NEWS: Neon Bible has leaked

You can pretty much find Arcade Fire's Neon Bible all over the net as of yesterday/today. I had hoped it would leak but I am surprised. You would think the hype around this would have kept it down or maybe the honor among everyone for AF would keep it quiet.....not so.

Two sites I found it on had this in the comment section, apparently from AF's manager:

"My name is Scott Rodger. I manage the Arcade Fire. Can I ask you to remove your link to the Arcade Fire album. Why? It’s just not cool.

I don’t get lawyers involved or our publishers and labels for stuff like this. I simply like to ask politely for it to be removed.
The band have worked hard for a year to make this album. They are very proud of it. They paid for it themselves. No label our outside corporate funding. Just their own hard earned cash.
The only way for them to get their investment back is by hopefully selling a few cd’s. It would be great if you, as a music fan, could possibly try and respect this.

When this album is released, it will be everywhere for free online and there really isn’t much we can do about that. Until that time, I’d like to ask for you to take down the link.

You’re lucky enough to have this album. Enjoy it, but don’t share it yet.


Thank you.

Scott Rodger"

I am still not sure where I stand on leaks and album downloading. I check out a lot of CDs pre-release and I am still weighing whether or not the public should have a opportunity to 'try the milk before buying the cow'. In a lot of ways, I think we should hear/see what we are buying before unloading the wallet. It can't easily be compared to a car (because that is a $20,00 investment instead of $10) but think of the test drives and market research you (should) do before buying a car. Should the same chance be given with music? A lot of our jobs we have to show that we can handle the task before someone pays us for it. Is the first album by a band the equivalent of showing a portfolio or seeing a business pitch? I don't know yet. Maybe I am just talking out of my ass.

Another perspective I recently heard on this is that the music industry for a long time got away with putting out crap. They would release a CD with 2 songs you wanted and 11 you didn't but you still ended up paying $14.99. For a long time, you the consumer got screwed and now we happened to find a way around that. We listen to the CD first and decide if the entire album is worth our $14.99, worth just a dollar for a single or worth nothing at all.

What do you think?

UPDATE: On the flipside of this, sites like AOL offer full CD previews so the option is out there to fully check out a CD before buying it. The difference being that they offer streaming of the album VS a download is portable and you can’t take it with you and listen to it when and where you can instead of being chained to the computer. In the end though, the stream stays online and you don't keep it whereas with the download, it is yours to keep and decide whether to pay up or not.

BLOC PARTY: Black Session 01/22/2007

I saw that the VERY recent Bloc Party Black Session was up on a torrent site. I ended up getting the mp3's downloaded but BlocParty.net already has them up.

Their first Black Session was pretty killer so dig in and enjoy the new tracks!

BlocParty.net

(*Thanks to Derek at Good Weather for Air Strikes for pointing me to the site.)

NEW TRAVIS!?

NEWS: Maximo Park waste no time

A new Maximo Park album, titled 'Our Earthly Pleasures', will hit US shores on May 1 via Warp, and rumor has it that the band will be around at some point this summer for a tour. The first single, 'Our Velocity', is due out March 19th. Check out the letter from Paul, and the track listing below.

Our Earthly Pleasures:
01. "Girls Who Play Guitars"
02. "Our Velocity"
03. "Books From Boxes"
04. "Russian Literature"
05. "Karaoke Plays"
06. "Your Urge"
07. "The Unshockable"
08. "By The Moment"
09. "Nosebleed"
10. "A Fortnight's Time"
11. "Sandblasted And Set Free"
12. "Parisian Skies"

Maximo Park
MySpace

SNL HIGHLIGHTS with JEREMY PIVEN

I seem to have taken to posting a lot of YouTube clips following SNL so I will make this a weekly thing.

Mike Vick - REALLY!?
A new segment on the news where Amy and Seth ask Mike Vick "REALLY!?"


Two A-holes at a Adoption Agency
My favorite characters, this time at a Adoption Agency. I love when Jason Sudekis asks if Piven "gets rim".


'Urigrow' commercial
"Thick, ropey streams of urine"


Blizzard Man helps out Common
Andy Samberg returns as Blizzard Man to help Common on his album.


