By Doug Wallen

Black Lips have a bad reputation. Whether making out on stage or fleeing India for fear of prison , they're known to some as gimmicky brats and others as brazen punks. But their albums speak for themselves. After a few promising cult platters, the Georgia quartet signed to the equally contentious Vice Records to release 2007's Good Bad Not Evil, the best garage album since White Blood Cells.

Finding themselves suddenly at the peak of accessibility, Black Lips decided to follow it up with 200 Million Thousand, a weird little record more notable for groggy atmosphere and dirge-like pacing than for any crossover potential. But damned if it isn't a grower, thanks to such diverse gems as the defiantly poppy "Starting Over," the dirty-ass "Big Black Baby Jesus of Today," and the Wu-Tang-damaged "The Drop I Hold." The band blurs the tragic and comic as well as the ugly and beautiful, and their blown-out analog vibe is as vintage sixties as their sinister guitar leads, slurred vocals, and shambling rhythm section.

Death+Taxes managed to snag some quality phone time with soot-voiced front man Cole Alexander while the rest of Black Lips were shooting a segment for MTV's Subterranean on the roof of the Vice offices. It was sprawling conversation that proved once and for all that the band aren't sloppy smartasses but raw showmen from a long line of them.

Read the full interview after the jump.


You guys have described yourselves as "flower punk." Are you still happy with that?

Honestly, it was a little tongue-in-cheek. A lot of times journalists and media want some sort of catchphrase. We always felt like we were a punk band but we weren't into the machismo. We were like a wussy punk band. There is this form of psychedelic punk music, and there've been a lot of bands doing it for the past thirty years. It can cross a lot of borders, like King Khan & BBQ Show. Even Butthole Surfers were like a punk band, but they were psychedelic. We always thought we could mix the two.

Did signing to Vice bring a more diverse audience to your shows?

Definitely. When we first started playing, we found ourselves playing to a lot of forty- and fifty-year-old record nerds who were into garage rock. We'd drive ten hours [to play to], like, twenty people. We've been playing for nine years now, so at some point we just wanted to get out to more people and not play for this picky niche crew. We were actually trying to get some other, bigger labels to sign us, but they weren't interested. Vice was the only label with a little bit of exposing power to really come up to us. It's definitely helped. But then you gotta back it up, any kind of media exposure like that. I think in a live sense, we've definitely done that. And we're working on it in a recording sense.

Yeah, the band once had this reception for trashing stages, but you've toned that down.

We made a conscious effort in the beginning, because we didn't know how to play. We wanted people to get our name out. And we were pretty young, so we were immature at the time. They're kind of gimmicks but we never did them every night. It had to be spontaneous. People expect that to happen every night, but it's not like a trick pony. Journalists [will write], "The Black Lips show includes urinating and nudity and French kissing." I would get off stage and people would be like, Why didn't you puke? How would I puke every night? It's not like GWAR. If you go to a Black Lips show and you see blood, I promise you it's real. We’re not gonna bleed every night like Kiss and GWAR do, but when you do see the blood, it's gonna be real.

On the new record, "The Drop I Hold" has this eerie hip-hop vibe. How'd that come together?

We're a garage rock band, but I grew up listening to Wu-Tang and Portishead, and I always liked how they would sample old sixties records. I was always into sixties music, so I could always identify with that. I believe sampling can be like a magical portal to a different dimension. All the samples on [that song] are from dead people. The girl's voice is this country singer who died recently, Sammi Smith. If I can interact with her spirit by singing along with her, she's still alive today. There's a sample from Jim Jones' death tape: the intro is from right before they killed themselves. This lady had this passion about giving up her life for what she believed in, wrong or not. Between her and Sammi Smith, we're interacting with these dead people. But then I didn't know how to sing it. So I actually did a rap, which I was really insecure about. Like, I hope this doesn't come out like Limp Bizkit or white-boy rap shit. But people liked it because it's different. Somebody even showed it to GZA from the Wu-Tang, apparently, and I heard he really liked it. We're actually trying to get him to rap on the remix.

Have there been remixes of your songs before?

Yeah, Diplo did a remix of "Veni Vidi Vici" [from] our last album, which was our other song that was a sample-based loop. When we do an album, I always try to do one song that could be bumped [to] in a club because I figure it's a foot in the door. I try to meet people halfway. I'm not really gonna change what I do, but I'll do one little off-the-beaten-path thing to meet the mainstream halfway. And we do it our way. That's like Black Lips' version of rap, I guess.

It even sneaks in some self-promotion for the band's website.

I'm glad you mentioned that. I do that twice. On "Meltdown" I say, "Blacklips.com Vietnam" and on that one I say, "Blacklips.com in Islam," I want our album to be mirrored in real life and work on a surreal, existential level, so I'm getting these guys to make us these websites, one in Arabic and one in Vietnamese. So when we say shit on the album, we mean it. It's not just bullshit, even though the lyrics seem arbitrary at times.

What's the story behind the song "Big Black Baby Jesus of Today"?

