Alternative Rock
They Might Be Giants Announce New Album BOOK, Share “I Can’t Remember the Dream”: Stream
A new album from They Might Be Giants is coming faster than you can say “Constantinople.” BOOK, the geek-rock icons’ 22nd (!!!) full-length LP, is due October 29th. As a preview of the upcoming music, TMBG have shared a surreal video for the snappy single, “I Can’t Remember the Dream.” BOOK, the album, is billed as a beacon of light amid a pretty unanimously rough period of time; As the band’s John Linnell describes, its songs are “humorously germane to the catastrophe going on around us.” “I Can’t Remember the Dream” is a perfect fit for this purpose, detailing all the benefits of a pleasant slumber: “I can’t remember the dream that I had last night/ But I woke with delight and excitement/ And then when I tried to remember the dream that I had last night/ It was gone, but the feeling I ha...
Weezer Cover Fall Out Boy’s “Sugar, We’re Goin’ Down” at New York’s Citi Field: Watch
Fans planning to catch Fall Out Boy on the Hella Mega Tour alongside Weezer and Green Day were bummed when the pop-punk icons pulled out of the New York City and Boston dates after a member of their team tested positive for COVID-19. But the show must go on, so last night at Citi Field, Weezer and opening act The Interrupters ensured the crowd’s Fall Out Boy hunger was satiated by ripping through not one, but two covers of “Sugar, We’re Goin’ Down.” It’s unclear whether or not the double-cover situation was accidental, but who would complain about getting to hear “Sugar, We’re Goin’ Down” twice in one night? While The Interrupters kept more true to the original punky attitude of the 2005 hit, Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo took a one-man approach with just his voice and guitar, making t...
Dinosaur Jr. Bring the Noise at NPR Tiny Desk (Home) Concert: Watch
Due to the pandemic, NPR has been hosting its beloved Tiny Desk Concert series wherever artists want to film their special contribution. Lots of people have replicated Bob Boilen’s famed office space by sitting behind their own desks, playing acoustic songs, or even recreating a miniature set in their apartment. Dinosaur Jr. are the latest group to film a Tiny Desk (Home) Concert, and they recreated the magic of that iconic NPR room for it by way of dozens of cute tchotchkes and other pieces of pop-culture iconography. Holed up inside an empty Shea Theater in Turners Falls, Massachusetts, Dinosaur Jr. enlisted a few camera operators and lighting assistants to help drag all of their tiny toys onstage. There’s a tiny wooden desk with a miniature laptop propped atop it, a giant stuffed animal...
Kurt Cobain’s Childhood Home Being Restored for Private Tours
Nirvana fans may soon be able to live out their dreams and visit Kurt Cobain’s Aberdeen, Washington childhood home in its original form. After being added to Heritage Register last week, the house’s current owner is continuing restoration plans with the goal of opening it to private tours next spring. Cobain lived in the one-and-a-half-story house from 1968 to 1984. The home’s current owner, Lee Bacon, and his wife Danielle bought it for $225,000 from the Cobain family in 2018. Bacon told Rolling Stone that plans to restore the house are “90 to 95 percent” complete. This will include repainting the exterior to match the “light-colored fern” and “dark-colored mint” colors it had in the ’70s. Meanwhile, the interior includes the Cobain family’s original dining room table and china hutch, the...
Bright Eyes’ Conor Oberst and Waxahatchee’s Katie Crutchfield Trade “Songwriting Slump” Tips and Discuss Returning to the Stage
Katie Crutchfield was destined to be a Bright Eyes fan. The singer-songwriter, who performs poignant folk-rock as Waxahatchee, recalls the music of Conor Oberst as a crucial turning point in her upbringing as a self-proclaimed outcast in suburban Alabama: “I feel like Bright Eyes had one of the biggest impacts of any band at the time,” Crutchfield tells Consequence by phone from her Kansas City home. It’s serendipitous that nearly twenty years after she first became enamored with albums like Letting Off the Happiness, Fevers and Mirrors, and Lifted or The Story Is in the Soil, Keep Your Ear to the Ground, Waxahatchee would be pegged to open for the Bright Eyes show, along with Lucy Dacus, at New York’s Forest Hills Stadium on July 31st. (The emo-folk titans played their first show tog...
Bleachers Shares New Album Take the Sadness Out of Saturday Night: Stream
It’s taken him a few detours to get here, but at last, Jack Antonoff has released Take the Sadness Out of Saturday Night, his first new album as Bleachers in four years. The follow-up to 2017’s Gone Now features guest vocals from Lana Del Rey and Antonoff’s fellow Jersey boy, Bruce Springsteen. Take the Sadness Out of Saturday Night spans ten tracks, which include the singles “Chinatown,” “Secret Life,” “How Dare You Want More,” and “Stop Making This Hurt.” While Antonoff’s previous releases as Bleachers felt contemporary with a splash of ‘80s sheen, Saturday Night feels more clearly indebted to hits of yesteryear, taking obvious inspiration from The Boss and utilizing more orchestral and baroque-pop elements. Inspired by both a romantic breakup and, of course, the pandemic, the album carr...
