We've been anticipating/dreading the leak of the new METALLICA single for weeks -- god, it can't be any worse than St. Anger, can it? -- and we can't say that we're heartened by the fact that the band is rolling out its American tour dates several weeks BEFORE the release of their new Death Magnetic. Metallica live is always sort of a no-brainer, but you can't help wonder whether they're gonna try to get fans to buy tix before the single comes out and spoils everyone's enthusiasm.

The good news? No on-sale dates have been posted yet, but the band will be at TD Banknorth Garden on January 18, 2009 -- a Saturday night -- with the Sword on the opening card. The bad news? The other opening band is Machine Head. Jesus.

Here's the full North American tour schedule:

October 21 - Glendale, AZ Jobing Arena
October 23 - Albquerque, NM Tingley Coliseum
October 25 - Kansas City, MO Sprint Center
October 26 - Des Moines, IA Wells Fargo Arena
November 1 - Portland, OR Rose Quarter
November 3 - Salt Lake City, UT Energy Solutions Arena
November 4 - Denver, CO Pepsi Center
November 6 - Omaha, NE Qwest Center
November 8 - Moline, IL iWireless Center
November 9 - Columbus, OH Schottenstein Center
November 17 - St. Louis, MO Scottrade Center
November 18 - Tulsa, OK BOK Center
November 20 - Houston, TX Toyota Center
November 22 - Little Rock, AR Alltel Arena
November 23 - New Orleans, LA New Orleans Arena

December 1 - Seattle, WA Key Arena
December 2 - Vancouver, BC GM Place
December 4 - Calgary, AB Pengrowth Saddledome
December 7 - Edmonton, AB Rexall Place
December 12 - Ontario, CA Citizens Bank Arena
December 13 - Fresno, CA Save Mart Center
December 15 - San Diego, CA Cox Arena
December 17 - Los Angeles, CA The Forum
December 20 - Oakland, CA Oracle Aren

January 12 - Milwaukee, WI Bradley Center
January 13 - Detroit, MI Joe Louis Arena
January 15 - Washington, DC Verizon Center
January 17 - Philadelphia, PA Wachovia Center
January 18 - Boston, MA TD Banknorth Center
January 26 - Chicago, IL Allstate Arena
January 29 - Uniondale, NY Nassau Coliseum
January 31 - Newark, NJ Prudential Center

8/11/2008 11:25:00 AM by On the Download | Comments [0] |  

Ohhhhhh, snap! Someday you'll be telling your grandkids about this one like it was Frank and Liza or some shit.

Heart of the City Tour" JAY-Z and Mary J. Blige
At the TD Banknorth Garden
Thursday, April 3, 2008 at 7:30 pm
Tickets are $49.75, $69.75, $89.75, $125.75 and $300
Tickets go on-sale Friday, February 15, 2008 at 10:00 am

In other news, Radiohead announced the first leg of its US tour -- Boston wasn't on it. By process of elmination, we deduce that Boston will be on the second leg, which will hit the US during a window that may match the as-yet-unannounced-rock-performance at Fenway Park on July 19 and 20. Still, we wouldn't bank on it. As one astute commenter pointed out -- with a ruh-roh -- the best guess for Fenway this summer is an encore of this monstrosity.

2/12/2008 5:47:05 PM by On the Download | Comments [0] |  

THE BOSS: If you love someone, mpfree.

• Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band
  November 18, 2007 at TD Banknorth Garden, Boston
  Tickets on sale September 22

Ehhh, who really cares whether "Radio Nowhere" is any good or not? The really, really, really big huge news is that some ginormous pop star finally took the plunge: not the Stones, not U2, not Madonna, not Metallica . . . Bruce. Of course. Man of the people. Populist to the core. He's giving away the single. HE'S GIVING AWAY THE SINGLE. He's giving away the fucking single.

And because he's giving away the fucking single -- for a week, at least -- we'll abide by the webiquette and mention the album (Magic, due October 2 on Columbia Records, and billed as a "rock" album), a preferred retail link (see below), and the tour, which brings the full E Street Band back to town. They'll play the TD Banknorth Garden on November 18; tickets go on sale September 22.

