) just plays da' bass. We were treated to stellar versions of "Beachy Head", "Found Love in a Graveyard", "Bad Feeling", "Misery" and plenty more.  It must be said the male guitarist with paisley short and bowl haircut bore a dashing resemblance to Primal Scream's Bobbie Gillespie.

The Drums returned this year to the comfier confines of the Doug Fir. Last year they headlined over Surfer Blood and they played the Wonder Ballroom that was way too big a room for those bands.  Touring as a 5-piece which included vocalist Jonny Pierce, guitarist Connon Hanwick and keyboardist Jacob Graham (also of Shelflife Records act Horse Shoes) and a solid rhythm section they kept the energy up for nearly an hour before playing a slower song. Jonny engaged the crowd  (but honestly, if he said thank you one more time I was gonna strangle him. It's nice to be polite but there is a thing as overkill). It was after midnight when the encores came out and we were treated to no version of "Let's Go Surfing", opting for a few of the slower doo-wopish cuts. Still though, for the whole evening they had nearly the entire trendy (on this evening , anyway) Doug Fir crowd shaking their moneymakers and while it was mostly fun I wouldn't need to rush out and see ‘em again.

Performs set of protest songs including a Woody Guthrie classic.

By Fred Mills

Yesterday, Oct. 13, Nightwatchman/Rage Against the Machine's Tom Morello, no stranger to activism, went activist in a major way at the Occupy Wall Street gathering at NYC's Liberty Plaza, performing 4 songs and mincing no words in his disdain for the current state of affairs - including President Obama's apparent lack of backbone in standing up against what Morello called "the Wall Street criminals who torpedoed our economy."

It wasn't an altogether unscripted appearance; Morello's itinerary that day had been circulated heavily via the press, and it was clear that he had put some time in beforehand thinking about what introductions and between-song remarks he would make (such as his withering Obama comments). It was inspiring  just the same. As Rolling Stone reports, "Before the performance, Morello addressed the crowd - whom he called "friends." He introduced himself as the Nightwatchman, his folk alter-ego, and spoke directly to the attentive and excited members of the Occupy Wall Street movement: ‘First, they ignored you - then you got pepper-sprayed.' But he didn't stop there. Morello led the crowd in a charged chant: ‘I know in my heart, all hell can't stop us now.' And then, repeatedly, ‘All hell can't stop us now!'"

Morello played "The Fabled City" (a key track from his second Nightwatchman album) along with "Save the Hammer for the Man," World Wide Rebel Songs" and, most significantly, Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your Land."

Read the full RS report and check out the video footage shot by RS as well. Also below you can see a brief audience-shot clip of Morello speaking to the crowd.