Blog: Uncensored Interview Blog

WHY? are holding an eBay charity auction to benefit Hands on Tokyo , a volunteer organization currently providing disaster relief after the recent earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Up for grabs are original handwritten lyrics, mixing and mastering notes from recording sessions and test pressings. Bidders can head to Josiah Wolf's eBay account , and all proceeds go to Hands on Tokyo. The grand prize is "Golden Ticket #4," a personalized song written for the winner. The highest bidder sends WHY? a few details about themselves, then Yoni Wolf cyber-stalks them for inspiring [...]

Searching for a unique live show amid the tiresome ubiquity of tight black jeans and ironic posturing? You're in luck, kid. A strange European phenomena known as The Vegetable Orchestra is coming to New York City this Wednesday. Set to play at the ungodly hour of 11 a.m. (that's A.M.) at the C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University, this archipelago of randomness, brilliance and aggressive oddness-reminiscent of Yoko Ono during her grapefruit phase -is as refreshing a break from the current scene as the first balmy day of spring. Modeled after the Viennese Das [...]

Big Boi, De La Soul and Atmosphere are heading the fourth annual Soundset Festival May 29 outside Minneapolis at Canterbury Park. Also performing are Curren$y, Slaughterhouse, Brother Ali, Doomtree, Macklemore, Rubberoom and dozens more. Spearheaded by Rhymesayers Entertainment, the festival also features b-boy and MC battles, live art, skate demos and a custom car show. Tickets go on sale this Friday. Atmosphere will release their newest full-length The Family Sign April 12. Check out Pitchfork's recent interview with Slug on the new record, the Minneapolis sound and whiskey poisoning.

To promote their new surprise album, The King of Limbs , Radiohead will release a newspaper " The Universal Sigh " March 28 internationally and March 29 in the U.S and Canada. "Dedicated teams of newspaper delivery people will be handing out copies" of "The Universal Sigh," in select locations across the globe according to paper's website. Find your nearest location here . Physical copies of the new album will be accompanied by an entirely separate newspaper in May, though no details have been released on that just yet. Mudhoney guitarist Steve [...]

Indie artist Andrew Belle currently straddles Chicago and Nashville, two of the best indie music/food cities in the country, and his down home, rustic, wry style reflects the comfortable literary wit evoked by his surroundings. Belle's work is selling like hotcakes on iTunes, and cheesy/tweeny TV shows are picking him up ( One Tree Hill , The Vampire Diaries , Keeping Up With the Kardashians ), but food is an equal passion. Belle enthusiastically embraces the zeitgeist-y space that exists between the overlapping worlds. And he somehow finds the time to update his [...]

Cult dubstep musician Burial (William Bevan) will release the 123 "Street Halo" on March 28 via Hyberdub, which includes two b-sides, the twenty-minute long "New York" and "Stolen Dog." The single marks his first release of solo material since the highly regarded Untrue in 2007. Just last week he appeared on a collaboration with Thom Yorke and Four Tet, the 123 "Ego/Mirrors." Burial previously worked with both musicians, including a remix of Yorke's "And It Rained All Night." The elusive artist rarely gives interviews, and his identity was unknown until 2008. For insight into [...]

Brooklyn-based rap trio Das Racist has been tap dancing on the line between ridiculous and sublime, vulture and culture, transparent and transcendent since their annoyingly addictive song "Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell" first cannon-balled into our culture's collective unconscious. That was way back in 2008. Since then, they've warred with music journalist Sasha Frere-Jones, held a " Cartoon-Off " with The New Yorker and spawned the smartest, funniest conversation about race America's had, since, well, ever. Most recently, the seminal, game-changing "Shut Up, Dude" and "Sit Down, Man" was released to a collective critical orgasm, [...]

Screeching Weasel frontman Ben "Weasel" Foster apologized Friday after punching a female fan in the crowd at Scoot Inn in Austin for reportedly spitting on him. See a video of the altercation here . "As a husband, father, and a musician on the public stage, I understand that it is my duty to always take responsibility for my actions in a socially acceptable way, and most especially in the face of confrontation," Weasel said. The punk rock band was scheduled to play San Antonio the next night, but the [...]

Foo Fighters are back, and they're everywhere, including Austin for SXSW and the mtvU Woodie Awards. The band previewed their forthcoming album, Wasting Light , at Stubb's during the festival, where earlier in the week they also screened "Foo Fighters," a documentary highlighting their early years, including their first 1995 tour. The documentary hits a theater near you in April. The band will scale things down a bit to play the garages of nine fans next month. Fans can enter the contest by uploading a picture of their garage on the [...]

Think you know where the best food is in Austin? Everyone attending SXSW has an opinion, from breakfast burritos to late-night vegan spots. And barbecue too, but that should go without saying. So in the interest of a well-rounded experience at SXSW, we've done the foodie research for you. Citizen Taco is a self-proclaimed "quick, easy, and reliable guide to finding good food, from four-star restaurants to no-name street carts." That is, perfect for our quick and dirty needs down south. They draw up a nerdy, handy-dandy map of joints to hit, then [...]

