Great week of music 'round here...

Tuesday, October 20
Lauren B and I will be Djing tonight at Buster's, from 10pm till the party stops. Come play with us. Best pool tables in town. It's FREE. (not $1 like we had formerly advertised.)

Wednesday, October 21

• Cult Film Series presents Quadrophenia at Al's Bar, 7pm
• Everyone Lives, Everyone Wins; Holy Mountains (new band featuring 3 members of Allegionaire); Dark Castle at the Hop Hop Garage. Uber-heaviness at the newly instated drone temple that ELEW christened at Boomslang a couple weeks ago. Seriously good space, seriously good jams. EARLY show, will be over by 11pm (at which point you should tune into WRFL for the last hour of my radio show).
• Randy Tuesday and the Two Two Tuesdays at Green Lantern, 10:30 pm, 21+
  

Thursday, October 22
TARA JANE O'NEIL, MT. EERIE, NO KIDS at Red Mile Round Barn.
All ages, $5 UK students, $7 general public.
One of the highlights of an insanely good week for music. Beautiful, beautiful stuff. Read me gush about it here.

Friday, October 23
The For Carnation at the Speed Museum's "Art After Dark" event (Louisville, 9 pm $10)
The For Carnation is a really awesome Louisville band featuring Brian McMahan (of Slint) and a rotating cast of characters. Not sure what the exact line-up will be for this show, but i think it includes Todd Cook (Parlour, Shipping News, Crain, etc.) and;
I was under the impression that The For Carnation was a thing of the past and that as often as I listen to their self-titled album (which is great!), they were one of those bands I would never get a chance to see live. Then recently I learned they were playing the ATP 10 years anniversary party in England, and then they (rather quietly) announced this "Art After Dark" event (which also features multi-media art, zombie theater, fire dancing and an early performance by renowned Lexington cellist Ben Sollee). Word on the street is that this will be an all cover set, which is slightly a bummer to me because I really love their originals, but maybe they didn't feel the Louisville art museum crowd would take to their suuuuuuper sloooooow and heavvvvy post rock (kind of like Slint on some really good downers). Anyway, I've been told to expect Nina Simone, George Michael, Curtis Mayfield (which may be why the Art After Dark description describes them as being "R&B-influenced," a term I would never personally employ when talking about The For Carnation, but which I guess sort of makes sense in a weird way...)
RIYL Slint, Shipping News, Explosions in the Sky.
Highly recommended :)

Saturday, October 24
The Black Angels & The Raveonettes @ Southgate House

Sunday, October 25
Broadcast and Atlas Sound at the Wexner Center (Columbus, Ohio)
It's a bit of a haul, but shit, Broadcast came all the way from England and your 3-hour drive will TOTALLY be worth it.
Broadcast = sexy British femme fatale shoegaze magic. New mini album with The Focus Group drops October 26. Maybe the merch guy will hook it up at midnight.
Atlas Sound = aka Bradford Cox = aka Deerhunter frontman = aka dude who told you at Boomslang that if you acted that if you talked during the set of a Phil Elverum show (Microphones/Mt. Eerie), Phil would beat the shit out of you and your blood would totally be on his sweater = aka beautiful and lo-fi melodic space pop.

Win a pair of tix to see The Features!

Win a pair of tickets to see The Features (Nashville) and The Modern Skirts (Athens, GA) this Friday October 16 at Buster's! 18 + show!

Both bands give great live performances - poppy, vintage, upbeat, new wave-influenced.

To enter, e-mail kyblueline@gmail.com telling me whether or not you've ever been to a Features show before, and I will draw a winner at random on Friday, sometime between noon - 2 pm. Be sure to include your contact info (phone number).

