55 search results for ‘greg’

Marina & The Diamonds - Hollywood (Acoustic)

The Family Jewels, the début album from Marina & The Diamonds is out next week, and judging on the four (you read that correctly!) fantastic singles that have proceded the album, it’s going to rock. Hopefully I might find time to review it, but for now, here is a fabulous acoustic version of the most recent single Hollywood.

Greg

Coachella Lineup Announced - It’s Good

Coachella’s line-up always has the best bits of all genres of music, and this year is no exception, check this out…!

Absolutely amazing. For more info check http://www.coachella.com/

Greg

Goodbye ‘The Noughties’

So today is the end of the decade, it went pretty fast right? From Kid A to Them Crooked Vultures and everything in between, I personally have certainly bought a lot of good albums but with the main and crucial difference that I bought Kid A on CD whereas Them Crooked Vultures was downloaded straight from iTunes to my Pod. Hopefully in the next 10 years formats and music alike will continue to progress, and the major labels wont fuck the industry up (even more). I’ll bet €5 that they will.

In case you missed it, I’ll remind you one last time that we at AGCS wrote exposé’s of the last 10 years and selected and reviewed our favourite album from that year. They were as follows…

See you in the next decade, music fans.

Greg

The White Stripes - Under Great White Northen Lights

UNDER GREAT WHITE NORTHERN LIGHTS chronicles the Stripes’ Canadian tour that took place over two years ago. Jack and Meg did it up right – they played every province and territory in the country, and not just in traditional venues. They played in a boat! On a bus! In a park! The results were all captured by a film crew for the documentary.

The Stripes are now issuing a massive box set to be released on March 16. The limited edition set will include UNDER GREAT WHITE NORTHERN LIGHTS on DVD, along with a DVD of the Stripes’ 10th anniversary show in Nova Scotia, a 16-track live album from one of the dates on Canadian tour (in both vinyl and on CD), a live 7”, a tour book clocking in at over 200 pages (with photos by Autumn de Wilde and a foreword by the incomparable Jim Jarmusch), and a silk screen print. The DVD will also be available separately on March 16.

- Source

For details of the 35 track 10th anniversary show DVD (that will REALLY excite White Stripes fans) click below…

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Art vs Science - Parlez-Vous Francais?

The observant amongst you will know that I’m currently residing in Australia, a country that musically has done very little for the world. For every Nick Cave there’s a Rolf and for every Avalanches there’s a Jet (I won’t go on because I’ve almost exhausted Australia’s music scene, except Kylie obviously).

However, I am trying my hardest to source some good stuff amongst the bad/nothingness and my first tip comes in the form of now essential pre-night-out-listening Art Vs Science. I’m not sure they’re as good as DIOY,Y?, but the five track EP they released just over 6 months ago is a lot of fun, especially Parle-Vous Francias.

Turn it up. Dance.

Greg (In Melbourne)

John Frusciante leaves Red Hot Chili Peppers (?)

Sad news if true of course, as since John returned in 1999 for Californication the Chili’s output has been overall outstanding, with his classical and electronic influences often sneaking in.

But having seen the bands final show with John in August 2007, it feels like maybe this is for the best. It was insincere to say the least, and it’ll be sad if we have to remember what has been a tight live band overall for the last drags of the £2 million a show Stadium Arcadium tour.

Still, Frusciante has been making some excellent solo albums since 2003 and hopefully this’ll free up some time for him to make more. If you’re wondering where to start, I suggest 2004’s Shadows Collide With People and The Will To Death (Review here) or The Empyrean.

Greg

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10TH DECEMBER

Today’s festive fun comes in the form of “Christingle”, a song released by AGCS contributor Greg under his Greg The Hero moniker. Cry nepotism all you like, but I wouldn’t post the track up here just to humour him - it is a genuinely good Christmas song, as you’re sure to find out if you click the little play button above. Go on, click it. And click here to listen to more tracks.

Will that do Greg?

Jed. x

Lightspeed Champion Q&A / New Video

Dev Haynes aka Lightspeed Champion has been doing a Q&A through one of his website forums and to save you trying to find it, AGCS have compiled the best questions with the best answers to create a post that may look like we interviewed Dev ourselves. But we didn’t.

Q: Are you afraid, with sophomore albums usually having some sort of defining moment on your career, that people may not ‘get’ this album?
A: Yeah that doesn’t really bother me, that’s not to say that it wasn’t in my mind at certain points, it’s human nature. But if you go through life thinking like this, it’s bound to drive you crazy.. funnily enough, this very subject is the meaning behind the ‘Marlene’ video.

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ALBUMS OF THE DECADE: ILLINOIS (2005)

Despite the fact fellow AGCS writer Jed calls 2005 a ‘fallow year for music’, it signalled the start of the modern British Indie movement with debut albums from Art Brut (Bang Bang Rock & Roll), Bloc Party (Silent Alarm), Kaiser Chiefs (Employment ), Editors (The Back Room), Maximo Park (A Certain Trigger) and Tom Vek (We Have Sound) among others. Whilst some of these albums were better than others (Vek and Maximo stand out for me), it was the small number of albums from across the pond that excited me most.

QOTSA released the truly fantastic Lullabies to Paralyze, and if they hadn’t already been awarded AOTY2002 it’d have made choosing 2005 near impossible. We Are Scientists début was also great (it remains their best work yet); System of a Down’s Mezmerize was a great “Metal” album that as someone that despises the genre I latched onto and still adore today; Panic(!) at the Disco made ‘Emo’ interesting merging classical instruments with electronic to some great pop songs, and Foo Fighters had a decent attempt at a double album.

It was however a certain Sufjan Stevens however that fully delivered the kind of inspiring album that every human being with ears deserves to hear at least one of a year.

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ALBUMS OF THE DECADE: THE WILL TO DEATH (2004)

2004 was a remarkable year for John Frusciante, with the release of six consistently fantastic albums he recorded in the space of six months on a break from the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Released just months after Shadows Collide With People, an album that reportedly cost $300,000 to record and was very production heavy, The Will To Death was a conscious effort to be the opposite of Shadows.

“On The Will to Death, I thought it would be a good idea to make a record with very little backing vocals, because we’d done it so much on Shadows. I always have to have a new idea for each album. For The Will to Death, the idea was to have very little backing vocals. There’s a lot of other huge differences. In every way, I wanted the opposite of Shadows.” : Frusciante

A simple but beautiful album, The Will to Death works solely on the songwriting ability of Frusciante. Whilst the production is sometimes confusing with Frusciante using techniques that would seem unnatural with most other acts, he brings it together with an album that feels real through its honesty and simplicity. The main themes are life and death, but it’s definitely not a dark album with Ttought provoking lyrics and interesting harmony.

It’s very difficult to choose which album from this series deserves the title of Album of the Year, and if Curtains (the last of the series to be released, in early 2005) was released on schedule within 2004 then that would be my album of the year. Alistair on the other hand rates Shadows Collide With People at number one but for me, it is the beauty in modesty heard in tracks like The Days Have Turned and The Will to Death that makes The Will to Death one of my favourite albums of 2004.

Greg (currently in Bangkok)