There are certain African Americans that really inspire me so much, and one of them was Jack Johnson. He was a boxer in the early nineteen hundreds. I thought that no matter what he lived life his way and he had probably the hardest time doing that. Ol' Dirty Bastard was another influence on the song. He said he was "Big Black Baby Jesus." He was guttural, and he was so creative, doing stream-of-thought. That's one of the reasons I think Lil' Wayne has found success--just to be free and not write stuff out. I imagined the coming of a black Messiah, and meanwhile the whole Obama thing started happening. I haven't seen that many shirts of a man since Tupac, who people also thought was almost divine at times. People looked up to him so much. So it's this ultimate African American--that's what the song's about.

Black Lips recently got "kicked out of India." What happened?

The way the shows would run was just so opposite to what we're used to: no booze allowed. No cigarettes. Done by midnight. We were put in this faux-Westernized setup, like the Hard Rock Cafe. It was really awkward and unnatural, and we just wanted to jam out with psychedelic sitar groups. So we snuck in some whiskey and promethazine--the [drug] that all the rappers do. It was this cheesy Honda-sponsored concert and we were doing cartwheels and jumping into the crowd, and security's going nuts. I think the kicker, though, was when I decided to kiss [guitarist] Ian [Saint Pe]. That's one of our trademark moves, to make out while we play the guitar. I don't know if you heard, but a couple years ago Richard Gere kissed a famous Bollywood actress in front of the media and got in a lot of trouble. So when two men were kissing--we read later that that is an obscene, lewd public act that can be punished with three months in prison.

Basically the whole tour got pulled out from under us. The [promoters] wanted us to get out of the country because they thought the cops were gonna come. We drove ten hours [to get] out of the state and all of our shows were canceled. The promoter started demanding ten thousand dollars from us, saying that we owed them for all the expenses. At one point he grabbed our passports and locked them in the trunk of a car. We surrounded the guy and got our passports back and basically got the next flight out. It just got real sketchy. But I wouldn't take it back for the world. I think we exposed a lot of kids to something they'd never seen before. If we turned on one kid to blasphemous acts of rock and roll, it was all worth it.

You mentioned that you actively sought out bigger labels...

Yeah, man, anybody with a dollar and a pencil, I would've signed [with]. Unfortunately, people weren't interested in what we were doing. At the time, even Vice wasn't really doing stuff like what we do, so I really commend them for going out on a limb. We tried Touch & Go, Sub Pop and we would have done even a major, but I think it worked out best this way. I think it's the best thing that ever happened to us, signing with them.

After so many albums, has it gotten easier or harder to write songs?

I feel prolific as hell right now. I can write, like, three songs with the same riff and not really worry about it. I felt like anytime I pick up a guitar and have a recorder, I can just make a song. There've been times where it felt dry, but even then I can spontaneously make something. I don't know if that'll last forever. We just cut an album with King Khan & BBQ. When we fled India, we went to Berlin [and] did a gospel-inspired record called The Almighty Defenders. That's the name of the group. It's King Khan & BBQ and us. We wrote all new songs on the spot. We're pretty prolific right now.

I must say, I'm glad to hear that your talking voice sounds just like your singing voice.

My voice has actually gotten horrible over the years from screaming. I got, like, calluses on my vocal chords. It fucked up my voice for a long time but I've learned to sing [with it]. I used to have more of a normal voice, but I've just torn it to where when I talk, I sound like a twelve-year-old kid and an old man at the same time. But I figure if I'm going to die tomorrow, I want to have something to show for myself. If I'm [making] a record, I'll sing until my vocal chords shred because I wanna lay it down hard. Guttural music is what I've always identified with, so I'm willing to destroy my voice in a sacrifice to music.

By Matt Fink

Over the course of the last year and a half, Akron/Family has suffered some growing pains. Since the release of 2007's Love is Simple, they lost multi-instrumentalist and main songwriter Ryan Vanderhoof, traded the avant-garde music scene of Brooklyn for the countryside of Williamsport, Pennsylvania, and set about remaking themselves as a trio (Seth Olinksy, Miles Seaton, Dana Janssen). Home alone and free of old expectations, they decided to share the songwriting process, eventually whittling down twenty songs they would produce themselves. The result was Set 'Em Wild, Set 'Em Free, an album that is at once their most focused and most sprawling collection, jackknifing through bubbling soul grooves and African guitar lines before drifting off into pastoral folk-rock and lurching into crashing thunderclaps of noise. "This is the beginning of everything we'll explore over the next few records," explains Olinsky.

Read the full interview after the jump.

Did you have specific ways that you wanted this record to be different than the previous ones?

Yes. I don't know if we achieved this, but from record to record, we've been trying to tame our schizophrenic tendency of being randomly all over the map. One of the things we were talking about in pre-production are these records that have this all-the-way-through vibe to them, whether it's There's A Riot Going On by Sly and the Family Stone or Kind of Blue by Miles Davis--these records that have one kind of quality. Sometimes our songs are so different that it starts to appear that you're listening to a bunch of different records. Partially, our goal was trying to create a thru-line or a similar sound from song to song.

Was there a foundational idea or tone or texture or theme that held the record together?

I think there are two things. Musically, I think we were all really focused on the rhythm of music. On our very first record, I feel like we were very focused on timbre and the sound quality in more of an ambient kind of way. For me, the thread through all the music is that we were very focused on the rhythm as we were writing and arranging and performing it. And I think the emotional narrative, which I don't think is totally explicit throughout.

