Friendly Fires North American Tour Dates

According to NME, Friendly Fires are coming back to New York (and North America) along with The Soft Pack, and White Lies in March and April as part of the NME Presents North American Tour:

March 24 - Washington - Black Cat
March 25 - Philadelphia - First Unitarian Church
March 26 & 27 - New York - Bowery Ballroom
March 28 - Boston - Paradise Rock Club
March 30 - Montreal - Les Saints
March 31 - Toronto - Lee's Palace
April 1 - Ann Arbor - Blind Pig
April 2 - Indianapolis - Radio Radio
April 3 - Chicago - Double Door
April 4 - Minneapolis - Triple Rock Social Club
April 7 - Seattle - Neumo's
April 8 - Vancouver - Richard's on Richards
April 9 - Portland - Doug Fir Lounge
April 11 - San Francisco - Slims

I saw Friendly Fires 3 times during CMJ and once last month at the Annex. They're dancey & poppy in a rocking way. Their album is great. Check them out!

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New Whomadewho video for "This Train" by Chicks on Speed!

WhoMadeWho has a video out for their track "This Train" (which was released digitally last week and will also be available on The Plot 7" out March 6th.

The video is totally weird, NSFW, and wild which is everything I've come to expect from the leotard-donning Danish trio, plus there are some extra creative touches as the video was done by Chicks on Speed (whose track "Surfer Girl" was recently remixed by WhoMadeWho which you can also read more about here). Check it out:

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Exclusive: Booka Shade New York Show Announcement!

Booka Shade will be playing the Fillmore at Irving Plaza on Friday, March 27th - 9pm doors.

$27.50 advance tickets go on sale 12 noon this coming Wednesday, 1/28 via Livenation.com or the Irving Plaza box office.

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Valerie Collective at Webster Hall Tonight!

Some great new (mostly) Frenchies are coming to Webster Hall:

The Valerie Collective is not just a music blog - it is a group of like-minded DJs and musicians from West France that fuse authentic 80s synths with modern indie/electronica. They sound like Daft Punk doing an '80s movie soundtrack... their tracks are startling in their consistency, mood and feel; they offer a sense of a time that never existed, but we all somehow understand… a future that once seemed possible. Their retro/futuristic artwork (by The Zonders) sums it up nicely.There are several artists under the collective's umbrella, (including College, Anoraak, Russ Chimes and Lovelock – all of whom will be performing).

RSVP here for $10 reduced admission.

You can download some tracks by Anoraak and Russ Chimes over at my dance post on Brooklynvegan, plus a new one - "Sentinel of Love" from 33Hz (who will also be performing live at Webster on Friday).

There's more info on Steve Moore of Lovelock, plus more College and Anoraak tour dates in a post by Black Bubblegum there too.

And...a good way to play catch up on your Valerie game (other than just checking out their blog) is to check out some informed suggestions from Dreamtard.

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WhoMadeWho track "This Train" Available Tomorrow on iTunes + Info on "The Plot" single + remix of Chicks on Speed's "Surfer Girl"

From WhoMadeWho's myspace blog:

This Train and The Plot Single Releases

Hey there….so things are moving forward….Tomorrow you’ll be able to buy “This Train” on iTunes. The track is from our forthcoming album “The Plot” which will be out March 23rd. Add to all this, that the single “The Plot” - yes, it’s also the name of one of the tunes on the album - will be out March 6th. It’ll be out on both 12″ and 7″, something for the young hipsters and for the hip youngsters as well. The track list “The Plot” 12″ : 1) The Plot Original Club Mix 2) The Plot Noze Remix 3) The Plot The Mole Remix 4) The Plot Discodeine Remix Gomma 1 The track list “The Plot” 7″: 1) The Plot (album version) 2) This Train (album version)

The band has also remixed a track called "Surfer Girl" by Chicks on Speed which recently became available on iTunes as well.

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Studio B Is Not Closing?!

According to the B's website, as of yesterday (January 19th):

Despite the rumors, Studio B is not closing and in fact has some exciting events coming up.

I'll say! Here's some stuff I didn't know about until just now:

February 7 - Matthew Herbert (dj set)

March 14 - Infinity +1 tour with DJ A-trak and DJ Mehdi

March 15 - Trouble & Bass with Jack Beats

Plus all the stuff that's already in the shows list on the left in the meantime.

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One Step Beyond Ticket Giveaway!

The American Museum of Natural History is having it's monthly dance party, One Step Beyond, this Friday with Tim Sweeney from Beats in Space and Bianca Grimshaw.

There's something surreal and awesome about having to walk past a huge dinosaur skeleton, and into a planetarium to get down. If you haven't experienced it yet, here is your chance to for Free! I have a pair of tickets to give away. Email showtrotta at gmail dot com with "OSB" in the subject line and I will randomly pick a winner and will let you know if you've won sometime before noon on Friday. Full info on the party is below:

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Trus'me to begin New York Residency at APT this Friday 1/16!!!

I first went to see Trus'me deejay on a whim after liking some of what I heard while researching for "the Week In Dance". By the end of the night he had packed the Yard's humble little dancefloor full of sweaty bodies, fittingly getting down to some perfect summertime house & disco grooves. It was one of my best nights out in New York last year (it made the top 20 which I hope to post sometime next week) which is pretty impressive considering I had very limited familiarity with his music prior to going to the party.

I impatiently waited for him to come back here all the way from Manchester which he thankfully did in October, and now he's back again this Friday for the first party of his new monthly residency at APT. Linkwood and Kon & Amir will be deejaying as well - definitely check it out if you're around!

All the info you need is on the flyer below. Also, if you're on Facebook be sure to add Trus'me NYC to your friends to stay in the loop about the future parties.

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This Sunday 1/18/09 - Korrupt: Back to the Minimall

This Sunday MeanRed (party throwers whose events make me reintroduce the term "rager" into my vocabulary with absolutely no regret) are bringing the party back to 88 Palace (a dim sum restaurant in a Chinatown mini-mall that they take over once the dining is done and turn into an awesome place to party). Their last party there was great and I'm sure this one will be nothing short of the same:

This episode of the dim sum-inspired dance party features THRONE OF BLOOD
(Dances With White Girls * Mattie Safer (of the Rapture) * Wiz)
And Special Guest: EBONY BONES

Sunday, January 18th - MARTIN LUTHER KING WEEKEND

OPEN ASAHI BAR (11pm - until supplies last)

11pm
$10 with RSVP : www.iamkorrupt.com
$15 without

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Mr. Oizo on Cover of XLR8R's January/February Issue 124

I was just reading the obscene number of blogs I read during lunch and came across a great feature on Mr. Oizo over at XLR8R (who graces their cover this month). I didn't do a Top 10 Albums list this year (top 20 shows and various ridiculous superlatives are on their way, hopefully next week) because I know there a lot of albums that would be in the running that I never got to listen to in full. One that I did get to listen to that definitely would be in the top 10 (dare I say, perhaps #1) was Mr. Oizo's Lambs Anger.

The article on him, Mr. Oizo: Master of Puppets, over at XLR8R does a great job of exploring his creation of Lambs Anger as well as some of his past, less accessible work (both music and film).

Not only is the article very well done, but the photos that accompany it are very fitting (good job XLR8R!). Can you capture the French/Quentin any more accurately than this photo?!



Go check it out already!

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Phoenix Announce New Album Title

Phoenix's new album will be called "Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix" and will be out this Spring, see?



You can geek out about it on the new Phoenix message board, and see a very dramatic intro with a soundbite (that is maybe from the new album?) here.

Philippe Zdar who produced their excellent album, United, is producing the new one. Should be good.

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