The latest FIFA football rankings are out, and a scrappy Northern Ireland side has risen four places to 32nd in the world. That’s three spots ahead of the Republic of Ireland, and clearly this week, Northern Irish eyes are smiling. And pointing and laughing at the Irish, I’m sure.
As someone whose borderline obsessed with the other football these days, that seemed like an interesting story to me. And as someone whose borderline obsessed with music, that interesting story made me think of Van Morrison, though I have no way of being sure he actually gives a shit about the national team, nor for that matter the rankings of the world’s other national teams.
But now I’m stuck with Van the Man on the brain, so let’s turn to London’s Rainbow Theatre on the evening of July 24, 1973. Morrison and a sizeable band tore up the stage that night, and now it’s up on The YouTube for all the world to drool. And, hey, if you like what you see, you can always download it from The Trader’s Den. Enjoy the awesome airkicks, a CaraVan staple.
We’ve noticed some striking similarities between two of our favorite shredders and two of our favorite villains. Any doppelganging in your nape of the neck?
Above: RAQ’s Chris Michetti and Whitestarr’s Cisco Adler [kudos to the_coach]
Above: Umphrey’s McGee Jake Cinninger and The Hamburglar
Here’s a survey that must be flawed: “The poll by Harris Interactive…showed that…83 percent of people earning $150,000 or more had a music education.” Then how do I know tons of poor folk that’ve played the skin flute for years?
The beginning of the year is generally considered the leanest part of the live music calendar, yet January tour dates have been flying into Hidden Track headquarters faster than Ricky Williams could injure himself upon returning to the NFL. And here we thought we were gonna be able to save some cash after the holidays. Fat chance. Let’s take a look at who’s hitting the road after Auld Lang Syne…
We were hoping Beck would play some shows on this here continent, but so far, no luck on that front. Our favorite Scientologist (sorry, Darren Shearer) just debuted a new band featuring legendary producer Nigel Godrich this past weekend at a secret show in Los Angeles. Gotta check that out…
It looks as if the Jackson 5 may reunite for what may potentially be the biggest source of Grade-A music-blog fodder since Radiohead “pulled a Radiohead.”
Jermaine’s talking, and he claims the talented one will be involved in some role:
Michael will be involved. We want to tour. We want to touch the lives of everybody who’s bought our records and supported us. It will probably start here first, but it will be sometime in 2008. That’s our plan.”
Our guess is Michael will want to touch more than just lives…we’ll let you know if “scrumptious boycock” is featured prominently on the tour rider. Eh, too easy.
We spent much of our Thanksgiving week hearing about how the pre- and post-holiday tradition of sandwiching live music around a delicious turkey may finally be dead. But sucks to your assmar, pessimistheorists, New York hosted a veritable shitload of live shows from Wednesday through Sunday, providing venues all over the city for hippies and hipsters alike to catch a wide variety of genres.
Your trusty Hidden Track sherpas caught three of these New York holiday shows, one taking in The Duo and Mocean Worker‘s awesome show at the Music Hall of Williamsburg before Thanksgiving, one catching RAQ at the Highline Ballroom on Saturday. And our main man Danfun headed over to the West Side’s Terminal 5 for The Hold Steady and Art Brut on Wednesday night.
Shane over at our corporate parent, Glide Magazine, reviewed The Hold Steady + Art Brut show in Phoenix two weeks ago, so head over here if you’re looking for words to compliment these fine, fine photos. Otherwise, read on after the jump for Danfun‘s view of the proceedings in New York’s newest big venue.
We had some fun at the expense of the popular indie-jam rock band moe. some five weeks ago, taking the piss out of the group’s management after it blasted out an e-mail to fans about the band’s innate potential for corporate partnerships, synergistic sponsorships and customized ad jingles.
