Chuck Palahniuk reads an excerpt from a new children’s book version of ‘Fight Club,’ and tries his best to stay kid-friendly.
But a club without rules wouldn’t get very far,
There were a few simple rules, and here’s what they are:
1. You do not talk about Horsing Around Club.
2. You DO NOT talk about Horsing Around Club.
A series of epic surprises emerge from what appears to be a normal porta potty.
Last week, the fab 33 1/3 series posted the covers for their two new books out in September, but things are far better than you thought, because they will also be publishing two BRAND NEW books in October: Wally Holland‘s book on Phish’s A Live One and George Grella‘s book on Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew. Covers below! Get excited.
Twenty years after its release, Phish’s double-CD collection A Live One has something rare and precious going for it: it still doesn’t sound like anybody else. Oversized, perverse, requiring an unusual amount of listener background knowledge? Yes to all. Yet the collective improvisations it captures, unprecedentedly coherent yet freewheeling and open-ended, are unique in rock ‘n’ roll.
This book considers the music and moment of Phish’s ecstatically inventive 1995 live document, a mix of weirdo acid-psych, ambient moonscapes, vaudevillian Americana, and riotous arena-rock energy, all filtered through bandleader Trey Anastasio’s screwball compositional sensibility and the band’s idiosyncratic approach to spontaneous group creativity. It places Phish and their fandom in historical and cultural context, and picks apart the mechanics of their extended group jams. And it examines the mystery of how a quartet of nice boys from Burlington, VT could have been, all at once, one of America’s biggest touring acts and one of its best-kept secrets.
It was 1969, and Miles Davis, prince of cool, was on the edge of being left behind by a dynamic generation of young musicians, an important handful of whom had been in his band. Rock music was flying off in every direction, just as America itself seemed about to split at its seams. Following the circumscribed grooves and ambiance of In A Silent Way; coming off a tour with a burning new quintet-called ‘The Lost Band’-with Wayne Shorter, Chick Corea, Dave Holland and Jack DeJohnette; he went into the studio with musicians like frighteningly talented guitarist John McLaughlin, and soulful Austrian keyboardist Joe Zawinul. Working with his essential producer, Teo Macero, Miles set a cauldron of ideas loose while the tapes rolled. At the end, there was the newly minted Prince of Darkness, a completely new way forward for jazz and rock, and the endless brilliance and depth of Bitches Brew.
Bitches Brew is still one of the most astonishing albums ever made in either jazz or rock. Seeming to fuse the two, it actually does something entirely more revolutionary and open-ended: blending the most avant-garde aspects of Western music with deep grooves, the album rejects both jazz and rock for an entirely different idea of how music can be made.
Today, Dam-Funk returns with the announcement of his first solo album in nearly 6 years, Invite the Light, out September 4th via Stones Throw. He also shares the first cut from the album, lead single “We Continue.”
Invite the Light isn’t just Dam’s first solo full-length since ’09, he thinks of it as his first fully-realized effort – a “concise, beginning-to-end vision” – that’s resulted in a loosely autobiographical concept album inspired by the trials and tribulations of his personal and professional life of the last six years.
As always, Dam flexes his multi-instrumentalist talents by handling all the production, but still makes time for guests including rapper Q-Tip, pop surrealist Ariel Pink, 7 Days of Funk collaborator Snoop Dogg, the father-son duo of Leon Sylvers III & IV, and funk giant Junie Morrison of the Ohio Players, who opens and closes the album with dire warnings of what could happen in a world without funk. Rest assured, Dam is here to make sure that never comes to pass. As he puts it, “funk is the underdog, the black sheep of black music,” and if that’s true, Dam-Funk is its shepherd.
Ever since debuting with Stones Throw in 2008, he has become one of the genres most passionate proselytizers, out to save it from devilish depictions of cartoonish caricature. To Dam, funk is a way of living, “a feeling of struggle and staying cool through it all.” Dam’s partnership with the label has now included everything from his 2009 LP Toeachizown, to an anthology of early productions, Adolescent Funk (2010), to 2013’s collaboration with funk pioneer Steve Arrington on Higher, and celebrated partnership with hip-hop’s Snoop Dogg titled 7 Days of Funk.
