This Is The Last…

According to NME…

Johnny Marr and Andy Rourke were reunited onstage for the first time in almost 20 years in Manchester last night (January 28).

The old pals came together during an evening of many collaborations at the Manchester vs Cancer charity event, organised by Rourke.

Marr opened with ‘There is a Light’, with himself taking the vocals!! He also played ‘How Soon is Now’ with Rourke. People in attendance said that it was breathtaking.

(Link via Morrissey Solo)

Meanwhile, Morrissey is preparing to release ‘Ringleader of the Tormentors‘ on April 4th. Check out how ridiculous the cover is.

What happened to the days of these beautiful album covers?

And this one…

And this one, too…

-It just wasn’t like the old days anymore.

I just finished reading The Know-It-All by A.J. Jacobs. Jacobs is also a contributing author to Mental Floss magazine, which has recently become one of my favorites.

This book chronicles Jacobs’ quest to read the entire Encyclopedia Brittanica from A to Z. The book is part memoir and part educational. Jacobs’ family and friends all tell him its a waste of time. Even his father, who tried to read the entire encyclopedia, but didn’t even get through the B’s.

I expected this book to be a lot of Jacobs sharing the quirky facts that he found while reading the encyclopedia. But it was also a lot about his relationship with his wife, his dad, his job, his quest for knowledge, his need to feel more than ordinary. He shares a lot about himself. He talks about his awkwardness in social situations, and how he jumps at any chance to talk about something that he just read about, even when its not at all relevant to the conversation. His wife charges him $1 for each irrelevant fact.

One of my favorite stories out of the encyclopedia with this entry:

Chang and Eng were the first Siamese Twins, born in Siam in 1811. They were joined at the hip. As children, a British merchant took them on tour and made a fortune off them. When they turned 21, they ditched the Brit and made money for themselves. They take their money and settle in North Carolina as farmers. In 1843, they married a pair of sisters and maintained separate households 1.5 miles aparts from eachother. Where they would alternate 3 day visits were their respective spouses. They adjusted well to their condition. They became expert marksmen, they could run quickly and swim well.

A few more that I found interesting…

Teddy Roosevelt renovated the second floor of the White House to make room for all of his children’s pets, including a raccoons, snakes, a badger, and a bear.

The French philosopher Renee Descartes had a fetish for womem with crossed eyes.

Coriander is the British word for cilantro.

In the past, hatters often became ill because they used mercury salts to make felt out of rabbit fur. The mercury poisoning led to a mental deterioration know as erethism. Hence the phrase “mad as a hatter”.

In ancient Balinese culture, it was believed that twins (of different sexes) should get married, because it was believed that they had already had sex in the womb.

This was a pretty good book. When I first started reading this book, I was annoyed by Jacobs’ personality. It seemed like he was so insecure, that he needed to be proving to everyone just how smart he is all the time. But he grew on me. While I don’t believe that reading the encyclopedia makes you smarter, I do think that sometimes fact is better (weirder) than fiction. This book was an interesting read.

If you missed Colin Meloy’s live performance on NPR last night, you can hear the full concert here.

Colin Meloy and his girlfriend Carson Ellis (who’s done all the artwork on the album covers) are having a baby in a month. He made a song about their baby.

Colin Meloy - Baby Song (live) .mp3

(Link via Stereogum)
(Photo by Joel Didriksen/ kingpinphoto.com)

I just read on Pitchfork that Grandaddy has decided to call it quits. Here’s the article…

After almost a decade and a half of scruffy indie rock and sprawling space-pop, the California band Grandaddy are headed for the great big rock and roll nursing home in the sky. In an interview with Pitchfork yesterday, frontman Jason Lytle revealed that Just Like the Fambly Cat, due out May 9 on V2, will be the last Grandaddy album, and that the band has no plans to tour.

“We’ve seen an erosion happening,” Lytle said. “I use the word ‘erosion’ in the most natural way I possibly can. It’s not entirely such a bad thing. We have just, throughout the years, always looked at every album coming out as ‘Wow we’ve got another album, now what?’ So that’s still going on right now, it’s just that it’s a lot different. We’re not jumping on that big rock n roll conveyor belt that happens when the album’s done.

“Everybody has been set free to pursue whatever it is they want to pursue, whether it be amateur poker playing, or [becoming] veterinarians, or working in a hot dog stand.”

While Lytle will continue making music, he has no plans to use the Grandaddy name for something it’s not (see: INXS, Queen, the Doors, etc.) “I think myself and the rest of the band hold that [name] pretty sacred,” he said. “It definitely won’t be this random assembly of crap shot players. There are plenty of people who are capable of standing up there and executing the songs. But it wouldn’t be comfortable for anyone.”

He added, “For whoever gives a shit, they can rest assured that it’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s no sadder than…I’m likening it to the natural crumbling of canyon walls. It can be sped up or done in by artificial forces. I just think we saw the opportunity to bring it to an end, to do it and still remain friends.”

