The News Review:
- An Explorer of a New Frontier in World Music
- Sunday ‘” April 27
- Vampire Weekend happy to enter post-breakout phase
- Band reunites for a cause — and a bit of fun
- Spinning Out
- Concert Review: Coachella Festival: Day 3
An Explorer of a New Frontier in World Music
Washington Post – Apr 27, 2008
It mattered little that the lyrics were a blur or that Sidibe’s donso music aims to incite hunters to kill. Carneal was hooked. He had played drums for indie bands most notably Palace Music. To his ears this was dance music only dance music whose roots can be traced back centuries and is thumbed on a donso ngoni — a large spike harp made of calabash gourd bamboo and fishing wire. He had in mind a number of songs for the CD that would become “Yoro Sidibe. ” These were daunting songs — 15-to-25-minute epic tales containing verse after rumbling verse without a single chorus. They might be hard sells for an American audience but that’s the point… "You really get a sense that there are still a lot of secrets among the men who are playing this music. "Carneal’s sentiments are in keeping with a new legion of part-time field recorders. In the past few years punk rockers publicists and record shop owners have been casting ears and eyes around the globe on the hunt for unheard non-Western sounds. Craving authenticity amid the tape hiss underground recorders are shunning the peace-and-harmony vibes of world music for a more warts-and-all style. Retro videos of African funk bands have found circulation on.
Sunday ‘” April 27
NEWS.com.au – Apr 27, 2008
Midnight Decks in the City (jazz funk fusion). 7 – 1am Adelaide’s Best Music.
Vampire Weekend happy to enter post-breakout phase
FOXNews – Apr 27, 2008
“At this point we feel like we’re a normal band” said singer and songwriter Ezra Koenig in an interview before the band’s performance at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. Vampire Weekend’s self-titled debut album was released in January but the band has already lived through a year’s worth of excitement over its arrival. The process of blog chatter and media fawning has become increasingly predictable and while most bands dream of such a reception Vampire Weekend is happy to be done with it. “We’ve paid our dues” said Koenig who wore dark sunglasses a light blue shirt and pink shorts. The band formed in 2006 while its four members were students at Columbia University was playing its first festival at Coachella and was happily considering ways to expand shows to suit bigger stages… The band formed in 2006 while its four members were students at Columbia University was playing its first festival at Coachella and was happily considering ways to expand shows to suit bigger stages. The desert setting of the Southern California festival appeared to fit Vampire Weekend whose sound draws heavily on afro-pop. Before launching into “A-Punk” Koenig suggested to the crowd: “This song is good to dance to in the desert. But if you’re feeling hot don’t push it.
Band reunites for a cause — and a bit of fun
News & Observer – Apr 27, 2008
But if I do it I want to put a La-Z-Boy onstage. “Back in the dayPressure Boys formed in the fall of 1981 at Chapel Hill High School. They sounded like what they were marching-band geeks who had picked up on British new-wave ska music — a combination of sped-up reggae rhythms and punk attitudes. They got by on enthusiasm the first few years eventually growing into a sound akin to English new-wave pop band XTC. By then Pressure Boys and Raleigh’s Fabulous Knobs were at the top of the local alternative-music totem pole. “In the mid-’80s they were pretty much the main Chapel Hill band” says Peter Cashwell a longtime fan who teaches English at Woodberry Forest School in Virginia. “A lot of that had to do with the fan base they had at Chapel Hill High which is where their first core audience came from.
Spinning Out
The Age – Apr 27, 2008
In the 21st century when people hardly even buy CDs anymorelet alone vinyl records it seems pointless to get worked up aboutthe differences between CD and record artwork. It seems pointlessto wax lyrical about the visual delights of the record cover thatwonderful 12-inch-square work of art when most covers end up tinyand pixelated on iPod screens. But despite living in an era of formatless music and paperlessart modern album designers almost uniformly look back topre-digital years for inspiration. “All those old vinyl covers have a whole lot more effort andpersonality in them” says Jonathan Zawada best known for his workwith successful Sydney electro-rock duo the Presets. “CD is not aparticularly inspiring format to work with but it’s even worse nowwith iTunes because you’re working on something the size of yourlittle fingernail. It’s as if album design has come full circle starting atnothing and potentially ending there. From the 1890s until the1930s vinyl records were packaged in plain card sleeves withnothing but the work and artist title stamped on the cover… “It’s sogood that they made such an incredible living off it” he saysjealously. “I don’t know how long they had to do those shots butit looks like they had ages. What a luxury!”During the punk and post-punk eras design adventurers took thepossibilities of the LP format to its outermost conclusionsperhaps with Andy Warhol’s famous peelable banana and zippable zip(for the Velvet Underground and the Rolling Stones respectively)as their spiritual ancestors. Manchester noodlers the Durutti Column’s 1980 debut album camein a sandpaper sleeve designed to destroy the records on eitherside of it. Metal Box the second album by former SexPistol John Lydon’s Public Image Ltd was released as three discsinside an embossed film cannister. Other late ’70s and early ’80s designers attached themselves tospecific labels to give them a consistent iconic appeal. Peter Saville’s work with Joy Division and New Order for FactoryRecords or Barney Bubbles’ association with punk label StiffRecords (Ian Dury and the Blockheads Elvis Costello etc) haveproved particularly enduring.
Concert Review: Coachella Festival: Day 3
Hollywood Reporter – Apr 27, 2008
The set included the landmark "The Dark Side of the Moon" album in its entirety and the two-part show climaxed with a giant inflated pig loosed into the desert night sky above the crowd. During his extensive 21⁄2-hour show full of fireworks flames complex lighting and imagery the British music icon paid tribute to Floyd's late founder-singer Syd Barrett with "Shine on You Crazy Diamond" and a tender acoustic "Wish You Were Here" with the entire field swaying to the elegy. In playing "Dark Side" Waters proved that the work has connected with several generations. In fact his appearance brought a contingent of the over-40 crowd to the festival… "CM8ShowAd(“Middle2″);Earlier a somewhat laid-back afternoon crowd came to life for Gogol Bordello's irresistible whacked-out Gypsy circus on the main stage which also featured chamber pop delights from Stars and appealing lean-clean style from Sweden's Shout Out Louds. Other notables in the tents included dance-rock upstarts Does It Offend You Yeah? in the Gobi an intimate acoustic outing with violins from Spiritualized soul-pop dolly Duffy and reunited feedback weavers Swerve-driver in the Mojave. Other options to see while Waters held night court included electro-beat heroes Justice and hip-hop artist Murs backed by a punk band. From dance to rap to all the shades of rock the festival has proved each year to be full of surprises. jsp –> Advertisement CM8ShowAd(“Middle”); Concert Reviews Minimize.