But Ryan left a year and a half ago, and it forced us to re-explore what we were doing and reinvent ourselves and go back to the drawing board. Instead of just replacing him with another guy who did what he did, we took the opportunity to check in with ourselves and say, "Hey, what is it that we want? What do we want to achieve?" We got to reinvent ourselves, and all of the trials and tribulations that go along with that show up in a narrative through the record.

It's interesting that a good groove can bypass your intellect in the same way that the noisier aspects of this record, or your previous ones, can connect with your inner fourteen-year-old kid that loves to hear crashing noise.

Sure. And that's the thing. When we first started the band, we were playing at this little place called Pete's Candy Store where we used to do a residency. And it was this magical little room in the back of this bar that kind of looks like a boxcar, and a full room probably held twenty-five people, and everyone was packed in there. We could play so quietly and you could drop a coin on the floor or take a toothbrush and scratch your amplifier, and people would pay attention. We were crafting these very delicate arrangements and playing all these little found sounds and instruments and making this tiny sonic world.

It's always about learning to deal with how to break through to an audience, and going back to rhythm being this thing that we're focusing on, as the audience has gotten bigger and you're trying to create this experience that opens this door that people can through with you, rhythm ends up being the great communicator. Obviously, melody and timbre and noise can, too, but rhythm has this special ability to reaching all the way to the back of the room. The way I look at it, if you can tap into that, you can go all sorts of different places intellectually and artistically and creatively.

What inspired the album cover artwork?

Around the time [that Ryan left the band], I started really liking the flag, and I was getting into Woody Guthrie and this idea of "transcendentalist America." Before we did our first tour as a trio in Europe that winter, we asked our friend Amy Waller, who is in the group Lexie Mountain Boys from Baltimore, to make us a giant psychedelic American flag to hang behind ourselves when we were playing in England. For me, besides being this thing that looks cool, it was also there for every show where we were forcing ourselves to get on stage as a three-piece and discover ourselves again.

It reminded me of how Dylan toured in the mid-sixties with that giant American flag. Did you get any bad reactions from that?

Less than we had hoped. But it's pretty punk rock. Dylan was always a punk rocker.

Natasha Khan, aka Bat For Lashes, will appear on David Letterman tonight to perform "Daniel," the single from her new album Two Suns, which seems to be melting everyone's brain. It's a good thing, too -- there has been a dearth of hyper-creative female artists since Amy Winehouse went off the rails and Joanna Newsom went off the map.

Khan also has a handful of tour dates coming up. Tour schedule listed after the jump.-AM

Tour dates:
5/2/09 Brooklyn, NY @ Music Hall of Williamsburg
6/10/09 Seattle, WA @ Crocodile Café
6/11/09 Portland, OR @ Doug Fir Lounge
6/13/09 San Francisco, CA @ Great American Music Hall
6/16/09 Los Angeles, CA @ El Rey Theatre

By Amelia Kreminski

It didn't take long for 13-year-old DJ Murphy to realize being a figure skater wasn't the best way to get girls. So in hormone-fueled persistence, he tried something else--playing music. Girls like guys in bands, right?

Sixteen years later, on a hazy, spring-warm Saturday evening in New York City's Pianos, singer and keyboardist Ben Elkins stood on stage with his band Heypenny--a band he'd created with guitarist Kevin Bevil, drummer Aaron Distler, and bassist DJ Murphy, a figure skater no more. Murphy, drenched in a grungy, rock-and-roll kind of sweat, his scarlet Japanese Epiphone bass swinging on his shoulder, leaped to the microphone and proclaimed to the crowd, "Hey, ww'ee a band called Heypenny, and we were born from the head of Zeus!"

Murphy and the rest of Heypenny, all dressed in creamy pastel-colored marching band uniforms Murphy's mom custom-made for them, shared an amicable laugh as he amended, "I mean, we come from Nashville."

But it's a fact that should be taken as no anticlimax. The amazingly unique and talented Tennessee pop-rock quartet Heypenny plays without inhibitions, taking the focus of concerts back where it really belongs--on the theatrics, the sound, and the pure joy of music. They aren't concerned with any rock star style superficiality-they're going to wear possibly the single most unflattering piece of clothing in the world. They aren't worried about maintaining a facade of cool, aloof musicians--they're going to scream and stomp and dance, damn it, the whole show through. And no, they are not worried about impressing girls anymore--well, maybe they are, but in the endearingly adorable way only boys in marching band uniforms can pull off.

Death+Taxes sat down with Heypenny at a sunny picnic table in New York City to discuss the reason behind the uniform, robot coloring books, and the inspiration of Boyz II Men. Find all that and more after the jump.


Ben Elkins called Death+Taxes from the road, lamenting their inevitable tardiness to the interview--from Philadelphia, they had gone south instead of north.

"We're not that good at geometry," he explained apologetically, his words bent with a tiny Southern twang, as distant groans and shouts of "Geography! It's geography!" could be heard from inside the van. With a quiet chuckle, Elkins hung up, and the band soon arrived, offering hugs instead of handshakes.

