Music Notes: CMJ Announces More Acts; Amanda Palmer Seeking Musicians; Pussy Riot to Go Free?; & More

Here's a collection of musical tidbits from far and wide:

* CMJ has announced a second round of artists for its 2012 music schedule (Oct. 16th - 20th), including AraabMUZIK, Savages, and Hey Rosetta!. Bands already announced include Mountain Goats, DIIV, and The Walkmen, among many others.



* Amanda Palmer attracted much derision when she called for musicians to come play on stage with her during her current tour—despite raising more than $1 million through Kickstarter for her current album (which is streaming online this week). Palmer insists that it would be too expensive to hire the string quartet, horns, etc. for the tour, and notes that participating musicians will get the experience of playing before her enthusiastic fans, and getting "beer and hugs." And hey, no one's forcing musicians to play with Palmer.

* Could Pussy Riot go free soon? Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has said that the three imprisoned members of the punk rock performance group should be let out of jail, and there are hints that this could happen after their appeal comes up on Oct. 1st. (via Spinner)

* Bonnaroo has announced the dates of its 2013 festival. The long-running Manchester, Tennessee shindig will take place June 13th - 16th. (via Consequence of Sound)

* Madonna has announced a second Madison Square Garden show, which will take place on Tues., Nov. 13th. Tickets go on sale to the general public on Fri., Sept. 14th at 10 a.m. Her Nov. 12th show is sold out, although sometimes extra tickets are placed on sale later.

* Canada's CBC Music has announced several new online streams in the continuing upgrade of its music website, which was totally revamped and relaunched several months ago. There's a stream of new-wave music that went live today, with songs hand picked by DJ and talk-show host Jian Ghomesi, and new offerings devoted to electronic dance music (EDM) and other genres as well as specialty streams dedicated to k.d. Lang and one-hit wonders.



* Finally, Brooklyn band Leda (fronted by Amy Klein, formerly of Titus Andronicus) released a new video (above) on Klein's Tumblr yesterday. It's a live performance of a song called "You Are the One," and Klein says more videos are coming. Based on the the tunes I've heard from Leda so far, I'm looking forward to hearing their debut album, whenever it comes.

Free Concert Podcast Downloads: Wild Flag, St. Vincent, Olivia Tremor Control, & More

If you like listening to recordings of your favorite artists playing live, there's a big batch of free concerts that's been made available online recently (yes, I've fallen behind on my semi-regular postings of these shows). Many can be downloaded as podcasts as well as streamed online; I've noted the ones that only offer streaming.

Stream or download a concert by St. Vincent below. Photo: Flickr user Moses.

The NPR Music podcasts (*) can be downloaded through iTunes, or from the links below.

• Wild Flag live from Washington, D.C.*
• St. Vincent live from Washington, D.C.*
• Moby in concert from Moogfest 2011*
• Austra live from Moogfest*
• Feist live from Toronto (CBC 75th Anniversary celebration) (streaming only)
• Olivia Tremor Control live from New York*
• Laura Marling live from Washington, D.C. (streaming only)*
• The Mekons live (streaming only)*
• The Horrors live from the 2011 ATP Festival (streaming only)*
• World Cafe 20th Anniversary concert, featuring Feist, John Hiatt, the Indigo Girls, Dawes, and more (streaming only)*

CBC Radio 2's "Canada Live" podcast offers downloads of live sets from Dan Mangan, Oh Susanna, Jason Collett (of Broken Social Scene), and more.

Free Live Music Podcasts: PJ Harvey, Land of Talk, Great Big Sea, & More

Here are some recent live music podcasts for your listening enjoyment. These free, fun performances span a wide range of musicians and styles, but all of the artists are veterans at the top of their game.

* PJ Harvey live in San Francisco — this excerpt from a recent concert has the British singer-songwriter playing songs from her acclaimed new album, "Let England Shake."

* Land of Talk live in Toronto — Liz Powell leads the Montreal-based indie-rock trio in a set at Canadian Music Week, including tunes from its latest album, "Cloak and Cipher."

