Sat. Afternoon Videos: Springsteen Plays the Apollo, Watch The Shins Webcast Replay, & More

Since many of us were frantically clicking around on the web this morning trying to get Radiohead tickets, let's wind down by watching videos of some musical performances that made the news this week. One of the most notable (and the most recent) of these was last night's show at the famed Apollo Theater by Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band. (See a video excerpt of "We Take Care of Our Own" and "Wrecking Ball" below.)



The concert was to mark the 10th anniversary of SiriusXM radio; see the writeup by Spinner's Dan Reilly for a review, setlist, and another video in addition to the one above. Sounds like it was a fantastic show, based on the comments by Reilly and others who either attended or listened to the concert.

The Shins returned from a five-year absence with a free concert webcast on NPR Music last Thursday night that was streamed only through the organization's iPad app. The show, at New York's Le Poisson Rouge, is now available for viewing online; you can also listen to the audio only. You can watch or listen to the Shins' concert here. Incidentally, The Shins will be the musical guests on "Saturday Night Live" tonight, and Nashville-based singer-songwriter Jessie Baylin will be part of the band.

Bradford Cox, leader of Atlas Sound (and Deerhunter), got very literal last week with a heckler who demanded to hear "My Sharona": he played a jam based on the song for a full hour (see two excerpts below).





The incident, at an Atlas Sound show in Minneapolis last Friday, was only one odd aspect of the concert, which saw Cox asked the heckler to come onstage and take his clothes off, ans instructing audience members to hold their venue's chair above their heads. Some attendees, including the person who shot the video, called the "My Sharona" cover "awesome" and "fantastic."

Finally, Sarah McLachlan performed a set before a few hundred people at CBC Vancouver as part of the network's "Toque Sessions." She then left the stage to a choir of musicians from the Sarah McLachlan School of Music, which reportedly moved into a new home in Vancouver recently. Watch the video for "Possession" below, and see more videos from the concert at CBC Music.

Canada Day Focus: Sarah McLachlan Back with New Album, Lilith Fair

OK, Canada Day is pretty much over (except for people on the West Coast), but thought I'd post this late article on one of the most successful musicians from the Great White North, Sarah McLachlan. She's just started performing on the revival of Lilith Fair (which, appropriately enough, played a show in Vancouver on Canada Day).

It's been 10 years since McLachlan first started Lilith Fair, which went on for three consecutive summers (she says she never planned for it to go on indefinitely), and there have been a lot of changes since then: for the music industry and for McLachlan.

Downloads (legal and illegal) are the biggest means of music distribution these days. As for McLachlan, she is now divorced and has two daughters. With the girls getting a bit older, she and her Lilith co-producers felt the time was right to resurrect Lilith Fair. And McLachlan is back with a new album, "Laws of Illusion," which dropped on June 15th.

It's definitely a challenging economic environment in which to stage a cross-country North American tour. The promoters announced today that 10 Lilith Fair dates had to be cancelled; others had previously been moved to smaller venues. (Fortunately the Lilith concert I'm attending, the July 31st New York/New Jersey show, is still a go.)

You can find a live session McLachlan did for Starbucks above (22 minutes). And you can read an article and see a bit of discussion and singing she did for the Wall Street Journal's "Speakeasy" blog.

Sarah McLachlan has gotten a lot of other press attention, too, which is good to see: you'll find a Los Angeles Times article on McLachlan here, and one from Reuters here, titled "Sarah McLachlan Resurfaces With New Album, Tour."

Good luck to Sarah McLachlan on Lilith Fair 2010, and Happy Canada Day!

Free Album Streaming: New CDs from Sarah McLachlan, Tom Petty, Devo, Gaslight Anthem, Stars, Chemical Brothers, More

Left: Devo is offering free previews of its new album, with cats or without.

A lot of veteran artists are among those releasing new albums this week and in the near future, and many of them are available for free online streaming. Besides current artists such as Sarah McLachlan and Oasis coming out with new releases, some musicians from the past are streaming their new projects, including '70s rockers Foghat, Genesis guitarist Steve Hackett, Steve Cropper and Felix Cavaliere, and of course Devo.

Speaking of Devo, the band is hosting a "cat listening party" on Ustream today to preview its new CD, "Something for Everyone." From 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Pacific time, you can listen to the album while watching a live video of cats playing in a room. The highlight of the cat pen: a big, fuzzy energy dome for the kitties to climb and romp on.

As for the other streaming CD choices, which presumably don't have live cats...

Spinner.com's Listening Party currently features about 20 albums including:
* "American Slang" by The Gaslight Anthem
* "Mojo" by Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers
* "Barbara" by We Are Scientists
* "Laws of Illusion" by Sarah McLachlan
* "Time Flies" by Oasis
* "Release Me" by The Like
* "Goodbye, Killer" by the Pernice Brothers
* "Last Train Home" by Foghat
* "Something for Everyone" by Devo (if you missed the cat listening party)

AOL Music free album previews, which have some overlap with Spinner: 
* "Playing for Change" by various artists
* "Love Like Crazy" by Lee Brice
* "Red Dog Speaks" by Elvin Bishop
* "Out of the Tunnel's Mouth" by Steve Hackett
* "Existential" by Grupo Fantasma
* "Midnight Flyer" by Steve Cropper and Felix Cavaliere
* "Live at the Fillmore" by Chris Isaak

NPR First Listen (all streaming until June 22):
* "Homeland" by Laurie Anderson
* "The Five Ghosts" by Stars
* "Broken Hearts And Dirty Windows: Songs Of John Prine" by Josh Ritter, Conor Oberst, and others
* "Further" by The Chemical Brothers
* "I Mean To Live Here Still" by David Karsten Daniels And Fight The Big Bull
* "The Imagine Project" by Herbie Hancock
* "Ten" by Jason Moran

Music News: Roger Waters 2010 Tour, Supergrass Breaks Up, Lilith Fair Sched Complete, CD Baby & MySpace Connect, No Cream Reunion, More

* Former Pink Floyd member Roger Waters will tour in 2010 to perform the band's album "The Wall" live in its entirety. You'll find Roger Waters tour dates here.

* U.K. pop group Supergrass is breaking up after almost two decades together. They produced six studio albums, according to the linked article, including the anthemic "Alright."

* Online music retailer CD Baby is partnering with MySpace Music to sell tunes from CD Baby artists on the widely used social-networking site. Though MySpace has lost momentum to Facebook and Twitter as a go-to social-networking destination, it's still a potent force for musicians and fans to reach each other.

* Lilith Fair has announced its complete list of 2010 tour dates. The all-women touring festival, begun by Sarah McLachlan a decade ago, returns this summer. McLachlan is once again headlining every event on the tour, which otherwise has a different line-up of 11 performers at each date.

* Jack Bruce, best known as the bassist for 1960s supergroup Cream (with Eric Clapton and Ginger Baker) and West, Bruce, & Laing, has confirmed that Cream will never reunite again. Which makes me very glad that I saw them in 2005 at Madison Square Garden. Even though that ticket was the most money I've ever spend for a concert ticket, it was well worth it.

* And finally, the highly influential Malcolm McLaren died last week, and KCRW music librarian Eric J. Lawrence offers a brief remembrance here. McLaren is best know for managing the Sex Pistols, but he also recorded his own albums and had a hand in fashion and cinema.