News Round Up: Week Ending 15th October 2005

[Revan]

Cat Power In Memphis
On January 24, Cat Power aka Chan Marshall will be releasing her long-awaited new studio album, The Greatest on CD and LP. And no, it is not a greatest hits compilation! The album was recorded in Memphis over the US summer by Stuart Sikes, and has been described by her record company as the “most confident and life-affirming work of her career… it’s as intensely personal, haunting and provocative as any of its predecessors” (but then they would say that, wouldn’t they?) The album's players are a bona fide All-Star team of Memphis musicians, including Al Green sideman Teenie Hodges on guitar, Leroy "Flick" Hodges and David Smith on bass, Rick Steff on keys, Jim Spake on sax and trumpteer Scott Thompson amongst others, with most songs recorded within the first three takes.



The O.C.’s Dad Releases Soul Record!
50 year old actor Peter Gallagher, who plays Seth Cohen’s father in bit TV series The O.C., scored a record deal with Sony BMG after an executive heard the singer perform a Solomon Burke song, “Don’t Give Up On Me” in an episode last year. Now he’s preparing the release of his soul drenched debut set, 7 days In Memphis. The album features guitar from Stax records alumni such as Booker T & the MGs Steve Cropper, and includes versions of Sam and Dave’s “When Something Is Wrong With My Baby” as well as Lucinda William’s “Still I Long For Your Kiss”. Gallagher, who has sung for 20 years, seems stunned by his good fortune. “"Getting a record deal at my age is nothing anyone in their right mind could anticipate or hope for in this day and age, It's one of the most extraordinary things that's ever happened to me professionally," he told E! News.


Eric Clapton To Publish Memoirs
Legendary guitarist Eric Clapton has signed a lucrative deal with Doubleday Publishing to release an authorised biography in 2007. This is the first time Clapton has agreed to tell his life story. Clapton’s life is certainly full of enough drama to ensure this’ll be a page-turner… from his early ‘Clapton Is God’ guitar hero phase with the Bluesbreakers and Cream, to his affair with George Harrison’s then wife Patti Harrison (which inspired the song, “Layla”), to his heroin addiction and the tragic death of his son Conor, who fell out a window from his high rise apartment, Clapton has led an epic life defined by dizzying success and dark tragedy.


Korn See You On The Other Side
Multi-platinum, Grammy Award winning hard rock act, Korn, are set to unleash their seventh studio album album, See You On The Other Side on December 4. The band, who have sold more than 25 million albums worldwide, including one million in Australia, redefined the parameters of heavy music, revolutionizing the genre by matching unsettling guitar textures and volcanic rhythms with jagged, introspective lyrics and intense vocal stylings. But the new album will be their first without long term guitarist Brian “Head” Welch, who left the band suddenly in February after having ‘moral objections’ to the band’s lyrics and music following his sudden conversion to Christianity. Speaking about the guitarist’s departure for the first time, singer Jonathon Davis told MTV “I miss him being around. It's unfortunate that he got hooked up in some drugs and the things that went on, but the whole Christian thing, all that stuff, if it's keeping him alive and he's happy, bottom line, that's all we care about”. The band have not replaced Welch. “You don’t replace your brother”, says Davis.


The Morning After Girls Evolve
Sydney’s the morning after girls, who are currently touring the USA, Japan & the UK for the second time this year – and receiving some seriously cool raves, with the LA Weekly declaring “They come off like a mix of Dandy Warhols, Raveonettes & The Velvet Underground” – have combined their two EPs (2003’s the morning after girls ep and 2005’s The Morning After Girls 2 ep) to produce an album, Evolve. The Australian version of Evolve will also include the previously unreleased track “Shadows Evolve”, which has already been added to rotation at triple J. Evolve will be released in Australia on November 7.


The Strokes confirm album details
Okay, so you’ve probably heard The Strokes rush-released, seriously cranking new single Juicebox. Well, now the New York four-piece have confirmed the release date, title and tracklisting for their muchly anticipated third album. The album is titled First Impressions From Earth and will now be released in Australia in December (previous reports suggested a January release). Unsequenced tracklisting for the album is as follows: “You Only Live Once", "Juicebox", "Heart In A Cage", "Razor Blade", "On The Other Side", "Electricityscape", "Killing Lies", "Fear Of Sleep", "15 Minutes", "Vision Of Division", "Red Light", "Evening Sun," "The Ize Of The World" and "Ask Me Anything".