* Great Big Sea live in Edmonton, Canada — the Celtic-influenced rock band always gets the audiences up and dancing with its guitar, mandolin, and fiddle party music.

* Booker T. Jones live in the NPR offices — the legendary leader of Booker T. and the M.G.'s performs a 17-minute set in the radio network's offices.

SXSW Music: Concert Podcasts, More Coverage

Brooklyn's The Antlers (shown here at NYC's RiverRocks festival last summer) will be webcast live on March 17th.

SXSW is in full swing, and you can get a lot of content online. NPR Music hosted its first live webcasts from SXSW 2011 today, and a couple are already archived for download (by the Smith Westerns and the oddly named, yet catchy, band known as Yuck). Others you can stream online, including Raphael Saadiq and electronic musician James Blake.

Thursday the 17th NPR Music will start webcasting at 1:30 p.m. Eastern, but I'll be checking in later on to listen to three acts I'm interested in: the new band Wild Flag at 3:30 (featuring Carrie Brownstein and Janet Weiss from Sleater-Kinney and Mary Timony from Helium), the Welsh group The Joy Formidable at 4:15, and The Antlers at 5:00.

For people like me who enjoy alternative Latin music, NPR Music's Alt.Latino blog takes a look at some of the new Latin musicians who are playing SXSW.

There are plenty of Canadian bands at South by Southwest, and CBC Radio 3 is doing some live audio webcasts. You can find those and the network's other SXSW coverage here. And check out their SXSW preview podcast, which spotlights some of the Canadians performing in Austin this week, with tunes by Jenn Grant, Said the Whale, and Oh Susanna.

For more international coverage of the goings-on in Austin, check the British newspaper The Guardian's SXSW section.

Free Music Downloads: Live Sets by Local Natives, Low Anthem, & More; Coverville Tackles Smokey Robinson, Peter Gabriel, The Doors, & Others

L.A.'s Local Natives performed a live set at KCRW recently, and you can download or stream the set.

If you're looking for some tasty music podcasts to download to your digital music player, there are some good choices this week.

* KCRW's Morning Becomes Eclectic has a live set from the L.A. indie rock band Local Natives, whose 2010 album "Gorilla Manor" was a favorite of many critics and fans. You can download the set from iTunes or stream it here. (Other recent MBE shows available for streaming only include Gang of Four and Adele)

* NPR Music has an hour-and-a-half concert from indie folk outfit The Low Anthem. You can hear songs from their new album "Smart Flesh," released just last month.

* CBC Radio 2's Canada Live series recorded a live set with singer-songwriter Julie Fader. Besides having her own solo career, Fader has also recorded and toured with fellow Canadian artist Sarah Harmer.

* Coverville, the fun, prolific cover-song podcast, has quite a few new shows spotlighting veteran artists. Among them: Smokey Robinson, Peter Gabriel, The Doors, INXS, and The Temptations

Free Music Podcasts: Live Folk-Pop from Antje Duvekot, Coeur de Pirate, Basia Bulat

Canadian singer-songwriter Basia Bulat brings her autoharp, and her band, to the NPR studios. Photo: John Benson

If you're looking for some good singer-songwriter music to listen to, here are a few recent episodes of free podcasts featuring live sets that are worth checking out. All three are female, and all work in the folk-pop genre, but with very different backgrounds and styles.

* Antje Duvekot performs a live set at Acoustic Long Island. The German-born, Boston-based Duvekot is a captivating acoustic singer-songwriter I only heard of a couple of months ago, but she won the Kerrville Folk Festival "Best New Folk Award" one year and has gotten lots of acclaim from some well-known folk artists. Hear Antje Duvekot in a 38-minute performance.

* The Francophone singer who goes by the name Coeur de Pirate is another relatively recent group to me. I've heard a few songs by her now and then on the CBC Radio 3 podcast; now here's a one-hour CBC 2 concert to get a food feel for her. Coeur de Pirate has a sweet sound that's a pleasure to listen to, even if you don't understand the French lyrics. Download the Coeur de Pirate live set here.

* Another artist I discovered through CBC Radio 3, Basia Bulat brought the autoharp back into pop music with her catchy single "In the Night" a few years back. You can hear her play that song and three others in a 15-minute set in the NPR offices (watch the Basia Bulat video here, or stream or download the audio).