To listen to both bands, visit the Buster's site here.

about The Features' new album:
"Self-produced with the help of stalwart supporters Kings of Leon and Jacquire King (Tom Waits, Kings of Leon), Some Kind of Salvation combines the eclectic, folksy sensibility of the band’s EP, The Beginning (2003), with the driving, live energy of Exhibit A, the group’s first full-length, which was released by Universal in 2004. The new album also expands on the band’s self-released EP Contrast (2006), which experimented with new soundscapes and included the band’s first collaboration with keyboardist Mark Bond. His subtle textures added a new sonic fullness to the band’s vintage, melodic pop songs."

about Modern Skirts:
"Some might say we’ve come up with our own homegrown version of Sloan: another band of accomplished musicians who know their rock history intimately and have a similar knack for matching hooky verses with dazzling choruses. But that wouldn’t do justice to the band’s offbeat diction and endlessly intriguing lyrics. We’ll put it this way: you won’t always know exactly what’s happening in a Modern Skirts song, but you’ll always be curious, and surprised, at where they’re going next."

Don't Miss - amazing three-act bill at Red Mile Round Barn

wrfl presents....
Tara Jane O'Neil, Mount Eerie, No Kids at Red Mile Round Barn
Thursday October 22, 8:30 p.m.
$5 UK Students; $7 general public

I'll go ahead and tell you, I have been looking forward to this event as being exactly what I needed after Boomslang - a totally awesome, totally chill show I could actually sit down and enjoy. It's kind of a toss up as to who will be 'headlining,' because both Tara and Mount Eerie are so phenomenal...I have a feeling it will be Mount Eerie, but I am every bit as excited to see Tara Jane. (I really don't know much about No Kids, but if they got on this bill they've gotta be great.)

Tara Jane O'Neil might just be my pick for under-hyped Kentucky talent - not to say that people don't know who she is, but I feel like her career hasn't been marked by the indie hoopla that surrounds names like Will Oldham, Jim James, or more recently, Vandaveer or Ben Sollee - though she is every bit as talented, seminal and capable of creating drop-dead ballads as any of those guys. Her new album, "A Ways Away" (K Records) is an absolute beauty, though my favorite album that I've heard of hers is by far "You Sound, Reflect" (2004, Quarterstick Records). A native Kentuckian who moved to the west coast a while back, O'Neil was integral to the Louisville underground post-punk scene in the '90s, playing a role in a number of bands at a time when Louisville was easily at the center of esteemed (if underground) alternative music in the entire country. O'Neil was in the short-lived but heavy-hitting Rodan (with Jason Noble and Jeff Mueller, both of Shipping News), but she was also in Retsin, The Sonora Pine and others, and played on Papa M's album "Whatever, Mortal." (She was also in this really cool cult movie called Half-Cocked, in which she, Noble, Meuller and other 'actors' play otherversions of themselves in a story about being clueless punk rockers on tour.)

However, all this name dropping and background says nothing about O'Neil's current music - her evolution from the more aggressive and dissonant sound that pervaded the Louisville scene in the '90s has led her to create beautiful, haunting melodies that still carry underpinnings of noise, psychedelia, discontent, heavy emotion...but talking about her songs doesn't do them justice in the slightest - listen to them here. (On a side note, O'Neil is also a visual artist and usually has artwork for sale on her tours too.)

Mount Eerie = Phil Elverum of the Microphones (you know, the guy Bradford Cox informed his slightly restless Boomslang crowd on October 9 who absolutely would not put up with talking during his set. So, if you talk during Elverum's set, and he beats the shit out of you like Bradford said he would, don't say you weren't warned.).
I admit I haven't followed his past few albums, but the new album "Wind Poems" is a departure from the Microphones' experimental lo-fi blippy psych pop, and a movement into dark, arresting poem-songs that are hollow and layered at once, one of which ("Between Two Mysteries") directly takes from the Twin Peaks theme song and therefore automatically garners my attention and respect (he actually alludes to Twin Peaks during the song, but I think he's talking about the overlook in San Francisco, not the David Lynch series/film - still an interesting thing to do).

No Kids = Vancouver indie pop who will be backing Mt Eerie as well. (They are also touring with Karl Blau this fall, who is coming to Lexington on November 5 with Lake.)

All this goodness will take place in the intimate and majestic setting of the Red Mile Round Barn on a Thursday night. It's the first show on this leg of the tour, and I predict a pretty magical evening. See you there...

mooooore....?

