Matador Records | News November 2001

Aereogramme — U.S. Tour Rescheduled
Hearts were broken and budgets were busted when Aereogramme’s debut U.S. tour was cancelled a few weeks back. Well, as Claus Von Bulow would say “surprise, surprise,” their tour is back on! Aereogramme will be hitting the highways and byways of los Estados Unidos in support of Superchunk, starting next week. Superchunk, whose excellent new album ‘Here’s To Shutting Up’ is available currently on the Merge record label (licensed to Matador in Europe, “how about that?” as Claus Von Bulow would say) are currently at the top of their game, they’re playing with pride, giving 110% and many other applicaple cliches. They fucking rule, as do Aereogramme. See you there.

Cornelius — Getting to the Point (Already)
At a press conference attended by some (but not all) Matador staff, Claus Von Bulow, and former Minnesota Vikings quarterback Fran Tarkenton, the label proudly announced that January 23, 2002 would be the North American release date for the new Cornelius album, ‘Point.’

After this announcement, we didn’t have much to say, so we turned the dias over to Mr. Tarkenton who graciously offered to do a live reading from his best-selling audiocassettes “Failure Is Not A Terminal Disease” and “What Losing Taught Me About Winning.” The presentation came to an abrupt halt when SEC investigators rushed the stage hoping to have a word with Fran. Displaying many of the scrambling skills with which he set many records as the field general of the Vikings, Tarkenton somehow slipped away through a fire exit (though not before collecting his speaker’s fee).

We’ll have more Cornelius news of a more substantiative nature very soon.

Cat Power — Ahem
We get asked “What’s up with Chan?” so often, it is nice to be able to say something definitive. The tour dates section has a bunch of forthcoming Cat Power dates in glamorous international locales. And upon Chan’s return to the land-of-the-free and the hooooooome of the brave (cue up big applause), she’ll be completing work on her as-yet untitled new Matador album, scheduled for 2002 release. To quote Claus Von Bulow, “sock it to me.”

Yo La Tengo
Yo La Tengo will be celebrating the 8 nights of Hanukah at Maxwell’s from December 9 through the 16th, with full sets of their own, plus specially selected guests each evening. When asked for a comment on this occasion, Claus Von Bulow refused to pick up the phone (supposedly he was in the bathroom. (For what, 2 hours?) Tickets are now available from the Maxwell’s website.

We would also like to add that Mike Peters of the Alarm is playing Maxwell’s on November 17. Matador Records has no working relationship with Mr. Peters, but we thought he could use a hand.

Arsonists
Neither this reporter or Claus Von Bulow could recall whether or not there was any mention in the last update of the amazing coast-to-coast Arsonists U.S. tour currently taking place in support of their brilliant new album ’Date Of Birth.’ If not, this was a huge oversight and on behalf of the entire Matador and Von Bulow families, we apologize and urge each and every one of you to check out one of the planet’s most thrilling hip hop trios tear it up. (Check the tour dates for more details). Tri-state residents (or even better, people who live near Hoboken) can see the Arsonists at Maxwell’s on November 20 with Mr. Len.

Preston School of Industry Instores:
Sunday, November 11th at 3PM
DC CD
2423 18th Street NW
Washington DC 20009
202-588-1810

Saturday, November 17th at 2PM
33 Degrees
4017 Guadalupe Street
Austin, TX
512-302-5233

Richard Hell — New Release of Old and Unheard Material Coming in 2002
In early 2002, Matador will be release an as-yet untitled double CD of recordings by Richard Hell & The Voidoids. Hell, a founding member of the Neon Boys and the Heartbreakers, before forming the Voidoids in 1976, is a crucial voice in American music and literature. Credited by many as one of the originators of the punk movement, songs such as “Blank Generation,” “Love Comes In Spurts,” “The Kid With The Replaceable Head,” and “Time” are amongst the finest of that or any other era. The first Voidoids album, ‘Blank Generation’ (Sire, 1977) has been cited more times than we can count as one of the most influential of its time. The following commentary on Blank Generation is from Lester Bangs:

