Louisville’s The Pass and the OK Deejays are going to help us all cool off with a pool party on August 7th at Turner’s Park on River Road. I could go on about how great the acts on the bill are, but do you really need any more incentive. The show is 18+ and there will be a full cash bar for all those kids of age. Tix are $7. 8pm to Midnight.
In the meantime, check out The Pass’ new music video for “Treatment of the Sun,” one of the track from their new album coming out this Fall (it’s going to be called Burst). If you like it, you can support the band by purchasing the song from their Bandcamp site.
Let me begin by saying that last night was pretty epic. It all started around midnight when I had the crazy idea to wake my brother (We Listen for You) up and head to ear x-tacy’s new location and start waiting in line to be the first customers (we were the last customers at the old location). We grabbed two folding chairs, iPods, and a New Yorker and headed down to Douglas Loop. A few employees were still there setting up and they were kind enough to give us a tour of the new digs. We set up camp out front of the mall and eventually tried to get some shuteye. A few “local business owners” weren’t too happy with us squatting on their street and eventually a few local police officers were trying to figure out what we were doing camping out on the sidewalk. We explained our situation, but I still feel our plight was lost on them. The eventual ruling was that we could be seated on the sidewalk, but could not sleep.
Around 5am, owner John Timmons and a film crew from WHAS arrived and began opening up the shop. The employees we saw the night before also started streaming in and continued getting the store ready right up to when they opened their doors. We became quite the spectacle and, as you can see from the videos below, local media got a kick out of us being “crazy kids.”
The final stretch was the toughest. The sun began shining down the hallway of the stripmall and my ipod was losing juice. Other customers began arriving around 9am (I guess we overshot a bit by arriving at 1am). Eventually the hallway was packed with customers looking to welcome the new ear x-tacy store (and get a $10 gift certificate)! Timmons came out shortly before 10am and gave a warm welcoming speech, then it was on.
I rushed to the counter with a dollar in my hand and bought one of those $.50 pens that say “I stole this pen from ear x-tacy.” I wanted to be the first customer, so it was either the pen or headphones (another item sitting at the checkout counter). Next up was figuring out how to best use the gift card. My brother bought Nick Drake’s Family Tree (see the Fox video below) and I picked up MGMT’s Oracular Spectacular, Pearl Jam’s Ten and My Morning Jacket’s It Still Moves. Not a bad first shopping day at ear x-tacy. The store looked great and I can’t wait to see Wax Fang on August 1 (6pm).
August 1st is ear x-tacy’s 25th anniversary. With ease, I can say that ear x-tacy is the heart of the local music scene and I look forward another 25 years.
We were there for ear x-tacy’s final day in its now officially “old” location. We showed up around 5:30 and movers were already there packing up the store. All of the posters, plaques, and records on the wall were gone and only tape marks were left. There was still a considerable amount of merch out and, as always, we found a few vinyl that we couldn’t pass up on. I grabbed Big Boi’s new album and a 7″ from Javelin. Turns out, I was the last customer! As the dramatic deep voiced announcement let everyone know that it was time to close up at 6:00 pm, I made my purchase. 7/21, 18:00.
Ear x-tacy will be moving to the new location tonight and tomorrow and will reopen Friday at 10:00 a.m. See you there!
As you know by now, ear X-tacy is moving down the street to 2226 Bardstown Road at Douglas Loop Station. Today is the last day for the “old” location. They are closing early at 6:00 p.m. The Backseat Sandbar folks are going to head down there at around 5:45 and watch the closing if you want to join us. Kind of a goodbye to the old and a celebration of a new beginning. We’ll just have to watch out for the moving trucks.
Program Information:
Band of Horses is Ben Bridwell, Creighton Barrett, Ryan Monroe, Tyler Ramsey and Bill Reynolds. Long time touring members of the group, Infinite Arms marks the recording debut of Ramsey and Reynolds, while Barrett and Monroe graced the last album, Cease to Begin. Through touring together in support of Cease to Begin and during breaks in the Infinite Arms recording process, the band have become a cohesive force with all members making invaluable contributions to the unmistakable sound that founder Bridwell has crafted since the band’s inception.
The latest addition to Band of Horses’ acclaimed discography arrived recently in the form of “Life On Earth” available exclusively on the new Twilight Saga: Eclipse soundtrack, joining Infinite Arms and its predecessors 2007’s Cease To Begin, the band’s 2006 debut album Everything All The Time, and a self-titled, self-released EP in 2005.
Ticketing Information:
Reserved Seating
Running Time:
Approximately 3 hours with intermissions
During our time as The Hold Steady, I’ve made a lot in interviews and onstage monologues about what little ambition we had when we started this band. We weren’t sure if we would play shows or release records. We had seriously managed expectations. But in the end, we did end up playing shows and releasing records, and we are better people for it. We’ve seen a lot of the world, met a ton of great people, and played a whole bunch of rock and roll music. Our efforts have been rewarded beyond our wildest dreams. It’s not exactly a mind-blowing statement when I say that this is the best job I’ve ever had. That said, there are sacrifices and discomfort that come with this territory: busted relationships, distance from family, physical exhaustion, disconnection from civilian life, ringing ears, interminable waiting around, trying to get through a ninety minute show when you have food poisoning, etc.
Our new record, Heaven is Whenever, is about struggle and reward. It’s about accepting suffering as a necessary part of a joyous life. It’s about how love can help us rise above these struggles. It’s about faith. It’s about how bad it hurts to settle for less. It’s about not being scared to try. It’s about four guys who still believe in the power and glory of rock and roll. Because even after a thousand soundchecks, a thousand load-in and load-outs, fifty missed birthdays, and a few hundred electrical shocks, our reward still vastly outweighs the struggle. In fact, the reward would not exist without the struggle. Thus, this struggle is inherently part of the reward. And in this way, the fantasy of playing rock and roll for a living is a lot like real life.
Heaven is Whenever is our fifth full length release. This is both cool and a cause to stop and think, as there are some inherent truths in any fifth record. For one, the band has to stay together long enough to last through the first four. Secondly, an audience has to be interested enough to encourage the band to make album number five. And third, the band still has to have something to say that it feels that it hasn’t said before.
I just went through my record collection to see how many bands I love never made it to a fifth record. I realized that most of the bands that mean the most to me had indeed made it through five and sometimes beyond: Led Zeppelin, The Clash, Thin Lizzy, REM, Creedence, etc. In some ways, album five implies a commitment and dedication and a realization that the band’s success is not a fluke, and that it’s not going anywhere. Albums like Physical Graffiti, Combat Rock, Fighting, Document, and Cosmo’s Factory are all fifth records that show their creators confident and brimming with new ideas. In many cases, peaking. While I am not going to compare our record to any of these masterpieces by my rock and roll deities, I am proud to unveil Heaven is Whenever and add it to our body of work. Five records in seven years. Not bad.
The title of this record comes from a lyric in the song “We Can Get Together”, which states “Heaven is whenever/We can get together.” In the end, that might say it best. The most amazing part of this life is the opportunity to share music with a supportive audience. It is not lost on us that people make sacrifices of their own to see us perform. They spend money on tickets and travel, they get baby sitters, they take time off work. It’s an honor for us to be a recipient of this kind of dedication. So when we say Heaven is Whenever, we mean that the greatest of rewards is our privilege of being able to tour and share our music and our lives with yours.
