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The S.S. Meets Anvil!!!!

April 23, 2009 11:02 AM

Photo: Granitz/WireImage

Was 4/20 a special day for you, too? 

It was a cold a wet day in New York, but we took the subway down to the Bowery Hotel, where it was our pleasure to hang with Anvil!

If you're not hip to Anvil, they're the Canadian heavy-metal band that, in the early Eighties, inspired Metallica and Slayer, but somehow failed to strike it big. For more than thirty years, the bands co-founders -- singer-guitarist Lips and drummer Robb Reiner -- have toiled away in relative obscurity, working shitty jobs to keep their metal dreams alive. Their struggle is laid out for all to see in the new documentary, The Story of Anvil.

It's a must see. While the film's trailer may give you the impression that Anvil are as hapless as a real-life Spinal Tap (yes, they visit Stone Henge in the film, and the fuckin' drummer's name happens to be the same as the man who directed Spinal Tap) but the film is a testament to human endurance. How far will these two dudes go to get the recognition they deserve? How eternal is their optimism? How much shit will they put up with just to be able to play their songs? You'll definitely laugh during the movie, but like us you'll weep like a small child. It's some powerful shit!

When we walked into room 1001 at the Bowery, Lips and Reiner were reclining on either side of a king size bed, for their Rolling Stone photo shoot. Lips was reading the New York Times, while Reiner held a cup aloft as it was refilled by a butler. (The hotel's manager dressed up for the part, because he loved the movie so much.) 

After the shoot, the three of us sat around the coffee table. "I celebrate 4/20 every day," Reiner told the S.S., sparking up a joint. (He didn't share with anyone.) Lips rolled up a Drum ciggie, and off we went. Below are some of our favorite moments.

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Help Wake Up Lucid Get To SXSW

April 22, 2009 1:11 PM

A few weeks ago, we acted on tips from our loyal SS readers to check out the LA-based trio Wake Up Lucid. We were impressed, tracked 'em down and talked to frontman Ryan Baca about their music and their rapid rise since hitting the SoCal circuit just a few months ago.

Now, we'd like to pass on a little more good news.

Ryan Baca just sent us a note saying that Wake Up Lucid will be hitting the legendary Village Studios in Los Angeles to track their first EP. No word on when it will be finished, but if their demos are any indication of what's in store, we're expecting raunchy rock at it's best.

Also, if you dig the band and have a spare thirty seconds, head here to vote for Wake Up Lucid in the Urban Outfitters "Your Band Here" contest. 

The winning band will receive a slot at next years South by Southwest.

Wake Up Lucid - "Broke Down House"

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Manchester Orchestra Enters the S.S.

April 21, 2009 2:32 PM

Manchester Orchestra - "The Only One" [Video: Pete Maiden/Eric Helton; Editing by Pete Maiden]


Andy Hull and Chris Freeman of the Manchester Orchestra were nice enough to swing by the Smoking Section to play us a few tunes from their new record, Mean Everything to Nothing, which comes out today!

Manchester Orchestra hails from Atlanta, and features Hull on guitar and vocals, Freeman on keys and vocals, Robert McDowell on guitar, Jonathan Corely on bass and Jeremiah Edmond on drums. Mean Everything to Nothing is their third LP and was produced by Joe Chicarrelli (the Shins, My Morning Jacket), Dan Hannon and the band.

In 2007, the band spent 300 days touring, and the bulk of material on Mean Everything to Nothing  is drawn from the road. "The first half of the record is about the anxiety and angst of the road and traveling in a van," Hull tells us. "The second half is kind of like where I found God on the road." Where was he, we ask? "He was under the back seat of the van."

Check out "The Only One" above, and click the jump for "Tony the Tiger," "The Party's Over," which is a Willie Nelson/Mountain Goats mash-up, and an exclusive interview with Hull and Freeman. And if you dig what you see, make sure you catch the Manchester Orchestra on tour this spring.

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The Band and the Kings

April 20, 2009 3:02 PM

The last couple of weeks have been absolutely nuts. When we returned from Australia with the Kings of Leon, in late March, we had to put our head down and write the story. The new issue of Rolling Stone -- with the Kings on the cover -- is on stands now, so if you ain't a subscriber, go on and buy one. We had a lot of fun writing it, and we hope you enjoy.

There are so many people to thank in helping us get our Kings story together (the band, the crew, etc.), but first and foremost we want to give a shout-out to Andy Mendelsohn, the Kings' day-to-day manager. We also wanted to congratulate him on his marriage a couple weeks back to his longtime honey, Julie. At the ceremony, everybody praised Andy for being the nicest guy on the planet, and we can only second that emotion. And at the afterparty, none other than Eddie Vedder dropped by to pay his respects to the newlyweds. It was a beautiful thing. Mazel tov!

