Gnarls Barkley news abounds today. First, the oh-so-predictable happened: the album, aptly titled The Odd Couple, leaked. Yawn. Call us when a hugely anticipated follow-up album doesn't leak. (Actually, Atmosphere might be able to pull it off. A recent e-mail from their publicist informed us that the only way for reviewers to listen to their newest record, When Life Gives You Lemons, You Paint That Shit Gold, is to head to one of the SXSW listening parties, or travel to Independent Label Group's offices in NYC. That's the kind of extreme leak prevention Always is talking about in those gross blue liquid test commercials.) Today, NME is reporting that GB's video for "Run," the first single from The Odd Couple, has been banned from MTV (huge bummer, because now we'll have nothing to watch for the 45 minutes around 4 am or so, when MTV actually plays videos, except for the latest Rihanna song craze or whatever). From NME:

"It was deemed that the video for 'Run', which features a cameo appearance from Justin Timberlake, may trigger epileptic seizures with its strobe-like effects.

'I don't know exactly what's going on, but we're having issues,' Danger Mouse told Billboard. 'I think (the video) is cool. It works for me. But I'm not necessarily that easily seasick.'"

The video's still everywhere online - including above, should we be posting a disclaimer or something? - so it's not really a huge blow for the craaazzzyy duo - if anything, everyone's rushing to YouTube now to watch the Timberlake-a-licious video, and then thinking really hard about whether they feel dizzy or anything. We just watched it and we feel ok - the song itself has all of the addictive deliciousness we hoped Gnarls Barkley's St. Elsewhere follow-up would have, and pairs well with a frantic dance party - but we're no experts on photogenic or photosensitive epilepsy. But, on a sensory level, it's nothing like some of the crazy light and sound performances we caught a few weeks ago in Amsterdam (and we've been looking for an excuse to blog about), which also came with a disclaimer for those with epilepsy. A few photos:







The images above are from an experimental light/sound performance at an art gallery in Amsterdam, and a few nights later we experienced something similar at a packed, multi-level club called Paradiso. It was the tail end of the Sonic Acts festival, and the final act of the night, an italian multimedia artist called Tez, used "flickering video, in the form of abstract lights and color gradients, coupled with synchronized synthetic sounds, distributed in a surround quadrophonic system," which, in more understandable terms, means glaring, shifting lights projected on a screen, and software-manipulated sounds leaking from extremely loud speakers - there was a large sign measuring the decibel levels. It was simultaneously totally strange and totally engaging - and maybe just a bit overwhelming. Who knew there was a connection between Italian experimental sonic weirdness, and American dance-pop?

3/5/2008 5:07:54 PM by Caitlin | Comments [0] |  

Lethal Bizzle: loves the Breeders

Wow, it's feeling so 1993 right about now. We lost track of Kim Deal after the last Pixies tour wrapped, and thus were wholly unprepared for the leak, over the weekend, of a brand-spanking-new Breeders album to the internets. Sure, this is the Kelley Deal version and not the Pod-era Tanya Donelly version, but nope, we're not complaining. It will take us at least several weeks to recall how forgettable the last Breeders album and the Amps album were, right? We have high hopes for the new one, not least because "Bam Thwok" was so obviously more of a Breeders tune than a Pixies tune. There's also a showdate: June 5 at the Paradise.

Then there's this: according to Ticketmaster, the Lemonheads -- i.e. Evan Dando and some dudes -- will be performing their landmark It's a Shame About Ray in its entirety at the Paradise. The hitch: it's on April Fool's Day. Which means . . . well, that means it's a joke, right? That was our first thought, too, except that Dando's doing it for real down at SXSW in mid-March, to celebrate the deluxe reissue of the album, and he's also the sort of goofball who would appreciate the irony of providing a little dreamy wish-fullfilment in Boston on April 1. Also, you can actually buy tickets for this thing. So, um, until further notice, LEMONHEADS PERFORMING IT'S SHAME ABOUT RAY ON APRIL FOOL'S DAY attains show-of-the-spring status until proved to be a figment of someone's imagination.

UPDATE: Confirmed by publicist: Lemonheads performing Ray on April Fool's Day is actually happening.

2/25/2008 12:56:05 PM by On the Download | Comments [0] |  

If you simply can't bear waiting till next week to buy the new Hot Chip album, but you're also feeling conflicted about Googling for a sendspace link and enjoying a free leaked copy, there's good news: Clash, the London-based magazine "dedicated to fashion and music" - not a whole lotta those these days - has posted the entire darn thing on Clash Music, their (you guessed it) music news website. Listen to it here. There's also a music video for their new single, "Ready for the Floor," complete with some behind the scenes footage. The British dance poppers will be at the Paradise on April 14.

