Jack Lee, the singer, songwriter, guitarist and producer with the 1970s West Coast band The Nerves who wrote the power pop trio’s “Hanging on the Telephone,” famously covered by Debbie Harry and Blondie, has died. He was 71.
Lee died May 26 in Santa Monica after a three-year battle with colon cancer, his family announced. “He never gave up on his music, to the very end,” they wrote in a statement. “His guitar, right by his side. He lived his songs. One by one they told the story of his life. Some dreams die. His never will.”
In 1976, The Nerves — Lee on guitar, Peter Case on bass and Paul Collins on drums — secured a $2,000 loan to record a four-song, self-titled, self-released EP in San Francisco that featured two Lee compositions, “Give Me Some Time” and “Hanging on the Telephone.”
After the band split in ’78, writer Jeffrey Lee Pierce — then-president of the...
Lee died May 26 in Santa Monica after a three-year battle with colon cancer, his family announced. “He never gave up on his music, to the very end,” they wrote in a statement. “His guitar, right by his side. He lived his songs. One by one they told the story of his life. Some dreams die. His never will.”
In 1976, The Nerves — Lee on guitar, Peter Case on bass and Paul Collins on drums — secured a $2,000 loan to record a four-song, self-titled, self-released EP in San Francisco that featured two Lee compositions, “Give Me Some Time” and “Hanging on the Telephone.”
After the band split in ’78, writer Jeffrey Lee Pierce — then-president of the...
- 6/7/2023
- by Mike Barnes
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Mark Stewart, the hulking and dynamic vocalist who shouted, whispered, and squealed over the Pop Group’s dubby, deconstructionist post-punk, died early Friday morning. A rep confirmed the singer’s death to Rolling Stone but did not disclose any additional details. He was 62.
“Mark was the most amazing mind of my generation, Rip,” the Pop Group’s guitarist and saxophonist, Gareth Sager, said in a statement.
“Thank you, my brother,” dub artist and one of Stewart’s longtime collaborators, Adrian Sherwood, said. “You were the biggest musical influence in my...
“Mark was the most amazing mind of my generation, Rip,” the Pop Group’s guitarist and saxophonist, Gareth Sager, said in a statement.
“Thank you, my brother,” dub artist and one of Stewart’s longtime collaborators, Adrian Sherwood, said. “You were the biggest musical influence in my...
- 4/21/2023
- by Kory Grow
- Rollingstone.com
The phrases “avant-garde improvisational noise rock” and “hot new buzz band” don’t often show up next to each other in the same sentence. But they’re hard to avoid when discussing London’s Black Midi, an adventurous group that’s somehow broken through over the last couple years to become one of the most hyped acts in the U.K. — despite (or perhaps because of) a sound tailor-made to challenge and bewilder listeners in its prog-punk weirdness.
Since forming in 2017, Black Midi has been slathered in the kind of...
Since forming in 2017, Black Midi has been slathered in the kind of...
- 2/6/2020
- by Jon Dolan
- Rollingstone.com
1. Aisha Harris, “Lion Queen (Beyoncé) Has Her Say,” New York Times (July 20). New Horizons in Democratic Theory Dep’t: “To hear Beyoncé speak is such a rare occurrence that any instance of it, no matter how fleeting, feels special, like catching a glimpse of a shooting star.”
2. Bruce Springsteen, Western Stars (Columbia). Battle of the Bands: Harry Nilsson v. Glen Campbell. On the record, it’s a draw, and really, who cares? Off the record, the world is smaller without Glen Campbell. It isn’t without Nilsson. And it isn’t bigger with this.
2. Bruce Springsteen, Western Stars (Columbia). Battle of the Bands: Harry Nilsson v. Glen Campbell. On the record, it’s a draw, and really, who cares? Off the record, the world is smaller without Glen Campbell. It isn’t without Nilsson. And it isn’t bigger with this.