Nate Dogg, famous for lending vocals to some of rap's biggest hits, has died. He was 41. While the official cause of death is unknown at this time, the singer, born Nathaniel D. Hale, suffered from two strokes in recent years and was undergoing therapy for paralysis on the left side of his body. Nate Dogg first rose to prominence on Dr. Dre's classic The Chronic , and later delivered memorable hooks for Eminem, Mos Def, Pharoahe Monch, 50 Cent and of course, crew mate Snoop Dogg. Vice has a great [...]

Oh, Charlie, honey. In addition to getting fired, raided for firearms by the police, offered a starring role in a porn movie and being the victim of an Unfollow Campaign on Twitter, Charlie Sheen has found time to launch a new show on Funny or Die. Check "Winning Recipes" for his tips on culinary teleporting, creating cauldrons of awesomeness with cooking wands, the art of killing green things and the importance of stalking and killing your own meat-all while Charlie chain-smokes, breaks plates, chugs wine and wears an orange tiger-striped chef's hat. [...]

The population of Austin expands exponentially this week as the 25th annual SXSW festival begins. Uncensored Interview artists like Toro Y Moi , The Airborne Toxic Event , Surfer Blood , MSTRKRFT , Tapes 'n Tapes , Spank Rock , Daedelus , Vetiver , Army Navy , Visqueen , Das Racist , Shad and hundreds more perform March 15-20. The big names this year are Kanye West and The Strokes, who last played the fest in 2001. Check our homepage for [...]

Starting this weekend Matt & Kim kick off a cross-country tour that includes shows at SXSW, Sasquatch and Bonnaroo. Accompanying them on tour are The Thermals, plus DJ Autobot from Chicago crew Flosstradamus. The duo will also be performing at the mtvU Woodie Awards, taking place this year in Austin in conjunction with SXSW, where they're nominated for "Live Performance Woodie." The awards air live March 16 at 12 a.m. EST on MTV, mtvU and MTV2. Last time we caught up with Matt & Kim they told us about the various bands they've worked with and [...]

Glenn Beck, the corn-fed neocon wing-nut and favorite whipping boy of the thinking set, has discovered a new way to 'splain the economy to the American people: the cupcake. That's right, the baked, delicious good that Sarah Jessica Parker sky-rocketed to fame. (What's next, Beck? Are you going to use Cosmos to explicate the legislature?) Will the buttercreamed edibles help the public understand the threat posed by the exclusive society Beck has darkly dubbed "Crime Inc."? TBD! (Members of Crime Inc., like President Obama, have contributed to the vast liberal conspiracy to "rebuild America [...]

The Antlers are gearing up for the release of their new album, Burst Apart , on May 10 via Frenchkiss. The 10-song follow up to Hospice was recorded in their Bushwick, Brooklyn studio. The band is also playing a few shows at SXSW, including the NPR party which will be broadcast live. Details on their website. We talked to the guys, who told us about their preference for the studio or the stage. The Antlers : Studio vs Stage .

Notable chefs usually come in two sizes: egotistical, entitled and European or alcoholic, asinine and American. Gabrielle Hamilton, indubitably zany, doesn't fit into either category, but her brash, swaggering and wacky joie de vivre is now on display with the release of her new memoir "Blood, Bones & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef." It's about time someone shook up the status quo. The beloved chef's chef, owner of the perennially packed but relatively low-profile East Village fave Prune , is the last person you'll find preening for the cameras or [...]

Just when you thought there was no new way to consume music, The Flaming Lips prove otherwise. The Oklahoma band, who's been together for 28 years now, will release three songs on a USB flash drive in April. To get to it, you'll have to eat your way through a life-size human skull made of gummy bear material. Last month the band released " Two Blobs Fucking ," and its video was divided into 12 separate YouTube clips, meant to be watched simultaneously on iPhones. More on that in the interview below with the endearing Wayne [...]

Norwegian-born, Brooklyn-based Sondre Lerche will release a new self-titled album-his sixth-on June 7th via Mona Records. "This record is very essential and intense. It still has a lot of the stuff that I really value in music, but it has a stronger purpose," he told New York magazine. Lerche makes several appearances at SXSW in a couple weeks, and after that he's on a month-long U.S. tour in June, with more dates to be announced. When Lerche stopped by our studio, he couldn't stop talking about one of his favorite musicians, [...]

As revolutions across the Middle East rage the story on the street changes from minute to minute, but one thing is clear: Nothing will ever be the same, especially in Libya, the nest of the world's wackiest dictator. Gaddafi-or is it Kadafi, Qaddafi, Gathafi?-has many awesome claims to fame , including employing Kalashnikov-toting pin-up babes as body guards, possessing a silkier and more vast collection of leisure wear than Hugh Hefner, and partying alongside Nelly Furtado, Beyonce, Usher and Mariah Carey. He has the cross-eyed, greasy, tousled hair of an under-medicated matinee idol, [...]