The News Review:
- Music Preview: Legendary punk band X returns for the first time in…
- Music Preview: Takeover UK launches invasion out of ‘Burgh
- 11 Things: No wave
- The Weekend List: Music and more in Grand Rapids and beyond
- Sasquatch! openers Fleet Foxes intend to be keep evolving musically
Music Preview: Legendary punk band X returns for the first time in…
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette – Pittsburgh Post Gazette – May 22, 2008
A witchy-looking girl singer who dressed like your granny and couldn’t stay on key. A rockabilly guitarist with a pompadour and a frozen smile. And a drummer named Bonebrake — OK he seemed to belong in a punk band. The result was all beautifully askew. When you played the band’s debut “Los Angeles” it sounded a little like a record that was left out too long in the sun. X — John Doe Exene Cervenka Billy Zoom and D… I know there are some differences but mostly physical. Emotionally it’s pretty intense. Going back to the early days can you talk about what inspired the music early on?
The rest of the band — the three guys — played music since they were little kids. Billy [the oldest member at 60] was really inspired by the Ramones ’cause he grew up in a time when there was Gene Vincent and those bands — before the English came along and took those bands over like the Beatles and stuff. He decided he wanted to be in a band again. So he places an ad and John answered it and I met John. We were just inspired by the times in which we lived the fact that we were all artists and poets.
Music Preview: Takeover UK launches invasion out of ‘Burgh
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette – Pittsburgh Post Gazette – May 22, 2008
We kind of just drew more from those bands than anything new. Not to say I don’t own a Strokes album or two but it didn’t have that much impact on how I sat down and decided to write a song. We’re big fans of early punk bands but there’s plenty of American influence too. We like Motown and Phil Spector and anything that came out the Brill Building. ”
They wanted to call themselves The Takeover after the Jay-Z song but that was taken so they took their cue from the Charlatans and Chameleons bands who got around the name problem by tacking on “UK. ”
“We thought about tacking on USA or PA but that didn’t sound right” Snyder says. ” ‘UK’ seems brash and we’re fans of British music… ”
They wanted to call themselves The Takeover after the Jay-Z song but that was taken so they took their cue from the Charlatans and Chameleons bands who got around the name problem by tacking on “UK. ”
“We thought about tacking on USA or PA but that didn’t sound right” Snyder says. ” ‘UK’ seems brash and we’re fans of British music. We thought about changing on multiple occasions but we never came up with anything better. Plus what’s a band name?”
Along with breaking into the Pub scene with Shade Camera and BTR The Takeover UK toured the country with their friends the Juliana Theory and ZAO. In the summer of ’06 another friend landed them a residency at the Kibitz Room in Los Angeles where the Wallflowers got their start. Snyder says “we scraped our pennies together drove our beat-up van out there and slept on his floor for two months.
11 Things: No wave
San Francisco Chronicle – May 22, 2008
No Wave is minimalism. “No Wave” is a recent book by Marc Masters with a foreword by Weasel Walter. No Wave is their book tour in the Bay Area this weekend… But without it a lot less people would’ve heard of No Wave. No Wave versus New Wave and punk: “No Wave took from reacted to and rejected New Wave and Punk. As Weasel puts it in the book’s foreword: ‘No Wave truly screamed ‘F- you all! I don’t want to be like you!’ Punk said ‘F- them! We don’t want to be like them!’ See the difference?”5. Obscurity: “No Wave records and films have always been hard to find. It’s fitting that a movement that dodged definition and defied convention takes work to discover.
The Weekend List: Music and more in Grand Rapids and beyond
mlive.com – May 22, 2008
The big show(s): It’s Memorial Day weekend so how about a concert a night to celebrate the extra-long kickoff to summer? First up country music stars Kenny Chesney and LeAnn Rimes play their second concert in a row tonight at Van Andel Arena and tickets ($69. 50) are still available for the 7:30 p. There’s even a pre-party on Ottawa Avenue outside the arena with Roy David Scott the Get the Cat Band playing at 5 p… org or call (269) 857-2399. Other bracing stuff: Tonight-Saturday — The Intersection by the way also has a big Memorial weekend planned. In addition to the Chesney after-party The Avett Brothers perform their folk-punk at 7 tonight; tickets are $20 day of show. Friday it’s the Jimmy Buffett tribute band the Parrots of the Caribbean ($12 advance $15 day of show).
Sasquatch! openers Fleet Foxes intend to be keep evolving musically
Seattle Post Intelligencer – May 22, 2008
”
Fleet Foxes recently returned from a tour with Portland’s Blitzen Trapper. Pecknold often is asked about the new wave — indeed tsunami — of Seattle bands that define a scene once dominated by grunge. “It’s like every kind of music is being made” he said. “The hip-hop scene is super-strong. There’s tons of awesome punk bands. There are tons of bands that would be closer in style to like us. There’s a ton of stuff going on.