Coachella 2009 Revealed: Moz, Macca and MBV

Okkervil River / photo by David Greenwald

Morrissey's not headlining (though that honor is going to his old pals, the Cure) but he's the guy I'm most excited to see at Coachella 2009, which, absurdly, will also feature Paul McCartney, My Bloody Valentine (finally) and '80s sound-a-likes the Killers, who should seriously play Smiths and Cure covers all night. Other highlights include the Hold Steady, Okkervil River, Fleet Foxes, TV on the Radio, Gang Gang Dance, Amy Winehouse (if she lives), Calexico, Junior Boys, Liars and Jenny Lewis -- not bad at all. I still think spreading them all over three days instead of two is a mistake, but, well, Macca! Peep the full list on Coachella's site.

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7th Graders Complain About Animal Collective Selling Out

I'm going to keep posting these videos until they stop being ridiculous: "Today, in my pre-algebra class, Kyle, who wears a Hollister shirt, was singing 'My Girls.'" 14-year-old hipster, welcome to the rest of your life. (Best part: "'Daily Routine?' It's a legit song, Panda Bear made it." [insert Joke/Despair re: Kids Today].) (Via Hipster Runoff, obv.)

"Watchmen" Has a Flickr

Or more precisely, The New Frontiersman, Rorschach's favorite paper, has a Flickr with sick shots of Dr. Manhattan. Guys, I know it's cheesy, but I fucking love viral marketing.

New Music: I Was A King - "Norman Bleik"

Photo by David Greenwald

Music always sounds best coming from a garage or a bedroom. That's when it's at its purest -- or at least closest to its point of creation, which is close enough. "Norman Bleik," the first single from the first album of the improbably named I Was A King jangles with the youthful energy of a bunch of curly haired dudes spending the summer before senior year listening to Radio City, saving up for new amplifiers and terrorizing the neighbors. Kids do that in Norway, right?

I Was a King - "Norman Bleik": mp3

(I Was a King's self-titled debut is due April 7 on The Control Group)

N0te: I have wireless Internet again after a lengthy furlough. This means I can upload MP3s from my external hard drive to this website, which in effect means we're back in business. Team Rawkblog is wrapping up the launch of our new look and our new site, but we'll let you know when we're ready for an open house. Stay close.

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Looking for new music? Click below for more recent and upcoming 2009 releases.

First Potential Coachella Lineup Leaks

Not these guys, sorry.

Ryan Seacrest, of all people, has posted one of what's sure to be a long list of long lists of rumored Coachella 2009 performers. Highlights: Headlining gigs from Morrissey and Paul McCartney (yes!), plus Neil Young, Nine Inch Nails, the Foo Fighters, the Shins (doubtful), Fleet Foxes, She & Him, the Killers, TV On The Radio, Asobi Seksu and the Hold Steady. Seems like a few too many big names for the three-day fest too afford in these trying times, especially given last year's lean lineup, but I guess we'll see, huh? Plus, where's Animal Collective and Pavement? A guy can dream. Coachella 2009 is on April 17, 18 and 19, and Seacrest's list is after the jump. [Continue reading...]

FRIDAY

Nine Inch Nails
Morrissey
Orbital
Franz Ferdinand
Puscifer
Katy Perry
Digitalism (live)
The Presets
K's Choice
Conor Oberst & the Mystic Valley Band
X
Metric
The Black Keys
Shpongle
Turbonegro
Bassnectar
Fair To Midland
Ladytron
Cage
Brian Jonestown Massacre
Hercules & Love Affair
Mickey Avalon
The Gaslight Anthem
Laura Marling
The Whip
The Bloody Beetroots
Kristina Sky
The Airborne Toxic Event
Friendly Fires
Straight Line Stitch
Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly.
Shadrach Kabango
Los Campesinos
O'Death
The Wishing Tree
Floater
Alias Westlord
Snailhouse
Asteroids Galaxy Tour
Miyavi
Kevin Rudolf
TINARIWEN
Heartless Bastards
Drop The Lime
Lucent Dossier


SATURDAY

The Killers
Neil Young
Primus
Basement Jaxx
TV on the Radio
Mike Patton Rahzel
Adele
Immortal Technique
Atmosphere
One Day as a Lion
Girl Talk
Primal Scream
Coolof (of The Knife) (DJ set)
KT Tunstall
Crystal Castles
Amon Tobin
M.A.N.D.Y.
She & Him
Roni Size
Kimya Dawson
Glasvegas
The Black Marquee
Jade Everett
Jamie T
Foals
Grace Potter & The Nocturnals
No Age
Late of the Pier
Sebastian Tellier
Peanut Butter Wolf
The Flobots
Radio Luxembourg
Ice Cream Floats
Flying Lotus
Kitty, Daisy & Lewis
The Bug
White Lies
The Knux
The Captains Intangible
Mad Marge & The Stonecutters
N.A.S.A.
Mexican Institute of Sound
Eric Mcfadden Trio
Soniko
Kira Willey
Lucent Dossier
KIM H & DANNY R


