(Jennifer O’Connor, Box Awesome, Lincoln, NE, July 12, pic taken from derek von‘s Flickr stream)

As we continue our feverish preparations for Jennifer O’Connor’s new LP/CD ‘Here With Me’ (8/19), there’s a couple of exciting they’ve-got-the-internet-on-computers-now developments to share with you.

For one, Jennifer is the New York Times Popcast (mp3) “Artist Of The Week”, and the subject of an interview with the Times’ Ben Sisaro and a live performance in the Times’ studios. There’s some album reviews by Jon Pareles at the start of the program — fast forwarding, is of course, entirely optional.

For another, we’ve launched a Jennifer O’Connor widget (above), which you’re free to plug into your own blog, MySpace profile, Facebook profile, Live Journal, etc. If you’ve got friends who tend to take naps with their laptops left open, you can cut and paste the embed code and let them do some free advertising for Jennifer, too.

Finally, along with next week’s dates supporting Wilco, a record release show at the Mercury Lounge on 8/21 and an instore at Brooklyn’s Permanent on 8/23, Jennifer will be hitting the West Coast with Damien Jurado in September. More dates to follow, soon.

August
10-Wilmington DE @Grand Opera House with Wilco
13-Brooklyn NY @ McCarren Park Pool with Wilco
21-New York NY @ Mercury Lounge with Dump
23-Brooklyn NY @ Permanent Records 3 PM in-store performance

September
7-Sacramento, CA @ Harlow’s Night Club with Damien Jurado
9-Los Angeles, CA @ Spaceland with Damien Jurado
10-San Francisco, CA @ The Independent with Damien Jurado
12-Portland, OR @ Doug Fir Lounge with Damien Jurado
13-Seattle, WA @ The Triple Door with Damien Jurado
19-New Haven, CT @ Cafe Nine
25-Northampton, MA @ Iron Horse Music Hall with Great Lake Swimmers

Jay Reatard’s compilation of Matador singles comes out on October 7 and is entitled “Matador Singles ’08.” It contains all 6 of the limited edition 7″es that we have been releasing this year, less Deerhunter’s cover of “Oh, It’s Such A Shame,” and with the addition of one extra track. Since single #5 has 3 songs, that makes 13 songs total. We’re currently up to single #4 with #5 on the way in three weeks. Track listing will be:

1. See/Saw – 7″ #1
2. Screaming Hand – 7″ #1
3. Painted Shut – 7″ #2
4. An Ugly Death – 7″ #2
5. Always Wanting More – 7″ #3
6. You Mean Nothing To Me – 7″ #3
7. Fluorescent Grey – 7″ #4
8. Trapped Here – 7″ #5
9. Hiding In My Hole – 7″ #5
10. Dead On Arrival – 7″ #5
11. No Time – 7″ #6
12. You Were Sleeping – 7″ #6
13. I’m Watching You – extra track

For those of you who have stayed out of the 7″ ordering fray, “Always Wanting More” was made available this spring on the Intended Play zipfile and free CD… that was the A-side of single #3.

Here is the A-side of single #1, “See/Saw:”

“See/Saw” (mp3)

photo by Jeff Allen

(l-r Stephen, Janet, photographed in Paris last month, pic taken from gguillaumee‘s Flickr page)

Midwestern USA, Western Canada, we’ve heard your plea. Or rather, Billions has heard your plea. We’re just forwarding the info.

October
23-Calgary AB @ The Warehouse
24-Edmonton AB @ Starlite Room
25-Saskatoon SK @ Amigo’s
27-WInnipeg MB @ Pyramid Cabaret
30-Madison, WI @ High Noon Saloon

November
2-Columbia, MO @ The Blue Note
4-Omaha, NE @ Slowdown
5-Lawrence, KS @ Liberty Hall
6-Denver, CO @ Gothic Theatre

Blitzen Trapper support on all dates.

(video hosted courtesy Spinner.com, directed by Wyatt Neumann)

“Highways Of Gold”, currently available on the Jaguar Love s/t CD EP / 7″, also found on the forthcoming ‘Take Me To The Sea’ LP/CD (August 19).