And while Don’t Fuck With Flo has, as of post-time, still yet to be adopted by the good people at Tampax, it appears from the video below that moe. has loaned their Happy Hour Hero to the hippie-beloved Saranac Brewery. We originally suggested that tune for a new T.G.I.Friday’s campaign, but it probably works better here considering Saranac is the band’s hometown beer and a moe.down sponsor. Oh, and because the beer is mentioned in the song itself. A natural fit.
moe.’s management confirmed for us that this Saranac ad had already been in the works “for a while,” before the mass e-mail to its fans. So what’s the point of this post? Not much. We just like the way this whole Jingle Episode is proceeding.
Saranac is the first and easiest step to moe.’s ad-related dominance. We must consider this marketing lay-up a necessary move before the tougher placements, like when the next Haggar slacks or Sears Craftsman toolset advertisements contain only 30-second Al Schnier face-melting solos. Without HHH in the Saranac ad, we will never have Spaz Medicine playing behind Wilford Brimley’s monologue in the “I’ve got Dia-beetis” commercials. You gotta crawl before you can walk, right?
If you’ve ever played Guitar Hero you’ve probably noticed the creepy “Oh, sure, this sounds just like the original” cover versions the games often use. Activision tries to save some cash by securing the rights to use a cover of the tune instead of ponying up for the original recording. The cover versions have been coming closer and closer to the originals with each new edition of the game.
Now The Romantics are suing Activision for using a cover version of What I Like About You that sounds a little too close to the original for their comfort. Believe it or not, The Romantics may have a good case. Artists such as Tom Waits and Bette Midler have won previous lawsuits claiming cover versions of their songs were too close to the originals. Read more about the lawsuit here as we move on to check out some of the other stories from the weekend:
Finally, My Bloody Valentine plans to “do a Radiohead” with their new release. Great, so there’s more fuel for the Radiohead superiority complex.
Sixteen years ago this weekend the world lost the ultimate showman, a once-in-a-generation performer who couldn’t singlehandedly erase the Village People from public consciousness yet still managed to make butch flamboyance a relatively cool endeavor. So to celebrate the life and times of the great Freddie Mercury on this day, I now present this not-so-fitting tribute of Don’t Stop Me Now:
Alright, here’s a fantastic video of the real thing. As you scope out those clips, we now take a long look back at a sample of the week that was at Hidden Track…
It’s the What-the-Fuck-on-Earf-Do-I-Do-Today? morning after Thanksgiving, and if you’re one of the sociopathic nutbars whose been up for five hours grousing the aisles of your local retailer in search of holiday bargains, best take a load off with the following seven numbers and a cup of hot cocoa. This one’s drenched in funk the pilgrims would be proud of, but I threw in some disco and some cheese-rock for the sake of the injuns. Either way, you should enjoy this one as we give thanks to Mediafire and Sendspace and the like…
Eleanor Rigby: Aretha Frankin — Live at the Fillmore West
Here Now!: Charles Kynard — Funky 16 Corners Radio
Grease Monkey: Brother Jack McDuff — Funky 16 Corners Radio
I Got My Mind Made Up: James Murphy (LCD) and Pat Murphy — Fabriclive36
Unclean Waters: Dirty Dozen Brass Band — Buck Jump
Moog Marmalade: Galactic — We Love ‘Em Tonight (Live at Tipitina’s)
Take Me Home Tonight: Eddie Money –Can’t Hold Back
It’s time to mourn the loss of another legendary venue. Ziggy’s, a Winston-Salem tradition for the past 30 years, closes its doors on Sunday. The list of bands that have come through the doors at Ziggy’s is staggering in both size and quality. Perpetual Groove closes the venue down in style on Sunday by hosting A Last Supper featuring a bunch of their close friends.
- With Sly Stone, in 2007, you take what you can get
- Spin interviews Arcade Fire and Bruce Springsteen for their first joint interview
- Donald Fagen let it slip that Steely Dan will return to the road next summer
- Neddy remembers Hampton ’97 ten years later
- Weezer is gearing up to release its sixth album, Tout Ensemble, on April 22nd
- The fight over James Brown’s estate continues to rage on
- Glen Phillips hits the road early next year
Finally, former Lynyrd Skynryd drummer Artimus Pyle was thrown in jail for failing to register on a sex offender’s list. Gimme three steps towards the cell.
