Tenor saxophonist and Slackers mainstay Dave Hillyard is planing a solo tour of California this January. He plans for several shows in Los Angeles, with each performance featuring a different theme and music.

The following shows have been announced so far: On January 8th Dave will appear at the Blue Beat Lounge for a “Rocksteady 7 West” show, featuring material from his Rocksteady Seven project backed by members of the Chris Murray Combo and other guest musicians. On the 9th he’ll visit the Dub Club for “Roots 7”, a set of reggae oriented Rocksteady 7 tracks backed by The Expanders. Other gigs are planned through the 12th with details still to be announced.

Dave’s Rocksteady Seven released Way out East: Live at The Kassablanca earlier this year via Brixton Records. The Slackers recently self-released The Boss Harmony Sessions, a collaboration with LA’s DJ Boss Harmony.
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Those complaining about the anti-downloading tactics of the RIAA should take note. Popular (and often strange) musician, Prince, has reportedly gone on an offensive against fan sites and those who post anything from live photography to lyrics to album covers.

Previously, he attacked major file sharing sites like The Pirate Bay and popular media sites like YouTube, but that was relatively understandable, given his position. The new attack on any who posts even a photograph taken by themselves seems baffling to most, and legally questionable as well. Prince has even forbidden fans from posting images of their own tattoos if they use Prince-like imagery (i.e. that weird symbol.)

After suing “The Internet,” his label, and his fans, all that’s left is to sue this guy for using his name.
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Recent Fat Wreck Chords addition The Flatliners have finished shooting a video for the song ‘Eulogy’ which appears on their Fat Wreck debut, The Great Awake.

You can view the video here.
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Florida’s Fake Problems are back home following six weeks of touring, which included shows with Nothington, an appearance at the Punknews / Mutiny PR CMJ Showcase, and of course The Fest 6 in Gainesville. The band is now hard at work on the followup to this year’s Sabot released How Far Our Bodies Go. The band’s previously announced 7″ Viking Wizard Eyes, Wizard Full of Lies will have a release date soon as well. Good Friends Records will put out the four song release, which will feature artwork by Heather Hannoura.

The band plans to resume touring in February of 2008.
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Chuck Ragan has made available a video for ‘Do You Pray?’ which he shot while on the road with Matt Skiba this past summer. The song appears on Ragan’s debut studio album Feast or Famine. Ragan had a busy year releasing a live album, a 7″ club and a studio album in addition to a number of 7″s.

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The new video from the The Killers and legendary music pioneer Lou Reed is now available online. The track features vocals and guitar work from Reed as well as vocals from Killers frontman Brandon Flowers. The song comes from the Killers’ new b-sides compilation. The record is titled Sawdust and is due out November 13, 2007.

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The Mighty Mighty Bosstones extra New Year’s Eve gig will have tickets available as of 5pm today. In light of the scalping going on for the other shows in Boston, it’s probably advisable to get in as quickly as possible.

The event is scheduled to take place in Providence, RI at Lupo’s Heartbreak Hotel. On the subject of scalpers, the promoters add:

Thanks to everyone who helped make this year’s Throwdown the fastest selling in Bosstones history!!! (No thanks to the bottom-feeding, greedy scalpers who also pitched in).

You can buy them here.

In related news, the band also recently confirmed that their December 26th gig will be supported by the Bouncing Souls and Everybody Out.
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Victory Records has signed Fallbrook, California’s Carnifex.

You can check out a new track from the band entitled “Lie to My Face,” as well as some other material, on MySpace.
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The King Khan and BBQ Show are on the road now supporting their 2006 full length What’s For Dinner. The duo will play a number of shows throughout the United States, cumulating with a quick hop over the border for a show in Toronto alongside Career Suicide and Brutal Knights.

BBQ, otherwise known as Montreal’s Mark Sultan, recently released a solo album via In The Red titled The Sultanic Verses. The Berlin-based Khan has been supporting the full length What Is?! by King Khan and The Shrines.
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Blacklisted have completed work on their next album. The record is titled Heavier Than Heaven, Lonelier Than God and the band worked with Kurt Ballou. The record is the follow up to 2005’s …The Beat Goes On and 2007’s new 7-inch Peace on Earth, War on Stage.
Source Continue reading Blacklisted complete “Heavier Than Heaven, Lonelier than God” →

Though much has been made of Radiohead‘s decision to release their album for donations, the future use of this practice may be deterred a little by the results of a recent survey which found many people paying nothing or next-to-nothing for the album.

According to the survey, 62 percent of the people who downloaded In Rainbows in a four-week period last month opted not to pay a cent for the record. The remaining 38 percent voluntarily paid an average of $6. There were extreme outlier’s of course – with Nine Inch Nail’s Trent Reznor paying $5,000 for the record – but these numbers suggest that the band wouldn’t have been much worse off if they had simply licensed the record to a major label.

In the face of internet downloading over the past few years, many have argued that people are opting not to support the major label system or wish to support artists directly. Unfortunately, these results suggest that for most, price is still the only real factor at play.
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Mae appears to have lost two members. The names of Rob Sweitzer and Mark Padgett have disappeared from the band’s MySpace page and postings on their message board have “confirmed” that they have left to “pursue other endeavors.”

The band is on tour with Motion City Sountrack in support of their most recent release Singularity.
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Red Scare Records has signed Ohio four piece the Sidekicks. The label also dropped an update on the The Lawrence Arms‘ 8th Annual Unbelievable Self-Indulgence Fest tour with Sundowner, the Falcon and American Steel. It would almost be a crime to rewrite Red Scare’s press releases, so here we go:

The Sidekicks are like, dude, Brendan’s favorite band right now. So we’re gonna release, distribute, promote, yada yada, their new record, “So Long, Soggy Dog”. They’re an awesome young band in the vein of HWM, AM!, TLA, D4, and maybe some other abbreviated punk bands. Perhaps we’ll call them SK? Maybe not. We’re gonna start with a digital release, then get rad from there. Go check out this band because they’re young as hell, but wise beyond their years and brimming with talent. They also don’t give a flying fuck about traffic cones. Inquire within.

What’s new on the tour with American Steel and The Lawrence Arms? Well, I had to fire our driver, send two band members to the hospital, and we got fucked by UPS today. ALL IN ONE DAY! The good news is that the shows are going great and that Teenage Bottlerocket is gonna play with us in Denver. Sweet meats. ‘Til Next time…

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