Get Ready to Be Elbow’ed to Death During the Summer Olympics
For those of you in Canada, you were surely sick of the 2010 Vancouver Olympic theme song on CTV by the end of the 2 weeks. You know the one I mean. Hopefully this decision won’t ruin Elbow for me – they have been chosen to record the 2012 Olympic Games soundtrack for the BBC (via NME). The rockers have written a 6 minute track, which will form the main theme for BBC’s Olympic Coverage. When Usain Bolt runs a sub 9.50s (you read it here first!), you’ll have Elbow playing along in your memories.
Elbow frontman Guy Garvey told BBC News, “We are knocked out to be involved and it’s been quite a challenge. We have feelings of real responsibility as we will be the soundtrack to so many images of personal sacrifice and endeavour while the nation roots for and celebrates with Team GB.”
Occupy Album Sales
It’s still cool to make Occupy jokes, right? Even though everyone has been saying “Occupy your couch” or “Occupy this beer” for 2 months straight, I can make it and think I’m original, right? Now that I’m done Occupying Sarcasm, I thought I’d let you know that Third Eye Blind are making a comeback! Third Eye Blind, along with Ladytron, Yo La Tengo, Devo, Crosby and Nash, Jackson Browne, and Lucinda Williams will all contribute to an Occupy Wall Street benefit album (via The Hollywood Reporter).
“Musician Jason Samel is putting together the album, and told The AP that they hope to raise between $1 million and $2 million to help support the movement. Money raised from the album will go through the nonprofit Alliance for Global Justice, with half the proceeds funneling to the New York movement, and the other half to other projects around the country and world.”
What do we call the protest that begins once Third Eye Blind is played endlessly on the radio again?
Blacklisted from Google: My Favourite Sites Pirate Bay, isoHunt, 4Shared
In what appears to be an attempt to play nice with movie and music companies, Google is blacklisting file-sharing websites from their Google auto-complete web searches (via Slash Gear). This blacklist on Google blocks the names of these websites in their Google Instant, auto-complete search services, but the webpages themselves remain indexed. I’ve been blacklisted from many, many things in my life (Girl Guides? Really?), but not from Google. I win, right?
“While there is no silver bullet for infringement online, this measure is one of several that we have implemented to curb copyright infringement online,” Google manager of global communications and public affairs Mistique Cano previously said to TorrentFreak. She also detailed that “this is something we looked at and thought we could make some narrow and relatively easy changes to our Autocomplete algorithm that could make a positive difference”.
isoHunt owner Gary Fung said told the blog in an interview, “It’s a lot more subtle than the censorship attempts made possible by the pending PROTECT IP and SOPA bills, but it’s still censorship and it starts small. Google is increasingly becoming a self-righteous Big Brother of the Web. So much for ‘Do no evil’”.
Watch! Austra – Lose It (Paper Bag Sessions)
Sort of like the From the Basement series, the Paper Bag Sessions strips down a band (no, not in THAT way – at least I don’t think so) and has them play without all that ‘studio magic’ (which I can’t seem to buy anywhere). Below you can see Austra play Lose It from their recent session. It simply features singer Katie Stelmanis sitting at a piano and playing – simple stuff, right? Except when I try to do it and end up falling off the piano bench.
Austra – Lose It (Paper Bag Sessions)
[youtube hvMA1loQAUc]
Tag Archives: Elbow
Morning Music Notes – Hip Hop Tue$day
Check out Bon Iver and Radiohead on Austin City Limits
Both Radiohead and Bon Iver stopped by Austin City Limits earlier this year to tape a segment for the legendary show. A behind the scenes of Radiohead’s Lotus Flower was previously released to get people like me excited – it worked. The shows for these bands will air on October 6 for Radiohead, and October 13 for Bon Iver (via Consequence of Sound). In an attempt to get us to tune in to the PBS session show, they have offered up the recordings of Radiohead’s Morning Mr. Magpie and Bon Iver’s Towers. Check them out below, and then tune in.
Radiohead – Morning Mr. Magpie (Live on Austin City Limits)
Click for more Morning Music Notes
SURPRISE! Olympics Were Popular on YouTube; Helped Artists’ Music Sales
Who knew that a bunch of ridiculous sports such as running and jumping with different legs three times, dancing horses, or throwing a pole would be SO popular? YouTube has released some numbers of its streaming partnership with NBC in the USA for the London 2012 Summer Olympics, and they look pretty good. The online peak saw 500,000 people streaming at once, and on NBCOlympics.com, 159 million total streams were watched (via Tech Crunch). In a sign of the times, 33% of these streams came from a mobile device. Across 65 countries, YouTube says 231 million video streams were watched. Sadly, none of these were for synchronized swimming.
