Morrissey quizzed by FBI

This story is only a week old. Why not post it? I've just c/p'd the story from "Ireland On-Line".

Morrissey: I was quizzed by the FBI

24/02/2006 - 16:45:25 Singer Morrissey says he was quizzed by the FBI and Special Branch over his outspoken criticism of the US and British governments.

The former Smiths frontman, who has previously branded American President George Bush a terrorist and denounced the war in Iraq, said the experience showed neither country was a democratic society.

He told the NME: “The FBI and the Special Branch have investigated me and I’ve been interviewed and taped and so forth.”

The singer, who lives in Los Angeles, added: “They were trying to determine if I was a threat to the government, and similarly in England.

“But it didn’t take them very long to realise that I’m not.

“I don’t belong to any political groups, I don’t really say anything unless I’m asked directly and I don’t even demonstrate in public.”

Explaining what he thought had prompted the move, the 46-year-old said: “My view is that neither England or America are democratic societies. You can’t really speak your mind and if you do you’re investigated even though it’s just a basic process that must be done.”

In 2004 Morrissey urged American voters to get rid of President Bush, saying he had turned the US into the most “neurotic and terror-obsessed country on the planet*“.

He sparked controversy earlier that year when he reportedly told a concert in Dublin he wished the current president had died instead of Ronald Reagan.


*this is actually true!

Smoking Popes

In old news, one of the only good pop punk bands to ever exist, the Smoking Popes, have reunited and are releasing a 23-track live album (from a November 11th, 2005 performance) and going on a tour. The album is coming out on Victory records, which means they are going to be on the tour with some really lame, sucky band. But the biggest problem is their tour is only going around the east side of the country. So it's meaningless for me, but here are the dates anyway. I would go if I could.

02/22 St. Louis, MO - Creepy Crawl
02/23 Oklahoma City, OK - Conservatory
02/24 Dallas, TX - Gypsy Tea Room
02/25 Austin, TX - Emo's
02/26 Houston, TX - Walter's on Washington
02/28 Atlanta, GA - The Masquerade
03/01 Greensboro, NC - Greene Street
03/03 Hoboken, NJ - Maxwell's
03/04 Brooklyn, NY - North Six
03/05 Philadelphia, PA - First Unitarian Church
03/06 Cambridge, MA - The Middle East
03/08 Detroit, MI - Magic Stick
03/10 Minneapolis, MN - Triple Rock Social Club
03/11 Chicago, IL - Metro
03/12 Chicago, IL - Metro

The End

The Field Mice played their last ever show on November 21, 1991. That was 14 years ago, yesterday. In honor of the ending of one of the greatest groups to ever exist in history, you can find this final show of theirs available online in low quality mp3. Where? Why, here.


The Field Mice split in 1991 at the end of a highly successful but increasingly acrimonious UK tour to promote their final album, For Keeps. There were many reasons for the rancour, including disagreements between band and label about how best to record and market future releases (the band had always felt held back by the endless generic Sarah reviews, in which reviewers persistently linked them with some post-C86 "indie-pop" scene with which they felt no affinity and for which they harboured no especial fondness), disagreements within the band as to whether going full-time was now a serious option, and frustration that live performances were being hampered by Annemari's increasing tendency to bouts of stage-fright - often she would arrive or leave halfway through the set, and sometimes be unable to join the rest of the band on-stage at all. Perhaps most significant, though, was the relationship that Bob and Annemari had begun whilst the band were on tour in Japan, which had to some extent split the band into two camps, and made Michael in particular feel somewhat isolated from his old friend.

A meeting between band and label was arranged for the final night of the tour, and it was here - after soundcheck, everyone huddled backstage before going out in front of a packed King Tut's in Glasgow - that Bob surprised everybody present - including, it turned out later, himself - by announcing his intention of leaving the band. They played the gig as planned - an ill-tempered set, not surprisingly - but that was effectively the end. Their final show was a couple of weeks later in London at the Tufnell Park Dome: they encored with The End Of The Affair and, as they walked off-stage for the very last time, Michael paused just long enough to whisper "the end" into Bob's abandoned microphone. - http://www.shink.dircon.co.uk/fieldmicebio.htm

Mixed Bag #1

Last month Matador posted one of the new Cat Power tracks (The title track from her new album, The Greatest, release forthcoming in January). Now they have announced this track will be out in stores Dec 6th on a 45 with the B-side as a song titled "Hate". The record will presumably have no cover art, but cost a mere 99 cents. Additionally, the record can be pre-ordered from their store right now. See the Matador news for a photo, and a link to order as well as for that mp3 which is still available.

