12/14: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds film 'One More Time With Feeling' (Newport KY)

When the new Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds 3D film, One More Time With Feeling (about the making of the Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds LP Skeleton Tree) was released on September 8th,  it was screened in 850 theaters worldwide but not in a single theater in Kentucky.

But the folks at Everybody's Records & Black Plastic records (both in Cincinnati) have set out to change that.
Working with the site TUGG, they hope to screen One More Time With Feeling Wednesday, December 14, at 7:30pm at AMC Newport On The Levee 20.  TUGG works like a crowd funding site, for just screening films. Anyone can set up a TUGG account for a specific film, and if they sell enough advanced tickets the show moves ahead as planned. If the goal is not reached the ticket sales are refunded to purchasers.

The Newport event only has a little more to go to ensure the screening, with only 75 tickets total needed by Dec. 7th it seems likely, but if you are interested don't wait! Grab your tickets now here. All Ages. $12. 12/14 7:30PM.

Best Of: Louisville Summer Events (includes FREE downloads!)

Now that the temperature has dropped and the end of the year is drawing closer, we thought it was a good time to reflect on some of our favorite summer LOUISVILLE shows!
--please notice we said Some, as there were many great shows this year (We decided to highlight ones we had downloads for..) & please feel free to leave a comment with some of your favorite shows from Summer 2014.

NICK CAVE & THE BAD SEEDS AT THE PALACE 6/16


Seeing Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds was a dream come true for this boy, especially since Cave finally shaved that mustache. I like a good Mustache, but it just made Cave look like the bad kind of creep, and not the kind he pulls off so well. This summer saw many great national & international acts in Louisville including several during the same week.. which may have been why People were giving away tickets at the last moment on the street for this show. weekday shows are hard to fill, especially when you can only pick one. I'd like to see these bigger acts Like Nick Cave, Broken Bells, & Elvis Costello play on a weekend,  and preferably not on the same weekend. Cave didn't play Deanna (my no.1 fav song of his), but he did play the Ship Song, which would be my second pick. And He was backed by Warren Ellis, which was also a dream come true.

SUMMER CASSINGLES SERIES VOL.1 w/ Citizens United, 1200, 2Strikes & Basement Up  AT NEW VINTAGE 6/25


Summer Cassingle Vol. II: Deloreans, Black Birds of Paradise, Plastic Bubble, Coins AT NEW VINTAGE 7/4
 Local summer shows are great, and Summer Series are better, and ones the include free music are tops! This summer LOUISVILLE IS FOR LOVERS and GUESTROOM RECORDS hosted 15 bands in a 3 part series at New Vintage, with a free Cassingle at each event. and for a holiday gift, all 3 volumes of the SUMMER CASSINGLE SERIES are available for FREE download here: www.louisvilleisforlovers.com/downloads  

Forecastle 7/18- 7/20






Forecastle 2014 had plenty of great national acts (would have liked to see more local bands though) including The Replacements (surprisingly backed by Billy Joe Armstrong), Outkast, & Slint, to name a few. Seeing Oukast was definitely on the Bucket List,  although I thought last years solo performance from Big Boi may have been better (and he pulled it off with a broken leg no less).
I was a little disappointed in SPOON, but in retrospect they sounded exactly like their records so I don't know what I was expecting.. Especially since I was a little disappointed in Jack White adding so many extra instruments to the White Stripes songs he covered, when back in the day he proved all he needed was a single girl backing him to slay an audience.  But I will say, that even though I wasn't overly impressed by the show, he definitely made up for it at the very end with this 7  minute slaughter of 7 Nation Army. It may have been the best 7 minutes of the entire fest.

Summer Cassingle Series Vol.3: Jaye Jayle, The Gallery Singers, eremy*JIrvin, Lydia Burrell & Twin Limb AT NEW VINTAGE 7/25
This last Summer Cassingle Series was a great way to button up the summer with killer performances by The Gallery Singers, eremy+JIrvin, Jaye Jayle, Lydia Burrell & Twin Limb! download this & all 3 volumes of the SUMMER CASSINGLE SERIES for FREE here: www.louisvilleisforlovers.com/downloads  

Editorial: Forecastle Fracas (and the state of live events in Louisville)

 

 Now that Forecastle is over we can shower off the glitter and settle into normal living until we need to break out the fake blood next month for the 10th annual Zombie Attack to mark the end of summer.
 It's been good season for music in Louisville including Nick Cave (my personal fav), Broken Bells, Melvins, Elvis Costello, and a whole slew of great local going's on such as Poorcastle, Deloreans, Black Birds of Paradise, Twin Limb, Howell Dawdy (another personal fav), Lydia Burrell, Lady Pyramid, Old Baby, Anwar Sadat, and many many others.  I would never say TOO MUCH music, but more than any other year I can think of, almost every event I attended I had to choose between at least one or two others. For local bands playing out at bar on a night when 10 other bars have local bands isn't anything new, it may be a little frustrating but by and large it isn't going to take away from your experience too much.

