Coachella

Spiritualized are limbering up to release the video for new single “Soul On Fire“. Here’s a little “making of” video, put together by the BBC, in which J.Spaceman peruses a West London warehouse stuffed to the gills with medical paraphernalia, a sort of private Mütter Museum. Jason chose it as one of the locations for the new video - the first video from the excellent new album Songs In A&E - and here he gives a tour. (A&E, as well as being two musical notes, is what the British call the ER. It stands for “Accident & Emergency”. Hey, you learn something every day, right?)

We’ll post the actual video just as soon as it’s completed.

Songs In A&E will be released on CD on May 27th and vinyl on June 3rd via Spaceman/Fontana Records. Spiritualized have a handful of West Coast shows coming up later this month, including a Sunday night performance at Coachella. Details here.

Remember when The Strokes and The White Stripes got really big in the UK really fast? And then America had to catch up with the mania? The same happened to Jimi Hendrix, I believe. Well, Florida’s Black Kids just released their first single “I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You” on the super cool Almost Gold record label. It debuted at #11 in the British Singles Charts. Pretty impressive! The band have been in the UK recording their debut album with Bernard Butler (Suede, McAlmont & Butler) and it’s set to come out sometime in the early summer.

We reckon this’ll be one of 2008’s biggest summer anthems.

Black Kids are on tour through the middle of August, including a stop off at Coachella & Lollapalooza. Full international tour dates here.

The Raconteurs just played the first two shows of their Consolers Of The Lonely tour in their hometown of Nashville earlier this week. We wish we were there! They’ll be touring through to the end of June as well as appearing at Coachella and Lollapalooza.

If you have a record player we strongly recommend picking up a copy of the album on vinyl as it comes replete with the most beautiful packaging.

Jack and Brendan gave an interview to Weekend Edition on NPR this week. Listen here.

Catch The Raconteurs -lucky people in Missouri get to see The Fiery Furnaces open for them!!

04/20/08 Vancouver. BC @ Commodore Ballroom*
04/21/08 Seattle, WA @ Neumo’s*
04/22/08 Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom*
04/23/08 San Francisco, CA @ Bimbo’s 365 Club*
04/25/08 Indio, CA @ Coachella
04/26/08 Las Vegas, NV @ The Joint*
04/28/08 Denver, CO @ The Fillmore*
04/29/08 Kansas City, MO @ Uptown Theatre*
05/1/08 Dallas, Texas @ House of Blues*
05/2/08 Austin, Texas @ Stubb’s BBQ*
05/3/08 Austin, Texas @ Stubb’s BBQ*
05/4/08 New Orleans, LA @ New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival
05/27/08 Washington, D.C. @ 9:30 Club^
05/28/08 Washington, D.C. @ 9:30 Club^
05/30/08 New York, NY @ Terminal 5^
05/31/08 New York, NY @ Terminal 5
06/01/08 New York, NY @ Terminal 5
06/3/08 Boston, MA @ Bank of America Pavilion^
06/4/08 Montreal, QUE @ Metropolis^
06/5/08 Toronto, ONT @ Ricoh Coliseum^
06/7/08 Detroit, MI @ The Fillmore^
06/9/08 Columbus, OH @ LC Amphitheater^
06/10/08 Cincinnati, OH @ National City Pavilion^
06/12/08 St. Louis, MO @ Pageant%
06/13/08 Manchester, TN @ Bonnaroo Music Festival
8/1/08 Chicago, IL @ Lollapalooza

*with Birds of Avalon
^with Black Lips
%with Fiery Furnaces

San Diego’s Grand Ole Party are one of our favorite new bands. We saw them at 2007’s SXSW and immediately leapt out of our seats and dashed over to them after their show to see if they wanted to be friends. They’ve only toured the US three times in their still-early careers - once with Rilo Kiley, once with Vampire Weekend and once (& currently) with Rogue Wave. That probably doesn’t suck at all. Their debut album Humanimals is completely great and was produced by Blake Sennett of Rilo Kiley. They just completed their first video, for track “Look Out Young Son“.

The band have tour dates left - as well as a performance at Coachella - don’t miss them!

4/15/08 Philadelphia, PA @ First Unitarian Church**
4/16/08 Washington, DC @ 9:30 Club**
4/18/08 Chicago, IL @ Schubas**
4/19/08 Chicago, IL @ Schubas**
4/20/08 St. Louis, MO @ Gargoyle Club**
4/22/08 Boulder, CO @ Fox Theatre**
4/24/08 Phoenix, AZ @ Rhythm Room**
4/27/08 Indio, CA @ Coachella
5/3/08 San Francisco, CO @ The Fillmore**

**w/Rogue Wave

Posted by CW

Oh, Festival Season. You’re not far from us now that we are in the month of April. Starting with Coachella at the end of April, the next few months are filled with bands from all over the world happening upon our fine nation with one goal only: the perfect Festival performance/set list. Last year, I personally only made it to Lollapalooza; and now that the 08 line-up has been announced, I may very well go back….

Here are some suggestions for bands that are guaranteed to be awesome at some of the festivals this summer.

COACHELLA:
Portishead * The Verve * The Raconteurs * Death Cab for Cutie * My Morning Jacket * The Breeders * Spiritualized * Goldfrapp * Rilo Kiley * MIA * Metric * Cold War Kids * Animal Collective * Simian Mobile Disco * Flogging Molly * Mark Ronson * Autolux * Sons and Daughters * Black Kids * Annuals * Vampire Weekend * St. Vincent

LOLLAPALOOZA:
Radiohead * Kanye West * Wilco * The Raconteurs * Bloc Party * Broken Social Scene * Flogging Molly * Mark Ronson * Cat Power * Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks (Janet Weiss on drums!) * CSS * Mates of State * Chromeo * The Kills * The Go! Team * Yeasayer * Black Kids * Kid Sister * Noah and the Whale

PITCHFORK MUSIC FESTIVAL:
Animal Collective * Jarvis Cocker * !!! * Vampire Weekend * Fleet Foxes * The Ruby Suns * Dinosaur Jr. * M. Ward * Dirty Projectors * Spiritualized

BONNAROO:
Robert Plant and Alison Krauss featuring T Bone Burnett * My Morning Jacket * The Raconteurs * Sigur Ros * Ben Folds * Cat Power * MIA * Iron & Wine * Stephen Marley * Broken Social Scene * Rilo Kiley * Against Me! * Aimee Mann * The Fiery Furnaces *

ALL POINTS WEST:
Radiohead * The Go! Team * CSS * Juana Molina * Andrew Bird * Grizzly Bear * Animal Collective * Metric * The Virgins * The Secret Machines

Happy Festival-Going!

Posted by JA

It’s been five years since J.Spaceman’s Spiritualized released an album. In that time J (aka Jason Pierce) has been through rather a lot. In the first piece about the album, which ran in the Guardian newspaper in Britain last week, he recounts how he nearly died of pneumonia shortly after recording.

The new album is called Songs In A&E and is the very eagerly-awaited follow-up to 2003’s Amazing Grace. It’ll be released on June 3rd on Spaceman Records/Fontana. Late last year Spiritualized came to America for a handful of Acoustic Mainlines shows, including a stop at the Harlem Apollo in New York where they received several standing ovations and left not a dry eye in the house.

The band will perform, with strings and gospel singers at Coachella and a couple of shows prior:

April 23rd @ Lobero Theatre -Santa Barbara, CA

April 25th @ 4th & B - San Diego, CA

April 26th @ Coachella Festival, Indio, CA

Posted by CW