MacGruber
Not that funny but kinda...a take off on MacGyver
Skit 1
Skit 2
Skit 3

SNOWFIELD editors SNOWFIELD

In a nutshell, before they were known as editors they were first (The) Pride...and then they changed the line-up to become Snowfield (Ed Lay replaced Geraint Owen on drums as he began to focus on his Welsh band The Heights). They played their debut gig at the request of Fused Magazine under the name Snowfield before becoming a popular unsigned band and signing with Kitchenware Records in September 2004.*

SO, that brings us here to today to dwell upon some early demos of editors when they still Snowfield. Got that? A good mix for the editors collector to check out and compare. You'll find mostly less-electronic-compared-to-what-was-released songs (checkout 'Distance') as well as 3 songs that weren't featured on the Back Room, (the recently released 'the Diplomat' as well as 'Chome Share the View', and 'Every Little Piece of your life').

01 - Every Little Piece Of Your Life
02 - Fall
03 - The Diplomat
04 - Distance
05 - Bullets
06 - Come Share The View

Photo from SophieJarryOnStageAndBack
*Info taken from Wikipedia

STEADICAM SHOT FROM 'CHILDREN OF MEN'

Cinematically, a great movie. Otherwise, confusing and depressing. This is the CONTINUOUS, 10-minute Steadicam shot from the movie. Unbelievable.

BLOC PARTY The Prayer

First video from the new CD.

BLOC PARTY - I Still Remember

Second video from the new CD.

NEWS: Apple unveils shloads of killer new products

Dang. The 2007 Macworld Conference was held today in San Francisco and Steve Jobs blew the roof off with three new products.



iPhone
Take your iPod in one hand and your cell phone in the other...now put them together. Basically a a kick ass phone that syncs with Address Book and iTunes, lets you watch movies, listen to music, text or call someone, surf the net, etc. all running on OSX. The downside is that it is only available to Cingular people out of the box in June and costs $499 for the 4Gb version and $599 for the 6Gb version.
HIGHLIGHTS:
3.5" color TOUCH screen, no stylus needed, just use your thumbs
Sensors know when you flip it from vertical to horizontal to watch movies/look at pictures


Apple TV
$299 for a AirPort Express basically that lets you watch content on your computer - movies, TV shows, music - on your home TV. So basically, anything downloaded can now be on your TV. Downside is that you have to have a widescreen TV and wireless network
HIGHLIGHTS:
Not that pricey and works with a lot of TVs
I don't have to watch downloaded content in my basement anymore

I had heard also about a wide-screen iPod with a touch-screen but the Apple site doesn't show anything yet.

Check Apple.com for full demos of the iPhone and details on Apple TV.

NEWS: Bloc Party tour US, Kele might be coming out of the closet

From Pitchfork

Bloc Party have announced a North American tour, but that isn't the biggest piece of Bloc Party news today. It seems that frontman Kele Okereke kinda sorta came out of the closet in an interview published yesterday in The Guardian.

Apparently, some songs on Bloc Party's forthcoming second album A Weekend in the City (due March 6 on Vice), are about homosexual love, which leads writer Craig McLean to ask about Okereke's sexuality, a topic he usually dances around. And while Okereke seems to be on the verge of some sort of confession, he ultimately states, "It's not something that I'd be inclined to talk...It isn't black and white. It isn't clear-cut."

So maybe he's bisexual? Who knows? Who cares? (A lot of people, obviously. Not that there's anything wrong with that!)

Anyway, none of that has anything to do with the matter at hand: that Bloc Party are headed Stateside for the first time since their aborted tour with Panic! At the Disco. And this time, they're bringing along some much hipper friends: the Strokes' Albert Hammond Jr., Final Fantasy, Sebastien Grangier (formerly of Death From Above 1979), the Like, and Smoosh, are all slated to open various dates of the trek, which takes up much of March. British and Japanese tours precede the North American jaunt.

Tomorrow, January 9, "The Prayer" remix EP will become available exclusively on iTunes, featuring remixes by Paul "Phones" Epworth and Does It Offend You, Yeah?, among others. Also, "The Prayer" 7", including the b-side "England", will be given away for free with purchase of A Weekend in the City by certain independent music stores. So support yr local mom 'n' pop.

Dates:

