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Chrysalis Rocks the Desert
Chrysalis made a big splash at Coachella with ten artists filling the line up of the three day music & arts festival held in the Southern California Desert. Drawing big crowds to their stages and great reviews from both coasts we’re extremely proud of all of our performers. You can read Ben Ratliff of The NY Times glowing reviews of Aphex Twin, Spiritualized, Portishead and My Morning Jacket here or check out LA Times music critic Ann Powers raves over My Morning Jacket’s performance in her Coachella write up here.
DANGER MOUSE
Since improbably appearing out of deep left field with his audacious Grey Album in 2004, Danger Mouse has accumulated an intriguing and multileveled body of work in which the generally accepted distinctions between art and commerce aren’t merely blurred but utterly obliterated. The creations he’s helped bring to life during the last three years and change—including the Gorillaz’ Demon Days, Gnarls Barkley’s St. Elsewhere, Danger Doom’s The Mouse and the Mask and the self-titled album by The Good, the Bad and the Queen—comprise an output that is at once powerfully distinctive and remarkably varied.
Danger Mouse's 2008 projects include new albums from the global pop phenomenon Gnarls, enigmatic songstress Martina Topley-Bird, the sunny, cerebral U.K. pop outfit The Shortwave Set and the rugged, passionate Akron-based rock band The Black Keys, who chose Danger Mouse as their first outside producer. Their partnership produced Attack & Release, the most intricate and intense record of the Keys' career to date. Danger Mouse is also working on projects with Sparklehorse and Beck.
He is not a stereotypical producer but a full collaborator. His projects feature his instrumental work, his compositional instincts and the full range of his aesthetic. Like the pop artists and filmmakers who inspired him, Danger Mouse is defined not by his skills, but by the choices he makes, which invariably result in the creation of self-contained worlds.
“I feel much more comfortable when my music is taken in context with itself,” says Danger Mouse, whose given name is Brian Burton. “If one song is just beating on a can, that’s fine because three tracks later it will be more complex and you’ll know that the can was put there on purpose, because that’s what it was supposed to be. I want people to ask, ‘Why is he doing that?’ as opposed to judging what they’re hearing. What I’m doing is very much by choice. It’s not because this is the best song I can do on any given track, it’s because it’s what I wanted you to hear. For those people who seek out the music and try to analyze it and maybe even get inspired by it, I do want them to understand that it’s a deliberate thing.
“There’s a reason something sounds the way it does,” he continues. “People say, ‘He used an Italian film soundtrack as a sample; maybe he just dug really deep into the crates and found something that nobody has heard before.’ It’s a lot deeper than that. Everything I do is very much on purpose. It’s intentional but not contrived, and that’s an important distinction.”
In a sense, Danger Mouse is a modern-day avant-gardist who, through the juxtaposition of inspiration and serendipity, happened to enter the mainstream in a dramatic way through a pair of smashes created in partnership with Damon Albarn (the Gorillaz’ “Feel Good Inc.”) and Cee-Lo Green (Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy”). While he doesn’t view himself as a hit-maker by nature or intent, when a potential hit presents itself through the process, he pursues it obsessively.
As for the results of these explorations between Danger Mouse and his collaborators, “When it’s right, it’s right,” he explains. “How we got there doesn’t matter. I don’t care whether I’m playing on it or not, because it’s not about how much I did or didn’t do—it’s knowing that it’s there at the end. As Damon has said, the people I’m working with are basically my instruments in some ways. It’s how they’re edited, how loud they are, how fast they are. I guess you could say I’m a fan—that’s one way of saying it. The people I’ve worked with, for the most part it was their biggest record. But at the same time, it was never about that. Usually, there’s a certain part of the thing each of them does that I like, and I try to make a record out of that.”
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REMINDER: SET YOUR TIVOS
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Don’t forget—My Morning Jacket will perform on Saturday Night Live this Saturday night, May 10. Evil Urges comes out on June 10, and the tour starts June 20 at the Radio City Music Hall. After that, the band will keep going, and going, like the Eveready Bunny, including a hometown shindig on the Great Lawn at Louisville Waterfront Park Aug. 16, Denver’s Red Rocks Amphitheater (with the Black Keys) Aug. 21, L.A.’s Greek Theatre Sept. 21, and wrapping up with two nights at the Chicago Theatre Oct. 9-10.
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| - 09-May-08 |
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WHAT'S GOING ON
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Speaking of touring, Gnarls Barkley has announced a slew of upcoming festival performances behins The Odd Couple. Gnarls has confirmed 20 dates so far, including: the Roots Picnic in Philly, the Soco Music Experience in Denver, the Quart Festival in Norway, the Roskilde Festival in Denmark, Rock Werchter in Belgium, Eurockness in France, the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland, the North Sea Jazz Festival in Rotterdam, the Benicassim Festival in Spain, Lollapalooza in Chicago and the ACL Festival in Austin. More will be announced as soon as the band is allowed to disclose. “Summer is a time to get outside, meet new people, try new things, and dance, in whatever way you dance,” said a spokesperson for the band, whose identity must remain a secret. “If anyone can coax the people outside, Gnarls can. Any excuse for a righteous throw-down.” And check out the brand-new, infectious and touching clip for “Going On” at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_R9fId_Rqo |
| - 09-May-08 |
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JACKET REQUIRED
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Fresh off their much-buzzed-about appearance at SXSW, and with a sold-out show at Radio City Music Hall around the corner, My Morning Jacket has just confirmed a pair of high-profile performances. On May 10, the much-adored and critically acclaimed band will play Saturday Night Live for the first time ever. Additionally, they’ll play hometown Louisville this summer for the first time since Thanksgiving of 2006. The show, set for Aug. 16, will take place in a picturesque setting—on The Great Lawn at the city’s Waterfront Park. MMJ is set to release their new full-length, Evil Urges, on ATO on June 10 in North America, and through Rough Trade on June 9 in the U.K. and Europe. We’ve been blasting the new record, co-produced by Jim James with the brilliant Joe Chiccarelli (Raconteurs, White Stripes, Shins)at New York’s Avatar and Nashville’s Blackbird, and it’s nothing less than mind-blowing. In fact, if you ask us, Evil Urges is an instant classic. |
| - 17-Apr-08 |
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GUESS WHO'S BIRTHDAY IT IS?
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We don't usually do this. To be honest, this is a first for the Chrysalis site. But a combination of unabashed sentiment and the impulse to suck up has overtaken us, and we just wanna say, in all sincerity: Happy birthday, Kenny Mac. You don't look a day over 39, boss. |
| - 12-Apr-08 |
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FOR THE LOVE OF JOAN
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You can check out “To Be Loved,” the first single from Joan as Policewoman’s upcoming album, To Survive, on her MySpace page: www.myspace.com/joanaspolicewoman. The LP, which features a duet with Rufus Wainwright, hits June 10 on Cheap Lullaby Records. The band will be performing April 17 at London’s Roundhouse, and May 15 at New York’s Mercury Lounge. On the same subject, during his keynote interview at this year’s SXSW, Lou Reed professed his love for Joan as Policewoman to producer Hal Willner, who conducted the onstage Q&A session. “I look to a young group for energy,” Lou said of her band. “They all have energy.” |
| - 26-Mar-08 |
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