Photo by MEREDITH KLEIBER A way sold out Union Transfer got its collective weird-beard on last night when local yokels Man Man planted their freak flag with an onslaught of rock-and-roll absurdity that spanned all four of their extant albums. It didn’t take long for the local cult favorite to raise the collective heart rate of the audience. By their third song, “Mr. Jug Stuffed,” they had the floor dancing, the balconies stomping, and the crowd surfers doing a great job of pissing off security. Momentarily slowing down the audience’s collective pulse, Honus Honus donned his signature alien mask as […]
THIS JUST IN: Morrissey @ The Tower 4/6
Tickets go on sale Friday at noon. PREVIOUSLY: Morrissey first canceled concerts earlier this month, citing a bleeding ulcer and Barrett’s esophagus as the reason for his cancelation. “Morrissey thanks everyone concerned for their well wishes during this time and hopes for a speedy recovery,” a rep for Morrissey said at the time of the first cancelations. While he intended to resume his tour in El Paso on Feb. 12, that show was canceled and he announced that the tour would return on Feb. 21 in Denver. That show has since been canceled as well. A post on Morrissey’s […]
A FLAMING LIPS EXCLUSIVE: “The Perjinky Effect”
As a souvenir of our visit to Wayne Coyne’s house last week (more on that later), we filmed the Flaming Lips frontman narrating a new comic book he’s working on called The Perjinky Effect in his kitchen. Enjoy. RELATED: The Flaming Lips are going to be busy at this year’s South by Southwest Festival. On Wednesday, organizers behind the Austin, Texas event added even more films to the schedule, including Lips frontman Wayne Coyne’s “A Year in the Life of Wayne’s Phone.” The film, which Coyne directed, is made up of footage recorded solely on the singer’s iPhone, and is […]
The Belle & Sebastian To Rock Skyline Stage (Gently)
Belle & Sebastian will be playing the Mann’s Skyline Stage on July 10th. Anybody who was witness to the splendor in the grass that was Sigur Ros’ two-night stand at the Skyline Stage last summer can attest to just how splendid this will invariably be: Craft beers, food trucks, blanket-on-the-lawn, under the bushes under the stars. And no cops. Tickets go on sale Saturday at 10 AM. So don’t just sit there with your teeth in your mouth. Fold your hands child, you walk like a peasant! RELATED: An Oral History Of If You’re Feeling Sinsister RELATED: The Postal […]
BEING THERE: Bleeding Rainbow @ Johnny Brenda’s
Photo by PETE TROSHAK There are a few things you need to know about Bleeding Rainbow. 1) they have been praised by both surviving members of Nirvana 2) they once were known as Reading Rainbow but changed their name after being chided by Carrie Brownstein and one too many stupid questions about LeVar Burton and 3) they might be the best band you’ve never seen. The band started out as an indie duo of husband and wife Rob Garcia and Sarah Everton, but last year expanded to a four piece by adding lead guitarist Al Creedon and drummer Greg Frantz. […]
THIS JUST IN: Wilco Announces Solid Sound Fest Line-Up
The three-day outdoor music festival for people who hate three-day outdoor music festivals.
Win Tix To See Power Pop Pied Piper Chris Stamey
We have a whole buncha tix to giveway to see power-pop legend Chris Stamey at World Cafe Live on Feb. 17th. To win all you have to do is sign up for our mailing list (SEE RIGHT, at the bottom of the masthead) and then send us an email at FEED@PHAWKER.COM saying as much with the subject line WHERE’S MY FREE CHRIS STAMEY TICKETS? Please include your full name and a mobile number for confirmation. If you have no clue who Chris Stamey and why you should care school yourself below. ALL MUSIC GUIDE: From his tenures with the […]
THE HURDY GURDY MAN COMES SINGING SONGS OF LOVE: Q&A w/ Julian Koster Of The Music Tapes
UPDATE: Tonight’s performances of The Music Tapes’s Traveling Imaginary has been postponed due to a band emergency. The show will be re-scheduled with a new date TBA. BY JONATHAN VALANIA Julian Koster was more or less was the one-man Salvation Army Band within Neutral Milk Hotel who made those proverbial ‘bare ruined choirs’ sing and gave NMH that Barton Fink feeling. In the wake of NMH’s long, never-explained self-exile, Koster has focused on The Music Tapes, wherein he creates whimsical, antediluvian hallucinatory circus music out of singing saws, rusty banjos, wrinkled horns and calliope-like keyboards with a revolving cast […]
BEING THERE: Flogging Molly @ The Electric Factory
Photo by PETE TROSHAK Midway through an intense, sweaty two-hour set at the Electric Factory on Thursday night Flogging Molly frontman Dave King stopped to share a Philly memory. He described a moment much earlier in the band’s career when a fan in Philadelphia showed him a blown up picture of the mosh pit from a previous show here and he described it as “the most frightening and beautiful thing” he had ever seen and said that after seeing that he knew his band would make it. The Celtic punk/folk rockers were in town with their Green 17 tour, an […]
BEING THERE: Gin Wigmore @ World Cafe Live
Gin Wigmore, Upstairs At World Cafe Live, by DEREK BRAD Last night, the Upstairs At World Cafe Live, usually a quiet-dinner-and-strummed-guitars kind of place, was turned upside down by New Zealander Gin Wigmore. The Kiwi singer rocked an enthusiastic, overflow crowd, some of which had driven from as far as Michigan to see her at WCL, one of her rare U.S. shows. You might recognize Wigmore from the new James Bond-themed Heineken ad starring Daniel Craig. She is currently on the road supporting her Gravel and Wine album, which was reportedly heavily influenced by a tour of the southern U.S. […]
THE FLAMING LIPS: The Sun Blows Up Today
“The Sun Blows Up Today” is a non-album track The Flaming Lips are giving away for free when you pre-order their new album, The Terror, due out April 2nd. This is known as an Instant gratification, Non-Album, Bonus Track. Also known as “a savvy inducement for moving units in the digital age” or a “gimmick like the cardboard “Mary, Mary” Monkees 45 you cut out of the back of box of Honeycomb cereal when you were seven and then your sister grabbed it and crumbled it up and now she’s dead. Or not. Either way, both the song and the […]
BEING THERE: The xx @ The Electric Factory
The xx, Electric Factory, last night by MEREDITH KLEIBER After a solid performance from Toronto natives Austra, a white curtain fell from the Electric Factory ceiling, separating the crowd from the stage at the sold-out show. A little over half an hour passed, the lights went down, and desperate screams erupted from the mostly teenybopper audience as an artsy design somewhat resembling a woman’s head projected onto the curtain and two silhouettes emerged into spotlights on either side of the stage. The xx had arrived. The uber-chill London band eased into their hour-plus set with the haunting, yet serene “Angels,” […]
INCOMING: Win Tix To See Ra Ra Riot
There’s a Ra Ra Riot goin’ on at Union Transfer tomorrow night and we have a pair of tix to see everyone’s favorite neo-retro synth-popsters from Syracuse — not to be confused with everyone’s favorite neo-retro synthpopsters from Buffalo, which would, of course, be Love Scenes. Duh. To qualify all you have to do is sign up for our mailing list (to the right of this post, at the bottom of the masthead). Trust us, you want to do this. Signing up to our mailing list gets you special content alerts and early warnings about special promotions and concert […]