Artist: Sunny Day Sets Fire Album: Summer Palace Label: IAMSOUND Records Release Date: July 8th 2008 Listen to "Mandarin": London-based band Sunny Day Sets Fire, whose name makes me think of both Sunny Day Real Estate and Alexisonfire, (but who don't sound like either), are certainly unique for their broad range of hometowns: singer/guitarist Mauro and fellow guitarist Max hail from Italy, while other singer Onyee (also synth and drums) is from Hong Kong, Ed... [continue]

Yesterday, in the L.A. Times, I read a story that made my blood boil. People with the initiative and the where-with-all to make their cars run on vegetable oil, thus saving themselves money and us all fumes, are being smacked down by the state government for not seeing to such things as, oh, a $300 license from the Meat and Poultry Inspection Branch to collect grease from kitchens. Oh, and road tax, God forbid these... [continue]

My new favorite book is the intriguingly titled The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly. It was one of those titles that called to me from a library shelf, and the story has stuck with me so much that I went out and bought it this past week to read again. Connolly is normally a mystery/thriller writer, so you may have to look for it in that section, but The Book of Lost Things... [continue]

Photo via Old 97's Myspace Everyone's (or certainly my) favorite country/rock band from Dallas, The Old 97's, are back with a new album due out May 13th! I heard the news and got out my Alive and Wired cd (Disc Two is the best, in my opinion) and sang along in the car this past weekend. Before the new album, entitled Blame It On Gravity, hits the shelves, however, bespectacled bassist Murry Hammond's solo... [continue]

If you've never heard of Fado, it is a Portuguese folk tradition born out of the Moorish influence in Lisbon, Portugal and Brazilian love songs called modhinas. Since fado songs are usually about heartbreak and loss, (some call it the Portuguese blues), the tradition was actually subverted by the country's dictators in the 1930s and turned into a political tool, encouraging the unhappy lower classes to focus on nostalgia and romantic love as a distraction,... [continue]

NPR's All Things Considered recently ran a story pulled from Action Figure Insider on unused Star Wars merchandise created while the prequels were in development. The story goes that Jason Geyer, a toy developer at a small agency, got the chance to design products for the upcoming Episode One, but because production was so hush-hush, he had to do it while not privy to any info on the film. So Geyer and his team brainstormed... [continue]

The great reggae dj and singer/producer Mikey Dread (born Michael George Campbell) passed away March 15th from a brain tumor at age 54. An engineer in the mid 70s at the JBC, the Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation, Dread started "Dread at the Controls", the first all-reggae show in a time where most of the music played was pop music from other countries. The show became a huge hit and Dread went on to record his own... [continue]

Last week I went to see Jim Henson's Commercials and Experiments at the Silent Movie Theater on Fairfax. It was with high hopes because Henson has always been a hero of mine, having created several of my favorite movies and TV shows (Labyrinth, Dark Crystal, Fraggle Rock, The Muppet Show & Muppet Babies) and involved in many other favorites, including Star Wars. For the first half of the film, I was certainly not disappointed. It... [continue]

One thing I love about L.A. are all the little shops and cafes that let us poor starving artists leave flyers or put up posters for our many different events. Here is a list of just a few such kind souls, to help my fellow independents, and also just to say a heartfelt thanks! (I hope you don't hate me.) Hollywood: Amoeba Karma Coffeehouse Sabor y Cultura *Nearly all of Melrose. Los Feliz: Psychobabble... [continue]

If, like me, you were such a huge fan of Muppets and costumed creatures growing up that you're practically anti-CGI, you should head over to the Silent Movie Theater on March 18th for "Jim Henson's Commercials & Experiments"! The screening starts at 8pm and will feature rare clips, shorts and commercials from Jim Henson's studio archives, including experimental animation and "a 35mm print of Time Piece, an Academy Award nominated 8-minute masterpiece that showcases Henson’s... [continue]

Last night's flamenco show at the Echoplex (that's underneath The Echo, for those people who ask me all the time) was awesome. I'm a new fan of flamenco, having the privilege to work with some acts at my current job, and last night's performers Son de la Frontera from Seville are not the stereotypical/cheesy idea you may have of flamenco, with the men each yelling louder than the next and the female dancers in their... [continue]

The Black Crowes' new album Warpaint, due out March 4th, was recently negatively reviewed in everyone's favorite trucker guy bible, Maxim. This was odd, however, since apparently, no advance copies of the album were given out. As it turns out, the reviewer never heard the album at all. According to The Black Crowes' website, when the band's management complained, the review was explained by Maxim's editors thusly: "Of course, we always prefer to (sic) hearing... [continue]

Although critics have raved about Juno, including myself, I have occasionally heard that it made a few people gag, and I've definitely heard mixed responses to the decidedly twee soundtrack. (I love that word. Twee! ...Not related, sorry.) Chicago Sun-Times critic Jim DeRogatis's rant about both the movie and the soundtrack is already making the blog rounds and iliciting quite a few responses. Working an odd angle for a screenplay written by a tatted-up former... [continue]

So I'm a fairly new resident of Studio City, and am still discovering little surprises on this side of town. Driving down Ventura, I have twice noticed a small, nondescript building bearing a sign with the letters ICA at Colfax Ave., which, upon closer examination while sitting at a red light, rest above the casually printed name "Intercontinental Absurdities." Clearly, this was something that called for investigation. It sounded a bit like something out... [continue]

Pretty cool. The group responsible is Improv Everywhere. The whole thing kind of reminds me of "Out of This World"...... [continue]

The LA Times reports that local indie stalwarts Dim Mak Records has made a deal with Downtown Music (Gnarls Barkley, Cold War Kids, Art Brut, Justice) in which Dim Mak will continue to discover and develop new artists, and Downtown will give them that boost in distribution and promotion that Dim Mak has never been fortunate enough to be able to offer. Sounds like a deal that could make everyone happy. Founded by well-known local... [continue]

If you're looking for a little more culture in your concert schedule these days, there's a cool new flamenco group from Sevilla called Son De La Frontera coming to the Echoplex next month, on February 28th. Founding member Raul Rodriguez (far right in pic) guested on Ojos de Brujo's Techari, and the group is something of a hybrid themselves, although less so than Ojos, because they add a Latin American twist to traditional Spanish flamenco.... [continue]

In my scouring for good things to read online, I've stumbled across (not actually Upon) a new favorite. Carrie Brownstein, former guitarist of one of my favorite bands, Sleater-Kinney, now writes for NPR's much commented-on new music blog, in a section called "Monitor Mix". She gets about 50 comments per post, no doubt partly due to her fame, but her writing is also really good in its own right. I've already discovered a couple new... [continue]

If you're looking for something interesting to do this weekend, tomorrow night from 9:00 p.m. to 3:00 a.m., a group of young women under the name Fetus are organizing the first of a planned monthly event at the INMO Gallery, in Billy's Coffee Shop, at the historic 1920s Rosslyn Hotel building. The $5 admission fee includes 3 free drinks (nice!) and there will be several DJs spinning Electro, Retro, 60s-80s dance, new disco, and international... [continue]

This is a good time to be a Kinks fan. Last year Ray Davies put out a solo album, then "A Well-Respected Man" and "This Time Tomorrow" popped up this year in movies like Juno and The Darjeeling Limited. And now a Kinks Retrospective box set is scheduled for release in 2008, and NME has announced that a reunion tour for the seminal 60s, fighting-brothers band The Kinks is supposed to take place this year.... [continue]