Searching for the lost kite

PESME ISPOD POKRIVAČA

Sun, 09 Jun 2013 11:31:00 +0200

POP Depresija :: Koncertne godine

Autopark - Dva klikera • Kodagain - Metal Baby • On Tour - Follow Me • Lula Mae - Slow Motion Movie Star • ŽeneKese - Supersonične sanke • The Mothership Orchestra - Lazarus Heart • Nežni Dalibor – Stanje budućnosti • Ventolin - Cracklin’ Water •Ilija Ludvig - Another Day Full of Dread • Stray Dogg - Nomadic Revery (All Around) •Ika - If I’m Waiting •Wooden Ambulance - My Blue Wave

Na papiru, činilo mi se da je ideja baš jednostavna. Želeo sam da “na jednom mestu” okupim sve muzičare (ili bar većinu), koji su tokom poslednjih desetak godina, od prvog koncert POP Depresije (Nina Nastasia, 23. septembar 2002, Dom omladine) do danas, svirali u Beogradu i da tako još jednom podsetim i sebe i druge na značajan period života. Nije bilo mnogo teško ni u praksi - brojni PD prijatelji koji su tokom godina bili gosti/domaćini na našim koncertima - Kodagain, Nežni Dalibor, Ilija Ludvig, Autopark, ŽeneKese, The Mothership Orchestra, On Tour, Ventolin, Wooden Ambulance, Ika, Lula Mae, Stray Dogg - izabrali su da obrade pesmu bendova/solista koji su tokom ovog perioda svirali u Beogradu. Baukova Soba, Studio Underground NBGD i svi učesnici ove “akcije” omogućili su da se sve na najbolji mogući način izvede i tako ovu ideju pretvorili u pravi muzički vremeplov. Svima se zahvaljujem i jedva čekam da ponovo nešto radimo zajedno. ivan/PD

&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href=”http://popdepression.bandcamp.com/album/pesme-ispod-pokriva-a” data-mce-href=”http://popdepression.bandcamp.com/album/pesme-ispod-pokriva-a”&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Pesme ispod pokrivača by POP Depression&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;

Richard Buckner: Mediji su agresivan parazit društva i kulture...

Tue, 22 May 2012 13:42:28 +0200

U sredu 23. maja u beogradskom Gun Clubu nastupiće Richard Buckner (Ričard Bakner), jedan od najcenjenijih i najtalentovanijih rokenrol autora današnjice. Tokom svoje karijere objavio je devet studijskih albuma - poslednji u avgustu 2011. godine “Our Blood” (izdavači - Merge - dom Arcade Fire i Lambchop u SAD/Decor - izdavač Chucka Propheta, American Music Club/Marka Eitzela, Richmonda Fontainea u Evropi), za koji je dobio fantastične kritike (UNCUT 4/5, Pitchfork 8/10) i koji će uživo promovisati u Srbiji. Za mnoge fanove Ričard Bakner je čovek koji se svojim talentom najviše približio besmrtnom Townesu Van Zandtu (Taunsu Van Zantu).

Gosti na koncertu u sredu 23. maja biće beogradski ON TOUR, sastav koji čine Ivana Smolović (IKA), Vladimir Marinović (Ventolin) i Marko Ćebić (The Mothership Orchestra).
Uz pomoć i razumevanje koncertne agencije i evropskog izadavača (Decor Records) Ričarda Baknera (Richard Buckner), uradili smo e-mail intervju sa legendarnim američkim trubadurom. Kultni pesnik i muzičar u Beogradu nastupa u sredu 23. maja u Gun Clubu. Bakneru je ovo prvi nastup u ovom delu sveta u karijeri (dan kasnije nastupa u Zagrebu na festivalu “Žedno uho”)…

POP Depresija • Koliko ti lako ili teško ‘pada’ pisanje pesama?
Ričard Bakner • Pisanje pesama može da bude lako, a može da bude i neverovatan, beskajan poduhvat. Ponekad, cela pesma se ‘ukaže’ odjednom i samo je stvar kako ću da je oblikujem ili ‘presložim’ delove kako bi imala zanimljiviji aranžman. A ponekad, pojavi se samo deo pesme i moram da se potrudim da nađem ‘kockice koje nedostaju’. U tim situacijama, procenat neuspeha je veliki i puno tih nezavršenih ideja kasnije ide u đubre za reciklažu.

Postoji li autorska blokada kada imaš ‘običan’ posao?
Blokada kod mene nastaje kad se previše napregnem da pratim neki jedva postojeći trag, usredsređujući se na sićušne detalje koji mi odvraćaju pažnju od ‘velike slike’. Za mene je bolje da se opustim i pratim ‘krivudanje’ podsvesnog.

Koliko je teško fokusirati se na stvaranje muzike kada imaš dnevni posao?
Kada komponujem (to smatram svojim pravim poslom), volim da ustanem rano, i uz velike količine kafe radim bez prestanka sve do večeri. Kada moram da idem na posao (što smatram nadničenjem da bih platio hranu i stanarinu), ti sati su ukradeni, tako da kad se vratim kući na kraju dana nemam više mentalne snage da se bavim kreacijom i razvijanjem jedne ideje do njenog prirodnog zaključka.

Izlazak tvog aktuelnog albuma pratile su neke tehničke poteškoće.
Već neko vreme koristim odličan ‘snimač’ - brz je i jednostavan za upotrebu (‘Our Blood’ sam snimio pomoću 24-kanalne miksete Roland 2480 i mikrofonskog predpojačala Grace). Ali oprema je bila u različitim neadekvatnim okruženjima (pretopli tavani, prehladni podrumi, hotelske sobe, kuće sa životinjama koje se penju po svemu), tako da je bilo pitanje vremena kad će stvari početi da otkazuju. U međuvremenu su se pojavili i problemi koji nisu bili vezani za samu opremu - tokom pljačke stana lopovi su odneli moj laptop sa miksevima pesama, beleškama i drugim važnim stvarima vezanim za pravljenje albuma. Sve to zajedno dovelo je do jednog ne-tehnološkog, kreativnog sloma koji me na trenutak mentalno oslepeo.

Koliko tvoj muzički stil zavisi od (nove) tehnologije?
Nove sprave (možda ne tako nove za svet, ali za mene - svakako) pomažu stilskom izrazu. Pošto su nam nepoznate, one uglavnom vode na nepoznatu teritoriju, dok istražujete kako najadekvatnije da ih upotrebite. Pre nekog vremena snimio sam album ‘Impasse’. Tik pre nego što sam počeo sa snimanjem, dobio sam analogni sintisajzer i Exhoplex i ta dva uređaja su odlično radila zajedno oblikujući zvuk i aranžmane pesama i albuma u celini. Za ‘Our Blood’ jedina nova sprava koju sam koristo bila je Boss Slicer pedala koja daje arpeđo efekat svakom instrumentu koji provučeš kroz nju. Ideja je bila da je koristim kao dopunu tradicionalnijim instrumentima poput tenor gitare sa različitim štimovima i žicama, nasnimavajući jednu preko druge pokušavajući da nađem meni zanimljive akorde i teksture, stvarajući tako slučajne fantomske harmonije i melodije koje inače ne bih mogao racionalno da osmislim.

Šta ti se kao “roots” orijentisanom muzičaru najviše dopada u vezi a novim tehnologijama?
To kako ja volim da radim nije vezano toliko za tehnologiju, već za iznalaženje načina da napišem i snimim muziku na noviji način. Za mene je to krčenje novih puteva za dolazak novih ideja. Na ‘Our Blood’ ograničio sam se na upotrebu ‘normalnih’ gitara, što me nateralo da sviram drugačije, a to je samim pesmama dalo drugačiji identitet. Možda se u svari kod mene radi o odbacivanju tehnoloških inovacija i traženju novih ideja uz pomoć starih, postojećih instrumenata, dok samo pokušavam da odgovorim na izazove modernih tehnologija.

Kakav je Njujork danas, naročito Bruklin?
Otišao sam iz Bruklina pre pet godina, preselio sam se na sever države Njujork. Sada putujem u grad tek nekoliko puta godišnje kad imam koncert i neke sastanke. Čak i kad sam živeo u Njujorku, nisam previše izlazio iz kuće.

Šta voliš u Njujorku i šta u drugim mestima gde si boravio?
U Njujorku volim prodavnicu ploča Other Music. Verujem njihovom ukusu. U Ostinu i San Francisku takođe ima dobrih muzičkih radnji koje treba posetiti. Širom zemlje ima nekoliko odličnih prodavnica instrumenata u koje volim da svratim kad sam u prolazu. To su radnje koje drže starije i intrumente koji se teže nalaze, a to je ono što me uvek zanima.

Okruženi smo razbibrižnom, brzopoteznom, gramzivom, ‘reality’ kulturom. Koliko je teško sačuvati svoje mesto i publiku u tako ‘nestrpljivom’ kulturnom okruženju?
Slažem se da postoji nestrpljenje u današnjoj kulturi. Bilo bi mi teško to da svarim, da mi je stalo. Ali ja to ne mogu. Ja nemam ‘mesto’ koje treba da sačuvam. Mogu samo da se nadam da će mi publika i mesto u kome sviram dozvoliti da dam najbolje sto umem. Uvek će biti onih koji nisu zadovoljni, iz ovog ili onog razloga (mnogo lupova, nedovoljno lupova, previše glasno, previše mekano). Uzaludno je pokušavati da ugodiš bilo nonšalantnim kapricima ili uštogljenoj tradiciji.

Ti imaš impresivan status među muzičarima, a ko su oni koji su na tebe najviše uticali?
Kad su u pitanju aranžmani i struktura pesme, volim sve od Glena Branke do Gila Evansa. O tome kako se emocije pretaču u melodiju učim i od grupe Slint i od Peta Metinija. Nisam naročito okrenut kantautorima. Odvojeno doživljavam muziku i tekstove.

Koje javne ličnosti najviše ceniš u današnje vreme?
U političkom smislu cenim Noama Čomskog, Ralfa Nejdera i još nekolicinu. U umetničkom i društvenom smislu - to je promenljivo. U poslednje vreme pratim podkast Marka Merona i njegove intervjue sa raznim frikovima i zabavljačima. On dobro komunicira sa mojim prigušenim životinjskim ponašanjem u kasnim četrdesetim.

