Fun Fun Fun Fest 2010

Ok, I'll admit that I have never even heard of the Fun FUn Fun Fest, but with a name like that how can you go wrong? And with bands like MGMT, Bad Religion, The Hold Steady, Dirty Projectors, Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti, Best Coast, Deerhunter, Kaki King, RJD2, Wavves, and Yelle I'm thinking that you simply can't.

The only problem is that I would never be able to go seeing as how the festival is November 5th, 6h, and 7th at Waterloo Park in Austin, Texas.

For more information (and tickets if you can go!) check out their website: FunFunFunFest.com.

Here's the full line-up:

A-trak
Appleseed Cast
Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti
Bad Religion
Best Coast
Big Freedia
Black Congress
Black Nasty
Butcher Bear and Charlie
Cap'n Jazz
Cold Cave (doing a live visual projection show)
Crew 54
Crocodiles
Dam-Funk
Deakin (of Animal Collective)
Deerhunter
Delorean
Designer Drugs
Devin The Dude
Devo
Dirty Projectors
DJ Bird Peterson
DJ Nick Nack
Dominique Young Unique
Dum Dum Girls
Dwarves
Eagle Claw
Floor
GWAR
Hatred Surge
High On Fire
Indian Jewelry
Invincible
Jean Grae
Jeff The Brotherhood
Junius
Kaki King
Kylesa
League of Extraordinary Gz
Magic Kids
Man Man
Margot and the Nuclear So and Sos
Mariachi El Bronx
Mastodon
MGMT
Monotonix
Mother Falcon
Municipal Waste
OFF!
Os Mutantes
Peelander Z
Pharoahe Monch
Polvo
POS
Power Trip
Ringworm
RJD2
Royal Forest
Slick Rick (performing "Great Adventures Of")
Snapcase
Strike Anywhere
Suicidal Tendencies
The Briggs
The Bronx
The Casualties
The Gories
The Hold Steady
The Vandals
Toro Y Moi
Valient Thorr
Wavves
Weird Al Yankovic
Woven Bones
Yelle

For the Music Geek in All of Us

Okay let's be honest - everyone's a little geeky. Maybe you secretly love Star Wars/Star Trek/some sort of space movie. Maybe you have mastered the rubik's cube. Maybe you can create a website using only html. But usually we try to pretend that there is absoluely nothing geeky about us. Think about it. As a kid you'd do anything to avoid being called a geek. Well live in shame no more!

Admittedly geeky, but totally awesome. That's the only way to describe GeekUnique. Billed as "geekery for the masses", GeekUnique has "one-of-a-kind iPhone/iPod docks and other cool geek schwag." This includes anything from old video game cartridges to controllers.

And if you're a music geek (yes, that counts too!) some of the iPhone/iPod docks are made out of vintage 8-Track cassettes including Cheap Trick's Live at Budokan, Billy Joel's 52nd Streetlife Serenade, and Boston's Don't Look Back.

Check out some of their iPhone/iPod docks here!

New Jens Lekman!

Oh hey, a free (and new) Jens Lekman song: "The End of the World Is Bigger Than Love."

It's been a while since Lekman's 2007 release Night Falls Over Kortedala. I don't think there's a nice way to say "about time!" but I'm happy to have the new track! Lekman is working on new recordings, but his manager notes, “There’s not much to talk about at the moment as we’re not sure when it will be finished.”

"Forced to Love" Music Video

So trippy, but I love it!


Oh, Broken Social Scene...

New Music Tuesday: Sarah Blasko

Oh this girl has got soul!

This Tuesday you should check out Sarah Blasko's new album As Day Follows Night. This Australian crooner knows just how to use her voice to make her music emotional and beautiful. As Day Follows Night has already won her the ARIA (Australian Recording Industry Association) for Best Female Artist. Produced by Bjorn Yttling (of Peter Bjorn & John), the album uses an eclectic palette of organic instruments to create a solid folk-based album.

Check out her song "All I Want" below.
Sarah Blasko - "All I Want"

I love her almost whispery vocals and the light strokes of the drums in the background!

They love her down under in Australia, and I think everyone here in the states could fall in love with her music too. Don't you?



And don't forget you can check out all of the albums being released not only today, but this month, with Hello August!

DJ-ing 101

Anyone want to teach me how to DJ? Cause videos like this totally make me want to learn!


Seriously though, how cool is that?

Free Music from Spin

I love when Spin gives away free music!

Click here to download 15 tracks from Spin's August issues, including Department of Eagles, Henry Clay People, Jaill, Menomena, Mt. St. Helens Vietnam Band, Tame Impala, and Villagers.

Thank you Spin!

New Music Tuesday: Mt. St. Helens Vietnam Band

Let's be honest - I could tell you the one album you need to check out today is Arcade Fire's The Suburbs, but you're going to pick it up anyway (and if you weren't planning on it well then go stream it - seriously). But the whole point of New Music Tuesday is to help you find some music you might not necessarily buy from the store (or iTunes or however you get music) anyway. So all that being said, you should somehow get your hands on Where The Messengers Meet by Mt. St. Helens Vietnam Band.

Mt. St. Helens Vietnam Band is composed of Benjamin Verdoes (guitar and vocals), the multi-instrumentalist Traci Eggleston-Verdoes (Verdoes’ wife), Marshall Verdoes (drums and Benjamin's brother), and friends Matthew Dammer (moog, guitar) and Jared Price (bass).

