Good gawd, ya’ll. The bootlegs keep coming in, but this time from the official source. WFMU just posted their archive of Growing’s performance at the absolutely immaculate All Tomorrow’s Parties. The attractive photo above is also from your menacing friends at Beware of Blog.I’m super bummed that I missed not one, but two festivals that were curated to my specific taste in music – as in, I would be stoked to see any given group on the festival roster. The other festival I speak of was Terrastock 7 in Louisville. Sure, ATP would’ve been a hike from Chicago (not to mention additional investment of time and money into exterminating bedbugs from my luggage due to an alleged infestation at Kutschers), but Louisville is just five hours and some change due south on I-65. I had no excuse other than pure dumbassery.

Anyway, Growing slays, and I hope they frightened each and every Hot Chip dork with their opening sets this month.

MP3 :::
Growing – Live at ATP

Once again, “woj” emerges victorious with another quality recording of WFMU’s broadcast of last weekend’s All Tomorrow’s Parties. This time, he comes bearing gifts of the Brain Jonestown Massacre and Spectrum (a.k.a. Spacemen 3’s Sonic Boom).

The Brian Jonestown Massacre says “no” to hippies and ravages through a cross-catalog of jams in a 45-minute span. Though the volume is low, the quality is good, with no discernible rip hiccups or encoding snags. The highlight for me includes, what I believe to be, an impromptu cover of The Smith’s “That Joke Isn’t Funny Anymore” right in the middle of “Hide and Seek” (from Spacegirl and Other Favorites). And of course, there’s always the strange and entertaining BJM stage banter.

Your Anton Newcombe Quote for October 1st:

Interviewer: What keeps you buzzing as a band?
Anton: Amphetamines

A quick programming note – the Decibel Tolls is ALL NEW this Friday with Kenny Bloggins v. Anton Newcombe. Comedy ensues when Kenny accidentally gets into an online nerd fight with the BJM front man, but they make up and touch weiners afterwards.

Spectrum… just plain sounds amazing. Spectrum dusted off and reworked some old gems, such as their own version of Spacemen 3’s version of Mudhoney’s “When Tomorrow Hits.” I’m also including a celebratory Silver Apples MP3 below since Simeon used to jam with Sonic Boom, often uncredited, under the Spectrum name. What, you don’t have the SA/Contact joint? Take care of that! Oh, and hey, anyone got that Spectrum/Silver Apples split Lake of Teardrops? That shit’s hard to find.

The new Spectrum album is tentatively titled On the Wings of Mercury (though I’m sure someone will correct me if this is wrong) and is supposed to be released before 2008 on Space Age Recordings, but no official date has been announced.

MP3 :::
The Brian Jonestown Massacre at ATP – 9.21.08
The Brian Jonestown Massacre – Here It Comes
Spectrum at ATP – 9.21.08
Silver Apples – Misty Mountain

Hey you, plaid shirt starin’ at your feet! Why are your arms crossed? You’re in the sacred inner circle of Lightning Bolt’s Church of Noizze… you don’t just stand around, wenis! The F is wrong with you? You can get away with that at the Low show, but not in the Church. Anyway, I feel very fortunate to be able to grip a recording of Lightning Bolt’s entire monolithic, late Friday night set via WFMU’s weekend broadcast! And it’s so evil. They brought out my favorite LB jam, “Dead Cowboy,” and I will never be able to sleep soundly again after hearing it.

In a truly unfortunately turn of events, I’ve not yet had the opportunity to witness LB’s decimation first hand, though I have had Gibson’s side project Wizardzz rape my brain. The fact that they can succinctly toggle between tempos like a sampler would is beyond my compositional understanding.

The sound quality of this bootleg is as good as you need it to be. You can hear the stream drop in and out occasionally, probably from rebuffering, but very little audience interference. This bootleg (with more to come) are from a reader/commenter named “woj.” I don’t know who you are, but you are the hero. So to “woj”:

In other news, Brian Gibson and I have the same trousers, as evidence in the picture above, and Brian Chippendale only uses bass strings manufactured by Aleister Crowley’s estate. Treated.