- 7/24/2019
- by Greil Marcus
- Rollingstone.com
With nods to King Crimson, Talking Heads, Death Grips, and many others, London’s Black Midi creates a unique brand of cathartic punishment on their excellent debut. The band’s barely college age (they met at the same prestigious performing arts school that produced Adele and Amy Winehouse), but they’ve attained striking erudition, dexterity and compositional know-how for musicians so young — not to mention a lot of UK hype for a band this odd.
Add to the above-mentioned touchstones Pere Ubu, Congolese soukous, modern classical music, electric Miles Davis,...
Add to the above-mentioned touchstones Pere Ubu, Congolese soukous, modern classical music, electric Miles Davis,...
- 6/24/2019
- by Jon Dolan
- Rollingstone.com
This time around, punk rock is reborn in Dublin, Ireland; an American experimental institution comes to a striking end; and two archival releases affirm, again, that there is still astonishing music out there from the Sixties and Seventies that has never been heard before — and great stories to go with it.
Fontaines D.C., Dogrel (Partisan)
“My childhood was small/But I’m gonna be big,” singer-lyricist Grian Chatten declares in “Big,” the tight, fast blast that starts Dogrel, the debut album by these young post-punk sensations from Dublin, Ireland.
Fontaines D.C., Dogrel (Partisan)
“My childhood was small/But I’m gonna be big,” singer-lyricist Grian Chatten declares in “Big,” the tight, fast blast that starts Dogrel, the debut album by these young post-punk sensations from Dublin, Ireland.
- 4/26/2019
- by David Fricke
- Rollingstone.com
It’s kind of amazing how much history Cate Le Bon packs into her music. The Welsh indie-rock artist’s great 2016 album Crab Day evoked the incisively loopy post-punk of Pere Ubu and the Red Krayola, the clattering epiphanies of the Raincoats and Lilliput, the Velvet Underground and Seventies Kraut-rock, as well as the homespun progginess of contemporaries like Stephen Malkmus and Eleanor Friedberger. Yet, Le Bon’s songs always feel utterly her own, cryptic and compact, errant yet conversational (even when she’s singing in Welsh), taking you to...
- 3/25/2019
- by Jon Dolan
- Rollingstone.com
Earth, 1977: England's dreaming, London's burning, and punk is raging as the U.K.'s youth culture du jour. Enn (Alex Sharp) spends his days writing and drawing his zine – titled Virys, because punk! – and giving polite society the two-fingered salute. At night, he and his knuckleheaded buddies hit up warehouse spaces to see first-wave bands like the Dyschords play their two-chords-and-the-truth anthems; the scene is run by elder stateswoman Queen Boadicea (viva Nicole Kidman!), who is inspiring the kids to fly their freak flags Asap and, apparently, will one...
- 5/22/2018
- Rollingstone.com
Robert Kidney, of the legendary N.E. Ohio-based agro-blues outfit 15-60-75 aka The Numbers Band, is set to release his long-awaited solo album, -- Jackleg (Exit Stencil Recordingsl). Friend, producer and bassist Tony Maimone (Pere Ubu) wisely persuaded him to record a solo album at his Brooklyn studio sans any outside distractions apart from a satchel of new songs and his guitar. What you hear is what you get. Unfiltered. His earnest vocals and guitar playing will leave you mesmerized. Not unlike the Rick Rubin-produced Johnny Cash sessions. "Paradise Lost" is the blues of a white man, blues that never try to mimic the blues of the African-American blues giants of the past, but rather distilled into Mr. Kidney's own unique style, a style that he has nurtured and refined for well over five decades. This track is only the tip of the iceberg and a full ablum review will be posted shortly.