Perhaps the friendliness comes from their roots of Southern hospitality. Elkins and Murphy, both raised in Arkansas, met during their time at the University of Arkansas, where they dabbled in playing music together. A few years later, Elkins moved to Nashville to play with Bevil, and Murphy moved to Oregon to attend graduate school with his wife.

"[Ben] called me on the phone one day and said, 'Why don't you move halfway across the country to play bass in a band, and you're not going to get paid anything for a really long time,'" Murphy said, explaining how he ended up playing with Elkins and Bevil in Nashville. "And I said, 'Yeah, let's do that!'"

"I moved to Nashville just to play with Ben, because I loved his music so much. It's, without exaggeration, the most original music I've ever heard. And I can say that because I don't write any of it."

Though Elkins has remained the sole songwriter for the band, his songs have gone from tricky, jazzy jam-band tunes to the tight, pop-rock quips that define the Heypenny sound today.

"I kind of tried to do this jam band thing, and that's when Kevin and I first started playing music together," Elkins explained. "For that musical project I wanted to record an album, and have some songs put together."

"So I bought a computer, and started recording in my house, and various places around town--other people's houses, and a neat old church, stuff like that. And that took about nine months, and really from the start of that to the end of that nine months, this band Heypenny was created. Somewhere in the middle it was like, This has become something else, and I like it a lot better, and other people--people whose musical opinion I respect, liked it a lot, and could notice that this is something new. So that first album is really a kind of live experience, in being alive, and there's some notes of what the old music was and there's some notes of the new music."

Use These Spoons, Heypenny's debut and only album to date, ranges across the entire spectrum of Heypenny's evolving sound, from the trickier, earlier songs to the cleaner, younger tunes. "Secreterror" lurks with off-kilter, off-tempo sounds, weirdly winding, synthesized melodies and almost whispered libretto, a sound the band associates with the older, jam-band style of Heypenny--a form they have abandoned, for the most part.

"It's like a permanent change too," guitarist Bevil added. "I don't know--it was like a chemical change almost. [Ben's] musical tastes actually changed during the making of that album, and his whole musical worldview."

"It was just interesting, seeing him. When he went into it, I knew him, and I lost contact with him for a few months, and I met him again and--he shaved his Abraham Lincoln beard, and that was it."

Chance encounters with The Shins' Oh, Inverted World, Iron and Wine albums, and Wilco provided Elkins with the musical inspiration that switched his playing style.

"Especially Wilco, with the Yankee Hotel Foxtrot--that just got into me and my blood turned Yankee Hotel Foxtrot color," Elkins said. "And the first album has a lot of little noise things and textures and stuff like that. To kind of define it, I basically lost interest in tricky, showy music and started liking things that are, I don't know, simple. Good songs are simple, and there's nothing that you would strip away from them. Everything that's there is needed."

But Heypenny's jam band roots can still be detected in their music--not in a winding, overly complicated sort of way, but simply in a truly fascinating and unique way, a way that blends pop rock cleanness with the whimsy of experimentation.

"Walnut St. Bridge" drips with an unexplainable beauty, a perfect sonic encapsulation of sleepy late-summer Southern afternoons. Tinkling, antique pianos punctuate warm, breezy guitar melodies and lullaby vocals. "Dooley" plays like a classic "Rocky Raccoon" reminiscent Beatles tune redone with a modern twist. The song showcases a mute character, John Dooley, who sees a girl, falls in love and... That's it. You'll have to buy the next record to find out what happens--the saga of John Dooley will continue, the band promises.

"Parade," an electric, driving pop song and the band's latest single, defines the groups new sound, and provides an explanation for the marching band uniforms (see the video below).



"The idea was like we're on a fun Parade," Elkins explained.

"So the marching band costume is supposed to fit in with the Parade idea," Murphy added. "Where they physically came from is my mom custom made and custom tailored [them]."

"They've kind of done wonders for our band," Elkins continued. "We've always wanted to be a little more theatrical at our show, and it's just really allowed us to do something actually theatric. From now on, at least for the foreseeable future, we're always going to theme. For all the other singles that were going to be releasing in the future, we're going to do a video and a whole different costume theme and a whole live show theme."

So be prepared for their next release, "CopCar," a peppy, fast-paced, irresistibly danceable tune that the band plans on dressing up like robots to perform. Yeah, that's right, the costumes just get better and better--and the single, scheduled to be released this summer, just may come along with a custom-made robot coloring book, illustrations courtesy of DJ Murphy.

But whether it's robot-themed or marching band-themed, the Heypenny live show is a wonder to behold. Big-knobbed, wood-paneled thrift store television sets bookend the band's set up, flashing fuzz and colorful patterns perfectly in sync with the music, a feat that is achieved through "magic"--apparently they are triggered by "fluttering hearts." Every member jumps, stomps, sings and screams with a level of enthusiasm and energy unmatched by most bands, and their playing remains impeccable and precise. Watching them perform without cracking a smile is impossible, and watching them perform without jumping up and dancing is damn hard. Sure, the record is awesome--but this is a live show you won't want to miss (tour dates below).

The "magic" that Distler and Murphy claim fuels Heypenny did not erupt overnight. Though the complete ensemble only emerged about eight months ago, when Distler joined after several drummer changes, the members have all been playing music for years.