Koji je smisao postojanja muzičkog kritičara u eri interneta?
Internet je ‘rodio’ ceo jedan univerzum samozadovoljnih kukavica sa plitkoumnom odvažnošću, koji u svoj svojoj dokonosti stoje ispred beskrajnog, belog platna i pišaju na njega zato što ne umeju da slikaju.

Koliko obraćaš pažnju na takve kritičare danas?
Tek povremeno i sasvim slučajno nabasam na te takozvane kritičare, kao kad zavučeš ruku u džep tražeći sitniš, a u stvari nađeš smotuljak prljavštine.

Da li muzički mediji danas mogu da stvore ili unište pravog umetnika?
Mediji mogu da stvore i unište onoliko koliko i bilo koja druga klika koja ima moć da oblikuje tuđe mišljenje. Važnije je da shvatimo da su mediji agresivan parazit društva i kulture. Mediji žive da bi jeli i jedu da bi živeli. Na nesreću, mnogi stoje u redu za tim švedskim stolom i nesvesno završavaju na jelovniku.

Koliko su muzičarima danas potrebni mediji?
Masovni mediji su jedan veliki Uroboros, zmija koja jede sopstveni rep, i to ne zbog ponovnog rađanja već zbog pukog žderanja. Tvitovanje može da se posmatra kao nova vrsta interno stvorenog medija kojim ne mora da manipuliše neko spolja.

Kakav je današnji status amerikane/alt-kantrija u odnosu na pre dvadeset godina?
Iskreno, nikad nisam razumeo niti pratio žanrove. Nikad nisam bio neki tip koji voli da se udružuje i pridružuje. Neki opsedniti samim sobom traže javno priznanje dok oni pravi mislioci hrabro pišaju u pantalone i drže to za sebe.

Koja je najbolja lekcija iz života koju si naučio kao muzičar?
Gotovo na svakom ćošku, video sam da je svet uglavnom sačinjen od oportunista koji traže brzo i jednostavno zadovoljenje.

Šta je najteže u životu jednog muzičara?
Kada si umetnik najteže je ubediti sebe u to da ti zapravo nešto radiš, a s druge strane pokušati da se setiš toga kad nema ničega na vidiku.

Šta čitaš ovih dana, možeš li da preporučiš nešto.
Upravo čitam Sabrane priče Lidije Dejvis. Prijetelj mi je to preporučio znajući da pratim izdanja kuće Meksvini i sličnih njoj. Želeo sam da probam nešto novo, ne bi li me to inspirisalo da i sam više pišem. Poslednji ‘klasik’ koji sam pročitao bio je roman ‘Native Son’ Ričarda Rajta.

A od muzike?
Prošle godine otkrio sam jedan biser - ‘The Om Album’ Teda Lukasa iz 1975. To je njegova jedina solo ploča. Na nekim koncerima na ovoj turneji sviram pesmu sa tog albuma ‘Now That I Know’. Uklapa se negde između Nika Drejka i Sendi Bul. Čarobna ploča.

Često si menjao prebivalište, možeš li da zamisliš da živiš u Evropi?
Mogu da zamislim da živim van Sjedinjenih država. Prošle godine sam svirao u jednoj umetničkoj koloniji u Holandiji i pomislio sam da bih mogao da se uklopim u tu okolinu i stil života.

Kako životno okruženje utiče na pisanje?
Životno okruženje najmanje utiče na ton pisanja, a najviše može da utiče tako što prenosi lokalne, društvene norme. Što se mene tiče, sve je u traženju svog unutrašnjeg glasa koji odslikava ono što ostaje izvan manipulacije melodija, kao i u igri rečima i slikama, kao u ukrštenici.

Prvi put ćeš nastupati u Srbiji, kakav je osećaj kad dođeš u novu sredinu?
Nikad nisam bio u vašem delu sveta. To je onaj uzbudljivi deo kada si na turneji.

Znaš li nešo o Srbiji, Balkanu, građanskom ratu?
Ono što znam o Srbiji saznao sam iz medija, ali to se ni približno ne može nazvati poznavanjem. Radujem se što ću osetiti stvari iz vaše perspektive.

PD GIG :: PEASANT & FORMER BELLE + KOLE :: SREDA 2. MAJ 22H :: GUN CLUB

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 15:17:20 +0200

Peasant je klinac iz Pensilvanije od 25 godina - gitare, melodija, malo eliota smita, zrnce krisa bela, trag bon ivera, sve ostalo skroz njegovo :)

U septembru 2010. godine PEASANT (Damien DeRose) nastupio je solo u beogradskom KC Grad u okviru festivala “Jesen folkera u Gradu”. Svojim glasom i akustičnom gitarom više puta “naterao” je publiku da peva zajedno s njim, usput izmamio prave ovacije i najavio veliku karijeru koja “samo što se nije ostvarila”. Svoj debitantski album samostalno je snimio i objavio 2005. godine, dok je još išao u srednju školu.

Peasant je vanserijski pripovedač, a poput nekog trubadura svetom hoda s gitarom u jednoj, a torbom prepunoj pesama u drugoj ruci. Trećim studijskim albumom “Shady Retreat” - koji je tada promovisao u Beogradu - dobio je značajnu medijsku pažnju i “naterao” mnoge da ga proglase “novim Bon Iverom”. Nekako logičan razvojni put za nekog koga su na početku karijere poredili sa besmrtnim Elliottom Smithom.

Početkom maja 2012. godine Peasant u Srbiju dolazi sa četvoročlanim bendom - gitare, bas, bubanj - da promoviše novi album “Bound For Glory” (april 2012, Schnitzel Records). Poslednjih meseci njegove pesme - nove i stare - mogu da se čuju u hit serijama kao što su “Good Wife”, “Weeds” (trailer za poslednju sezonu)…

PEASANT nastupa u Gun Clubu u sredu 2. maja u 22h. Podrška na koncertu biće mu takođe singer-songwriter iz Filadelfije i lider benda FORMER BELLE, Bruno Joseph, a na koncertu će kao specijalni gost nastupiti i Vladimir Kolarić, lider Velikog Prezira.

Ulaznice po pretprodajnoj ceni od 600din mogu da se kupe u muzičkoj prodavnici Pinball Wizard (TC EUROCENTAR, Makedonska 30, lok. 15) i kafeu Šikarica (Skadarska 22). Na ulazu karte će koštati 800din. Ulaz u Gun Club otvara se u 22h, a planirano je da koncert počne u 22:30h

Velikim skitanjima došao je kraj...

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 19:58:00 +0200

Velikim skitanjima došao je kraj...:

Koncertna sezona PROLEĆE 2012 za POP Depresiju počela je dabl-bilom u petak 23. marta u Gun Clubu. Sve je prošlo u granicama (mojih) očekivanja - Richmond Fontaine i Rebel Star bili su fantastični, publike je bilo nešto manje nego što je bilo potrebno da se pokriju troškovi, ali je zato 40-ak “izabranih” koji su ostali do kraja užarenog i strasnog nastupa Rebel Star moglo da prisustvuje totalnom spektaklu koji se dešavao u ranim jutarnjim časovima…

Uz 15 minuta kašnjenja u odnosu na obećanih 22:30 veče su otvorili Willy i Dan i oduševili me na svaki način. Opušteno, vešto, nadahnuto i direktno prošetao je ovaj tandem kroz skoro dvodecenijsku karijeru grupe Richmond Fontaine i pokazao da se i u običnim pričama iz života krije inspiracija za pop hitove.

Willy mi je rekao da je završio četvrti roman koji mu je upravo vratio prezadovoljni agent na korekcije - Willy sam smatra da je knjiga drugačija od svih prethodnih i da se nada da će je čitaoci prihvatiti i takvu, “drugačiju”. Planira da prvi put posle x godina ode na godišnji odmor sa devojkom (i to u Nju Orlians) i da je to totalni šok za njega pošto uglavnom nikad nije kod kuće da bi i teoretski razmatrao odlazak na odmor…

Od muzike RF članovi benda uglavnom ne mogu da žive, tako da i dalje većina njih ima “day job”. Willy ima privilegiju da zahvaljujući svojim knjigama i novcu koji je dobio od prodaje prava na ekranizaciju istih, može da komotnije pristupi planiranju života na neke kratke staze. On i devojka žive na ranču sa konjima, mačkama, psima i ostalim domaćim životinjama. Kaže da zna da jaše, ali da je devojka mnogo bolja od njega. Svo troje (Svetlana, on i ja) razmenjali smo slike svojih kućnih ljubimaca - Ripli je očekivano
bila prva zvezda :)

I Dan i Willy jako su bili uzbuđeni što su imali priliku da sviraju i dođu ovako daleko na istok Evrope i oduševljeni su reakcijom publike. Intervju sa Willyjem Vlautinom očekujte uskoro na PD sajtu.

Rebel Star duo uživo je verovatno najbolji domaći bend koji sam gledao u poslednjih deset godina. Do poslednje kapi znoja, tehnički besprekorni, u totalnom transu svirali su Milan i Atila stare hitove i nove generacijske himne i totalno razgalili euforičnu publiku (predvođenu Magdalenom i Sašom V.) koja je većinu pesama pevala zajedno sa Milanom. Tako bih voleo da se odužim RS na dolasku i ovakvom spektaklu koji su napravili u ograničenim tehničkim mogućnostima “Gana” i nadam se da ćemo zajedno da smislimo nešto pametno.

Hvala svima koji su bili i kupili kartu, sledeći koncert je u sredu 2. maja - stiže Peasant (The Band) uz podršku FormerBelle i možda još jedno iznenađenje, i za kraj - 23. maja Richard Buckner i beogradski On Tour.

POPDepresija :: Nagradna igra :: 2012 ::

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 10:37:48 +0100

Povodom 10 godina rada i 500 emisija POP Depresija organizuje nagradnu igru. Propozicije su kratke i (nadam se) jasne:

- izaberite jednu pesmu - koja iz bilo kog razloga ima poseban značaj za vas - nastalu u periodu od 2001. do 2011. godine (prvih deset PD godina),
- pokušajte da vaš doživljaj te pesme prenesete na papir/fotografiju/instalaciju/ekran/audio/video… Znači od vas se očekuje da nešto napišete/nacrtate/sastavite/kompujete/snimite… - uslov je da to što uradite bude vaše - pozajmice se neće tolerisati,
- pošaljite vaš rad na PD mejl: popdepresija AT gmail DOT com - rok je produžen do 29. februara.

