Tagged: pullintubes

It's a good time to be a forgotten band from the 19602s and '70s. While the world might not have been ready for them at the time, over the last few years music fans have been embracing the fascinating stories of these long-forgotten acts that had been been relegated to record store dust bins. Of the recent crop of rediscovered acts that are having a bigger second act than their first is the band Death . Formed in 1971 by brothers Bobby, David and Dennis Hackney in Detroit, Michigan, the trio started out as an R&B act but switched [...]

A quick primer of well-known music festivals from the late 19602s/early 19702s might looks something like this - Monterey Pop, Woodstock, Altamont, Summer Jam and the Atlanta International Pop Festival. Much like today's saturated festival landscape though, there were dozens of fests that didn't quite have the cultural impact - for better or worse - as the ones mentioned. In the June of 1971 an ambitious eight-day music festival called the Celebration of Life was set to take place in McCrea, Louisiana, a town located on the east bank of the Atchafalaya River. The lineup was as impressive as they come [...]

In the decade-plus since the release of their self-titled debut in 2001,  The National have become the model of what it means to be a successful indie-rock band. The Brooklyn-based act have slowly grown their audience through of a series of critically acclaimed albums full of their brand of dark brooding rock, anchored by lead singer Matt Berninger's unmistakable baritone voice. On May 21, the band will release their sixth full-length effort Trouble Will Find Me . The self-produced 13-track effort was mixed by longtime collaborator Peter Katis and features guest appearances [...]

Over the course of two full-length studio albums and an EP Bon Iver front man Justin Vernon has enchanted us with his heart-tugging falsetto vocals and lushly arranged folk-rock. If you think you've got him pegged as just the poster child for the beard-rock movement then think again, as Vernon has unleashed a new side with his latest project The Shouting Matches . The three-piece act, that also features Brian Moen (Peter Wolf Crier) and Phil Cooke (Megafaun), originally came together back in 2006, in the wake of the break-up of the much mythologized DeYarmond Edison. The band, [...]

An easy way to put it is that  Shuggie Otis is this year's version of Rodriguez. While there are certainly a number of similarities and parallels between the two artists, Otis' story has a lot more close brushes with fame when he was originally recording music, than Rodriguez ever did. The son of Rock & Roll Hall Of Famer Johnny Otis, Shuggie was a child guitar protege, who began playing as a member of his dad's band starting at age 12. In 1969, at the age of 15, Al Kooper recruited him to be featured on the second installment [...]

Prior to 2009 if you had asked most music fans if they had heard of Phoenix , they'd likely have thought that you were talking about Arizona's capital city and not the Parisian act . That all changed with the release of the band's fourth studio album - Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix . The record featured ear-wormy electro-disco-rock tracks like Lasso, 1901 and Lisztomania, which propelled Thomas Mars & Co. from a little known underground band to a critical and commercial success story seemingly overnight. While they had their hype machine working early, with a song featured during the Super [...]

Over the last few months there has been tons of chatter, rumors and speculation surrounding the details of the Queens Of The Stone Age's new studio album . For their first new set of material since 20072s Era Vulgaris , the stoner-rock-act  have gone indie moving from Interscope to Matador Records, and confirmed that their sixth record will be called ...Like Clockwork and will be released this June. Those are not quite the details that have been getting buzz around the internet though, it's been more about just who joined front-man Josh Homme in the studio [...]

The members of von Grey  stuck out like a sore thumb amidst the thousands of bands that descended upon Austin for the music portion of SXSW - not because of some lavish clothes they were wearing or wild stage antic, but for the sheer fact that their oldest member is barely old enough to vote while their youngest isn't even a teenager yet. Hailing from Atlanta,  the quartet consists of sisters Kathryn, Annika, Fiona and Petra and may be best described as a teenage version of the Dixie Chicks or what [...]

Over the last few years, the West London music scene has gathered at the Notting Hill Arts Club for a monthly night of music dubbed Communion  that has churned out an impressive number of critically acclaimed acts – notably HT faves Mumford & Sons, Laura Marling and Michael Kiwanuka. With its pedigree firmly established the latest in the line of folkie British acts to emerge from that scene which deserves your attention is recent Partisan Records signees Treetop Flyers . The Treetop Flyers, who won the Glastonbury Festival Emerging Talent [...]

• Treetop Flyers - Things Will Change

For someone that has been recording albums for roughly 45 years and has contributed to over forty albums, Richard Thompson doesn't get the same instant name recognition as many of his contemporaries. The British singer-songwriter and guitarist got his start as a founding member of the highly underrated folk-rock act Fairport Convention in the late-1960s, playing on the band's first five records - including their seminal 1969 release Liege & Lief . After leaving the group in '71, Thompson went on to release a string of records with his wife Linda over the [...]

