Asides

Free download from Jill Cunniff (ex-Luscious Jackson)

Jill’s giving away a new remix on her website (it’s in the M4a format) FOR FREE and it’s a great, end-of-the-summer, loungy dance track.

DOWNLOAD: “Last Summer (Sparkle Mix)”

If you somehow missed it, Jill released her first solo album, City Beach, in early 2007 and it made my year-end Best of list that year. If you are/were a Luscious Jackson fan and this is news to you, you can find the CD used on Amazon.com for $.01.

Here’s my review of that CD:

Perhaps it was the fact that they were introduced to the world as the female version of The Beastie Boys, but Luscious Jackson never seemed to live up to the hype despite scoring a number of moderately successful hits during their short run. By the time the ladies went their separate ways in 2000, their kinky disco music had worn out it’s welcome. Lead singer Jill Cunniff started a family and worked with the New York disco duo The Cooler Kids all the while writing songs that she’d eventually use for her debut, City Beach.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Cunniff’s own work is cut from the same cloth as the material she contributed to Luscious Jackson, but it’s more subdued and there is even a hint of Brazilian pop spread throughout the songs. While Cunniff’s lyrical prowess may leave a bit to be desired, the general lazy summer afternoon tone of songs like “Lazy Boys” and “NYC Boy” make for a welcome return by this one-time New York City street punk.

And a low-budget video for “Lazy Girls”.

Oh Fly Seville, where are you?

Let’s see how wide-reaching this Internet thing is. Back in ’99 I interviewed a Boston-based band called The Fly Seville (at least I remember them being from Boston) while they were touring in support of their Sealed Fate release, Carousel. It was a good night, Ohio State was playing their first home game of the season, students were starting to come back to the campus area and were looking for some entertainment that night … and while The Fly Seville didn’t play in front of a huge crowd, it was decent and even the owner of the club came up to the band afterward and said “Any time you want a gig in Columbus, you’ve got one.”

It’s been many years since I thought about this band but scanning through some CDs tonight, I found Carousel and popped it in -  very sweet, melodic dreamy pop … singer Jesse Blatz reminds me vocally of a cross of Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow of The Posies and Stacy Joy adds lots of emotion via her violin. The only thing I could really find was a couple of videos that some filmmaker (James Holland) put together and posted on YouTube a year ago. I’m not really sure when these videos were shot or how new/old the songs are.

So, Jesse or Stacy or any of the other former members of Fly Seville, if any of you stumble upon this while Googling your own names, let me know what’s up and if you’ve got anything new in the works, either as The Fly Seville or with different bands.

Video: Snow Patrol – “Take Back the City”

First thoughts on the song were that it sounded like a cast off from Eyes Open, something that maybe wasn’t good enough to be included on that album. But after 30 or so listens in the last week, I’m thinking it’s not such a bad first single after all. The new Snow Patrol album, A Hundred Million Suns, is in stores at the end of October.

Letters to Cleo to reunite … but don’t get too excited

Kay Hanley and Stacy Jones have been touring as part of Hannah Montana’s band and Hanley is married to LTC guitarist Michael Eisenstein so a reunion isn’t a huge surprise – they just had to rope in guitarist Greg McKenna and, well, let’s face it, his post-LTC career hasn’t exactly skyrocketed with Murder Capital of the World. Bassist Scott Riebling isn’t taking part in the 20th anniversary reunion and his spot will be filled by Joe Klompus (a member of Hanley’s solo band).

While it’s cool and all that LTC is reuniting (read the press release here … warning, it’s a Word doc), the “tour” is only 4 dates at this point (see below) and there is no indication of future shows or future new music. Until more dates get added or the promise of a new album surfaces, I’ll just have to be content with my LTC CDs and videos (thank you YouTube).

Dates:
November 8 -Los Angeles CA – The Roxy
December 8 – Boston MA – Paradise Rock Club
December 9 – Boston MA – Paradise Rock Club
* New York date in December to be added soon.

“Awake”

“Here and Now”

Back for more

You probably have already forgotten about Hurricane Ike. Who would have guessed that the storm that hit Texas would make it’s way all the way to Ohio and knock out power at Atomic Ned headquarters for 6 days? The server that hosts AtomicNed.com was also hit with a power outage and then the owner of the server (my father-in-law) was on vacation for a week so I apologize for the downtime. But, as Ratt once said, “We’re back / back for more” so hang out tight.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moXb1HbOxyw[/youtube]