Sleater-Kinney premieres star-studded music video for “No Cities to Love

Rock band, Sleater-Kinney recently released the video for the song, “No Cities to Love,” which is the title track on their upcoming album.

The video has an array of celebrities singing the song before the actual band takes it away themselves. Among those who were featured were Andy Samberg, Sarah Silverman, Gerard Way, Connie Britton, Miranda July, Fred Armisen, J Mascis, Vanessa Bayer, Ellen Page, Natasha Lyonne, and more. Watch the video here.

The album, No Cities to Love, is expected to come out internationally on January 19 and in the U.S. on January 20.

Caribou puts together 1,000 track mixtape for fans

Producer and composer, Dan Snaith, known as Caribou, has had a productive 2014, releasing his latest album, Our Love. Caribou as also been playing shows around the world and will continue during the first half of 2015. Snaith says all his success is due to his fans’ loyalty and to show his appreciation, he curated a 1,000 track mixtape.

The mixtape is named “Longest Mixtape” and Snaith describes the mixtape as the “musical history of my life. I’m sure some things are under-represented or over-represented, but roughly speaking this is what has stayed with me.” Songs on the playlist includes from artists such as Wire, Boz Scaggs, Minnie Riperton, The Zombies, Kanye West, Warren G, Usher, Transvolta, Pusha T, Sly and the Family Stone, Arthur Russell, Led Zeppelin, Sun Ra, CAN, Nas, Eddy Grant, and various experimental pieces and random mixes.

Snaith tasks the mixtape’s listeners to shuffle the tracks as there is no set order and hopes people will send suggestions, “in the hope (that) this becomes a dialogue rather than a monologue.”

Listen to the full playlist here.

Read the thank-you note below:

The last few years of my life have been incredible, thanks in large part to all of you — so I’ve been thinking of how to say thank you.

As you can imagine, music has been a central love of my life since I was a teenager and over the years I’ve been introduced to a lot that has stayed with me. I’ve collected the majority of that music here — and I thought sharing it with you seemed like one way I could say thanks.

I’m sure some things are under-represented or over-represented, but roughly speaking this is a musical history of my life. Of course a lot of this music has come to me through my friends — thank you to Koushik, Kieran, Jeremy, Gary, Brandon, Jason, Sam, Ketan, Ryan, Toby and many others … Also, please share music with me that you think I would like but is not included here, in the hope this becomes a dialogue rather than a monologue.

I suggest you listen to this on shuffle as I made no attempt to sequence these tracks — I just entered them as I browsed along the shelves in my record collection. If you see dead links or duplicate songs please tweet me — @caribouband.

I hope you find something to enjoy here.

Thanks,

Dan

H&M announces Coachella inspired clothing line

Coachella Music and Arts Festival has been known for the fashion amongst it’s visitors as well as the acts that they bring in. Now, going to the festival looking fashionable can now be affordable as clothing chain, H&M, announced a new line of clothing inspired by the festival.

Named “H&M Loves Coachella,” the line will bring BoHo-chic looks known to come from the festival. Ladies can go through cutoff shorts, crop tops, tunics, wide-leg pants, and rompers. The men can choose from t-shirts and shorts.

The clothing line is affordable ranging from $4.95 to $49.95. About 350 North American stores will begin selling the line March 19th, and will be available worldwide and online the following week. The clothing will also be at an H&M pop-up shop that will be at the festival as well as exclusive designs and merchandise.

The Coachella line-up will include Jack White, AC/DC, Drake, Tame Impala, The Weeknd, Florence + the Machine, Ryan Adams, alt-J, Alabama Shakes, Steely Dan, St. Vincent, and many more. Although tickets to the actually sold out, H&M are giving away trips to the festival all through the month of March.

Death Cab For Cutie to release new album

Indie rock band, Death Cab For Cutie announced details for a new studio album. The album is named Kintsugi and is the eighth LP and will be released on March 31st.

The title is a reference to, as the bassist Nick Harmer said, a “Japanese style of art where they take fractured, broken ceramics and put them back together with very obvious, real gold. It’s making the repair of an object a visual part of its history.”

The frontman Ben Gibbard also added, “This is an opportunity for the band to become something it could only become by losing a founding member. It’s our goal to make records that rank amongst the best work we’ve ever done. I completely respect and understand why people love Transatlanticism or We Have the Facts… or Narrow Stairs. And I would hope that as we move forward, people listen with as little prejudice as they can and try to hear the music for what it is and not what they want it to be.”

Check out the 11-song track list below.