01-25 London, England - Mean Fiddler
01-27 Southampton, England - Guild Hall
01-28 Norwich, England - UEA
01-31 London, England - Astoria
02-01 London, England - Astoria
02-02 London, England - Astoria
02-03 Folkestone, England - Leas Cliff Hall
02-05 Reading, England - Hexagon
02-06 Cardiff, Wales - University
02-07 Bristol, England - Academy
02-09 Exeter, England - Great Hall at University
02-10 Birmingham, England - Academy
02-11 Nottingham, England - Rock City
02-13 Cambridge, England - Corn Exchange
02-14 Manchester, England - Academy
02-16 Dublin, Ireland - Ambassador Theatre
02-17 Glasgow, Scotland - Barrowland
02-18 Aberdeen, Scotland - Music Hall
02-20 Edinburgh, Scotland - Corn Exchange
02-21 Newcastle, England - Academy
02-22 Sheffield, England - Octagon
03-04 Tokyo, Japan - Studio Coast
03-05 Nagoya, Japan - Diamond Hall
03-06 Osaka, Japan - Namba Hatch
03-11 Seattle, WA - Paramount Theatre
03-12 Vancouver, British Columbia - Orpheum Theatre
03-13 Portland, OR - Crystal Ballroom
03-15 Austin, TX - SXSW
03-17 San Francisco, CA - Concourse Exhibition
03-19 Los Angeles, CA - Wiltern Theatre
03-20 Los Angeles, CA - Wiltern Theatre
03-23 Chicago, IL - Congress Theatre
03-24 Detroit, MI - Royal Oak Theatre
03-25 Toronto, Ontario - Kool Haus
03-27 Montreal, Ontario - Metropolis
03-28 Boston, MA - Orpheum Theatre
03-30 New York, NY - United Palace Theatre
03-31 New York, NY - United Palace Theatre
05-12 Bologna, Italy - Estragon
05-13 Milan, Italy - Alcatraz

Where should I buy my CDs?

Anyone have any insider places to buy CDs online for cheap? I usually use Amazon.com but found under the 'New and Used' link that Newbury Comics has a online site with all of their prices beating Amazon by a few bucks.

I checked InSound.com as well bcause I know they specialize in indie but they were the same price or higher than Amazon.

Any good sites I should know of?

Yet another cool SONY BRAVIA commercial

Way back when, we posted the first commercial for the SONY Bravia LCD television that featured Jose Gonzales' cover of The Knife's Heartbeats while 250,000 plus super balls bounced down San Francisco streets.

NOW, SONY is back with another great commercial. This time, they are having a fireworks show around a building...EXCEPT they are using the full spectrum of PAINT instead of fireworks.

(Stick around and watch the Behind the Scenes footage as well. It takes a bit of the magic away to see it wasn't necessarily one shot but it is still cool.)

SEINFELD: The Lost Episode

Funny and smart editing. Who would have thought Kramer said all of that stuff during the show.

MARILYN MANSON GETTING 'VON-DITCHED'

It is amazing the details these magazines get. They know the DAY the papers will be served and exactly WHERE Marilyn Manson will be when he is served.

(via Page Six) Shock-rocker Marilyn Manson is about to get one of the biggest shocks of his bizarre life - his stunning stripper-wife, Dita Von Teese, is dumping him after only a year of marriage.

Page Six has learned that the pasty-faced Manson, whose real name is Brian Warner, will be served with divorce papers today at a Los Angeles recording studio where he's working on his next album, with Von Teese citing "irreconcilable differences" in giving him the boot.

"He's not been responsive," a friend said. "She loved him so much, but he has too many demons. He can't even communicate with her at this point. She tried to tell him she was divorcing him, but she can't even get him on the phone. She moved out of the house and he hasn't even noticed."

INTERPOL, BLOC PARTY, Stooges, Lily Allen PLAY SXSW

This headline made my nethers twitch. Why, since I won't be going, I don't know, but maybe because two of my favorite bands will be back on the circuit this year woke me up the dead inside me. Courtesy of your friends at Pitchfork.


Matt & Kim, Cold War Kids, the Watson Twins also on board

Struggling to find vacancy at a convenient Austin hotel for South by Southwest 07? It's no wonder. Tucked away in a handy brochure offering hotel information on the festival's website is the fest's star-studded initial lineup.

The Stooges, Interpol, Bloc Party, Lily Allen, Matt & Kim, the Watson Twins, Cold War Kids, Devin the Dude, Hoodoo Gurus, Ghostland Observatory, Stax 50th Anniversary Soul Review, Ozomatli, and Turbonegro are slated to play the music portion of the mega-event, which runs from March 14-18 (the full extravaganza, including film and "interactive" festivals, runs from March 9-18). As previously reported, Under Byen are also scheduled to perform.

Following the announcement is a line of small italic text reading, "everything subject to change," and while hope nothing changes, we're letting you know anyway.

In addition, Pete Townshend will appear as the keynote speaker for SXSW's Music Conference. Following the keynote, which takes place on March 14, Townshend and "Attic Jam" partner Rachel Fuller will put on a March 15 show featuring some special guests. Other SXSW speakers and interviewees include David Bryne (with his presentation "Record Labels: Who Needs Them?"), Emmylou Harris, Gilberto Gil, Terry McBride, Rickie Lee Jones, Booker T, and Joe Boyd.