Free Music: Mellow Music Podcasts for Thanksgiving Weekend

Sixteen-year-old Canadian singer Nikki Yanofsky is featured in a live concert podcast from CBC Radio 2. Photo: Florian Kragulj

Since many of us here in the U.S. (including me) are still recovering from Thanksgiving dinner and are in a groggy turkey coma, here's a selection of mellow music podcasts for free download, much of it recorded live in concert. And interestingly, much of it is from Canada (where they celebrate Thanksgiving in October).

The Acoustic Long Island podcast has three new episodes in the last month with live performances by singer-songwriter Kat Mulvaney and the folk-blues duo Nini and Ben.

The Canada Live podcast from CBC Radio 2 has several good recent podcasts with singer-songwriters from up north:
* the Great Canadian Song Quest 2010 concert;
* the Rootstock concert featuring Sarah Slean, Joel Plaskett, Steven Page, Hawksley Workman, and others; and
* a concert from 16-year-old singing phenom Nikki Yanofsky, who wowed viewers around the world with her rendition of "O Canada" during the opening ceremonies of the Vancouver Winter Olympics earlier this year.

I'd never heard of the Canadian singer-songwriter Al Tuck, but apparently he's one of those individuals who is much-loved by his fellow musicians but is underappreciated by the masses. CBC Radio 3 devoted a recent podcast to Al Tuck, with songs by Tuck himself and covers of his tunes by a variety of Canadian artists, who also talk about what he has meant to them and their music.

Free Music: Streaming Albums & Downloads from Vampire Weekend, Laura Veirs, Spoon, Elvis Cover Tunes, & More

There's plenty of free music to start the new year off with a bang in the form of podcast downloads and streaming CDs; here's a look at some of the notable offerings.

There are some great free streaming albums from NPR Music available now and other the next month or so in their "First Listen" series; here is the schedule:
* Laura Veirs, July Flame - until Jan. 12
* Vampire Weekend, Contra (also streaming free at KCRW) - Jan. 5 to 12

* Spoon, Transference - Jan. 11 to 19
* Patty Griffin, Downtown Church - Jan. 15 to 26

* Charlotte Gainsbourg, IRM - Jan. 18 to 26

If you want to take the music with you, check out the recent free music podcast downloads that are available. Here are some new ones:
* Coverville offers Coverville Countdown, a four-episode survey of the most popular covers of all time, chosen by listeners. Also new on Coverville is part two of its Elvis Presley cover songs podcast.
* CBC Radio 3 is out with part one of its Best Songs of the 2000s podcast, featuring the station's choices of the best Canadian indie tunes of the last decade.
* L.A. band Sea Wolf appears live in KCRW's studios for the first Morning Becomes Eclectic live podcast in the new year. You may still be able to download the previous in-studio performance, by London quartet One Eskimo.
* New releases by Yeasayer, the Shout Out Louds, Danger Mouse, and Freelance Whale are among those played in the first free podcast download of 2010 from All Songs Considered.
* The Kinks Choral Concert, a live version of Kinks songs performed with accompaniment by, you guessed it, a classical choral group, is available for download from NPR Music's concert series. It may sound like an odd combination, but Kinks leader Ray Davies makes the idea work.

Happy listening!

Podcasts for Valentine's Day

OK, I'm late in posting music for Valentine's Day, but these two podcasts are great for any time. First you can stream or download CBC Radio 3's second-annual Make-Out Podcast, featuring songs about love, longing, and lust from Canadian indie artists like Basia Bulat, Broken Social Scene, and more. And host Grant Lawrence adds his own acerbic twist to the proceedings, along with an assortment of odd photos you can see if you're using an iPod or computer that allows you to view photos.

For some Latin love music, check out the Valentine's Day edition of the Rimo Latino podcast. It's got love songs in all kinds of Latin genres, from orchestral to rock en Espanol, fro artists including the Spanish Harlem Orchestra, Selena, Mosquitos, and Julieta Venegas.

