DMW: Digital Music W...

September 20 - 21, 2008 will be the dates for this fledgling music fest that takes place on the man-made island of Treasure Island. The island is located in the San Francisco Bay and is connected to the cities of San Francisco and Oakland by a bridge that runs through it.

Here's the list so far:

Saturday, September 20

Justice
TV on the Radio
Goldfrapp
Hot Chip
CSS
Antibalas
Aesop Rock
Amon Tobin
Foals
Mike Relm
Nortec: Bostich + Fussible

- more TBD

Sunday, September 21

The Racontours
Tegan & Sara
Vampire Weekend
Spiritualized
Okkervil River
Tokyo Police Club
The Kills
Dr. Dog
John Vanderslice
The Dodos
Fleet Foxes

- more TBD

Tickets go on sale to the general public on May 30 at 10AM. Not sure if that's Pacific or Eastern time.

For more info, jump to the Treasure Island Music Festival site.

Posted by Amanda Nanawa on May 22, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Five months into 2008 and EMI is hanging on for dear life to get through the year. The latest news deals with a financial extension with lender Citigroup. June 1 was the deadline for its first milestone and it seems that EMI couldn't meet its target. The problem lies with the company not turning a profit fast enough to meet that first milestone. It would've been difficult, what with the music industry sales slumping across the board. Also, it would help a lot if EMI could get more of their artists in the Top 20 sales.

So now, everyone is turning to Coldplay to save the day. Will Coldplay's Viva La Vida outpace sales of previous releases? That's a tough order to make. Its turning into a bad game of chance - hedging bets on whether Coldplay's new release will accellerate or stall.

Its going to take more time for Guy Hands to reorganize EMI. The milestones set were overly optimistic and everyone kinda knew that when he revealed it at that meeting earlier this year. Hands may be biting off more than he can chew and he's starting to realize how incredibly daunting it is to tear down an old infrastructure and make way to a new idea.

Plus, they really need to re-launch their corporate site. It really sucks.

Posted by Amanda Nanawa on May 21, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (1)

I encountered an amusing blog on Times Online about the latest mascot on Nestle's drinks. Its none other than the head-shot assassin Golgo 13.

You should read the blog. It really is funny. And I found this after reading about EMI's latest financial extension from Citigroup.

Posted by Amanda Nanawa on May 21, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Behold... Ladytron's new video from forthcoming Velocifero.

Ladytron - Ghosts (MySpace Exclusive)

The video was directed by Joseph Kahn. I would assume most Ladytron fans must've known that since March.

Still, my favorite Joseph Kahn video has to be the one he did for Muse - "Knights of Cydonia". Better than the one he did for The Chemical Brothers, "Get Yourself High".

I like the sleek feel of the "Ghosts" video. You can't go wrong when you add bunnies and a wolf in your video. Ladytron has grown into a fine band and I'm really looking forward to adding Velocifero to my collection.

Posted by Amanda Nanawa on May 17, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

**TRACKLIST UPDATE** As of 6/6/08
CD
1. Caravan Girl
2. Happiness (Video)

Maxi CD
1. Caravan Girl - Live Choral Version
2. Monster Love - Live Acoustic Version
3. Little Bird - Live at The Union Chapel (Video)

7" numbered picture disc
A. Caravan Girl
B. Little Bird - Animal Collective Remix

I was busy and didn't post this three days ago. But here it is anyway. Every time I look at the "Caravan Girl" single cover, I can't help but think awe...Alison looks like she needs a hug.

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Just when you thought I could take a break from mentioning Goldfrapp this week, this info pops up. Notice that there is no official tracklisting yet. There better be an awesome b-side. C'mon Goldfrapp - unleash one of those other recordings that didn't make it on Seventh Tree!

"Caravan Girl" is the new single that will release June 30. Is it me or are these singles released a lot sooner than in previous releases? For the Seventh Tree era, these singles are coming out every other month - Feb was "A&E", April was "Happiness" and now June is "Caravan Girl". I predict that for August its either "Little Bird" or "Monster Love".

