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Brendan Benson had a fairly productive 2012. He started his own record label and publishing company, Readymade, and released his fifth solo album, What Kind of World. This year, The Raconteur has an equally hectic schedule, with plans to release a new song every month leading up to a full-length LP for Black Friday in November. For the month of June, Benson has unveiled “New Words of Wisdom”.

Benson’s sometimes bluesy, sometimes folksy sensibility takes on a slightly Caribbean vibe, with the defiant acoustic guitar paired with the pseudo-tropical hum of organs for a refreshing slice of Benson’s rural musicality. Still, Benson’s vocal presence remains the song’s core, sounding equally stoic and prepared and emotionally bankrupt as he contemplates what comes after the heartache (“I’ll call you friend/But we both know/That a thousand years/Couldn’t heal these wounds”). Listen in below.

For more from Benson, be sure to check out January’s “Swimming”, February’s “Oh My Love”, March’s “Purely Automatic”, April’s “Diamond”, and May’s “Swallow You Whole”.

Also watch Benson’s recent interview with Rock it Out! Blog:

The single comes from their most recent album 'Hummingbird'

Following a busy summer festival schedule and a string of September dates with The National, Scottish folk outfit Frightened Rabbit will head out on their own North American tour. The jaunt runs through the end of October and comes in support of the band’s latest album, Pedestrian Verse.

Frightened Rabbit 2013 Tour Dates:
06/18 – Haldern, UK @ Haldern Pop Bar
06/19 – Berlin, DE @ Lido
06/20 – Vienna, AT @ The Full Hit of Summer
06/22-24 – Scheessel & Neuhausen OB Eck, DE @ Hurricane & Southside Festival
06/26-30 – Worthy Farm, UK @ Glastonbury Festival
07/13 – Scotland, UK @ T in the Park
07/28 – Seattle, WA @ Capitol Hill Block Party
07/30 – Salt Lake City, UT @ The Depot
07/31 – Boulder, CO @ Etown Hall
08/02 – Montreal, QC @ Osheaga Festival
08/03 – Chicago, IL @ Lollapalooza
08/09 – Newquay, UK @ Boardmasters Music Festival
08/15 – Kiewit, BE @ Pukkelpop
08/16 – Gampel @ CH @ Gampel Open Air
08/18 – Biddinghuizen, NL @ Lowlands Festival
08/23 – Reading, UK @ Reading Festival
08/24 – Leeds, UK @ Leeds Festival
09/01 – Dorset, UK @ End of the Road Festival
09/08 – Nashville, TN @ Ryman Auditorium *
09/09 – Atlanta, GA @ Cobb Energy Centre *
09/11 – Charlotte, NC @ The Filmore Charlotte *
09/12 – Ashville, NC ...

Action Bronson -- the Queens-based rapper/gourmet chef known for handing out weed and steak dinners during live performances -- fit the Bonnaroo vibe like an extra large glove. He passed blunts to the soundboard operator, asked the audience to toss drugs onstage (they obliged), and routinely ventured not only into the crowd but outside of the performance tent itself. With just an announcement of "the show's out here now," Bronson left most of the crowd dumbstruck as he disappeared from view, circled the stage, and finally returned to a hero's welcome. Once his hour-long, freestyle-heavy set ended (after a performance of his debauchery-heavy "Hookers at the Point"), the crowd was left chanting his name, understandably thirsty for even more. [Billboard]

Queens rapper Action Bronson played Bonnaroo this past weekend, and this coming weekend (6/21), he'll play Delaware's Firefly Music Festival. After that, he'll return home to NYC to play a show at Santos Party House on June 25 with Harry Fraud, who produced Bronson's new EP, SAAAB Stories, which is out now and can be streamed via Spotify (where it premiered) below. Bronson also said in an interview with Whoo Kid (via HipHopDX) that it's going to be his last one-producer project, which he has many of, including Rare Chandeliers with The Alchemist, Blue Chips with Party Supplies, and more.

Tickets for the Santos show are on sal...

photos by Caroline Harrison

Inter Arma at Union Pool, 6/15/2013

Unlike Heavy Blanket the week before, the free Invisible Oranges presented Summer Thunder show on Saturday (6/15) did NOT get any noise complaints and went on as planned. This could be because the bands played indoors, but still featured raucous sets from Inter Arma (who played with Torche at 285 Kent), Anicon (who are hitting the road) and Pyrrhon (currently in the lab, working on a new LP). Regardless, the perfect weather, cheap beverages and great bands made for an excellent day at Union Pool. Many thanks to the bands, venue and all who attended! Pictures from the show are in this post and even more are up at at Invisible Oranges.

More pics below

Continue reading "Inter Arma, Anicon and Pyrrhon played the IO 'Summer Thunder' show at Union Pool (pics)" at brooklynvegan

Read and comment. From thedailyswarm.com.

Read and comment. From rollingstone.com.