Očekuju vas vredne nagrade koje su obezbedili PD prijatelji i Pinball Wizard Records:

LP :: UNKNOWN MORTAL ORCHESTRA - ST (Fat Possum)
LP :: THE STEPKIDS - The Stepkids LIVE Direct To Disc (Stones Throw)
LP :: TINA WITH IKE TURNER & THE IKETTES - PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE! (Ace/Kent)
LP :: 24-CARAT BLACK - Gone: The Promises Of Yesterday (Numero Group)
GIG POSTER :: TEENAGE FANCLUB koncert u Beogradu sa potpisima članova benda.

Krajem 2008. i početom 2009. godine rezultati slične nagradne igre bili su ovakvi… Svi ste pozvani da učestvujete!

Joe Henry: Tiny Desk Concert

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 16:05:53 +0100

Joe Henry: Tiny Desk Concert:

Music Interviews

Joe Henry’s Raw, Raucous ‘Reverie’

November 21, 2011

For musicians performing behind Bob Boilen’s desk at the NPR Music offices, there’s often an inverse relationship between professional accomplishment and the amount of time required to set up. For new bands still finding their way, pre-show preparation can be a numbing chore of positioning effects pedals and rehearsing song after song before the cameras start rolling. But for established veterans like Joe Henry — who, as a gifted producer, is no stranger to asking musicians to perform in seemingly unnatural settings — it’s as simple as showing up nattily dressed, pulling out a guitar and knowing instinctively where to sit and what to do.

Henry just released the excellent Reverie, his 12th solo album, and it reflects that easygoing vibe perfectly. He’d even made a point, during the recording process, of leaving his windows open to capture the everyday sounds that surrounded him — the street-level noises that only added to Reverie’s cool, conversational vibe. So asking Henry to sit in front of a crowded office and sing those songs never felt like much of an imposition. He fits in here, whether performing new songs or conversing amiably about his guitar or the late Vic Chesnutt, to the point where it was tempting to ask him to stick around and pull up a computer for the rest of the day. Surely, we could find something for him to do, right?

by Stephen Thompson

Audio Only: Joe Henry’s Tiny Desk Concert

[20 min 59 sec]

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Download

Watch The Video Below Or Download By Subscribing To The Tiny Desk Concerts Podcast

Set List: “Sticks And Stones”, “After The War”, “Odetta”, “Piano Furnace”

Musical World Tour: The Best Songs About New York City

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 13:36:18 +0100

Musical World Tour: The Best Songs About New York City:

by Tom Hawking

Not so long ago, we were listening to M83′s glorious Dead Cities, Red Seas and Lost Ghosts album. The album’s not heavy on lyrics, but its widescreen soundscapes definitely reflect its evocative, dramatic title, and it got us thinking about the manifold different ways the world’s great cities have been immortalized in song — and about how different cities have inspired very different musical tributes. In view of this, we figured that it’d be an interesting idea to do a semi-regular series wherein we choose our five favorite songs about a particular city. The first stop on our whistlestop world tour? Why, right here at Flavorpill central in New York City. Hop on board after the jump.

LCD Soundsystem — ”New York, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down”
We’re especially partial to this song because it captures the New York of today, not the much-mythologized city of any number of past eras. James Murphy’s lyric deals with the creeping Disneyfication of New York — “New York, you’re safer and you’re wasting my time/ Our records all show you are filthy but fine” — and the collateral cultural damage of Rudy Giuliani’s much-trumpeted clean-up of Manhattan. The reality of the island in 2011 is that while you’re a lot less likely to get shot there, it doesn’t really matter, because unless you’re making money hand over fist, you’re not likely to be living there in the first place.

Nas — ”NY State of Mind”
Nas’s vision of New York, by contrast, dates from an earlier, bleaker era — but it still applies to the dark pockets of the city that nestle mutely up against the bright lights of the Sarah Jessica Parker-ified districts of Manhattan. Filching the title from Billy Joel’s sentimental postcard to the city, Nas sets out what New York means to him: a perilous urban landscape where “every block is like a maze,” a city where cash is king and your guard can’t be dropped for a moment — “I never sleep,” he raps in the song’s sole, crucial repeated line, “’cause sleep is the cousin of death.”

Lou Reed — “Dirty Blvd”
Reed’s written reams of lyrics about New York, and for all that he clearly loves his home city, and that its environment has been a constant influence on his music over the years, he’s never been one to be overly sentimental about it. (Or, indeed, about anything else, really.) “Dirty Blvd” captures the city at the tail end of the Koch era, and pulls absolutely no lyrical punches, depicting a metropolis with an ever-widening gap between rich and poor, where the positions of the privileged few are maintained by the labor of exploited immigrants, all under the gaze of the “Statue of Bigotry.”

Leonard Cohen — “Famous Blue Raincoat”
It’s not all grim realism here, though. Pretty much everyone who moves to New York does so with some measure of starry-eyed idealism, something that even epoch-defining poetic geniuses aren’t immune to. “Famous Blue Raincoat” isn’t about New York per se — its lyric takes the form of a letter to a friend-turned-love rival — but its setting permeates every line, so much so that you can almost see Cohen in a sparsely-furnished room on Clinton Street, punching away at his typewriter as music plays in the dark street below.

Liza Minelli — ”Theme from New York, New York”
And yes, if you can make it (t)here, you’ll make it anywhere, etc etc etc.

Gillian Welch: 'A lot of the songs are done in one take. Maybe two'

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 13:18:39 +0100

Gillian Welch: 'A lot of the songs are done in one take. Maybe two':

Celebrated acoustic duo Gillian Welch and David Rawlings talk to Phil Hogan about authenticity, Nashville, and why there’s nothing ‘old’ about their music
by Phil Hogan

Awesome twosome: David Rawlings and Gillian Welch in London last week. Photographed for the Observer by Katherine Rose

If you only know two things about the American singer-songwriter Gillian Welch – and not everyone does – it will be that her name is pronounced with a hard G (as in gigabyte rather than giraffe) and that she is one half of the duo also called Gillian Welch, along with her musical partner, David Rawlings.

It’s not what you’d call equal billing, but Rawlings has had almost 20 years to get used to it. It’s a vestige of their early days doing the club circuit in Nashville, which in the early 90s favoured solo female artists. “We were funnelled towards that,” says Rawlings. Welch goes further and says the prevailing advice was to “get him out of the picture”. Hadn’t they heard him play guitar? To be fair, Rawlings says, they both still had a lot of developing to do.

We’re in a poky conference room at a London hotel. The duo are in the middle of a European tour to promote their superb, long-awaited fifth album. They make a lean and angular pair (a western storyteller would describe them as raw-boned) and both wear cowboy boots. Welch, pale as a stone, has holes in the elbows of her black cardigan, which she sometimes draws tightly round herself, as if she’s feeling a chill. There’s an occasional yawn. Rawlings – firm-jawed, intelligent and open-faced – answers my questions from under a straw Stetson.

To fathom their music is to sift through their every influence, starting with brother-team acts from the 30s through to Johnny Marr in the 80s; Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Richard Thompson alongside Willie Nelson, Lefty Frizzell and Bill Monroe. Welch started writing songs in the folk-country idiom when she was seven. By her late teens, she says, “I was on a constant quest to make the song I write sound more classic. I always want them to be as good as ‘Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain’.”

She was an untypical California girl in more ways than one. Welch was an adopted child, born in New York and brought up in Los Angeles. Her adoptive parents – successful TV entertainers and musicians – told her that her biological father had been a musician visiting New York; her birth mother was a first-year college student. The abiding mystery of her parentage is touched upon in several of her songs: “No One Knows My Name”; “I Had a Real Good Mother and Father”. Welch says that “Orphan Girl”, one of her best-known songs, is also her most autobiographical. And, you could say, a classic.

She met Rawlings (he’s from Rhode Island) at Berklee College of Music in Boston. It wasn’t a hotbed of country music, according to Rawlings (“There were a lot of kids whose parents had sent them off to learn heavy metal”), but he says there were “enough of us to form a circle”. But while he and Welch were happy to sit jamming with kindred spirits, “there was something we recognised when we just played together that interested us more”.

That something was what pushed them to try their luck in Nashville, where they eventually attracted the attention of producer T-Bone Burnett (now best known for the Grammy-winning O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack – on which Welch and Rawlings also collaborated). There was also what Welch calls “a completely romantic attachment to the music that came out of Nashville – though we were 30 years too late,” she adds, meaning that the greats had been and gone. But the duo have followed in their heroes’ footsteps in so far as they are celebrated in their adoptive town, not only on the stage of the Grand Ole Opry but also for their work with stalwarts such as Emmylou Harris, Alison Krauss, Steve Earle and indie-folkies including the Decemberists and Conor Oberst.

Their 1996 debut album Revival was nominated for a Grammy, as was their third, the magnificent Time (The Revelator), released in 2001. “Best contemporary folk” was the category, though their stripped-down style – two voices and two guitars – is harder to pin down than that, with its hues of bluegrass and gospel, country and blues, its laments from the dustbowl, its breezier Appalachian workouts.

In a 10-page profile of the duo in 2004, the New Yorker described their music as “at once innovative and obliquely reminiscent of past rural forms”. Commentators are apt to read the mood as mournful (and as Rawlings observes, “Gill always likes the saddest song on a record”), though Welch more accurately identifies it as stoical, and for argument’s sake draws their style under the simple umbrella of “acoustic”.

Whatever it is, it transcends the sum of its influences and attracts admirers who own no country albums (I’m one of them), and are drawn as much by its unnerving modern dissonances as its timeless meditations on moral ruin or crop failure (and even here you’re likely to encounter a lyric such as: “Becky Johnson bought the farm/ Put a needle in her arm”). The nearest historical model for their sound is the prewar brother teams – duettists such as the Blue Sky Boys and the Monroe Brothers, who rode the American country airwaves between the wars. But while Welch and Rawlings have set up house in what they see as a largely abandoned musical form, they reject any idea that they are therefore playing “old” music.