In perhaps a surprise to no one, the artists that played at the Olympic Closing Ceremonies have received a sales boost because of their exposure (and not the indecent kind, unfortunately). Emeli Sandé’s debut album, Our Version of Events, is back atop the UK charts (via Billboard). Musicians and songs featured in the Opening and Closing Ceremonies ended up accounting for a massive 57 of the top 200 albums and 66 of the top 200 singles.
Ed Sheeran, who covered Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here, had his album jump from 8 to 3. The cover song is Number 34 on the Official Charts Company list, while the original song is number 68. The “talent” that is Jessie J went from 15 to 7, One Direction jumped 19 to 10, and the Spice Girls’ Greatest Hits made it to number 18, despite being a blank album.
John Lennon’s Imagine returned to number 18 in the charts, and Muse’s Survival went from 62 to 22. Despite playing in a ridiculous octopus on stage, Fatboy Slim’s Right Here Right Now is number 62.
Elbow sung two songs – One Day Like This from the album The Seldom Seem Kid. The album jumped to number 6, while the single 4. The other song was Open Arms from the album Build a Rocket Boys. The album went to number 35, while the song was number 58. Check out One Day Like This below, and then buy the song and continue to help the Olympic boost. Just because.
Elbow – One Day Like This
Morning Music Notes – Olympic Rejection
iTunes Festival Adds Hot Chip, Elbow, Bat for Lashes
Joining Noel Gallagher, Jack White, and Mumford & Sons for the month-long September iTunes Festival in London are Hot Chip, Elbow, and Bat for Lashes (via NME). And who says iTunes is good for nothing? The tickets can be applied for online through a system as wonderfully user friendly as iTunes itself.
Lots of People Turned Down the Closing Ceremonies
Remember me ranting about David Bowie’s Fashion being played at the Olympic Closing Ceremonies but no Bowie himself? It was just yesterday, so your memory must be worse than mine! The reason for no Bowie is because the man himself turned it down via NME.
It wasn’t just Bowie rejecting the Olympics like girls reject me – it was also The Rolling Stones, the Sex Pistols, and Kate Bush. I’m sure the reason is because they wanted to watch Blur play at Hyde Park, right? Or relax and watch the monstrosity that was the Closing Ceremonies.
Continue reading →
Morning Music Notes – The Jessie J Olympics
Closing Ceremonies Were What Brits Feared Opening Ceremonies Would Be
I’ll admit – the London 2012 Olympic Opening Ceremonies were pretty good, especially considering they had to follow up Beijing’s insane opener. Danny Boyle did a good job of mixing the humour, music, and history of Great Britain, with a few cool surprises. Who knew Mr. Bean was still alive? I feared the worst for the Opening Ceremonies, but these fears came to life in last night’s pretty average Closing Ceremonies.
For those who missed it, there were no big surprises, few stand out moments, and WAY too much of mediocre pop act Jessie J. We had recordings of Kate Bush, Blur, John Lennon (and a creepy wall built that resembled Lennon), as well as a loop of already played songs by Pet Shop Boys and Madness. Also performing were Emeli Sandé (twice), George Michael (who did Freedom, and an an awful new song that lost the crowd), Elbow, the Kaiser Chiefs, that Ron Weasley twin Ed Sheeran playing a cover of Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here (with Nick Mason on drums), Ray Davies from the Kinks, Queen with that awful Jessie J singing, Fatboy Slim DJ’ing in an octopus, a Spice Girls reunion, Beady Eye covering the Noel Gallagher penned Oasis tune Wonderwall, Muse doing Olympic anthem Survival, and everything closed out with The Who. They couldn’t get David Bowie to play during the musical tribute to British fashion (ya, I didn’t get it either) which featured David Bowie’s Fashion. We did get boy (now man) band Take That, minus Robbie Williams. If we could’ve minused the other 4 members, we would’ve been alright.
I lied – there was one stand out moment. Monty Python alumni Eric Idle sung Always Look on the Bright Side of Life, complete with the “life’s a piece of shit” line. He didn’t get the laughs that Mr. Bean did, and I would’ve preferred a Monty Python reunion over a Spice Girls one, but I’ll take it. Now – withdrawal time. I want to watch random sports that I can only watch every 4 years. There just instead enough dressage with moonwalking horses on daytime television to satisfy my cravings.
The Flaming Lips Are Doing a Musical – Of Course They Are!
One of my favourite albums, Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots, is being turned into a musical by its creators, The Flaming Lips (via NME). The musical will play at La Jolla Playhouse in San Diego, California from November 6 to December 16, and if it’s anything like a Flaming Lips concert, it will be fuckin’
WEIRDgreat. Producers have said, “Yoshimi is a young Japanese artist facing the battle of her life: the battle for her life. Adrift from her family and lover, Yoshimi journeys alone into a fantastical robot-world where she wages a war with fate. Will her will to survive be powerful enough to master the evil forces that threaten to destroy her?”So basically, a thrown together plot, ala American Idiot by Green Day, using the band’s appeal to attempt to milk another audience for some more money, amiright? The musical will have music from the Yoshimi album, as well as Soft Bulletin and At War With The Mystics.