Matthew Houck, a.k.a. Phosphorescent, already had a jam-packed tour schedule with tons of summer festival gigs and fall European dates lined up. Now, he’s announced a new batch of U.S. shows, including two opening for the one and only, Robert Plant. It looks like the Brooklyn based singer-songwriter will be on the road for most of what’s left of 2013, which means you literally have no excuse not to see him and witness his excellent Muchacho album in live form.

For a preview, check out our report of Phosphorescent’s show from last weekend’s Northside Festival in Brooklyn.

Phosphorescent 2013 Tour Dates:
06/30 – Montauk, NY @ The Surf Lodge
07/13 – Ottawa, ON @ Ottawa Bluesfest
07/14 – Burlington, VT @ Signal Kitchen %
07/16 – Columbus, OH @ A and R Music Bar %
07/17 – Cleveland, OH @ Rock & Roll Hall of Fame %
07/18 – Louisville, KY @ Headliners %
07/20 – Chicago, IL @ Pitchfork Music Festival
07/25 – Boston, MA @ Bank of America Pavilion *
07/26 – Newport RI @ Newport Folk Festival
07/27 – Brooklyn, NY @ Prospect Park Bandshell *
07/28 – Philadelphia, PA @ XpoNential Festival
08/09 – Oslo, NO @ Oya Festival
08/10 – Goteborg, SE @ Way Out West Festival
08/11 – Copenhagen, DK @ Vega
08/13 – Helsinki, FI @ Tavastia
08/15 – Hasselt, BE @ Pukkel...

Electronic-duo Fuck Buttons announced last month that their new album, Slow Focus, will be released July 23 via ATP. This will be the first album for the English duo since its haunting 2009 release, Tarot Spot, and they’ve already already given us a taste of it with the pulverizing buzzsaw of a single, “The Red Wing.”

Today, the group has shared a fittingly discombobulating and warped video for the track via Pitchfork. The clip is a series of mirrored scenes centered around a single girl dancing and looks like it belongs at the opening credits of a James Bond film—let’s call it From Fuck Buttons With Love. Check out the video for “The Red Wing” below.

The post Watch: Fuck Buttons’ “The Red Wing” Video appeared first on CMJ.

The South Side of the Chi.

Whilst fellow Chicago driller Chief Keef might be having a pretty crappy week all being said (despite his appearance on Yeezus), the city’s burgeoning rap scene is still moving onwards and upwards – something that’s plain and clear on this new cut from local rapper Giftz. Featuring a guest appearance from man-0f-the-moment

Read and comment. From thedailyswarm.com.

Music critics make mistakes all the time, and I made one two years ago, when I reviewed Austra’s debut album Feel It Break for Pitchfork. I gave that album a positive review, but it was one of those wait-and-see positive reviews, like, “They’re onto something here! Let’s see what they can do next time around!” This was wrong. They were not onto something. They did something. Austra was, and is, the group led by Katie Stelmanis, a much-admired fixture on Toronto’s art-punk scene with a voice like a heavily medicated soaring eagle. She’d linked up with a group of synthetic musicians and a pair of unearthly-beautiful twins who sang soft-monotone backing vocals, and together, they’d made an album of miasmic, uncanny synthpop, music that used the grammar of dance music to cast a warm spell that never once invited dancing. The album stuck firmly within a single mode, never varying from its thick and deep central sound, and maybe that lack of variance was why I didn’t entirely trust the spell that the album cast on me. If they expanded that core sound, I thought, maybe that spell would become stronger. This was dumb, because two years later, that album’s spell lingers; it might’ve even gained in strength. But it wasn’t entirely dumb, because now Austra have made an album that expands on their original sound, and it’s even better than the one that came before.

R...

Firefly 2012 (more by Dana (distortion) Yavin)

It's been crazy both in and not-in the NYC-area for festivals this past week. NYC was taken over by a very muddy Governors Ball last weekend (6/7-9), and this past weekend (6/14-16), while almost every Brooklyn venue took part in the Northside Festival, Toronto was hosting NXNE and Tennessee had Bonnaroo to name the ones we were most focused on. That's all behind us now, but those who are into festivals still have much more to look forward to this summer including another big one on the east coast this weekend.

This coming weekend, Friday, June 21-Sunday, June 23, the Firefly Music Festival is returning to Dover, Delaware's Dover International Speedway, which is only about a 3 hour drive (directions) from NYC. The festival debuted last year, and like Governors Ball, they've upped their game a bit this year. There will be a bunch of great bands across four main stages, like:

On Friday, there's sets by Django Django, Dr. Dog, Action Bronson, Foxygen, Public Enemy, Grizzly Bear, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Earl Sweatshirt (who was added to the lineup in May) and more. And besides RHCP vs Earl (who start 15 minutes apart), the conflicts that day aren't too bad.

On Saturday, there's sets by Japandroids, Jim James (who replaced Imagine Dragons, so bonus points for that), Kendrick Lamar, Alabama Shakes vs Lord...