R.I.P.: Former Ramones manager Linda Stein murdered?!

From the NME:

Stein, 62, who was once married to famous Sire Records head/Warner Brothers Vice President Seymour Stein, was found dead in her kitchen.

In recent times, Stein was well-known in show business circles as a realtor for high-profile and celebrity clients including Billy Joel, Calvin Klein and Bruce Willis.

Stein died from blunt force trauma to the head. Police are treating the death as murder, and are continuing investigations. They say there were no signs of forced entry to her Fifth Avenue apartment.

Holy shitbombs, yo.  What the fuck caused all of this?  Obviously (and this is due to our huge amounts of time spent watching the CSIs and the L&Os), because of the lack of forced entry, the alleged perp should be someone she knows.

(mp3)    The Ramones - We're A Happy Family

Godspeed!

P.S. Happy Halloween!

Go get wasted and wreck some pumpkins (or not, you don't HAVE to be destructive you know).  Enjoy the night.  Maybe we'll see you at the MOTHERFUCKER??

(mp3)    Dead Kennedys - Halloween, from the Plastic Surgery Disasters LP

Godspeed!

Video: Mark Ronson and Charlie from The Rumble Strips cover Amy Winehouse - "Back To Black"

Oh, Mark Ronson.  When you're not reclaiming soul music through your producing/remixing/deejaying skills, you find the time to pay homage to the artists you love/work with.  How totally UN-patronizing of you.  Taken from Ronson's Electric Proms performance, this minute-long teaser was enough to catch our attention.  For a minute, that is.  Enjoy.  PLUS, we're totally (for some reason or another) digging the WHAM!-infused garage pop of The Rumble Strips.

(mp3)    The Rumble Strips - Boys and Girls in Love

(mp3)    Mark Ronson featuring Amy Winehouse - Valerie

Godspeed!

News: Trent Reznor announces full details for Y34RZ3R0R3M1X3D

Y34RZ3R0R3M1X3D, coming November 20,  features all 14 tracks from the original LP with remixes from a veritable assault of pop culture icons, from Joy Division and New Order's Stephen Morris, the guys in Kronos Quartet, hip-hop poet (and recent graduate of Reznor's "let's release this shit ourselves school of thought") Saul Williams, avant-garde leader Bill Laswell, Olof Dreijer from The Knife, Interpol's Sam Fogarino and Clark and company from The Faint.  Stunningly though, the remix record also includes work by an unknown fan who submitted his interpretation via the Internet (along with many many many other remixes sent in by fans to boot).

Here's the situation: you can get it via digital download, the CD version's package includes a complete DVD of Year Zero tracks in their master formats.  Meaning, you can futz with them completely in GarageBand (or whatever you PC users do things like that with).  The vinyl version is 180 gram and comes in a six-panel gatefold.

A special Web site, remix.nin.com, will debut on the release date, too.

From Reznor himself:

I can make this easy for you: if you just want to hear the tracks as cheaply as possible, get it digitally. The highest fidelity will likely be Amazon (through legal means).

If you want something that's aesthetically cool and will enhance any collection, get the vinyl. Trust me, it looks great. The extra tracks are fairly minor embellishments to the whole (and surely someone will upload them instantly).

If you want higher quality tracks legally, a nice package AND a complete multitrack of the whole record, get the physical CD / DVD ROM.

Tracklist (download and CD version):

01 gunshots by computer: saul williams
02 the great destroyer: modwheelmood
03 my violent heart: pirate robot midget
04 the beginning of the end: ladytron
05 survivalism: saul williams
06 capital g: epworth phones
07 vessel: bill laswell
08 the warning: stefan goodchild featuring doudou n'diaye rose
09 meet your master: the faint
10 god given: stephen morris & gillian gilbert
11 me, i'm not: olof dreijer
12 another version of the truth: kronos quartet & enrique gonzalez muller
13 in this twilight: fennesz
14 zero sum: stephen morris & gillian gilbert

Tracklist (180 gram gatefold vinyl):

Side 1
01 gunshots by computer: saul williams
02 the great destroyer: modwheelmood
03 my violent heart: pirate robot midget
04 the beginning of the end: ladytron
05 capital g: epworth phones

Side 2
01 the warning: stefan goodchild featuring doudou n’diaye rose
02 meet your master: the faint
03 god given: stephen morris & gillian gilbert
04 vessel [mix 1]: bill laswell

Side 3
01 capital g: switch
02 me, I’m not: olof dreijer

Side 4
01 the good soldier: sam fog
02 vessel [mix 2]: bill laswell

Side 5
01 capital g: ladytron
02 another version of the truth: kronos & enrique gonzalez müller
03 in this twilight: fennesz
04 zero sum: stephen morris & gillian gilber

(mp3)   capital g (switch remix)

Godspeed!