Listen: Hot Chip, "Made in the Dark" (full album)

1/29/2008 4:41:16 PM by Caitlin | Comments [0] |  

I've been fascinated by the reactions I've encountered in the two days since Radiohead fired "the shot heard all around the recording industry." Specifically, I've been interested in how people have been able to choose their own headline and inadvertently reveal what they find most important about the news: "Radiohead give album away for free!", "Radiohead eschew record companies altogether!", and of course "Radiohead attempt to rip fans off with new eighty dollar album."  Amazing, it's like the news is so overwhelming no one can process it calmly yet. A completely unheralded bombshell rarely occurs these days (there are few opportunities for cultural surprises in the digital age, i.e. we know the moment a film is being made right down to who the dolly grip is before the screenplay is even finished) and so I've been relishing in this while I can. Today I feel like it's a good idea to take a look at it with the big picture in mind.

 

If bands can surprise the public with an album out of the blue, have it available a few days later (no chance for a leak that way), and have a price tag that's completely up to fans I think a lot of people WILL gladly pay for the album download (I've heard that ordering site could barely handle the traffic on Monday).  If you dismantle the early-leak-listener-club you put all fans on the same even playing field and everyone has a chance to hear it at the same time. And if the money goes directly to the band you destroy the "the band doesn't see that money anyway" downloader argument, which leads you to end up with, miraculously, a healthy relationship (both monetary and artistic) between artist and band.

 

What I'm most excited about though is fan bases discovering an album all together at the same time again. That strengthens music fanatic communuties immensely.  Whether you consider this a collective conscious phenomenon or good old gang mentality nothing beats experiencing a musical event with a shitload of like minded people. 

 

In recent years it has become the norm that an album gets discovered by fans in the following order:  1) The press are issued their copies of the album. They begin to form opinions but can't talk about them online yet. One of them, however, is bold enough to leak it online. "Fuck it," he or she says to themselves, "I don't care if I get fired. I'm going to be a hero on Oink." This leads to 2) The computer savy early-leak-listener-club all breaking their wrists to either dismiss or praise the album first on their message board of choice. 3) The die-hard-fans who swear off early leak listening finally hear it the day it comes out in stores. A new wave of discussion and evaluation rolls in. The reviews come out. 4) New fans or casual fans find the album eventually also and chime in as well. Now, that's dividing up a fan base's initial new album experience into four segments over at least six months of time. Imagine combining all four segments within a the span of three weeks. Which scenario do you think is more likely to cause cultural explosions? Which scenario do you think will create a more lively, unified fan base? And what sounds like more fun to you?

 

Now what about that hard copy of the album that costs more than it does to fill up my band's tour van (not by much but still)? I think it's a smart move. It's a little extreme but I believe they'e loaded it up to the brim with goodies and charged a hefty amount to make a specific point. I believe that point is this: A certain shrinking segment of music fans still very much enjoy owning the album as an actual artifact. If you want to continue to have the option of holding the album in your hands (staring at the art as you listen, rolling joints on the cover, whatever, it's your copy) you're going to have to be willing to pay more money for it. Less people will now pay more money to own nicer, highly fetishized packaging for the albums they own. I'm ok with that. It's better than the art and packaging disappear all together equation! In fact, I'm still pissed that David Byrne declared that packaging would soon die all together and he was fine with that. Dude! Don't make me take that More Songs About Buildings And Food vinyl cover out of its frame on my wall! 

 

Now what about the fact that this, apparently, isn't coming out a record label? Well, it's pretty damn interesting but I can't help but think it's a little bit like your rich friend being able to fly his private jet around instead of scoring a ticket on Delta or American Airlines. It's fine for him but what about the rest of us poor kids? Labels are still very, very helpful and often essential for most bands who can't release a random assortment of bleeps and bloops and have critics call it a masterpiece of songwriting craft (I kid, I kid. I joke because I'm jealous). I can personally speak of the very, very positive effects of being on a kick ass indie label during the last year of my band's existence. 

 

But you can't help but think that Radiohead's presentation of this new business model will eventually filter down to the little fish too. It would be foolish to start guessing exactly how that will work just yet. But recall what Anton Newcombe said in the movie Dig!: "Until they can write the letter I'm writing they are the postman and I am the letter writer." He was using the postman as a metaphor for what he believed record companies essentially do but, here, ironically, Radhiohead is releasing this album merely with help from the post office itself. No metaphor required. Wow. Here we go.

