Jesus & Mary Chain

The Jesus & Mary Chain have been in Texas this week playing a handful of shows. Watch some fan shot footage from the Houston show below:

"Reverence"



"The Hardest Walk/Taste Of Cindy/Never Understand"

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Johnny Marr

Johnny Marr treated fans to a short studio performance of "European Me" on his 1985 Les Paul yesterday. Watch it here.

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Liam Gallagher--Beady Eye dusting off Oasis favorites

Noel Gallagher has routinely been playing Oasis songs during his live shows, but so far Beady Eye (Liam Gallagher's band) has not. That'll be changing soon according to some comments Liam made today on London's XFM:

"We're doing Fuji Festival in Japan, which is in July. And we will be dropping Oasis songs for anyone who's bothered...I feel they're just as much my songs as they are Noel's. And if people don't like it, go to the bar or fuck off. If they do like it, jump up and down, let's have a good time."

Of course, the British media is ramping out of control with the news, so Liam took to Twitter in an effort to calm the masses in his own inimitable style:

Listen up squares were playing them live not re recording them so chill LG x

— Liam Gallagher (@liamgallagher) March 14, 2012

"squares" = comedy gold. Good times!

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SPC ECO

Fans of shoegaze/goth band Curve should check out Dean Garcia's latest musical project--SPC ECO (pronounced space echo). The band have been around for a few years and recently signed to XD Records (also home to Bloody Knives). At the end of last year SPC ECO dropped a compilation album, You Tell Me, featuring eight previously unreleased tracks and a few older ones. Last week they followed up the album with an ep titled Don't Say. The album and ep are available through bandcamp and you can listen to a stream of both below. FYI, you can also purchase older material from SPC ECO on iTunes.

"Give You Nothing" SPC ECO (from Don't Say ep)

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Cedric Sharpley, R.I.P.

Cedric Sharpley, ex-drummer for Gary Numan, suffered a heart attack at the beginning of the month and according to reports, died yesterday. He was 59 years old. R.I.P.

Sharpley played with Numan's band from 1978 through about 1992, and had also formed a band of his own Dramatis.

Watch video of Sharpley in this classic video from 1979.

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Jack White

Jack White recently debuted a new song titled "Sixteen Saltines" on Saturday Night Live. Today the studio version was posted on White's website (take a listen to it below), plus you can pre-order the single, which will be released on March 20th. White's full length debut Blunderbuss drops April 24th.

Jack White "Sixteen Saltines"

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Morrissey: Prince Harry is here for your money

Morrissey followed up last week's William & Kate comments with a few words about Prince Harry before launching into "Meat Is Murder" at his show in Rio De Janeiro this weekend. Though Morrissey is known for dishing out the snark, somehow his recent barbs have re-sparked a debate in the U.K. (you'd think they'd be used to this by now, or perhaps it's just a slow news week). Saturday The Guardian ran an op-ed featuring a couple of music critics debating Morrissey's "national treasure" status. Read it here and watch video of the Prince Harry Incident below.

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Noel Gallagher acoustic show

Watch a full acoustic Noel Gallagher concert recorded a couple of weeks ago in Glasgow below. Don't miss Gallagher live on his (plugged in) North American tour this spring. The Detroit area show is March 31st at the Royal Oak Music Theater.

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fIREHOSE launch tour and new compilation

fIREHOSE will kick off their first tour in 18 years next month. To coincide with the launch of the tour, the band will release a compilation titled lowFLOWS: The Columbia Anthology '91-'93. The limited edition two disc set features select tracks from the band's two Columbia releases (1991's Flyin' The Flannel and 1993's Machinery Operator) plus some rare and previously unreleased material from that era. The set drops April 3rd and you can pre-order it now here. As far as brand new music from fIREHOSE goes, Mike Watt recently told Rolling Stone that nothing is planned right now, but it's a possibility for sometime down the road. Read Watt's full interview with Rolling Stone here.

Meanwhile Watt's will release a book/photographic memoir titled Mike Watt: On And Off Bass in May. Read more about the book here.

fIREHOSE "Flyin' The Flannel"

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Ride

Ride's 1992 album Going Blank Again is celebrating its 20th anniversary this week. This is my favorite record from Ride, and definitely one of my all time favorites. To this day I'm still blown away by the swirling eight minute epic album opener, "Leave Them All Behind." Such shoegaze perfection. Back in the day on 89X we played an edited four minute radio version, but the song is truly best enjoyed in its original, unedited form:



Ahhhhh, what a majestic song! Happy Birthday, Going Blank Again!

Ride went on to release two more records before breaking up in 1996. Songwriters Andy Bell and Mark Gardener have worked on a variety of musical projects since the dissolution of Ride. Bell released a record with his project Hurricane #5, joined Oasis and is currently a member of Beady Eye. Gardener formed a band called The Animalhouse, went on to release two solo records under his own name, and is currently working on a new music/art project Hush Delirium which you can read more about here.

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Hush Delirium

Ex-members of Ride and The Stone Roses have formed a new music/art project called Hush Delirium. Mark Gardener and Aziz Ibrahim have teamed up with abstract artist Simon Welford to create a multimedia project with an interesting twist: Gardener and Ibrahim will compose music, then they'll hand it over to Welford, who will then create art inspired by the music. Hush Delirium hopes to then take the final masterpiece (both the music and artwork) and produce a gallery exhibition to be displayed worldwide.

Visit Hush Delirium on Facebook or Twitter to find out more about the project.

