The marriage of death and showbusiness is at the heart of the Oklahoma band’s appeal. During the show, amid all the confetti and clouds of red smoke, Coyne sings, in a high, cracked voice, about grief and struggle and how to face the unfaceable. Come for the balloons, stay for the space-rock anthems about the inevitability of oblivion. They end the show, as always, with their best-loved song, “Do You Realize??”, often played at weddings and funerals because of its pivotal line: “Everyone you know someday will die.” Coyne regards it as a miraculous phenomenon rather than something he had a hand in creating. “We play it like it’s some magic thing we discovered in Antarctica and brought back, like, ‘Look at this thing!’” [Source]
The Chemical Brothers have premiered their official London 2012 Olympic Games track. The duo have recorded ‘Velodrome’ as the official soundtrack to the Olympics Track Cycling events in the velodrome this summer. [Source]
Shield of Thorns is the second solo studio album by Seattle musician Shawn Smith. Two songs (“Leaving California” and “Wrapped in My Memory”) were featured on the “Long Term Parking” episode of The Sopranos fifth season (2004) on HBO.
[This song is dedicated to the best dog in the world. Ymer will live her last day in this life today. I will see you in the after life, my little friend.]
Kiss’s drummer Peter Criss sings the song, which he co-wrote with Stan Penridge. The song was written before Criss had joined Kiss, while he was still a member of Chelsea. Criss came up with the melody for the song while on a train to New York City from New Jersey where the band practiced. He and Chelsea guitarist Stan Penridge wrote the song together. Neither of the two women who inspired the song were actually named Beth. A bootleg exists of the song from 1971, but the song was sung “Beck, what can I do?” “Beck” was the nickname of fellow Chelsea member Mike Brand’s wife, Becky, who would call often during practices to ask Mike when he was coming home. Years later, while in Kiss, both Bob Ezrin and Gene Simmons are credited for changing the song’s title to “Beth,” presumably to be more recognizable as a female name. According to interviews with Criss, around the same time, some of the lyrics were changed to reflect his wife Lydia Di Leonardo’s lamentations that she missed him while on tour. So, the song is partly written to Becky and partly to Lydia. The song was a last-minute addition to the Destroyer album. According to Bill Aucoin, the manager of Kiss at that time, Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley did not want “Beth” on the album because it was not a typical Kiss song. Bill insisted on keeping the song on the record. When released as a single, however, “Beth” was initially the B-side of “Detroit Rock City”. But radio stations, particularly one in Atlanta, Georgia, began playing it more than “Detroit Rock City” and it quickly became a highly-requested selection. Kiss and Casablanca Records reissued “Beth” as an A-side with “Detroit Rock City” as the B-side, and it was far more successful. The single went Gold in the United States (the first Kiss single to do so) on January 5, 1977 and in Canada on December 1, 1976. In 1977, Kiss received a People’s Choice Award for “Beth”, one of the few industry awards the band ever won. “Beth” is also credited as invigorating sluggish sales of the Destroyer album, which many fans initially saw as a misstep. It is also the only Kiss song that features no instrumental performances by any member of the band. Criss is backed by a piano and a string orchestra, a stark departure from the hard rock-oriented band.
Golden Clouds is the first single taken from the brand new album The Orb featuring Lee Scratch Perry presents “The Orbserver In The Star House.” The album will be released on Cooking Vinyl on September 3rd 2012.
Listen to the first blog single from the album here.
The Orbserver In The Star House comes out on CD, 2 x 12″ Vinyl, Digital Download and a special highly limited Deluxe Boxset pressing featuring the below.
- Standard CD
- Exclusive Instrumental CD of full album
- 3 x 7″ coloured (green, yellow, black) vinyl singles.
Golden Clouds b/w Golden Clouds Dub (Yellow)
Soul Man b/w Soul Man Dub (Green)
Ball Of Fire b/w Ball Of Fire Dub (Black)
- 2 x 7″ Artwork Prints
- Numbered limited to 1000 copies worldwide
- Individual signed painting from Dr Alex Paterson
Ride have now released an ancient Portishead remix of Carnival Of Light cut ‘Moonlight Medicine’. The original track, it ought to be noted, features organ contributions from Deep Purple’s Jon Lord, who sadly passed away on Monday. For anyone that’s been keeping up with Portishead’s recent work/numerous offshoots, the remix provides the shock of the old. No Krautrock signifiers here: the ‘Moonlight Medicine’ is a lumbering, druggy piece of trip-hop, enlivened by some nifty turntablism and Adrian Utley’s louche guitar work. That organ is all-enveloping, shining brightly right at the front of the mix. ”Freedom and time/It’s got me frozen up inside”, goes the lyric, and you’ll find it difficult to hold off the nostalgia when enjoying this muted blast from the past. [Source]
The Thom Yorke/Flea/Nigel Godrich project Atoms for Peace will release a new single on Modeselektor’s label Monkeytown’s 50WEAPONS series. It features Atoms for Peace remixing their own track “Other Side”, as well as an Atoms for Peace remix of “Tamer Animals” by Other Lives, who have opened for Radiohead. [Source]
Land Observations, a solo project by James Brooks (formerly of Appliance), has signed to Mute for the release of his debut album Roman Roads IV-XI. It follows from his debut at the Short Circuit presents Mute festival in May last year, and will be released on 3rd September. [Source]
File this one under FIRE. Major Lazer puts its midas touch on Hot Chip’s new single “Look At Where We Are” from their most recent album In Our Heads. I can’t even put into words how much I’m in love with this song right now — blast this immediately. [Source]
Originally released by Frank Ocean in 2011 on his debut mixtape, Nostalgia, Ultra, the track has become a staple of The Afghan Whigs live set since their reformation this year.