“Setting means a lot in terms of perception,” says Rawlings. “If you play something on a banjo, it seems old time. I used to stand on stage in a brand-new Dries Van Noten suit and I would see written next day: ‘Standing on stage in his grandfather’s sharecropper’s suit…’”

In the duo’s early career they came in for flak from some critics for a perceived lack of authenticity – the idea that only a coalminer’s daughter should be singing a song called “Miner’s Refrain”.

Welch sighs. “It’s such an unartistic way of looking at it,” she says.

Rawlings throws up his hands. “I come from Rhode Island,” he says. “Should I have been a lobster fisherman? It’s an argument that it is a ghost. You can’t hit it because it has no weight. And it’s related to something else we don’t like – the way some people need backstory to enjoy art.”

Naturally, I pick this moment to ask if the pair are more than musical partners. There’s a pause. “That’s not part of the act,” they say, almost in unison (which almost answers the question). They are happier to talk about the work.

They write wholly together, words and music alike. Rawlings says: “Gill is a better songwriter than I am, but together we are better songwriters than either of us.” (Later, he trumps this by saying that Welch is the better guitarist – “way better” – but that she rarely gets the chance to show her technique.)

The songs are highly arranged – interwoven guitars and an ear-defying melding of vocals. Sometimes, I say (and I speak as someone who sings in the bath), their harmonies are so close you can’t see any light between them.

“Dave has notes he wants to hear,” explains Welch, and she tells a story illustrating how he’ll try one, then another, until he arrives at the least conventional. “He’ll pick the one that’s maybe a major second – not a very common interval in harmony singing.”

His guitar work is full of it too, a waywardness that makes that noodling behind the vocals and flurries of chiming notes unguessably inventive. I have assumed he works a guitar part to death before committing it to tape, but no, it’s all improvised. He talks animatedly about a song’s picture and the challenge of working within its parameters. Put simply, “there’s a lot of things going on to keep it from sounding like guitars banging away”.

I think of their hypnotic, thrilling stage performances, at times all chemistry and telepathy, at others each in their own trance, Rawlings on his toes swaying, eyes closed as he wrings and shakes notes out of his ancient guitar (a battered 1935 Epiphone Olympic), Welch stooped over hers, one boot scraping the floor in time – or squinting out as she sings, as if facing a strong wind.

“It’s a very mentally focused show,” she says, and I’m amazed when she tells me that this is pretty much the way they record – just the two of them singing and playing live in front of microphones. “A lot of the songs are done in one take,” she says. “Maybe two.”

And yet, I say, the new album – The Harrow & the Harvest – is their first in eight years. What was that about?

The short answer is that it had a difficult gestation. The clue is in the title, says Welch. They spent too long touring the last album (Soul Journey) and not enough time writing. Then they had a writing crisis. “We were writing and writing but we didn’t like what we were getting. So we didn’t put it out.”

Rawlings adds: “We were aware of the pressure but we couldn’t just pull the trigger and say OK, here’s some music we don’t feel strongly about. We were constantly having to recalibrate by going back, finding some unfinished piece of song and thinking, would we accept this now? Has our bar become too high? Are we crazy?”

“Or,” says Welch, “will we ever like anything we do again?”

It was a miserable time, but things worked out. And now they’re back touring, which they love. They’ve just been to Paris and Norway and Brighton. Charmingly, they still drive themselves from gig to gig. They have their instruments with them right now.

Rawlings gives me a quick and awesome masterclass on his guitar, which he says he found in his friend’s basement in 1995. The first time he used it, Welch says, was on “Annabelle”, the first song recorded for their first album. He’s used it ever since. It’s really a student guitar, he tells me, his narrow fingers spidering up the fretboard, the notes ringing out in the small room. “I got lucky.”

Welch puts her coat on and watches him and waits.

Pam Grier on Jackie Brown, Quentin Tarantino, and Her Reign as the Queen of ’70s Action Cinema

Tue, 04 Oct 2011 15:23:09 +0200

Pam Grier on Jackie Brown, Quentin Tarantino, and Her Reign as the Queen of ’70s Action Cinema:

Grindhouse icon Pam Grier blazed a trail through the blaxploitation era, was dubbed “the baddest One-Chick Hit-Squad that ever hit town” (a title that remains uncontested four decades later, one might argue), and commanded the screen with a combination of ferocity, empathy, and a look so striking Roger Ebert once described her as an “actress of beautiful face and astonishing form.” Years later, in 1997, Quentin Tarantino paid homage to the work and the woman in Jackie Brown, adapted from Elmore Leonard’s Rum Punch, one of the filmmaker’s best and most underrated films and the spark that jump-started a career revival for its stars.

Grier earned a Golden Globes nomination for her turn as Jackie Brown, a flight attendant who turns the tables on a local gun-runner (Samuel L. Jackson) and the feds with the help of a sympathetic bail bondsman (Robert Forster, who was Oscar-nominated for the role). In honor of the film’s Blu-ray debut this week, Movieline spoke with Grier about the legacy of Jackie Brown, Tarantino’s appreciation of a certain kind of woman, her legendary career as the queen of exploitation cinema, and her upcoming turn in rapper-turned-director RZA’s martial arts film The Man with the Iron Fists.

How do you feel about Jackie Brown and its impact on your own career when you look back on it now?
Pam Grier: Well, the fact that the film had legs because of the wonderful talent of Quentin Tarantino and his ensemble and the film that he invested two years of his life to write for me — and for me, I wrote a journal of how wonderful it was to work on the film. My experience was very emotional; I wouldn’t reveal it to other people. It’s very sentimental, on and off camera. Moments, Quentin’s direction, and how he worked with me and other actors, his belief in me… but I really believe that if I hadn’t done theater and that process of rehearsal, because when you’re on stage people are eating sandwiches, sneezing, there are noises and you can’t lose that focus. So that prepared me to work at his level of intensity. Jackie Brown meant a lot. I would always say, ‘If I never work again, I have been to the mountaintop.’ This was an extraordinary experience with someone who loves films.

A lot of conservative men were upset that I had taken their roles, or they were objecting to me being so progressive and thought I should be in the kitchen barefoot and pregnant.

And he loves your films in particular, as well. Do you remember the first time you met Quentin?
Grier: Yes, it was frightening! I thought he was a stalker. It was for Pulp Fiction, I’m going in and all my posters are on his wall. I said, ‘Did you put this up for me?’ He said, ‘No, but I would have.’ I realized he was a real, true filmmaker. And the nuances of the films that we made, not only with Roger Corman but with AIP [American International Pictures] in the ’70s, the women’s movement and sexual revolution, political liberation movement, he knew what they meant and what they meant to me. He embraced it, and it wasn’t something where he felt challenged, or intimidated. A lot of conservative men were upset that I had taken their roles, or they were objecting to me being so progressive and thought I should be in the kitchen barefoot and pregnant. That was a conservative movement toward the films, where the ‘blaxploitation’ term was made up to divide and ‘let’s dismantle this women’s [movement].’ But they forgot that pioneer women such as my mother and my aunt, who were in Wyoming huntin’ and shootin’ and fishin’ and riding horses and doing things to survive, but not emasculating men or taking away their jobs. Just being the best women that they could be. That frightened a lot of men. But Quentin’s generation, the younger generation, were saying ‘Yeah, that’s what our single moms have to do! They have to do that.’ So there was a different mindset. I could see that he was open — a-ga-pe — to not only my work, but other work of women. He really likes what women do, and you can really see that in his films after Jackie Brown but he really embraced that character.

Quentin is known for his fondness for grindhouse cinema, including the films you become known for which were termed “exploitation” movies. How do you view that label?
Grier: Well, what is it? Look at martial arts. I saw martial arts films with my ex, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, he was studying with Bruce Lee and we used to go see martial arts films. And later, The Bride with White Hair and Seven Samurai. Those are exploitation films — the first two seconds, decapitations, stabbing, children being burnt! But that’s action film. Is it exploitation or action? So it evolved into action, because a lot of films are very exploitative today.

When you look at how the female action star has evolved from your time to now, it seems that the sexualized component that largely made it exploitative is no longer on the table anymore. Why do you think that is? Just a product of the time in which these films were made?
Grier: I don’t know, you’ll have to ask men and ask other women. But I think it’s been played out because I established it in the ’70s. Forty years later now women are just coming into a story and it’s not about sex, it’s about survival and being stealth and powerful. Then, we could play at sexuality just to show them we could play at this, it’s really silly and it’s not that important. But we had to play that out then. A lot of films then would not work today, because it’s already been established — the sexual mores, how people have relationships and open marriages, it’s so different today. It’s just a different social and cultural difference, sexual difference. It’s completely different today. People couldn’t even say certain words. You would never hear the word ‘vagina’ then, even though it’s exploitation, it’s hard core, it’s this and that. Today, you’re gonna hear everything. So it’s different, but I’m glad I was a part of that. It was tongue in cheek, we were making fun of men making fun of us and saying, back atcha!

“Fearless” and “confident” are adjectives that have been applied to you and your film roles over the years, qualities that really shine through onscreen. What would you attribute that to?
Grier: It comes from my personal life. It comes from me experiencing very tragic circumstances when I was six and again at 19, and again at 21, where I finally felt I had to survive, I had to live through these circumstances. That gave me confidence. I fight a little harder, I challenge people… there are things that happened to me personally that I bring to the screen. But also, I wanted to show other women that they, too, won’t lose their femininity or castrate their men by being assertive. It’s okay to be confident… if you’re right. But it’s subjective, like art. Because of what’s happened to me personally in my life, I bring that to the screen. Handling guns, if you will, the action, there’s not really any hesitation. Just make sure I’m not on fire at the end of the stunt! But there weren’t stunt women for me, or at least black stunt women. Only when I did Coffy was that invented. I was a scuba diver, I water skied, and in Sheba, Baby when they had the jet ski, the personal watercraft, Kawasaki wanted to show that — the first time it was in a movie — with me in Sheba, Baby. I got on that thing and I didn’t even get wet. I came back dry. They said, ‘Oh, this is going to be fun.’ But they had the confidence, this major brand, to show this in my film. So I felt I was doing something right, for other women. You know, you don’t have to be pregnant to have fun, just get out of the house!