First impressions (and the wonderful thing about giving away mpfrees is, feel free to form your own): sounds awful contemporary. Which isn't to say cutting edge or groundbreaking, unless you're still someone who finds Social Distortion and Tom Petty to be edgy. It's got that Brendan O'Brien thing going on. (By which we mean it has been micro-engineered to within an inch of its life in order to sound pristine on the radio, though not in a way you'd overtly notice: in his productions for Pearl Jam, among many others, O'Brien perfected the art of shaving the edges off capital-R Rock songs without sacrificing the grain and the grit, a near-magical boon for classic-rockers in the age of lossy compression technologies. Things sound big, but not scary big. It's almost like . . . soft big. If you wanted to be cute, you could say O'Brien invented soft-hard rock. And though O'Brien's invention is a dubious honor, it's also the kind of gradational sonic achievment that has a huge impact on the way things actually sound, even though it goes pretty much unnoticed.)

So, right, "Radio Nowhere": doesn't sound immediately dated (except for the bridge, which sounds derivatively 1980s in an interestingly Dire-Straits-meets-Bon-Jovi kinda way); it's got a wiry, Van Halen-y arpeggio simmering underneath that bar-band-by-numbers chords; and the chorus does that Springsteeny thing that the Boomers all love, where he masks his reassuringly authoratative, self-aggrandizing pronunciation (there's nobody out there) with a disingenuous but heartfelt rhetorical question (is there anybody out there?). 

DOWNLOAD: Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, "Radio Nowhere" (free on iTunes)

8/28/2007 8:06:57 PM by On the Download | Comments [0] |  

JT, "What Goes Around" at Boston Garden, 8/10/07

We've reviewed Justin Timberlake enough that we didn't expect to have anything new to say about his show at the Garden last night, a return trip on a tour that Sharon has already gushed about anyways. Partly we wanted to see how the crowd makeup changes when he had a so-called rock band opening (answer: an even larger ratio boost, this time it appeared to be about 12:1 women). Partly we wanted to see what the HBO special is going to look like. 

The last time we saw JT -- a couple of days after the album leaked, but before most of his fans had heard it -- "What Goes Around" was greeted with blank stares. This time it was the centerpiece of the set, with Justin playing piano while rotating on a platform in the middle of his in-the-round stage. (He appeared to be playing an electric keyboard; if memory serves, he had a real-live baby grande at Avalon. What gives?) In the middle of the song, he started singing some new lyrics, and for a second we couldn't place them. "Come pick me up . . . " No, it couldn't be. "Take me out." Oh my god. "Fuck me up." Holy shit. "Steal my records, screw all my friends." Jesus H. Christ. Justin Timberlake is sneaking in the chorus of "Come Picke Me Up," a song from Ryan Adams' Heartbreaker, which still hovers in our mental all-time top 10 albums list. We suspected that maybe we were hallucinating. But when the song came back around to the bridge he did it again, sneaking in pretty much the same lines. We have no audio evidence or even a pictoral illustration, so we guess you'll just have to take our word for it. Video found! See above! (At the 1:47 mark you can hear him sing, "I wish you would . . . fuck me up . . . steal all my records.")

Other observations:

- We also suspect Justin's a Trent Reznor fan. NIN's "Closer" (aka the "fuck you like an animal" song) blared as one of the two get-back-to-your-seats songs immediately before JT took the stage (the other one was, even odder, the Rapture's "House of Jealous Lovers"). And the semi-transparent-scrim stage treatments, with Justin visible behind the video projections, seemed a pretty overt homage to/ripoff of Trent's performance of "Hurt," which if you haven't seen you should.

- Timbaland's DJ set is mostly blah (here it is in three parts on youtube, but if anyone has seen it HQ, please give a shout); or, at least, as a DJ set it's pretty disappointing. As self-promotion, though, it's pretty great, and even the lack of a solid flow all the way through can't obscure some of the whoa when he drops "Billie Jean" into that Keri Hilson "Since You Been Gone" remix. Might even be better  Way better than the Robyn cover of "Since U Been Gone" that's been making the rounds.

