Search Results for: take this to heart records

PARK CITY, Utah – Deciding to shelve an album is never easy, but it helps when writing another one only takes a month. “I wrote a record and I didn’t like it so much,” Dashboard Confessional singer Chris Carrabba said recently. “It didn’t feel like the right songs for where I’m at in my life right now, so I started again about four weeks ago. Now I’ve got another one and I like it a lot – I can talk about these stories truthfully for the next two years. I didn’t think the last batch would mean something to me… Read more »

You can’t get the question right. You’re fumbling for the right words but all you can hear are the lyrics to “Age of Consent” over and over and over again in your brain… It’s almost too easy to toss the word “influential” in front of a band to hype up its place in the pop-music pantheon. Few acts deserve it, and the word is so damn relative. But the culture mill spits out thousands of new bands each year and inevitably even the most wanly creative gets the “influential” stamp if it can hang in there long enough. So, then… Read more »

SANTA MONICA, California – It’s been awhile since we’ve heard from Garbage, but don’t worry, they didn’t break up. Or maybe they did. “It depends on which one of us you ask,” bassist/guitarist Steve Marker said during a recent visit from their Madison, Wisconsin, home base to Los Angeles. “I think we took a break, but some of us think that we broke up, so we haven’t even resolved that yet. We should probably talk about that. It got pretty weird between the four of us, and the music wasn’t really happening, so we took a break. There were times… Read more »

Maybe you can blame it on some indie-minded guilt. On March 1, Death Cab for Cutie – longtime independent stalwarts recently inked to Atlantic Records – will drop The John Byrd EP, the final release for them on tiny Seattle label Barsuk Records. The EP will only be available in two places: on Barsuk’s Web site or in record stores who are members of the Coalition of Independent Music Stores. It could be the result of a guilty conscience. But it’s more than likely not. “We just wanted to have a properly recorded live record out there, because bootlegs show… Read more »

New York – On the day nominations for the music industry’s highest honors were announced, nobody could find Killswitch Engage. Most of the members were asleep after headlining a concert the night before, pumping out ear-shattering music and screeching lyrics for a tiny audience. At least it was tiny compared with audiences for previous metal Grammy nominees, like Metallica and Black Sabbath. “Everyone’s mouth was pretty much wide open” after the Grammy nods, lead singer Howard Jones recently told The Associated Press. “Everyone was like, ‘Did this really just happen. What sort of bizarro world is this?’” It’s the kind… Read more »

New York – It’s been a stunning year for Brian Wilson. The former Beach Boy released his rerecording of the group’s “SMiLE” album to critical acclaim, and staged a worldwide tour chock-full of standing ovations. The original “SMiLE,” recorded more than 37 years ago, was never released officially. The Nonesuch Records release bowed at No. 13 on The Billboard 200. The set, whose full title is “Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE,” has sold more than 300,000 units, according to Nielsen SoundScan, and has been nominated for three awards at the Grammys on Feb. 13. Two nights before that, he will be… Read more »

Washington, D.C., probably hadn’t seen anything like it since 1985, when Twisted Sister’s Dee Snider and punk provocateur Jello Biafra testified before Congress during the height of the obscene lyrics witch-hunt: Tatted and pierced pop-punkers holding court on Capitol Hill. Members of Sugarcult and Hawthorne Heights took part in a press conference held in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Wednesday to announce the kickoff of the fifth annual Take Action Tour, and to raise awareness – and federal funding levels – for teen-suicide prevention programs across the country. “It’s one thing when you’re promoting your band, because you feel… Read more »

Hoboken, N.J. – The brooding kid hailed as rock’s next musical genius slouches next to the bar at a tiny, smoky club. No one notices. Not even this crowd of indie music fans recognizes Conor Oberst, the 24-year-old sensation behind Bright Eyes who’s been pegged as this generation’s Bob Dylan, putting words and melody behind those tormented emotions the rest of us struggle to describe. He pops up on stage to join his friends, Yo La Tengo, for their encore. Then he slides back into the crowd, just another skinny guy in jeans and a black hoodie. But the days… Read more »

Los Angeles – Bright Eyes principal Conor Oberst delivered a finished album to his label last February with an eye on a summer release, but then he had other ideas. He went back into the studio and recorded enough songs for a second set. Unwilling to scrap or combine any of the material, Oberst told his label, Omaha, Neb.-based Saddle Creek Records, that he wanted to release two separate albums – on the same day. “We felt like, ‘Why not kill two birds with one stone and put it all out there?”‘ Oberst says. On Jan. 25, Saddle Creek will… Read more »

New York – As rap stars go, Jin has the typical look down cold: Hoodie, baggy sweats, chunky diamond stud earring, a Chinese character tattooed on his neck and a large blingy necklace. Not everything’s typical, though. “Yeah, I’m Chinese. And what?” he asks with mock exasperation. At just 22, the Miami-bred, New York-based rapper is something of a pioneer – the first Asian-American hip-hop artist to get a major solo record deal. At the same time, he worries that it’s his race, not his rhymes, generating all the attention. “Being Asian helps me so much,” he says. “It definitely… Read more »