"I started playing violin when I was two and a half years old," said Elkins. "My first violin was a Cracker Jack box with a ruler glued to it, and I was tiny, chubby cheeks--so freakin' cute."

"I kind of grew up around [music], and always took private lessons. I did violin, and then I took drum lessons for a couple years, and then I took piano for maybe three or four years, but my heart was never in it until I just kind of stopped all that and tried to become a cool high school kid and play sports and, you know, just go the more typical route. I did marching band and stuff, but I just didn't really ever get it. So I just, for a couple years, didn't do anything, musically speaking."

"Then, I was walking by the choir room one day after school and this guy was in there playing the piano, and he was playing the song 'Love Is' by Vanessa Williams, and I loved it. And I went and had my mom drive me--we went to the music store and bought the sheet music to it, and I learned how to play that song. That was the first time I remember really liking to play music and wanting to play a song."

"But I had the [musical] background, so I just took it from there and I started playing guitar and just learning songs, and then I started to write a little bit in high school. Mainly when this girl broke up with me, and I wrote some songs that I really, really believed were going to win her back to me, but did the opposite--she just got kind of annoyed that I was still thinking about her, I guess. I remember them, and they're not good songs. But that was the first time I created something and would show people."

"I don’t have anything important," Distler said with a good-hearted shrug and a smile. "I failed at trumpet, I failed at saxophone, and in fifth grade I started playing drums and discovered Buddy Rich. [My school] had a lot of grant money and they had this incredible jazz program, and this instructor turned me on to Buddy Rich. He gave me The Roar of '74 and Big Swing Face to take home to listen to and then--I just kind of ran with it."

"I had a couple bands in Indiana that didn't really do much. I moved to Nashville with a band called Duraluxe who had some success, like they ranked pretty high on the CMJ charts like late nineties, but we don't really do much anymore. But I loved their music enough to move to Nashville. And it led me to these guys, so it was definitely worth it."

Smatterings of misty-voiced murmurs broke out amongst the bandmates, one of them stating, "Warmed the cockles of my heart!" while another agreed, "Yeah, my cockles feel warmed." After all imaginary tears had been wiped, Murphy began his own story.

"When I first started realizing that I was sexually attracted to girls, I decided I needed to do something to start impressing them," he said. "And so the first thing that I tried to do was figure skating."

"This isn't a joke. I'm not joking, actually," he insisted, looking around at his guffawing bandmates.

"And I started figure skating, and I ended up spending a lot of time around girls, but for some reason it didn't make that magical connection of making them attracted to me. So about a year after that I decided I should start playing some sort of instrument. And I chose bass because my father was a bass player, and I felt like maybe I had it in my blood. So I picked that up, and discovered that was as successful at getting me girls as being a figure skater, because nobody likes bass players."

A statement is clearly untrue, however, as earlier in the interview guitarist Bevil had said, while contemplating another instrument he admires, "I love bassists more than anything." Perhaps he and Murphy should have a heart-to-heart.

Bevil began his musical career as a fourteen-year-old classical guitarist, roots that give him a unique, studied playing style and a background in form. He played in a trip-hop, electronica band before Heypenny, and even played a giant wooden flute once at a Native American festival, an experience that deeply inspired him. But he's still satisfied with his guitar.

"The Edge from U2 said once that his relationship with the guitar is never like this symbiotic, constructive relationship," Bevil said. "He's always having a war against the guitar to strangle out what he wants--the tones he wants and the notes he wants, and it's not this sort of nice, creative relationship. And that's kind of how I think of the guitar too. [But] my best moments, when I'm most freely playing, my mind kind of leaves it, obviously, and I'm sort of inside the music at that point, and I'm playing it as I'm creating it in my brain. Those moments happen with the guitar, and those are satisfying moments--those sublime, creative moments."

And Heypenny hails from a music scene that nurtures these creative moments within them--a music scene that embraces the unique quality of their band and music.

"The Nashville music scene is amazing," Murphy said. "It's a really tight-knit community of musicians who like to put on great shows and help each other out. It's a friendly atmosphere and it's a very talented atmosphere."

"One thing I think that's somehow important about this band is that we all come from very uncool music backgrounds," Elkins added. "At least, compared to some people who grew up listening to the underground whatever whatever music, you know? Especially me, I always listened to whatever the Top 40 radio was feeding me, and I loved it, and would tape all the songs and listen to them over and over--like Boyz II Men, and stuff like that. I was really, really into that stuff."

But it's a fact that takes nothing away from their music, and instead adds an eclectic depth and texture to their style, creating a pop sound with indie and experimental undertones. It shows how much Heypenny, in all that they do, refuse to follow a crowd or creed of "cool."

"It feels like [in Nashville] there's a lot more fun and a lot less coolness," mused Distler.

"There's the coolness scene," Elkins countered with a smile, "but we just make fun of those people."

I was on the subway this morning, and saw these dudes brazenly defying the Vice President's advice to avoid subways, airplaines--just about every confined space--with a membrane of surgical mask to keep them safe.

I actually saw a few more folks with surgical masks, but it took a few masks before I realized I should be snapping these on the camera. My question is -- do surgical masks actually keep you from getting sick? I mean, that's not an airtight seal around the face, and last time I heard viruses were damn small.