Click for more Morning Music Notes, including Beastie Boys, the Vaccines, and Drake
Morning Music Notes – The Brit (Awards) Are Coming!
Facebook Joins the Listening Party Bandwagon; Will Hit 1 Billion Users
Similar to the popular Turntable.fm, Facebook users can now simultaneously listen to music and have a group chat session (via Hypebot). The new feature is called Listen With, and it sets up a chat room where you can, um, chat, and also share tunes with your friends. It’s like a real life listening party – but not! The service currently uses Spotify and Rdio, and will add more streaming services in the future. Now since your friends are all having a streaming party without you, it looks like you’ll need to finally get that Spotify (or Facebook!) account to get in on the action with your friends. Or pick up the phone, and you know, invite them over to your house.
It looks like resistance is futile – Facebook will soon have ONE BILLION users as of this August (via Digital Trends). This is pretty amazing, considering the world has anout 7 billion people, and not all of them are a) internet connected or b) internet saavy or c) in a respectible age bracket to actually use Facebook. There are currently 800 million users, and with new games and features (such as the aforementioned Listen With) being added all the time, why would you NOT be on Facebook (shameless, non-beneficial plug!).
Click to read the rest of the Morning Music Notes, including stories about The Brit Awards, The Decemberists, and Snoop Dogg’s cigars
Morning Music News – Third Eye Not Blind Forever
Get Ready to Be Elbow’ed to Death During the Summer Olympics
For those of you in Canada, you were surely sick of the 2010 Vancouver Olympic theme song on CTV by the end of the 2 weeks. You know the one I mean. Hopefully this decision won’t ruin Elbow for me – they have been chosen to record the 2012 Olympic Games soundtrack for the BBC (via NME). The rockers have written a 6 minute track, which will form the main theme for BBC’s Olympic Coverage. When Usain Bolt runs a sub 9.50s (you read it here first!), you’ll have Elbow playing along in your memories.
Elbow frontman Guy Garvey told BBC News, “We are knocked out to be involved and it’s been quite a challenge. We have feelings of real responsibility as we will be the soundtrack to so many images of personal sacrifice and endeavour while the nation roots for and celebrates with Team GB.”
Occupy Album Sales
It’s still cool to make Occupy jokes, right? Even though everyone has been saying “Occupy your couch” or “Occupy this beer” for 2 months straight, I can make it and think I’m original, right? Now that I’m done Occupying Sarcasm, I thought I’d let you know that Third Eye Blind are making a comeback! Third Eye Blind, along with Ladytron, Yo La Tengo, Devo, Crosby and Nash, Jackson Browne, and Lucinda Williams will all contribute to an Occupy Wall Street benefit album (via The Hollywood Reporter).
“Musician Jason Samel is putting together the album, and told The AP that they hope to raise between $1 million and $2 million to help support the movement. Money raised from the album will go through the nonprofit Alliance for Global Justice, with half the proceeds funneling to the New York movement, and the other half to other projects around the country and world.”
What do we call the protest that begins once Third Eye Blind is played endlessly on the radio again?
Blacklisted from Google:
My Favourite SitesPirate Bay, isoHunt, 4SharedIn what appears to be an attempt to play nice with movie and music companies, Google is blacklisting file-sharing websites from their Google auto-complete web searches (via Slash Gear). This blacklist on Google blocks the names of these websites in their Google Instant, auto-complete search services, but the webpages themselves remain indexed. I’ve been blacklisted from many, many things in my life (Girl Guides? Really?), but not from Google. I win, right?
“While there is no silver bullet for infringement online, this measure is one of several that we have implemented to curb copyright infringement online,” Google manager of global communications and public affairs Mistique Cano previously said to TorrentFreak. She also detailed that “this is something we looked at and thought we could make some narrow and relatively easy changes to our Autocomplete algorithm that could make a positive difference”.
isoHunt owner Gary Fung said told the blog in an interview, “It’s a lot more subtle than the censorship attempts made possible by the pending PROTECT IP and SOPA bills, but it’s still censorship and it starts small. Google is increasingly becoming a self-righteous Big Brother of the Web. So much for ‘Do no evil’”.
Watch! Austra – Lose It (Paper Bag Sessions)
Sort of like the From the Basement series, the Paper Bag Sessions strips down a band (no, not in THAT way – at least I don’t think so) and has them play without all that ‘studio magic’ (which I can’t seem to buy anywhere). Below you can see Austra play Lose It from their recent session. It simply features singer Katie Stelmanis sitting at a piano and playing – simple stuff, right? Except when I try to do it and end up falling off the piano bench.