SUNDAY

Paul McCartney
Foo Fighters
Public Enemy
Chemical Brothers
Keane
Poe
MSTRKRFT
Fleet Foxes
Band of Horses
Lupe Fiasco
Skunk Anansie
Planet of the Drums
Jenny Lewis
Imogen Heap
The Heavy
The Shins
Black Mountain
Asobi Seksu
Gus Black
Alabama 3
The Faint
The Sounds
The Ting Tings
Yeasayer
Conjure One
The Bees
Bizarre
Surkin
The Greencards
The Hold Steady
Uh Huh Her
Christopher Lawrence
a place to bury strangers
Carolina Chocolate Drops
The Death Set
Florence & The Machine
Anna Ternheim
Weston Boys
Tommy Mills & The Jade Amenity
Gutevolk
Buraka Som Sistema
Lucent Dossier

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Andrew Bird and Animal Collective's first-week sales: 25,471 and 24,684, respectively -- good enough for No. 12 and 13 on the albums chart, but it seems the salad days of the Shins dropping at No. 2 are over. Still, 25K for Andy is what his label, Fat Possum, was looking for; it seems spending money on marketing still works, even in 2009. (That Bon Iver schmuck sold a bunch of copies of his new EP, too. Can he go away now?)

Live: Wavves @ The El Rey, 1.24.09

All photos by David Greenwald

I made myself a New Year's resolution that I was going to stop using words like "hype," "zeitgeist," "blogosphere" and "Pitchfork." So I'll just tell you what I saw on Saturday night: A duo that is not ready to open shows at the El Rey, much less perform in public. Wavves are a San Diego lo-fi duo whose scattered releases (and upcoming full-length, Wavvves) plunge deep into red-lining guitars and cauterizing fuzz. It makes their music visceral, immediate -- and surprisingly boring, once it steps out from behind the curtain.

Live, the band made no effort to replicate the searing sounds of their recordings and just simply played the songs. That was a mistake. Their drummer has the creative faculties of a deaf Meg White, while frontman Nathan Williams droned along with "Oooh" falsettos as he aimlessly played power chords. Occasionally, on songs such as "So Bored," Wavves caught the glimpse of an actual performance, but for the most part, it was like watching a Ramones practice session if they fired their bassist and overdosed on Valium. Lamme. More photos after the jump. [Continue reading...]

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The Week In Rawk, 1.25.09

David Berman's Silver Jews called it quits. Despite the fact that they're one of the great enduring bands of the '90s indie rock boom, the blogosphere couldn't seem to find the time to blog about it. Animal Collective has a sweet new video and might be in league with Us Weekly. And we talked about the Oscar nominations (and the Oscar snubs).

(Silver Jews photo by Redheadwalking)

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The Week in Rawk: This is really happening. Click below for more.

Hipster Runoff and Ed from Grizzly Bear are Twitter Bros

Important breaking news!

Hipster Runoff has been Twittering at Ed Droste of Grizzly Bear, trying to pull an indie rock dinner invite (e-vite?) for some gumbo so he doesn't have to go to Chili's -- and it appears this has been the beginning of a beautiful blogship. "Are we 'real friends' or just 'fake internet friends'?" HRO asked. To which Ed replied, "Hopefully both and more!!!" Awww. Ed happens to be bloggy buddies with us, too, and sent us his list of his favorite five recipes of 2008 a while back. Feast your eyes. In actual news, Grizzly Bear's latest album is due in March (so, like, a leak in two weeks?) and should be totally awesome. (Sorry, guys, I just got caught up on Gossip Girl. It's one of those days.)

Buy Animal Collective Tickets, Get An Us Weekly Subscription: This is Live Nation's doing, but that doesn't make it any less hilarious.

Video: Animal Collective - "My Girls"

No walls or adobe slabs (or girls -- sigh) in this one, folks, but the underwater video for Animal Collective's current jam of the year is bubbly and bizarre enough to warrant a viewing. Then again, it also kinda looks like an iPod ad -- let the backlash begin!

Previously: First Look: Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavillion

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Inside The Golden Days Of Missing Silver Jews

Photo by Redheadwalking

Bad news, folks -- indie rock's poet laureate, David C. Berman, announced today that he's calling it quits with the Silver Jews and moving on to greener pastures: "screenwriting or muckracking."