8/11/2007 10:50:42 AM by On the Download | Comments [2] |  

Elvis Costello at Avalon
Tuesday, May 15, 2007 at 8:00 pm
Tickets are $55
On-sale Saturday, April 7, 2007 at NOON

Velvet Revolver at Avalon
Wednesday, May 16, 2007 at 8:00 pm
Tickets are $55.00
On-sale Saturday, April 7, 2007 at NOON 

John Mayer and Ben Folds at the TD Banknorth Garden
Tuesday, July 17, 2007 at 7:30 pm
Tickets are $49.50 and $59.50
On-sale Saturday, April 7, 2007 at 10:00 am

4/3/2007 10:12:46 AM by On the Download | Comments [1] |  

Justin Timberlake and P!ink
February 6 at TD Banknorth Garden
Photos (c) Carina Mastrocola

OTD happened to be in the vicinity of the Garden last night -- but not inside, since our girl Sharon who wrote the cover story last week rightfully snagged the office tix -- and even just perusing the aftermath we knew something special had gone down. Scoped some up-close camera phone video from the dudes in front of us in line at the Store 24, and the girls behind us were still panting, verging on fainting. Sharon's full report coming in minutes up on the main site. We also heard that a certain Compound 440r star whose artwork appears at the top of this blog managed to get in -- Mark E. Moon, throw us some knowledge jewels in the comments! 

UPDATE: "Afterglow: Justin Timberlake, TD BankNorth Garden, February 6, 2007." By Sharon Steel. (Note: more photos up here too).

2/7/2007 11:07:32 AM by On the Download | Comments [4] |  

We were looking for this footage on YouTube back when we named James Brown's historic concert at the Garden in 1968 -- yes, the one he did the night Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated -- the best concert in Boston, ever. The performance, nearly cancelled but eventually broadcast live on WGBH, has been widely credited over the years with sparing Boston from the riots that erupted in many other cities. This footage has been on and off YT over the past couple of months, and here's hoping the copyright holders let it stay up for a bit. This six-minute clip is particularly amazing -- not just for the performance footage, which shows James screaming and dancing at his superhuman, late-'60s best (it also includes his infamous cape-throwing reveal), but also for the way he handles the crowd rushing the stage: as a gaggle of nervous cops attempt to keep people at bay, James takes command and talks one-on-one with members of the audience, calming both police and fans while displaying in a few short moments the authority, grace, and pride that informed all of his finest music.

WATCH: James Brown, live at the Boston Garden, 1968.

12/27/2006 12:17:48 PM by On the Download | Comments [1] |  

1. We know how much you dudes were let down by the DFA remix of Justin Timberlake's "My Love." We feel your pain. No, it's not as bad as the demo the DFA did with his ex-girlfriend or anything. But lets speak real words. You listen to this remix and you get the impression that there was some tape left on the floor from the LCD Nike promo, and it happened to be in the same key, but not quite in the same tempo, so they just slowed the acappella down and . . . y'know . . . let it ride. Whatever. If the DFA was good at making "pop" music, the Rapture would be playing Centrums and Tim Goldsworthy would be way too busy making crafting radio hits for Radio 4 to crank out Arthur Russell re-edits that make Pitchforkian hipsterz blow loadz. Also, just in case you haven't heard it, the definitive 8-minute "My Love" refix is already circulating. Bonkers:

DOWNLOAD: Justin Timberlake, "My Love (Capski Re-Do)" (mp3)

2. Tickets to the Justin Timberlake/P!nk extravaganza at the Garden on February 6 don't go on sale to the public until tomorrow morning, but all you cats on the internets are about to get the hookup. Go here for details on how to get tix early, starting in . . . like . . . thirty seconds or so. (UPDATE: it's on.) Crappy DFA remix or no crappy DFA remix, the Timberlake live spectacle is unfuckwithable. We speak from experience.

PRESALE: Justin Timberlake at the Garden, February 6 2007

PREVIOUSLY:

REVIEW: Justin Timberlake at Avalon, August 26, 2006
REVIEW: Justin Timberlake at the FleetCenter, August 4, 2003

11/3/2006 11:02:01 AM by On the Download | Comments [4] |  

Red Hot Chili Peppers & the Mars Volta
October 2 at TD Banknorth Garden, Boston
All photos by Carina Mastrocola

10/3/2006 2:02:37 PM by On the Download | Comments [0] |  

The Who
September 16 at TD Banknorth Garden, Boston
All photos (c) Phil Sussman

Full report coming soon. . .

