
As you've probably read, My Chemical Romance announced earlier this week that they were going their separate ways, and this morning singer Gerard Way published a lengthy missive explaining the reasons behind the split, along with a whole bunch of other stuff about coffee, birds, talking amplifiers, and acting on stage. As far as these kinds of statements go, it's really pretty great — honest, funny, and heartfelt — and it got us thinking about some of the more notable breakup announcements of our time. Some of these are funny, some of them gloriously [...]

Now that I've wasted so much time here establishing a few traditions, I'd be remiss to honor not them... Almost every artist in the history of mankind has at least one title in their catalog that is a compilation, a stopgap collection meant to maintain interest between releases (often to boost holiday sales) or to fulfill a contractual obligation. This is the former, a chance to make use, one more time, of a lot of wasted time over the past twelve months. Four years ago, I reflected on the annual, childhood tradition of [...]

On one of the however hundred or so cable channels, NBC is airing It's A Wonderful Life . Most years, since I first watched the seasonal classic in my mid-twenties, I've made an annual viewing a habit. (Paloma finds the flick too depressing and annually doesn't watch it) Instead, I'm watching the alma mater's top-ranked basketball team as they finally lower the boom on a plucky low major that has hung tough but is gassed. When I went to bed last night, it was still November. The last remnants of [...]
Jens Lekman's new record I Know What Love Isn't is out this week, and on the whole it's a pretty morose affair, as befits its status as a breakup album. Still, even on a record this subdued, Lekman's signature humor can't help but shine through, despite the fact that he's left some of his funniest recent songs (namely "Waiting for Kirsten" and "An Argument With Myself") off the tracklisting. The fact that Lekman's songs are often as witty as they are moving is something that we've always liked about him — after all, love is frequently as bewildering, ridiculous, [...]

Ik ben verknocht aan Amsterdam. Heb er tien jaar gewoond en kom er nog altijd met heel veel plezier. Je kan er echt jezelf zijn, heb ik het gevoel. Wat minder is aan Amsterdam is dat iedereen dat heeft en dat er best wel wat arrogantie onder de Amsterdammers heerst. Niet allemaal, natuurlijk, maar er zijn genoeg mensen die status durven te ontlenen aan het feit dat ze in Amsterdam wonen. Rotterdam is wat dat betreft wat directer. Mijn vader heeft er jarenlang gewerkt en ik ben er zelf de afgelopen jaren wat vaker geweest omdat het een [...]

The Guardian So yes, been away a little while - San Francisco was lovely, thanks for asking, I've just started putting up photos on Flickr - and yes, there's a bit of a backlog of stuff to get through. But there's also a dollop of jet lag to get over, so I'll just ease back into this if it's all the same to you. We may as well start with the only thing that I actually listened to from all the RSS/Twitter/email items immediately: yesterday's livestreamed Blur mini-concert from atop a [...]

Los Campesinos - I Love You (But You' re Boring) [The Beautiful South]

ithugsback.co.uk Though I only gave it a very passing mention when it came out, I was really quite fond of British quartet It Hugs Back's 2009 debut Inside Your Guitar ; after all, I described their aesthetic of narcoleptic vocals, humming organs, and understated guitar heroics as a charming blend of American Analog Set and Yo La Tengo - how could I not like its fuzzy, mid-fi charms? But I lost track of them between then and now, though not without reason: first, they found their way off [...]

No ano passado, eles superaram (de certa maneira) todos os desfalques na formação da banda e lançaram um disco regular, mesmo que nada impressionante. Se Hello Sadness carregava poucos momentos de brilho, é em um cover que o Los Campesinos! resolveu mostrar todos os seus pontos fortes como banda, revisitando aquela que de acordo com o frontman Gareth , é sua banda favorita: o The Beautiful South , de Paul Heaton (também dos Housemartins ). I Love You (But You’re Boring) já tem um título estranhamente [...]
Stereogum Next month Los Campesinos! frontman Gareth Campesinos! will join his favorite songwriter Paul Heaton (Housemartins, the Beautiful South) in a tour of the new soul opera "Paul Heaton’s The 8th " and "Paul Heaton & Friends - Greatest Hits," back-to-back sets over six nights in the UK. In advance of these dates, Los Campesinos! have covered the Beautiful South's "I Love You (But You're Boring)" and you can download it below. Read More... [...]
Next month Los Campesinos! frontman Gareth Campesinos! will join his favorite songwriter Paul Heaton (Housemartins, the Beautiful South) in a tour of the new soul opera "Paul Heaton’s The 8th " and "Paul Heaton & Friends - Greatest Hits," back-to-back sets over six nights in the UK. In advance of these dates, Los Campesinos! have covered the Beautiful South's "I Love You (But You're Boring)" and you can download it below. Read More...
Earlier in the week we celebrated the release of the new Dirty Three album by surveying a selection of artists who've been in two or more great bands simultaneously. But on a lighter note, as well as his membership of the Dirty Three, Grinderman, and the Bad Seeds, Warren Ellis is also known for his biblically foreboding facial hair. The untamed nature of Ellis' beard — he once told our friends at the Quietus that beard trims were "incredibly dangerous" — is legendary, and worthy of awestruck respect. So to celebrate the arrival of Toward the [...]
It seemed appropriate to use this Trigger today. Best wishes and Good Luck! wedding (wed-ing) –noun 1. the act or ceremony of marrying; marriage; nuptials. 2. the anniversary of a marriage, or its celebration 3. the act or an instance of blending or joining, especially opposite or contrasting elements -synonym : marriage TRACKS [...]

In the overdue return of The Originals, we’ll visit three songs that became iconic in their interpretations from the 1960s, but had been standards since the early 1930s and, in one instance, 1940s. Blue Moon and At Last debuted in movies, while Dream A Little Dream Of Me, the oldest of the three songs, would end up lending its title to a 1989 flick (and an episode of Grey’s Anatomy ). Speaking of At Last, I hear that Etta James is in very poor health. Don’t forget the index of The Originals to revisit older instalments in [...]

This is The Beautiful South performing an acoustic concert on the 29th November 2001 at Boeblingen, Munich, Germany. The concert was subsequently broadcast on Bayern 3 (3rd December 2001) and WDR2 (20th January 2002). Paul Heaton, Dave Rotheray and Dave Hemingway are all performing, I am not sure if any other members of the band were involved. The band were supported on the German gigs by a young German band called 'Lost In Venice' from Stuttgart. The Beautiful South formed at the end of the 1980s by two former members of Hull group The [...]

After several years of anticipation, Chicago’s much loved orch-pop sextet, Canasta , has finally released their second album, The Fakeout, The Tease and The Breather . But listeners should be thanking their stars that the band took their time on this album. Filled with detailed orchestration, plenty of emotion, and carefully planned harmonies, this album speaks to the layers of orchestration that Canasta can produce. Canasta came to immediate light and sent critics swooning after releasing their debut album, We Were Set Up , in [...]
The Beautiful South came to Belfast in December 2004 to play the Waterfront Hall. Setlist: 01. Intro Music (Frantic Freeway) 02. From Under The Covers 03. Old Red Eyes Is Back 04. Don`t Stop Moving 05. Pretty 06. This Old Skin 07. Rotterdam 08. This Will Be Our Year 09. One Last Love Song 10. [...]