Stuck here in the Bay Area when you want to be in Black Rock City? Good news! You can head to the East Bay for a sweet rockin' alternative to Burning Man called Burnout Man. In it's second year, the fest is delivering ten bands for only ten bucks (though I'm told no one will be turned away for lack for funds). You can't beat that with a sweaty hippy. It's all going down tomorrow at the Grant Irish Warehouse, 2230 Poplar St. @ West Grand in Oakland.

The lineup:

Big Baby Tiger Tears

Groggs

Wyld Youth

Rock The Light

The Moral Tourists

Shannon And The Clams

Forever

Homo²

Steve Mcqueen For A Day

Glitter Wizard

Byrne/Eno Streaming Beauty

Some thirty years after their initial collaboration My LIfe In The Bush Of Ghosts and a clutch of Talking Heads records Brian Eno produced as a de facto member of the band Byrne and Eno are back with a new record called Everything That Happens Will Happen Today. While longtime Eno fans hoping for ambient quirk pop might be disappointed this music, culled from tracks Eno's been collecting over the last few years augmented by words and melodies provided by Byrne, is full of hope and warmth. In fact, to these ears it sounds closer to the Talking Heads than anything Byrne's done since they disbanded in '91. Add guest spots from the likes of fromer Soft Machiner Robert Wyatt (frame drum solo on "Strange Overtines"), ex-Sex Pistol Steve Jones (guitar on no less than four tracks) and Eno's old Roxy Music cohort Phil Manzanera ("I Feel My Stuff") and you've got a gorgeous new record its creators are calling "electronic gospel".

The album is available in myraid formats (including a $70 deluxe version) exclusively from their website. You can get a full listing of who does what here. Why not give it a listen right now:

David Byrne is planning an ambitious tour that will feature material from the three Eno produced Talking Heads records as well as material from the new record. Sadly Eno does not plan on joining him.

Tour dates:

9/16 Bethlehem, PA - Zoellner Arts Center - Baker Hall
9/17 Baltimore, MD - Lyric
9/18 Newport News, VA - Ferguson Center for the Arts
9/20 Atlanta, GA - Chastain Park Amphitheater
9/21 Asheville, NC - Thomas Wolfe Auditorium
9/22 Nashville, TN - Ryman Auditorium
9/23 Memphis, TN - Orpheum Theatre
9/26 Austin, TX - Austin City Limits (Zilker Park)
9/28 Albuquerque, NM - Kiva Auditorium
9/30 Phoenix, AZ - Orpheum
10/2 San Diego, CA - Humphreys
10/3 Los Angeles, CA - Greek Theatre
10/4 Santa Barbara, CA - Arlington Theater
10/6 San Francisco, CA - Davies Symphony Hall
10/8 Santa Rosa, CA - Wells Fargo Center For the Arts
10/9 Saratoga, CA - Mountain Winery
10/11 Park City, UT - Eccles Center for the Performing Arts
10/12 Denver, CO - Buell Theater
10/14 Minneapolis, MN - State Theatre
10/15 Milwaukee, WI - Pabst
10/17 Omaha, NE - Kiewit Concert Hall
10/18 St. Louis, MO - Fox Theatre
10/19 Kansas City, MO - Uptown Theatre (Reserved)
10/21 Louisville, KY - Louisville Palace Theater
10/23 Cleveland, OH - Allen Theatre
10/24 Ann Arbor, MI - Michigan Theatre
10/25 Indianapolis, IN - Clowes Memorial Hall
10/26 Chicago, IL - Chicago Opera House
10/29 Toronto, ONT - Massey Hall
10/30 Montreal, QUE - Metropolis
10/31 Boston, MA - Wang Center
11/1 Atlantic City, NJ - Borgata
11/3 Red Bank, NJ - Count Basie Theatre
11/5 Albany, NY - Empire State Plaza
11/7 Pittsburgh, PA - Carnegie Music Hall
11/8 Philadelphia, PA - Tower Theatre

Penelope Houston's doing it for the kids

Local Punk/Folk goddess Penelope Houston is playing a benefit for Music In Schools Today (MuST) at the Café du Nord on Monday Sept. 8th. MuST is a San Francisco non-profit organization supporting music programs in public schools and helps over 10,000 kids every year get at least a semblance of the music education we pre-Prop 13 fogies enjoyed. A portion of the evening's proceeds will also go to the Claremont Middle School Band & Orchestra from Oakland. If you're planning on making the scene they're accepting donations of instruments in usable condition for MuST's Adopt an Instrument Program which has distributed much needed items to over 100 schools and community centers. So not only is the former Avengers frontlady helping with cold hard cash, she's donating her childhood violin as well: “It was my introduction to playing music but became an instrument of torture for me. Perhaps I should have started with something more tuneful, like piano or guitar.”

Luckily, Houston eventually discovered how to write her own dark folk/pop songs on June Carter's instrument of choice, the autoharp, sometimes with the help of co-writers like Chuck Prophet, Billy Joe Armstrong, Steve Jones, Charlotte Caffey, and most frequently guitarist Pat Johnson, who performs with her band Sept 8th. The show will feature six new songs and the addition of noir-folk master Jeffrey Luck Lucas to the line up on cello.

Also on the bill is Colin Gilmore, son of legendary Austin songwriter Jimmie Dale Gilmore. Colin describes his music as “West Texas-style rock, with a country/punk/psychedelic/pop edge.”