 

Ryan Walsh

October 2nd 2007

 

p.s. We'll be on tour when In Rainbows is released online on October 10th. Please show up to one of our shows with a cd-burn so we can hear it. We put some money in the Radiohead online tip jar already! We swear!

Oct 9 2007 8:00P
 World Grotto Knoxville, Tennessee

Oct 10 2007 8:00P
 The Caledonia Lounge Athens, Georgia

Oct 11 2007 8:00P
 The Reservoir Carrboro, North Carolina

Oct 12 2007 8:00P
 The Red & Black -- DAM!Festival Distric Of Columbia, Washington DC

Oct 13 2007 8:00P
 3rd Floor Studio Fredericksburg, Virginia

Oct 14 2007 8:00P
 Galaxy Hut Arlington, Virginia

Oct 17 2007 8:00P
 Cafe Nine New Haven, Connecticut

Oct 18 2007 8:00P
 Arlene’s Grocery - Misra/AbsolutelyKosher CMJ Showcase New York, New York

10/3/2007 4:34:17 PM by On the Download | Comments [3] |  

Dear dudes,

 

Thanks for deciding to fuck the music industry in all three holes by giving away your new album, In Rainbows, for free on the internet. Yes, we've heard the old saw that there’s nothing more expensive than free. And we appreciate your generosity in allowing us to pay whatever we feel like giving you when we download your DRM-free mp3s. This is a very bold and brilliant idea, and we can’t think of a band we’d rather see come up with it. Just one problem: it’s a fucking scam. You tossers.

 

Once we read the fine print, it became apparent that your “pay what you will” philosophy was just a smokescreen for a marketing plan that owes far more to conservative, old-world distribution plans than the blogosphere realizes. Let’s start by outlining what’s actually happening: beginning October 10, In Rainbows will be released in two very different packages. The free-download version (or, we should say, the email-us-a-few-bucks-if-you-want version) contains 10 songs, no extraneous packaging or information, all spartan and Fugazi-like. The deluxxx model is an $80 boxset that adds a double-LP, the CD version of the album, a bonus disc of additional tunes, and an original, signed copy of the Magna Carta, shipped directly from England sometime on or before December 3. At some point in the indeterminate future, In Rainbows will be released in something approximating traditional CD form. By someone, somewhere. You might be able to buy it in a store, even.

 

With one fell swoop, you’ve solved the blood-from-a-stone riddle that’s been plaguing the music industry since Napster: to wit, how do you get people to pay for free music? “Give it away” might seem a strange answer, unless you’ve been breathing for the past seven years. Everyone was going to download the album for free anyway, so you might as well do it yourself and pass the hat while you’re at it. From the perspective of a band that knows its albums will be file-traded, every penny donated is a penny more than you’d have got otherwise. And if you’re a downloader, why would you bother googling for a zshare link when you can go right up to the front door and grab it from Radiohead themselves? Once you’re there, you might even feel guilty enough to PayPal them your allowance.

 

So, sure, “giving the album away for free” is genius PR. It’s thinking waaaay outside the box. If someone’s keeping a doomsday clock for the CD as a viable medium, please wind it another hour closer to midnight.

 

The amazing part about your plan, Mssrs Radiohead, is that if fans want the “object” – the physical manifestation of the music – you, Radiohead, are willing to gouge people for far more than the traditional record industry would ever dream of. I mean, I was pretty pissed when I had to pay $19 for a Madonna record. But I’ll blow David Geffen before I pay $80 for a Radiohead album. And before you Radiohead fans start typing, “Hey asshole, they’re giving the album away for FREE, remember?,” well, last time I checked, “Down Is the New Up” is on the fucking bonus disc. And I love “Down Is the New Up.”

 

Of course, Thom, you know as well as I do that I’m not paying $80 for “Down Is the New Up.” I’m gonna illegally download that bitch from Oink, or from someone who got it from Oink who puts up a sendspace.com link, and I’m not gonna feel bad about it. I might even PayPal you the going iTunes rate, if iTunes doesn’t make like Tower Records and croak now that Amazon.com is selling DRM-free mp3s and the Biggest Bands In the Universe are suddenly giving their records away on their own sites. Insert cute cat photo with “I can havz it free?” caption here.

 

If In Rainbows is a model for how the music business is going to pan out, being a music fan is going to get really weird, innit? The album becomes an objet-d'art destined for well-heeled connisseurs. The digital download becomes a freebie that nobody pays for. And the CD-as-we-know-it goes straight to the cut-out bin (or the Wal Mart sale rack) several months after the fact, so your mom still has something to buy you for Christmas. So congratulations, Radiohead. You just ruined everything!