- 2/4/2016
- by Dusty Wright
- www.culturecatch.com
15-60-75 (Numbers Band) Jimmy Bell's Still in Town (Exit Stencil)
Haven't heard of this oddly named band? You're probably not from Ohio, and you're definitely not from Kent. Formed there in 1969 by lead vocalist Robert Kidney and saxophonist Terry Hynde (brother of Pretenders vocalist Chrissie), it created a strange and compelling amalgam of styles. Kidney doesn't sing so much as chant, or emphatically recite. There are not really any melodies, and the horn section, so often in other bands a sweetener, only adds acrid commentary. There's an obvious blues influence, but this is not tidy 12-bar blues, it's a primal drone that pulsates with dark energy, not least because of drummer David Robinson's angular beats.
This album, recorded in concert on June 16, 1975 at the Agora in Cleveland when they opened for Bob Marley, was their debut, released the following year. It was too weird -- even by...
Haven't heard of this oddly named band? You're probably not from Ohio, and you're definitely not from Kent. Formed there in 1969 by lead vocalist Robert Kidney and saxophonist Terry Hynde (brother of Pretenders vocalist Chrissie), it created a strange and compelling amalgam of styles. Kidney doesn't sing so much as chant, or emphatically recite. There are not really any melodies, and the horn section, so often in other bands a sweetener, only adds acrid commentary. There's an obvious blues influence, but this is not tidy 12-bar blues, it's a primal drone that pulsates with dark energy, not least because of drummer David Robinson's angular beats.
This album, recorded in concert on June 16, 1975 at the Agora in Cleveland when they opened for Bob Marley, was their debut, released the following year. It was too weird -- even by...
- 1/31/2014
- by SteveHoltje
- www.culturecatch.com
Kidney Brothers: Coal Tattoo (Hearpen)
Having grown up and loved from afar, forced to do so after I moved to NYC, there are few bands still playing live -- four decades later -- worthy of my unbridled accolades and devotion but so it is with the heady agro-blues of 15-60-75 Aka The Numbers Band. If you dig music and happen to hail from Northeast Ohio, you know what I'm talking about. Having followed their entire career, I can proudly boast that I'm one of their biggest fans. Yet, it's no leap of faith or youthful nostalgia.
If you've seen them live, regardless of the decade, then you know the passion and verve that the brothers Kidney -- singer/guitarist Bob and harpist/sax/keyboardist/vocalist Jack -- share with their audience, regardless of the size, every single time they take the stage.
Along with horn player Terry Hynde (Pretender...
Having grown up and loved from afar, forced to do so after I moved to NYC, there are few bands still playing live -- four decades later -- worthy of my unbridled accolades and devotion but so it is with the heady agro-blues of 15-60-75 Aka The Numbers Band. If you dig music and happen to hail from Northeast Ohio, you know what I'm talking about. Having followed their entire career, I can proudly boast that I'm one of their biggest fans. Yet, it's no leap of faith or youthful nostalgia.
If you've seen them live, regardless of the decade, then you know the passion and verve that the brothers Kidney -- singer/guitarist Bob and harpist/sax/keyboardist/vocalist Jack -- share with their audience, regardless of the size, every single time they take the stage.
Along with horn player Terry Hynde (Pretender...
- 4/5/2013
- by Dusty Wright
- www.culturecatch.com
"Ingenue" Atoms for Peace Amok (Xl Recordings)
Thom Yorke, Flea, long time Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich, session drummer Joey Waronker, and percussionist Mauro Refosco have conjured up some heady experimental rock and electronica juju on this album of Radiohead-like alt-dance and fragmented rock tunes. Much of what I hear on this album had its roots in Radiohead's Amnesiac -- vague lyrics, off-kilter rhythms, Yorke's falsetto vocal phrases. Get your groove on, like Thom does in the video on the next page...
The Mavericks In Time (Valory)
Raul Malo has a voice as angelic as Roy Orbison's. He and his country-leaning Mavs -- original bassist Robert Reynolds and drummer Paul Deakin, along with the more recent guitarist Eddie Perez -- have regrouped and released their first new music in ten years, entitled In Time, including tunes co-written by former Nrbq badass Al Anderson. Last month I was lucky enough to...
