Massive wildfire wreaks havoc in Texas, nailing Will Johnson's home county particularly hard.

By Blurt Staff

This just in from Centro-matic frontman Will Johnson. It speaks for itself so we are reproducing it in full...

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Centro-matic Dispatch - September 6, 2011

I write to you all with a pretty heavy heart this afternoon. On the flight home from New Orleans yesterday, I saw a massive portion of my former home county on fire. I got word of all this after our show on Sunday night, and waited 'til morning to make some calls. I spoke to a friend and former neighbor before I got on the plane to make sure he, his wife and dogs were okay. He told me that the fire came through faster than they could have imagined on Sunday afternoon. They had just enough time to get the dogs into their small car, shut the front door to the house that they'd put years of love, work, and care into, and say goodbye. They lost everything minutes later to a fire that presently spans over 30,000 acres, and has destroyed more than 500 homes. Resources are stretched thin out there. As I write this, the fire is still 0% contained.

My friend's story is one of many here in Central Texas right now, but it sure hits hard. It comes from a community that I lived in for a good while, and still have immeasurable love for. Bastrop and its surrounding piney woods has inspired the last few years of our songwriting and the releases that have followed. Every ounce of Candidate Waltz was written out there. The Little Raider EP that I released earlier in the year is as close as I could get to out and out writing a love note to that area's beauty, inhabitants, and uniqueness.

Our band has decided we'd like to help out in a few ways.

We will donate all Centro-matic/South San Gabriel/Will J sales from the Undertow Store on Saturday Sept. 10th and Sunday Sept. 11th to help victims of this fire. It's a good time to pick up a release (or releases) you may not have, need to replace, or pass along to a friend.

Go to The Undertow Store here

I will also auction off two original baseball paintings (Dave Kingman and Richie Hebner) starting Sunday. The auction will be up and running for a week, ending Sunday Sept. 18th. All details on the paintings will be included once the auction begins.

100% of the proceeds will go directly to help victims of this fire get their lives back on track.

Thanks for reading and considering.

-Will J

New documentary gonna take you all the way back to Memphis (by way of Hereford), natch...

By Doc Thomas

Due Nov. 15, The Ballad of Mott The Hoople is a feature length documentary (Start Productions) from filmmakers Chris Hall and Mike Kerry that profiles one of the greatest rock bands ever through a combination of rare and unseen archive footage and the testimonies of band members Ian Hunter, Mick Ralphs, Verden Allen, Dale ‘Buffin Griffin, Ariel Bender and Morgan Fisher. Also I the mix: numerous other associates and witnesses including Mick Jones of The Clash, Queen's Roger Taylor, plus fan club president (and UK journalist extraordinaire) Kris Needs. No less a fan than Morrissey wrote the sleeve notes for the DVD.

Check out the advance trailer:

BOMTH Original Promo from Start Productions on Vimeo.

While the rest of us start the countdown until Nov. 15, for those not in the loop, here's some of the backstory, courtesy the label:

From their early encounters with the troubled, yet visionary Svengali Guy Stevens, the astounding music which followed (and that stand the test of time so much better than many of their keyboard pummeling contemporaries) to the band's witty, honest and frank recollections of the crazy circumstances that whisked them from Hereford to the bright lights of London, America and world level rock stardom, this documentary tells the whole story leading up to the band imploding at the height of their fame.  The Ballad of Mott The Hoople chronicles and evaluates (in the artists' own words) this very unique history and the lasting impression the band made on their peers and the younger groups that followed in their wake. In 2009 they reformed to play a reunion show at The Hammersmith Apollo to a packed audience that included such deities as Jimmy Page. The only available film footage of this reunion is available on this DVD.

 Although a rock band that saw guitar gods Mick Ralphs, Ariel Bender and Mick Ronson pass through their ranks, Mott The Hoople never succumbed to guitar histrionics above the substance of songs. Ian Hunter's lyrics combined Dylan's mid-60s poetry with the band's Stonesy vibe, a Velvet Underground sneer and a sound, that helped pave the way for the punk movement.  Indeed, ‘Crash Street Kidds' from 1974's The Hoople more than hints at what was around the corner! The Ballad of Mott The Hoople talking head and punk hero, the Clash's Mick Jones, has been quoted saying, "I supposed my main guitar influences are Mott The Hoople, The Kinks and the Stones".  The Clash song ‘Julie's In The Drug Squad' was a clear homage to the majesty of the Hoople.