Olivia's Video Gold!
If ever an artist was due for a DVD video career retrospective, it’s Olivia Newton John, who has shone on both the silver and the small screen. So on November 4, our Olivia will release a double DVD collection that brings together the video highlights and biggest hits of her career, including conceptual videos from the Physical, Twist Of Fate and Soul Kiss video collections, plus the music video for “Hopelessly Devoted To You”. There are also live performances from Olivia’s 1982 US tour, and videos from 1988’s The Rumour, 1992’s Back To Basics and the 1998 US No. 1 Adult Contemporary remake of Olivia's double Grammy winning “I Honestly Love You”, featuring Babyface. An all-new 20 track greatest hits CD, Gold, will be released the same day.


Arcade Fire to bury Funeral
Montreal seven piece Arcade Fire have revealed to NME.com that, with the exception of two shows supporting U2 in their hometown in November, they’re staying off the road until they complete the writing and recording of their follow-up to 2004’s Funeral – which they hope will be ready for release within the next 12 months. “We have our own studio space now,” says organist Richard Parry. “So there's no time constraints. We spend as much time as we want and then see what happens." Given the universally acclaimed response to Funeral – which pitches the band somewhere between The Pixies, Talking Heads, U2 and Radiohead – a new album can’t come soon enough for critics and fans alike.


Marilyn Manson To Launch Perfume
Pancaked shock rocker Marilyn Manson has revealed to a US fashion magazine - at a John Galliano fashion show in Paris, no less! - that he plans to introduce his own perfume next year, and is also designing a beauty line that includes lipstick and foundation! “I’m in the final stages with one of the major companes,” revealed Manson. We all know celebrity perfumes are nothing new… Britney, Ashanti, J.Lo and others all have one. But the fascinating question here is, what will a scent endorsed by Manson actually smell like? This is, after all, the same singer who reportedly enjoyed the odd toke of dried human bones…


New Outkast For December
Sony BMG have confirmed the new Outkast album My Life In Idlewild is set to drop in either late November or the first week of December. (It’s being released on 6 December in the US.) As previously reported, the album is a companion piece to the film of the same name starring the band, but rapper Big Boi insists the album stands alone on its merits. "This is an Outkast album. It isn't like a soundtrack,” he says. Big Boi also confirmed the album continues the band’s flirtation with jazz (their 2003 set, The Love Below, paid homage to Coltrane's “My Favourite Things”), but this time, given the film’s 1930s setting, their hip-hop is flavoured with a piano-driven rag-time feel.


Piano Man To release rarities
Billy Joel, in conjunction with his label Columbia Records, has mined his back pages for a forthcoming five disc box set. The collection, titled My Lives, contains 23 previously unreleased tracks, as well as alternate versions, remixes, covers and live tracks. Some of the material is especially rare, including songs dating back to the mid '60s with the Lost Souls ("My Journey's End", "Time and Time Again"), the Hassles ("Every Step I Take (Every Move I Make)" and his late-'60s hard rock outfit Atttila ("Amplifier Fire"). The collection spans Joel’s career, including his recent classical music forays. The collection also includes a 14-track music video DVD anthology.


Original REM reform
Bill Berry, the former drummer for REM who left the band in 1997, temporarily rejoined the fold last Saturday when the group took to the stage in their hometown of Athens, Georgia for an impromptu performance. The band – singer Michael Stipe, guitarist Peter Buck and bassplayer Mike Mills – were attending the wedding of their guitar tech. Billboard.com reports the band performed seven songs, all drawn from their earlier albums: “Sitting Still”, "Don't Go Back to Rockville", "Wolves, Lower", "Begin the Begin", "The One I Love", "Permanent Vacation" and "Radio Free Europe".


Robbie & Chambers out of Intensive Care
Robbie Williams - whose first album without contributions from long-term songwriting partner Guy Chambers, Intensive Care, is released on October 23 -has revealed the rift between the pair is healing. Williams and Chambers fell out after Williams negotiated an 80 million pound album deal that excluded Chambers. But at a press conference in Germany, Williams revealed he and Chambers are on speaking terms again and plan to collaborate in the future. "Me and Guy are friends again. We speak now and will be working together in the future, you'll all be pleased to hear." Williams also revealed he will be embarking on a five-month long tour next year, which is strongly tipped to include Australia. Williams' first single from Intensive Care, “Tripping”, debuted at No. 7 on the ARIA chart this week.


Material Girl's Rabbi rebellion
Madonna has a long history of courting controversy - especially in the lead-up to the release of a new album. The current controversy centres around a song called “Isaac” from her forthcoming release (due 11 November), Confessions On A Dance Floor. Madonna’s troubles stem from the fact that the song references a 16th Century Kabbalah scholar and mystic called Yitzhak Luria, with the very act of referencing the scholar an action which an Israeli rabbi has said breaks Jewish law. Rabbi Rafael Cohen told the Israeli Marriv newspaper that Madonna’s actions have incurred God’s wrath: "Jewish law forbids the use of the name of the holy rabbi for profit. Her act is just simply unacceptable and I can only sympathise for her because of the punishment that she is going to receive from the heavens."


