Perhaps fearing the wrath of Courtney Love, Dr Martens has fired Saatchi and Saatchi, the agency responsible for those Kurt-and-Joey kickin’ it in Heaven ads that were set to be plastered all over bus shelters in the UK. So wait, does this mean that Sid Vicious is actually in Hell?
Full release after the jump.
Sigh. Well, you can say this about Gawker Media: In the Bush era, they may be the last organization left that doesn’t resort to knee-jerk cronyism. More »
– Poison covers Tom Petty. Seriously. [Retro Music Snob (MP3s)] – Corey Hart’s Bang!: “Sunglasses At Night” is definitely not on this album. [jefitoblog] – Counting down the best jazz of the 1990s. More »
Now that the names of the people subbing for D’Arcy and James Iha in Smashing Pumpkins have been revealed, the scramble for information about them has begun. More »
Being an R. Kelly fan requires a lot of compartmentalization: In order to fully enjoy his music, you have to block out the lurid and/or absurd realities of his life and his music. For example, you can’t think about his alleged pee-pee sprees when dancing to “Step In The Name Of Love,” and you certainly don’t want to dwell too much on the non-midget lyrics of “Trapped In The Closet,” a song that’s basically a worse-than-usual Tyler Perry movie boiled down to about 40 minutes. But even the most die-hard R.-lover will be tested by Kelly’s soon-to-be-released Double Up album, which leaked over the weekend, and which is absolutely bonkers.
In case you haven’t heard, June 1 marks one of the most super-important, life-changing, monumentastic events in music history: The fortieth anniversary of the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. And if you do try to claim that you didn’t know about this, we don’t believe you, as the media has been billy-clubbing it into our brains for seemingly the last five months.
– Looking back at Todd Rundgren’s 1972 mess-slash-masterpiece, Something/Anything. [The Stypod] – “Well produced atmospheric rock” from the Swedish band Surrounded. [swedesplease] – If you’re in the mood to hear “Popcorn,” today’s your lucky day. More »
Pitchfork has an MP3 of “Our Life Is Not a Movie or Maybe,” the opening track from Okkervil River’s forthcoming The Stage Names. More »
Last night, the Smashing Pumpkins made its first live appearance in seven years, playing a 29-song set at Paris’ Grand Rex. We didn’t go, but here’s our best guess as to what happened: Billy Corgan repeatedly made his half-smile/half-snarl face; the three new members (Jeff Schroeder, Ginger Reyes and Lisa Harriton) looked slightly terrified; and people got very excited when the band played the first few notes of “Today.” Also, it was 19 hours long, and included such new songs as the acoustic ballad “For God and Country,” which was captured in all of its mid-fi camera-phone glory:
The Smashing Pumpkins – For God and Country [YouTube, via Deaf Indie Elephants]
And, for all you completists out there, the band’s set list is after the click-through. Nothing from The FutureEmbrace, alas.
Was it really only four months ago that we were wondering just what, exactly, we’d gotten ourselves into–and why Jewel was there? It seems like so much longer.
Our last American Idol liveblog of the year begins after the jump. If Jewel shows up to warble “Intuition” at Blake, we apologize in advance.
