NewsNotice of CollusionWe suspect there has been a clerical error at MTV2, which, if it remains uncorrected, will have the Silver Jews (Cassie and David in this case) co-hosting a video show they have called "subterranean" next week in person. It will be shown on March 12 at midnight. They are hopefully going to play a "Sleeping is the Only Love" video that Brent Stewart (the fellow who made the "How Can I Love You" video) shot yesterday and edited last night, continuing to make a big name for himself in the under 100 dollar MTV-worthy video world. Time Out Tel AvivThere's an article and video clip in the digital format of Time Out Tel Aviv. Check it out! Silver Jews in Scotland
From www.triptychfestival.com: Performing live for the very first time in a celebrated fifteen-year career, enigmatic versifier David Berman and his endlessly erudite Silver Jews are finally set to gratify ears and enliven hearts with a clutch of inaugural Stateside shows in March; before crossing the water to woo Triptych aficionados and music lovers with their heady, hazy, hairy, grace.
US Tour Dates
October BornFrom www.dragcity.com:Big news drops in October — in case you hadn’t already heard, October 18th is the date that the new Silver Jews opus Tanglewood Numbers becomes available to a world that has desperately needed more love from the Jews! You see, Silver Jews are a tradition to the young and semi-young of our global village — they quote David Berman’s lyrics, incorporating them as catch-phrases into their impressionable lives, fashion their lifestyles after what they imagine Silver Jews’ albums to be espousing and burn their favorite songs onto mix-CDs that they seek to influence others with, the cheap bitches! Ah, what we wouldn’t do for this fandom...it seems like the least we could do (literally) to release an album every four years or so from one of Drag City’s most celebrated of bands. Tanglewood Numbers is a celebration of life, played by more living creatures than ever before featured on a Silver Jews record. For all you dweebs out there: yes, Steve Malkmus is one of those creatures. And this helps to make Tanglewood Numbers one of the electric Jews records — as opposed to the more acoustically-flavored Bright Flight, let’s say. At times, the electricity is a bit shocking — but at the end of the day, it’s a great new Silver Jews record, full of life and death and beauty and humor and all the rest. Viva Tanglewood Numbers! It’s loaded with some of the greatest Silver Jews music.
Psst...From www.dragcity.com:Hey, American friend - wanna buy a really rare record? If you’re near a fine Drag City direct retailer, you’ll have a chance to buy one on October 18th. See, that’s the day Drag City’s little sister label Sea Note issues a mystery single so strange and mysterious...let's see, so strange and mysterious, we can’t tell you a single thing about this single! Well, perhaps just one little note — this record is related to our big October 18th release and a rumor that’s spread for some years over a collaboration with this band and another band on Drag City. That’s all we’re telling you - put together the pieces and five dollar bills and be the first in line - and you too might have this rarest of items!
Silver Jews vs. The Mountain GoatsThe CD accompanying the latest issue of The Believer magazine includes a version of Pet Politics played by the Mountain Goats. For more details visit: The Believer
False AlarmFrom donewaiting.com:All masters were located in another part of the building which received little to no fire damage. Whew!
Up In SmokeFrom NME:The studio Jeff Buckley was recording in when he died has been destroyed by fire. The Easley McCain recording studio in Memphis suffered considerable damage after an electrical fire broke out on Wednesday last week (March 2). "The (fire) inspector said that two fires broke out at the same time at opposite ends of the building, due to some electrical reason," engineer Kevin Cubbins told Rolling Stone. "Within 15, 20 seconds, the whole place was engulfed." The studio has witnessed sessions by Sonic Youth, The White Stripes, Guided By Voices, Wilco and Loretta Lynn among others. Along with damage to the studio the new album by the band Silver Jews - which features former Pavement members - was also destroyed. The record had apparently been delivered to the studio to be mastered on the morning of the fire (see update). The studio’s future is now uncertain while the insurance is being examined, however Wilco bassist John Stirratt insisted it would a great loss. "It's unbelievable. Really, really sad," he explained. "If you tried to record in Memphis before Easley, you had to work with, well, born-agains. Easley was the first place to reflect how hip and weird and diverse Memphis really is -- the great, weird underbelly."
