Hailing from Nashville, JEFF the Brotherhood is the two-piece of brothers Jake and Jamin Orrall. Their newest double-album Global Chakra Rhythms is ... More

JEFF the Brotherhood

Album “Global Chakra Rhythms”

JEFF the Brotherhood

Album “Global Chakra Rhythms” 

Hailing from Nashville, JEFF the Brotherhood is the two-piece of brothers Jake and Jamin Orrall. Their newest double-album Global Chakra Rhythms is their second release this year (and 10th in total), following last spring’s Wasted on the Dream. The album features collaborators Jack Lawrence of The Dead Weather/Raconteurs, Reece Lazarus of Bully and Jessica McFarland, and a song originally recorded with Jack White at Third Man Records.

This year, Jake Orrall also played on friend/fellow musician Colleen Green’s album I Want to Grow Up. Read our doodle Q&A between the two here.

via Infinity Cat

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Honduras gives you two options: either turn them off or turn them up, because once they’re on you certainly can’t ignore them. ... More

Honduras

Album “Rituals”

Honduras

Album “Rituals”

By Kris Pitzek

Kanye West and Bob Dylan are punk

Patrick Phillipscause they’re making their own decisions.” — Patrick Phillips



Honduras gives you two options: either turn them off or turn them up, because once they’re on you certainly can’t ignore them. Now a four piece based in Brooklyn, Honduras came into shape as a collaboration between two friends—lead vocalist Patrick Phillips and guitarist Tyson Moore—living rent-free in a basement in Bushwick. Or rather paying a lawyer for a civil case, which was cheaper than paying the landlord. Since taking a stab at Americana early on, Phillips and Moore have tested out various sonic personas before they eased into their current sound, putting out two EPs and now a debut album, Rituals.

Raucous live shows and a punk ethos draw Honduras comparisons to the Buzzcocks and The Sex Pistols, among a whole range of others, to which Phillips responds, “I think it means you’re creating original music if you’re not pinpointed down to a couple different bands. I find that flattering.” It’s clear that Honduras is a band bent on growing their sound organically without constricting themselves to a certain image. Adding drummer Josh Wehle and bassist Pauly Lizarraga to the mix for Rituals led to a broader, more communal effort, influenced by what they describe as “psychier stuff.” When the band came through LA on their tour, they talked about their beginnings, their video for “Paralyzed” and what it means to carry punk into 2015.



You are both from Missouri and relocated to Brooklyn?

Patrick Phillips: I played basketball at Hunter College [in New York], but the move was always about music. That was kind of the opportunity, but even back then I had no clue. I was just a big Bob Dylan fan at the time. We were making music when we were teenagers.

Tyson Moore: I went and studied audio engineering in Chicago, and then I worked at a small studio there. He came and stayed with me and we started writing some stuff. It was super different from what we do now. It was like Americana, Dylan-inspired…

PP: Ryan Adams kind of vibe

TM: We had good chemistry. Then he moved back to New York, and I decided I was done with the studio hustle game. I just wanted to get back to playing my own music.

PP: We just wanted to play in a band, and play more aggressively and just be loud. So we kind of started from scratch.


Since the beginning of last year, you put out two EPs and now a full album. How do you feel you’ve evolved since then?

PP: I’d say the big difference in this operation is that we’re fully a cohesive band now. These new songs that we’re playing now are all of our songs as opposed to me and him in a basement.


What do you think it means to be punk right now?

PP: The big punk thing is having control over your music. Not having anyone tell you what it really needs to sound like or whatever.

TM: That’s why people like Thee Oh Sees and Deerhunter are amazing. You see Bradford Cox’s progression of different genres record to record. Nobody’s calling the shots for him.

PP: You know, Kanye West and Bob Dylan are punk cause they’re making their own decisions.

TM: But then there’s the punk aesthetic of music, which we are also really influenced by. So I think we’ll always have that, even when we get into psychier stuff—the punk delivery comes through.


Tell me about your new music video for “Paralyzed.”

PP: Josh directed it and conceptualized it.

Josh Wehle: It was between me and our friend [Danny] Dwyer, who’s a brilliant dude. It went from just sitting at a bar crossing out ‘bad idea, bad idea’ and we all hit this love motel, sleazy fucking Jersey S&M dungeon. So I spent hours reading the Yelp reviews. People leave these hotels after doing whatever the fuck they do there and write these detailed reviews of what they did and how clean the showers are. I found pretty much the most disgusting one I could because you need a spot that wouldn’t really notice if you filed 15 people into a room with strobe lights.