I just really hope this doesn't become a totally ubiquitous fashion accoutrement, because living in a city where everyone is wearing surgical masks all the time is only slightly less creepy and depressing than living in a city where everyone actually has swine flu.

But hey, I'm still dousing up with sanitizer just for good measure.-AM

And, perhaps more importantly, if you're the thieves, what the hell do you do with a stolen tour bus? Party in it for a while then leave it on the side of the road? Have a spare airplane hangar you can hide it in? You can't sell it for parts -- there are only a few tour bus manufacturers, and they'll know where the black-market items come from.

Canadian band The Dears are grappling with all of this right now, as their tour bus was stolen last night, on the eve of their tour with Great Northern and Eulogies. It was stolen from the parking lot of a Comfort Inn while the driver was asleep in the hotel. This is just speculation, but that guy is totally, totally fired. As you can see from the picture, this thing was deluxe -- a Prevost, which is the luxury bus maker. These things cost 600,000 - 800,000 bucks easy.

The Dears are continuing with their tour, resilient Canucks that they are. The Tour dates are available after the jump. -SB
THE DEARS HEADLINE TOUR WITH GREAT NORTHERN & EULOGIES

April 30 - Toronto, Ontario @ The Mod Club *
May 1 - Brooklyn, N.Y. @ Bell House
May 2 - Albany, N.Y. @ Valentines
May 4 - New York, N.Y. @ Bowery Ballroom
May 5 - Philadelphia, Pa. @ Johnny Brenda's
May 7 - Washington, D.C. @ Black Cat
May 8 - Pittsburgh, Pa. @ Diesel
May 9 - Cleveland, Ohio @ Grog Shop
May 10 - Columbus, Ohio @ Skully's
May 11 - Detroit, Mich. @ Magic Stick
May 13 - Chicago, Ill. @ Lakeshore Theater
May 14 - Columbia, Mo. @ Mojo's
May 16 - Denton, Texas @ Hailey's
May 17 - Houston, Texas @ Warehouse
May 18 - Austin, Texas @ Parish
May 21 - Phoenix, Ariz. @ Rhythm Room
May 22 - San Diego, Calif. @ The Casbah
May 23 - Los Angeles, Calif. @ Echoplex
May 24 - San Francisco, Calif. @ The Independent
May 26 - Portland, Ore. @ Doug Fir Lounge
May 27 - Seattle, Wash. @ Crocodile Lounge

THE DEARS HEADLINE TOUR WITH JETS OVERHEAD & BLACK DIAMOND BAY

May 29 - Victoria, British Columbia @ Sugar
May 30 - Vancouver, British Columbia @ Richards on Richards
May 31 - Kelowna, British Columbia @ Habitat
June 2 - Calgary, Alberta @ Theatre Junction Grand
June 3 - Edmonton, Alberta @ Starlite Room
June 4 - Saskatoon, Saskatchewan @ Amigos
June 5 - Regina, Saskatchewan @ Distrikt
June 6 - Winnipeg, Manitoba @ West End Cultural Center

Boston's celebrated electro art-pop outfit Passion Pit will be releasing their highly anticipated full-length Manners in May -- and what better way to celebrate electro art-pop than... a booze cruise?!

Ok ok, we agree -- it may have been a little cooler to celebrate with a trip on the Chicken Bus, but you just can't pack the numbers in on that thing way you can on a boat.

Summer tour dates have also been announced. Seems like just a few months ago that Passion Pit, playing Glasslands on their Low-Fi EP, was merely a spark in the synapses of emerging-music consciousness. Oh wait, that was just a few months ago. And here they are now with two consecutive June shows already sold out at Bowery Ballroom. Hey, smoke if you got 'em, right?

Summer tour dates and details on the cruise after the jump.-AM


PASSION PIT:
For the Booze Crise, click here.

US Summer Tour Dates:

5/23 - George, WA @ Sasquatch! Music Festival
5/24 - Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom
5/26 - San Francisco, CA @ Bimbo’s
5/28 - West Hollywood, CA @ Troubadour
5/29 - Los Angeles, CA @ Echoplex
5/30 - Pomona, CA @ The Glass House
6/2 - Dallas, TX @ Granada Theatre
6/3 - Austin, TX @ Emo’s
6/4 - Houston, TX @ Warehouse Live
6/5 - Baton Rouge, LA @ Spanish Moon
6/6 - Atlanta, GA @ The Drunken Unicorn
6/8 - Richmond, VA @ The National
6/9 - Washington, DC @ Black Cat
6/11 - Manchester, TN @ Bonnaroo
6/13 - Covington, KY @ Mad Hatter
6/14 - Chicago IL @ Empty Bottle
6/17 - Buffalo, NY @ Mohawk Place
6/18 - Boston, MA @ Paradise
6/19 - New York, NY @ Bowery Ballroom
6/20 - New York, NY @ Bowery Ballroom

The nineteenth issue of Death+Taxes, which features East Bound & Down star Danny McBride, is on stands now wherever fine magazines are sold. The article was written by Brian Frazer, a fantastic writer and frequent contributor to Esquire, ESPN, and Los Angeles Magazine. He did a great job tackling the meanest man on television if we do say so ourselves.