Thom Yorke, Flea, long time Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich, session drummer Joey Waronker, and percussionist Mauro Refosco have conjured up some heady experimental rock and electronica juju on this album of Radiohead-like alt-dance and fragmented rock tunes. Much of what I hear on this album had its roots in Radiohead's Amnesiac -- vague lyrics, off-kilter rhythms, Yorke's falsetto vocal phrases. Get your groove on, like Thom does in the video on the next page...
The Mavericks In Time (Valory)
Raul Malo has a voice as angelic as Roy Orbison's. He and his country-leaning Mavs -- original bassist Robert Reynolds and drummer Paul Deakin, along with the more recent guitarist Eddie Perez -- have regrouped and released their first new music in ten years, entitled In Time, including tunes co-written by former Nrbq badass Al Anderson. Last month I was lucky enough to...
- 3/21/2013
- by Dusty Wright
- www.culturecatch.com
Josh Spiegel swaps in for Ricky D, joining Simon Howell and Julian Carrington to discuss two late-year fest darlings – which, of course, also makes them Oscar hopefuls. First up is David O. Russell’s bipolar rom-com Silver Linings Playbook, with Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, and Robert de Niro; next is the John Hawkes vehicle / bio-pic/ would-be tearjerker, The Sessions. Up for discussion: the MPAA and penises, the Tiff Audience Award track record, and whether it’s better to over-direct or not to direct at all.
Playlist:
Pere Ubu – “The Modern Dance”
Smog – “Dress Sexy At My Funeral”...
Playlist:
Pere Ubu – “The Modern Dance”
Smog – “Dress Sexy At My Funeral”...
- 11/26/2012
- by Sound On Sight Podcast
- SoundOnSight
Yes, I have too much time on my hands. Here's a new feature that was fun to put together (though quite time-consuming, which makes me worry about my ability to do this every month). I look back at rock, pop, and R&B albums that came out five years ago, ten years ago, etc.
1967
Buffalo Springfield: Again (Atco)
There was much chaos surrounding the creation of this quintet 's second album. Bassist Bruce Palmer, in some ways the soul of the band, was unavailable due to a drug charge deportation, and a string of session players took his place. Stephen Stills, who saw himself as the leader of the group, was feuding with Neil Young, who considered himself an equal, and Young actually quit -- but returned. And that's without getting into the fiasco that was the band's management team.
Nonetheless, it was a quantum leap forward from their debut,...
1967
Buffalo Springfield: Again (Atco)
There was much chaos surrounding the creation of this quintet 's second album. Bassist Bruce Palmer, in some ways the soul of the band, was unavailable due to a drug charge deportation, and a string of session players took his place. Stephen Stills, who saw himself as the leader of the group, was feuding with Neil Young, who considered himself an equal, and Young actually quit -- but returned. And that's without getting into the fiasco that was the band's management team.
Nonetheless, it was a quantum leap forward from their debut,...
- 10/30/2012
- by SteveHoltje
- www.culturecatch.com
Ralph Carney's Serious Jass Project: Seriously (Smog Veil)
One of the great things about recycling old jazz is that there are so many styles to choose from. On the evidence of this CD, saxman Ralph Carney (known as a member of Tin Huey and Oranj Symphonette as well as for his contributions to records by Tom Waits, the Black Keys, Black Francis, the B-52's, Bill Laswell, Elvis Costello, Galaxie 500, Allen Ginsberg, Marc Ribot, William Burroughs, Pere Ubu, and many more) has a great fondness for small-group swing and jump blues, but taps a few additional subgenres as well. He's even more versatile as an instrumentalist, credited on this album with six types of saxophone, two types of clarinet, and flute, trumpet, English horn, lap steel guitar, and vocals, with a moderate amount of overdubbing at times.
Of course, when Carney includes "serious" in the band and album names,...