“Highways Of Gold” (edit) – “Highways Of Gold” (mp3)

July
Wednesday 30 Salt Lake City, UT In The Venue w/The Faint
August
Friday 01 Vancouver, CA Commodore Ballroom w/The Faint
Saturday 02 Richmond, VA The Old Firehouse
Sunday 03 Portland, OR Crystal Ballroom w/The Faint
Tuesday 05 Burlington, VT U of VT Davis Center Grand Ballroom w/The Faint
Wednesday 06 Pomona, CA Glass House w/Crystal Antlers
Wednesday 06 Long Beach, CA Que Sera
Wednesday 06 Long Beach, CA Que Sera w/Crystal Antlers
Thursday 07 Los Angeles, CA Henry Fonda Theatre w/The Faint
Thursday 07 Los Angeles, CA Henry Fonda Theater w/The Faint
Friday 08 Anaheim, CA Chain Reaction
Friday 08 Anaheim, CA Chain Reaction w/Crystal Antlers
Saturday 09 San Diego, CA Soma w/The Faint
Monday 11 Austin, TX La Zona Rosa
Tuesday 12 Dallas, TX Palladium Ballroom w/The Faint
Thursday 14 Atlanta, GA Variety Playhouse w/The Faint
Friday 15 Carrboro, NC Cat’s Cradle w/The Faint
Saturday 16 Washington D.C., DC 9:30 Club w/The Faint
Sunday 17 Philadelphia, PA Trocadero Theater w/The Faint
Tuesday 19 Brooklyn, NY Southpaw
Wednesday 20 Worcester, MA The Palladium Ballroom w/ The Faint
Thursday 21 Toronto, CA The Opera House w/The Faint
Friday 22 Chicago, IL Vic Theater w/The Faint
Saturday 23 Omaha, NE Sokol Auditorium w/The Faint

Fucked Up’s second album, ‘The Chemistry Of Common Life,’ will be in stores on October 7. The record synthesizes their numerous musical directions into an expansive epic about the mysteries of birth, death, and the origins of life (and re-living). Merging elements of hardcore riffage with up to 70 tracks of guitars, organs, winds and vocals, (including 18 guitars on the first single, the fatalistic “No Epiphany”), the music remains iconoclastic and startling, with Pink Eyes’ vocals front and center. Guest musicians, of course, abound, notably gorgeous female voices such as Brooklyn’s Vivian Girls and Toronto’s Katie Stelmanis. The perspective is idiosyncratically scientific: amid soaring guitar chords, the title track pays homage to the random chemical processes that created life on this planet. Though Fucked Up remain punks at heart – if quixotically diverse ones – they have created a great, weird, heavy record that stubbornly sticks in your brain and your heart.

Track listing:

1. Son The Father
2. Magic Word
3. Golden Seal
4. Days Of Last
5. Crooked Head
6. No Epiphany
7. Black Albino Bones
8. Royal Swan
9. Twice Born
10. Looking For God
11. The Chemistry Of Common Life

Vinyl bonus track: The Peaceable Kingdom

You can preorder the Fucked Up album from the Matador Store and get $2 off and a free poster:

Fucked Up Preorder Deal

Check out the MP3 of “No Epiphany.”

FUCKED UP, CRYSTAL ANTLERS, STRANGE BOYS

Sat-Aug-30 – Los Angeles, CA – Fuck Yeah Fest
Sun-Aug-31 – Berkeley, CA – 924 Gilman
Mon-Sep-01 – San Francisco, CA – Hemlock Tavern
Thu-Sep-04 – Olympia, WA – TBD
Fri-Sep-05 – Seattle, WA – Vera Project
Sat-Sep-06 – Portland, OR – Music Fest NW
Sun-Sep-07 – Vancouver, BC – Richards on Richards

(photograph by David Waldman)

If anyone wants equal time, Kyte the will allow you to film your own rebuttal (keep it short, however)

That’s right… three different sleeves, featuring pics of Jay, Stephen and Billy. (Sorry, we cannot accommodate requests for a specific sleeve, and webstore preorders will be limited to one per customer.) Tracks are “Trapped Here” on the A-side, and “Hiding Hole” and “Dead On Arrival” on the B-side.

Release date is August 19.

We’ll be announcing preorder information shortly and yes, we have a plan in place to deal with the problems we had on #4.