"If I continue to record I might accidentally write the answer song to 'Shiny Happy People,'" he wrote, and while nobody wants to see that, last year's Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea was a great J00s record; arguably their best since their seminal release, 1998's Malkmus-aided American Water. Berman remains at the top of his game and was just getting comfortable with touring after refusing to do it for years, so all in all, this is quite the loss. I met him after a show on their inaugural tour and he was incredibly charming, even while discussing his dislike of the nickname "Dave," which yours truly obviously goes by. "We should be free to be Daves and Davids," he said at the time. D.C., you should be whatever you want. Best of luck.

Silver Jews - "Smith and Jones Forever": mp3

(Buy Silver Jews albums -- all of 'em -- on Drag City)

Video: Loney Dear - "Airport Surroundings"

B-roll from Emil's 90210 audition, perhaps? "Airport Surroundings" is the first single from Loney Dear's tear-stained love letter of a new album, Dear John, out Jan. 27 on Polyvinyl. It sounds a lot like the last one, which you'll remember was one of my 10 favorites of 2007. Angelenos, he's opening for Andrew Bird on February 18 at the Orpheum, if you're looking for the year's best double bill thus far.

Loney Dear - "Airport Surroundings": mp3

Oscar Nominations Thoughts

Some quick thoughts:

-- Nobody saw The Reader coming. I haven't seen it (I was boycotting all the Nazi movies this year), but I guess I'll have to now. What a turnaround from the Golden Globes, where Revolutionary Road dominated the nominations. Unfortunately, it took the fifth Best Picture slot everyone (read: me) hoped would go to The Dark Knight -- and the directing slot which should've gone to Christopher Nolan (or Darren Aronofsky for The Wrestler, a film which should've also gotten a screenplay nod, and Best Picture, too).

More after the jump... [Continue reading...]

-- Nothing for Vicky Cristina Barcelona except Penelope Cruz's expected Best Supporting Actress nod -- where's the screenplay nomination? Art direction? Anything? When it won the Golden Globe, I was really hoping it would have a shot at Best Picture -- it's Woody's best film in years and a legitimately great effort. It's certainly better than Benjamin Button, which I found moving but is a Forrest Gump rehash at best and a superficial technical achievement at worst.

-- Doubt: I don't think Viola Davis' 10 minutes of crying deserves a nomination, but I'm happy to see Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Amy Adams all nominated. A great movie, if one too "small" for a Best Picture nod. Viola aside (she was fine), everyone in the Supporting Actress category is fantastic.

--Wendy And Lucy: Didn't get a thing. I suppose Angelina Jolie makes for a better photo op than a quiet indie about a homeless person, but Michelle Williams is outstanding in it and it's one of the most emotional, affecting films I saw last year. Seek it out -- L.A. folks, it's still playing at the Fairfax Regency.

-- Nothing for Synecdoche, New York. I suppose it's too much to ask to think Jon Brion's stellar "Little Person" would make Best Song, but I was hoping for a screenplay nod for my favorite movie of the year. No dice. I still love you, Charlie Kaufman.

-- Did Robert Downey Jr. really get nominated for Best Supporting Actor for Tropic Thunder? Heath's going to win (deservedly), but how amazing would it be to have RDJ take the stage and thank everybody for voting for him for playing the dude playing the dude disguised as another dude?

--No Bruce! Can't the Boss catch a break? Especially when Slumdog got two nominations in the Best Song category?

-- No Clint! Guess the Academy decided they'd given the guy enough.

See the full list of nominations here.

LOST Is Back Tonight AGHHH!

I have to be up in the pre-dawn hours tomorrow for work, which means I'll probably be watching tonight's two-hour premiere on ABC.com tomorrow, but, uh, get excited in this thread! And no spoilers!

Joaquin Phoenix, Rap Superstar

I hope this is some weird Dadaist prank, like that time he thought he had a lizard crawling around his head.

Video: Fleet Foxes Do 'Mykonos' On 'SNL'

Jam. I'll update when a better quality video surfaces (and when we get "Blue Ridge Mountains").

Video: "500 Days Of Summer" Trailer

On the upside: Soft-Focus Shots Of Zooey Deschanel: The Movie. And it's set in L.A. On the downside: The horrendous voice-over, which someone, somewhere, was actually paid to write. Cross your fingers, I guess. 500 Days of Summer is due on Fox Searchlight on July 24.

Previously: Ben Gibbard Possesses Zooey Deschanel's Heart -- Really

Video: Michael Cera's 'Paper Heart'

Paper Heart, the pseudo-documentary on comedienne Charlyne Li's denial of love -- and how she finds it with the cuddly young Michael Cera (star of your favorite indie-rock film of 2008) -- is premiering at Sundance this week, but several clips from the film are out now. They're hilarious, as expected. See more at The Playlist.

