Rock Star Journalist

Kansas City’s High Diving Ponies haven’t played a show since last November, when they played FOKL with Dry Bonnet. They’re not likely to be playing around here any time soon, either. According to the band’s Josh Thomas High Diving Ponies are “probably not playing Lawrence or KC again until fall.” So, that makes tonight’s show at the Replay in Lawrence an imperative thing to attend, especially if you’re a fan of the intense psychedelic shoegaze the band proffers.

Thomas promises that the band will be “playing mostly new songs,” giving you a chance to hear the live versions of the long-gestating Face Blindess cassette that ought to be out sometime in July (Thomas has “been doing seemingly endless remixes,” he says). However, if you’re looking for a chance to hear it before everyone else, there will be 10 light-scribed CD-Rs of the album available at tonight’s performance (which also features Kansas City’s Pretty and Wisconsin’s Elusive Parallelograms). The show starts around 10-ish, and High Diving Ponies take the stage around midnight.

Listen to a couple of tracks from Face Blindness below, but take care — I listened to all of these yesterday afternoon and promptly lost a good half hour of time. They’re mesmerizing.
read more »

Small Plastic Songs is the first release from a new boutique vinyl label called Record Collective Limited and features one song each from the forthcoming debut albums of four of Sydney’s “most promising up and comers,” according to the press release. What we know is that we’ve listened to the four-way split, and it sounds just dandy. The shoegaze-tinged, college radio flavored “Wind Shear” from Skullsquadron will instantly grab your attention, as will the additional tracks from Ya Aha, The Aerotrope Guild, and Restless Leg.

“The Record Collective Limited exists because the music business is broken,” continues the press release, with the “boutique, short run releases” taking inspiration from the likes of “legendary DIY record labels like Merge, Flying Nun, Siltbreeze, and Half A Cow.”
read more »

Minneapolis musician and writer Nate Gangelhoff has an impressive CV. He’s played in Off With Their Heads, Rivethead, and Banner Pilot, as well as a band that’s recently put out their third full-length, The Gateway District. The quartet’s remarkably well-known for a band that rarely plays outside of the Twin Cities area, but their pedigree is enough to interest anyone familiar with the current punk scene, with members of the Soviettes, Salteens, and Dear Landlord (to say nothing of Gangelhoff’s laundry list of bands).

Gangelhoff was kind enough to take time out of his rather busy schedule to do an e-mail interview with us about the new album, Old Wild Hearts, as well as his many other musical projects.
read more »

Lawrence’s the Rackatees and Omaha’s the Shidiots have their upcoming split 7-inch off to the plant for test pressings right now. Let’s hope these two gruffly poppy punk acts will have some new vinyl in time for our favorite warm-weather activity: opening up the windows, putting the speakers right up next to the screens, and annoying the neighbors while we drink beer on the front porch.

As for pressing details, they’re doing 300 copies (each band will have 150 copies) pressed on randomly colored vinyl. It’s looking like the release date will be mid-April 19, but that hasn’t been confirmed just yet — and I think we all know about what happens with vinyl delays, especially considering that falls right before Record Store Day.

We’ve got an exclusive preview track from the Rackatees’ side, entitled “Anthem for the American (Food Service) Worker.” It’s the first song off the upcoming 7-inch. It’s especially great for a Monday morning start to the working week, with lines like “So never trust the manager / The whip that’s in his hand.”

MP3: The Rackatees, “Anthem for the American (Food Service) Worker”

The upcoming release of Till Death… A Guide to Love and Loss is sure to be a big deal for fans of New Years Day and its frontwoman, Ash Costello, as well as Kriz DK of the Genitorturers and Deadstar Assembly. It’s a wonderfully shot series of photographs by Jeremy Saffer, and the concept is that it “shows what it might be like to date a Gothic matriarch, like Morticia, Elvira, Lily, etc. prior to them meeting their Gomez or Herman.”

It’s a 70-page, full-color hardcover, with the images within hewing to “Addams/Tales From The Crypt” sense of humor. Essentially, that means some very cheesy (cheap Valentine’s Day level, really) visual puns, coupled with some excruciatingly gory imagery.
read more »

We’ve demonstrated some love for Berwanger a lot recently, and it’ll only ramp up now that the band’s getting ready to release their full-length, All You Can Eat, later this spring. In advance of all of that, however, will come this split 7-inch with TK Webb on California’s Creme Tangerine Records. Berwanger’s contribution, as you can see, is the track “Neon Corners.” No clue as to when the split will see release, but keep an eye on the band’s Facebook page for more updates.

You can hear a live version of the band’s track below, in a live video shot by Sid from Too Much Rock during their show at the Jackpot in Lawrence on Thursday, February 7, 2013.
read more »

Some of you may have recently become acquainted with the UK’s Death Waltz Records via their profile in Spin. Well, the fine purveyors of horror and sci-fi vinyl announced their releases for Record Store Day 2013. They’re fucking choice. While the soundtracks to Horror Business and the short film Yellow will have a lot of the folks out there most excited, I’m pretty jazzed about the series of three split 7-inches of TV themes.

There’s Star Trek / Lost In Space on black and glitter vinyl, The Twilight Zone / The Outer Limits on clear and black vinyl, and Alfred Hitchcock Presents / The Munsters on white and black vinyl. They’re all in exlusive Death Waltz die cut retro disco bag sleeves (300gsm card with matte varnish and black paper inner sleeve), include a free 7 x 7 artprint, and are limited to a one-time pressing of 1000.

WANT. HARD. Somebody in the UK needs to figure out a way to get me one of each, please. Check the art below.

Despite a toddler running around, Matt Beat has finished his trilogy, The Presidents of the United States of America, as performed by Electric Needle Room. This is the third volume of songs about every president of the United States — except for Obama, however. Beat says he’s “waiting to write the song about him until after his term.”
read more »

St. Joseph’s Radkey came to the Eighth Street Taproom in Lawrence last night, and a small group of hardy rock fans braved bitterly cold temperatures to catch the trio of young brothers in the bar’s basement. The boys were shooting a music video for “Is He All Right?”, meaning the Taproom’s concert nook was lit better than I’ve ever seen it. In addition to some pro cameras on hand, audience members were encouraged to shoot with camera, phones, or whatever they had. I was really, really hoping to see a Super 8, but no such luck.
read more »

The latest single from psychedelic rockers Kid Congo Powers & the Pink Monkey Birds won’t be released until January 22 via In the Red, but you can listen to to the a-side, “Conjure Man,” right now via Soundcloud.

The b-side has “a deranged cover of an old Seeds tune,” “Lose Your Mind,” according to the press release. Both tracks are exclusive to this 7-inch, and won’t appear on Haunted Head, the next long-player from the former member of the Bad Seeds, the Cramps, and the Gun Club, due out later next year. If you don’t trust your local record shop to get in this spooky slab o’ wax, you can pre-order it from Midheaven Mailorder
read more »