(“a little less of Peter’s vocals in the monitor, thank you” – Clint Conley at Pitchfork ’08, photo swiped from Kirstiecat‘s Flickr stream)

The following dates, featuring Mission Of Burma performing a classic album or EP from front to back (yes, they play other stuff, too — if these shows were a ripoff, our bulletin board would be the first place to find out) are on sale right now.

9/25 – LA at Echoplex – Vs.
9/26 – SF at Independent – Signals, Calls & Marches
9/27 – SF at Independent – Vs.
9/29 – Portland at Doug Fir – Signals, Calls & Marches
9/30 – Vancouver at Plaza Nightclub – Signals, Calls & Marches
10/1 – Seattle at Neumo’s – Vs.

Two day passes for the San Francisco shows entitled the bearer to a Burma poster, which you can collect at the merch table on the 26th.

Hot off the heels from opening various Stateside enormo-dome arenas for some band called Coldplay (yeah I know, me neither), us Brits – along with the French, Irish and Dutch – finally get a piece of the Shearwater action this coming September.

If, like me, you’re of a financially-challenged nature, please take note of the free in-store gig the band will be doing at London’s Rough Trade East store on Thursday 18th September.

In a nutshell, there’s no excuse to miss out. At least, none that will wash with me.

10 September – Paradiso, Amsterdam (NL)
12 September – La Maroquinerie, Paris (FR)
13 September – End Of The Road Festival, Dorset (GB)
14 September – Zodiac, Oxford (GB)
15 September – Captain’s Rest, Glasgow (GB)
16 September – The Roadhouse, Manchester (GB)
17 September – Bush Hall, London (GB)
18 September – Rough Trade East, London (GB) *Free in-store performance*
19 September – Whelans, Dublin (IE)
20 September – Speakeasy, Belfast (GB)
21 September – Roisin Dubh, Galway (IE)

Longtime Matador associates and NZ transplants Bailter Space aka bailterspace, will be playing Manhattan’s Bowery Ballroom on August 23. Though they’ve got no shortage of contemporary material to drop on your lovely head, persons familiar with the band’s back catalog might get to hear this :

Or maybe not. They’re musicians, not a jukebox, darn it.

We’re happy announce Pre-Order is now up for Mogwai’s new album “The Hawk Is Howling.” If you order now, you receive $1 off of either the LP or CD and a free poster! Order HERE

In addition, we’re offering a special Mogwai BUNDLE deal. You can get all four Matador Mogwai albums (including The Hawk Is Howling) plus a free poster for the insanely low price of $36! The bundle will be shipped around street date. Click HERE to purchase!

(above, J, Johnny, Cody, photograph by Michael Lavine)

Jaguar Love’s performance at the Capitol Hill Block Party (Seattle, WA) will be webcast on KEXP.org tomorrow at 6:30 PST (9:30 EST). If you’ve not already made plans, Jay Reatard is on the Neumos stage tonight, while the Cave Singers are playing 2nd on the Main Stage tomorrow.

Yo La Tengo never pass up an opportunity for self promotion.

Courtesy of our good friend Stewart Green – roaming reporter at Latitude Festival this weekend.

Adam whipped this one up, using a recipe from the River Cafe Pasta Cookbook as inspiration. Since the sausage was pork and fennel, and he had fennel tops lying around, he added those to the saute. The saute base was shallots in a mixture of Pugliese unfiltered olive oil and Carlí olive oil with butter. He added tomatoes and chopped (New Jersey, seeded) pepperoncini. Pasta was fresh penne from Ceriello in Grand Central.

We also had a tomme d’Alsace and Forsterkäse as well. The former was buttery and nutty and matched the Pinot d’Alsace from Zind-Humbrecht (1999) that we drank with the meal. The latter is a washed-rind cheese, powerfully odiferous and creamy, from canton Thurgau in northern Switzerland.

“Highways Of Gold”, from the upcoming LP/CD ‘Take Me To The Sea’ (August 19). A snazzy conceptual video of the above song will be appearing in this space soon (other spaces, too)



The British love affair continues. I think it’s something to do with the high volume of beard per capita/band member.

The above Cargo show is just one of many others Pete, Derek and Marty will be playing in UK, Ireland and beyond….