Speaking of fun, part of your legend has it that you once punched a journalist in the junk during an interview. True or false?
Grier: Well actually, he wrote that but he exaggerated. I did not. Because if I had really punched him, he wouldn’t be walking. He wouldn’t be able to finish the article. So he basically made it seem like I was kind of tough, but I didn’t really. I wanted a correction but he says, ‘No, I want you to look strong!’ I said, ‘I can do that without this.’ But I really didn’t punch him in the family jewels. I think he would have sued me if I had! There’s one thing I learned in martial arts, we would never joke around with our form, with our art. We’re always very respectful. So I would never hurt someone or punch someone outside of a dojo.

I’m curious to hear about your very first screen credit, which was in Beyond the Valley of the Dolls.
Grier: It’s Beyond the Valley of the Dolls! I went to the set to visit a friend; I was a starving student working six jobs, and I just kind of went with him and the next thing I know they say, ‘Hey, we need more extras!’ They said, ‘We’ll put you in a dress, and you’ll say something.’ That was my first credit. It was Russ Meyer and Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, and I wasn’t even union. I was like, ‘Well, okay.’ I had no intention of being an actor.

Really? What convinced you to become one?
Grier: I still haven’t been convinced. [Pauses] Just kidding! At the time I wanted to be a camera person. I didn’t feel like I was attractive enough, with the glamour you see on television and the images that were portrayed. And I was a revolutionary, I was into the Black Panthers, being independent, feeding your own, give them a pole they’ll learn how to feed themselves, and all of that. The womanly stuff was foreign to me. I came to Hollywood in a flannel shirt, Timberland boots, and Levis, with a big ‘fro in my family’s hunting jeep with no roof, no doors, no windows. They’d see me hiking up Sunset Plaza Boulevard, it’s a long winding road, because I was used to hiking in Colorado. They said, ‘No one in Los Angeles hikes! What are you, nuts?’ No, it’s just what I do. So I brought all of those differences, a different type of woman. They could dress me up, I clean up well. But that was my first credit. And I didn’t know what I was saying. I didn’t know anything of what to do.

Are you glad you did it?
Grier: Um… It was tuition money! Anything for school. I was saving every dime.

What was your recent work with RZA like?
Grier: Yes! The Man with the Iron Fists, I play his mother. We shot it in Shanghai. He’s going to be an extraordinary director as well. He’s excellent. And of course I loved Wu-Tang Clan, I loved his art form there, but this is a film where I play his film in the mid-1800s. It was a great experience.

Broken Social Scene Plan Indefinite Hiatus

Tue, 04 Oct 2011 15:20:47 +0200

Broken Social Scene Plan Indefinite Hiatus:

Danielle St. Laurent

After 12 years, four albums, and a revolving door of close to 20 musicians, Canadian indie rock collective Broken Social Scene might be calling it quits for good. The alternative supergroup has decided to go on “indefinite hiatus,” according to our colleagues at the Huffington Post.

Speaking to Huffington Post backstage at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival, lead singer Kevin Drew explained, “There’s no bad blood, no problems, everyone is at peace. We’ve had a lot of inter-relationships, some have worked, some haven’t. But we all loved what we were doing. And I think we were always fair.” The festival was to be one of the band’s last North American shows before embarking on indefinite hiatus, that purgatorial term which has doomed many a rock group.

As one might imagine, trying to schedule band practice with close to 20 musicians is not an easy task. “It’s like wrangling cats,” Drew says. Not dogs. “Dogs would actually listen.”

Due to the fungible nature of the project, and their several attempts to disband, a full and complete ending to BSS seems hard to believe. Their most recent album, ‘Forgiveness Rock Record’ was completed after an “extended hiatus” during which many of the group’s multiple members embarked upon projects like Stars, Metric, Do Make Say Think, Land of Talk and many others. Drew and Brendan Canning, another founding member, have both released solo albums of their own. Most visible of these acts might be Leslie Feist, whose breakout single “1234” launched her to international fame, and sold a whole bunch of iPods.

“I don’t want to dilute what we’ve done,” Drew said. “But I’d like to find other ways of telling the story of our band.” Here’s to hoping he does just that, or just makes another Broken Social Scene album.

Willie Nelson's Coldplay Cover For Chipotle

Wed, 07 Sep 2011 13:42:13 +0200

Willie Nelson's Coldplay Cover For Chipotle:

Looks like we can now feel even better about ourselves for eating Chipotle more than once a week. Thanks, Willie Nelson!

The Chipotle Cultivate Foundation, a non-profit established by the burrito barons (that’s what I call Chipotle, OK?), commits itself to creating a more sustainable and healthier food supply and raising awareness about food issues the world over. In the past few years, they’ve raised thousands of dollars for farming organizations and culinary institutions.

And now they’ve gone and enlisted Willie Nelson to cover Coldplay’s “The Scientist” for an adorable stop-motion animation video called “Back to the Start,” which follows a pink farmer who decides to go big business, before reverting back to his organic farming ways.

We imagine the phone conversation between Nelson and Chipotle below:

CHIPOTLE: Hey, is this Willie Nelson?

WILLIE: Yes, it is.

CHIPOTLE: Hi, this is Chipotle.

WILLIE: Oh, hey. How are ya?

CHIPOTLE: Good, thanks. We’re wondering if you’d want to do a song for a video we’re making about organic farming.

WILLIE: Sure, I could write something for that. Can you give me a couple days to —

CHIPOTLE: (interrupting) Why don’t you just cover “The Scientist” by Coldplay?

WILLIE: By who?

CHIPOTLE: Coldplay.

WILLIE: That seems weird.

CHIPOTLE: We assure you, it’s not.

WILLIE: (Long pause) Can I have free burritos for life?

CHIPOTLE: Hold on. (Long pause) Free burrito bowls. For thirty years.

WILLIE: Sold.

Mashable reports that Chipotle plans to air the video at movie theaters, and you can buy the song on iTunes, with $0.60 of each download going to the Foundation.

Nelson, who turned 78 last April, has a long history of supporting farmers and sustainable agriculture. As the president of Farm Aid, he’s organized a major concert and countless events every year. This year’s Farm Aid concert took place August 13 in Kansas City.

Watch The Trailer For Joe Henry’s Reverie

Sun, 14 Aug 2011 23:17:32 +0200

Watch The Trailer For Joe Henry’s Reverie:

By Jessica Pace

With 12 acclaimed albums already under his belt, producer and Grammy-winning musician Joe Henry is set drop Reverie October 11 via Anti- Records. Though it’s entirely acoustic, don’t expect soft and sweet.

“I knew it should be stripped and lean but not demur, sonically speaking; in black and white, but not without red blood in its veins,” Henry says.

“This album speaks about time. The great river that reminds us we are buoyant after all, as its moving current lifts us by the chin and just off of the balls of our feet, while we strain to dig our toes into the sandy ground,” he adds. “I am not convinced that any song exists without some knowing nod in its direction. And so with Reverie I am nodding, then –to time, but also to all the love, hope, despair, and revelation that stands naked inside its weather.

NPR recently premiered Reverie’s “Odetta” on All Songs Considered. It’s a somewhat spiritual track that embraces the subject of mortality and refers to political folk singer Odetta. Listen here.

Watch the premiere of the trailer for Reverie, and check out the track listing, below.

Reverie Track Listing:

Heaven’s Escape
Odetta
After The War
Sticks & Stones
Grand Street
Dark Tears
Strung
Tomorrow Is October
Piano Furnace
Deathbed Version
Room At Arles
Eyes Out For You
Unspeakable
The World And All I Know

Penny & the Quarters find fame wasn’t so fleeting

Sun, 17 Jul 2011 21:24:01 +0200

Penny & the Quarters find fame wasn’t so fleeting:

www.theotherpaper.com BY ERIC LYTTLE

Nannie Sharpe always looked forward to calls from her daughter Jayma, especially since she’d left their Woodbridge, Va. home to study abroad in Italy. A call earlier this week, however, proved even more interesting than usual.

Jayma had been out to dinner with a couple of Italian acquaintances. One, named Roberto, was a record collector of some note, specializing in old jazz and soul. During the course of the evening, he relayed the story of how an old demo tape, recorded decades earlier in Columbus, Ohio, had gained a bit of notoriety after its use in the 2010 movie, Blue Valentine. Fans of the dark story of romance between Ryan Gosling and his co-star, Michelle Williams, who’d earned an Oscar nomination for her role, became enamored with the charmingly soulful song that highlighted the film, posting it all over YouTube, drawing hundreds of thousands of hits.

What made the story interesting was that the identity of the group that recorded the song had been lost to time. No one knew who these obscure Columbus singers were. The guest remembered the title of the story in which he’d read about the song: “Lost Soul” (which was The Other Paper’s cover story on Jan. 27)

Knowing her mother and her uncles had dabbled briefly in Columbus’s soul-music scene in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Jayma called her to tell her about it.

“She said, ‘Let me get on the Internet and look it up and I’ll get back with you,’” Sharpe said

Soon, her cellphone was blowing up with texts from her daughter.

“It was all, ‘OMG exclamation point, exclamation point,” said Sharpe. “She said, ‘This is you, Mom! They’re looking for you!’ I said, ‘Are you sure?’ And she said, ‘Mom-they are looking for you.’”

Sharpe, whose laptop recently died, went to the library Monday and looked up the link her daughter had emailed her.

“I was sitting there reading it. Oooo I was getting so excited,” said Sharpe. “I was having to jump up.”

The song in question was called “You and Me” and was recorded about 1970 as nothing more than a one-take rehearsal at Harmonic Sounds Studio, which once sat at the corner of East Broad and 18th streets. The taped rehearsal was then labeled, tucked in a box and all but forgotten for the next 40 years.

When the studio manager, Clem Price, died in Columbus in 2006, the tape was one of a handful that turned up at Price’s estate sale. The buyer was friends with an associate of the Numero Group, a label in Chicago that specializes in reissuing long-forgotten soul and R&B records recorded by small, indie labels.