Austra – Lose It (Paper Bag Sessions)
[youtube hvMA1loQAUc]
Morning Music Notes – Kayne West is a Muppet
Doves + Elbow = Elves?
2 great British bands, both from the Manchester area, are teaming up. The lead singer of Doves, Jimi Goodwin, is coming out with a solo album, and teaming with Elbow’s Guy Garvey (via NME).
Goodwin told BBC 6 Music, “I’m loathed to call it a solo record but it probably is. It’s shaping up to be like a mad mix tape, no pause for breath, no gaps between songs, going from 140BPM carnival style freak out to a folk track then hitting a hip hop esque beat. Me and (Guy) Garvey have always threatened to write together and we finally got a chance to do that in the summer at [Peter Gabriel's] Realworld studios. I came down for a weekend and we finally got round to touching on a couple of tracks that we’d sent each other, we made progress on a couple of songs that will almost definitely make this record whatever it is I am making.”
Facebook Adds New Following Tool called Subscribe
Are you sick of seeing people on Facebook count down the days until their vacation, starting at Day 50; or hearing every detail about their pregnancy and then their baby’s life? You might want to focus on the good things, like news and updates from PeteHatesMusic, right? Not one to sit back (well, at least since Google+ entered the picture), Facebook has added the Twitter-esque following feature called Subscribe (via SlashGear).
“With the “Subscribe” button, Facebook users can now connect with each other without having to become friends. This allows for more asymmetrical relationships, something that Facebook has been resistant to for a long time. However, the Subscribe button doesn’t work exactly like Twitter’s follow feature. The button only appears on your page if you choose to allow other users to subscribe. And those that subscribe have three options of receiving all updates, most updates, or only the important updates.
The act of subscribing to someone’s profile is public and you will only receive updates from them that are set as public. Hence, subscribing only makes it easier to see the updates that you would normally already be able to see by going directly to that person’s profile.”
But all you readers are already smart enough to be Facebook fans (and twitter fans @petehatesmusic) of PeteHatesMusic, right?
Footage from Kanye West’s Muppets-esque Alligator Boots
What If. Back in 2008, Kanye West teamed up with Rhymefest, plus the Comedy Central’s Crank Yankers producers for a puppet show ala the Muppets, called Alligator Boots (via Consequence of Sound). The show never made it to air, so we’ll never know how good (or utterly terrible) it might have been, but now we might. Below is a 10 minute clip from the canned show Alligator Boots. Bonus: Kim Kardashian might be dressed as Princess Leia in a bikini in one segment. The show is actually not too bad – give it a watch until you get bored or die from laughter.
[youtube wFgGG9wr4kY]
Mercury Prize 2011 Shortlist Revealed
The Mercury Prize is an annual music prize awarded for the best album from the United Kingdom and Ireland. It started in 1992 and features past winners including Portishead – Dummy (1995), Pulp – Different Class (1996), Badly Drawn Boy – The Hour of Bewilderbeast (2000), Arctic Monkeys – Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not (2006) and The xx – xx (2010). This year’s shortlist has been announced, ahead of the September 6 award date. The nominees are (I’ve always wanted to say that!):
Mercury prize 2011 nominees (from Mercury prize website)
Adele – 21
Anna Calvi – Anna Calvi
Elbow – Build a Rocket Boys!
Everything Everything – Man Alive
Ghostpoet– Peanut Butter Blues and Melancholy Jam
Gwilym Simcock – Good Days at Schloss Elmau
James Blake – James Blake
Katy B – On a Mission
King Creosote & Jon Hopkins – Diamond Mine
Metronomy – The English Riviera
PJ Harvey – Let England Shake
Tinie Tempah – Disc-Overy
Any glaring omissions? Radiohead – The King of Limbs? Gold Panada – Lucky Shiner? The Horrors – Skying? Arctic Monkeys – Suck It and See?
Both PJ Harvey and Elbow have previously won the Mercury prize. Check out the first single, The Words That Maketh Murder, from PJ Harvey’s Mercury Prize-nominated album.
[youtube Va0w5pxFkAM]
Elbow Wants to Build a Beer, Boys
Mercury-award winning Brit band Elbow have a novel idea that every band should follow. Gigwise has info that Elbow are releasing a limited edition “Build a Rocket Boys” beer, named after their most recent album. Like any band that one should be a fan of, Glastonbury-players Elbow love themselves some fine British Ale. Since I also do, Elbow have skyrocketed on the PHM favourites charts. The limited edition beer will be available at the Manchester Food and Drink festival in October. No words when the unlimited edition beer will be available.