Tea & Sympathy
Tea & Sympathy, the debut solo album from Powderfinger frontman Bernard Fanning, will be released on 30 October. Tea & Sympathy was recorded with Tchad Blake (Tom Waits, Crowded House, Pearl Jam) at Peter Gabriel’s Real World Studios in the UK. The bulk of Tea & Sympathy was written by Fanning at his Brisbane residence over the last 12 months (with a creative spurt between March and May) and features Melbourne multi-instrumentalist John Bedggood, who Fanning met when they worked on the Ned Kelly film. Fanning co-produced the 14 tracks featured on Tea & Sympathy and as well as singing he played guitar, keyboards, harmonica and percussion. Fanning is doing a brief tour to support the album’s launch, with tickets on sale Monday 17 October.


Born To Run ... again Date published
Bruce Springsteen’s 1975 classic album Born To Run is to celebrate its 30th anniversary as a triple-disc box set when it is released in November. The original album has been remastered by renowned engineer Bob Ludwig and will be accompanied by two DVDs that capture The Boss in all his 1970s glory. The first DVD "Wings For Wheels: The Making of Born To Run" is a 90-minute documentary that features never-before-seen archival footage of Springsteen performing in 1973, as well as interviews with everyone involved in the making of the album. The second DVD features Springsteen’s entire 16-song live performance at London’s Hammersmith Odeon on 18 November 1975. The set will also contain a 48-page booklet of previously unpublished photographs.


New Bob Marley song
“Slogans”, a previously unreleased Bob Marley song, is set to get the “Free As A Bird” treatment and be released as a single later this year. NME.com suggests Marley recorded “Slogans” in Miami in 1979, with the song remaining lost until his musician son Ziggy came across it on an unmarked tape last year. It’s now believed the tape may contain up to seven new songs, the titles of which are said to include “Jailbreaker”, “Vexation”, “Jump Them Out Of Babylon” and “Pray For Me”. As on “Free As A Bird”, “Slogans” is an acoustic-based demo that has been worked up with the addition of other instruments, including guitar played by Eric Clapton.


Coldplay sell out
All tickets to Coldplay’s 2006 Australian concerts in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane sold out yesterday. Fortunately the promoter, Chugg Entertainment, has announced second shows in Sydney and Melbourne which are on sale now. As previously reported, shows for Perth and Adelaide have now been announced, after petitions were started by local radio stations and articles appeared in the press. Coldplay will perform the Adelaide Entertainment Centre on Wednesday 5 July and Perth’s Burswood Dome on Friday 7 July 2006. All other details, including on sale dates and ticket prices, are yet to be announced. Michael Chugg, Executive Chairman of CHUGG Entertainment, said: “We’ve rushed the announcement ahead of locking down all the details because we didn’t want Adelaide and Perth to make interstate concert purchases without knowing that concerts would be happening for them.”


Nirvana rarities album finalised
The tracklisting for the forthcoming Nirvana rarities compilation Sliver: The Best Of The Box has been finalised and will include three previously unreleased tracks: a 1985 demo track “Spank Thru”, a 1990 Bleach outtake “Sappy” and a version of “Come As You Are” recorded at rehearsal prior to the release of Nevermind. The remaining tracks are all culled from the band’s 2004 box set With The Lights Out. The compilation marks the first time Cobain’s daughter, Frances Bean, has been officially involved in a Nirvana release; Frances Bean had a hand in track selection and the album’s artwork. The album will be released in the US on 2 November, but a spokesperson for Universal Music said an Australian release date has not been confirmed.


Elvis Costello goes opera
There’s not much music Elvis Costello hasn’t tried his hand at. From his punkish new-wave work with The Attractions through to his album and tour with classical string outfit the Brodsky Quartet, Costello has always sought to expand his musical horizons. And over the weekend in Copenhagen, Costello continued to expand, performing in an opera he composed about a love triangle between children’s writer Hans Christian Andersen, circus showman PT Barnum and Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind. "The songs tell a story that I have imagined existing between the lines of Andersen's biography and some of his most famous tales,'' Costello said. Costello is not the first rock musician to dabble in classical – Paul McCartney, Billy Joel, Roger Waters and even Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood have all dabbled in the field, with mixed results.