After weeks of research and a field trip to Columbus to talk to some old soul singers still in town, Numero Group owner Rob Sevier and his associate, Dante Carfagna, were able to identify virtually all of the songs and artists on the tapes. Only one box remained a mystery. On it, written in pencil, were notes identifying tracks 1 and 2 as “Penny & the Quarters.” And nobody knew who Penny was, much less the Quarters.

A year later, Numero Group released a CD titled Eccentric Soul: The Prix Label, featuring songs recorded at Harmonic Sounds. Track 18 on the 19-song disk was “You and Me.” The CD sold poorly.

In 2009, two years after its release, actor Ryan Gosling over-nighted at his PR agent’s home in Chicago. Kathryn Frazier of Biz 3 publicity also happened to represent the Numero Group. As the night unfolded, Frazier and Gosling sat up playing old soul songs from the Numero Group releases. One song, in particular, caught Gosling’s ear.

Later that year, when he was filming Blue Valentine, Gosling knew just the tune to represent his character’s budding love for Cindy, the character played by Michelle Williams’ role-“You and Me.”

Within days of the movie’s release, the number of downloads from the Numero Group’s website for “You and Me” began to escalate.

And still, no one knew who Penny & the Quarters were.

A week after The Other Paper ran its January cover story about the mystery song, Glodean Robinson came forward. She was the widow of Jay Robinson, and she had proof he’d written the song. Unfortunately, he’d died in September, 2009-just about the same time Gosling was discovering “You and Me.” Robinson had no idea his song had been re-released in 2007. And with him, it seemed, also died the identity of Penny & the Quarters.

That is, until an Italian TOP reader met Jayma Sharpe, who quickly called her mother.

Nannie Sharpe was nicknamed Penny as a child. “Daddy gave us all nicknames,” she said. “There were 10 of us. He had to do something.”

She still goes by Penny.

“I was kind of a tomboy. I used to race my brothers. He’d say, ‘If you beat them, I’ll give you a penny.”

The Coulter family (Sharpe is Penny’s married name) moved to Columbus in 1961, from North Carolina. It was there, near Charlotte, that the family had begun singing together. “I probably started singing with my brothers and sisters when I was 5,” said Penny. “We’d sing all the time, in church, in the house. We’d stand around, helping whoever’s turn it was to wash dishes that week, singing together.”

In late 1969 or early 1970, Penny’s brothers, Preston, Johnny and Donald-all of whom still reside in Columbus-answered an ad in the newspaper.

“They were auditioning singers, starting a label,” said Preston. “My brothers and sister and I answered it. There were all these people there at Harmonic Sounds. It was really crowded. But when we sang, everyone was like, ‘You were great. You were great,’ and Mr. Price (the studio manager) told us, ‘I want to work with you.’”

In the following weeks, Penny, just a year out of high school at that point, began singing background with her brothers for other Harmonic artists. “We would go over there every Saturday morning and stay all day, from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. I remember thinking, ‘Do we have to stay all day?’”

Preston remembers meeting Jay Robinson. “Mr. Price asked Jay to work with us, to polish us up,” he said. “I remember he used to emphasize to us to enunciate those words, and he liked the phrase ‘my, my, my, my’ to illustrate.”

It’s a phrase Penny ultimately used in “You and Me”-a song Robinson asked them to sing one afternoon.

“I didn’t even realize they were recording,” Preston said.

“We were just trying to get ourselves on record,” said Penny. “It was exciting. It hadn’t really set with us as to what we could be yet. We were just trying to get on board.”

But a record never came, and as the soul scene slowly gave way to rock ‘n’ roll, and then disco, the studio ran out of money.

The Coulters moved on, but continued singing gospel together through the years, in the choir at Bethany Presbyterian, and in a handful of groups, calling themselves at various times the Harmony Group, the Ecumen, the Final Choice. They even produced one CD as DC and the Gospel Quest, but it never took off.

After working for 30 years as a mail sorter at the Main Post Office on Twin Rivers Drive, Penny moved to Woodbridge, Va., in 2006. Now 62, she still sings for the Harvest Life Changes Church, whose choir can be seen on the Word Network daily at 2 p.m.

None of the Coulters have yet seen Blue Valentine, the movie that pulled a rehearsal from a younger day out of obscurity. But they plan to. Soon.

“It’s been 40 years since I’ve heard it,” said Preston of that old recording. “I’m just shocked and elated at the same time.”

Rob Sevier, co-owner of the Numero Group label, spoke with Penny and Preston on Tuesday. “It’s exciting to resolve the mystery of this song,” he said. “It started as a throwaway in a catalog we thought was pretty cool. The song was charming, so we included it on the CD. And against all odds, we were proven correct long after it was released. The act of releasing the music aids in the discovery. Bringing the lost to light is a beautiful thing.”

Penny couldn’t agree more.

“Just last Sunday, my preacher’s sermon was that your blessings will come in unexpected forms. I know that’s right.”

Lucinda Williams is kind of happy

Tue, 12 Jul 2011 15:27:51 +0200

Lucinda Williams is kind of happy:

Lucinda Williams feels both blessed and baffled these days.

The iconic singer-songwriter, who plays PNC Pavilion Friday night with Amos Lee, is thankful that her latest album, “Blessed,” has struck a chord. But she is mystified why some people are calling it her “happy” album.

“It’s funny because it comes up all the time about the tortured artist myth,” Williams said. “People are confused because now that I’m married to Tom (Overby, her manager and producer), how am I supposed to be able to still write these gut-wrenching songs?

“People think it’s one or the other, but it’s not black and white. (Being married) doesn’t make me happy 24 hours a day.”

Although “Sweet Love” and “Kiss Like Your Kiss” might be a testament to Williams’ blissful union, it’s her ability to compartmentalize that is responsible for “Don’t Know How You’re Livin’,” “Copenhagen” and “Seeing Black,” three bleak reminders that happiness isn’t universal.

The album’s concept gestated for awhile.

”(‘Blessed’) started with just one line a few years ago and I never did anything with it,” Williams said. “I went back and was looking at things - I’m always writing stuff down on napkins or whatever. I have kind of an organic approach, I don’t have a disciplined thing.

“I had written the line in this Mexican restaurant we go to all the time (in Los Angeles) where this girl comes in selling roses every night.

“One night I asked her where she was from, just trying to find out about her life. It’s something I’ve always done. Everybody has a story.”

Williams’ unique talent is taking those snippets - whether from her life, from a girl selling roses, or from a friend who commits suicide - and turning them into songs that make people sit up and listen closely.

Her influence extends far and wide, and has touched Karin Bergquist and Linford Detweiler of the Cincinnati band Over the Rhine.

Williams sings a duet with Bergquist on “Undamned” from the group’s latest album, “the Long Surrender.” It was a defining moment for them.

“As a young artist, I wanted to meet my heroes,” Bergquist said. ” … I don’t necessarily have that need or desire (now) because there can be a disconnect between the work and the artist.

“With Lucinda however, there is no disconnect. She is what she writes and sings. It’s been truly wonderful to be able to sing together … a real and unexpected gift.”

Detweiler is just as eloquent and passionate as his wife.

“… When Lucinda sings, I feel something. She reminds me that I’m not dead yet. (She) wraps her arms around all of the beauty and messiness of this world with her music. And ultimately, it’s an act of true generosity for which I’m deeply grateful.”

Maybe even blessed. But Williams herself doesn’t use the word lightly.

“The word is loaded (with subtext) and very complex,” she said. “Part of it is little gifts that no one noticed. It’s probably the hardest song that I’ve ever had to try to explain.

“(The word) means different things to different people. I was afraid to call the album ‘Blessed’ because I didn’t want people to think, well, like Bob Dylan’s ‘Saved’ album (she’s found religion).

“But I’ve always wanted to work more with why are we here, the question of life, love, death …”

It might not be a straight line from “blessed” to “happy,” but it’s likely there is an intersection. And it’s certain that folks who love great music will be happy when they listen to “Blessed.”

Stray Dogg - Almost

Mon, 30 May 2011 10:53:00 +0200

Stray Dogg - Almost:

First Album : Almost available on Bandcamp
Free Download
Album was recorded in a studio called ‘Baukova Soba’

Stray Dogg band is made of :
Dukat Stray - Guitar, vocals and backup vocals, harp
Jelena Damjanovic - Piano
Ana Jankovic - Violin and backup vocals
Marko Ignjatovic - Solo guitar

<a href=”http://straydogg.bandcamp.com/album/almost” _mce_href=”http://straydogg.bandcamp.com/album/almost”>Almost by Stray Dogg</a>

National's treasure: Rocker Dessner finds harmony in B’klyn house

Fri, 20 May 2011 21:58:00 +0200

National's treasure: Rocker Dessner finds harmony in B’klyn house:

The National is a hip Brooklyn band, but their sound isn’t exactly Williamsburg. They create sprawling songs that evoke the feeling of living in places where you have room to spread out, where people actually own land.

And while guitarist/keyboardist/principal songwriter Aaron Dessner does indeed reside in Brooklyn, he’s not in the kind of walkup or loft you’re likely imagining.

“It’s the largest urban Victorian neighborhood in the country,” Dessner says of Ditmas Park, where he’s lived for seven years in a 2,800-square-foot, three-story, two-family house.

GARAGE BAND: When the National’s Aaron Dessner wants to record, he just steps outside to his state-of-the-art studio in what once was the garage of his Ditmas Park home. (PIC ZANDY MANGOLD)
After the renovation, he discovered lovely original details like parquet floors, which are complemented by modern, Danish-style furnishings (pictured).

Dessner, who bought the home for $700,000 in 2003, shares the first floor with his girlfriend, Stine, and rents the top two floors out to his bandmate, Matt Berninger, the National’s lead singer.

“I think someday I would want to live in the whole house if I have children, but right now this just makes sense,” he says. Though only taking up a single floor, Dessner’s one-bedroom is quite spacious — with a double-size living room, a dining room and a large galley kitchen. The bedroom overlooks the deck and a suburban-size backyard that houses the music studio where the National recorded their fifth album, “High Violet,” last year.