Also in the issue: The Pains of Being Pure At Heart, Silversun Pickups, Akron/Family, Metric, Black Lips and Phoenix!

If you're in a hurry to check out the issue, you can do so digitally here. And if you have trouble finding Death+Taxes, hit us up: info@dt-mag.com with the subject heading "I can't find your fucking magazine." -SB

Omaha-bred rock band, Cursive, will continue to tour behind their latest release Mama I'm Swollen.

People have been pouring out in droves to see the band who recently emerged from two years of inactivity. The record has received quite a bit of praise, and rightfully so. Death+Taxes recently caught up with front man Tim Kasher to talk about the record, and you can read about that here. It's all about fighting societal norms and stuff.

Do yourself a favor and go see Cursive; the tour dates are available after the jump. -SB


CURSIVE TOUR DATES

JUNE 13 DENVER, CO WESTWORD MUSIC SHOWCASE
JUNE 18 SIOUX FALLS, SD NUTTY'S NORTH
JUNE 20 BILLINGS, MT YELLOWSTONE VALLEY BREWERY
JUNE 21 MISSOULA, MT THE OTHER SIDE
JUNE 22 SPOKANE, WA KNITTING FACTORY
JUNE 23 SEATTLE, WA NEUMO'S
JUNE 24 PORTLAND, OR WONDER BALLROOM
JUNE 27 SAN FRANCISCO, CA GREAT AMERICAN MUSIC HALL
JUNE 28 LOS ANGELES, CA EL REY THEATRE
JUNE 29 POMONA, CA GLASSHOUSE
JULY 1 SALT LAKE CITY, UT CLUB SOUND

Previously announced Cursive dates:

APR. 30 ORLANDO, FL THE SOCIAL* (sold out)
MAY 1 ATLANTA, GA VARIETY PLAYHOUSE*
MAY 2 CARRBORO, NC CAT'S CRADLE*
MAY 3 WASHINGTON, DC BLACK CAT*
MAY 4 STATE COLLEGE, PA THE STATE THEATRE*
MAY 5 PITTSBURGH, PA DIESEL*
MAY 6 DETROIT, MI MAGIC STICK*
MAY 7 MILWAUKEE, WI TURNER HALL#
MAY 8 MINNEAPOLIS, MN FIRST AVENUE
MAY 9 CHICAGO, IL BOTTOM LOUNGE#
MAY 12 LONDON, UK DINGWALLS
MAY 14 CARDIFF, UK CLWB IFOR BACH
MAY 15 BRIGHTON, UK THE GREAT ESCAPE
MAY 16 BIRMINGHAM, UK HARE AND HOUNDS
MAY 17 NORWICH, UK ARTS CENTRE
MAY 18 MANCHESTER, UK ACADEMY 3
MAY 19 YORK, UK FIBBERS
MAY 20 NEWCASTLE, UK ACADEMY 2
MAY 21 LONDON, UK STAG & DAGGER FESTIVAL
MAY 22 LEEDS, UK STAG & DAGGER FESTIVAL
MAY 23 GLASGOW, UK STAG & DAGGER FESTIVAL
MAY 24 NOTTINGHAM, UK DOT TO DOT FESTIVAL
* with MAN MAN
# with P.O.S.

Massachusetts-based rock band, Cave In, are finally reuniting after years of inactivity. The band, which began playing metallic hardcore in the mid-nineties alongside groups like Converge, Coalesce, Shai Hulud, Earth Crisis, and so on, fizzled out in 2005 after an unsuccessful shot at major label glory with their 2004 release, Antenna.

The band has spent the last four years concentrating on middling side projects like Clouds and Zozobra. Thank goodness they'll be doing Cave In again. Despite what you might think of Antenna, it did have a few solid songs, namely "Joy Opposites" and "Woodwork." Any attempts at writing singles were pretty disastrous.

Hopefully the reformed Cave In will sound like Jupiter / Lost In The Air-era Cave In, when they weren't so, you know, eager to be famous. Here's what they had to say:

Dear friends,
After 3 1/2 long years, Cave In has decided to end its hiatus. Please join us for an EP release show at Great Scott's (1222 Commonwealth Ave., Allston MA) on Sunday, July 19th @ 9PM. Also playing will be our friends Disappearer and Phantom Glue. Copies of the "Planets Of Old" limited 12" (recorded by Adam Taylor, Alex Hartman & Johnny Northrup @ Camp St. Studio) from Hydra Head Records will be available that night.

We hope to see your lovely selves.

Steve, Adam, J.R., Caleb
CAVE IN

Everybody's favorite The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart have announced new tour dates for summer, including a free show at the South Street Seaport festival in NY on July 10th.

The band has also released a fun new video for "Young Adult Fiction," which you can watch after the jump courtesy of our friends over at Pitchfork.com.