Since the Kings love and idolize the Band, their cover shot was loosely inspired by Elliott Landy's iconic photo of the Band in the Catskills. In fact, drummer Nathan Followill has a rare print of that exact photo above his fireplace in Nashville.

So now get this: Last Friday, for a separate story, we happened to be talking to Robbie Robertson and he told us he dug the story (!), and he was flattered when he'd read that the Kings admired the Band. And he also said he's been listening to the Kings a bunch recently. How fuckin' rad is that?

And on Saturday we were up in Woodstock and visited the Midnight Ramble, where Levon Helm assembles a sick band to jam on killer covers and old Band songs at his house up there. It's was one of the greatest shows we've ever witnessed: Larry Campbell (a Dylan alum) ripped it up on guitar, and Steely Dan's Donald Fagen (our hero) played piano and organ throughout. (They even covered "Black Friday"). After the show we got to go back to Levon's kitchen to interview him for a story we're working on about the Ramble and his new album, Electric Dirt, out in June.

When we got back to the kitchen it was 1 a.m. Levon rolled us a super-fat J, and we sat on a rocking chair between Larry and Levon, burning that fattie down to the nub. 

We can't wait for you to read the whole story!

Levon was the sweetest, funniest, most humble dude ever!

Greatest night of our life? Maybe so!

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The S.S. Chats with Regina Spektor

April 15, 2009 2:11 PM

Photo: Gentner/Getty

We recently spoke with Russian-born chanteuse Regina Spektor about her new album, Far (out June 23rd). We got to hear the album and it's AMAZING, so we thought we'd share the chat with y'all.

FAR features 13 new tracks by Spektor, and the production work of four A-list producers, including Jeff Lynne (ELO, Traveling Wilburys), Mike Elizondo (Dr. Dre, Eminem, Fiona Apple), David Kahne (Paul McCartney, the Strokes) and Garrett "Jacknife" Lee (Weezer, REM).

"I wanted to learn as much as possible from as many people as I could," Spektor tells us. "If I had more time and if I got to make a 25-song record, I would have worked with another four or five or six people, just because it is so amazing to experience how different producers approach things and what they’re looking for in sounds."

Click the jump for the full interview with Spektor! 

She's really funny! 

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Lunch with Stevie Nicks

April 15, 2009 11:39 AM

Photo: Lovekin/Getty

If we had a single regret about going to Australia with the Kings of Leon (for RS's current cover story), it would be that we missed Fleetwood Mac performing at Madison Square Garden. But, when we returned, we had the pleasure of lunching with Ms. Stevie Nicks, who was in New York to promote her new live CD-DVD, The Soundstage Sessions: Live in Chicago, a collection featuring some of her biggest hits and baddest rarities. We chatted about the first time she met Lindsey Buckingham (at a Mormon Party), and that time she unceremoniously dumped Don Henley. 

But it was truly awesome to rap about "Silver Springs," an amazing track that was left off Rumours. The song is about her breakup with Buckingham -- "I'll follow you down till the sound of my voice will haunt you," she sings. "It was me realizing that Lindsey was going to haunt me for the rest of my life," she says. "And he has."

When she performs "Silver Springs" these days -- it's the final number on Fleetwood Mac's current tour -- Nicks resists the opportunity to get up in Lindsey's face: "I don't want fans to walk away in the middle of our argument."

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Chris Cornell Talks Ten and First Pearl Jam Gig

March 9, 2009 12:52 PM

Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam hangs on Chris Cornell during a Soundgarden performance in 1991. Photo:Temme/WireImage

On Friday we had a long chat with Chris Cornell for an upcoming Q+A in Rolling Stone. On March 10th, he'll release Scream, his new album that he made with the mighty Timbaland.


In honor of the upcoming reissue of Pearl Jam's Ten, we got Cornell reminiscing about Temple of the Dog, and seeing PJ's first show ever, in October of 1990 at Seattle's Off Ramp.(They were known as Mookie Blaylock.)

Q: You were obviously around the guys in Pearl Jam when they were working on Ten. From your perspective, what was it like watching them ascend so quickly?

A: It was just one surprise after another. I was at their first show, and it wasn't a surprise to me that they'd take off. It wasn't an immediate ascension, though, it was very MTV-driven, which was the case with all the Seattle bands. To be frank, it was all MTV-driven. With Soundgarden, we'd sold a couple hundred thousand copies of Louder Than Love and MTV put up "Outshined" and suddenly we were Number Five on the Billboard charts. Same thing happened to Nirvana and Alice In Chains and the Chili Peppers. The hit video phenomenon is what propelled these bands to sell out stadiums.

What do you remember of that first Pearl Jam show?

It was fantastic. It was the best debut show of any band that I've ever seen. They were not the band that we toured with in '92 on Lollapalooza, whic was much more jam-oriented and much more aggressive. That first night they were flawless, and the soulfulness coming from Eddie was unlike anything I'd ever seen in a club. His singing was phenomenal, and the songs had a lot of weight to them, more so than when I'd heard those official recordings. I felt like I was seeing a moment that was happening that was about to change everything.

