So So Glos
Nicole Schneit of Air Waves once clarified that her band’s name is not meant to refer to the transmission of sound, instead it is the air we breathe and the waves of the ocean. Am I over-thinking things to say Air Waves make a lot more sense knowing that? Give Air Waves one listen and it’s clear their music is more natural earnestness than radio fuzz (not that radio fuzz isn’t near and dear to my heart). Saturday evening Nicole and crew were at the top of their game, playing with a fantastic slate of bands at Market Hotel which included Jersey’s Screaming Females and Baltimore’s Double Dagger. Openers Videohippos were also impressive, playing with a video accompaniment that made for a punk acid trip.
Market Hotel’s resident So So Glos headlined the show and shook the place to it rafters. At one point during the set fans could be seen climbing up pillars and piping around the loft. Maybe they were trying to get a better view or maybe it’s the new crowd surfing. The phrase “driven up the wall” traditionally means you were annoyed by something, perhaps the So So Glos live set has spawned a gleeful antonym.
More images after the jump. Air Waves
Multi-instrumentalist and former member of Wilco Jay Bennett died this weekend, according to a post on the website for Undertow Music Collective. He was 45. A cause of death was unknown. ‚”We are profoundly saddened to report that our friend died in his sleep last night. Jay was a beautiful human being who will be missed,” read the update on Undertow. The company released his 2002 solo album, ‚”Palace at 4 am (Part I).”
Representatives from the label and management firm had not responded to requests for comment as of Sunday evening, but the Chicago Sun-Times reached Bennett’s friend and collaborator Edward Burch. “Early this morning, Jay died in his sleep and an autopsy is being performed,” Burch told Jim DeRogatis.
In the late ’80s, Bennett founded the rock band Titanic Love Affair in Urbana, Ill., which lasted into the mid-’90s. He was best known for his seven years in adventurous rock act Wilco. Bennett split from the Chicago-based group in 2001, and since his departure had been pursuing a solo career, as well as operating Pieholden Suite Sound ‚Äì named after a song on Wilco’s 1999 album ‚”Summerteeth” — in Champaign , Ill. …
Bennett was asked to leave the group before ‚”Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” was released, and his relationship with Wilco leader Jeff Tweedy remained strained. In early May of this year, Bennett filed suit against his former band mate for breach of contract stemming from his participation in ‚”I Am Trying to Break Your Heart.” Bennett was seeking damages in excess of $50,000, according to court papers.
Late last month, Bennett posted on his MySpace page that he was to undergo hip replacement surgery, revealing that he had been living with a torn ACL since his time in Titanic Love Affair, and lacked health insurance. He was also completing work on his fifth solo effort, “Kicking at the Perfumed Air.”
“This whole experience has really taught me to look both inward and outward for support, and I’ve learned things about myself that I thought I had completely figured out years ago,” Bennett wrote on his MySpace page. “Family and friends have helped me to keep faith in a future that will actually be much more carefree than my constricted present state. I encourage you all to tell me stories of recovery, as they really do help.”
Wilco are on tour in Spain, but a spokesperson for the band passed along a statement from Tweedy: “We are all deeply saddened by this tragedy. We will miss Jay as we remember him — as a truly unique and gifted human being and one who made welcome and significant contributions to the band’s songs and evolution. Our thoughts go out to his family and friends in this very difficult time.”
These are Powers
With a sea of empty Colt 45 cans strewn across the floor and a crowd packed like the L on a weekday morning These Are Powers rocked Vice’s party at Glasslands Thursday night. Late on the bandwagon, These Are Powers first drew my attention opening for Dan Deacon this January in a raucous warehouse show in Bushwick. While they were great in the winter, warm weather and top billing drew a different level of energy out of the band. These Are Powers have described their sound as ‚”ghost punk” and their set last night indeed proved to be haunting-yet-extremely-danceable chaos. Pterodactyl opened with thunderous punk and the crowd was treated to a surprise set by Columbus, Ohio’s finest lo-fi noise rockers Psychedelic Horseshit. A friend of mine noted that the crowd was so hyped by These Are Powers’ set that they forgot to stop shaking their booties and dancing during Horseshit’s heavy drone.