Ben Lee hearts Sally S.
Ben Lee, who is set to kick off his 23 date national tour in Darwin this Friday night, has announced a brief but hectic 12 date North American tour in November that is sandwiched between his Australian dates. Lee’s current album, Awake Is The New Sleep, is set for release in the US in February. Lee will be supported on his US dates by Melbourne singer-songwriter New Buffalo (aka Sally Seltmann) whose debut album The Last Beautiful Day was rapturously received by the New York Times. “The Last Beautiful Day is the intoxicating album by Sally Seltmann,” read the review. “Ms. Seltmann's marvelous songs make themselves visible slowly, as deceptively casual tunes and arrangements hint at shivery pledges and pleas. Perhaps nothing is more memorable than what she does with the titular word in the song 'Yes', bending it upward until you can't tell whether it's a question or an answer."


CBGB's gets more support
The Sopranos star and E-Street guitarist Steve Van Zandt is continuing to lobby against the eviction of legendary New York music club CBGB's from its Bowery district premises and has penned a column in Billboard magazine urging musicians and record company executives to join the fight. (Although the club has received its eviction orders, it continues to operate in the premises.) For Van Zandt, who also hosts a weekly radio show showcasing the music of garage bands the world over, the closure of CBGB’s is evidence of a deeper malady facing rock music: "There is no development anymore. No patience. No long-term thinking. The entry-level doorways to our culture are disappearing before our very eyes. We cannot afford to lose another one."


Pixies new album the real Deal
The Pixies, who reformed as a touring band in 2004, have revealed that plans to record their first studio album since 1991’s Trompe Le Monde are moving ever closer. Critically, it seems old wounds between key songwriters Frank Black and Kim Deal are fully healed, with Black noting Deal is even keen to help rework some of Black’s older unreleased material. Nonetheless, the issue of the band retaining their critical integrity and not being perceived as sell-outs remains important - at least to Deal. "I think Kim is a little more afraid of the legacy being ruined, which is fair enough," Black told MTV.com. "But I think Joey and I are like… ‘Come on, let's just do it, man. We're the Pixies, of course it's going to be good.' And she's all, 'Yeah, but what if it's not good?' So we'll see what happens."


SOAD Hypnotize
Six months after System of a Down’s Mezmerize debuted at Number One on Billboard’s Top 200 Albums charts and ARIA’s Top 100 Albums charts, the uncompromising and outspoken quartet returns with Hypnotize, part two of a promised two-album set. American Recordings/Columbia will release two versions of Hypnotize, the band’s fifth studio album later this year. The album features 12 new songs as well as artwork by Vartan Malakian, father of SOAD’s guitarist/singer Daron. The packaging for Hypnotize is specially designed to physically join Mezmerize and Hypnotize together, forming one unified product with continuous artwork. The album also interlocks musically, with the final track on Hypnotize, “Soldier Side”, completing “Soldier Side Intro” which appears as the opening track on Mezmerize. Produced by Rick Rubin and Daron Malakian, Hypnotize will be released on Novemebr 20.


Aerosmith are askin'...
Crinkly hard rockers Aerosmith have developed a novel ploy to ensure fans get the most out of their forthcoming US tour. In a posting on their official website, the band asks fans: “If they could play two albums from start to finish at their shows, what two albums would you most wanna hear?” Fans are then asked to select two albums from a scroll-down list of 25 possible albums. Voting for the poll closes on 15 October. The concept of a band performing an album from start to finish is gaining momentum, with a recent concert series in London seeing the Lemonheads playing It’s A Shame About Ray, the Dirty Three performing Ocean Songs, Mudhoney riffing through Superfuzz Bigmuff, Cat Power play The Covers Album and Jon Spencer Blues Explosion doing Orange.


Yeah Yeah Yeahs nearly there
A few months back we reported the Yeah Yeah Yeahs were in the studio working on their “radically different” new album - the follow-up to 2003’s critically acclaimed Fever To Tell. Now it seems the band has completed recording and is set to mix the the final tracks in London. The band’s bass player Nick Zinner told Pitchfork Media: “It's just a matter of picking and choosing, and all the other things you have to think about when putting out a record, which I don't really want to think about right now.” The album is expected to be released next year.


Cue the drums, Fernando
News that the film which captured ABBA’s phenomenal 1977 tour of Australia is coming to DVD is sure to elicit more than a few excited “Mama Mia’s” down under. The ABBA-mania phenomenon reached its high-point when ABBA conducted an enormously successful Australian tour in March 1977. The feverish madness of the tour was captured on film in director Lasse Hallström’s ABBA – The Movie, which remains one of the few opportunities to experience ABBA live onstage. The film follows radio disc jockey Ashley Wallace as he tries to hunt down the group for an exclusive in-depth interview. Oh, the suspense! As we’ve come to expect, the film has been fully restored and comes with remastered surround sound. It will be released to DVD this month.