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Panties featuring lyrics from The Smiths

What female Smiths fan wouldn't want a pair of custom made panties with Smiths lyrics printed all over them? Come to think of it, male fans are probably going to want these too! The pair of made-to-order panties were sold recently by BunnyJump through the etailer Etsy, but it looks like you may still be able to request custom orders through the BunnyJump website. Take a look at the original listing and click the different angles to get a better view of the song lyrics. Lyrics from quite a few Smiths songs were used--see how many different ones you can spot! "Frankly Mr. Shankly," "Unlovable," "Unhappy Birthday," "Shoplifters Of The World Unite," "Panic," "Sheila Take A Bow," and many more were featured. Awesome!

BunnyJump is also selling custom made Star Trek, Where The Wild Things Are, and retro horror poster themed panties.

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Liam Gallagher--Greatest frontman of all time?

Over the past couple of weeks London's Xfm radio held a contest and asked listeners to determine the greatest frontman* of all time. The results were announced yesterday and proved to be somewhat questionable: Liam Gallagher was named the winner.

Hang on a minute here--I am a HUGE Oasis fan--but are you kidding me? Greatest frontman? Gallagher is known for standing on stage, putting his arms behind his back, and leaning into the microphone to sing. At times he's good for a quick mumble before a song, and on special occasions he busts out a tambourine.

Here, take a look:





Liam graciously (?) acknowledged his win on Twitter:

Wanna thank all the xfm listeners who voted me as the BEST FRONTMAN OF ALL TIME. Keep the faith and beware of daftcunts, I mean darkness..LG

— Liam Gallagher (@liamgallagher) March 9, 2012

I don't know who I would have chosen as greatest frontman of all time, but it sure wouldn't have been Gallagher. Take a look at the full top 20 list:

1. Liam Gallagher
2. Freddie Mercury
3. Dave Gahan
4. Dave Grohl
5. Matt Bellamy
6. Brandon Flowers
7. Morrissey
8. Jim Morrison
9. Kurt Cobain
10. Alex Turner
11. Paul Weller
12. Mick Jagger
13. Tom Meighan
14. Eddie Vedder
15. Joe Strummer
16. Ian Curtis
17. Caleb Followill
18. Ian Brown
19. Thom Yorke
20. Chris Martin

*Hey, Xfm are you holding a separate poll for frontWOMEN??? You DO realize that women can also rock, right???

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Spiritualized drops trailer for new single

Spiritualized return with their eleven track record Sweet Heart Sweet Light on April 17th. The first single "Hey Jane" debuted a few weeks ago and while the official video is still yet to appear the band just released a video teaser:



If you haven't heard the full version of "Hey Jane" envelop yourself in the epicness below:



You can pre-order Spiritualized's Sweet Heart Sweet Light here. or if you're in the U.K. pre-order the cd or limited edition double vinyl here. Don't miss Spiritualized on the road this spring. The Detroit show is May 4th at the Majestic Theater.

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Noel Gallagher

Win tickets on Time Warp on 89X this Sunday to see Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds at the Royal Oak Music Theater on March 31st.

"Don't Look Back In Anger" (click the red box on the You Tube bar to disable annotations)



"AKA...What A Life"

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Joy Division

Take a listen to a couple of rare Joy Division recordings: The version of "Ceremony" is a bootleg rehearsal version from 1980 and is believed to be the first recorded version of the song. The second song is an alternate version of "The Eternal" taken from a Martin Hannett mixtape.

"Ceremony"



"The Eternal"

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Gary Numan

It's Gary Numan's birthday! Celebrate by watching the Numan documentary Reinvention. FYI, a best of DVD titled Machine Music: The Best of Gary Numan will drop on June 11th.




Part 2




Part 3



Part 4 of the documentary was removed from You Tube by Universal Music, but another uploader posted it--the following version overlaps a bit with part 3 and part 5, but it's still very much worth watching:




Part 5

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Erasure--the worst interview ever

The most awkward interview with Erasure took place after the band's show in Sweden back in 1997. Where to start with this atrocity? Clueless interviewer? Check! Bizarre sing-a-long? Check! The most ridiculous question ever (at ~ 6:30 into the video)? Cheeeeeeeeeeck! Wow, you really have to watch this:

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Garbage

Garbage will return with their first new record in seven years later this spring. Not Your Kind Of People will be released via the band's label STUNVOLUME on May 15th. Watch Garbage reveal the titles for all eleven songs from Not Your Kind Of People in the following video



There will be two different versions of Not Your Kind Of People--a standard and deluxe version. The standard edition features eleven tracks with black and white cover art:

The deluxe version adds four tracks (fifteen total songs) with red and white cover art:


The record's first single and video, "Blood For Poppies" is expected to drop very soon. In the meantime, you can pre-order both the standard and deluxe versions on Amazon now.

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The Smiths--30th anniversary

A 30th anniversary celebration of the formation of The Smiths will kick off in Manchester's Holden Gallery next week with an artistic extravaganza titled The Gospel According To. The exhibit, which sounds more like an art festival of sorts, will include artistic interpretations of Smiths songs & photos (including the Stephen Wright fan photos taken last weekend), screenings of bootleg footage of early Smiths performances, panel discussions (one such panel examines a conspiracy theory which suggests that The Queen Is Dead foretold Princess Diana's tragic death), and a "live music event" organized by ex-Smiths drummer Mike Joyce. More events to commemorate the anniversary are also being organized for later in the year.

Read more about the The Gospel According To here.

"Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now" (Top Of The Pops, 1984)

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