Houston is also donating 100% of sales of select CDs on her website to raise even more money for this fabulous cause. Click here to do the right thing and get some great music while yer doin' it. My favorite of the lot is The Whole World where you can get the original versions of these two classics that were re-recorded for her major label debut Cut You:

Glad I'm A Girl

Sweetheart


If you can't make it out on the 8th but still want to help you can donate directly to MuST right here.

Happy birthday Joe

Joe Strummer would have turned 56 yesterday had he not left this mortal coil criminally early. The Clash's influence on my beliefs about what music can do and what it should strive to be are impossible to put into words.

I had the opportunity to pay tribute to Mr. Strummer on KALX in Berkeley last night. A brief search around the internet made it seem like The Clash was well represented in the myriad tributes across the blogosphere so I decided to focus on his post and pre-Clash output. Both are as deserving of further investigation as "London Calling" and "I Fought The Law" deserve repeated plays.

Give it a listen:

Joe Strummer birthday tribute podcast (48 MB)

Songlist:

"Get Down Moses" - Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros (from Streetcore, released almost a year after his death and #1 on my 2003 Top Ten)

"Straight To Hell" - The Clash (from Combat Rock)

"Keys To Your Heart" - The 101ers (Joe's first band, from the soundtrack to the recent documentary The Future Is Unwritten)

"Slant Six" - Joe Strummer (from, barring the soundtrack to Walker, his first post-Clash album Earthquake Weather)

"Coolin' Out" - Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros (from their second album Global A Go-Go)


Joe, you are sorely missed...

Drive-By Truckers & The Hold Steady presale tomorrow!

The rumors are true. While this paring might seem odd check this quote from Hold Steady frontman Craig Finn: "Seeing the Drive-By Truckers on the Southern Rock Opera tour was instrumental to me wanting to start a band and play music again. That band is the Hold Steady. This tour brings it full circle, and it will be a pleasure and an honor to be able to share a stage with the Truckers. We're gonna have a really good time." I'm sure a beer or two will be swilled onstage. Fans of either band will get a chance to see one or the other headline as they're taking turns closing the show on what they're calling the "Rock And Roll Means Well Tour"

The online pre-sale starts tomorrow at 10 AM Eastern time. Click the picture above to buy tickets. To get you in the mood here are some live tunes from both bands:

The Hold Steady on WXPN in Philadelphia: 8/15/08

Constructive Summer/Hot Soft Lights

Sequestered In Memphis

Stay Positive

Here's a whole DBT's show from First Avenue in Minneapolis on July 2nd

Tour dates with closer info:

Thu Oct 30 Louisville KY COYOTE'S @ CITY BLOCK (HS Closes)
Fri Oct 31 Nashville TN RYMAN AUDITORIUM (DBT Closes)
Sat, 11/01 Atlanta GA TABERNACLE (DBT Closes)
Sun, 11/02 Tallahassee FL THE MOON @ FSU (HS Closes)
Mon, 11/03 Raleigh NC LINCOLN THEATRE (DBT Closes)
Wed, 11/05 State College PA THE STATE THEATRE (HS Closes)
Thu, 11/06 New York, NY TERMINAL 5 (Closer TBA)
Fri, 11/07 New York, NY TERMINAL 5 (Closer TBA)
Sat, 11/08 Philadelphia, PA ELECTRIC FACTORY (DBT Closes)
Sun, 11/09 Boston MA ORPHEUM THEATRE (HS Closes)
Tue, 11/11 Toronto ONT PHOENIX THEATRE (DBT Closes)
Wed, 11/12 Pittsburgh PA CARNEGIE MUSIC HALL (HS Closes)
Thu, 11/13 Bloomington IN BLUEBIRD (DBT Closes)
Fri, 11/14 Chicago IL RIVIERA (HS Closes)
Sat, 11/15 Minneapolis MN FIRST AVENUE MAINROOM (DBT Closes)
Sun, 11/16 Minneapolis MN FIRST AVENUE MAINROOM (HS Closes)
Wed, 11/19 Boise ID THE BIG EASY (DBT Closes)
Thu, 11/20 Seattle WA THE SHOWBOX (HS Closes)
Fri, 11/21 Seattle WA THE SHOWBOX (DBT Closes)
Sat, 11/22 Portland OR CRYSTAL BALLROOM (HS Closes)
Sun, 11/23 San Francisco CA THE FILLMORE (DBT Closes)
Mon, 11/24 San Francisco CA THE FILLMORE (HS Closes)
Tue, 11/25 Los Angeles CA THE WILTERN (DBT Closes)

New music & video from Bart Davenport

Hi everybody. Now that the kiddies are ready to go back to their 9-5's (or rather 8:30 to 2:50's) it's time to put my summer lazy down and get back into the swing of this thing. No better way to restart than share some new stuff from the hardest working man in Oakland. My good friends at Antenna Farm Records have given the thumbs up to sharing a couple slices of pop deliciousness from his upcoming release Palaces. Hope you dig it.

Jon Jon

A Young One

Check out the video for A Young One:

No one but Bart could step right up to the edge of insufferable cheese and make it seem so sincere. Crush on your corny! Palaces is out September 9. A CD release party is happening at Cafe Du Nord on the 19th