Will be in Australia all this week profiling these guys for the October issue of MAGNET MAGAZINE. Will try to post some local color everyday. Cheers, mate!
TURBO FRUITS: Sweet Thang
Turbo Fruits – “Sweet Thang” from Serpents & Snakes on Vimeo. Nashville’s Turbo Fruits plays the North Star Bar tonight with Philly G-rockers The Chelsea Kills.
RIP: JJ Cale, Songwriter’s Songwriter, Dead @ 74
CHICAGO TRIBUNE: J.J. Cale, the songwriter behind the Eric Clapton classics “Cocaine” and “After Midnight,” died Friday at the age of 74. Born John Weldon Cale in 1938 in Oklahoma City, Okla., the Grammy winner was an originator of the “Tulsa Sound,” a loose genre drawing on blues, rockabilly, country and jazz influences. His career saw him release 14 albums and his songs have been covered by acts including Johnny Cash, Santana, Tom Petty, Waylon Jennings and Captain Beefheart. His biggest U.S. hit single, “Crazy Mama,” peaked at No. 22 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1972. MORE
NPR 4 THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When U Can’t
FRESH AIR “Good evening, hello. I have cancer. How are you?” That’s how comedian Tig Notaro began her set at Largo in Los Angeles the day she was diagnosed with Stage 2 breast cancer. As she uttered those words to the audience, there was nervous laughter, weeping and total silence in response. Comedian Louis C.K. was there that evening, and tweeted this about her performance: “In 27 years doing this, I’ve seen a handful of truly great, masterful standup sets. One was Tig Notaro last night at Largo.” When she spoke with Terry Gross, it had been an eventful […]
KING KHAN & THE SHRINES: Darkness
From the new album Idle No More, due out Sept. 3rd on Merge.
CONTEST: Win Tix To See New Order At The Mann
ALL MUSIC GUIDE: Rising from the ashes of the legendary British post-punk unit Joy Division, the enigmatic New Order triumphed over tragedy to emerge as one of the most influential and acclaimed bands of the 1980s; embracing the electronic textures and disco rhythms of the underground club culture many years in advance of its contemporaries, the group’s pioneering fusion of new wave aesthetics and dance music successfully bridged the gap between the two worlds, creating a distinctively thoughtful and oblique brand of synth pop appealing equally to the mind, body, and soul. New Order‘s origins officially date back to mid-1976, […]
FOLLOW THE MONEY: The New Jersey Marijuana Criminalization Industrial Complex Is Profit-Driven
PHILLY 420: When a little known committee dismissed a complaint filed against a New Jersey Assemblywoman, it shined some rare sunlight on an industry raking in a healthy profit from marijuana prohibition: Substance abuse prevention and treatment centers. The Joint Committee for Ethical Standards at the New Jersey Legislature on Tuesday dismissed a complaint filed against Assemblywoman Mary Pat Angelini (R. Montmouth) who had been accused of appearing to benefit from Garden State’s marijuana laws. The core issue in the complaint was if Assemblywoman Angelini was garnering a personal profit by voting against medical marijuana access, voting against decreasing […]
LET’S ACTIVE: Every Word Means No
NME: Faye Hunter, bass player in the band Let’s Active, has died of an apparent suicide aged 59, it has been confirmed. Hunter formed the band, contemporaries of REM and Pylon, in North Carolina alongside Mitch Easter and drummer Sara Romweber in 1981. The group went on to release three albums and an EP between 1983 and 1988. Raleigh’s News & Observer newspaper report that Hunter had struggled with employment and was caring for her elderly mother at the time of her death. Jamie K. Sims, a personal friend of Hunter’s, told the paper that: “I’m not shocked, but I […]
YE SHALL REAP WHAT YOU SOW: Gay Satanists Convert Soul Of Westboro Baptist Founder’s Mother
PHILLY.COM: The owner of a cemetery where Satanists allegedly desecrated the grave of the mother of Westboro Baptist Church’s founder said he has filed formal charges and expects police to arrest the officiating dark priest. “There is a warrant for the arrest for the leader of that group that has been issued,” William Arlinghaus, owner of the Magnolia Cemetery in Meridian, Mississippi, told WTOK-TV. Lucian Greaves, the founder of New York’s Satanic Temple, officiated two “Pink Masses” July 14 over the grave of controversial pastor Fred Phelp’s mother, Catherine Idalette Johnson. Two pairs of same-sex couples kissed over Johnson’s […]
EXCERPT: A Confederacy Of Dunces
Artwork via CARGO COLLECTIVE PHILADELPHIA MAGAZINE: Reader commenting on Philly.com has also been around since the late ’90s, but it wasn’t until 2008, following years of internal deliberations and successive regime changes, that the site went all-in and began allowing readers to talk back at the bottom of every article. “Journalism had been a one-way conversation for too long,” says one Philly.com staffer. “It was a good idea to open the door and allow the public to start commenting on our work.” Well, on paper, maybe. In practice? Not so much. There was some recognition from the get-go that there […]
Win Tix To See Clap Your Hands Say Yeah @ TLA
Artwork by YOKO SHIMIZU It’s been eight years since CYHSY first blazed across the night sky of the blogosphere, leaving behind of phosphorous tail of spent Pitchfork hype and Brooklyn hipster cache and exactly one great debut writ incandescent by those twinkling gyroscopic guitars, martial drum thwackery, hooky bass thrum and Alec Ounsworth’s slurry adenoidal yelp. An ill-conceived follow-up and a protracted hiatus, not to mention various side projects and an Alex Ounsworth, along with the inevitable passage of time and the eventual departure of everyone but Ounsworth and drummer Sean Greenhalgh , has let much of the air out of […]
PARQUET COURTS: Stoned & Starving
SPIN: From the Velvet Underground to the Modern Lovers to Richard Hell to Jim Carroll to R.E.M. to the Dream Syndicate to Galaxie 500 to Pavement to the Strokes to countless others, there have always been heady rock bands trying to lock down an agitated, trance-like guitar-bass-drums groove over which some poetically inclined young man or other can intone cryptic lyrics with a flat affect and vaguely nihilistic/existential swagger. In 21st-century New York City, Parquet Courts are keeping the faith, shuffling nervously through Ridgewood, Queens, flipping through magazines, perusing junk food, playing scratch-offs, and savoring the feedback loveliness of the […]
ARMED & STUPID: If Ted Nugent Was Sheriff
SALON: Better things, for [Gilberton, PA sheriff Mark Kessler], include opening new chapters of the paramilitary militia group he founded, pushing legislation to fight the encroaching tyranny of the federal government, and making flamboyant YouTube videos that portray him “shoot[ing] a libtard out of a tree” or taunting the United Nations, but always shooting lots and lots of souped-up guns. It was that last activity that caught the attention of the local press this week. “Coal region police chief posts profanity-laced video on YouTube,” was the headline in the Allentown Morning call Tuesday. “Well, I guess I upset a […]