One of the great things about recycling old jazz is that there are so many styles to choose from. On the evidence of this CD, saxman Ralph Carney (known as a member of Tin Huey and Oranj Symphonette as well as for his contributions to records by Tom Waits, the Black Keys, Black Francis, the B-52's, Bill Laswell, Elvis Costello, Galaxie 500, Allen Ginsberg, Marc Ribot, William Burroughs, Pere Ubu, and many more) has a great fondness for small-group swing and jump blues, but taps a few additional subgenres as well. He's even more versatile as an instrumentalist, credited on this album with six types of saxophone, two types of clarinet, and flute, trumpet, English horn, lap steel guitar, and vocals, with a moderate amount of overdubbing at times.
Of course, when Carney includes "serious" in the band and album names,...
- 11/29/2011
- by SteveHoltje
- www.culturecatch.com
In 2003, the epochal proto-punk band Rocket From The Tombs reformed and laid down Rocket Redux, an album comprising proper studio versions of the group’s widely bootlegged 1974-75 repertoire. The problem is, many of those songs had long ago been cannibalized and owned by the two bands Rtff begat, Dead Boys and Pere Ubu, which makes Redux feel more like a tombstone than a rebirth. But Redux did serve a purpose: It spurred original members David Thomas, Cheetah Chrome, and Craig Bell (along with new recruits Steve Mehlman of Pere Ubu and Richard Lloyd of Television) to roll up ...
- 10/11/2011
- avclub.com
Getty Fans at 2010′s Lollapalooza in Chicago’s Grant Park
Now in its seventh year at Grant Park in Chicago, Lollapalooza is offering this weekend a spectacularly diverse collection of contemporary rock and pop acts including after-dark headliners Coldplay, Deadmau5, Eminem, Foo Fighters, Muse and My Morning Jacket as well as familiar talent like Big Audio Dynamite, Bright Eyes, the Cars, Cee-Lo Green and Deftones. As is customary at these mega-festivals with many stages, some of the best music is...
Now in its seventh year at Grant Park in Chicago, Lollapalooza is offering this weekend a spectacularly diverse collection of contemporary rock and pop acts including after-dark headliners Coldplay, Deadmau5, Eminem, Foo Fighters, Muse and My Morning Jacket as well as familiar talent like Big Audio Dynamite, Bright Eyes, the Cars, Cee-Lo Green and Deftones. As is customary at these mega-festivals with many stages, some of the best music is...
- 8/3/2011
- by Jim Fusilli
- Speakeasy/Wall Street Journal
*%$#Loads Of Videos with Jeff Krulik Live!
Sun at Ritz
Pop And Not-so-pop Clips with Chuck Statler Live!
Mon at Ritz
This Sunday and Monday, we’ll be showcasing the work of two of the secretly perfect men of American entertainment!
About Jeff Krulik: Many consider Heavy Metal Parking Lot to be one of the defining works of the ’80s. And it is. Hilarious, unbelievable and 100% Real, it’s persevered as a truly classic mini doc. But creator Krulik has never stopped chronicling amazing, gut-busting and truly unusual people across the globe. From raging pro wrestlers to Jew-obsessed shut-ins to all-chimpanzee rock bands, Krulik has fearlessly delved into the strangest chasms of the world.
On Sunday, he joins us in person to present selections from his skull-rattling filmography, including monkey manifesto I Created Lancelot Link, oddball celebrity travelogue Ernest Borgnine On The Bus, the unstoppable, aforementioned Heavy Metal Parking Lot and many more.
Sun at Ritz
Pop And Not-so-pop Clips with Chuck Statler Live!
Mon at Ritz
This Sunday and Monday, we’ll be showcasing the work of two of the secretly perfect men of American entertainment!
