Thursday, March 27, 2008

American Music Club @ Sled Island

Yep, the American Music Club are playing the Sled Island music festival in Calgary. Thats in Canada in case you didn't know. It takes place on the 27th and 28th June if you are interested.

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Bruce Kaphan On New No-Man Album

Ex Music Clubber and all round excellent pedal steel player Bruce Kaphan appears on the new album by a band called No-Man. No idea what they sound like but
"schoolyard ghosts is released by Kscope / Snapper music in mid-May, 2008, and will feature a 22 piece orchestra on the 13 minute track truenorth, as well as contributions from a number of guest collaborators (including Pat Mastelotto, Bruce Kaphan, Porcupine Tree's Gavin Harrison and Colin Edwin, and Tim Bowness Band members, Pete Morgan, Andrew Booker and Peter Chilvers)."
So there.

Thursday, March 20, 2008

User Generated Content???

The tour is well underway and apart from the fact that Mark has started doing Firefly as a solo encore, there isn't much else for me to report. However, if any of you have reviews, photos, videos, audio recordings of the current tour tat you would care to share then let me know. Either leave a comment with details or e-mail me at "ThirdPrize AT Gmail DOT Com" and I will post them on the site.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Danny Pearson News

There seems to be a flurry of activity over at the web site of our favourite bass player. He has a new album coming out on Evangeline Records and is doing a few gigs in preparation for it. The next one is the 6th April at the Cafe Du Nord in San Francisco as part of a Evangeline Records showcase.

There is also a remastered version of Reds Recovery Room available for download. This features everything from the (now out of print) original as well as a couple of bonus tracks. I really liked this album so it is really worth $12 if you haven't got it already.

Monday, March 10, 2008

Nick Drake

There is an interesting interview with Mark Eitzel in Harp Magazine where he discusses the influence of Nick Drake on his work. A few interesting titbits including the fact he never got into Nick until after the band had started and that he was friends with Heath Ledger.

Wednesday, March 05, 2008

Atwater Afternoon CD Review

Well, a month after I got my copy I have finally got round to doing a review of it. Atwater Afternoon is a Ltd Ed release of a couple of sessions recorded by the new look American Music Club. I say a couple of sessions as the first half sounds like demos for the new album while the latter half sound like it was recorded "live" in the studio.

There are 13 tracks in all. Of these, 3 are old country standards, one is written and sung by Vudi and one is by new band member Steve Didelot. There is definitely a bit of a country vibe running through the whole thing. Steve's song is a classic bit of country all about a book called "The Insiders Guide to life". It gets passed down from generation who admit that they have "never read it son, but I really think you should". the other cover of note is "I'm your Puppet" which has Mark reaching for the falsetto he last used on "Move on Up". "Long Long Walk" is supposed to be an out take from the Golden Age. Based on the evidence of this, the new version of the AMC could have a good country album in them. The new boys know their licks and as Mark is feeling mellower these days we could have another Everclear or California.

The last 3 tracks sound a bit more live than the rest. There is lots of Cymbals there but you can't really make out much other detail.

It is also worth noting that the ones sold on the current tour make up the very limited CDR run of 300. I managed to get one of these complete with a hand drawn cover by Vudi. The ones on the Internet will be a run of 1500 proper CDs with proper printed covers.

Tuesday, March 04, 2008

Yeee Gods!!!

It has come to my attention that a comedian named Neil Hamburger has released a CD of country covers, among them being the American Music Clubs "Hula Maiden". And I quote ...

"But his album-closing take on Eitzel’s “The Hula Maiden” played semi-straight is a real gem, bringing out both the over the top self-pitying indulgence of the song even as he refashions it as a lost country classic. It’s almost kind of brilliant."

Monday, March 03, 2008

The Tale Of a Support Band

There is a nice blog post here from the band Dacianos about their support slot on the recent American Music Club tour. It was last Friday, 29 February at the venue called John Dee in Oslo.