So, there just so happens to be overwhelmingly amazing slew of shows in the upcoming weeks to ease any Boomslang withdrawal you might be fearing. I am trying to muster the strength to do my Official Recap while the memories are still fresh and vivid....hopefully I'll be able to get it up by the end of the week. In the meantime, check out some of the press and photos from the festival, here!

some upcoming shows you should most definitely have on your radar (and it don't stop):

FRIDAY OCTOBER 16
Dinosaur Jr. at Headliner's

SATURDAY OCTOBER 17
The N.E.C. w/ Jovantaes, Speech Boys, Cross at Al's Bar

SATURDAY OCTOBER 17
Indian Jewelry/Sword Heaven/Death Beam at Art Damage Lodge in Cincy

THURSDAY OCTOBER 22
Tara Jane O'Neil and Mount Eerie at Red Mile Round Barn

FRIDAY OCTOBER 23
The For Carnation at Speed Museum After Dark (Louisville)

SUNDAY OCTOBER 25
Broadcast and Atlas Sound at Wexner Auditorium in Columbus

SATURDAY OCTOBER 31
Man Man at Buster's - Halloween 'Halfway to Beaux Arts' fundraiser

SATURDAY NOVEMBER 21
Shellac at 930 Listening Room (Louisville) - Jason Noble benefit. If there are still tickets to this, I'd be shocked, and I bet they won't last for long!!

THE DEAL WITH FRIDAY BUSTER'S SHOWS

(faust)

so here's the deal with the Friday Buster's shows

MUSIC STARTS AT 7 pm, with my vote for mystery-man-who-ends-up-stealing-the-show CASINO VERSUS JAPAN. He may have a surprise up his sleeve, he may not, who knows?? He's awesome either way. Bradford Cox has cited him as an influence. And works at your favorite record store..

And ATLAS SOUND will take the stage shortly thereafter, and be finished before 9 so be on time as much as possible! You can still make Atlas Sound if you go see Rachel Grimes! The hip hop show may go till 8 but you can experience one of the early shows and still catch 5 great bands at buster;s!

Bradford Cox has had pneumonia an has been majorly under the weather. Send him happy, healthy thoughts. Dude's getting ready to go on an extensive tour with BROADCAST for chrissake! We are thrilled he still wants to play Boomslang, of course, and are giving him an early slot so he can rest rather than raging until 2:30 am with us (there will be plenty of other options for us to do that!!!).

PARLOUR, featuring former members of Crain, Aerial M, The For Carnation - Louisville all-star band - hits the stage after that, then MISSION OF BURMA then friggin' FAUST!!!!!

In the midst of all that, the line-up in the Billiards Room is epic in and of itself:

GOOD POSTURE CLUB > CABOLADIES > PEAKING LIGHTS > TINY FIGHTS

So, yeah...tickets are "going like hotcakes" in the words of one co-organizer. See ya there....! DOORS AT 6! MUSIC ACTUALLY STARTS AT 7!"

-riot

Rachel Grimes and Sound/Vision

Rachel Grimes has announced she will be opening her Boomslang performance at the Second Presbyterian Church with several of Erik Satie's 'Gnossiennes,' and then performing Book of Leaves, her gorgeous new solo piano album released last month on Karate Body Records. Perhaps best well known for her role in the amazing chamber group Rachel's (not names after Rachel!), Grimes is also a member of Louisville's King's Daughters and Sons, and has appeared on recordings by Tara Jane O'Neil, Shipping News, and many others.

Sound/Vision, Lexington's own (stunning) modern composition ensemble, will be opening the evening with 'Le Moutons de Panurge' by Frederic Rzewski.

5:00 pm Friday October 9

Show at 5:30

$6 general public/free with boomslang pass!

Hope to see you there - it's going to be a really beautiful and stimulating two sets, and one of the only sit-down shows we will have - there will be plenty of time to catch the evening shows at Buster's afterward!

2nd Pres is located on Main Street and Ransom, directly next to the Woodlands building. Turn on Ransom from Main and park on the street or in the Goodwin Square parking lot (approved parking for the church. Front Door Entry!