Punks in the Beerlight
From The Dust Congress: Info on the upcoming Silver Jews album, from the main Jew: We won't be finished until Feb.24th. So it should come out around July. i'm giving a reading at sarah lawrence on thurs nite at 9pm. bring a walkman and ill let you listen to what it sounds like so far. the working title is "tanglewood numbers" you know "woodchilde masquerade" had it's chances. and i know what you're thinking- but remember "the natural bridge" is THREE words. the players in order of appearance:
steve malkmus brian kotzur bob nastanovich bobby bare jr. steve west duane denison azita youseffi will oldham pete cummings tony crow paz lenchatain j.d. wilkes songs are called :
there is a place punks in the beerlight how can i love you (if you won't lie down?) the poor the fair and the good animal shapes i'm getting back (into getting back into getting back into you) sometimes the pony gets depressed k-hole the farmer's hotel brian's song freezing in the shadow of your knee region ten re: is it the last silver jews album? Impossible! as long as two of us walk the earth the band is still together. and, as always, thanks to you that give a damn about what we do.
The BelieverStarting with the June issue, The Believer, published by Mcsweeney's, will feature a poem by David Berman every single month. See www.believermag.com for more details.
Actual Air On Stage
Borrowed from
http://www.infernalbridegroom.com18th February 2003 Infernal Bridegroom Productions kicks off the new year with the first in a series of four consecutive world premiere productions, and the indie rock world is already buzzing about it. Having introduced Houston audiences to the works of Suzan-Lori Parks, Brian Jucha, Sarah Kane, Wallace Shawn, Mac Wellman and several other theater artists who represent the most exciting work happening in contemporary theater, IBP has found another outstanding playwright in rock and roll poet David Berman. And, as was the case with our recent production of The Kinks’ Soap Opera, people from around the country are already booking their tickets. David Berman is a hero. He is a hero to fans of independent music and he is a hero to the fans of contemporary American poetry. Moreover he is a hero to longtime IBP company member Troy Schulze, who is uniquely suited to bring Berman’s poems to life and make believers out of the uninitiated. Berman is best known for his work with The Silver Jews, a band which featured members of the legendary rock outfit Pavement. As the story goes, Silver Jews mate Stephen Malkmus, of Pavement, was so impressed by Berman’s third record that he became disillusioned. According to Malkmus, “It was such a better record than Terror Twilight [Pavement’s last release]. Much more inspired. After American Water, I could no longer make a record the way [Pavement] made records.” In his book Actual Air, Berman has accomplished a similar feat: reawakening the listless world of American poetry, taking sly observatons on life’s mundane rigors and twisting them into mythic, witty, passionate anthems. Berman's journey through a weird, dreamlike America is amusingly strange, yet it's strikingly familiar and precise. Pulitzer Prize-winning poet James Tate described Berman's poems as "beautiful, strange, intelligent and funny ... narratives that freeze life in impossible contortions." Berman’s a hero, alright. He’s a hero of the most exciting variety. The sort you may never have heard of but you’ll almost certainly never forget. Troy Schulze joined the IBP company during it’s second production, in 1994. In the time since, he’s played featured roles in 2 dozen productions, and was voted Houston’s best actor this year by Houston Press readers. In 1999, he directed Bernard- Marie Koltes' Roberto Zucco also for IBP. Houston Press theater critic Lee Williams wrote: "[IBP's] exquisite world of wonderland shows just gets curiouser and curiouser and smarter and smarter. And the thrilling intellectual puzzle of their latest endeavor, " Roberto Zucco," is as good as it gets." Schulze is a funny sort of director. Although his directing debut was an unmitigated success, he waited three years before mounting his sophomore effort. He was looking for a project which demanded his attention and his unique, visually arresting style. He found it in Actual Air. Schulze's stage adaptation of Berman's book is a collage of American snapshots – a surreal anti-narrative decorated with striking visuals, hilarious dialogue and