STREAM: The Who, "It's Not Enough" and "Tea and Theatre"

9/17/2006 5:04:00 PM by On the Download | Comments [0] |  

From the inbox:

THE WHO TO LAUNCH FIRST MAJOR WORLD TOUR IN OVER 20 YEARS 

North American Leg Kicks Off September 12th in Philadelphia

The Who
At The TD Banknorth Garden
Saturday, September 16, 2006 at 7:30 pm
Tickets are $54.50, $79.50, $99.50 and $204.50
Tickets go on-sale Monday, July 17, 2006 at 10:00 am 

NEW YORK, NY -- (July 13, 2006) – Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey, the dynamic, innovative force behind The Who, announced today that they will kick off their first world tour in over 20 years on September 12th at Philadelphia’s Wachovia Center.  The legendary rock band is already confirmed to play 17 dates at arenas and amphitheatres across the U.S. and Canada with more U.S. shows to follow in November and December. Planned concerts for 2007 include South America, Japan, Australia and Europe to be announced later.

Anticipation for the tour is already running at an all-time high following the incredible critical and box-office response to the Who’s European shows which opened in June. Fans and critics alike have hailed the show as being, “Just like the good ole days,” with the same, unbridled power and emotion that exemplifies a Who show. 

The Who, famous for their powerful music and energy on stage, will perform songs from their new mini rock opera, Wire & Glass, material from their upcoming studio album along with their greatest hits and rarities, certain to please long time fans. The new album, provisionally called “Who 2,” and the band’s first since 1982’s It’s Hard, is scheduled for an October 23 release.

VISIT: The Who tour home

7/13/2006 3:17:45 PM by On the Download | Comments [0] |  

So they had what the bizzers call a walkthrough down at the Garden for the "Confessions" extravaganza, and it was totally awesome, and by totally awesome we mean that it was everything you'd expect: over-caffeinated Madonna employee shouting at OTD to put away his camera phone, big burly friendly Live Nation dude posing for the nightly-news cams, lots of jaded roadies wishing us press fags would get out of the way so they can do their jobs. We empathize: if you and your friends just decided to come hang out in our cube right now, we'd kick you in the balls, photo pass or no photo pass. We're not supposed to give away the details, but they mentioned two things that might pique your interest: One, girls on roller skates coming down from the ceiling. Two, as per tradition, they just released a bunch of good seats through ticketmaster -- so if you want to take out a second mortgage, you can still go tonight without seeing Mr. Scalper.

Here's some useless and yet hypnotically fascinating information provided to us on two sheets of 8 1/2 x 11 paper. Thanks, Liz Rosenberg!

400,000: watts of power used for run of show, nightly
5000: square feet of surface on Madonna's four stages
4000: number of Swarovski crystals in the 10-pound belt designed for Madonna by Michael Schmidt
1000: hours of rehearsal over 12 weeks
600: number of outfits worn in entire show
280: yards of ace bandages used for Madonna and dancers
253: massages provided to dancers
106: crew members in Madonna touring party
50: number of thorns in the infamous crown of thorns, via Cotters Church Supply in LA
40: in feet, size of turntable in center of main stage
27: number of performers including madonna, band, dancers
24: semi trucks used to transport equipment from city to city
8: number of Madonna's broken bones displayed via x-rays and MRIs during "Like a Virgin"
2: Million dollars worth of Swarovski crystalls embellishes [sic] above disco ball
1 1/2: Tons of Madonna disco ball rocket ship at start of show
1: number of "Discofied" crucifixes rising nightly from stage floor with surprise visitor attached

Here's our home-made camera-phone video of the Live Nation dude telling people what to expect tonight: we think that if you click on it, it will open in QuickTime. If it doesn't, well, you're not really missing a whole lot anyway.

UPDATE: We give up. Our blog engine sucks. No video. Sob.

7/6/2006 12:54:07 PM by On the Download | Comments [0] |  

Is that a Pearl Jam hat?

Donate enough money to a good cause -- or win the Red Sox their first World Series in 80-odd years -- and you too can rock out with Pearl Jam. Last night between songs PJ's Eddie Vedder went on a rant about how part of the ticket price ($51 + service fees, ouch!) was to be donated to Horizons for Homeless Children, a Boston-based organization that attempts to break the cycle of homelessness, starting with children. Then, he mentioned that a local man and his cohorts have agreed to match every dollar that PJ donates, and that local man, avid/rabid Pearl Jam fan, is Theo Epstein.