Ronnie Hawkins pitched Robbie Robertson on joining his band with one undeniable sentence: “Son, you won’t make much money, but you’ll get more pussy than Frank Sinatra.” That’s what most heterosexual males call “a decent offer.”
Some 15 or so years later, Hawkins stood with Robertson and the other four brilliant members of The Band on the Winterland stage on Thanksgiving day in 1976. It’d mark the last time these five performed together as one of the greatest mostly non-American, American rock bands in music history (and probably the most underrated). Just about 31 years after The Last Waltz, we celebrate the greatest rock concert ever and the greatest concert film of all-time. Lotta superlatives today.
There’s no legitimate or acceptable excuse to be a music fan and not own this DVD. But if for some strange reason you “just never bought it,” we’ve compiled just about every single musical clip from the movie after the jump. Spend this fine turkey day with The Band and some little-known friends like Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Neil Young, Van the Man Morrison, Joni Mitchell, Muddy Waters, Paul Butterfield, Dr. John, Neil Diamond, Ronnie Hawkins and more. Could you imagine if blogs existed back then? The Internet may have exploded that night.
Maybe one day when the time is right, we can finally pull off my Last Waltz Halloween Party. It’ll be better than Vegoose. Anyway, read on to really enjoy your Thanksgiving…
The Thanksgiving holiday is finally upon us, and we’d like to take this opportunity to thank all of our readers for wasting their time with us. We’re changing the schedule around a bit due to the short week, so Grousing The Aisles and The B List will both take a spot on the bench until next week. But we do have plenty of links to some sweet bootlegs in this special edition of MP3 Boot Camp.
- Life before In Rainbows: The Ultimate Bootleg Experience shares some live Radiohead from the O.K. Computer tour
- Licorice Pizza turns us onto new bands like The Devil Makes Three
- Sting put together one helluva band in 1993, and now you listen to a radio session they recorded during that tour
- The Midnight Tracker found a copy of Sugarloaf covering Chest Fever
- If you are reading Nikki Sixx’s Heroin Diaries, be sure to listen to the mix Nazz prepared at Bleedin’ Out for the full multi-media experience
- Jesse Jarnow shares another edition of The Frow Show podcast
- NYCTaper recorded last Friday’s Yo La Tengo concert in Williamsburg
- And, finally, you can download the best of the ARMS supergroup featuring Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton
The Silver Jews yentas over at Pitchfork always seem to have the Berman-related scoop, and today they’re reporting the title of the band’s forthcoming LP will be Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea. The album hits some time in April 2008, but so far there’s no confirmed information, speculative rumors, innuendos, hints or allegations about either a tracklist or a subsequent tour. So far.
So naturally I spent the last 15 minutes fucking around on The YouTube watching as many Silver Jews clips as possible, but as it turns out, there’s a serious dearth of quality shit. The best I could do is this video of Black and Brown Blues and Smith & Jones Forever from the Grey Eagle at Ashevegas, North Carolina. Random Rules may contain the best opening line in music — “In 1984 I was hospitalized for approaching perfection” — but Smith & Jones Forever is clearly the best SJ song.
Agreed? In any event, now we can all anticipate a new batch of genius…
One of the interesting side effects of the upcoming Led Zeppelin reunion gig is that any time Jimmy Page gives an interview people analyze every single detail for clues about what will go down on December 10th. Page yesterday let it slide that the band has been rehearsing a song written between 1968 and 1980 that has never been played before. Jimmy played it cool when pushed for further details, but apparently he mentions they plan to play For Your Life in memory of Ahmet Ertegun in an interview that will run in the next issue of Guitar World.
Speaking of people that can’t keep a secret, Ian Astbury told a stunned crowd in Cincinnati that The Cult will be opening for Led Zeppelin during what’s shaping up to be the biggest tour of 2008. Be sure to save those holiday bonuses, because tickets won’t be cheap. Alright, what else is out there?
Finally congrats to Queen’s Brian May for being named Chancellor of Liverpool John Moores University, paving the way for Rock Star Astrophysicists everywhere.
