Intrigued by the Say Anything feature in this week’s TONY? Here’s an exclusive acoustic performance of the band’s new song “Eloise,” courtesy of frontman Max Bemis. Catch Say Anything live next Tuesday (November 3) at Fillmore New York at Irving Plaza, and Wednesday (November 4) at Highline Ballroom.

The young London trio Micachu and the Shapes was in town over the weekend, concluding an American tour with a pair of shows at Littlefield, on Friday, and (Le) Poisson Rouge—where, on Saturday, the band performed accompanied by strings in a concert for the Wordless Music Series. The musicians met with TONY before their Littlefield show, performing the song “Guts” as the sun set over DeGraw Street. Click here to see the artists—Mica Levi, Marc Pell and Raisa Khan—discuss their impending Wordless Music show. Micachu’s agreeably unruly debut album, Jewellery, was released earlier this year on Rough Trade.

For our latest Flipcam concert, we present to you .357 Lover, performing in the cozy confines of the Williamsburg tattoo joint 8 of Swords (featured in TONY a few years back). We can think of no better setting in which to experience keyboardist-vocalist Corn Mo & Co.’s Meat Loaf–esque operatic-pop goodness. If you like what you hear, catch the group in full-volume mode this Friday (October 2) at Brooklyn Bowl, where it opens for Bee Gees cover band Tragedy and celebrates a splendidly titled new CD, Diorama of the Golden Lion. Click past the jump for a bonus video.
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The idiosyncratic Manhattan folksinger Larkin Grimm arrives at an East Village community garden, a leather case slung over her shoulder. Affixed to the case, which contains a dulcimer, is the mildly terrifying carcass of a fox. Grimm spots a Hare Krishna sitting high in the garden’s shed and walks up its stairs, a glint in her eyes, trailed by her sometimes bandmates John Houx and Marit Bergman. The Hare Krishna, who is reading a book about Paul Revere, looks up at the singer as if she is the most outlandish person he has ever encountered. “Hello!” Grimm says. “Do you mind if I play some music?”

The Hare Krishna nods, bemused.

“Do you want to play percussion?” Grimm inquires.

“But I don’t play,” the Krishna replies.

“I thought all Hare Krishnas played drums,” says Grimm, the demonic shaman suddenly channeling Larry David. The man shakes his head.

Grimm sits next to her new friend, plucks her dulcimer from her fox-bag and sings “Mina Minou,” off her superb 2008 album, Parplar (Young God). From behind the flipcam, Houx and Bergman harmonize and add minimal percussion; to Grimm’s left, the Hare Krishna quietly reads about Paul Revere. (It is worth noting that when Grimm last met with TONY, she had an unusual encounter with a homeless man; some people have all the luck.)

After the jump, Grimm discusses Musicka Mystica Maxima, the music and magic festival she is curating with the Ordo Templi Orientis at Santos Party House Monday, September 21 and Tuesday, September 22.

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Richard Hell walks outside his East Village apartment, his lips curved into the mischievous smile that he has worn, regardless of prevailing fashion orthodoxy, for decades. A founding father of CBGB punk, the onetime Voidoid has been retired from music since the mid-’80s, his energy devoted to an arguably more punkish vocation: writer. Yet now and again, Hell is lured back to music. Now, he cups in his hand his unlikely new CD: Destiny Street Repaired, a retooled version of the Voidoids’ 1982 album Destiny Street, released this week on Insound. Hell walks to Tompkins Square Park, looks around, and heads to a playground; there, he reads from the new album’s liner notes. A toddler gazes on in awe.

On Sunday, September 13, Hell reads at the New Museum as part of the Howl! Festival. “Be sure to mention that tickets are only $6,” he says. “And that goes toward the price of museum admission, too.”

While the world awaits the release of the Beatles’ digitally remastered studio albums and The Beatles: Rock Band video game on Wednesday, September 9, we at Time Out New York turned to Brooklyn band Bubble to get our Fab Four fix. Among tribute bands, Bubble reigns supreme, playing faithful adaptations of the Beatles’ greatest hits to sold-out crowds. The group also records original material, claiming influences as diverse as Elvis Presley and astronauts. We caught up with three of the band’s members in Bryant Park for a flipcam concert, but when a police officer informed us we couldn’t legally set up an amp in the vicinity, a Hard Days Night–style chase ensued. Dave Foster, the John Lennon of the group, was worried that Bubble would have to shorten its performance to “Four Days a Week,” but we eventually received permission to resume taping. Clearly the cops were swayed by Bubble’s spot-on performance—or perhaps it was the $20 “gift” that changed their minds.

Bubble’s second full-length album, Seconds, comes out on Wednesday, September 9. To celebrate the event, the band will perform a set of originals and Beatles songs at The Living Room. Special guests Jupiter Deluxe kick things off at 9pm.