About 20 minutes later, as they were starting to close down shop with "Rockin' In the Free World," an unannounced special guest guitarist came out donning a hat, wig, and GIANT sweatshirt. After a performance that included lots of off-time jumping, sloppy axe work, and falling to his knees to rock even harder, the garb was shed to reveal . . . you guessed it, Epstein. (Some audience-shot photos can be seen here.) Who woulda thunk it? I was hoping for the Boss, who was rumored to be in the building. Oh well.

That capped a pretty rock and roll day for Epstein, who kicked off with a morning announcement that for the second year his Foundation To Be Named Later would be throwing a bash at Ye Olde Fenway Park in conjunction with ESPN rockabilly fanatic Peter Gammons and CBS sitcommer Mike O'Malley. The 2nd annual Hot Stove, Cool Music: The Fenway Sessions takes place July 12, with music by the Click Five, Juliana Hatfield, Buffalo Tom, the Gentlemen, and a bunch of Sox irregulars including Lenny DiNardo and Epstein. Now if they can just get Eddie to replace last year's faux-Eddie impersonation by Bronson Arroyo, maybe they'll fill the joint.

 

5/26/2006 4:20:53 PM by On the Download | Comments [0] |  

Photos: Carina Mastrocola

Pearl Jam/My Morning Jacket mayhem continues tonight at the Garden. Full report from last night's show is up now over here. Also, we would like to encourage people to join the Tool argument in the comments section on James Parker's piece. Hilarious.

READ: Jung at heart:  Tool at the Orpheum. By James Parker.
READ: Pearl Jam at the Garden:  Less is still more. By Matt Ashare.

5/25/2006 3:42:59 PM by On the Download | Comments [0] |  

Photos by Eric Antoniou.

(today's guest OTD post is from Matt Squadcar)

First the Ameriquest Mortage signage flanking the striking curtain mural that hung in front of the stage came down. Then, after a few random guitar chords echoed through the Garden, the scrim disappeared, as the big screen behind them let off a blinding flash, the Stones were back in town on the second leg of their “Bigger Bang” tour. At one point, a bemused Keith did manage to mumble something about “déjà vu,” but — to their credit — this was no rehash of the August 21 gig that got the tour off to celebratory start back in August. Yeah, they opened with a loose and swinging “Jumping Jack Flash” that took a few bars to come into focus, which is saying a lot for such a familiar song. But that Keith and Ronnie’s style: whether they’re toying with crowd or each other, they seem to enjoy stumbling into their bloosier rockers rather than nailing the hook right away. Maybe it pisses Mick off, though he seemed his usual happy self as he half-sung/half-shouted a chorus as fully etched in our collective cultural memory as the lips-and-tongue Stones logo that adorned all the merch the capacity crowd had already feasted on, from the $15 faux laminate ticket holders the guy in front of me wore around his neck, to a $600 leather jacket that one couple were debating about as I’d made my way into the venue. Hell, what’s six bills when you’re shelling out up to $450 for tickets.

The show may have started in similar fashion to the Fenway gig, with Keith’s freeform soloing and beefy Chuck Berry licks fighting with Mick’s flashy moves for the spotlight during “Jumping Jack Flash” and “It’s Only Rock And Roll.” But then, with keyb man Chuck Leavel leading the way, they launching into “Let’s Spend the Night Together,” setting the tone for a set that featured almost a dozen tunes they didn’t play that hot August night at Fenway. From a perilously loose “Midnight Rambler” and a shambling “Happy” to a smooth “As Tears Go By” that featured some nice 12-string acoustic strumming by Keith. After seeing about a dozen Stones shows in the past dozen or so years, I’ve admittedly started looking for something — anything — critical to report. But when you consider how easy it would be for the “Greatest Rock and Roll Band in the World” (or, at least, to judge from all the 18-wheelers parked out back, one of the biggest) to just go through the motions, it’s truly remarkable to watch Ronnie wait for Keith to give him the nod before breaking into the lap-steel solo on “Happy,” or look on as Keith makes eye contact with Mick before glancing back at Charlie to mark the end of “Tumblin’ Dice.” Yeah, they’ve got a couple of keyboard players, a four piece horn section, three background vocalists, and a monster of a bassist in Daryl Jones to keep some semblance of order. But there aren’t even many club bands left who deliver the level of spontaneity that distinguishes the Stones as dinosaurs in the very best sense of the word.

1/14/2006 12:57:22 PM by On the Download | Comments [0] |