R.I.P.: Robert Goulet will no longer hock Emerald Nuts

The singer [Goulet] died Tuesday morning in a Los Angeles hospital while awaiting a lung transplant, said Goulet spokesman Norm Johnson.

He had been awaiting a lung transplant at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles after being found last month to have a rare form of pulmonary fibrosis.

Goulet had remained in good spirits even as he waited for the transplant, said Vera Goulet, his wife of 25 years.

"Just watch my vocal cords," she said he told doctors before they inserted a breathing tube.

The Massachusetts-born Goulet, who spent much of his youth in Canada, gained stardom in 1960 with "Camelot," the Lerner and Loewe musical that starred Richard Burton as King Arthur and Julie Andrews as his Queen Guenevere.

(video)    Robert Goulet - Sunrise, Sunset

Godspeed!

mp-FREE: The Arcade Fire respond to Sasha Frere-Jones

You know I just love me some gossip.  So when New Yorker writer (and unbelievably awesome role model up until this point) Sasha Frere-Jones wrote a piece about the dooming "whiteness" of indie rock, including a stabbing reference to Montreal's finest kids on the block, Arcade Fire, we could've only hoped for some kind of response.

And now we have it.  Notably late on this one (the original posting was put up on Frere-Jones' site on Oct 26), but whatevs.  At least we have this: an mp3 dissecting what Arcade Fire lead Win Butler can only describe as "parts of our songs that I think steal quite blatantly from black people’s music from all over the globe".

In the mash-up, we hear The Supremes, Konono No. 1, some mariachi, Gladys Knight, Beastie Boys, and The Beatles doing "Twist and Shout", among others.  Enjoy.

(mp3)    Arcade Fire and their influences mash-up

Godspeed!

CSS declares "Music is My Hot Hot Sex" for the iPod touch

(mp3)    CSS - Music is My Hot Hot Sex, from the CSS LP

Godspeed!

Emerging: Kaspar Hauser

Kaspar Hauser is a cool band name.  And thankfully, it's just a band name.  The nom de plume of Chicago, IL native Thomas Comerford (a much better, more normal name), KH has, over the last half-decade or so, been self-releasing material that mixes completely unequal parts Petty, Reed and Tweedy, which, if you follow that train of thought, has bred the kind of jangly folk pop that only geneticists can properly prepare for.

The latest from the group, this year's pretty much stellar all around Quixotic/Taxidermy, finds Comerford crafting swagger-filled vignettes and empty motel room crooning ballads.  Having worked on the record off and on since 2004, Comerford (whose day job is that of a film professor at the windy city's Art Institute) and company create arrangements that are sometimes sparse and almost always fierce, giving Comerford's strained falsetto center-stage.  This is certainly a must-listen.

(mp3)    King Pop

(mp3)    Without a Word

Godspeed!

mp-FREE: Ween - "Your Party"

To be perfectly frank about this whole thing, we have to tell you that we actually DO NOT really like Ween all that much.  Too much shlock is just that.  Too much.  But we finally got around to listening to Gene and Dean's latest epic masterpiece, La Cucaracha, and it's quite good.  Borderline great, even.  Harnessing the musical genreless approach that they've honed over the last two decades, the record is composed so densely of influences and parodies that it begs for no discussion, only listening.  So we'll let that happen.  Enjoy "Your Party", a track so overcome by slickness and suave that it may as well be the soundtrack to a Billy Dee Williams Colt 45 commercial.  Awww yeah.

(mp3)    Ween - Your Party, from the La Cucaracha LP

Buy La Cucaracha from the Rounder Records store now.

Godspeed!

The Red Sox win!

And we don't really care, but this video of Dropkick Murphys performing "Tessie" at the ALCS is totally on repeat for us at this point.  We just love the Celtic-edged punk (and have for years).  These guys kill live.

Godspeed!