popwreckoning

PopWreckoning will celebrate its 3rd birthday by hosting a The Poison Control Center at Record Bar in Kansas City, Missouri on Monday, October 4.

The Poison Control Center, whom recently opened for Pavement here in Kansas City, will headline the show. It will also feature Mansions, O’Giant Man and Max Justus.

The show will cost $7 at the door. However, PopWreckoning is offering up a special deal to help you afford our party. If you come to the venue with a Pavement ticket from the September 11, 2010 show, we’ll let you in for 5 bucks flat. Furthermore, if you’re attending the evening Deadmau5 show at the Uptown Theater or The Mountain Goats show at the Bottleneck, you can show up at our show after, present the door guy with a ticket and get in for 3 bucks flat. That’s how badly we want you to join.

The show starts at 9:30 p.m. with Mansions. 10:15 will feature Max Justus, followed by O’Giant Man at 11:15. Your headliner, The Poison Control Center will melt your face at 12:15 a.m. (giving you plenty of time to make your way to the show after Deadmau5). This show is 18+ with legal ID.

Come support local music, the Record Bar and local media. PopWreckoning thanks you for your support.

Reunion shows are exciting, but nerve-wracking. At first, you’re all excited: “OMG!!!! THEY’RE TOURING AND COMING TO MY CITY? My inner-teenager is squealing!” But then some doubts set in: “Will they be the same and as great as they were?” “What if they don’t play such and such song?” “What if I find out I don’t like them anymore?” It’s a lot of pressure for both the artist and the fan hidden under the guise of a “special musical treat.”

So when Pavement announced their 2010 reunion, the chain reaction set in: “OMG! Excited!” to “OMG, what if they’re not as good?” But, fret not. After the venue lights went down at the Uptown and the decorative string lights strewn across the stage came on, Pavement triumphantly took the stage and played a flawless set for Kansas City. It maybe even trumped their performances from their heyday.

There wasn’t really any awkward tension or any attitude that they were just doing this for the money. Instead, there was a genuine feeling that this was for the fans. If the quality of the performance was enough evidence for this, then consider exhibits b and c: (b) front man Stephen Malkmus donned a local jersey for the Chiefs (who won their opening game, woot! that jersey must have been lucky) and (c) the set list pretty much consisted of every Pavement song you could hope to hear. There were very few people disappointed in the song choices.

Because Pavement was trying to fit in as many songs from their catalog as possible, there wasn’t very much banter inbetween songs. A few basic, “thank you” and one quip about Malkmus almost taking out some of the string lights when he lifted his guitar above his head, but this was really a show that delivered song after song with perfect execution. The guitar riffs were breathtaking, the vocals spot on and the fans loved every minute of it. The time off did not hurt these guys as they’ve only gotten better.

Pavement’s openers were equally fun. Poison Control Center switched off vocal duties and enhanced their brand of rock with brass elements. Though their songs were unfamiliar, they didn’t have a problem drawing the audience in with easy to clap and singalong sections. Then there were the stunts.  The guys would tumble, while playing the guitar and one guy even performed one guitar solo, while doing the splits the entire time. They’ll be back in KC in October headlining at the RecordBar. If this set was any indication, it will be a show you won’t want to miss.

Set List:
Gold Soundz
Rattled by the Rush
Starlings in the Slipstream
Date with Ikea
Shandy Lane
Frontwards
Heckler Spray/In the Mouth a Desert
Unfair
Spit on a Stranger
Stereo
Loretta’s Scars
Conduit for Sale
Shoot the Singer
Silence Kit
Trigger Cut
Grounded
Perfume-V
Cut Your Hair
Stop Breathin
Box Elder
Fight This Generation
Debris Slide
Kennel District
///
Here
Lions (Linden)
We Dance
Range Life/Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da

Okay, so I readily admit it. I don’t listen to a lot of American bands. I do, however, have a defense: if you turn on your car radio in Washington, DC, scroll up and down the dial all you want, but you won’t be able to find a good station that plays all “new” American rock ‘n’ roll. (There is a rock station in the area that I like, but the problem is they play a lot of Red Hot Chili Peppers and Nirvana, which is fine if you want to relive the ’90s but not if you want to discover new bands.) To seek out the next biggest American rock band, I’ve used one of two methods: either listen to the good mix of stuff played on BBC 6music (through which I found out about the Airborne Toxic Event, the Gaslight Anthem, and Titus Andronicus) or show up early to gigs as to check out opening bands.

