Allen and Burnham Exit Gang of Four

Gang of Four (l-r) Gill, King, Allen, Burnham


Allen (l) and Burnham (r) in happier times, May 5th 2005 backstage at Portland’s Crystal Ballroom (pic: Jamie Francis)

GANG OF FOUR MINUS TWO

The original and best-loved line-up of famed post-punk icons Gang of Four reunited in 2005 to great acclaim and success - unfortunately all good things must come to an end. Bassist Dave Allen and drummer Hugo Burnham are moving on, although singer Jon King and guitar-player Andy Gill will continue, focusing on writing and recording new music as Gang of Four. Burnham last performed with the band at All Tomorrow’s Parties in the UK in December 2006, while Allen played a few shows alongside drummer Mark Heaney in 2007, and recently worked on new material with King and Gill.

Allen says, “At the beginning of April, I decided that I could no longer continue to be a member of Gang of Four. My ability to give 100% to the band is limited and I feel that if I can’t do so, then I shouldn’t continue. As I expand my research and thinking about contemporary music distribution on Pampelmoose.com, and as I focus on online technology and social networking at Nemo Design here in Portland, I find myself conflicted about how the band’s new music should be released. To retain any credibility for Pampelmoose.com about what the future of music distribution will look like, I have to move on and not hold back Jon and Andy’s music plans. I have had a side project for a while now with John Askew of Tracker and Menomena’s drummer Danny Seim called Faux Hoax (pronounced Folks), and I look forward to fun times finding ways to get our music into peoples’ hands in unique ways.”

Burnham writes, “It was a great couple of years of intermittently reminding people old and new, far and wide just how powerful the original four of us were together. Age only increased our power and focus onstage, and it was a rare pleasure to work with the original band once again. Being in a band requires handling the business side of it too, and that became boring and the constant travel became debilitating. I am soon to start my Doctorate, as well as broadening my teaching at more than one college here in Massachusetts, so my free time has become increasingly limited, making it difficult to be involved with them going forward. Musically, I am recording and writing with members of Boston noise-merchants, The Bags and I have also been doing some recording lately with Mike Watt. I wish Jon and Andy luck with their new musical endeavours; I am sure they will be interesting.”

pampelmoose presents the teenagers, doug fir, april 20 - win free tickets

Ok, here’s a first for the Moose, we’re throwing down for a band. That’s right, we’re stepping up to the plate and saying “here’s something that’s worth your hard earned bucks…” Portland readers already know that we do our bit to support local music but this is the first time (and I can safely say, not the last) that we’ve picked an international touring act to get behind. The Teenagers, lead singer Quentin Delafon, guitarist / synth man Dorian Dumont and bassist Michael Szpiner, hail from France and their album Reality Check just came out. Here’s what the Brits made of it -

“The Teenagers’ ‘Reality Check’ is a seething mass of synths, bottle-neck harmonies and off-kilter guitars that chime with a lo-fi sizzle. However, gripping as it is, the music actually plays second fiddle to their hormone-filled lyrics and vocalist Quentin Delafon’s singing/speaking style. Two parts Gallic Lou Reed one part Eddie Argos, he intones each tune with a mix of bathos and heart. ….While we’re not sure how long The Teenagers can play the roles of STD-prone lover/sulky bastard/stalky webmaster, for now Reality Check stands as a fun, frank and startlingly perceptive debut that surprises for all the right reasons.” - NME.com.

The band is joined on the night by Portland’s The Hugs and DJ Joeeirwin.

Watch the video for Love No here. Enjoy an in-depth interview with the band from Hipster Runoff here. And have a listen to Scarlet Johanssen below. Check back for details on how to win a pair of tickets….

The Teenagers - Starlett Johansson [MP3]

AU, New Album ‘Verbs’ - Another Portland Gem

I love that publicity folk send me music everyday and I also love that I am getting them trained to stop sending me those plastic non-environmentally friendly CDs. [Have you ever wondered how much oil and energy it takes to make a CD, and how long it will live in a landfill...?] Anyway, I digress - back to PR folks - they also send me hyperbolic blurbs about their bands. The one that accompanied the fascinating new album from Portland’s AU is an example:

Between these disparate bookends lies the staggering aesthetic expanse of Verbs-the sophomore record from acclaimed Portland, OR. experimental pop collective Au-which, in its swirling depths and subtleties, promises to be one of this year’s most satisfying surprises.

