Nu Rave Brain Wave

When I fell backwards over the railings at the Green Door Store last night, screaming Derek Holland, I had this mix in my mind. Dance to this shit, motherfuckers!

01 Bob Dylan – Sittin’ On A Barbed Wire Fence
02 Almighty Defenders – The Ghost With The Most
03 Lafayette Thomas – The Thing
04 The Growlers - Camino Muerto
05 Bazooka – I Wanna Fuck All The Girls In My School
06 Flight – Witch Hunt Town
07 UV Race – Burn The Cat
08 Nobunny – Hocus Pocus
09 Catholic Spray – Beast In The Bushes
10 Woven Bones – Your Sorcery
11 Thee Ludds – Where To Begin
12 The Spooks – Now I’m A Ghost

mp3: Nu Rave Brain Wave x Halloween: A Mixtape [53.5mb]

The King Khan & BBQ Show:

09.Feb.10 Prinzenbar, Hamburg (Germany)
10.Feb.10 Gleis 22, Munster (Germany)
11.Feb.10 Trix, Antwerp (Belgium)
12.Feb.10 DBs, Utrecht (Netherlands)
13.Feb.10 Paradiso, Amsterdam (Netherlands)
14.Feb.10 Le Tipi, Liege (Belgium)
15.Feb.10 Le Grillen, Colmar (France)
16.Feb.10 Point Ephemere, Paris (France)
17.Feb.10 La Vapeur, Dijon (France)
18.Feb.10 Le Rex, Toulouse (France)
19.Feb.10 Le Transformateur, Fribourg (Switzerland)
20.Feb.10 St.Gervais Р̩tage, Bienne/Biel (Switzerland)
22.Feb.10 B72, Vienna (Austria)
23.Feb.10 Forum Stadtpark, Graz (Austria)
24.Feb.10 59:1, Munich (Germany)
25.Feb.10 Festsaal Kreuzberg, Berlin (Germany)
24.March.10 Biltmore Cabaret. Vancouver (BC)

Sled Island Festival, Primavera Festival and various mystery dates TBA SOON!

BBQ (Mark Sultan):

4.March.10 Pop Corn, Marghera (Italy)
5.March.10 Spazio 211, Torino (Italy) w/ Mojomatics
6.March.10 Officina 49. Cesena (Italy)
10.March.10 TBA, Stockholm (Sweden)
11.March.10 Truckstop Alaska, Goteborg (Sweden)
12.March.10 Pub Babar, Tranas (Sweden)
13.March.10 TBA
15.March.10 TBA, Helsinki (Finland)
16.March.10 TBA, Finland
17.March.10 House Of Rock. Moss (Norway)
18.March.10 Bastard. Tromso (Norway)
19.March.10 Hinsides. Bergen (Norway)
20.March.10 TBA, Oslo (Norway)
24.March.10 Broken City. Calgary (AB)
26.March.10 Double Double Land. Toronto (ON)
16.April.10 The Echo. Los Angeles (CA) (THE DAY BEFORE COACHELLA WHERE ALMIGHTY DEFENDERS ARE PLAYING….. YOU THINKIN’ WHAT I’M THINKIN’?)
19.April.10 Bottom Of The Hill. San Francisco (CA)

Brazil April/May dates TBA SOON!
Spain, Italy, Turkey & Israel May/June dates TBA SOON!

Below is the album art and tracklisting for Mark Sultan’s new album…

CD Tracklisting:

01. Icicles
02. Donʼt Look Back
03. Ten of Hearts
04. Status
05. I Get Nothin From My Girl
06. Go Beserk
07. I Am the End
08. Miseryʼs Upon Us
09. Iʼll Be Lovinʼ You
10. Waiting For Me
11. Just to Hold You
12. Catastrophe
13. Nobody But You

The CD’s ‘bonus track’ is the original ‘I’ll Be Lovin You’, which was later I later revamped to fit KKBBQ’s sound.

The Almighty Defenders:
SOOO many tourdates to announce, but I will wait until everything is 100%. What I CAN say is to expect a European tour in May, a show at Primavera, a show at Sled Island and a smattering of surprise gigs. More on that later…

DOWNLOAD -> The Almighty Defenders – She Came Before Me

The Almighty Defenders – Self Titled Debut

So the very premise of The Almighty Defenders in all likelihood is going to split the world’s constituents into two categories. The first will probably be pissing themselves thinking the amount of talent contained in the members: King Khan himself, the BBQ aka Mark Sultan, and the entirety of the Black Lips. It’s like a match made in a disgusting Berlin garage. Oh wait… The second group will probably be rolling their eyes in disgust that the kings of the current garage revival all got together after the purported international incident where Black Lips got kicked out of India and recorded and album. I happen to be of the first persuasion. By that I mean, I was waiting on the edge of my seat until this album got released, and finally it’s here.

So the story goes that Black Lips went to India, got their cocks out and got kicked out of the country under threat of jail time. They were not heard from for a few days until “word” got back to Vice that they were holed up with King Khan and BBQ in a studio in Berlin, where Khan lives with the Shrines. Whether or not that whole incident was a plea for more publicity matters not, for the Almighty Defenders came out of it – a pairing which was made in Heaven (yes, the nightclub in London) and which many people were clamoring for long before Black Lips had even made a name for themselves. So it is with great pleasure and a fair amount of liquor, weed, and dirt under their fingernails that King Khan, BBQ and the Black Lips bring to you the Almighty Defenders debut.

