PLAYLIST B+W 11/21

Jennie Richee VIVIANS
Mind Your Own Business DELTA 5
Air War CRYSTAL CASTLES
Neutral KAP BAMBINO
Sweet Chips CLIQUE TALK
En Papier THESE NEW PURITANS
Bully FORTUNE
c.y.o.a. HEARTS REVOLUTION
Marathon ERASE ERRATA
Hey KAP BAMBINO
Deceptacon LE TIGRE
Kids MGMT
Elvisss THESE NEW PURITANS
Navvy NAVVY
What She Wants REWORK
Parking Lot THE COATHANGERS
Count In Fives THE HORRORS
Huggy Bear HEARTS REVOLUTION
Troubles Of Keneat THE VIOLETS
Reach Me Helen Keller ULTRANOIR
Ping Pong X-WIFE
Starlett Johanson THE TEENAGERS
Acrobat CASSETTE KIDS
Common People PULP
Temptation NEW ORDER
The Lovecats THE CURE
Pop The Glock UFFIE
No Love Lost LCD SOUNDSYSTEM
Diamonds In The Dark MYSTERY JETS
That Was Just A Dream CUT COPY
Cannonball THE BREEDERS
Stigmata MINISTRY

MAINLINE

The last time I saw Spiritualized was back in 2002 at the Beacon Theater. It was all laser-guided starbursts, seizure strobe lights and hypno feedback. Not to mention a healthy pillowing of rock-fog throughout; basically full on space madness. It was fantastic fun, and the ex-Spacemen 3 singer Jason Pierce seemed to revel in the psych-lunacy of it all. Well, a lot has happened to Pierce since then, namely that the guy pretty much died (twice!) from pneumonia and tissue damage. He's come back from that white light with more lucidity, re-working and performing music that now fully embraces the gospel nature of his songwriting. For the past year or so, Spiritualized has toured under the "Acoustic Mainlines" tag (a pun off the "Electric Mainline" track), with a healthy dose of ballads and old classics on the set list. At the famed Apollo Theater on 125th street last Friday, Pierce shuffled onto stage accompanied only by his Spiritualized keyboard player, and backing them, a nine-piece string section and choir. The combination of Pierce's storied musical past and his recent brush with death makes for a dramatic premise for sure, and I was curious to see how it would unfold. FULL REVIEW

FULTON ST SESSION

SPIRITUALIZED

MUM

SUNSET RUBDOWN RANDOM SPIRIT LOVER

I have this running argument with myself about which is more valid for an artist - scant output defined by isolated peaks, or prolificacy with lots of filler. Is it better to be astute and produce only when things are aligned or is it better to spit it all out when you think it and push on? Clearly, Spencer Krug can't figure out how to go about the former, as albums seem to pour out this guy every time the season changes. As the unofficial hardest workingman in indie-rock, Krug has built an impressive canon of material since leaving Frog Eyes back in 2003. Wolf Parade's seminal Apologies To The Queen Mary dropped (officially) in 2005, and since then, Krug has produced an EP and now two full lengths with Sunset Rubdown. If Krug keeps this pace, he should have about forty albums recorded by the time he retires. I wonder, does Krug even remember how to play half the songs he's written from only the past few years? And with each different band he involves himself in (Fifths of Seven, Wolf Parade, Swan Lake), he leaves a mark that is undeniably his. FULL REVIEW

RUB N TUG

MORRISSEY

Stop me if you've heard this one before - curtains up, thunderous applause, mopey jams, clothing thrown and torn, exit stage left. For five nights this past week, this is exactly what you got during Morrissey's triumphant return to New York City. Forget about the canceled Madison Square Garden gig, and let's not talk about the $65 Hammerstein tickets being reduced to $22 a week before the shows. Overestimating your drawing power is something every major musician deals with as the sunset years start to swell, and 2007 has been a watershed year of sorts for Morrissey. Cancelled and rescheduled shows were announced like clockwork this year, and as they mounted up, fans started to surmise about poor ticket sales being the culprit and not the throat infections the press was pushing. The Richard Burton/James Dean set backdrops don't exactly argue against the whole thing being an oldies act, either. But on Sunday, as he closed out his epic Hammerstein Ballroom residency, Morrissey seemed eager, almost determined, to live up to his own grandeur. FULL REVIEW

NAVVY

†

Justice unofficially closed out this year's CMJ festival on Saturday as three thousand dance-hungry people sold out the new Terminal 5 for the first of two Justice shows. New venues in New York seem to be popping up like kebab stands all of a sudden; I feel like every show I go to lately has a fresh plaster job on the venue's drywall. Not that I'm complaining, because most of these places have their charms. Terminal 5 feels like the Thunderdome of music halls-lots of steel and a vertical layout (3 floors!) makes it a great place for either a pro wrestling cage-match or a Judas Priest video. It seemed perfect to see Justice there, with their ten thousand Marshall amps and five hundred cigarettes. FULL REVIEW

LOUD

SIMIAN MOBILE DISCO

NAS

SLICK RICK

WORK FROM UVA

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