For big name bands on the other hand, i have noticed a few large obstacles. Nick Cave played at the Palace on a week day, which is going to cut some people out who work early, and the very next night Elvis Costello played at the same venue, again on a week night, not only cutting out early workers but those of us who can only afford one $75 ticket a summer, much less in the same week. This may have to do with why they kept lowering the price of Nick Cave tickets, eventually doing a 2 for 1 deal.

I understand how event production works: a band says we want X amount of money to play, so the production company agrees and hopes to sell enough tickets at a certain price to pay the band, venue, advertising, etc and keep how ever much extra they can get. So it would make sense that they would sell tickets high to grab as much as they can, and eventually start to lower the price if they need to. But people see ticket prices at $100 and decide they can't go, and the result is the production company is trying to give away tickets a the door so Nick Cave doesn't walk out int a half empty room and decide to never come back to Louisville. In fact I couldn't afford to see Nick Cave but when I walked over to the Palace was given 3 free tickets inside a minute. I stopped count after I was offered 25 FREE tickets to see what turned out to be one of the best live performances I had ever seen.

We saw the same thing  later that week at the Broken Bells show at Iroquois Amphitheater, they couldn't give tickets away.  One issue was so many big names playing in town that week (Cee Lo Green & Lionel Richie also played) coupled with high ticket prices, many people like myself would have to loved to have seen all these acts, but can't afford it so close together. But once upon a time Louisville had the opposite problem, we couldn't attract national acts. The Replacements mentioned this at their set a Forecastle, that they used to play Lexington. Many acts went to Lexington as it was a College town, and we weren't a big enough college and at the time, just barely under the City status.

Now we are both an official CITY and with a large college presence and the outside world is taking notice of us. We just now have to figure out how to handle it. Personally I think starting off with high ticket prices is a no go. Obviously we have a selection of entertainers to choose from so we don't HAVE to pay big prices. Start tickets sales at reasonable amounts (say the $25 the nick Cave tickets ended up being instead of starting at $75+), sell the room out in 2 days, and you won't have to scramble with discounts, 2 for 1 deals, and handing out free tickets on the streets.

And this could also be said for Forecastle, at $200 & $400 a ticket there are plenty of people who would have gone if it didn't cost a week's pay to get through the gate. I only got a gate count for Friday, which I was told about 12000, which is about half of last year's one day total. But the whole weekend seemed light. which isn't a complaint, in year's past it was cramped and nightmarish trying wade through the crowds to get from one stage to another. but for vendors, entertainers and even the event organizers I am sure they could benefit from having more people even if it meant selling tickets at a reasonable price; say $100 for the weekend and no $400 VIP passes.

I am a socialist, i can't help it. I go into debt every year doing Zombie Attack because I want a free event where everyone can be involved, but i know events like Forecastle can't do that, but they shouldn't expect their loyal patrons to go broke just by walking through the gate. and for me it's insulting to these people that they have to see the folks who can afford $400 VIP tickets get preferential seating, air conditioned lounges, free ice cream and luxury toilets while the rest of wade through exploded port-a-johns and over priced snacks while melting in the heat. Everyone who supports you and goes to your event should feel respected, and this isn't just forecastle, this special treatment for rich people business was going on at the Nick Cave show and I'm sure at all the other national events this summer.

That said, there were many changes at Forecastle this year that I was really happy to see. In past post-forecastle editorials I had some major complaints at the lack of water, the non-existence of "activism", and the steadily declining number of local acts. Although the local acts in this year's line up where reserved to the heavy hitters: Slint, Jalin Roze, Old Baby, they did have a FREE kick off event at Against the Grain with local bands such as Second Story Man. and as for activism, there were two new additions I really enjoyed seeing, one was Sober Sailing, a tent for AA and NA members to come to get away from the booze infused everything at forecastle. I get that booze companies have war chests filled with cash just to sponsor music events, and it helps pay the bills, but for someone like me who has been sober for 7 years, it is difficult when it feels like everyone around you is telling you the only way to have fun is to be tanked.
The other unique 'Activist' related tent i saw was a tent filled with nice prizes (clothes, music, etc) that you received by earning points by picking up trash in the festival.

I also noticed the Forecastle Foundation has stepped up things dramatically by working with 2 foundations: Guayakia Foundation in South America and Kentucky Natural Land Trust (after all if you are looking to help others all you have to do is look out your own door) by donating $14000 to each.