MP3 :::
Lightning Bolt – Live @ ATP, 9.20.08

A lot of small, relevant snippets of information have been appearing on my newsdesk in the past couple of hours, so I figured, why not dump everything in my action items box into one convenient, slammin’ post. So here’s all the news fit to print, in one post. It will help augment my lack of posting over the weekend, as I will be out of town. The timing was a little bad considering…

Ariel Pink Hits the Bottle This Weekend… Hard

Ariel Pink, on his 2008 “Thanks Mom, I’m Dead” tour, is now bringin’ it proper with a lush, full band. I’m interested to hear this, considering the last time I saw Ariel’s twisted AM radio golden pop was his opening spot for Animal Collective during the Sung Tongs tour. They sounded (sonically, not compostionally) like shit, just like on album. I wonder if this same interpretation will happen full band (featuring members of Indian Jewelry, Lilys and Beachwood Sparks). Philadelphia’s singing-at-the-bottom-of-a-well siren Tickley Feather opens the New York, Philly, and Baltimore shows. I know nothing about Tickley Feather’s live show, but the recorded material is sick! As for local action, Ariel Pink hits the Empty Bottle in Chicago this Saturday (totally feelin’ sad panda for missing this). Please see it for me – take photos!

7/19 San Francisco, CA Cell Space
7/21 Salt Lake City, UT Kilby Court
7/22 Denver, CO Larimer Lounge
7/24 Omaha, NE Slowdown
7/25 Minneapolis, MN 7th Street Entry
7/26 Chicago, IL Empty Bottle
7/27 Toronto, ONT TBA
7/28 Montreal, QC Zoobizarre
7/29 Boston, MA TT The Bears
7/30 New York, NY Knitting Factory
7/31 New Haven, CT People’s Center
8/1 Philadelphia, PA M Room
8/2 Baltimore, MD Sonar
8/4 Atlanta, GA Eyedrum
8/5 Tallahassee, FL Beta Bar
8/6 Baton Rouge, LA Spanish Moon
8/7 Houston, TX Walter’s on Washington
8/8 Denton, TX Hailey’s
8/9 Austin, TX Mohawk
8/11 Tucson, AZ Plush
8/12 Los Angeles, CA Echo

Ariel Pink’s Haunted Grafitti – Inmates of Heartache
Tickley Feather – Natural

Lightning Bolt and Wooden Shjips Do ATP’s Release the Bats

Halloween is the only holiday I really celebrate, and if I can locate a few extra thousand dollars (plus exchange rate fund) lying aruond, I may just take a hajj to London’s Forum on October 31 for ATP’s Release the Bats. No, I probably won’t make it, but you Britons should take the trip to see Lightning Bolt and Wooden Shjips, then tell me how it was. Lightning Bolt, who refuse to play on a stage, is worth traveling any distance to see, for their energy, face melting performance, and sheer unadulterated volume. Wooden Shjips will be fun to see live, as well, since they will be testing lots of new material for the follow up to their airborne self-titled. ATP is encouraging people to dress spooky. Considering LB is booked – shouldn’t be a problem.

Lightning Bolt – Duel in the Deep
Wooden Shjips – Lousin’ Time

Watch Anton Newcombe Woo His Peers and Neighbors in DIG!

DIG is an amazing documentary by Ondi Timoner outlining the seven year trajectory of two very aesthetically different groups, starting from the same place, but creating two vastly incongruent story arcs (with the Brian Jonestown Massacre acting as the undeniable central force, the immovable object, like the Joker in the Dark Knight). Totally fascinating – sometimes you just can’t make this stuff up. Of course, a lot has been written and discussed concerning the general insanity provoked by Anton and company (which I think is kinda cool in a psychotic way). What really matters is the music, ultimately, and this film holds true to this ideal.

Now, thanks to SnagFilm, you can watch this riveting piece of human drama – for free. Way rad. Czech out DIG here, or go on and watch it all up in that lil’ widget dude above! Technology is fucking aces.

Personally, I love every Brian Jonestown Massacre record. But even if you’re not into the music, the movie is more than entertaining. If you do love the BJM, there’s tons of great music throughout. You should definitely buy the DVD if you like the flick, since the DVD is packed with tons of great deleted footage, extras, and BJM performances. In a later post, I have quite a story concerning my epic run-in with Mr. Newcombe. Look out for that, but in the meantime, enjoy a lil’ guy from the We are the Radio EP.

Brian Jonestown Massacre – Seer