10 August – Zomerparkfeest, Venlo (NL)
11 August – Bar Mondial, Antwerpen (BE)
12 August – Paradiso, Amsterdam (NL)
14 August – Cargo, London (GB)
15 August – Green Man Festival, Glanusk Park (GB)
16 August – The Adelphi Club, Hull (GB)
18 August – Roundhouse, London (GB) *
20 August – Crawdaddy, Dublin (IE)
21 August – Cyprus Avenue, Cork (IE)
22 August – Roisin Dubh, Galway (IE)
23 August – Speakeasy, Belfast (GB)

* w/ Alela Diane

Canadian Virginia-spawned vocalist/keyboardist Bruce Hornsby is no stranger to untruth-in-advertising. For years, he fronted a band optimistically known as The Range  when they had little to speak of. Now, he’s hitting the summer shed/state fair circuit as the face and voice behind The Noisemakers.

Though a number of mainstream musicians have flexed their avant chops before (Pat Metheny, Norah Jones’ collaborations with the Bunnybrains, anytime Ashlee Simpson sings without autocue, etc.) I submit there is no greater stretch in hyperbole history than Bruce Hornsby calling his band The Noisemakers.

The Times New Viking Music Festival Weekend Express made a brief stop by our offices on Friday to drop off some new tunes and create some artwork on Patrick’s floor. Both of these bits of news (and the video below) should excite you (or at least ignite another limited edish 7″ thread on the BB).

Mission Of Burma, performing “Learn How” from ‘Vs.’, Pitchfork Festival, Friday, July 18.

We’d heard Sunday night that Matador Direct’s table at Pitchfork had generated a few thousand dollars in merchandise sales, truly excellent news as we’d decided to put every penny towards a very deserving charity (The Ronald McKugelberg House For Kids Who Buy Too Many Records On eBay).

However, Monday morning, after our intrepid crew returned from Chicago, we’re left trying to determine how they’ve only brought home $27.50 and a strongly worded letter from management of the Red Roof Inn banning our company from ever using their facilities again.

Dean, Sara, would you care to explain?

a solo rendition of “Daylight Out” from the upcoming LP/CD ‘Here With Me’, as captured in Chris Lombardi’s office.  I don’t know how many of you have ever been held captive in Chris’ office, but I think it can safely be called a minimum security prison.

This is what happens when the Memphis music scene stops being polite and starts getting real.  Jay – as always – plays the voice of reason.

OK, perhaps that’s overstating things a tad. But Jeff (above, right) can be heard this coming Monday on Viva Radio , July 21 at 2pm EST 12pm EST. This is your big chance to explore the inner workings of this quality individual’s vast brain. On top of that, he’ll be making some calls to American Apparel stores. For prank purposes, I mean. Not to see if they have any job openings.

Lots to say, people, lots.  I totally heart Milwaukee.  Previously, I’d been to this fine city only once to play and had such a great time.  I wondered if it was a fluke.  I now know it was no fluke – Milwaukee may just be the finest place on Earth.

But let’s get to the record store juice, shall we?

I visited Atomic Records and had a lovely chat with Sahan.

JO’C: How long have you worked here?

Sahan: One year.

JO’C: What did you have for lunch?

Sahan: A baked potato.

JO’C: Yum, that sounds good. What’s your favorite place to eat in Milwaukee?

Sahan: Classic Slice.

JO’C: What’s the best music venue in Milwaukee?

Sahan: NOT The Rave.

JO’C: Oh shit! Is there a good music scene here? What are some good local bands?

Sahan: Yeah, I’d say there is. Malachi, Get Rad, Call Me Lightning, Brief Candles. Those are some of the best.

JO’C: Cool, I’ll check them out. What are your favorite new releases?

Sahan: Gregor Samsa – Rest and the Atlas Sounds‘ record.

JO’C: Are you going to any of the big festivals down in Chicago this summer?

Sahan: No, I was gonna go to Pitchfork, but I’m not now. I AM going to see My Bloody Valentine in September.

JO’C: I think that’s a much better choice. Good work.
I really like Milwaukee. Should I move here?

Sahan: Yes.

JO’C: Anything else you’d like to add?

Sahan: Yes, I am not 15…I’m actually 22.

