Something to cool off with: Sierra Leone's S.E. Rogie, highlife and palm wine guitarist, as featured on our Mondo Boys Tidal Wave mixtape last summer (still fresh). Weird Summer three on the horizon...
MP3: S.E. Rogie :: Please Go Easy With Me Only the good shit. Aquarium Drunkard is powered by its patrons. Keep the servers humming and help us continue doing it by pledging your support. To continue reading, become a member or log in.
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While visiting family last week in North Carolina I ran across an old CD-R I'd left there 8 or so years ago, a Whiskeytown bootleg of late 90s studio demos entitled Those Weren't The Days. At 19 tracks much of the set is comprised of material that would later find a home on Whiskeytown deluxe reissues (Faithless Street/Strangers Almanac) and Adams' solo work (see: "My Heart Is Broken"). The below track, "Kiss & . . .
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Our weekly two hour show on SIRIUS/XMU, channel 35, can now be heard twice, every Friday - Noon EST with an encore broadcast at Midnight EST.
SIRIUS 198: Jean Michel Bernard - Generique Stephane ++ Ham1 - Ghost Loop ++ Oregon Bike Trails - High School Lover ++ Dirty Gold - California Sunrise ++ Eddie The Wheel - Nearsayerfive ++ Gardens & Villa - Black Hills ++ Unknown Mortal Orchestra - Thought Ballune ++ White Denim - I'd have It Just The Way We Were ++ Twin Sister - Bad Street ++ Monster Rally - Surf Erie ++ Hotel Mexico - Dear Les Friends ++ The Rosebuds - Woods ++ The Rosebuds - Change My Life (Spoon cover) ++ White Denim :: Drug . . .
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The Rosebuds just released their fifth studio album, Loud Planes Fly Low; their most inventive, inspired, and honest record to date. Following their fourth release, 2008’s Life Like, the relationship that inspired the group in the first place came to an end and the couple chose divorce in order to save themselves and their music. Leaving North Carolina's sweethearts at a crossroads, Ivan Howard and Kelly Crisp, chose to look at this as a chance for a new beginning---a chance to push reset. The songs on Loud Planes Fly Low allow the listener to peer into the most intimate of conversations and the catharsis that had to take place if the band was going to give themselves an honest chance at moving forward. AD recently caught up with Ivan and Kelly to discuss the process in making the album, and the second chance they have at making the "first" Rosebuds record.
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For a band just hitting the end of its first decade the Rosebuds' catalogue has been a fascinating one. From the boisterous indie-pop of their debut to the dark and dancey Night of the Furies, the band has taken some interesting chances with variations on their own sound that make the arrival of new albums a continuously welcome occasion. But following 2008's become a member or log in.
This Friday, during the first hour of the Aquarium Drunkard show, I'm airing the session White Denim laid down for us at Red Rockets Glare Studios prior to their show that night in Echo Park. For those of you sans satellite radio, you can download/play the tracks below. And if you haven't picked up become a member or log in.
When you think about eccentric French singers, Serge Gainsbourg is probably the first guy who comes to mind for most of us. But another gent who equaled Serge in weirdness, propensity for attention grabbing stunts and talent was Michel Polnareff. And while there isn’t a Polnareff tribute show planned for the Hollywood Bowl this summer like Serge (though Polnareff is alive and well living in L.A.), his music is well worth checking . . .
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In 2008 Centro-matic, along with their alter-ego South San Gabriel, released the sprawling double LP, Dual Hawks. In the Fall of last year the band released the Eyas EP along with a note stating it would "serve as an apt farewell to that phase of our bands, leading us down a new path." The culmination of that path is the new Centro-matic record, Candidate Waltz---the most kinetic batch of music the band has released in years. With the album dropping June 21st, I caught up with songwriter/vocalist Will Johnson last week to discuss the band's new direction, the future of South San Gabriel, his thoughts on touring the house show circuit and Woody Guthrie. (photo/Stevan Alcala)
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Aquarium Drunkard: Last year upon the release of the the Centro-matic/SSG split EP, Eyas, the band alluded a change was on the horizon. I'm curious what prompted this.
Will Johnson: Those songs from Eyas ushered out the whole Dual Hawks phase of our bands in a way we liked. When we released that EP, we were already pretty far along with Candidate Waltz. We were already living in a pretty different phase of our voyage.
AD: Right, Candidate Waltz feels like the first major stylistic move in some time…the energy even feels different. What took the band in this direction?
Will Johnson: I wrote most of the songs on bass guitar. That changed some things from the outset with respect to choice of vocal melody, cadence, and the relationships amongst the rhythm instruments. It peeled things back and made me think about the writing in a different, less comfortable, or maybe just less habitual way. We also knew from the beginning that we wanted a specific economy in the tracking. We didn't want the songs drenched with overdubs, and we wanted to try some different things with our drum sounds. We focused more on elements of tension instead of release. We're aware that we're not reinventing the wheel here, but it created some new parameters and terrain for us. We need new parameters and terrain, since we've been together now for seventy-one years.
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Our weekly two hour show on SIRIUS/XMU, channel 35, can now be heard twice, every Friday - Noon EST with an encore broadcast at Midnight EST.
SIRIUS 197: Jean Michel Bernard - Generique Stephane ++ Howard Nishioka - Carnivourous Dogaramus ++ Michael Kiwanuka - Tell Me A Tale ++ Big Sambo & The House Wreckers - The Rains Came ++ Bill Withers - Better Off Dead ++ Amanaz - Khala My Friend ++ Wendell Stuart & The Downbeaters - Hey Jude ++ Santa Nguessan :: Manny Nia ++ Os Mutantes - A Minha Menina ++ Henri . . .
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As summer tends to begin late and run long in Los Angeles, much of my August-October last year was soundtracked by the (then) new compilation The World Ends: Afro Rock & Psychedelia in 1970s Nigeria. The entirety of the two disc set is worth seeking out, but it was my own re-discovery of The Ify Jerry Krusade's "Nwantinti/Die Die"---a track I originally heard in a long lost tape from an old friend---that was the was the . . .
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With Pavement on the road most of last year I almost forgot Malkmus had been fronting his other band, the Jicks, for nearly a decade. With his old band is back on the shelf, the Jicks have a new (Beck produced) record ready to roll out August 23rd, via Matador, entitled Mirror Traffic. "Senator," the first taste off the album is, in true Malkmus form . . .
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If you somehow missed our Ghost Capital mixtape last January, here's a second shot at Otis Wright's acoustic Jamaican gospel, "It's Soon Be Done."
Otis Wright :: It's Soon Be Done
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Tony Joe White's The Train I'm On is one of those records that are just too damn good to be kept a secret. Keeping it oh so real and raw on what may be his finest moment, the LP is a sweet and languid roots rock triumph.
Give me acoustic guitar and the bass drum, that's all it needs to hook me. "I've Got A Thing About You Baby
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Their first collaboration on record since 2005's Superwolf, Matt Sweeney and Will Oldham just released "I Must Be Blind" on 10" vinyl with "Life In Muscle" on the flip. I ran into Sweeney last month in New Orleans and followed up this week to get the skinny on his and Oldham's collaborative history, creative process, graphic design and some very welcome Chavez news.
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If there was a jumping off point in trying to predict the sound of Bon Iver's self-titled sophomore album, it probably came with the numerous live recordings of the touring incarnation of the band covering the Outfield's "Your Love" back in 2009. But it isn't as simple as that either. While Bon Iver certainly owes its . . .
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