Speaking as a Pet Shop Boys megafan, a Brit, and someone whose first seven-inch was “Always on My Mind” (above), even I felt like a pretty casual listener at last night’s Hammerstein Ballroom show—such was the devotion displayed by the packed-out, disco-dancing crowd. As you’ve seen in the magazine, the show was the first of two nights in NYC for the duo, celebrating both new album Yes and 25 years since “West End Girls” was a hit. Accordingly, the crowd went berserk for the show’s New York–themed segment (which had dancers dressed up as skyscrapers dancing around Neil Tennant) and the song “New York City Boy.”

Click past the jump for a show recap, photos, and videos of the hits

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If you’re a sentient indie music fan with Internet access, or perhaps a Times subscription, chances are you’ve heard Das Racist’s infectious novelty-rap track “Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell.” As we watched the song go viral, we here at the Volume knew we had to contact the Brooklyn duo, Himanshu Suri and Victor Vazquez, and arrange an in-person meeting. The objective? To find out if the project has legs. After watching Suri and Vazquez’s exclusive impromptu performance of “Art School”—filmed last night in Williamsburg watering hole Savalas with The Warriors projected in the background—we think you’ll agree that they have a lot more to offer the world than just their current smash. Click past the jump for a bonus bathroom chat with the Das Racist boys, and catch them live at Bowery Ballroom next Thursday (August 6).
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We at the Volume make no secret of how great we think Naomi Shelton is. Signed to Daptone Records, the veteran gospel singer just put out an album, What Have You Done, My Brother?, which seems a shoo-in for album of the year—even if it does sound like that year is 1964. We raved about that disc here—and were thrilled to our boots when the Volume was invited to one of Shelton’s weekly rehearsals, in a tiny little church on Utica Avenue in Brooklyn. The film you see above finds Shelton and her Gospel Queens in full effect, accompanied by Shelton’s pianist for the past 40 years, Cliff Driver, plus an interview with the pair. After the jump, check out performances of the slow-burning “Rock of Ages,” the album’s amazing title track and clappy classic “Happy Day.” Naomi Shelton and the Gospel Queens play every Friday at the Fat Cat, entrance $3 (yes, that’s right)—and look out for their live bonanza at Celebrate Brooklyn, Prospect Park Bandshell next Thursday (July 30.)

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For our latest field recording, we wanted to shine a spotlight on the talents of Sarah Siskind, who plays Joe’s Pub tomorrow (Wednesday, July 15). The Nashville singer-songwriter shot to attention last year after being praised enthusiastically by Justin Vernon (Mr. Bon Iver). In fact, Vernon said that Siskind’s music had changed his life—and he covered her beautiful song, “Lovin’s for Fools,” to prove it. Sure enough, Siskind is a really great songwriter, combining directness with exquisite nuance; but it’s her voice that really gets you. Siskind sang a cappella for TONY in Tompkins Square Park, in the rain, with a chorus of barking dogs. The song is “Go,” and though it sounds like a traditional blues song, she wrote it herself—you can hear it on her new album, Say It Louder. Let us know if you get goose bumps at the end too.

Peter Stampfel, monster of New York folk, co-led the mighty Holy Modal Rounders and was a member of the Fugs. Even if they do not know it, most artists currently pursuing bent folk music—whether dubbed anti or freak—play in his shadow. Yet Stampfel has steadfastly refused to dine out on his legacy, making the rounds of small New York clubs with his latest awesome outfit: Peter Stampfel and the Ether Frolic Mob. The singer remains a captivating performer; few artists can convey joie de vivre like Peter Stampfel. When I interviewed the musician in 2007, he enthusiastically played a CD of Sheriff and the Ravels’ “Shombalor,” a berserk 1959 doo-wop obscurity. Last week, Stampfel did TONY one better: Accompanied by guitarist Hubby Jenkins, he performed his own version of “Shombalor” outside of his Soho apartment. Stampfel, Jenkins and other members of the amorphous Ether Frolic Mob play Jalopy Theatre on Friday (July 10). After the jump, Stampfel discusses the song and Soho.

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By now it should be obvious even to casual readers that we’ve fallen hard for Brooklynati, the latest CD from hip-hop trio Tanya Morgan, and we’re eager to share our obsession. We’ve streamed a single for you, we’ve reviewed the album, and we’ve helped you hear a recent freestyle, and we’d been hoping to shoot a live video with the group for some time now—easier said than done, given that the members still split their residence between Brooklyn and Cincinnati. We prevailed at long last this morning, when Ilyas, Donwill and Von Pea hit the Hudson River piers to rock an a cappella version of “So Damn Down,” the leadoff single from Brooklynati. Have a look, then head out to Southpaw on Wednesday (July 8) to catch Tanya Morgan on a bill with Marco Polo and Torae.