Kintsugi Tracklist:
01. No Room in Frame
02. Black Sun
03. The Ghosts of Beverly Drive
04. Little Wanderer
05. You’ve Haunted Me All My Life
06. Hold No Guns
07. Everything’s a Ceiling
08. Good Help (Is So Hard to Find)
09. El Dorado
10. Ingénue
11. Binary Sea

The Melodic Tree’s Weekly Playlist

1. Chapter 1 – Lonely Horse

2. Advanced Falconry – Mutual Benefit

3. Too Dry to Cry – Willis Earl Beal

4. Holiday – Poor Moon

5. Lullaby (Mountain) – The Acorn

6. Lost Coastlines – Okkervil River

7. The Vowels Pt. 2 – Why?

8. Safe and Sound – Electric President

9. Lion Face Boy – Seabear

10. Two Matchsticks – The Wooden Birds

11. Incarnation Song – Chris and Thomas

12. Neither Here Nor There – Lost in the Trees

13. Nine is God – Wavves

14. Good Advice – The Growlers

15. Flowers on the Wall – Tomorrows Tulips

16. Lovers Lane – Hunxs & His Punxs

17. Creature – Tijuana Panthers

18. Sweet Thang – Turbo Fruits

19. Get Lost – The Babies

20. Floating Vibes – Surfer Blood

Alamo Basement Sessions: January

San Antonio is on its way to creating a new and exciting music scene that has seemingly grown over the last several years. Music store, Alamo Music, now hosts a series of local bands once a month, beginning last month (December 2014). The inaugural session began with a kick with San Antonio bands, You and I Underwater and Televangelist. This month’s basement session was no different.

Starting the night with Tera Ferna, the band premiered new songs off of their upcoming record, which is due out in the fall. The indie rock outfit is native to San Antonio and began initially as a solo project by the lead singer. Matt Charles. As time went by, Charles added bassist, Brandon Kent, guitarist James Perez and formed the band, which was later joined by keyboardist Richard Castillo and drummer Anthony Washington. Richard Castillo came roaring in on keys followed by Anthony “Junie” Washington who keeps it tight in the pocket behind the drums. Rolling out song after song, the band had endless energy bringing out piano melodies and guitar solos.

Following Tera Ferna, Lonely Horse, a dark folk rock duo, began after singer and guitarist, Nick Long burned incense around the basement. After a speech given in order to fix technical difficulties, the duo went from song to song in an effortless-like attitude. During a particularly exuberant guitar solo, Long spontaneously unplugged his guitar and yet continued his solo and returned to his feet and plugged in a new guitar. Using his pedal board to create the atmosphere of multiple songs and sampled his own voice, as well as members of the audience’s. Drummer Travis Hild performed an impressive drum solo which flowed into a couple more songs until the end of their explosive set. There is most definitely something about Lonely Horse that shows that at every set, not only at these sessions, that they are a force to be reckoned with.

the next Alamo Basement session is February 21, you can RSVP and find more information on the even through its Facebook page.

Run the Jewels to open for Jack White at Madison Square Garden

El-P and Killer Mike, the duo behind Run the Jewels, had a successful 2014. To add to the successful year, Jack White has them to open for his headlining Madison Square Garden show on January 30th. The pair is just planning on performing that one show with White for now.

The show at Madison Square Garden kick-offs a year of shows for the duo. Run the Jewels will perform at Coachella, Buku Music + Art festival, and Flow festival. The touring is joined with the work on Run the Jewels 3 which is supposed to come out later this year.

White has also announced several new tour dates including his set for Coachella. See the itinerary below.

Jack White 2015 Tour Dates:
01/24 – Austin, TX @ Austin Music Hall *
01/25 – Austin, TX @ Austin Music Hall *
01/27 – Starkville, MS @ Humphrey Coliseum *
01/28 – Nashville, TN @ Bridgestone Arena +
01/30 – New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden ^
01/31 – Columbus, OH @ The Schottenstein Center *
02/02 – Norma, OK @ McCasland Field House *
02/03 – Albuquerque, NM @ Popejoy Hall *
02/04 – Las Vegas, NV @ Brooklyn Bowl Las Vegas *
03/12-14 – Bogota, CO @ Festival Estero Picnic
03/14-15 – Santiago, CL @ Lollapalooza Chile
03/19 – Asuncion, PY @ Asuncionico
03/20 – Asuncion, PY @ Asuncionico
03/21-22 – Buenos Aires, AR @ Lollapalooza Argentina
03/28-29 – Sao Paulo, BR @ Lollapalooza Brazil
04/11 – Indio, CA @ Coachella Music Festival
04/18 – Indio, CA @ Coachella Music Festival

* = w/ Chicano Batman
+ = w/ Loretta Lynn and William Tyler
^ = w/ Run the Jewels

This company call themselves the Netflix of vinyl

Costumers use Netflix for a number of reasons, including the ability to binge watch anything they could think of. Now there is a service called VNYL that is marketing itself as the “Netflix of vinyl records.”