Back in late December a giant-sized mural appeared on the side of a building at the intersection of Front and Master Streets in the Fishtown neighborhood of Philadelphia. The mural's sole purpose was to announce the release of Kurt Vile's new studio album - Walkin' On A Pretty Daze . Created by graffiti artist Steve Powers , the piece not only revealed the record's title, but its track-listing as well. On April 8, the  singer-guitarist will release the sprawling 68-minute double-album Walkin' On A Pretty Daze via venerable indie label Matador, which [...]

Long before the Grateful Dead rolled out their monstrous sound system known affectionately as "The Wall Of Sound," famed record producer Phil Spector was crafting a sound in the recording studio using layers of sounds that became his calling card throughout the 19602s. Spector originally had aspirations of being a performer, having early success with his band The Teddy Bears, who had a number one hit in 1958 with To Know Him Is To Love Him , which sold over one-million copies. Despite their success, the band broke up the next year, and Spector turned his attention to record [...]

While there are certainly many out there who would whole-hardheartedly agree with The Dude about the Eagles , the fact still remains that they are one of the most successful bands of the last 50 years, having sold a staggering 150 million albums worldwide, including 42 million copies of their Their Greatest Hits 1971-1975 alone. The initial incarnation of the band came together in Los Angeles in the Spring of 1971, when Don Henley, Glen Frey, Randy Meisner and Bernie Leadon were recruited to back Linda Ronstadt as her touring band. The foursome, [...]

While the name Ben Harper is certainly a familiar one to our readers, blues harmonica legend Charlie Musselwhite , whom the singer-songwriter has teamed up with for his latest studio album, may not be. Born in Mississippi in 1944, Musselwhite is considered to be one of the two most important artists to emerge from the "white blues movement" of the late 19602s, alongside Paul Butterfield. Musselwhite moved to Chicago from Memphis in search of higher paying factories, ingraining himself the city's blues scene and playing alongside the likes of Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Sonny Boy Williamson, Buddy Guy [...]

The city of Muscle Shoals, Alabama holds a special place in music history. The musicians that headed to the unassuming town in the Northwest corner of Alabama, near the Tennessee River, to record at FAME Studios and Muscle Shoals Sound who tried to harness the "Muscle Shoals Sound" reads like the roster of inductees at the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame. For a solid twenty year period some of the most famous and influential rock, soul, funk, country and R&B songs and albums were recorded there - from Aretha [...]

While some would like to call it the Mumford-ization of rock, there is no denying that over the last handful of years folk, roots and Americana music has crossed over into the mainstream with bands like The Avett Brothers, The Civil Wars, The Swell Season and most recently The Lumineers all achieving cross-over success. The latest band that is likely to benefit from this trend is  The Lone Bellow , who will release their  self-titled debut next Tuesday via Sony's Descendant Records imprint. The Brooklyn-based band, who has already [...]

Since we're in the midst of that ambiguous zone of the year where we are a few weeks away from any notable new releases coming our way, it seems like the right time to head back to the Pullin' 'Tubes Theater to offer up a semi-obscure music doc that has resurfaced in the last few months - The Incredible String Band: Be Glad for the Song Has No Ending . While The Incredible String Band may not illicit the instant recognition that many of their contemporaries do, the band was at the center of England's [...]

No other late night talk show has Christmas traditions quite like the ones David Leterman has introduced us to since switching networks, time slots and being rebranded as The Late Show with David Letterman back in 1993 - with two becoming staples of show's last new episode of the year prior to their holiday break. Since former Jets quarterback Vinny Testerverde and Letterman ran onto the stage and knocked the large meatball off the top of the in-studio Christmas tree with a football in 1998, comedian Jay Thomas has been back each and every year since to compete in the football [...]

Over the weekend,   The Continental Club  in Austin hosted a pair of benefit concerts for injured and uninsured Austin musician Michael Fracasso and the Health Alliance for Austin Musicians medical assistance program simply billed as " Patty Griffin and Her Driver." For those that haven't been keeping up on Ms. Griffin's personal life, they were in for quite a treat as when she finally welcomed "her driver" to the stage about a third of the way into her set it turned out to be none other than former Led Zeppelin front man Robert Plant . [...]

It's safe to say that Matisyahu has cornered the market on contemporary Hanukkah music, not that he's had much competition in that department. Back in 2010, the Jewish reggae star released the single Miracle, which celebrated the traditional story of the Festival Of Lights, and he has followed that up with the uncreatively-titled  Happy Hanukkah . In the spirit of giving back, Matis released the tune as a digital download charity single, with all the proceeds going to The Jewish Federation Of North America and The Robin Hood Foundation until the end of the holiday on [...]