Ride lead singer Mark Gardener will be on the Andrew Collins show, a BBC "6music" radio show, on Nov 20th between 14:00-17:00. That probably equates to something like 7am for us folks in the States. A description: "The show on 6Music features a special guest each week whom tells them what they get up to when they're not writing, recording or performing and what their interests are away from the business." So, those that are interested can email their own non-musical question in hopes of it being asked on-air. For all that, check out the Andrew Collins page. And once the show has aired, if you set up RealPlayer, which I haven't done, you can access a RealAudio archive of the latest show or other past shows. So it's probably OK for those of us that are out of Radio 4 range and not going to be awake circa 7 am.

The other day I went into my local indie comics and music store, and noticed two things. Firstly, Zak Sally (former member of bands Enemymine, and Low) has just released his new comic art book thing, Recidivist. There's a new article on Econoculture about him and the new book, but furthermore, some additional articles through his own website (www.lamano21.com) as well as this news: Kirsten Dunst is wearing a Low shirt of his design in the new film, ELIZABETHTOWN. But his Hollywood takeover isn't done there, he also actually appears in that other new film, SHOPGIRL (He has a cameo role in which he pees. Well, pretends to pee. He's acting, after all.) Mark Kozelek appears in that film as well. Which makes me want to go on a tangent regarding that weird, new all-Modest Mouse covers record that he just released as Sun Kil Moon, because I still find that seriously weird, but I'll just leave the tangent at that. Anyway, there are photos of both these Zak Sally-related Hollywood occurances at his site there. Check it out. Oh, one last thing I will note is that they're about to release a little collection of William Schaff prints (he of Okkervil River artwork fame).

Ok, so the other thing at the local store I noticed was the new Beatles cover/tribute album, This Bird Has Flown. I normally wouldn't be that terribly excited about this release, but Ted Leo actually submitted a track (he covers "I'm Looking Through You"). Other contributors I will note are Low, Sufjan Stevens, and Rhett Miller. Ted Leo talks about his involvement. Not that I'm personally interested, but Ben Harper and Dar Williams do too. All I can really tell you about this covers album is that I probably wouldn't buy it but for the fact Ted Leo is on it. If I do buy it, it will probably be for just the one track. I'd have to hear more and get more impressed about it to really be enthusiastic about this collection.

Ok, that's enough parentheses brackets for today.

Some Blues

I found out from (iheartmusic) that CBC has a nice resource for music-related things, and if you know me you might be aware of how I love my CBC (Between Don Cherry on Hockey Night, and Canadian Football? Come on). They've got this thing going on called "Just Concerts" where they post various live recordings. One of their postings is a session with Julie Doiron, and if you know me you might be aware of how I love Julie Doiron. In fact, this session was recorded only three days after I saw her play a wonderful show last year. She's backed by a band from Vancouver called Radiogram. You can listen to it in RealAudio at the Just Concerts page or alternatively download a zip file of mp3s here. The CBC page is worth checking out either way for the photos from the session, and by navigating the site you'll find many other noteable clips from the usual brand of indie groups you'll find in Magnet, etc. There's actually a Wolf Parade page as well, who a couple of my friends have been hyping recently and, from what I've heard, seem to have at least one good song.

No One Cares

WELCOME to the world's newest and best music blog. I tend to dislike the nonword "blog" completely, yet over the course of the past few months it has come to fixate itself somewhere inside my vocabulary. This is mainly due to increased discussion about blogtype things with folks who are most likely non-blogtype people.

WHAT the purpose of this "music blog" is: To serve notice on fantastic music. But in this case, the music is really fantastic, and it is probably ignored most of the time and occasionally you may never have even heard of it. The music will hopefully often be new, but since well over half of the music my friends and I like came from 1993 or earlier, there will surely be discussion on some old thing from some old time.

WHAT we are concerned about: We are concerned about the fact that there are plenty of people writing about music or other multimedia but they consistently talk about the same uninteresting or inferior nonsense while eschewing or knowing nothing about other astounding music or media that is almost certainly more deserving of attention. Ok, in many cases, it is certain. So our goal is not only to serve notice on fantastic music, but to do it often in contrast of most other folks writing about whatever their big #1 bandwagon record this year is.

THE problem: We are lazy and hopeless and will probably do a miserable job of maintaining this blog. But at least we all know this in advance.