The latter method applies to how I found out about New York band the Dig, who supported Editors in February at the 9:30 Club. I always feel bad for opening bands. Unless you happen to be lucky and are already famous before you’ve agreed to sign on to support a bigger band on their headlining tour, the venue is likely to be mostly empty when it comes time for you to play. This was true at the 9:30, but the Dig worked it like pros, and by the end of their set everyone around me was smiling, obviously converted into fans. Workhorses of the American rock world, this band has toured around the country a lot, and it showed in their pretty much seamless live performance. Live shows are one thing; but can the band deliver on record, on their debut Electric Toys? I would say yes, a resounding yes. One better: this debut effort was produced by Bryce Goggin, who has previously worked with Pavement (on their 1994 opus Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain) and Antony and the Johnsons. Intrigued?

Like New Hampshire band Wild Light, the Dig features different members switching off for who sings lead. Bassist Emile Mosseri takes lead vocals on what I consider the more middle of the road radio-friendly tunes. “You’re Already Gone” tells the story about, from what I gather, the morning after but with a twist – the emotionally unavailable woman has split and the man is lamenting that she’s left so quickly. The result? A peculiar but wholly romantic tune (with lyrics like “I just want to hear you say good night again” and “all the city lights will light your skin“) with a wicked guitar groove. Tom Chaplin (Keane)-like vocals feature in “Carry Me Home,” just that electric guitars are the prominent instrument on this song, not keyboards. ” The drums by Jamie Alegre drive “Sick Sad Morning” along as Mosseri pleads, “why don’t you pick up the phone?” and later yelps in yearning.

In contrast, guitarist David Baldwin sings lead on “I Just Wanna Talk to You,” a tune with almost Southern swagger. Take that, Kings of Leon. “She’s Going to Kill That Boy” and “Two Sisters in Love” are equally searing, with rocking choruses. “He’s a Woman” has a psychedelic bent, with crashing drums and swirly guitars. These are the kind of songs you want to have along for a long car ride in the summer, windows rolled down, speakers blasting. The album cover of Electric Toys features a red velvet cupcake, cream cheese frosting, and a perfect maraschino cherry. I highly recommend taking a great big bite. Dig in.

Electric Toys will be released in America on June 8 on Megaforce Distribution.

Track Listing
01. Carry Me Home
02. Two Sisters in Love
03. You’re Already Gone
04. She’s Going to Kill That Boy
05. Penitentiary
06. Sick Sad Morning
07. He’s a Woman
08. Look Inside
09. For All Your Sins
10. Shadow
11. I Just Wanna Talk to You
12. Feel Like Somebody Else

The Dig: myspace | @ 9:30 Club | The Joy Formidable / The Dig Live Performances / Webchat on May 10 | Thrice announce 2nd leg of Summer tour w/Kevin Devine, Bad Veins & The Dig

The Sasquatch Festival 2010 in Quincy, Wash. will feature united Pavement, Massive Attack, My Morning Jacket, Ween, Vampire Weekend, MGMT, Kid Cudi, LCD Soundsystem and many more.

The festival is Memorial Day Weekend from May 29-31. Tickets go on sale Saturday, February 20 at 10 a.m. PST at ticketmaster.com. Prices range from $70-$170.

The 2010 line-up for Coachella has been revealed.

Jay-Z, Muse and the Gorillaz will headline the festival that stretches from Friday, April 16 to Saturday, April 18 in Indio, California. Other notable performances include Pavement as part of their reunion tour and Thom Yorke????, and though his name is still followed by several question marks, he is there. That is seriously the name of his new solo-band project.

See the full line-up in the flyer below or at Coachella.com. Tickets officially go on-sale for the event January 22, 2010 at 10 a.m.

Whenever my mind turns to a band I want to see, my thoughts invariably turn to Bear Mountain Picnic. It’s unfortunate that my thoughts do so since the band broke up well over two years ago. Like a lost loved one they stay in my thoughts. Their only release, a five song EP called Happiness in the Dybosphere, remains in my constant rotation and their songs rank as some of the best driving around music of all time.