Here's the smashing artwork for "Caravan Girl"

Also, here's an update on their live sked:

JUNE
05 - Becks'perience, Bucharest, Romania
19 - Sonar Festival, Barcelona, Spain
21 - De Le Warr Pavilion - Bexhill-On-Sea SOLD OUT
22 - Birmingham Symphony Hall – Birmingham SOLD OUT
23 - Bridgewater Hall – Manchester SOLD OUT
25 - Royal Albert Hall – London SOLD OUT
27 - Hove festival, Arendal, Norway
29 - Glastonbury Festival, UK
30 - Glasgow Royal Concert Hall – Glasgow SOLD OUT

JULY
01 - The Sage – Gateshead SOLD OUT
03 - Westerpark, Amsterdam, Netherlands
04 - Roskilde Festival, Roskilde, Denmark
06 - Heineken Opener Festival, Gdynia, Poland
11 - Balaton Sound Festival, Ungarn, Hungary
12 - Colours of Ostrava, Ostrava, Czech Republic
16 - Newmunster Abbey, Luxembourg
17 - Dour Music Festival, Dour, Belgium
20 - Lovebox Festival, London, UK

AUGUST
08 - Sudoeste Festival, Zambujeira do Mar, Portugal
15 - Ola Festival, Almeria, Spain
29 - Electric Picnic, Stradbally, Co.

Laois, Ireland
31 - Connect Festival, Loch, Scotland

SEPTEMBER
20 - Treasure Island Music Festival, San Francisco, CA USA

Posted by Amanda Nanawa on May 16, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A year ago at TAF, I was doing this interview with Japanese TV broadcaster WowWow and Madhouse. We were talking about their latest manga adaptation of "Shigurui". The cover was fascinating. Take a look at the cover for Vol 3:

As I had expected, FUNimation might actually make an announcement tomorrow about their acquisition of their most mature anime title to date. This beats Speedgrapher, Witchblade, Basilisk and Shin Chan by miles (in terms of FUNimation catalog titles). Shigurui is actually not for the faint at heart. There is a lot of gore, blood, violence, hacking of body parts, hacking of tits, hacking of all sorts of things that humans could not believe they are watching. This is the anime title meant for adult viewers over the age of 21.

ENJOY!

Posted by Amanda Nanawa on May 15, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

This past weekend in the UK (Mote Park, Maidstone, Kent to be precise), BBC Radio 1 held its Big Weekend music festival. If you look carefully at the 2-day billing, you will notice a menagerie of different bands but still leans heavily towards indie guitar acts. There was a write-up from Reuters that kept popping up on various news sites and blogs and it just kept clogging up my inbox with the same crap about Goldfrapp vs. Madonna (aka Oldfrapp). Swear to God, every time those two are performing in the same festival there's always someone trying to write-up an imaginary feud. Funny how Reuters likes to perpetuate the myth.

Anyway, Madonna and Usher performed on Saturday - separately. Very interesting lineups. On Sunday, Goldfrapp performed on the main stage. If there's one thing you cannot fault Alison Goldfrapp for, its her desire to put on a great show - regardless if its in a festival environment or at a bonfire on the beach. They performed seven songs - "Strict Machine", "A&E", "You Never Know", "Satin Chic", "Number 1", "Caravan Girl", and "Happiness".

Now, it was during "Happiness" that there were dancers dressed up in those leafy outfits - the costumes that were featured in the "A&E" video (do not ask why they didn't dance during "A&E"). Near the very end of the song, Alison shouted out "In Time!" to the two dancers to her left. Apparently, they weren't dancing in time???

Ooohh but Sunday had another performer that I didn't know was at another tent. It was none other than New Zealand's own Wing. Remember Wing from that episode of "South Park" that featured the Awesome Talent Agency and Sly Stallone and the Chinese Mafia?

She sang "Dancing Queen", "Close to you", and "Candle in the Wind". She spared the crowd with her rendition of AC/DC's "Back in Black". I shit you not - she really did a cover of AC/DC songs. Jump here for her site. New Zealand's TV One News even did a segment on her growing popularity in the U.K.

Its times like this I wish I was living in the U.K.

Posted by Amanda Nanawa on May 13, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Trent Reznor never ceases to amaze me. GO visit the NIN site and get your chance to download the new album The Slip.

Here's an excerpt from the site:

as a thank you to our fans for your continued support, we are giving away the new nine inch nails album one hundred percent free, exclusively via nin.com. the music is available in a variety of formats including high-quality MP3, FLAC or M4A lossless at CD quality and even higher-than-CD quality 24/96 WAVE. your link will include all options - all free. all downloads include a PDF with artwork and credits. for those of you interested in physical products, fear not. we plan to make a version of this release available on CD and vinyl in july. details coming soon.

Track listing is on the sidebar of the site. But just in case:

1. 999,999
2. 1,000,000
3. letting you
4. discipline
5. echoplex
6. head down
7. lights in the sky
8. corona radiata
9. the four of us are dying
10. demon seed

Posted by Amanda Nanawa on May 05, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)