Full summer tour schedule also listed after the jump.-AM


"Young Adult Fiction"


Tour Dates:
Apr 28 2009 Lee's Palace - Toronto, Ontario %
Apr 29 2009 The Pike Room at Crofoot - Pontiac, Michigan %
Apr 30 2009 Beachland Tavern - All Ages-Cleveland, Ohio %
May 1 2009 The Summit-Columbus, Ohio %
May 2 2009 The End-Nashville, Tennessee %
May 3 2009 The Earl-Atlanta, Georgia %
May 4 2009 Local 506-Chapel Hill, North Carolina %
May 5 2009 Talking Head Club-Baltimore, Maryland %
May 6 2009 The Barbary (Early Show)-Philadelphia, Pennsylvania%
May 7 2009 Champion Ship-Lemoyne, Pennsylvania
May 12 2009 Bowery Ballroom-New York, New York %
Jun 18 2009 Cake Shop-New York, New York #
July 10 2009 South Street Seaport-New York, New York % (FREE)
July 18 2009 Pitchfork Fest Chicago-Illinois
July 20 2009 The Echo Los Angeles-California *
July 21 2009 The Rickshaw Stop-San Fransisco, California *
July 23 2009 Backspace Portland-Oregon *
July 24 2009 Biltmore Cabaret-Vancouver, BC *
July 25 2009 Capital Hill Block Party-Seattle, Washington

% = w/ Zaza
# = w/ Crystal Stilts
* = w/ Girls

Check out the video for "Feel.Love.Thinking.Of." off the album of the same name. It's easily my favorite song on the record. The video ain't bad either! Ryan Bosworth directs. I have no idea if he's related to Kate Bosworth. -IL

Check out the latest from Green Day below. "Know Your Enemy" is off the forthcoming 21st Century Breakdown, which will be released on May 15th. -IL

What's the story about your birth? You were born in a car crash? Please explain.

I WAS BORN ON A PIRATE SHIP

You've been playing with the Dirty Projectors for two years. How did you get hooked up with Dave?

I WAS LOOKING FOR SOME GOOD WEED AND GOT RECOMMENDED TO THIS GUY WHO LIVED UNDER A STAIRCASE IN WILLIAMSBURG BY THE RIVER. THAT GUY WAS DAVE AND HIS WEED WAS PRETTY TOP SHELF. I HEARD HIM BUMPING SOME SICK BEATS FROM HIS TINY STAIRCASE ROOM AND ASKED HIM WHAT IT WAS. HE SAID IT WAS SOME NEW SHIT HE WAS WORKING ON. THEN HE INVITED ME TO JAM ON THE BASS GUITAR AND IT JUST CLICKED.

Has playing with him changed the way you write your own music? Has he influenced you in any way?

YES AND YES.

Through Dirty Projectors you got to work with David Byrne. What is he like?

DAVID BYRNE IS A VERY KIND AND GENTLE MAN. I DIDN'T GET TO CHAT WITH HIM TOO MUCH BUT HE HAS A CHILL VIBE AND DRESSES SHARPLY.

What is a Mind Raft?

GET ON IT

The EP sounds amazing in headphones! How did you go about recording it? Did Chris from Grizzly Bear lend a hand? Did it take a long time to do? I imagine you've been busy with Dirty Projectors.

THANK YOU. IT WAS RECORDED WITH DAVID LONGSTRETH IN A BRICK WALLED PRACTICE ROOM IN EAST WILLIAMSBURG. CHRIS LENT US A BASS CAB WHICH SOUNDED GREAT. IT TOOK ABOUT ONE WEEK AND SOME INTERMITTENT RECORDING PERIODS FOR THE DRUMS EARLIER IN THE YEAR.

A few different styles/genres seep through. Things we don't usually hear from the indie-rock world. There's a bit of an R&B vibe to your vocals on "You Carry The Deed." And "Moon" has a Middle Eastern vibe. Where did those influence come from? Which one do you feel more at home with?


AS A YOUNGER WOMAN I LISTENED TO LOTS OF R&B (I.E. MARIAH, WHITNEY, ADINA/ A PASSION I SHARE WITH MY FELLOW BAND MATES) WHICH HAS LENT ITSELF TO SOME OF MY VOCAL STYLINGS. THE MIDDLE EASTERN STUFF IS IN THE BLOOOOOOOD...KINDA.

Will you be taking the Deradoorian project on the road? Or do your duties in Dirty Projectors take precedence? What do you ultimately want to do?


THAT IS TO BE DECIDED. I AM VERY BUSY WITH DIRTY PROJECTORS BUT HAPPY ABOUT THAT. ULTIMATELY, I WANT TO FEEL AT HOME.

After twenty-one issues and months of speculation about its demise, Conde Nast has finally folded Portfolio. Possibly the last in a long succession of super-expensive magazine launches, Portfolio's folding follows hot on the heels of Domino and Men's Vogue, both closing within the last six months.

Personally I'm not all that surprised at the news as I find myself creeping slowly but surely into a recession backlash, in which every time I start to hear some news about how impossibly terrible everything is and how broke everyone is my stomach turns and I just turn off the radio or TV, click through to a different page, or do whatever it takes to avoid it. Last time I walked by Tim Geithner's face on the cover of Portfolio I thought about the dour invective filling those 150 pages, and barfed on the floor. Of course I'm being hyperbolic, but I'm not surprised that a magazine about the economy was a drag to a lot of people.

In other other magazine-folding news, Esquire recently replied to rumors that it is on the endangered species list of print, insisting that it's in good shape. Check out the response here.-AM