I also Liked the addition of some acts that you might not see on the other regional Festival circuits such as Slint and Dwight Yoakam, and this may be due to an idea that's been discussed lately about why try to be every other fest in the area? why not make Forecastle a fest for Louisville/Kentucky! Bunbury Fest in Cincinnati seems to be doing this, with some "festival fodder' groups like Flaming Lips  but with local and regional acts like Foxy Shazam and Cage The Elephant. and they can manage a unique  3 day music fest for a mere $100 for a weekend pass. I think we can too.
We have already proven we can run with he big dogs, now let's show them we can do our own fest, for us, that's not just the same festival bands that are at every other fest, but a unique line up, for a price that means everyone can join in the fun.

Sober Sailing

read other editorials on past Forecastle events here:

Editorial: What to Expect When You're Expecting... A Weekend Fest (2013) 

Memory of a Free Festival (2010)

Tonight Nick Cave/tomorrow Elvis Costello @ Palace

Tomorrow June 17th Elvis Costello is playing at the Palace, but  I was unaware until I went online looking for Nick Cave tickets (Tonight 9 pm). Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds have not yet sold out so prices have fallen enough that I may have a chance to see this living legend. all I really want is to see Deanna played live by the man himself.

   

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds. 6/16 $35-70 Palace

 

Elvis Costello 6/17 $35-100 Palace

The new Nick Cave album 'Push The Sky Away' made it onto Logan's best of 2013 list. see here.

Logan's Best of: 2013

We’ve been in the new year for a little while now and I may be a little late on this, but 2013 was a huge year for music and there’s so much amazing material to sift through. So here’s a short comprehensive list of the best music the year had to offer.

• Chance the Rapper: Acid Rap-

         This is the most original rap album I’ve heard in years. Imagine Andre Benjamin but as a 20 year old Chicago kid instead of a southern gentleman. He's had two mixtapes so far and both are available for free on his website. Acid Rap is both a tribute to Chicago's history and a leap into its future. 

• Eminem: The Marshall Mathers 2 LP-

            Don’t call it a comeback... because it's almost certainly his last album. It's definitely his best album since his real comeback in 2009. Unlike his more uplifting albums Relapse and Recovery, what makes the MM LP 2 stand out is that he's gone back to doing what he does best- being angry.

• Sunn 0))): Black One-

            Technically it was just an unofficial RSD re-issue, but this was one of my favorite records I picked up all year. Really good album to listen to if you don't want to go outside or if you don't believe in electric lights.

• Gubbey Records: Head Cleaner-

            This compilation is over two hours long and features fourty six Louisville acts. Read our Full review here.

• Vampire Weekend: Modern Vampires of the City-

            After a three year break, Vampire Weekend went back into the studio with producer Ariel Rechtshaid (known earlier in the year for Snoop Lion's album, Reincarnated). This was the first time they've ever brought in an outside producer since keyboardist Rostam Batmanglij usually produces their albums. It seems like a weird combination, but they're exploring a lot of new territory with this record.

• Portugal. The Man: Evil Friends-

            I was really excited to hear that Danger Mouse was in studio with Portugal. the man. Immediately I thought they'd go back to the synth-heavy styles of Censored Colors and Church Mouth, but this listens more like one of those collaboration albums Danger Mouse is known for. 

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds: Push the Sky Away-

            This has been a constant listen since its release in February. Push the Sky Away is mainly built on a set of loops Warren Ellis made that the Bad Seeds played over to bring structure and depth to the sound. Lyrically, it's some of Cave's most ominous work.

• Megajoos: Mega Deuce:

            Megajoos (pronounced: mega-juice) is an experimental drum and bass outfit from Nashville. Some guy flagged me down in a Post Office parking lot and gave me their CD, and judging by the cover I didn't know what to expect, but these guys bring the fuzz. They kind of remind me of the Pixies' good stuff.

• Zorch: ZZOORRCCHH-

            I'm not sure how they got the name Zorch, I'm sure there's some sort of agreement with the older band by the same name. As I said in an earlier review, Zorch has everything it takes to be America's next big two piece, but their psychedelic electronic prog style might be too much for the masses to handle.

The Flaming Lips: The Terror-

            The Lips turned a new leaf with their 2013 release. Since keyboardist Steve Drozd is 100% sober now, it seems that Coyne gave him the wheel and let him steer the ship. The happy go lucky "it's great to be alive" band that you've grown to love is still in there somewhere, but now they're saying something more like "it's terrifying that I'm alive." 

That's all folks. Enjoy the tunes and good luck out there in 2014.

Coming Soon: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds

         Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds just announced a 2014 tour in response to their successful tour of the States earlier this year promoting the album "Push the Sky Away." Saving the best for fist, Cave and the Bad Seeds' first stop is right here in Louisville at the Palace Theater on June 16. Guestroom Records is hosting a contest on instagram for a signed test pressing of the Bad Seeds new "Live from KCRW" record and two free tickets to the show. Good luck!