Year: 2008

The now-defunct New England jazz-rock outfit headed by Geoff Farina and known as Karate had led an expansive career that has left many fans in their wake. Though known for its live shows, 595 is their first official live record. As Farina states, “We’ve heard countless live recordings of the 694 shows we played between 1993-2005, but this recording of #595 is surely our favorite.”

There’s a video on YouTube of four guys backstage in a small dressing room. The acoustic guitarist plays a riff and the drummer, with only a sleigh bells and a tambourine, joins in, followed by two more guitars and a sequencer. The main vocalist stumbles on his words during a verse and the band snickers. Any band could’ve made this video. But with over 200,000 views in its first two weeks online, this one not only made Alamo Race Track an internet phenomenon but it also created international hype for their latest release, Black Cat John Brown.

Our previously announced contest to win two tickets to see Don Caballero @ Subterranean in Chicago has just got sweeter.

Thanks to our friends over at Relapse Records the winner will also be receiving a super heavy, double-gatefold vinyl of Don Caballero’s new release Punkgasm.

Click here to enter the contest.

Portland experiemental party people YACHT signs to DFA Records. New full-time member Claire L. Evans has joined founder Jona Bechtolt to release “Summer Song,” available now on 12″ or download, which will give listeners a taste of what is to come on the electronic group’s upcoming full length, See Mystery Lights, out on DFA in January, 2009.

Coliseum front man Ryan Patterson laughs when I ask him about the “thousands” of bands he has been in over the years. “More like a million,” he says. “I got to the point that every band I had been in was around for a year, and then it fell apart. Someone would quit and it would be over.” Although he had been playing guitar with Louisville hardcore act Black Cross, in forming Coliseum he saw both a chance to play heavier and faster material than what Black Cross had been doing as well as the opportunity to decide for himself whether or not to continue if the going got tough.

DJ A-Trak will be performing this Saturday at Subterranean in Chicago. Collaborating with the likes of Lupe Fiasco and releasing the 45-minute Running Man: Nike + Original this past June, A-Trak has made quite the name for himself.

Chicago-based post-metal experimentalists Suicide Note have announced their new album, Empty Rooms, was released earlier this month on drummer John Gagovski’s own Hawthorne Street Records. The record is their first effort in four years, since 2004’s Too Sick To Dance. Drawing influences from Drive Like Jehu, The VSS, Sonic Youth and Fugazi, Suicide Note look to expand their adrenaline-fueled, pulverizing sound on the new album.

On Oct. 7 Toronto punks Fucked Up are set to release their second record The Chemistry of Life. In addition to some guaranteed rocking riffage, the record, whose name and content celebrates the random chemical processes that brought life to Earth eons ago, is littered with exciting guest vocal appearances by Brooklyn’s own Vivian Girls, as well as Fucked Up‘s hometown friend, Katie Stelmanis. Be sure to check out Chemistry‘s first single “No Epiphany,” which is streamable below in the track listing section.

Childhood friends Adam Stephens and Tyson Vogel have been playing music together for over a decade and performing as Two Gallants since 2002. Their newest record, a self-titled release on Saddle Creek, showcases their talent for blending traditional folk and blues with a rock edge, creating an infectious lo-fi indie sound that is at once a breath of fresh air and a staunch reminder of the timelessness of American music.

AhCold Fact, the record that almost wasn’t, is finally here. Recorded nearly four decades ago with the legendary Motown players The Funk Bros. and dripping with the same psychedelic charm from the late 60’s when it was recorded, Rodriguez’s debut Cold Fact has been fully reissued and is now ready to be heard by the masses for the first time here in the US. Though the Detroit guitarist is a household name in other countries…

Coheed and Cambria will bring their uber-popular Neverender shows to Chicago as well as abroad in London. Originally slated for New York and Los Angeles exclusively, tickets for the previous two Neverender events sold out in three hours. Presented by Q101, Neverender is a new, four-night concert project in which the group will perform all four of their concept albums in their entirety, from beginning to end.

Once popular in Peru, chicha is a style of music that combines psychedelic riffs with Amazonian rhythms. Popular among indigenous empowerment members of the 1970s, the music was never truly accepted by the mainstream or middle classes in the country. Now, however, the sound is welcoming a resurgence through world music hotspot Cafe Barbès‘ club owner Olivier Conan and his band, Chicha Libre.