Monday Morning Newsletter (08/25/08)

With the Fritz out on vacation this week, I thought I would do my best to fill his shoes to come up with this week's newsletter. Odds are I will not do nearly as good a job as him being witty and all, but I am willing to give it a try.

Mac McCaughn's other band, Portastatic, will release a two-disc compilation of odds and sods on September 9th entitled Some Small History. The 44-song set includes covers, alternate versions and previously unreleased material. I'm just ecstatic there's a place where all can finally get his awesome rendition of Hot Chip's "And I Was A Boy From School". Merge is letting you stream the entire thing for a limited time right now, so get on that.

It wouldn't be right of me to take Fritz's place and not discuss his beloved Metallica. The band offered up a stream of their new single "The Day That Never Comes" on their MySpace page last week. The 8-minute track does indeed sound like the old-school Metallica of the 1980s that the San Francisco four-piece promised their new album, Death Magnetic, would harken back to. They successfully achieve this by rehashing the melodies of earlier songs "Fade To Black" and "One" in the same song. Good job, assholes.

Famed produer Jerry Finn passed away last week at the age of 39. Finn suffered a brain hemorrhage in July and was taken off life support earlier this month. Finn's family will announce plans in the near future for a scholarship in his honor. Finn produced many acclaimed records over the last 15 years, including Rancid's And Out Came The Wolves, Morrissey's You Are The Quarry and Blink-182's Enema of the State. The one album people keep neglecting to mention in obituaries is his tremendous production work on Superdrag's 1998 masterpiece, Head Trip In Every Key. His last work known was his production on the new Morrissey album, Years Of Refusal, which is due out next year.

Some Neil Young guy is going on tour for the umpteenth time this fall in the United States of America, and has drafted Death Cab For Cutie and Wilco to support him on the separate legs. You might remember Young doing this in the early 1990s, i.e. building his indie cred, by asking bands like Sonic Youth and R.E.M. to join him on the road.

If you live in the NYC area and have nothing to do tonight, might I suggest catching a one-off reunion of the original line-up of And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead at Santos' Party House. I guess it's not a reunion really, but just the original duo of current members Conrad Keely and Jason Reece. Either way, I'm sure it will be a pretty cool time and better than staying in and watching the U.S. Open.

Monday Morning Newsletter (06/02/08)

Oxford Collapse is releasing their fourth album, Bits, on August 5 on Sub Pop Records. It was recorded primarily with Eric Emm at Brother Studios. They’re also releasing a new 5-song 12-inch on Comedy Minus One Records. This follows a new 7-inch on Flameshovel records. The supporting tour begins June 13 in Madison, Wisconsin at The Terrace. These boys need a hobby.

Chopper Challenge, a motorcycle-building reality show on CMT, will soon be featuring the band Seether. The bike for episode 104 will feature the band’s logo and likeness. This is slightly less whorish then the cable and insurance company bands they normally use.

The Stills third album, Oceans Will Rise, is coming out on August 19 on Arts & Crafts. There is no word of a tour yet but the band has announced three shows in Canada this June.

The Caesars are releasing their 6th album Strawberry Weed August 19th. This will be their third on Astralwerks and was produced by Ebbot Lundberg of the band Soundtrack Of Our Lives. To the Swedes the band is known as Twelve Caesars or Caesars Palace. Copyright law is a bitch.

Rapper 50 Cent is in trouble again. His Dix Hills home was destroyed this week by a suspicious fire. Six people who were inside including his ex-girlfriend, Shaniqua Tompkins, and their 11-year old illegitimate son Marquise. The couple had been fighting over the 2.4 million dollar house.

There was a big hullabaloo about Prince and Radiohead this week. Prince covered Radiohead's 1993 single "Creep" live at the Coachella Festival. About a hundred bad cellphone videos of it appeared on YouTube overnight. Then in a typical Prince anal-retentive response, his label (NPG) had YouTube yank all the videos. But then Thom Yorke appealed to Prince publicly to permit said videos back online. So today we are all free to see the shitty grainy videos with terrible bootleg audio. Oh joy. Jose prefers the Miser version if you need a cover.

Morrissey has announced his 9th studio album, Years of Refusal, which will be released this September. Producer Jerry Finn also produced his 2004 album You Are The Quarry. Also planned is a Sony BMG reissue of Morrissey's 1995 album Southpaw Grammar. No US label has been announced for Years of Refusal. Morrissey will also be appearing in a UK set of E.D. commercials plugging Viagra alongside Bob Dole.

Neil Young has been moonlighting as a venture capitalist, funding an electric car project. Young has teamed up with Wichita-based Johnathan Goodwin, owner of SAE energy. Young has gambled about $120,000 on the project so far. He was quoted as saying "You know, I thought long ago you could change the world by writing songs, but you can't.”