And that was just the opening paragraph. These expansive rants are rarely helpful in giving me a sense of what to expect; they inevitably never match up to my listening experience - let’s just paraphrase ‘beauty lies in the eye of the beholder’ into the ‘ear of the listener.’

With Verbs, Luke Wyland, the architect behind AU has managed to wrangle a rather wondrous and vast sonic landscape of an album into a cohesive musical shape and form using multiple instruments while collaborating with multiple musicians, many of whom if not all are from Portland, Oregon. I dare say that when Wyland released the debut AU album last year the comparisons to Arnold Dreyblatt, Animal Collective, Terry Riley, Steve Reich and Grizzly Bear may have been correct [I never heard it.]

On Verbs the resulting sonic landscapes remind me more of Bjork and Sigur Ros in the way multiple vocals and vocal harmonies are wrapped around eclectic beats. I hear gospel and a vaudeville element at work here especially on RR vs D which in its second half sounds like we are in a parade with a marching band or even at an old-fashioned circus. And is the hand clapping beat on RR vs D just a coincidence or is it a favorable, knowing nod to the french singer Camille who used handclaps to such great effect on her stunning song Au Port?

With AU and ‘Verbs’ Portland can be justifiably proud - another feather in the city’s cap. The album is released June 26th, 2008 and ‘RR vs. D’ will be released as a 7″ single on May 20. Keep up with tour dates at their MySpace page.

AU - RR vs D [MP3]

Camille - Au Port [MP3]

EMI Records Reinvents the Wheel

Stop stealing music motherf*^%#er. Will Ferrell and Heidi Klum as imagined in the movie Music Fans vs The Music Industry.

I wasn’t inclined to pitch in about the story of EMI hiring an ex-Google exec to overhaul its global digital strategy. I figured it was a non-story - record labels are in trouble, have been for years while they buried their collective heads in the sand, then some bright spark at EMI says “hey let’s hire someone from Google, they seem to know what they’re doing….” Yeah that might work.

Here’s a story about EMI’s new guy. “Glen Merrill was Google’s chief information officer and one of the architects of the internet firm’s successful flotation in 2004. He has been appointed at EMI to a new role overseeing all of the company’s digital strategy, innovation, business development, supply chain and global technology activities.” It seems an odd fit to me yet other writers have validated Merrill’s hiring because of the way he dresses! This from News.com “On a personal level, the match might be more heavenly [heavenly!]. Merrill’s shoulder-length hair and casual attire makes clear he’s not a corporate “suit.” Plus he’s got a bachelor’s in social and political organization and a master’s and doctorate in Psychology from Princeton.” As I am an actual professional rock musician who dresses like one and has spent the last decade in the internet music distribution business I await the call from EMI.

But seriously, Mr Merrill has his work cut out for him. In the article he says - “”There is academic research that shows file sharing is a good thing for artists and not necessarily bad,” said Merrill. “We should do a bunch of experiments to find out what the business model is.” [Rick Rubin talks about setting up a 'lab' here.]

Readers of this blog don’t need a degree from Princeton to understand that indie labels long ago embraced the idea of giving away music files for free to spread awareness of their artists releases. He then goes on - “I think people will pay,” Merrill said. “There is evidence that people we think are not buying music are buying music. They’re just not buying it in formats we can measure.” That’s an odd statement, there are many tools at hand to measure music sales both online and off. I presume he means what I have held as a given for many years - that when someone is exposed to a music file online and they like that music they then go on to buy it either in digital form or as a CD.

Meanwhile - “Merrill plans to experiment with ad-supported music download services, pointing to Google’s success with targeted advertising, and subscription models.” Nothing new there.

All Mr Merrill needs to do is to persuade his new corporate bosses that by giving away non-DRM music files to music fans they are fulfilling what their customers want - free access to new music. Maybe he can find a way to compare that activity to the way labels have used another free format for their customers to hear their music - FM Radio. And also he might discuss how much money EMI loses by making music videos then giving them away for free to MTV. And he should remember that tap water is free but bottled water companies make a fortune. He’s smart, he’ll work it out.