Rachel Trachtenburg first met with TONY in 2002, when she was eight years old and the band for which she drums, the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players, had recently landed in New York. Rachel is now 15, a music-biz vet and New York fixture. In addition to her ongoing duties performing with her parents—the fab Slideshow Players headline (Le) Poisson Rouge Thursday, July 2—she sings lead in her own band, the Oh My God Girls. She also stars in a variety show: Rachel Trachtenburg’s Homemade World, which appears at both Solar One and Governors Island on July 12. Below, Rachel performs “The Horse Carriage Song” on the rooftop of her Bushwick apartment building, accompanying herself on ukulele while singing in protest of Central Park’s horse carriages. Also, she is hula-hooping. Ever see Pete Seeger do that?

The young New York singer Christina Courtin was first featured in Time Out New York in 2006, when she was 22, unsigned and fresh out of Juilliard. Courtin, who studied violin and still keeps a foot in the classical world, has since settled on the one label that befits her work: Nonesuch, which will release her superb debut album tomorrow. The self-titled record is beautifully textured, with contributions from hotshots like Jon Brion and Benmont Tench, but it pivots around Courtin’s commanding voice. Earlier this month, Courtin and guitarist Ryan Scott performed “Foreign Country” for TONY, playing on a Hudson pier across from the Frying Pan, helicopters buzzing around them. The musician appeared affable and social one minute—then bizarrely focused and trapped in some third dimension of song once she opened her mouth to sing. Courtin plays a record-release show at (Le) Poisson Rouge Wednesday 24. After the jump, she talks about the song and the Frying Pan.

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Yesterday, the startling young songwriter Ezra Furman drove from his home in Boston to his drummer’s place in Brooklyn. Ezra Furman and the Harpoons are playing a Pianos residency every Tuesday in June; more broadly, the singer is plotting a move to New York—Boston being about as hospitable to rising rock musicians as it is to Yankees fans, or polite people. Furman climbed to his friend’s Williamsburg rooftop, looking out upon the daunting Manhattan skyline. On record and in concert, the Harpoons are rambunctious and rocking; for Time Out, the musician performed acoustic, like a folkie. Both formats work as effective vehicles for Furman’s torrent of words, flush with a level of personality and contemplation often absent in the work of his contemporaries. His lack of a wider audience irritates me. Below, Furman sings “The Worm in the Apple” from last year’s Inside the Human Body (Minty Fresh). After the jump, he talks about his song—and ambivalence toward New York City.

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It seemed like an obviously good idea, to film the Low Anthem on a boat: much of the Rhode Island trio’s iconography is nautical (check the artwork on new album Oh My God, Charlie Darwin)—and the band looks like it’s stepped out of a sepia photograph. So we thought we’d ask it to play a song for the Volume on Chelsea Pier, in support of its show tonight at the Bowery Ballroom. Little did we know that the barge we found there—the Frying Pan—would be the perfect visual match for the Low Anthem’s misty, warm and slightly forlorn sound. Built in 1929, the floating art space and sometime bar has been anchored at the pier for years, having been dragged from the bottom of the river. It’s restored, but still gloriously corroded and old-fashioned; wandering around its sparse cabins in light filtered through pinprick portholes was like being on a ghost ship. After exploring its cabins and dingy “theater” space (complete with out-of-tune saloon piano), the group settled on the spot you see above. Here, it plays “This God Damn House” on an E-flat horn, restored pump organ, clarinet and cell phones (the whistling feedback at the end is worth waiting for).

Click past the jump to see the other parts of the barge that the band performed in. Read more »

Todd Snider, one of the sharpest songwriters in Nashville and, by extension, America, meets Time Out at his in-laws’ apartment on a gloomy Friday morning. As Snider walks to the elevator, he strums a borrowed acoustic guitar. A neighbor passes the singer and shrugs. “Sounds good,” he says. Snider walks up Broadway to Madison Square Park, tuning and strumming as he passes commuters in the thick of the morning rush. The singer parks himself by Shake Shack’s ordering board. While Shake Shack employees set up shop for the day, Snider sings “Slim Chance,” the leadoff track from his lovely new album, The Excitement Plan. Below is Snider’s performance; after the jump, the singer talks about his album. (Todd Snider plays Bowery Ballroom Thursday 11.)
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By and large, the Simpsons stereotype is accurate: School assemblies tend to suck. But students at Cobble Hill’s P.S. 29 got a taste of something extraordinary on Thursday night as Ween frontman Gene Ween—whose daughter attends the school—presented his eponymous side project at a full-length concert in the building’s auditorium, proceeds from which benefited P.S. 29’s arts programs. Ween diehards mingled with neighborhood parents and their buoyant kids, many of whom pranced, wiggled and air-drummed stageside throughout the performance. Check out this wailing version of the Ween chestnut “Boing,” accented by the children’s irrepressible hopping. (Watch at 1:00 as one girl covers her ears, and at 4:50 as Gene compliments the kids on their exemplary “boinging.”)