The company is very straightforward. Subscribers choose between categories called #vibes that include #cooking, #betweenthesheets, #rainyday, and #work. There on, the company will send a pack of LPs depending on the selection the customer chose. Users can either keep the LPs for $12 each or return a record for another at the end of the month.

Company founder Nick Alt told Mic recently: “Right now I feel penalized for not being able to share what I’m listening to and get decent recommendations on vinyl that I may be into. [The inspiration for VNYL] was taking some of the best parts of Beats, Spotify and SoundCloud and translating them into a tangible experience.”

In the last year of 2014, people bought approximately 9.2 million records, the highest number since Nielsen began tracking in 1991.

This new company has its competitors, namely the subscription service of Vinyl Me which sends its subscribers a limited-edition LP every month for $23. On the European competition, the company Wax & Stamp and Klekt will open later this year.

There are questions about whether the quality will maintain after repeated usage and returning as well as possibly scratching the LP and what that could do on a customer’s equipment. It could also be harder to bring subscribers in due to their nearby record stores.

Of Montreal premieres new song and announce tour dates

Psych PPP band of Montreal shared another track from Aureate Gloom, their 13th studio album, due out on March 3rd. Listen to the song here.

Aureate Gloom Tracklist:
01. Bassem Sabry
02. Last Rites At The Jane Hotel
03. Empyrean Abbatoir
04. Aluminum Crown
05. Virgillian Lots
06. Monolithic Egress
07. Apollyon Of Blue Room
08. Estocadas
09. Chthonian Dirge For Uruk The Other
10. Like Ashoka’s Inferno of Memory

The band has expanded their Us tour and they will be on the road in the latter half of January and through most of March.

of Montreal 2015 Tour Dates:
01/13 – Tallahassee, FL @ The Moon
01/14 – Pensacola, FL @ Vinyl Music Hall
01/15 – Gainesville, FL @ High Dive
01/16 – Orlando, FL @ The Social
01/16 – Orlando, FL @ Afterparty at Olde 64
01/17 – Tampa, FL @ Crowbar
01/18 – Miami, FL @ Grand Central
01/19 – Jacksonville, FL @ Freebird Live
01/20 – Macon, GA @ Cox Capitol Theatre
01/21 – Charleston, SC @ The Pour House
01/22 – Greensboro, NC @ The Blind Tiger
01/23 – Nashville, TN @ Mercy Lounge
01/24 – Chattanooga, TN @ Rhythm and Brews
03/05 – Athens, GA @ 40 Watt
03/06 – Carrboro, NC @ Cat’s Cradle
03/07 – Washington, DC @ 930 Club
03/08 – Philadelphia, PA @ Union Transfer
03/09 – New Haven, CT @ Toad’s
03/10 – Boston, MA @ Paradise
03/11 – New York, NY @ Webster Hall
03/12 – Cleveland, OH @ Beachland Ballroom *
03/13 – Chicago, IL @ The Metro *
03/14 – Milwaukee, WI @ Turner Hall *
03/15 – Minneapolis, MN @ First Ave *
03/16 – Omaha, NE @ Waiting Room *
03/17 – Oklahoma City, OK @ ACM@UCO Performance Lab *
03/18 – Houston, TX @ Walter’s Downtown *
03/19 – Austin, TX @ Polyvinyl Showcase at Cheer Up Charlie’s
03/20 – El Paso, TX @ Tricky Falls
03/21 – Tucson, AZ @ The Rialto
03/22 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Regent
03/23 – Los Angeles, CA @ Largo at the Coronet
03/24 – San Francisco, CA @ Great American Music Hall
03/25 – San Francisco, CA @ Slim’s
03/26 – Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom
03/27 – Seattle, WA @ Neumo’s
03/28 – Boise, ID @ Treefort Festival
03/29 – Salt Lake City, @ Urban Lounge
03/30 – Aspen, CO @ Belly Up Aspen
03/31 – Denver, CO @ Bluebird
04/01 – Lawrence, KS @ The Granada
04/02 – Dallas, TX @ Trees
04/03 – Austin, TX @ The Mohawk
04/04 – New Orleans, LA @ Howlin’ Wolf
05/01 – Annandale-on-Hudson, NY @ Bard College Spring Fling
05/16 – Suffolk, VA @ LAVA Music Festival

* = w/ Deerhoof