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From the Carolina Theatre:
Tickets for Katrina benefit show
with Aaron Neville go on sale Monday
DURHAM — Tickets for a concert featuring News Orleans musical legend Aaron Neville to benefit victims of Hurricane Katrina will go on sale at the Carolina Theatre on Monday.
The show, called “Christmas with Aaron Neville and his Quintet featuring Charles Neville,” is scheduled for 8 p.m., Wednesday, Dec. 7, at the historic Carolina Theatre in downtown Durham.
Tickets are priced at $39. A very limited number of pit seats will be available for $42. In the spirit of the holiday season, patrons are encouraged to bring an unwrapped gift for distribution to children who were evacuated from New Orleans and are currently living in the Triangle.
You have to hope that, at some point, Ghostface realizes that funds from the check given to him by the OG Bank of Respect that comes with anyone’s membership in Wu-Tang will run out. Obviously, he hasn’t reached that point yet.
Wednesday night, Ghost and a handful of other Wu associates—Cappadonna and Theodore Unit—showed up at the Cat’s Cradle well after midnight. The show was scheduled for a 9:30 p.m. start, with two disappointing openers—Swollen Members and Tru Life. The Members finally hit the stage after 11 p.m. and went for about twenty minutes. They asked the crowd for love, and a handful of folks—most too drunk to realize they should do otherwise—gave it to them, throwing their hands up and following the Members in their inane this-is-hot-shit (It’s not, I promise.), can’t-stop/won’t stop (Please Stop.) chants. They looked like Teletubbies on 9-volt batteries, with Mad Child bouncing around like an androgen-amped jackass and Prevail throwing his dreads around like they gave him the right to spit dead-end verses. Of course, Tru Life—the new Roc-a-Fella signee who has several spots on Ghostface solo albums—spitted the same kind of banal bullshit. I guess someone at Def Jam decided there needed to be a new New York cat to step up to the plate, and Tru Life was an easy (but ultimately wrong) answer. His debut should be out soon, and it should take about the same amount of time to forget. Imagine Ghostface dumbed down and boring, and you get what I’m saying.
Then again, last night, even Ghostface seemed like a dumbed-down version of himself, bouncing around stage and actually handling his verses pretty well and smartly switching things up by letting Cappa take several verses. But he ran into brick walls when he went into five-minute, Springsteen-esque lectures about hip-hop history and how hip-hop radio sucked. You would hope that one of the most respected guys in hip hop would have something a bit more fresh to rant about, especially in this political/social/economic quandary. It’s not like he was out of intelligent thoughts for the day: Around 4 p.m., he cancelled a scheduled 6:30 p.m. appearance at UNC on the future of hip-hop. Of course, that panel probably would have been the same thing the capacity-plus crowd heard from the stage, which was the same our-way rhetoric that made Wu-Tang so damn refreshing—that is, thirteen years ago. C’mon, break away already: Your past is no reason for an uninspired, uncourteous, uninspiring performance for a crowd eager to see you, even though many of ‘em loved you just because you’re, well, you.
EDIT: Apparently, I was wrong, and that wasn’t Tru Life. Anyway, thanks Tim.
According to the Cradle Web site, the Gang of Four show hasn’t sold out yet. A little surprising, but good news for us old-timers who are slow on our feet.
Update: Very sold out
Before his show tomorrow at the Cat’s Cradle tomorrow night, Ghostface Killah will lead a panel on the state of hip hop with Language Arts, Kaze and Skaz Diggah on UNC-CH’s Campus in Manning Hall, Rm 209 at 6:30 p.m. As far as we can tell, it’s free and open to the public.
Update: This from Jenne Masse of UNC-Chapel Hill’s Hip Hop Nation:
“Unfortunately, the forum has been postponed. Due to Ghostface’s performance at Cat’s Cradle, his schedule for sound check will not allow him to appear at the forum at the scheduled time. We will be postponing the forum for a later date. On behalf of Hip Hop Nation, I apologize for any inconvenience and please look out for the new date of the forum”
Just an FYI from the blue house on Hillsborough Road.
Right now, we’re putting the finishing touches on our next issue, which is due to hit the streets around lunch on Wednesday. In it is a good long look at what Little Brother’s been up to of late. If you haven’t heard the new record, prepare to be impressed.
They play the Cradle this weekend. Better score your tix now.
What really bugs me about this story is what is the assumption that this is what happens to people who grow up poor in High Point and how wonderful she is for rising above it.
Let’s hope that all those folks in Guilford who are so proud of Fantasia take this as a challenge to help the tens of thousands of other students who aren’t going to be so lucky as to get their shot at made-for-TV-stardom.
She is continuing to work with her tutors and hopes someday to be able to read to her daughter, and to fully understand the legal contracts that could make her rich.
My favorite moment of Mono’s Sunday night set at Local 506 in Chapel Hill: After the Japanese quartet’s fifth song—a fifteen-minute dynamic epic that built into a two-guitar, one-bass 90-second feedback blast before falling away too reveal the melody still slinking along—the couple dancing in 506’s cage plops down and lights a more-or-less post-coital cigarette. They were exhausted by aural orgasms, I suppose.