 

Except that you didn’t. Go back and read that last graph again: What’s so genius about the marketing plan for In Rainbows isn’t that it’s some radically new vision of music-industry-future. It’s simply a realistic reflection of how the music industry actually works right now. It ain’t what we grew up with, but it is crushingly simple:

 

Down is the new up, motherfuckers.

10/1/2007 4:25:14 PM by On the Download | Comments [17] |  

From the inbox (in case you hadn't heard it from everyone else yet, i.e. every music blog on the web, your hipster little sister, your grandmother, the mailperson, the Starbucks barista, your newborn baby cousin, etc. etc.):

RADIOHEAD: THE ALBUM IN RAINBOWS

AVAILABLE EXCLUSIVELY AT RADIOHEAD.COM

PRE-ORDERS NOW UNDERWAY FOR THE SPECIAL EDITION BOX-SET AND FOR OCTOBER 10 ALBUM DIGITAL DOWNLOAD.

Radiohead.com is open for business with pre-orders having begun today for their 7th studio album In Rainbows, which will be available from October 10 as a DRM-free MP3 download. Also available to pre-order from now is the Discbox, a special edition box set, details of which are below.

Radiohead's fan service, WASTE, is currently taking advance orders for two formats: the album MP3 and the Discbox, which includes double vinyl and CD versions of the record and a second, enhanced CD with additional new songs, artwork, and photographs of the band, all exclusive to the box. Anyone purchasing this deluxe edition will automatically receive the bundled MP3 album on October 10.

Radiohead are currently planning a traditional CD release of In Rainbows for early 2008.

The album was produced by Nigel Godrich. The complete track listing is:

15 STEP
BODYSNATCHERS
NUDE
WEIRD FISHES/ARPEGGI
ALL I NEED
FAUST ARP
RECKONER
HOUSE OF CARDS
JIGSAW FALLING INTO PLACE
VIDEOTAPE
 
The extra songs on the second CD of the Discbox are:
 
MK1
DOWN IS THE NEW UP
GO SLOWLY
MK2
LAST FLOWERS
UP ON THE LADDER
BANGERS AND MASH
4 MINUTE WARNING

According to Idolator, Pitchfork, and NME (who worries that digital downloads are excluded from chart counts, therefore In Rainbows won't be a chart topper), though, the official hardcopy release date will be Dec. 3. Who you gonna believe? Another question: why would Radiohead fans need to pre-order a digital download? Are they going to run out?

For the record, many of the listed In Rainbows tracks were circulating the internets in various forms as early as last spring (when the then-mysterious album was deemed "LP7" by uploaders), and Will Spitz put together a handy track-by-track guide to the songs - check it out here.

More on the album here, at inrainbows.

10/1/2007 10:39:53 AM by Caitlin | Comments [1] |  

     ARTiST.....: Kanye West
     ALBUM......: Graduation
     LABEL......: Def Jam
     GENRE......: Hip-Hop
     SOURCE.....: CDDA
     TRACKS.....: 13
     PLAYTiME...: 51:24
     SiZE.......: 64,3 MB
     ENCODER....: Lame 3.97 V2
     BiTRATE....: VBRkbps
     SCENE DATE.: 08/30/2007
     STORE DATE.: 09/11/2007


     Tracklist:

     01.     Good Morning (Intro)                 03:15
     02.     Champion                             02:48
     03.     Stronger                             05:12
     04.     I Wonder                             04:03
     05.     Good Life (Ft. T-Pain)               03:27
     06.     Can't Tell Me Nothing                04:32
     07.     Barry Bonds (Ft. Lil Wayne)          03:24
     08.     Drunk And Hot Girls (Ft. Mos Def)    05:13
     09.     Flashing Lights (Ft. Dwele)          03:58
     10.     Everything I Am                      03:48
     11.     The Glory                            03:33
     12.     Homecoming  (Ft. Chris Martin)       03:24
     13.     Big Brother                          04:47

Let the hating begin. Early word on the torrentz and the messageboards is all like, "Kanye Suxxxx." See what two hot new singles and an indie-rock mixtape buys you in America today? Not a goddamn thing.

Running "we're still listening to the album" thread:

- Production on "Barry Bonds" is kinda weak-sister, and the hottest name-check on the track isn't Mr. Asterisk, it's Ye repping a Robyn album. (Konichiwa Bitches!) Also, let's put it down right here that Mr. West here does something that no other rapper in the history of rappers has been able to do: he got Lil' Wayne to spit a boring verse.

8/30/2007 10:53:15 PM by On the Download | Comments [0] |