Growing up in the Los Angeles city/suburb of Pasadena, Dam-Funk is a ‘70s baby who came of age in the era of the Uncle Jamm’s Army parties, of electro-pharaoh Egyptian Lover, of Prince’s purple reign. His parents nurtured his musical talents as a child and by his teens, he mastered the drums, then the drum machine. A chance encounter led to an apprenticeship under funk songwriter/producer Leon Sylvers III (SOLAR Records) and by the mid-90s G-Funk era in hip-hop, Dam found his musical skills in high demand by rappers such as Mack 10 and MC Eiht. “Everybody was trying to do the live instrumentation thing, so then you got cats like me playing on records,” Dam explains.
Sideman status wasn’t enough though. Dam remembers “watching gold plaques hitting the wall” for everyone but him and he decided to go “full-funk” and make a do-or-die try to become an artist on his own terms. In 2006, Dam-Funk and a few friends launched the popular Funkmosphere party in L.A., bringing the boogie back. It’s around then that Dam drew the attention of Stones Throw and both label and artist related to Dam’s insistence that “funk is not just a Jheri Curl. There was more than that.”
Pre-order Invite the Light on iTunes and receive a free download for “We Continue” or pre-order vinyl via the Stones Throw website.
Dam-Funk Live Band Tour Dates
Fri 9/04 || San Diego, CA || The Casbah
Sat 9/05 || Los Angeles, CA || Teragram Ballroom
Sun 9/06 || San Francisco, CA || The Independent
Tues 9/08 || Portland, OR || Doug Fir Lounge
Thurs 9/10 || Vancouver, BC || Venue
Sat 9/12 || Jackson, WY || Pink Garter Theatre
Sun 9/13 || Salt Lake City, UT || Urban Lounge
Tues 9/15 || Denver, CO || Cervantes
Wed 9/16 || Albuquerque, NM || Sister
Fri 9/18 || Las Vegas, NV || Bunkhouse Saloon
Dam-Funk – Invite the Light
(Stones Throw – September 4th, 2015)
Tracklisting:
In an interview with Rolling Stone, The Killers’ lead singer Brandon Flowers said Somebody Told Me “…is the story of trying to meet someone in a club.” The single peaked at #51 on the US Billboard Hot 100. In the UK it charted at number 28 upon its first release in March 2004 becoming the band’s first top 40 hit, it was then re-released in January 2005 and reached number 3.
https://youtu.be/5ZA4se9byzY
Check out this cool video demonstration of the third version of Rhythmicom built by Leon Theremin at Moscow State Conservatory in early 1960s. Theremin was a Russian and Soviet inventor, most famous for his invention of the theremin, one of the first electronic musical instruments and the first to be mass produced. The first Rhythmicon was developed by Theremin for Henry Cowell in 1932, making it the first rhythm machine ever built. You know who likely wants this really badly? Martin Gore of Depeche Mode, since he likes buying this stuff on eBay.
The Phillies hosted the Cardinals at Citizens Bank Park when a squirrel climbed across the netting behind home plate and dropped into the Phillies dugout. The squirrel actually landed on Chase Utley as several players scrambled out of the way. The squirrel quickly scurried out of sight.
MTV’s 120 Minutes With JJ Jackson debuted on March 10, 1986, and here’s a 35-minute video spanning the entire two-hour show with a few of the music videos still left in.
https://youtu.be/mXo7zGQkS9c
To commemorate the 20th anniversary of The Edges of Twilight, The Tea Party have announced the release of a deluxe remastered CD, remastered LP, and a North American tour. It has been 20 years since the group released the iconic album featuring such singles as Sister Awake and The Bazaar. The band will kick off the tour in Windsor, ON, on September 4th for two HOMETOWN SHOWS at the Olde Walkerville Theatre. The tour will stop all across Canada, and fans can look forward to seeing the band perform the album in its entirety. Tickets go on sale this Friday, June 26th and the remastered album will be released on September 4th with Universal Music Canada, the country’s leading music company.
