Jun
23
Posted by Luke, under The World of Music · RSS ·
Jimmy Eat World have told press that fans should expect their new album soon, at least compared to the wait between 2004’s “Futures” and 2007’s brilliant “Chase This Light”. I caught the Arizona band on tour for the third time back in February, and they are most certainly a force to be reckoned with. They’ve quietly worked their way into the hearts and stereos of rock fans all over the world and now that hard work is seriously paying off, with the latest album selling well over 300,000 copies worldwide, making #5 on the US Billboard chart (an impressive feat for an alternative band), and packing out venues on their latest international tour.
In other news Robbie Williams has reportedly been offered the handsome sum of £1.5m to play a 30-minute headline set at a festival in Norway. That’s £50,000 a minute. Although it’s probably the easiest money he’ll ever make, Robbie recently posted in his blog that his last tour “nearly killed him”, and that he has no desire to return to live playing. Perhaps this paycheck will help change his mind a little.
Vampire Weekend are the Hype Band for this week. Although they’re getting a lot of press and radio play, they’re not quite ready to be considered mainstream.. perhaps all that will change after their long list of festival appearances this summer. They live and work in Brooklyn, and recently signed to XL recordings after recieving major internet attention via a series of blogs and demo plays over social networking sites such as myspace. They mix a distinctive NY indie with African beats and Western classical music to make what can only be described as.. Vampire Weekend. Hit the myspace to find out more.
Jun
18
Posted by Luke, under Guitars, The World of Music · RSS ·
NEWS.
After joining Foo Fighters’ Dave Grohl onstage at their Wembley Stadium show, Led Zep’s Jimmy Page has said in an interview that his band are ready to reunite and possibly perform a world tour next year.
John Lydon of the Sex Pistols has told the BBC “it might be true” that the band are planning to record a new album, after their performance at Isle of Wight Festival this weekend, in which he managed to threaten to murder audience members, insult headliners The Police and down liquor from a bottle. Punk ain’t dead. Is it?
An Arts Council poll has named Liverpool as England’s most musical city, for the likes of The Zutons, The La’s, and some band called The Beatles. Must be a new act.
I’m still pretty convinced it’s Maidenhead.
REVIEW.
Last night I saw Journey at the Hammersmith Apollo and I must say that it was even better than the last time I saw them, the atmosphere was electric!
They were supported by British Musician John Parr for his first night as support act for them and I have to say that I was very disappointed. It was quite evident that this chap should now be classed as a “has-been”. His guitar was constantly out of tune, he struggled to hit his high notes, and get making “jokes” about how 23 years ago he would have been “handed his guitar by a roadie” and had it plugged in for him.�
I thought it was quite funny after his set to see the bass player coiling up his own guitar lead!!
Anyway, on to Journey… With new Phillipino vocalist Arnel Pineda taking to the stage with enormous stage prescence despite his small size! He pounded out all the greatest tracks along with some new songs from their new “Revelation” album. The only thing that I though rather odd was “how can this sound be coming from such a small chap!?” His look was somewhat different from previous Journey front men, but having said that the most important thing is the music and so he is a welcome change.
Neal Schon was on top form as ever with his ever great wailing solos, and drummer/vocalist Deen Castronovo gave a top performance of some of the greats like “Who’s Crying Now” and “Mother, Father”.
This was definitely a gig to remember!
IN-STORE.
For the record, we have just taken delivery of the brand new Yamaha CPX500 guitars, which are at the same price as the APX500 model - just £269.00! Please call 01628-771400 or e-mail us for details.
Jun
17
Posted by Steven, under Guitars, Pianos, The World of Music · RSS ·
Good day to everybody, I must say it is nice to have Luke back in the shop up to his usual trickery and promotional madness!
News
Amy Winehouse mysteriously fainted yesterday and was taken by her father, Mitch to the famous London Clinic in fear that she had sprained her ankle - shock horror! News this morning is that she has been released and has recovered fully! What has happened to Amy Winehouse? She seems to have dropped off the face of the earth (musically) and constantly in and out of ‘rehab’.
Coldplay’s speedy selling album is still on the move after their first of 3 FREE concerts! Last night, they played at Brixton Academy playing tracks from their new albums along with the old classics like “Clocks”, “In My Place”, and finished an encore with an acoustic version of “Yellow”. The next concert is tonight in Barcelona, and finishing in New York on the 23rd.
Queen of Soul, Aretha Frankline is set to headline at the Newport Jazz Festival on 9th August along side the likes of Sonny Rollins, Wayne Shorter, Chris Botti and the legendary Herbie Hancock.
In other news…
I visited the London International Music Show (LIMS) last week at the London ExCel, which was the first year this event has been in full flow. I visited on Thursday, which was deemed “Dealer Day” although I saw plenty of Joe Public. All manufacturers were there and I visited most.
A few interesting things to mention:
I saw a rather interesting looking guitar on the Tanglewood stand, who have teamed up with Swedish Luthier, Michael Sanden to launch a very special range of Custom Tanglewood Guitars. The guitar I saw featured a rather strange looking fretboard where the frets were what can only be described as ‘wiggly’ rather than straight. This design has created a perfectly intonated guitar. On most guitars, the intonation is set by the angle of the saddle, which is also filed down in certain places to intonate the guitar. On this new guitar, the saddle is completely straight and all the intonation is set through the angle of each fret along the entire neck. This produces an interesting looking guitar, but one that is perfect tonally across the entire length of the neck!
I saw the brand new range of Yamaha Clavinovas and Personal Pianos. They are a vast improvement of the previous models in terms of sound and touch. They have also changed their mahogany finish, which now looks rather nice! I saw the new Arius YDP140, which comes in a rather lovely Dark Alder finish and Cherry.
After seeing how good these new pianos were, I arranged a meet with Malcolm, our Yamaha Rep to get some of these beauties on our shop floor, and as I write, he has just left me and on his way to Wear! So at the end of June expect to see the new range of Yamaha Clavinovas on the shop floor at both Cobham and Maidenhead shops.