Too often cast off as one hit wonders by the musically illiterate or as glam or "classic rock" by the ill informed, Mott The Hoople were a unique act who in combining the rootsy rock of the Stones and The Faces, the unbridled punkishness of early Kinks and the intelligence of Dylan and Bowie were a one of a kind British rock band that still sound valid and fitting for a new audience in 2011.

Don't hate ‘em just ‘cos they're prolific!

By Jennifer Kelly

With Explosions In The Sky currently on tour, presumably playing, on occasion, some of their Friday Night Lights-commissioned material, there are three other shows we propose for EITS to soundtrack. (Read our interview with the band here.)

Glee

The whole chorus comes down with laryngitis just before competition, so Will and the gang choreograph a slow-moving, emotionally-charged (but still really gay) interpretive dance to "Greet Death."

The Big Bang Theory

Why stop at the North Pole? Sheldon and the crew get a year-long grant to study string theory at the International Space Station. EITS one-ups 2001's "Blue Danube" sequence with a stirring, crescendo-studded theme song.

Fringe

Mythology arc be damned. When is Olivia going to get back into the tank in her underwear to talk to dead people? Surely EITS could compose the requisite creepy-yet-sexy instrumental backdrop?

More audio advances than you can shake a P2P Torrent site at...

By Blurt Staff

What used to be a novelty - and sometimes a harried, frantic reaction to an unauthorized leak - is now a regular component of any artist's sensible marketing plan when rolling out a new album: post streaming audio of the entire thing online a week (or more) prior to the official release date. There are so many of them it's impossible to keep track of every single one, much less spend enough time with all the new releases to see if they don't, uh, such... But here are a few we are digging that we think you will too when they are released next week:

St. Vincent: Strange Mercy (Sept. 13, 4AD) - go to NPR Music

Girls: Father, Son, Holy Ghost (due Sept. 13 from True Panther Sounds) - go to Hype Machine

Neon Indian: Era Extrana (Sept. 13, Static Tongues) - go to NPR Music

Laura Marling: A Creature I Don't Know (Sept. 13, Ribbon) - go to the New York Times

Also see tour dates, below.

By Blurt Staff

PJ Harvey - BLURT's cover subject for our most recent print issue - is set to release an exclusive iTunes Session EP on September 12. It features seven recently recorded live tracks along with an interview with the songwriter. The session includes four songs from her most recent album, Let England Shake (Vagrant/Island), as well as three of her fan faves from past albums. 

Harvey was nominated for a Mercury Prize for the album, her fourth such nomination (she won in 2001). The Awards take place in London tonight.

Tracklisting:

1. Let England Shake

2. The Words That Maketh Murder

3. The Last Living Rose

4. Written On The Forehead

5. Angelene 

6. C'Mon Billy

7. Down By The Water

8 - Interview -

Tour Dates:

Sep 08 - Manchester, UK @ O2 Apollo

Sep 10 - Isle of Wight, UK @ Bestival

Oct 21 - Stockholm, Sweden @ Filadelfiakyrkan

Oct 22 - Stockholm, Sweden @ Filadelfiakyrkan

Oct 24 - Oslo, Norway @ Sentrum Scene

Oct 25 - Oslo, Norway @ Sentrum Scene

Oct 27 - Prague, Czech Republic @ Lucerna Hall

Oct 30 - London, UK @ Royal Albert Hall

Oct 31 - London, UK @ Royal Albert Hall

Additional juice to fill those Fab Four coffers with...

By Blurt Staff

The world's best-selling album of the past decade, The Beatles 1, makes its global digital debut today at iTunes. The album has debuted at #1 on several iTunes top albums charts around the world, including the US, Canada, Japan, the Netherlands, Mexico, Sweden, Spain, New Zealand, and Greece.  The Beatles have now sold more than nine million songs and over 1.5 million albums on iTunes worldwide. 

Whew. That's a lotta damn Beatles. Some more stats to help you eyes glaze over before you log on to iTunes and order up the album:

* Since its original release in 2000, 30 million physical copies of The Beatles 1 have been sold around the world

*More than 11.7 million copies sold in the US, where 1 topped Billboard's Top 200 Albums chart for eight weeks on its way to becoming the decade's top-selling album (2000-2009).