Was that after Eddie had sung on "Hunger Strike," with Temple of the Dog?

Yeah. When we did that, Eddie had only sung over the demos that Stone Gossard had sent him. They were working out whether or not they'd become a band. I wasn't really sure. So Eddie was at the second of two rehearsals that we had as Temple of the Dog, waiting for us to be done so that they could rehearse, and I was singing "Hunger Strike." I'd written it but it wasn't really complete. I thought it could be a live track, or a deep album track. All it had was a verse and a repeating chorus. It was written as it is, so I was singing the low and high parts simultaneously, thinking I would overlap them, and he shyly came up to the microphone and started singing the low parts. I heard his voice and a light bulb went off in my head, and I thought, “Wait a minute, he sounds amazing in this register, why not I’ll sing a verse, then he can sing the same verse again, so it’s up to two verses, and we’ll have a real song here. This could be great.” Everybody seemed to like that idea. 

Which songs on Ten blew you away?

"Black" and "Release." Those were kind of shocking. The structures of those songs were not really typical, and they were really full of melody and super-memorable. I remember Eddie singing "Release" at the show and it knocked me over. It was weird, because Seattle went from this era where you couldn't find a good singer  if you went to every single show seven days a week, to seeing Layne Staley do one-take demos for five songs in a row that were all incredible album takes, and seeing Eddie's debut. I was shocked by the first Nirvana demo I'd heard, which was before Bleach! Mark Lanegan was another guy. All these unique voices were starting to appear and no one sounded remotely similar to the other guy.

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JJ Cale Is Our Hero

March 6, 2009 10:57 AM

Photo: Jane Richey

A few weeks back we had the honor of interviewing legendary songwriter JJ Cale about his new album, Roll On.  We wrote about it in the last issue of RS. Check it out right here. 

Turns out that the man who wrote the awesome Clapton hits "After Midnight" and "Cocaine" is one of the most down-to-earth dudes we've ever met.

And Roll On is an incredible album. We've been listening to it nonstop!

As he has throughout his career, JJ played pretty much every instrument on Roll On, and his lyrics couldn't be more perfect and economical. On the album he sings about the old days, and he sings (a lot) about loose women, but our favorite song on the album, "Leaving In the Morning," which addresses mortality. (JJ is seventy years young!)

It's one of the most beautiful songs ever.

Please enjoy.

Then get your hands on the whole album.

JJ Cale - "Leaving In The Morning"

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Exclusive: Wayne Coyne Tears Apart Arcade Fire!

March 4, 2009 6:49 PM

Photo: Koplaoff/FilmMagic (Coyne), Gershoff/WireImage(Butler)

Wow! We love Flaming Lips frontman Wayne Coyne. He's always been cool to us, and we appreciate the fact that he always speaks his mind. So, it wasn't a total shock to hear him tear the Arcade Fire a new asshole.

So, last week, our buddy and colleague Andy Greene is on the phone with the Coyne, when they started talking about some of the movers and shakers in the music world. They talked about Brian Eno, and Radiohead, and then got on the subject of Arcade Fire, which set Coyne off. (Just to clarify, Coyne is not comparing Eno to the Arcade Fire -- Eno was just a talking point.)

"I'm a fan of them on one level, but on another level I get really tired of their pompousness," says Coyne. "We've played some shows with them and they really treat people like shit. Whenever I've been around them, I've found that they not only treated their crew like shit, they treated the audience like shit. They treated everybody in their vicinity like shit. I thought, 'Who do they think they are?' I don't know why people put up with it. I wouldn't put up with it. I don't care if it's Arcade Fire or Brian Eno. If either of them walked into a room and treated people like shit I'd be like, 'Fuck you, get outta here.'

He continues, "People treat Arcade Fire like they're the greatest thing ever and they get away with it. Those sort of opinions change my view of their music. They have good tunes, but they're pricks, so fuck 'em. Who does Arcade Fire think they are? I've been around groups. I've been around the Edge from U2 and he's the fucking sweetest guy ever. I was around Justin Timberlake when he was young and he was just a normal, nice, kind person.  Anyone can be polite and kind and people who have the privilege and money and attention should understand that. If they don't, then fuck 'em."

Discuss.

UPDATE: Through their publicist, the Arcade Fire has declined to comment.

UPDATE #2: Arcade Fire frontman Win Butler has responded via his band's website. (Follow the link to Win's scrapbook.)

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Manchester Orchestra Are Our Friends

March 4, 2009 2:48 PM

We are seriously digging Mean Everything To Nothing, the new album by Manchester Orchestra (out in April).

This is the third album by the quintet, who hail from Atlanta and are led by singer Andy Hull.

Check out "I've Got Friends," below.

Manchester Orchestra - "I've Got Friends"

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