The three founding members of the band, Jeff Martin, Jeff Burrows and Stuart Chatwood are looking forward to sharing this album with their fans again. Frontman Martin says; “People often ask me ‘what does The Edges of Twilight mean to me as a musician?’ My answer, although not so simple, is simply this: it was the crystallization and the manifestation of an incredible musical vision between the three of us, and the fact that it was achieved in such a way was probably, and is still, one of the proudest musical achievements of my life.”
While Burrows (drums) “remembers writing a lot of that with the guys just in a basement in our hometown, which was the most ironic part about it because it turned into such a worldly album. With all of the pieces and parts connected to it, it was just an interesting growth from where we came from to where we wanted to go, and where we ended up.”
Chatwood (bass and keys) shares how the band’s travels strongly influenced this album. “After we came off the road for ‘Splendor Solis’ the time was set for us to head to the studio for ‘Edges of Twilight’ and our musical travels informed that record, and we expanded the band’s sound going in the direction of incorporating world music instruments. So, it was just a monumental record of our career and it sort of set the main signpost that dictated where the band was to head musically for the subsequent releases.”
VIP packages for the tour will be available through MapleMusic beginning this Friday at 10am EST at http://www.ticketbreak.com/theteaparty. The band will also launch a PledgeMusic campaign on Friday, which will include a chance to purchase memorabilia, ticket bundles and so much more. All of the details for pre-order bundles can be found at www.pledgemusic.com/projects/tea-party-eot20. General ticket sales begin on Friday, details will be made available on the band’s website at www.teaparty.com.
The Edges of Twilight, originally released on March 28, 1995, hit double platinum and was nominated for two Junos. The title of the album was taken from a chapter of the book Fire in the Head, by American author Tom Cowan, which also inspired the name of the first track on the album. Universal Music Canada will release both a deluxe edition CD of the album and a 2LP 180 Gram Heavyweight Vinyl edition of the original release. The 2-CD Deluxe, Digital Deluxe, Mfit & Vinyl Editions will include newly remastered audio. The deluxe CD and digital deluxe will also include a second bonus disc that will consist of alternate, live, radio sessions and bonus audio and the booklet will feature the story of the album with new band interviews and previously unseen photos. The Vinyl edition will include the newly remastered audio across 2 x 180 gram heavyweight vinyl that will be housed in a gatefold sleeve.
The Edges of Twilight 20th Anniversary Tour
Fri/Sat Sept 4 & 5 – Windsor, ON – Olde Walkerville Theatre
Tue/Sep-08 – London, ON – London Music Hall
Thu/Sep-10 – Oshawa, ON – Regent Theatre
Fri/Sep-11 – Barrie, ON – The Roxy
Sat/Sep-12 – Waterloo, ON – Maxwell’s
Sun/Sep-13 – Sarnia, ON – Rustic
Wed/Sep-16 – Hamilton, ON – Hamilton Place Theatre
Fri/Sept-18 – Montreal, QC – Corona Theatre
Mon/Sep-21 – Winnipeg, MB – Burton Cummings Theatre
Tue/Sep-22 – Medicine Hat, AB – Esplanade Main Theatre
Thu/Sep-24 – Calgary, AB – Jack Singer Concert Hall
Fri/Sep-25 – Edmonton, AB – Mary Winspear Centre
Sat/Sep-26 – Toronto, ON – Massey Hall
Mon/Sep-28 – Grande Prairie, AB – Better Than Fred’s
Tue/Sep-29 – Vernon, BC – Vernon & District Performing Arts Centre
Thu/Oct-01 – Seattle, WA – Showbox Theatre
Fri/Oct-02 – Vancouver, BC – Hard Rock Casino
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Eric Alper is a 6-time nominee for Publicist of the Year during Canadian Music Week and has overseen the publicity campaigns for over 183 JUNO Award-nominated albums (and 16 in 2025), 45 Grammy-nominated albums, including 47 JUNO Award, 58 Canadian Folk Music Award, 126 Maple Blues Award-winning albums and is also truly honoured to work with some of the biggest and most important artists of our time.
Contact me: eric@thatericalper.com
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