PP: We were doing a lot less crazy stuff than what was going on in the other rooms, too. It was dark.

JW: Watching that parking lot could have been a reality show and would have done really well.
It’s in a part of Jersey that only has in-service strip clubs, abandoned strip clubs or sex hotels. They have rates that are like by the minute and by the hour. It’s some dark shit. But an amazing set for a music video. And you can’t really fake that unless you have 50 grand. You either need 15 dollars or 50 grand. And one Yelp review that really pushed you towards it.

via Black Bell Records

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EL VY is the collaboration born of a ten-year friendship between musicians Matt Berninger of The National and Brent Knopf of Ramona ... More

EL VY

Album “Return to the Moon”

EL VY

Album “Return to the Moon”

EL VY is the collaboration born of a ten-year friendship between musicians Matt Berninger of The National and Brent Knopf of Ramona Falls. Berninger and Knopf met while touring a string of small clubs along the West Coast back when Knopf played with his Portland-based band Menomena and both bands’ shows were still half-empty. The pair finally united on their debut album, Return to the Moon, a medley of Berninger’s trademark storyline lyrics and Knopf’s playful arrangements. The album was mostly written while the two worked in different parts of the world, sending samples and lyrics back and forth. Return to the Moon reflects this lighthearted banter. Rest assured that EL VY (pron. “el viy”) is a separate entity from the musicians’ current projects and does not mark a split with either—both bands are set to release new material in the coming months. As Berninger put it, EL VY indulges in “a lot of guilty pleasures without any guilt.”

via 4AD

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The world’s first punk record label, Ork Records, emerged in 1975 as the brainchild of Terry Ork, a SoCal cinephile who, after ... More

Ork Records: New York, New York

Box Set

Ork Records: New York, New York

Box Set

The world’s first punk record label, Ork Records, emerged in 1975 as the brainchild of Terry Ork, a SoCal cinephile who, after meeting Warhol’s clique shooting a surf film, relocated to NYC in 1968 for its underground post-disco scene and The Factory. Ork led the success of the club CBGB, and his fledgling Ork Records went on to release raucous debuts by Television and Richard Hell, as well as legendary recordings from Lester Bangs, The Feelies, Patti Smith, Talking Heads, Brian Eno, Blondie and The Ramones. Ork Records underlies punk mythology as a leading story of an underdog in a world of hustlers. It is riddled with heartbreak, financial straits and raw ambition. A musical narrative, Ork Records: New York, New York is a box compilation curated and released by Numero Group, giving voice to the forgotten genesis of punk and the birth of the New York indie scene ever after.

via Numero Group

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In the 1970s and ’80s East Village punk art scene, Jimmy DeSana was among those bringing photography into conversation with his compelling ... More

Suburban

Book by Jimmy De Sana

Suburban

Book by Jimmy De Sana 

In the 1970s and ’80s East Village punk art scene, Jimmy DeSana was among those bringing photography into conversation with his compelling and at times explicit work. In addition to his staged photos, DeSana photographed stars of downtown New York’s art and music scene, including Debbie Harry, David Byrne and Laurie Anderson. DeSana’s art graced the cover of the Talking Heads album More Songs about Buildings and Food and attracted the attention of William S. Burroughs, who penned the introduction to his Submission collection.

Jimmy DeSana: Suburban is the first print collection from his series of the same name, made throughout the late ’70s and into the ’80s. His nudes were intertwined with various everyday objects and lit with gel-covered Tungsten lights, suggesting both physical comedy and sadomasochism. “I don’t really think of [Suburban] as erotic,” DeSana said, “I think of the body as an object. I attempted to use the body but without the eroticism some photographers use frequently. I think I de-eroticized a lot of it… but that is the way the suburbs are, in a sense.” DeSana: Suburban is edited by Dan Nadel and Laurie Simmons, DeSana’s longtime roommate and friend, and offers access to an early, crucial body of DeSana’s work.

via Aperture/Salon 94

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In 1983, legendary photographer Mary Ellen Mark first photographed Erin “Tiny” Charles, a homeless 13-year-old sex worker with dreams of a horse ... More

Tiny, Streetwise Revisited

Book by Mary Ellen Mark

Tiny, Streetwise Revisited

Book by Mary Ellen Mark 

In 1983, legendary photographer Mary Ellen Mark first photographed Erin “Tiny” Charles, a homeless 13-year-old sex worker with dreams of a horse farm, diamonds, furs and children. Tiny was just one of Mark’s eight subjects for “Streets of the Lost,” a photo series in Life magazine documenting Seattle’s homeless and troubled youth working as pimps, prostitutes, panhandlers and small-time drug dealers.