“Richard Hell identifies with no movement, with few people in fact. If you listen between the sonic blasts, his music is about a sense of aloneness beyond the old alienated antihero syndrome, but before that Richard Hell is a rocker. The music on this album is some of the strongest, truest rock & roll I have heard in ages. Like most great rock & roll, it stands alone; there are influences, not all of them musical and many of them literary, but he is no arty poseur, in fact this is also some of the most honest music I have heard in some time. As we trail out of the age of artifice (I don’t think I have to mention any names), artifice itself rides on the coattails of most of those who proclaim themselves an alternative. Richard Hell is different. I hear echoes in this record of rock & roll from time immemorial, and they are not contrived, they are rather the modus of a plain-speaking kid with an awesome intelligence and a great pain to speak plainly of... The toughness of the music is just defensive armor, courtesy the searchlight-destructive tag-team of Robert Quine and Ivan Julian on guitars. In this album they have slashed out some of the most fitfully dangerous rock & roll I’ve heard this decade. If you think I say that lightly you don’t know me. But at the center is Hell himself, his own ninth circle, pretending to be blank when his every move and word reveals a naked, impassioned intelligence in the throes of the only truly rock & roll artistic convulsion, which is to be driven so far into and paradoxically, simultaneously outside of yourself that you create as a matter of frenzy, instead of lowering your eyelids before the world in shame and loneliness.”

The forthcoming double CD will consist of the following:

Disc One
(the bulk of this CD was previously
available on the ROIR cassette ‘RIP’)

Heartbreakers — 1975 (Hell, Thunders, Nolan, Lure)

1. Love Comes In Spurts
2. Chinese Rocks (Previously Unreleased)
3. Can’t Keep My Eyes On You
4. Hurt Me

Voidoids 1977 (Hell, Robert Quine, Ivan Julian, Marc Bell)

5. I’m Your Man
6. Betrayal Takes Two

Voidoids 1979 (Hell, Quine, Julian, Xavier, Morrison)

7. Crack Of Dawn
8. Ignore That Door
9. I Live My Life
10. Time (Previously Unreleased)
11. Going Going Gone
12. Funhunt (Previously Unreleased)

Voidoids 1983 (Hell, Paumgardhen, Freeman, Wood, live in Atlanta)

13. I Can Only Give You Everything

Hell In New Orleans, 1984 (Hell, Sanzenbach, LeBon, McCollam, Quine, Modeliste)

14. I Been Sleepin’ On It
15. Cruel Way To go Drown
16. The Hunter Was Drowned
17. Hey Sweetheart

Disc Two
(previously unreleased live recordings)

Richard Hell And The Voidoids
Live at Music Machine, London 1977

1. Intro
2. Love Comes In Spurts
3. Liars Beware
4. You Gotta Lose
5. Lose Yourself
6. New Pleasure
7. Walking On the Water
8. The Plan
9 . Blank Generation
10. I Wanna Be Your Dog
11. Vacancy
12. Venilator Blues

Richard Hell & The Voidoids --
Live At CBGB, New York, NY 1978
St. Mark’s Church Poetry Project Benefit, FM Broadcast

13. Kid With The Replaceable Head
14. Don’t Die
15. You Gotta Lose (with Elvis Costello)
16. Shattered

There might still be a change or 2 to disc one, but we’ll let you know. Disc two — whatever it might lack in terms of “production value,” it more than makes up for in the performances. This is no mere historical artifact. Nothing against historical artefacts, but this sounds pretty devastating in on the brink of 2002.

‘Hot & Cold’, a huge collection of Richard Hell’s non-fiction essays, poetry, song lyrics, notebooks and drawings, has just been published by powerHouse books. You can order it from Amazon or you can think about it for a minute or 2 and order a signed copy instead from Richard’s website.