Second favorite moment: The Bellini set. I lost the copy of their new record, but I bunkered down and finally found it last night, inspired by their live set—a spasmodic affair of dissonant guitar delay so angular it could stab and Giovanna Cacciola’s high-abrasion poetics. Ear-splitting and pulse-raising extrapolation for fans of Steve Albini.
Least favorite moment: The fan who kept applauding when songs went quiet, thinking—consistently—that they were ending. C’mon now, pay attention.
Mono has a new split with Pelican out on limited-edition vinyl from TRL. I’ll update when I’ve had time to hear it.
D.I.Y.? Yeah? Huh? Pitchfork? Reporting? Nah.
New York “D.I.Y.” darlings Clap Your Hands Say Yeah—who, in true indie fashion, are booked by Monterey Peninsula Artists—play a sold-out show at Local 506 tonight. Good luck getting in to see their hyped-to-the-hilt mediocrity. Oh, well: Sit in a quiet room and shout “Child Stars” 45 times. It’ll be about the same effect, and it’ll probably sound better than Alec Ounsworth, honestly.
Meanwhile, Black Dice and Growing promise much more over at the Cradle tonight, as does the excellent double bill of Richard Buckner and The Strugglers at Kings.
PANTS!, McKinney’s entry in Fortune Magazine’s Battle of the Bands contest at the NAMM trade show took top honors. According to the release
The panel of judges at the event included Jeff Carlisi (.38 Special guitarist and founder of Camp Jam), Liberty DeVitto (drummer for Billy Joel and other Hall of Fame artists), GE Smith (10 year musical director for Saturday Night Live), and Southside Johnny (founder and vocalist, Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes).
So, when’s the next show y’all?
Fresh off tour, Little Brother’s Phonte posted an open thread on the Justus League’s The Lawn, offering folks the chance to ask any question they want. He gives some pretty thorough answers (and props to this story).
The Strugglers fantastic new record, You Win, sees the light of day through Spain’s excellent indie label, Acuarela Discos, today. The band plays at Schoolkids Records #2 on Franklin St. in Chapel Hill this evening to celebrate the release. The in-store, of course, is free, and the album is certainly worth buying—at least once. And there may be a little something in Wednesday’s paper about it. I’m not sure on the time of the performance yet, but I’ll update with it soon enough.
The Strugglers play another free release show with Schooner and Heather McEntire of Bellafea (who guests on You Win) Friday night at Local 506. Free is good, eh?
Yet another cancellation, this time with T.S. Monk at Hayti Heritage Center on Saturday, October 29: “The TS Monk concert schedule for October 29, 2005 at 8:00 pm in the St. Joseph’s Performance Hall at the Hayti Heritage Center has been cancelled. Any persons who have purchased tickets will receive a full refund. Please contact the Hayti Heritage Center at 683-1709.”
Rock band
(The Detroit Cobras play Local 506 Tuesday, Oct. 18)
Story By Grant Britt
The Detroit Cobras are not a cover band. Though the sound is familiar, it’s not a carbon copy of the original oldie you’ve got filed in your head or your heart. They prefer to be called re-arrangers. “We’re the big blender,” says frontwoman Rachael Nagy of the band’s sound that includes bluegrass, gospel, country and R&B. “We definitely have our own machine and our own filter. We just kind throw it in there and it still comes out a Cobras song.”
What comes out is a jangly, garage-y sound with a punky edge-as if produced by Phil Spector. Their name describes their sound perfectly. It’s gritty, with that Detroit muscle car era sound before it was called Motown. It’s funky, but edgier than the Berry Gordy stuff with more of a punk edge, sounding like what the British invasion bands tried to copy from the Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels days.
But the sounds that the Cobras rearrange are not that accessible to the casual listener. The band goes after the obscure stuff, focusing mainly on vintage R&B. One local band figures predominantly in the Cobras’ rearrangement list—Winston-Salem’s The 5 Royales, one of the first gospel groups to cross over into R&B. The Royales’ “Think” was covered by Aretha, “Tell The Truth” by Ray Charles, and “Dedicated to the One I Love” was covered by the Shirelles and the Mamas and the Papas. “Mary (guitarist Ramierez) and I are absolutely in love with those guys,” says Nagy, who have a Royales song on their latest record, Baby, as well as on their second release, 01’s Life, Love and Leaving. (more…)
By now, you may have heard about the Ghostface incident in Chicago last week. A much more elaborate and contested account can be found here. Unfortunately, we’ll have to put up with the NYC dregs of Tru Life when he opens for Ghostface at the Cradle next Wednesday, but it should be worth it. Go ahead and get your tickets now.
Ghostface is another in a string of hip-hop shows coming through the area soon: Blackalicious at the Cradle was just announced for November 15, and Dead Prez will perform at the Hayti Heritage Center on November 12 with local riser TWIP. Also: The Perceptionists, Sage Francis, Atmosphere and Cage.
Here’s the Insider.
The cover story this week is on Little Brother and we cut loose some space (nearly 9,000 words) to get what it’s like on the road for ‘em. One thing is clear: These are some dedicated people. Plus, the record is damn good.
So check this.
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