“The people that lived here had lived here for almost 40 years,” Dessner says. “They had no idea that these [original parquet] floors were in the house because they were covered with tile and layers of carpet. It was only after tons of demolition that I got down to them.”

Dessner did most of the home’s restoration himself. Finding the original wood beneath layers of green paint on the coal-burning fireplace in the dining room was a lengthy process, as was getting to the soaring 12-foot ceilings that had been dropped three feet.

“All the ceilings were this weird stuff from the ’60s that turns into dust when you start pulling it down,” Dessner says. “I think I inhaled a lot of that and all kinds of stuff when I was doing the floors.”

It was so intense that Dessner’s lung collapsed from inhaling all the debris six months into the renovation, which included jack-hammering the pavement that covered the backyard to create, well, a yard. “I wasn’t being careful enough with what I was breathing,” he says, adding, “I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to do something like this again. It was so traumatic.”

Now he reaps the benefits of all that hard labor. “I could never afford to buy a house like this now,” he says. It’s now worth about double what he paid for it.

“It’s so nice that the lots here are 50-by-100 feet. Brownstone lots are 25 feet. Here you have twice as much land, and there are so many trees,” Dessner observes. So many that it’s easy to forget you’re still in the city, though the Q train is a five-minute walk away.

Unlike an actual suburb, though, Ditmas Park is filled with musicians, including Sufjan Stevens and Dessner’s brother, Bryce, who plays guitar for the National. And Bryan and Scott Devendorf, the other set of brothers that make up the band, live nearby, making recording in Dessner’s studio easy.

“It’s really cozy and easy to use,” he says of the studio, which was designed and built by his architect brother-in-law, Ole Sondresen, in a structure that used to be the house’s garage. It features skylights with power-retractable shades that give the place an airy feel, and cedar-lined walls that improve the acoustics and resemble a “Scandinavian sauna,” Dessner says. “I prefer it to big studios because you don’t get that feeling of being in a fishbowl or that the clock is running. You can just experiment.”

Recently, Dessner’s quintet composed a song for the film “Win Win” and one for the video game “Portal 2” there; they will be released together as a 7-inch record on Monday.

The Scandinavian vibe extends into the house. There’s an Illum Wikkelso rocking chair he bought for Stine in the living room; in the couple’s bedroom is a colorful Hay area rug that Dessner got in Copenhagen; bright orange lamps hanging in the kitchen were acquired on a trip to Aarhus, Denmark. “Here you’ll probably pay 400 to 500 bucks apiece for them,” Dessner says of the lights, “but there they’re like 30 bucks.”

There are also pieces bought locally, like a 1910 armoire made of tiger oak.

“We went out to look at antique shops in Brooklyn. This was just covered up in the corner,” Dessner recalls. “We were like, ‘Wow, it’s beautiful,’ so we just went for it. I don’t think I’ve ever bought a piece of furniture that expensive, but it’s pretty and it feel like it belongs.”

A 1940s spinet upright piano, which was found on Craigslist and lives in the dining room, can be recorded through wires Dessner ran underground between the house and the studio.

“You can’t really tune it without strings breaking, so it’s like 10 percent flat. If you want to use it for recording, you have to tune to it,” he says.

But, as with his home, Dessner is willing to put in the work.

Aaron Dessner’s favorite things
* The recording studio
* 1940s spinet piano
* 1910 tiger oak armoire
* The original wood fireplace mantel
* Illum Wikkelso chair bought for his girlfriend

NEW YORK POST By CHRISTOPHER KOMPANEK

How Thurston Moore Met Kim Gordon

Sun, 01 May 2011 11:22:35 +0200

How Thurston Moore Met Kim Gordon:

Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore recalls meeting his wife/bandmate (via Sonic Truth):

Kim wore glasses with flip-up shades and had an Australian sheepdog named Egan. She had an off-center ponytail and wore a blue-and-white-striped shirt and pants outfit. She had beautiful eyes and the most beautiful smile and was very intelligent and seemed to have a sensitive/spiritual intellect.

She seemed to really like me. I definitely liked her, but was scared, as always, to make a move. I was afraid to kiss her. We walked around a couple of times. One night, it got late and we were eating at Leshko’s, and I think she wanted me to ask her over. I only lived up the street. So we parted. She would take the subway, staying at gallery owner Anina Nosei’s place. Before she split, she actually touched my arm (!) and said, “See you later.”

She moved into a raw railway apartment on Eldridge Street, below Grand Street. The artist Dan Graham lived upstairs and had acquired the place for her. She invited me over one evening and I played this beat-up guitar she had. I knew the guitar because it belonged to an associate of the Coachmen gang, who left it at Jenny Holzer’s loft, where Kim had stayed, and somehow it was passed on to her. All she had was the guitar and a foam-rubber cushion for sleeping. That night was the first time we kissed.

(Photo by Rachel Chandler)

3D artist paints stunning tiger from hidden, crouching women (who had to pose for a back-breaking 24 hours)

Sat, 23 Apr 2011 12:34:08 +0200

3D artist paints stunning tiger from hidden, crouching women (who had to pose for a back-breaking 24 hours):

Artist Craig Tracy chose a canvas with a difference for his striking three-dimensional picture of a tiger.

Three naked women spent an amazing 24 hours as his subjects as he assembled his masterpiece to raise awareness about the plight of endangered creatures.

His next project might need to be in aid of sufferers of back pain. Tracy, 43, from New Orleans, created the breathtaking piece to raise awareness about the endangered animal.

He assembled the women on the floor of his studio and then used paint specifically designed for human skin. Throughout his career Craig has painted a staggering 400 bodies - including women at the Rio carnival and his home towns’ Mardi Gras. And he admits that he has enjoyed his brush with fame.
He said: ‘The rich and famous seem to enjoy my work in due proportion. I have sold some works to them for up to $1,200, but I could never say which ones.

‘But it isn’t just celebs who love my work, people from all walks of life love it. ‘I’ve never had a negative interaction regarding what I paint or how I paint it.’ The self confessed art nut believes this particular work is his most successful and important of his life. He added: ‘The South China Tiger image is certainly one of my favourite images so far. ‘I love what it represents and all of the good that it has done to help save the tiger.’ And Craig admitted that he doesn’t struggle to find models willing to appear in the buff for his art - they find him.

He said: ‘It has never been an issue for me. I paint on people and people are readily abundant. ‘All of my models are volunteers. I never use agencies or websites to find them. In fact, they find me. ‘Girlfriends that I have had, have had an understanding of what I do and the professional nature of how I paint and create. So I have never had any issues regarding jealousy - I simply wouldn’t tolerate it if they did.’

From humble beginnings as an airbrush artist in a local shopping mall at the tender age of 16 - Craig has gone on to set up the world’s first art gallery dedicated to body painting. After graduating from The Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale, he went on to become a freelance illustrator. But soon decided it wasn’t the right career choice for him. He said: ‘I actually hated being an Illustrator. I was so disappointed by just how mind-numbingly boring and lonely it all was.’

The body painter started with just a small amount of face painting before, several years later, he took to painting whole bodies into art works.

Now he owns and operates the first gallery dedicated solely to body painted images - which includes his stunning South China Tiger work inspired by Tom Mangelsen’s photograph.

The gallery allows visitors to see firsthand how body painting is done and he personally meets and educates hundreds of people each week in the New Orleans studio.

Once More, With Feeling: Joss Whedon Revisits ‘Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog’

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 12:39:19 +0200

Once More, With Feeling: Joss Whedon Revisits ‘Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog’:

In the pantheon of fantasy and science-fiction projects that Joss Whedon helped create, the Internet musical “Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog” can be easy to overlook: it’s not his beloved television series that ran a healthy seven seasons (“Buffy the Vampire Slayer”), or its beloved spinoff (“Angel”), or his misunderstood television show that was canceled before its time (“Dollhouse”) or his other misunderstood television show that was canceled before its time and spawned a misunderstood movie (“Firefly” and “Serenity”). “Dr. Horrible” is simply a three-act musical about an aspiring super-villain (played by Neil Patrick Harris), his smug do-gooding nemesis (Nathan Fillion) and the woman who comes between them (Felicia Day). Dreamed up by Mr. Whedon, his brothers Zack and Jed, and Maurissa Tancharoen during the 2007-8 writers’ strike and produced on his own dime, it is the pure expression of what they wanted to make at the time, without any outside interference.

For that reason alone, “Dr. Horrible” holds a special place in Mr. Whedon’s heart. (Another sign of his affection: he made time to talk to about it when he really should have been preparing to direct his superhero mega-movie “The Avengers.”) In these excerpts from a recent conversation, Mr. Whedon spoke to ArtsBeat about the making of the musical, its recently released companion volume “Dr Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog: The Book” and his future online ambitions. (O.K., so we asked about “Avengers,” too.)

