Grand Ole Party Tour with Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Since taking the city by storm with their debut release, 2007’s Humanimals, San Diego dance-funk band Grand Ole Party has kept plenty busy. They’ve played back-to-back sold out shows at the Casbah, thrilling audiences with their syncopated sass. Lead singer Kristin Gundred started her own label, Zoo Music, and signed bands like Crocodiles and Dum Dum Girls. The band has also been hard at work in the studio, recording their eagerly awaited follow-up to Humanimals.
But since nothing is ever enough for you people, the band hasn’t stopped there. The trio has lined up a Midwest tour where they’ll be opening up for a little band called Yeah Yeah Yeahs. You may have heard of them. (more…)
Download: Owl and Bear’s Honorable Mention of 2008
Owl and Bear’s list of albums that almost made the cut in 2008.
Pitchfork Music Festival 2007 (II)
Note: Photos in this essay depict re-enactments of actual events, not the events themselves.
Thursday, July 12
McCaskill picked me up at my folks’ house at 9PM. We weren’t planning to leave Jackson until about 1 or 2AM, but we’d decided to hang out a while and say goodbyes because, naturally, we may never come back.
Instead of going to the bar, for obvious reasons, we opted for dinner. Regardless, as with alcohol, we are both bottomless pits for food. The meal was uneventful, save for the fact that our waitress had apparently served McCaskill once before, and had taken offense to a conversation about foreskins. Despite this, the food was palatable and (hopefully) spit-free.
Girl Talk – Night Ripper
2007, Illegal Art
I can see Gregg Gillis, late at night, hunched over his laptop, sweat trickling down his brow in the unhealthy LCD glow, as he rips apart other artists’ works, and re-stitches the parts into a hellaciously funky monster that simply demands dance, all night.
Interview: Gregg Gillis (Girl Talk)
Owl&Bear: Where did you get the name Girl Talk and what does it signify, if anything?
Gregg Gillis: I was trying to pick the most intimidating name possible, something that when people hear it, they just sense insanity.
Pitchfork Music Festival 2007 (I)
Let’s get this out of the way: fuck the Chicago Tribune. They messed up a lot of indie fans this past weekend by printing completely wrong directions to the Pitchfork Music Festival. Despite having lived in the Chicago area for nearly eight years and being with two people who attended the festival last year, I still managed to take the Green Line L train all the way to the end of the line (as per the directions), nearly five miles south of Union Park. A long string of expletives and one forty minute bus ride later, we had missed nearly all of Slint, the first act of the first night. It’s a shame, too, as they sounded pretty damn good.
Bonnaroo 2007
When I left Thursday afternoon, I felt like shit with an ungodly case of mono and, apparently, Lyme disease. I thought I might die there, but by Friday, I felt much, much better. It may be stupidly-named, but Bonnaroo apparently cures all ills.