About Jeff Krulik: Many consider Heavy Metal Parking Lot to be one of the defining works of the ’80s. And it is. Hilarious, unbelievable and 100% Real, it’s persevered as a truly classic mini doc. But creator Krulik has never stopped chronicling amazing, gut-busting and truly unusual people across the globe. From raging pro wrestlers to Jew-obsessed shut-ins to all-chimpanzee rock bands, Krulik has fearlessly delved into the strangest chasms of the world.
On Sunday, he joins us in person to present selections from his skull-rattling filmography, including monkey manifesto I Created Lancelot Link, oddball celebrity travelogue Ernest Borgnine On The Bus, the unstoppable, aforementioned Heavy Metal Parking Lot and many more.
- 7/16/2010
- by Zack Carlson
- OriginalAlamo.com
As the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall approaches on November 9th, many events are planned to mark the occasion and assess the changes Germany has undergone since reunification. In such moments, artistic considerations often take a back seat, but the Goethe Institut [1] in London, whose remit is to promote German culture, is presenting a film series at several locations across the city, looking at underground cinema in East Germany and West Berlin, a first for the UK. Of the two, West Berlin's thriving Super 8 scene of the 1980s is much better known outside of Germany, spawning collections such as Berlin Super 80 [2]. Even at the time of their making, some of the films were shown in New York and London, receiving a better reception in the avant-garde circles of those metropoli than they did in West Germany. If the West Berlin underground filmmakers styled themselves as radical and transgressive,...
- 11/5/2009
- by Val
- SoundOnSight
Maybe you see further than I can see,
or maybe things just look differently.
Maybe I'm nothing but a shadow on the wall.
Maybe love's a tomb where you dance at night.
Maybe sanctuary is an electric light -
I get so tired it's like I'm another man.
And everything I see seems so underhanded.
I don't see anything that I want.
And I don't see anything that I want.
*—Pere Ubu, "Heart of Darkness," 1975
Countess: Ich fürchte, es gibt überhaupt nichts auf der Welt, wofür ich mich auf die Dauer interessieren könnte…Alles, was fich vom Auto, von der Loge, vom Fenster aus beobachten lässt, ist teils widerwärtig, teils uninteressant…Mindestens is test lang; weilig!
Mabuse: Sie haben recht, Gräfin—nichts auf der Welt ist auf die Dauer interessant—ausser einem…
—From Dr. Mabuse, Der Spieler, I: Der Grosse Spieler, screenplay by Thea von Harbou from the novel by Norbert Jacques,...
or maybe things just look differently.
Maybe I'm nothing but a shadow on the wall.
Maybe love's a tomb where you dance at night.
Maybe sanctuary is an electric light -
I get so tired it's like I'm another man.
And everything I see seems so underhanded.
I don't see anything that I want.
And I don't see anything that I want.
*—Pere Ubu, "Heart of Darkness," 1975
Countess: Ich fürchte, es gibt überhaupt nichts auf der Welt, wofür ich mich auf die Dauer interessieren könnte…Alles, was fich vom Auto, von der Loge, vom Fenster aus beobachten lässt, ist teils widerwärtig, teils uninteressant…Mindestens is test lang; weilig!
Mabuse: Sie haben recht, Gräfin—nichts auf der Welt ist auf die Dauer interessant—ausser einem…
—From Dr. Mabuse, Der Spieler, I: Der Grosse Spieler, screenplay by Thea von Harbou from the novel by Norbert Jacques,...
- 10/30/2009
- MUBI
Half the fun of listening to South Africa’s Blk Jks is trying to imagine just what these guys listen to. Have they really been subsisting on a steady diet of The Mars Volta and TV On The Radio for the last few years? Or, due to whatever culture filters exist between Western shores and the tip of Africa, are they listening to an even stranger jumble—some radio station that plays Pere Ubu, Led Zeppelin, and U2? The band traveled to New York’s famed Electric Lady Studios to record its debut LP under the tutelage of Secret Machines ...
- 9/8/2009
- avclub.com
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