Angels & Airwaves Unveil New Single “Losing My Mind”: Stream
Angels & Airwaves have shared “Losing My Mind,” the latest preview from their upcoming album, Lifeforms. It arrives with a goofy music video in which frontman Tom DeLonge plays a sleazy character trying to make it big on “Tic Tac.” Appropriately, “Losing My Mind” is made for dancing with a heavy dose of synths combined with meme-worthy lyrics. “Now, what is this bullshit/ I said we’re not alone and the government knows it,” sings Delonge. “There’s idiots abound, and they’re all fucking racist/ I’ll put us back at ease because we need more complacent/ We’re all going to die.” Directed by DeLonge, the accompanying visual features him playing a character named Disco, the brother of his alter ego Boomer in Blink-182’s “First Date” video. It follows Disco’s night wandering in Las Vegas afte...
Sharon Van Etten, Jack Antonoff, Fred Armisen Join Beck Onstage at Newport Folk Festival: Watch
For being such a low-key event, Newport Folk Festival sure loves to jam as many star-studded cameos and surprises as possible into their schedule. The latest example of such went down on Tuesday when Beck was joined onstage by Sharon Van Etten, Jack Antonoff, and Fred Armisen for different songs. Because, you know, why not? Normally Newport Folk Festival takes place over the course of one weekend, but the 2021 edition of the event is operating a little differently. They divided their schedule up over two back-to-back three-day chunks, each with a completely unique lineup. To help mitigate COVID-19 risks, Newport organizers also limited the capacity to just 5,000 daily attendees. All of this helps set the scene for the magical reality of a cameo-filled set like the one Beck just p...
Turnstile Book Fall 2021 Tour with $uicideboy$, Unveil New Song “Blackout”: Stream
Turnstile have unleashed the new song “Blackout” as the latest single from their forthcoming album, Glow On. In addition, the band has unveiled dates for a fall 2021 US tour with hip-hop acts $uicideboy$ and Slowthai. Following the recent release of the chill-out song “Alien Love Call” (featuring Blood Orange), “Blackout” offers a wide range from Turnstile’s eclectic musical palette, including melodic verses, a hardcore chorus, and improvisational drum solos. The song is accompanied by a music video featuring animation by Alexis Jamet and Logan Triplett. Glow On will arrive on August 27th, and was preceded by the recent Turnstile Love Connection EP. With all four tracks from the EP (including the anthemic “Mystery”) included on the full-length album, we’ve now heard six songs from the 15-s...
Eddie Vedder’s Daughter Soundtracks Trailer for Sean Penn Movie Flag Day: Watch
Flag Day, a new drama film directed by Sean Penn, just got its first trailer and it features an unexpected music cameo. Singing atop the clip is Olivia Vedder, the daughter of Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder, with a song called “My Father’s Daughter.” Check it out below. Written by Glen Hansard and Eddie Vedder, “My Father’s Daughter” is a moving number about watching yourself grow into your parents’ traits, whether you wanted to or not. Luckily for Olivia Vedder, that includes being gifted a natural music talent from her dad which she displays in full force on the track. Over slow drumming and stripped-down guitar work, she goes right for the heart strings while violins mellow out the gentle song. Flag Day stars Sean Penn and his daughter Dylan Penn alongside Josh Brolin, Norbert Leo Butz...
Chad Smith’s Daughter Ava Maybee Covers Red Hot Chili Peppers: Watch
Ava Maybee is a Los Angeles-based musician who writes indie pop songs with a funk undercurrent. She’s also the daughter of Chad Smith, the drummer in Red Hot Chili Peppers and the internet’s favorite Will Ferrell lookalike. Over the weekend, she paid tribute to her dad’s band by covering “Universally Speaking” on Instagram, notes Exclaim. Check it out below. “Universally Speaking” originally appeared on Red Hot Chili Peppers’ classic 2002 album By the Way. It’s a poppy number full of vibrant guitar riffs and hard-hitting yet simple drums. But in the hands of Ava Maybee, the single turns into a moving piano ballad with gentle background ambiance. She’s got a naturally deep voice, and hearing it stripped down for this cover song makes it obvious just how talented of a singer she re...
Liz Phair Pulls Out of Tour With Alanis Morissette and Garbage, Replaced by Cat Power
Bad news for those who were planning to catch Liz Phair on tour with Alanis Morissette and Garbage this year: Phair announced this week that she had pulled out of the tour. In her place, fellow ’90s icon Cat Power will join the lineup on the Jagged Little Pill 25th anniversary tour. “Sadly, due to unforeseen circumstances, I won’t be able to join Alanis & Garbage on tour this summer,” the singer-songwriter wrote on Twitter. “I’m incredibly disappointed as I was looking forward to seeing all of your beautiful faces. Shoutout to Alanis, Garbage, and Cat Power, who I know will put on an incredible show. Hope to see you all soon!” The “Why Can’t I?” singer has yet to give any indication to what prompted her dropping out of the tour, which kicks off in Austin this August after being delayed...