In 1984, Tiny became the main subject of Streetwise, a film directed by Mark’s husband Martin Bell. The film was nominated for an Academy Award in 1985, propelling Tiny’s story into a sort of documentary cult status. In tandem with her husband’s film, Mary Ellen Mark released the accompanying photo book Streetwise. In the thirty years since, Mark has sustained her relationship with Tiny, continuing to photograph and at times interview her. Tiny, Streetwise Revisited now reveals these intimate portraits of Erin “Tiny” (née Charles) Blackwell and her 10 children along with conversations between Tiny, Mary Ellen Mark and Martin Bell. The photos speak to consistent issues of poverty, class, race and addiction against the evolving backdrop of time.

via Aperture

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California-based trio Fuzz—fronted by prolific musician Ty Segall—return with II, the awaited sequel to their eponymous 2013 debut. Segall, with longtime collaborator ... More

Fuzz

Album “II”

Fuzz

Album “II”

California-based trio Fuzz—fronted by prolific musician Ty Segall—return with II, the awaited sequel to their eponymous 2013 debut. Segall, with longtime collaborator Charles Moothart on guitar and Roland Cosio on bass, explores the prog, proto-metal and hard-rock influences known to inform his idiosyncratic sound. II is what you get when three supremely talented musicians geek out on the stuff looping through their headphones back in high school: Black Sabbath and Deep Purple. The result is distortion-drenched and well-honed, full of indulgent noodling and virtuoso jams, managing to be both hard rock nostalgic and gratifyingly fresh.

via In The Red

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With her heavy fringe, cat-eye and simple chic, French chanteuse Françoise Hardy was not only the muse for the likes of Mick ... More

Françoise Hardy

Five Album Reissue

Françoise Hardy

Five Album Reissue

With her heavy fringe, cat-eye and simple chic, French chanteuse Françoise Hardy was not only the muse for the likes of Mick Jagger and Bob Dylan, she embodied the modishness and creativity of 1960s Paris. Hardy’s prolific career began with five LPs en français, released yearly from 1962 to 1966. These albums, each named after their hit track, showcased her evolving style, maturing talent and inevitable stardom. Often described as “a pop singer with the heart of a chanteuse,” Hardy differentiated herself from her contemporaries by writing her own music regarding love and loneliness, deftly merging the French chanteuse tradition with blues, jazz, folk and rock.

Future Days Recording, a sub-label of Light in the Attic Records, will now reissue Hardy’s five iconic albums remastered from the original tapes—1962’s Tous les garçons et les filles, 1963’s Le Premier Bonheur du jour, 1964’s Mon amie la rose, 1965’s L’Amitié and 1966’s La Maison où j’ai grandi. Hardy, now seventy-one, provides an exclusive interview for the liner notes of the collection. (Future Days Recording)

via Light in the Attic Records

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Meadowland is a gorgeous directorial debut from cinematographer-cum-auteur Reed Morano, starring Olivia Wilde and Luke Wilson, with whom Morano worked on the ... More

Meadowland

Film by Reed Morano

Meadowland

Film by Reed Morano

Meadowland is a gorgeous directorial debut from cinematographer-cum-auteur Reed Morano, starring Olivia Wilde and Luke Wilson, with whom Morano worked on the set of last year’s Skeleton Twins. A cathartic meditation on loss and emptiness, Meadowland grips a once-happy couple in a nihilist’s New York City as they reel from the abduction of their son. The film is infused with moments of startling compositional beauty as it sifts through the deep despair of hours, days and weeks, blurring the poignancy and passage of time. Adam Taylor’s score hefts emotional weight, and the acting enhances even the slightest, quietest moments with a phenomenal supporting cast of Juno Temple and John Leguizamo.

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