Happy Valentine's Day, enjoy the music, and don't eat too many chocolates.

The CBC Summer Road Trip Mix Tape is Out

If you want some great traveling music, head over to the CBC Radio 3 podcast Web page and download the Summer Of 2008 Roadtrip Mixtape Special (show #163). As in years before, it's a virtually nonstop playlist of great Canadian indie music tunes just right for driving down the endless highway with the windows down. Host Grant Lawrence keeps the talk to a minimum so you can enjoy the songs almost nonstop, nearly one and a half hour's worth.

U.S. audiences may recognize artists like Sloan, Kathleen Edwards, and Matt Mays on the mix tape, but there are also great lesser-known (in the 50 states, anyway) Canadian indie artists such as Ladyhawk, the Wet Secrets, and Malcolm Bauld.

And while you're at the CBC Radio 3 site, download podcast #164 too, which announces the 10 finalists for the Polaris music prize, and features a song from each artist that made the final cut.

O Canada Day ... Saluting the True North

While preparing to celebrate the Fourth of July, many people in the USA are probably unaware that our neighbors to the north will be observing their own independence day.

July 1st is Canada Day, and as anyone who reads this blog knows, I'm a big fan of Canadian music and especially, appropriately enough for this time of year, independent Canadian artists. There are always a few concerts in New York City featuring Canadian artists to celebrate the holiday, and I usually try to make it to one of them. The shows are sponsored by the Canadian Consulate in New York (which cleverly calls itself the "Upper North Side") to help give a taste of Canadian music to U.S. residents and ex-pat Canadians.

For those unfamiliar with Canadian contributions to music and other entertainment, here's a brief recap of some of the brighter stars of the True North:

Music: besides indie artists like Broken Social Scene, Arcade Fire, and The New Pornographers, also hailing from up north are Neil Young, the Guess Who, Diana Krall, Leonard Cohen, Shania Twain, and Joni Mitchell, among many others

Comedy and TV: lots of Saturday Night Live alums, including Phil Hartman, Dan Akroyd, Mike Myers, and John Candy, as well as Jim Carrey, Tom Green, and Leslie Nielsen

Movies: prolific director Norman Jewison and horror master David Cronenberg

Sports: I was a hockey fan as a kid, back when 90% of NHL players were Canadian. 'Nuff said.

And of course, I've got friends and acquaintances up north. One of my blogging buddies, Kim D, has several children but nevertheless seems to be one of the most busiest bloggers in North America. She writes at least three blogs that I know of, including a great-looking new one, and did more than five posts on one of them in one day. That's more than I typically write in a week.

And, if you've got a hankering for some fresh Canadian rock music, go to the CBC Radio 3 Web site and check out their podcasts. There's the CBC Radio 3 program with Grant Lawrence, the R3 30 countdown, and the Song of the Day.

So happy Canada Day to all the great entertainers from the North part of North America. I'll be seeing some of them this weekend at a few different Canada Day concerts in the New York area. Should be fun.

The Best World News Podcasts

Podcasting has introduced people around the world not only to new music, but to a wealth of international news as well. Here’s a look at some of my favorite podcasts from some of the best regarded news organizations.


BBC News: The granddaddy of Western news organizations offers more than 20 podcasts, but there are two I enjoy the most. Newspod offers a one-hour program each weekday that features about five segments in each program that take a deeper look at the day’s leading world news stories, from the U.K. and around the world. From Our Own Correspondent is a twice-a-week podcast featuring four or five segments from foreign correspondents stationed around the globe. These vignettes give a reporter’s-eye view of a topic in the world news; it could be a fresh glance at a major new event or a curious or amusing look at local traditions.

ABC’s All in the Mind: This approximately hourlong look at one issue related to psychology and the mind comes not from the American ABC, but the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Some of the topics are specific to the land Down Under, such as the mental health problems of homeless aboriginal residents; others are universal, such as a look at advances in brain surgery.

Deutsche Welle: Germany’s state broadcaster offers many world news programs, but two of its podcasts are of particular interest to the listener seeking news of Europe and the world. Inside Europe examines several stories regarding events in the European continent, while Newslink provides insight on events around the world.