‘Bow Down and Die’, although one of the first tracks released to promote this album, never gets old. It’s straight up hand clapping gospel Sunday morning tune with Cole’s dirty vocals and enough “harmonizing” to make it seem like a cat dying, this tune is grade A. But more importantly, I love how each song in its own way showcases the amazing things about each member of the band – things that may not necessarily get such a showcasing whilst they play in their day job bands. ‘Cone of Light’ showcases the elements that BBQ (Mark Sultan), Joe (Black Lips), and Ian (Black Lips) do quite well respectively: BBQ belts it out, making him currently the only singer in garage rock who can actually fucking sing; Joe is a machine behind the drums, urgent as ever; and Ian is rock solid on guitar, sneaking up on you making you think he’s a messy guitarist but actually working some type of magic. The Ghost With The Most is swampy sounding, with Jared getting to show his vocal muscles with a fair amount of reverb, “It takes a wicked man to blindly lead the blind”, sounds most like a Black Lips song probably due to Ian’s most underappreciated guitar line taking the back seat to Jared’s wailing. I’m Coming Home unites all their talents into a ‘love tune’ about a man coming home from war, syrupy bass line drives the tune forward with Cole, Joe, King Khan and BBQ taking scratchy vocal duties over a fairly blues guitar line. Gospel is not forgotten with everyone shouting, “I’m coming home, oh yeah!”

But make no mistake, this record is not polished. It’s cohesive in its almost otherworldly, saintly in a dirty way, gospel garage heavenly feel, but it’s still a product of those who make up the band. And what I mean by that is that these men are ridiculous, crazy, and like to fuck around and this record does have a few WTFuck moments, as we all knew it would. ‘Death Cult Soup ‘N Salad’ consists solely of weird noises (most I’m assuming made by Cole and Joe) over some pretty heavy, and by heavy I mean distorted and rudimentary, riffing that together make up this delectably titled song. ‘The Great Defender’…. All I can assume about this song is that crack was a main component in it’s creation.

So what remains to be seen is whether or not the material will play out live. The group has played less than a handful of shows, including the Sell Out Festival, oh excuse me, Scion Garage Fest in Portland. But with the busy touring schedule each band keeps, with Khan and BBQ touring America in the fall, Black Lips touring the world for ever and ever, Mark Sultan coming out with a new album and the Shrines supposedly coming out with a new album soon – it doesn’t look good for the Defenders live show, but performances like the aforementioned CMJ prove that I may not know what the fuck I’m talking about. ‘Mon the Almighty Defenders world tour of 2010.

8/10

I am going to ignore the fact that this is a complete corporate sell out for all the bands involved, but hey, Jay/Black Lips/King Khan are a little older now, they don’t shit and spit (well…) on each other that much more these days, and HEY, it can’t be cheap paying for an apartment that you never live in, but regardless, the best bands in the world will be playing the free Scion Garage Fest, coming to Portland, Oregon on October 17.

The festival will go down at four venues: Satyricon, Berbati’s Pan, Someday Lounge, and Dante’s. Roky Erickson, the former 13th Floor Elevators frontman and general all-around psych-rock O.G., will headline. The bill also includes Black Lips, Jay Reatard, the King Khan and BBQ Show, the Almighty Defenders (the supergroup featuring the Black Lips, King Khan, and Mark Sultan), the Dirtbombs, the Deadly Snakes (reunited!), Simply Saucer, the Dutchess and the Duke, Harlem, Box Elders, the Beets, Fresh & Onlys, the Coathangers, and many others.

http://www.scion.com/garagefest/

Is anyone in the world more interesting than the Almighty Defenders right now?

Uh, no.

mp3 | CONE OF LIGHT by the ALMIGHTY DEFENDERS

If you forgot the post where I introduced the ALMIGHTY DEFENDERS, log off this website right now. Just kidding. But seriously, this is going to be one of the most incredible collaborations probably of all humanity. It’s BLACK LIPS and KING KHAN & THE BBQ. Yes, you heard me right. Black Lips AND King Khan. Together. This is the album that the guys made after Black Lips were forced to flee from India, so they ended up in Berlin recording with Khan. Wow.

They’ve got one song off the album up on myspace and have got their first ‘official’ (as it was put) show in TORONTO. (Had it been even marginally closer… I might have gone….)

However, deets are as follows:
Presented by VICE & ZUNE

The Almighty Defenders (Featuring members of the Black Lips & King Khan and BBQ)
With: Bloodshot Bill & DJ Saint PE (Black Lips / VICE)
NOTE: A Facebook RSVP doesn’t cut it at the door. RSVP: to@viceland.com

From the Black Lips Blog… I fixed any and all grammatical and spelling errors and bolded what you need to know. Think of it as Black Lips + King Khan & the BBQ = The Defenders. The Defenders + studio time = magnum opus.

So, as most of you now know we had to get the hell out of India, and find a safe have here in Berlin. It was too bad we couldn’t finish the tour, but we’re gonna make the best of it, and record an entire new album. It’s us and King Khan and BBQ joining forces as the Defenders. We started yesterday at Moon studios, and have already completed 4 songs. Once we’re done we’ll be giving the album away for free, and maybe do a limited vinyl pressing. I guess India wasn’t ready, but maybe it was a blessing in disguise because we are gonna make our magnum opus.