As for Lytle’s next step, well, he’s not so sure what that will be. “All I’m working on now is regaining a pure appreciation for just playing music, just sitting and playing music. It seems to have been attached to and saddled by a lot of stuff. It’s getting fun again.

“I don’t intend on ever stopping. I’ve actually tried to stop a bunch of times, but it’s not really possible. Sometimes I hate it so much, because it’s something that fatigues me. I’m going to do something, but I have no idea what.”

At least they’re giving us one more album. It sounds to me like Jason Lytle will continue making music, just maybe solo stuff.

I’m so excited I’m smiling! Teeth even! Freeheat, the wunderkind offspring of The JAMC, The Gun Club and Earl Brutus will be releasing their first full length early this year on Planting Seeds Records. According to the labels website the 17 track album is due out March 28, 2006.

The LP “Back on the Water” is made up of sessions recorded at the infamous Drugstore as well as live tracks from Paradiso, Amsterdam. Planting Seeds describes it as a stripped down affair bringing to mind Andy Warhol and absinth. I appreciate the reference point given the facts that I’m both chronically inpatient and prone to the bottle.

My calendar for the next week: woodworm liquor and urine on a canvas. Hey I’m smiling again.

This story is so awesome. I ran across this story last Friday.

In London, a 74-year-old woman who had been blind for 25 years awoke in a British hospital after suffering a heart attack and could see again. Doctors have no medical explanation for this.

You can read the rest of the Yahoo News article here.

It must have been an eye opening experience.

Thanks to You Ain’t No Picasso for the heads up on this one…

Colin Meloy, frontman for The Decemberists, and art-pop singer-songwriter Laura Veirs perform a night of solo, acoustic work, webcast live on NPR.org Sat. Jan. 28. Both concerts, from The Birchmere in Alexandria, Va., can be heard in their entirety online, beginning at approximately 7:30 p.m. ET

It looks like Meloy will be performing some Decemberists’ songs and some off his solo EP ‘Colin Meloy Sings’. Which, is only available for purchase, when he tours solo.

I thouht this was interesting. I came across this story and picture on Stereogum.

Has anyone written anything about the phenomenon of people using cell phones as lighters at concerts? During every slow song last night, the whole Garden had their cell phones out waving them back and forth in the air.

I haven’t been to an outdoor concert in a long time. Are people actually doing this?

The Art Gallery of NSW is hosting an exhibit on the works of French impressionist Camille Pissarro(1830-1903). While he is lesser known than his contemporaries Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Pissarro is regarded as the father of impressionism and forwarding impressionist thought. Before visiting the exhibit I knew very little about Pissarro, impressionism and altogether thought it might be boring. But Pissarro’s work is completely breath-taking when standing before oversized canvases portraiting workers in French country sides and crowded Paris streets. In 1870 Pissarro fled his home when the French-Prussian War reached Paris and later received word that his home had been ransacked, and from 800 paintings only 40 survived.

Camille Pissarro was also an anarchist and sympathetic to the plight of working classes and the oppressed. On the evening that I visited the exhibit the Gallery held a lecture by Andre Frankovits, a human rights activist and fellow anarchist. Frankovits spoke about the political climate durring the 1880’s and 90’s in Europe and Pissarro’s thoughts as an anarchist thru letters he wrote to his children. The after effects of an industrial revolution and a depression were taking its toll on French workers and their families, and the state was making things worse. Frankovits told great stories of that time period and had an oversized audience very captivated.

Afterwards the Art Gallery held free screenings of 1940’s and 50’s French films based on the novels of Emile Zola and Guy de Maupassant. Contemporaries of Pissarro with likeminded ideals who highlighted social injustices and their negative influence on human development. I watched about half of a very funny movie called ‘Pot-bouille’ (House of Lovers, 1957) and left to meet Anna for coffee.

So much senseless word vomit over one “rumored” Coachella lineup. Why?! Deep breaths everyone, Jill wasn’t posting a list to the survivors of the upcoming apocalypse. If you or any of your favorite people weren’t on there don’t sweat it. There is still time!

Now that we cleared up that misconception lets please focus on a lineup worth whining about. SXSW has just released their lineup and it’s a heavenly blend of baby smiles and tequila. I’m tempted to post the lineup here but I’ll refrain based on some recently posted comments. Although laughing at the slack jack comments was fun those laughs couldn’t heal the chronic sadness that followed once I realized they were real. Click here to go to the SXSW website and view the lineup. Keep in mind it’s nowhere near finished.

Austin’s annual festival will take place March 15 – 19. As you know this is one of the years most on the mark festivals. If you’re fortunate enough to be attending you’ll be rubbing elbows with genius. Just to mention a few names: Echo & the Bunnymen, Art Brut, Cat Power, The Brian Jonestown Massacre, Mogwai, Animal Collective, I Love You but I’ve Chosen Darkness and literally hundreds more. Hazaah!

IF YOU HAVE AN ISSUES WITH THE LINEUP GO TO THE SXSW WEBSITE AND TAKE IT UP WITH THEM.