Atomic is awesome. Sahan gave me a great Atomic Records t-shirt, and I bought Aretha Franklin’s I Never Loved a Man…on cd so I could listen in the car. And a $2 Deee-Lite single with some rad re-mixes. I also got the new Magnet magazine…which has a really fucking awesome new Matador ad in it. Really. To top it off – Sahan came to the show that night at the Cactus Club – which was the best show so far I think. I could go on and on, but unfortunately, I have to get in my rented Chevy Impala and drive to Minneapolis now.

Love,
JO’C

Mission Of Burma’s start-to-finish performance of ‘Vs.’, live from Chicago’s Pitchfork Music Festival, will be webcast today at 7pm EST. Who knows what you’ll see this time? Springa at the side of the stage? Closeups of Bob Weston’s hands? I’m gonna have my view blocked by a combination of trees, tall people and road cases, but you can tell me what it looked like on the computer the next time I see you.

Photography by Miwa Okumura.  I’m pretty sure the guy on the far right is checking his voice mail (as opposed to sticking his fingers in his ears).  Not shown : Nate Dogg, Chris Martin.

As many of you are aware, the preorder process for Jay Reatard 7″ #4 turned into a nightmare for you and for us. First, on Monday, the preorder accidentally went live at 1:30 PM, 90 minutes earlier than was announced. Early orders poured in, and since this seemed unfair to those who were waiting until 3:00 PM to order, we canceled those orders and started the process again at 3. However, due to a rule at our credit-card processing company that we had never had reason to encounter before, anyone who ordered for a second time on the same card got a duplicate/fraud message, and were not allowed to complete the order. In addition, the rush of orders at 3 was so intense that the server slowed down to a crawl, and many people were not able to complete their orders at all.

In light of all this we decided to redo the order at 3 PM on Tuesday. We canceled all orders for a second time, got with our credit card processing company to shorten the timeout period for duplicate orders, and got with our ISP to prepare for an onslaught of traffic at 3.

However we were not prepared for the amount of traffic we did get yesterday – over 10,000 unique visitors at 3 PM, and the server once again slowed to a crawl or worse, leaving many people out in the cold, disgusted, and fed up with Matador – understandably. (For comparison’s sake, the entire Matador website usually gets 8,000 unique visitors per day.) We’re still not clear whether the publicity resulting from the previous two preorders led to the increase in visitors, or whether this was some kind of denial of service attack from a disgruntled customer.

In any event, we have collated orders from everyone who ordered successfully the first OR second time with those who ordered successfully the third time, and we are filling orders for everyone who got a successful order confirmation from us, whether it was cancelled or not.

We’d lke to offer apologies for all the drama and hassle, but we’ve been apologizing non-stop and that’s not what you guys want – you want an efficient order process, and that’s what we pledge to offer in the future. It’s going to be even harder to buy singles #5 and #6 – that’s the whole point of this exercise after all – but it won’t be due to technical problems. We’ll have security, traffic, credit card processing and everything else sorted out and tested well in advance of the remaining 7″ preorders, and it will work the way it’s supposed to. I think that’s all we can say at this time.

Matador Records

Matmos, currently touring North America in support of their most recent LP/CD, ‘Supreme Balloon’, will be playing at Chicago’s Permanent Records on July 26. We hope you can attend. Not in lieu of the show at the Lakeshore Theatre or anything, but preferably, both.

Fucked Up rounded up their first stint across Europe with Matador in 2008 last night at London’s Water Rats in Kings Cross.

Set list!

Vivian Girls
Black Hats
Baiting The Public
Fate Of Fates
Crooked Head
Crusades
David Comes To Life
Invisible Leader
Police
Circling The Drain
Blaze Of Glory
Color Removal
Jacobs Ladder
Nervous Breakdown
Generation

A bit of a greatest hits session, with an encore to boot. Only one new track in there, but i’ve been assured that when they get back in August tracks from The Chemistry of Common Life will be making an appearance.

Some photos below taken at Supersonic festival on Sunday night… Now that was a whole other experience in itself. The Doom crowd didn’t know what was going on. As Damian rightly pointed out, probably the only band to make a joke on stage that weekend. (Also probably the most naked band of the festival.)

Photos courtesy of the wonderful Lucy Johnston.