Q. How are you? A. I am super-tired. I just have insomnia, so I’m like, [zombie voice] “Uhhhh. Prepping.”
Q. It’s been almost three years since “Dr. Horrible” was first released. What does it mean to you now? A. It means, what the hell have we been doing? Where’s the damn sequel? The shame. Mostly that. And it remains one of the purest experiences of my life. It just makes me happy all the time. It wasn’t like anything else.
Q. As much as the project was initiated by the writers’ strike, was it also in some way an acknowledgment that you couldn’t produce something like “Dr. Horrible” anywhere but on the Web? A. My ideas are always slightly left-of-center. I like to think that I’m a populist entertainer, but I’m a little bit idiosyncratic and sometimes the networks wouldn’t really roll with that. I was trying to – this was during the strike – make a deal with a big Internet company that had expressed interest in doing some low-budget production, and I laid out these ideas that I had, that I thought they might be interested in, the last of which was “Dr. Horrible.” I said, “And here’s the one you’re definitely not going to want to do.” And they said, “Yes. We don’t.” It became clear that nothing was going to happen with this company before the strike was over. So I got more and more obsessed with “Dr. Horrible” and asked my wife, “Honey, would it be O.K. if—” And she said, “Hells yeah.” We just eliminated the middle man. Or actually, the top man.
Q. This was totally financed out of your own pocket? A. Mm-hmm. I’m like, hey, you know what? Some mid-life crises are cars. They cost about this much. Mine has songs in it.
Q. I was amazed to see, in the book, your original handwritten lyrics to “My Freeze Ray,” which contain no crossed-out words, changes or even misspellings. Did all the songs emerge from your head fully-formed like Athena? A. I’m shocked about the misspelling thing. And yes, it was fully-armored. But I usually write things in my head before I ever write them down. When I write it out, usually I’ve already figured out what it is I’m trying to do. Sometimes I’ll forget to write them down, and then I’ll be like, “Here’s how this song goes: Uh. I don’t remember.” I’m that organized. Also, it’s a pretty simple lyric. There are other song sheets with many scribble-outs. But that one just sort of formed in my head pretty quickly. Not quickly enough. It was actually more painful than that page would express.
Q. Were there other numbers that were written but didn’t make it to the final cut? A. I don’t think there were, because we didn’t want to write anything extra. When I first thought of “Dr. Horrible” I had worked on a couple of other songs that didn’t make it – I didn’t even pitch them to the other writers because they didn’t work in the structure we’d come up with. There wasn’t a lot of “Well, what if?” We wrote exactly what we wanted to say and as many songs as we could, knowing exactly where, structurally, they had to go. We were going to cut up some of my endless monologue for Neil, or at least intercut it with things, but he just rocked that one take so well. And we liked the idea people would be settling into the idea of a guy doing a blog when the first musical number started that we ended up leaving it.
Q. Was Wonderflonium, the mystery material that Dr. Horrible wants to steal, the most ridiculous name you had heard of before you saw “Avatar”? A. [laughs] Ah. The thing in “Avatar” was also in “The Core” so let us give “The Core” its credit. “Avatar” was not the first to come up with Unobtanium. However, I believe Zack first referred to the mysterious substance as Bananatonium. So Wonderflonium was our nod to real science. It’s more grounded.
Q. When you look at the success of “Glee,” do you feel like that couldn’t have happened without things like the “Buffy” musical episode “Once More, With Feeling”? A. No, but boy am I going to tell people that now. I’m going to run that theory up a flagpole. There’s other things like “High School Musical” that were more influential. However, let’s just say I invented television and leave it at that.
Q. You don’t feel you’ve played any role in - A. Legitimizing musicals on TV? Maybe. Before “Once More, With Feeling,” you couldn’t not say “Cop Rock.” Nobody was giving it cred, so there is an element of, Oh, it’s cool now. That wasn’t there. Was I a snowflake in the avalanche? Yes, I was. Am I going to take credit for the whole thing? Possibly not.
Q. There have been performances of “Dr. Horrible” at conventions – has it been licensed for schools and other stage productions? A. We did a little agreement, and many schools and some professional troupes have done it around the country. We actually had to put a pause on it, because people were starting to sell DVDs and stuff, so we had to figure out more complex legal language, which hopefully we’ll be done with soon. Obviously, we love the idea that people and schools are doing it, but if people are making money off it, then we go, “Hmmm, wait a minute. Isn’t there a rule about this?”
Q. What about producing it Off Broadway? Or even on Broadway? A. We have spoken of that much. Especially every time Jed comes back from New York – “We’ve just got to do it! Come on, we just write some more songs to make these longer!” Because some of us have sat through “Spider-Man.”
Q. Does that include you? A. [after a pause] I neither confirm nor deny. And you kind of go, “Hey, let’s do something for no money.” Which is the same feeling we had about TV and movies when we made “Dr. Horrible.” But I would say my heart is more in the idea of the sequel. We’ve done a lot of work on it.
Q. Really? A. Oh, yeah. We’ve got several songs near completion and we’ve got a very specific structure. We’ve just all got jobs. And it’s not like Neil, Nathan and Felicia ain’t busy either. We get together at Christmas and family occasions, and then play each other our partial songs and go, “Yup, that’s still exactly as it was the last time we played it. We’re great.” It’s bad.
Q. Is there anything you can say yet about what the “Dr. Horrible” sequel will be? A. It’s going to be “Dr. Horrible and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.” And it’s going to be just as good as the other one. I don’t know why people are upset about that title. And by the way, by the time we finish it, Neil will be just as old. No, I’m not saying anything.
Q. You’ve had other projects that ended, perhaps, in ways you didn’t want them to, or before you wanted them to- A. I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.
Q. -so after something like “Dr. Horrible,” are you ever tempted to chuck it all and only produce things for the Internet? A. I’m more than tempted. I’m a little obsessed. And after “Dr. Horrible,” I thought, well, somebody will come around. I talked at great length and planned at great length the idea of a portal and putting shows together, having an Internet identity and starting my own little micro-studio. Nobody in town was interested, and then by the time they were, “Avengers” came around. I was and will continue to work on a very, very different Internet mini-thing that I was writing with Warren Ellis, and I have a lot of ideas for things I want to put up there. I still believe it’s a viable financial model, and a creative playground and I miss it. But in the year that I was supposed to do that, I instead decided to make this little Sundance movie that I’m making.
Q. I certainly hope you find distribution for it. A. You know, I’m looking at the Independent Film Channel very closely. Knock wood.
Q. Did you happen to keep up with the March Madness tournament on io9.com, in which readers voted “Serenity” the top fantasy film of all time, over “The Empire Strikes Back”? A. I have been alerted to this fact by certain of my friends. When I saw us going up against “Empire Strikes Back,” all I could think was, “Oh, they’re gonna hate it. They’re gonna hate us. They’re gonna call our fans names.” But while “Empire Strikes Back” is for me the more seminal film, “Serenity” at least has an ending. I don’t know when “The Matrix” got voted down – that’s my favorite. It is starting to be a double-edged sword. There’s no greater sadness than not still being on board that ship with that crew, in my career. All I can think is, maybe someday, someone at Universal will say, “Hey, we made money. Let’s do that again.” So I’m glad that it lives. But I also know that every time it gets in one of those polls, against beloved movies, we just get flamed. I feel sad, too.
Q. It’s like being a parent, and letting your child find its way in the world. A. I can’t control how beautiful and popular my child is. What can I do?
Q. Since there’s not much you can discuss about “Avengers” right now, what can you tell me about the status of your long-awaited horror film “The Cabin in the Woods”? A. I know that MGM is talking to people about it. Because MGM is, Everything must go – they’ve lost their lease. And I believe that there is some interest from other companies in acquiring it and distributing it. More than that, I cannot say, but I have hope that “Avengers” may not be the only thing I get to put out next year.
Q. Can you say when you start production on “Avengers”? A. We’re just a hardscrabble bunch. Guerilla filmmaking. I start production a week from Monday. I’m going to get started on the script now. Apparently that’s a thing. I don’t get it. Improv stunts are always way more exciting-looking.

William Shatner's 'Searching For Major Tom' Track List

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 13:41:02 +0200

William Shatner's 'Searching For Major Tom' Track List :

Captain Kirk is headed back to space.

William Shatner, the Emmy winning TV icon, announced the track listing and details for his new space-inspired cover album, Searching For Major Tom. The album will feature a large number of heavy metal covers, as well as songs by U2, Frank Sinatra, Queen and Pink Floyd.

Shatner has had a storied music career, producing confusing, parodied yet somehow enlightening song covers and original bits over the past 40+ years. His first album, The Transformed Man, raised eyebrows with its bizarre covers, which, in what would become his trademark style, boasted dramatic readings of lyrics over music. HIs best known track was a recording of Sonny & Cher’s “Mr. Tambourine Man.” Check out Urlesque’s ranking of his ten best cover songs here.

Shatner announced the album via Twitter back in February.

Here’s the track list:

Space Trucking Originally By Deep Purple - Deep Purple Drummer Ian Paice Has Performed The Drum Part. Johnny Winter Is On Guest Guitar.

She Blinded Me With Science Originally By Thomas Dolby - Bootsy Collins Is On As The Guest Bassist. Patrick Moraz (Ex Yes And Moody Blues) Is Guesting On Keyboards/Synth.

In A Little While Originally By U2 - Manuel Gottsching From Ash Ra Tempel Has Added Guitar.

Empty Glass Originally By The Tea Party - Michael Schenker (UFO/Scorpions) Has Added Guest Guitar.

Lost In The Stars As Done By Frank Sinatra - Jazz Legend Ernie Watts Is On Guest Saxophone.

Twilight Zone Originally By Golden Earring - Warren Haynes (Gov’t Mule/Allman Brothers) Is On Guest Guitar.

Space Cowboy Originally By Steve Miller - Country Artist Brad Paisley Has Added Guitar And Vocals.

Rocket Man Originally By Elton John - Guitarist Steve Hillage (Ex Gong Member And Current Member Of Techno Rock Duo System 7) Has Added Guest Guitar

Space Oddity Originally By David Bowie - Ritchie Blackmore (Ex-Deep Purple) Has Added Guest Guitar. Alan Parsons Is Adding Guest Keyboards.

Spirit In The Sky Originally By Norman Greenbaum - Peter Frampton Has Played Guitar On This Track.

Bohemian Rhapsody Originally By Queen - John Wetton From Asia Has Played Bass And Done A Vocal.

Silver Machine Originally By Hawkwind - Wayne Kramer From The MC5 Is Adding Guitar And Carmine Appice (Vanilla Fudge/Rod Stewart) Is Adding A Guest Drum Part.

Major Tom Originally By Peter Shilling - Nick Valensi, The Guitarist From The Strokes Has Added Guest Guitar To This This Track. Also Zakk Wylde (Ozzy Osbourn, Black Label Society) And Mike Inez (Alice In Chains)Have Contributed To This Track.

Learning To Fly Originally By Pink Floyd - Edgar Froese From Tangerine Dream Has Played Guitar And Keyboards On This Track.

Mr. Spaceman Originally By The Byrds - Dave Davies From The Kinks Has Added Guest Guitar On This Track.

Iron Man Originally By Black Sabbath - Zakk Wylde (Ex Ozzy Guitarist) Played Guitar And Did A Vocal On This Track.

Planet Earth Originally By Duran Duran - Steve Howe, Guitarist With Yes, Played Guitar On This Track.

Walking On The Moon Originally By The Police - Toots Of Toots & The Maytals Has Added A Guest Vocal.

Mrs. Major Tom - Female Singer To Add A Track -To Be Announced