The band’s name is owed to the song from the Bob Dylan Bootleg Series, volume 1. “Bear Mountain Picnic,” the song, comically details a man who purchases phony tickets for a phony event and the eventual letdown. Bear Mountain Picnic, the band, matched the attitude of this song beat for beat.

The group wrote true blue indie-rock songs on par with the Black Lips or Wowee-Zowee-style Pavement. The songs were well constructed snippets with vocal arrangements that seemed to come right out of Big Pink. The band declares on “Silent Trade,” the opening song on Happiness in the Dybosphere:

My father was a military man/he went down in a blaze of glory

I’d like to tell you everything about him/but it’s just too gory of story

A short moment later they nail a great melody over a Dylan-esque guitar part on “Brain Tonic” and then merge that folk guitar with a strong Pixies influence on “Your Cousin’s Neck.”

Many of the band’s finest songs don’t appear on the EP. At live shows they broke out classics that teetered on the edge of pure punk before falling back into pure indie-rock. The most memorable of that group was “Bear Mountain Picnic Blues,” a song the band used to open sets shortly before the break up. The song gave a quirky twist on the band’s ‘current’ situation—most noticeably being blacklisted from the Blind Pig in Ann Arbor.

The band members have carried on. Reagan (bass and vocals) carries on in the acoustically geared Long Whisker and Lucas (guitar and vocals) has moved onto the Chicago scene where he plays in Hospital Garden. The results of both bands are great and worth hearing, but if you build a time machine set it for Detroit between 2003 and 2005.

Track Listing:
01. Brain Tonic
02. Gold
03. Headlines
04. Silent Trade
05. Your Cousin’s Neck

Bear Mountain Picnic: website | myspace

Back in June, I was awakened by a text message from a very excited friend who read that Sonic Youth was going to be a part of Celebrate St. Louis’ Live on The Levee in which the city provides free live entertainment. Needless to say, I thought this was merely a rumor considering Sonic Youth not exactly striking me as a family-friendly act and for free no less. Talk about too good to be true. To my surprise however, the art-rockers were actually the band scheduled to kick off Live on The Levee which is a month long series following Fair St. Louis over the Fourth of July festivities.

The Arch grounds were packed with punks young and old, the older crowd bringing their kids. It’s not everyday you see toddlers with such good taste in tunes as they dance around to Sonic Youth.  As the band made their way through a set consisting of a huge portion of new material off their new album, The Eternal (which sounds even better live if you ask me), Thurston Moore asked if the weather was always this nice because they were looking to re-locate and out of true rarity, it was not 100 degrees here in St. Louis in July so they lucked out weather wise.

As the sun faded behind the city skyline, the true Sonic Youth concert experience took over as their lighting, rendered unseen in pure sunlight, began to blanket the band in warm red lighting and a series of flashing white backlighting. The band joined by former Pavement bassist, Mark Ibold, continued their 90-minute set until Sonic Youth’s noisy second encore was cut off by Finger Eleven’s “Paralyzer” coming over the loudspeakers  and fireworks display.

Sonic Youth – “Sacred Trickster”

The Live on the Levee series continues through August 1st featuring acts such as Little Feat, Angie Stone, Guster, Gretchen Wilson and Lupe Fiasco. If you’re in the area and looking for an evening of free entertainment, do yourself a favor and head downtown to the Arch, have a seat on the steps, crack open a cold one and enjoy yourself. All proceeds from the vendors on site go to charity so do your part.

Set List:
No Way
Sacred Trickster
Calming The Snake
Stereo Sanctity
Walkin Blue
Poison Arrow
Malibu Gas Station
What We Know
Antenna
Leaky Lifeboat
Hey Joni
Anti-Orgasm
Massage The History
//
The Sprawl
Cross The Breeze
//
Shadow of a Doubt
Death Valley ‘69

Live on The Levee Series Schedule:
Jul 24 – Angie Stone @ 8 p.m.
Jul 25 – Gretchen Wilson @ 8 p.m.
Jul 31 – Guster @ 8 p.m.
Aug 01 – Lupe Fiasco @ 8 p.m.

Sonic Youth: website | myspace | The Eternal review
Live on the Levee: website | tickets