Related: Michael Cera

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95% Of Music Downloads Are Illegal: This is probably a made-up statistic until Mediafire gives away download stats on stuff like "ac-mpp.zip," but holy shit, right? In other news, you can download any album ever recorded by typing "'album name' site:mediafire.com" into Google.

Fleet Foxes Are Not Ready For Their Close-Up

Maybe it's just 'cause Rosario Dawson's so button-cute, but the Fleet Foxes dudes look beyond nervous to be in front of a camera -- even though they're just filming a promotional spot for their Saturday Night Live appearance tomorrow. Look at Robin jitter!

"Watchmen" Suit Settled; Movie Due March 6

Watchmen, which I'm more excited about by the day, will arrive on schedule on March 6 thanks to Warner and Fox making a deal in which Fox gets a lot of money for kinda being dicks. I didn't realize that Alan Moore and Dave Gibbon's original graphic novel was the best-selling ever -- considering it's probably the best ever, too (at least as far as superheroes go), high-five, America.

We Live In The Future

Photo by Grego! and used with kind permission

A plane crashes, and, like magic, its entire journey appears on the Internet -- for the world to see -- within minutes. Astounding.

Stream "Merriweather Post Pavillion"

Hear Merriweather Post Pavillion in full on Domino Records' Australian MySpace. Perhaps it's to be expected, but the post-Person Pitch Animal Collective backlash has already begun -- I saw one dude on Facebook today call MPP "B.O.R.I.N.G." As I've already said, it's quite the opposite, but listen and make yr own decisions.

Previously: First Look: Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavillion

Pavement Probably Reuniting For ATP New York

Photo by David Greenwald

Stereogum reports Pavement will reform to play at the Flaming Lips-curated ATP New York festival in September. It's Pavement's 20th anniversary this year and they've just wrapped up reissuing much of their catalog, so it'd be a great time to do it -- and assuming it's true, we might see them sooner, if Coachella (known to be after a Pavey reunion) decides to shell out this April. But till I hear about an LA date from the Malkmus' mouth, I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Of note, current indie standard-bearers Animal Collective are already booked for ATP; I'm envisioning Panda Bear and Steve high-fiving and talking about the zeitgeist while listening to Reckoning or something.

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L.A.'s Indie 103.1 calls it quits: One of the two worthwhile stations in town -- and the only one that actually plays indie rock (sorry, KCRW) -- is apparently done. Buzzbands.la has more info. Cheer up folks, there's always UCLAradio.com. Update: The station will live on online.

Video: Andrew Bird - "Anonanimal"

From last April, a solo take on the best song from Andrew Bird's solid new release, Noble Beast. I prefer this version -- it's more raw and unrefined, a musician building a song in the sand. Beast isn't quite as fierce as I was hoping, given the rock action of Armchair Apocrypha, but it's a welcome addition to his catalog and one I'm going to let sink in a while longer before offering a full review.

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Ryan Adams To 'Walk Away' From Music

"I will walk away now and it will not matter what anyone says. There are other things I can do in this life, other ways to be creative," Ryan Adams writes on his blog. He adds that his shows in March will be the last with the Cardinals. The guy sounds really morose about the whole thing -- about being considered an "asshole," his lukewarm critical reception (which I've always argued against), about having his blogging misquoted -- and I can't say I blame him, considering he's the closest thing we've got these days to a Neil Young and, like Neil and Tonight's the Night, his best work has gone underappreciated or worse, vilified. Take your time, Ryan -- but please, do us a favor and put out the box set while you're off.

Previously: Ryan Adams' Elizabethtown Sessions Leak

The Best-Ever Blog Post About Animal Collective With Regard To Internet Vs. Real-Life Culture

It's on Hipster Runoff. Dude is the Michael Phelps of blogging.

We're knee-deep in redesigning the new site and trying to get wireless Internet at my apartment. Regularly scheduled blogging will return, well, when it's good and ready. Sorry, folks.

Bruce Springsteen wins Golden Globe for "The Wrestler" Title Track

Well deserved, if only because Jon Brion's "Little Person" wasn't nominated. Nice work, Boss.

2009's First/Worst Band Name Trend

Multiple consonants. Exhibits A-C: Wavves, Lovvers, Nodzzz. I miss animal bands, guys.

We just got Internet in the new place -- regularly scheduled blogging returns on Monday. Apologies on the delay. I needed a break to listen to the Zombies for a week, anyhow.

Rawkblog's Return

Gentleman, ladies: I've moved to a new apartment and we don't have Internet yet. This is obviously putting a crimp in me uploading 50 MP3s for my songs of the year list. Hopefully we'll be up and running sometime next week and it'll be back to business as usual -- thanks for being patient, and a belated happy New Year to everybody.