live rock music, which is somehow simultaneously bizarre and accessible, soporific and dynamic. As in the best of poetry, plays or music, it is the stuff dreams are made on. Simply put, it’s the sort of work Infernal Bridegroom exists to produce: fresh, bold, challenging, entertaining, brand new poetry in motion for the next generation. In a pressurized cabin on the moon, a robot asks his maker about the relative sentience of snowmen. In another scene an omniscient voice summons “all students named Doug” to a mysterious concourse. In another a young man paints a self-portrait as a present to himself, meditating on simple pleasures and comforting himself with such thoughts as “at least I have not woken up with a bloody knife in my hand.” As another sly rock poet once observed, something is happening and we don’t know what it is. But something is absolutely happening. It’s poetry made live again. It’s theater made poetry. And Infernal Bridegroom, and fans of David Berman from across the country, couldn’t be more excited. Ten years and forty-one shows after it all began, Infernal Bridegroom Productions is in its first full season in its very own theater doing what we've been doing all along. Only more. And better. Actual Air is the first of four world premieres, to be followed by a collaboration with Bobbindoctrin Puppet Theatre (The Noblest of Drugs), a new work by IBP artistic director Jason Nodler (Meat/BAR) and the eighth in our ever-popular Tamalalia series. Actual Air will be playing at the Axiom, 2524 McKinney, at 8:00 p.m. on the following dates: February 13, 14, 15, 20, 21, 22, 27, 28, and March 1, 6, 7, 8. Opening Weekend, February 13, 14 and 15, tickets are only $5.99. Remaining performance ticket prices are as follows: Thursdays $10, Fridays $12, Saturdays $15.
Big chords, sweet melodies and (sometimes dubious) wisdomTypically, Silver Jews is the warmest, most homespun music of all the US stuff we represent; legendary leader DC Berman dropping the big chords, sweet melodies and (sometimes dubious) wisdom in equal parts. Bright Flight is a little different, a little the same - I read something about it that stuck with me, where the spin is that it's a little wilder and a little less kind than the Wild Kindness we experienced on the previous set, American Water. Maybe that's true, and the Nashville Joos sure sound lived-in, but DCB is incapable of sounding over-familar, naturally incorporating George Washington, Stephen Foster and Royal Trux into the best lyric schemes you're going to get outside hip-hop. Also Tennessee may well be the ultimate Joos track, if you ever need to turn a friend on to this incredible group in a hurry. And if it fails, well would you really want a friend who doesn't love this group? www.dominorecordco.com
Silver Jews Take Bright Flight To The Near FutureWhenever we hear the sound of Silver Jews, it always seems to come from another time, a moment in the near future, perhaps. Their songs are like predictions that come true — moments of déjà vu played backwards, instantly familiar, making us nostalgic for a past that hasn't quite let go yet. Well, it's time for Silver Jews fans to prepare for such moments of time travel in the immediate future... around November 20th, to be precise! That's the day the new release Bright Flight will be made available, like an IV, to all the fans out there. This time, you'll have two new titles to choose from: not only the new 10-song Bright Flight LP/CD, but also a 4-track 12"/CDEP called "Tennessee." This 12" is a cut from the record with three cuts not from the record adding up to a mini-trip all of it's own — who are you kidding, there's no choice! You've got four purchases to make an LP, CD, 12" and CDEP! Start slinging that rock ASAP!And the record is great. Keeping in the tradition of not repeating past poses, D.C. Berman has typed up a new set of profiles. He assumes them all on Bright Flight, assisted by a couple characters from the American Water sessions (Tim Barnes, Mike Fellows) as well as a number of talented players from the Nashville area, where Bright Flight was laid down. This is one of those lonely-sounding, make-you-cry Silver Jews records so get ready for a cold winter. With Bright Flight in hand, it will be a long, devastating, worthwhile experience. This could be humanity s last chance so please — don t fuck it up, you kids at heart. Reality just got a little more real. www.dragcity.com Actual Air
Updates
2nd March 2006 - news. |