SIMPSONS MOVIE TRAILER

Sorry to inundate you with trailers the last few weeks, hopefully new music is coming.

The intros for the Simpsons movie are both the same but there are short clips after that.

Trailer 1
Trailer 2

HEROES ONLINE COMICS RECAP

I have had some free time today and have been reading through the HEROES comics online today. Thus far I can tell you that:

There is a new character, a girl named Hana. Her grandmother was a part of the resistance that fought Nazi's in WWII. Her mother was a fighter pilot in the Israel Armed Forces. One day, as a young child, she boards a bus with her Grandmother and Mother as they travel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and the bus becomes the first suicide attack. Grandmother and Mother die, leaving her behind to fulfill a legacy. Hana tries to enlist in the Paratroopers but everyone knows she is only full of vengeance and a potential disaster in the field. She excels at her desk job, breaking codes and busting up attack plans but is still unsatisfied. One night, while walking the perimeter, she is approached by a man with Horn Rimmed Glasses, hesitates too long and is knocked to the ground....

HRM guy tells her he will change her life and takes her to a secret facility where she is told she was hand picked to be a part of a secret operation. She is physically pushed above and beyond her limits and her brain is tested and she is given 'vitamins' to help. One day she has had enough and attacks HRM, wanting to know what is going on and why she he was just sent a text message that says, "When will she manifest?" HRM says his phone hasn't rang and suddenly it does with that message. In a instant, Hana sees billions of codes, emails and text messages flying around her and she realizes that she can find any code or secret out there and HRM knocks her out. She wakes up and is told by HRM that they haven't been able to get any emails in or out except ones with the word "Kadina". Without speaking, Hana text messages HRM the word means "attack" and he tells her she is ready to go.

There are supposed to be two more parts to her story before the show starts back.

The guys Nikki buried in the desert are DL's old crew. After he went to prison, she joined up with them but they had no idea she was related to DL apparently. She helped them do a heist, they pulled guns on her after they had the money so they wouldn't have to give her any, she killed them and buried them.

DL realized his powers after he was arrested for being a part of said heist Nikki was in and they found a gun in his house that matched the crime. DL was really upset with a detective questioning him and suddenly slipped out of his cuffs. Later in prison he learned how to turn his power on at will and slipped out.

Eden did kill herself before Sylar could get her power. Following that showdown, HRM glasses guy and the Haitian shot Sylar up with drugs to knock him out and the Haitian did his part.

Parkman, in an effort to clear his head of all the wacky thoughts he hears, hops in his patrol car and ends up chasing a suspect. He feels pretty confident in chasing him because he can hear the guys thoughts before he makes them so he knows his every move. Eventually he does catch him and is happy to put his 'guessing' and 'doubts' of every one and their thoughts to rest with this 'black and white', clear cut conviction.

Isaac had his first vision while shooting up before a gallery show. It was some large, blue, rock like creature with horns saying, "Isaac! What have you done!!!" He then goes to his show where everyone is very pleased with his work but some random blond girl comes up and punches him saying "How could you!" as she points to some painting of her getting hit head on by a city bus as she crosses a street. He says, "I don't even know you!" and she runs out the door as he chases after her. In the midst of the chase, she ios hit by the bus that he painted and his first vision/painting comes true.

Eden came from a very fugged up family. Drunk for a Dad, Step mom who hated her and blamed her for everything. She kept her mouth shut and blamed herself for everything that went wrong. Her Dad left and she was left a life of servitude under her Step mother, hoping that if she did a good job her Dad would be back. Time went by and she grew up, still in her life of work under Step mom. One day she was pushed to far by Step mom and Eden said, "I wish you would die." and there it was, her heart listened to Eden's command she died. Her Step mom's cigarette fell out of her mouth and eventually engulfed the house in flames and Eden took flight.

After one of Sylar's crimes in Chicago, he goes back to the scene of the crime to watch Audrey (Parkman's partner). Like a peeping tom, he stands in the crowd watching the police and she eventually sees him watching and gives chase. They both jump on top a speeding commuter train and jump off at a train station where she pulls her gun on him and fires. Oops, it is the wrong guy, a old man that Sylar had passed his coat and hat off to. Sylar is off again.

Peter is in the hospital following is collapse outside the police station following his vision of him blowing up NYC. He sees himself in a dream, not as the bad guy but of course, as the good guy, flying around with a suit and cape, stopping crimes. He finally brings the guy he is chasing to the ground and is told by the bad guy that he can't stop him and he can't change who he is - truly a bad guy.