*1 collects all of The Beatles' singles released between 1963 and 1970 that reached #1 on the UK's Record Retailer chart and/or on Billboard's Hot 100 chart in the US.  The Beatles achieved 17 #1 UK singles between May 1963 and July 1969 and 20 US chart-toppers between February 1964 and June 1970.  Between both charts, The Beatles' singles spent a total of 128 weeks at #1.

So... it is really New Order without Hook, hmmm? It wasn't Joy Division without Curtis, hence the name "New Order." Just sayin'...

By Fred Mills

Rolling Stone is reporting that New Order plans to get back together in October after a five-year hiatus. Don't hold your breath too much kids: it will only be for a pair of charity concerts in Brussels on Oct. 17 and Paris on Oct. 18. (It's to help out filmmaker Michael Shamberg, battling a "severe illness.")

One cool item to note: joining guitarist Bernard Sumner and drummer Stephen Morris will be keyboardist Gillian Gilbert, who originally quit in 2001.

One not so cool item to note: estranged bassist Peter Hook was not invited to be part of the reunion. Hook and Sumner had a huge falling out some time ago and he has since been involved with other activities, including a solo tour in which he performed classic Joy Division.

It'll make you smile esp. if you're a collector...


By Fred Mills


Here's a brief but fun clip - an "animated unboxing" of the upcoming SMiLE box set from the Beach Boys, which as everyone knows finally got an official release date last week. Mark your calendars for Nov. 1...

Lemmy: 49% Motherf***er, 51% Son of a Bitch (E1 Entertainment) unveils its subtleties a little at a time and... oh, who are we kidding. The documentary is like a brick smashed into your face. Rawk on!

By Jason Gross

If you don't know the subject of this rockumentary, we feel sorry for you. This metal God and Motorhead leader was shadowed for three years by the filmmakers, who gathered hosannas from most of the original Guns N' Roses, Dave Grohl and Metallica (the last two shown collaborating with him), among others.

l's likes: Jack Daniels, the Beatles, Elvis, Little Richard, video games, a cluttered apartment, war memorabilia (especially knives), Rickenbacker basses, speed, cigarettes and Daisy Dukes (!). L's dislikes: heroin, cocaine, marriage, bullshit. Things he denies being: a hippie, a Nazi (among his war collectibles are German WWII stuff). What sets this apart from most worship-filled profiles is that the subject is so freakin' interesting: watch this transplanted L.A. icon design leather boots, fire tank guns and lead one of the world's loudest bands. Not a bad resume, even if he needs running subtitles to hear what he's saying through his thick West Midlands accent.

More crucial indie rock than you can shake a Flaming Lips mirror ball at.

By Fred Mills

Unless you've been under a rock the past few months you know that this is the big week for the second annual Hopscotch festival, taking place Sept. 8-10 at various venues in Raleigh, NC.

Among the performers: headliners Flaming Lips, Guided By Voices, Superchunk and Drive-By Truckers, along with Japandroids, the Dodos, J Mascis, Black Lips, Toro Y Moi, Twin Shadow, Julianna Barwick, Cold Cave, Oneohtrix Point Never, Ford & Lopatin, Swans, Yelawolf, Earth, Xiu Xiu, the Love Language, Braids, Mount Eerie, Liturgy, the Body, Rhys Chatham G3, the Foreign Exchange, Krallice, Beach Fossils, Jeff the Brotherhood, John Vanderslice, Weekend, Lower Dens, Andrew Cedermark, Reading Rainbow, Disappears, Beans, Sir Richard Bishop, Future Islands, Wooden Wand, Mouthus, Prurient and Tyvek.

There's a number of related events as well, such as the HOOPscotch charity basketball game on Friday afternoon. Players will be culled from various indie bands and proceeds will go to Raleigh's Helping Hand Mission. Meanwhile, festival co-sponsor Merge Records will be hosting a special Wild Flag listening party also on Friday afternoon. Go to the official Hopscotch website for details (they've also just unveiled an official mobile app for all you smartphone wielders who are into "sharing"), as well as ticketing info. Note that 3-day passes are already sold out but they still have individual passes for selected show.

We'll be on hand cheering on our fave local and national acts as well, so watch for our post-event coverage and photos early next week. Go here to read our report from last year's Hopscotch.