Search Results for: indie

In the last month, two very different West Coast live music venues have met two very different fates. In Los Angeles, the resolutely DIY noise and punk outpost the Smell celebrated its 10th anniversary with a series of shows featuring scene stalwarts like No Age and Abe Vigoda. In Seattle, however, music fans mourned the sudden closing of the Crocodile Cafe; the 16-year-old space, which was heralded as the “living room of grunge,” closed unexpectedly December 16. In an age where clubs seem to come and go in the blink of an eye, one that remains open into its teens… Read more »

Dance musician Moby has launched a Web site that gives his music away — to the right people, of course. He is licensing his music for free via mobygratis.com to help out indie and student filmmakers. “I was a philosophy major and I had a minor in film,” he says. “Ever since then, I’ve had a lot of friends in the world of independent and nonprofit film production. Their recurring complaint is that it’s really difficult to license music for movies that have no budgets, so I thought I would start this Web site which very simply provides free music… Read more »

F. Scott Fitzgerald may have depressingly opined that “there are no second acts in American lives,” but Nada Surf is certainly making the case for second acts in indie rock. The band had an accidental alt-rock radio hit in 1996 with “Popular,” only to be signed and then summarily dropped by Elektra. This sort of rise and fall would spell the end for many bands, but Nada Surf kept on going, buying back and reissuing its shelved major-label album, “The Proximity Effect,” in 1998. Since then, the band released two records on Seattle-based indie Barsuk: 2003’s “Let Go,” which has… Read more »

In 2004, U.K.-based independent label Memphis Industries released the sample-heavy, intentionally lo-fi and daringly jarring “Thunder, Lightning, Strike,” the Go! Team’s debut full-length CD. The buzz was deafening, so in 2005, the label entered a joint venture with Sony BMG to distribute the album internationally, with the major’s Columbia subsidiary handling it in the United States. It’s a turn of events that every band dreams of — unless that band is the Go! Team. The brainchild of Ian Parton, the Go! Team was never supposed to be mainstream. Parton set out to make “dirty” pop songs — danceable, catchy tunes… Read more »

In case you haven’t heard, the formerly unsinkable airship of cash known as the music industry is currently crashing down from the heavens in a ball of flames, hurtling toward the Earth at supersonic speeds. In fact, at this point it’s only a matter of time before it smashes into terra firma with the impact of 10,000 atomic bombs, blowing a hole clear through North America, causing the seas to boil and sending clouds of black soot skyward, blotting out the sun and eventually ending life as we know it.At least that’s how the members of Stars see it. “It’s… Read more »

The past few years have been bittersweet for music retail in Los Angeles. The opening of Amoeba Records in 2001 gave the city one of the stronger music outlets in America, but was followed soon by the closings of Aron’s Records and Rhino Records. Yet indie music fans not wanting to brave the Hollywood traffic to hit Amoeba had an outpost near downtown in Sea Level Records, run by Todd Clifford, merchandise man for the rock band Silversun Pickups. The store arrived as the city’s Echo Park neighborhood was undergoing a revitalization, and stocked a heavily curated catalog (top sellers… Read more »

After launching a brand partnership to support non-commercial radio at the South by Southwest Music Festival in Austin, TX, Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A., Inc. (TMS) and Urban Outfitters (URBN) announced some of the 13 bands who will make the upcoming “Free Yr Radio” Tour. “Free Yr Radio” is a series of free, in-store performances by some of the biggest indie music names at Urban Outfitters locations across the country. The tour, part of the multi-phased “Free Yr Radio” campaign that will channel much-needed funding to participating independent radio stations, kicks off April 15th at the Chicago Urban Outfitters with a… Read more »

Merlin, a new agency that seeks to represent the world’s independent music sector, has agreed to a deal with the digital music company Snocap that will allow music from Merlin clients to be sold from Web sites like MySpace. The group announced the deal at the annual MidemNet music conference in France, saying it would allow thousands of independent labels across the world to sell digital downloads of their music. Merlin said it would act as the “fifth major” in the world and would help independent labels get better deals. Snocap was founded by the creator of Napster, Sean Fanning.… Read more »

Independent record labels behind artists like The White Stripes, Deep Purple and Arctic Monkeys announced a global deal Saturday to pool access to their catalogs, seeking to grab a bigger share of online music sales from the major record companies. Indies and their trade groups from more than a dozen countries signed up to Merlin, a nonprofit licensing agency that will cut deals on their behalf with download sites under the terms of the agreement unveiled at Midem, a music industry gathering in the French Riviera town of Cannes. Smaller record companies with just a handful of successful artists fear… Read more »

It’s New Year’s Eve in New York and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah is headlining the buzziest indie rock bill in town. The eclectic quintet — which has risen to notoriety for selling more than 110,000 copies of its 2005 debut album in the United States without the help of a record label — has plenty to celebrate. The band is using the show at Manhattan’s Hammerstein Ballroom to preview a half-dozen tracks from its self-released sophomore set, “Some Loud Thunder,” due January 30. CYHSY’s most rabid fans don’t need much of an introduction to some of the new material.… Read more »