The band's name is a mouthful, and in a way their music is too. Hear me out - everything feels urgent and energized - but somehow it works. At times there is a lot going on from song to song, and the band takes their noodling guitar lines and complicated chunks of bass in all kinds of directions on Where The Messengers Meet. There are bouncy verses and blitzing choruses, tumbling notes and thick cymbals bridging to more stripped-down hooks. It's not punk rock, new wave, garage rock, or any other tag you can think of. Though elements of those sounds exist, they're just buried under the energy. But like I said, it works.

This band clearly can’t sit still, and as you listen, you won't likely be able to either.




Where The Messengers MeetTracklist:
01 At Night
02 Leaving Trails
03 The Roof
04 Hurrah
05 Not To Know
06 You Were / I Was
07 Gone Again
08 Bitter Cold
09 In A Hole
10 Cadence
11 Messengers
12 George Clark

Coolest Drum Ever!

Can you just look at this for a second, it's amazing!

It's a drum lamp! Tap the drum and it turns on, another tap and it turns off. Sensitivity control stops other noise from activating the light.


How cool is that? It would be awful if someone thought it was to a real drum set and broke it (especially since it's $850 without shipping from New Zealand, and no, that's not a typo).

Hey, if you have some sort of rich benefactor go crazy! Here's the link to buy. The site has a lot of cool (slightly more affordable - it depends) things too - anything from t-shirts and key chains to other lamps and wall decals.

Hello August!

August is going to be an amazing month: Arcade Fire! Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin! Mt. St. Helens Vietnam Band! Klaxons! Jenny & Johnny! The Weepies! As always, here's to another great month of music!

Note: Unless noted, the release dates are all for the U.S.

August 3rd
Arcade Fire - The Suburbs
Autolux - Transit Transit
Bambara - Dog Ear Days
The Black Crowes - Croweology
Buckcherry - All Night Long
Bun B - Trill O.G.
Candy Claws - Hidden Lands
David Dondero - # Zero With A Bullet
Dax Riggs - Say Goodnight To The World
Dr. John And The Lower 911 - Tribal
El-P - Weareallgoingtoburninhellmegamixxx3
Ferraby Lionheart - The Jack of Hearts
Gaelic Storm - Cabbage
Gov't Mule - Mulennium [live]
Grip Weeds - Strange Change Machine
Katie Melua - House
Los Lobos - Tin Can Trust
Mt. St. Helens Vietnam Band - Where The Messengers Meet
Rose's Pawn Shop - Dancing on the Gallows
Rusty Anderson - Born on Faith
Ryan Star - 11:59
Shapes and Sizes - Candle to Your Eyes
Squeeze - Spot The Difference
Wavves - King Of The Beach

August 10th
Black Label Society - Order Of The Black
Blake Shelton - All About Tonight
Bottomless Pit - Blood Under The Bridge
Budos Band - The Budos Band III
Cam'ron - The UN: Gunz N' Butta
Colour Revolt - The Cradle
Drums - The Drums
Emily West - Emily West
Gasoline Silver - Gasoline Silver
Grand Lake - Blood Sea Hippies Are Dead
Jon Spencer Blues... - Year One
Kathryn Calder - Are You My Mother?
Killola - Let's Get Associated
Landing On The Moon - We Make History Now
Mike Posner - 31 Minutes To Takeoff
PVT - Church With No Magic
Reporter - Time Incredible Holocene
Sarah Blasko - As Day Follow Night
Stornoway - Beachcomber's Windowsill
Titles - Dirt Bell
Toadies - Feeler
Unearthing - Unearthing (EP)

August 17th
American Hi-Fi - Fight The Frequency
Brian Wilson - Brian Wilson Reimagines Gershwin
Camu Tao - King of Hearts
Chief - Modern Rituals
Chromeo - Business Casual
Ciara - Basic Instinct
David Gray - Foundling
Filter - The Trouble With Angels
Hey Monday - Beneath It All
Iron Maiden - The Final Frontier
John Mellencamp - No Better Than This
Just Surrender - Phoenix
Kem - Intimacy
Last Felony - Too Many Humans
Megan McCormick - Honest Words
NOFX - The Longest (EP)
Peter Block - Peter Block
Peter Salett - Addicted to Distraction
Shannon Whitworth - Water Bound
Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin - Let it Sway
T.I. - King Uncaged
Trace Adkins - Cowboy's Back In Town

August 24th
Brad Laner - Natural Selections
Coin Under Tongue 0 Reception
Eels 0 Tomorrrow Morning
Fantasia - Back To Me
Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan - Hawk
James Blackshaw - All is Falling
Jenny Wilson - Hardships!
Jesse Harris - Through The Night
Klaxons - Surfing The Void
Land Of Talk - Cloak And Cipher
Maximum Balloon [TV On The Radio's Andrew Sitek project] - Maximum Balloon
Mogwai - Special Moves [Live]
S. Carey - All We Grow
The Sword - Warp Riders

August 31st
10 Years - Feeding The Wolves
Alain Johannes - Spark
Carl Broemel [My Morning Jacket] - All Birds Say
Disturbed - Asylum
Goo Goo Dolls - Something For The Rest Of Us
Heart - Red Velvet Car
Jenny & Johnny [Jenny Lewis & Jonathan Rice] - I'm Having Fun Now
Lyfe Jennings - I Still Believe
Last Nights Vice - Perfect Little Noise
Magic Kids - Memphis
Portico Quartet - Isla
Sonny And The Sunsets - Tomorrow Is Alright
Sum 41 - Screaming Bloody Murder
Terrible Things - Terrible Things
The Weepies - Be My Thrill