More photos after the jump. –Andrew Ritchie
The Willie Mae Rock Camp for Girls are throwing a couple of parties next week to support their amazing program. If you don’t know, now you know:
The summer camp is an intensive one-week day camp program. The organization currently offers two sessions every summer, serving a total of approximately 150 girls. Daily programming consists of instrument instruction (drums, bass, guitar, keyboards, vocals, DJ/turntables, and sound & recording), band practice, and workshops on a variety of topics, from songwriting to self-defense. Games and crafting activities (including making band t-shirts and buttons) are interspersed throughout the day.
Campers form bands on the first day, and during daily band practice they write music and lyrics collectively, assisted by band coaches. At the end of the week, the camp bands perform their original songs at a large-scale recital concert.
The shows will include some of our faves such as Pterodactyl and Parts & Labor. And, if you’re a 19+, they’ve got Ladies Workshops too!
Todd P & Horse+Dragon are also hosting a benefit for the Rock Camp on May 29th at Monster Island featuring Wild Yaks, Lady Magma, Hexa, & Beluga. We’re giving you 4 shows to celebrate the same cause here… so, pick one!!
FREEwilliamsburg showcase headliners These are Powers are playing tonight at Glasslands. And there’s going to be free Colt 45:
VICE x Colt 45 present The Colt Guides and Launch Parties
Keeping 2009 nice and smooth
May 21, 2009 – Brooklyn, Glasslands Gallery (289 Kent Ave)
Featuring These Are Powers and Pterodactyl
21+ |RSVP REQUIRED | 9PM-2AM
Free with RSVP – http://www.viceland.com/coltrsvpny/
Do you wake up in the morning, sign into your decade-old America Online account and think something like, “Hot damn. I am the shit, online.”? Do your friends just “not get twitter,” but you RT them regardless b/c it makes you/them look important? Are you following Soup on Tumblr? Well, great! Then you might just be a Webutante. And now, thanks to our friends (and who Media Bistro calls “new Media power couple”) Jessica Amason & Richard Blakeley, you’ve got your own prom. It’s the Webuntante Ball, a “cocktail-formal event for both male and female ‘WEButantes’ held at the swanky rooftop of a luxury hotel.” Welcome, bitches. You’ve made it. And you’ve got mail.
To celebrate Internet Week, Jessica Amason and Richard Blakeley, bring you the WEBUTANTE BALL. A cocktail-formal event for both male and female “WEButantes” held at the swanky rooftop of a luxury hotel.
The event features a fashionable no sneakers or hats dress code, free vodka cocktails from 6-7 and a ceremonial crowning of a Webutante King and Queen! Come have your webutante portrait taken and shmooze with the best of web-society.
Eat your heart out Chuck Bass: we may not have private planes, but we’ve got Twitter and we’ve got style
Beauty Bar is having their Brooklyn grand opening next weekend. Getting my nails did while getting happy hour drunk, and not having to stomach the L train to do it– this gets 2 thumbs way up from me.
Christ, I never thought we’d post anything featuring The View or Jesse Ventura. But dammit, Jesse really nails it, exposing the racism behind the whole waterboarding debate. And it’s always good to see that idiot Elisabeth Hasselbeck put in her place. Too bad we have to rely on a debate from an ex-wrestler and a Survivor contestant to put this whole horrible thing in perspective.
Is this a crack in Gimme Coffee’s armor? An Eater reader sent in a photo of a pants-sagging coffee barista, writing, “Reason 12 why Second Stop is better than Gimme. This is a Gimme barista working while sporting the pants below ass look. Has to be a violation, no?”.
Not sure. But it cracks me up. No, actually that joke doesn’t work because I see no crack. Is this barista buttless? I think the violation lies in the photographer’s pocket, as srsly, who gets someone to make them a latte before snapping an iphone photo of their ass?
FREEwilliamsburg showcase headliners 
