Author Archives: robert duffy

YO LA TENGO, CELEBRATING THE HOLY HOLIDAYS

from the Yo La Tengo newsletter:
Hey! Guess what? We’re playing all 8 nights of Hanukkah at Maxwell’s in Hoboken again. We did this last year and it was a lot of fun–ask anyone who was there. We don’t have a lot of information yet, but we can tell you this. Hanukkah begins Friday November 29 and runs through December 6. Each show will have different additional acts on the bill–we’re still working on it, and may be working on it right up to the start of the shows. Each show will be a benefit. Tickets will cost $20, and we’ll try to add details on yolatengo.com as we confirm stuff. Tickets are available in New York at Other Music and in Hoboken at Tunes, and at Ticketmaster everywhere else. If you’re planning a trip from abroad (and we know at least one person is) the best thing to do is to go to www.maxwellsnj.com and contact the club that way. See you soon.

Good news for me: I’ll be in New Jersey during this time.

Seems like you old people out there don’t like mp3’s.

NEWSWEEK GETS THE NIRVANA

From Cobain’s unpublished journal:
“I like punk rock. I like girls with weird eyes. I like drugs. (But my Body And mind won?t allow me to take them). I like passion. I like playing my cards wrong. I like vinyl. I like to feel guilty for being a white, American male. I love to sleep. I like to taunt small, barking dogs in parked cars. I like to make people feel happy and superior in their reaction towards my appearance. I like to have strong opinions with nothing to back them up with besides my primal sincerity. I like sincerity. I lack sincerity … I like to complain and do nothing to make things better. I like to blame my parents generation for coming so close to social change then giving up after a few successful efforts by the media & Government to deface the movement by using Mansons and other Hippie representatives as propaganda examples on how they were nothing but unpatriotic, communist, satanic, inhuman diseases. and in turn the baby boomers become the ultimate, conforming, Yuppie hypocrites a generation has ever produced.”

Read more excerpts, watch the new video, and more over at Newsweek’s website. And if you haven’t already, buy the amazing Cobain biography, “Heavier than Heaven.”

I’M GOING HUNGRY

Hey look! Bjork’s mom is on a hunger strike.

PROMISE RING BREAK UP

I’ve been trying to come up with some sort of witty thing about keeping promises, breaking up, all that nonsense, but I just can’t do it. Instead, why don’t you read the story.

WAY DOWN UPON THE ZWANNIE RIVER

So what’s Billy Corgan and his new band ZWAN up to these days? Let us see what Corgz has to say in his message board…

“The Zwan album is just about done and we are all very excited and proud that we were able to come together to make this possible. We’ve been having a lot of fun, working like wizards under red lights here in the studio. Everyone has worked very hard so we could make the first Zwan record a reality by the end of this year, and it looks like we will probably be playing some shows after Thanksgiving.”

Corgan and the crew encourage MP3 trading of their live shows, so I’ve been able to snag a bunch of rough songs of the band. I’m sure you can too if you use one of those nasty file sharing programs.

Anyway, the songs are pretty good. If someone told you they were Smashing Pumpkins songs, you wouldn’t be shocked. ZWAN is not a huge departure of the signature Corgan sound.

BEHOLD! THE POWER OF THE WORLD WIDE WEB

“The fact that John Wesley Harding isn’t currently signed to a recording contract didn’t stop him from recording and releasing a new album. He recently issued the studio set “Swings and Roundabouts,” the fourth edition in the singer/songwriter’s “Dynablob” series of albums sold only through his Web site and at shows. And it’s already turned a profit.

“This album went into profit within 32 hours of being on sale on my Web site,” Harding proudly tells Billboard.com. “No reviews, no adverts. The only advert for it is my Web site and my career. No reviews anywhere because I haven’t yet given away a copy for review, because they’re all mine,” he says while laughing. “It’s pretty incredible.”
(full story)

The internet is your friend. Never forget that. Ever.

NEW FUTURE BIBLE HEROES

This is what I like to imagine: Stephen Merrit, sitting on a park bench, watching the people walk by. A piece of crumpled paper blows by, and he picks it up. He irons the paper out with his hand, takes out a pencil, and begins to write a song. Because that is what Stephen does: he writes songs. LOTS of them. All the time. Obsessing over and over again, and the world is a better place for it.

His latest batch is under his one-of-many band monikers, Future Bible Heroes. The new record, “Eternal Youth,” is such a great, fun listen. And one song in particular, “Doris Day the Earth Stood Still,” has finally given The Hives’ “Hate to Say I Told You So” a run for “donewaiting’s favorite song of the year.”

Find this record. Listen to it. Buy it. Know it.

Stephen, for those of you who may not know, is also the mastermind behind The Magnetic Fields, whose 1999 opus, “69 Love Songs,” was the best release (make that 3 cd set) of the year.