News reaches us that the Smashing Pumpkins plan to release an EP of four acoustic tracks exclusively through Apple’s iTunes store.

The EP will be titled American Gothic and is due to be released on 2 January 2008. Although the release will be iTunes only stateside, the rest of the world will see a physical release also.

The songs on the American Gothic EP are:

• The Rose March
• Pox
• Again, Again, Again (The Crux)
• Sunkissed

The songs were recorded by the band during a break in touring earlier this year and the EP was produced by Billy and Pumpkins drummer Jimmy Chamberlin. On the official website, it says:

“We have always regretted not recording more in between tours because albums have never caught the full story of the group…it’s sort of Zeitgeist+,” says Billy of American Gothic, the title of which is “continued comment on the state of our country.”

“I had written a bunch of material during the residencies in Asheville and San Francisco [earlier this year],” continues Billy, “and fans kept asking us if we were gonna put any of that stuff out. iTunes came to us wanting to do something together, so it just felt right.”

That said, there have been a lot of negative reviews of Zeitgeist, suggesting that the Pumpkins reforming was not the second coming of Christ that people expected it to be.

Will American Gothic improve upon that? Guess we’ll find out in the new year…

Funny how a great track can totally pass you by. I Write Sins Not Tragedies has been getting a load of radio play recently, so I assume it’s a new tune in the Fall Out Boy tradition.

Wrong. It was actually released in February and October last year.

I could write about how this sounds so like Fall Out Boy that it’s almost emo-by-numbers, but the truth is the song just rocks. What greater pleasure is there in life other than screaming “haven’t you people ever heard of/closing the goddamn door” at the top of your lungs?

I Write Sins was Panic! At The Disco’s first single to have a music video, and what a freak-fest it is too. It features a wedding attended by a bunch of clowns (if you’ve ever gotten married, you’ll relate to this), where the bride argues with the groom and is later found outside kissing one of the circus freaks.

Great tune, great video. Here it is again in case you missed it first time round…

Positive Reviews

• Johnny Firecloud – “What makes their sixth studio album so good isn?t the fact that Grohl has found a way to take the signature Foo sound to a higher level. He has, but with the help of producer Gil Norton, (knob-turner for 1997?s double-platinum The Colour and the Shape) Grohl has also discovered how to break outside his own mold.”
• John Robinson – “On the last Foos album, “In Your Honour” rock and acoustic music were exiled to different discs. Here, a satisfactory compromise is brokered between the two: the excellent “Summer’s End” is easy on the ear, easier still on the brain, and sets him up in the radio-friendly ?Wonderwall? district one imagines is his spiritual home.”
• Simon T Diplock – “…it brilliantly captures a band on form, back on their toes, and remembering how to rock too. Wonderful.”
• John Murphy – “…this is another fine album from Grohl and company. Their ‘greatest hits’ collection, whenever that’s released, may well prove to be their finest release, but this is just fine to be going on with.”

Neutral Reviews

• Kyle Anderson at Spin – “It’s hard to criticize Grohl for his lack of innovation, because he’s never wanted to start a revolution. But at this point, Foo Fighters’ consistency has become predictability, and it threatens to trap them in the modern-rock ghetto, dangerously close to those guys in Hinder.”
• Ryan Deramos – “Fortunately, the album goes beyond standard Foo fare starting with the fifth track, the aptly titled “Come Alive.” I highly enjoyed the second disc – the acoustic disc – of In Your Honor, and tracks five through twelve successfully not only successfully marry acoustic Foos with loud Foos (often in the same song), but those tracks make babies that further the Foo evolution. All right, those were messy metaphors, but I hope you understand what I mean.”
• David Fricke – “Dave Grohl used to spread this variety across whole albums — the one-man power pop of 1995’s Foo Fighters; the real-band slam of ’97’s The Colour and the Shape; the unplugged CD in the 2005 set In Your Honor. He has finally figured out how to make one record out of all that leeway.”
• Dan Kelly – “In conclusion, this album is a definite improvement on previous effort In Your Honour. More clearly defined and lyrically intelligent, this album easily gets two thumbs up.”

Negative Reviews

• Adam McKibbin – “[Foo Fighters] continue their pace, but without the peppering of truly great songs that propelled their first two albums to the top of the then-crowded alt-rock field. They can still bring the thunder, but the chunky riffs and anthemic alt-rock choruses aren’t always aging kindly.”
• Damien Jones – “Unfortunately when Grohl et al do delve into pastures new it doesn’t quite work. When the charismatic frontman kicks up a country storm on “Summer’s End”, it falls painfully short of the mark.”
• Zane Ewton – “The Foos long ago abandoned humor for a more grown up, morose view of life…On record, they just are not that much fun anymore.”
• Adam Moerder – “Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners highlights the Foo Fighters’ unsolicited willingness to be everything to everybody all the time. Consequently, they’re sounding less and less relatable, leaving us pining not just for the days of a little grunge trio from Seattle, but for the relentlessly catchy and charismatic Dave Grohl of the Foos’ still-fantastic self-titled debut and the better half of The Colour and the Shape.”

Having read through 12 great reviews of the new album, most reviewers are hung up on the slight change in the band’s sound. Some see it as an evolution for the band and embrace it. Others are slightly hostile to it and criticise the inconsistent styles on the album.

One thing they are agreed on however, is that Foo Fighters are on of the most consistently good acts in rock music today. I thought Zane Ewton’s comments about them losing their humor were interesting – it’s been a while since I’ve seen a fun Foo Fighters video.

Anyway, I’ll be having a listen to the album this week, and I’ll let y’all know what I think of it soon…

Done it? Good. Now let’s talk…

I first heard these guys on the cover CD for this month’s Classic Rock magazine, and the music blew my mind. It’s a fully realized mix of swing, opera and heavy metal. I can honestly say I’ve never heard anything like this band in my life – and I love it.

Imagine Evanescence on heavy-duty steroids and you’re still not even close. Regular metal will never sound the same again – what this group do is combine traditionally classical instruments with crushing metal riffs. Amazingly, what comes out the other end of this is crazy, uplifting metal music that is so totally uplifting.

Other music writers are similarly dumbstruck by Diablo Swing Orchestra:

Nowadays, in the metal scene, everyone seems to be doing what bands from the 80’s and early 90’s already shaped, most metal music kept recycling itself over and over again until we sadly got used to that fact without minding much. When a band like D:S:O suddenly appears and breaks the whole metal scheme with such an original sound and renewed vibe, I just can’t help to be utterly impressed as I am right now.

Anyway, I managed to get my hands on a copy of their album, The Butcher’s Ballroom. It’s a sublime listening experience. Balrog Boogie opens the album – it’s the most accessible track on the whole album. It’s followed closely by Heroines, which reminds me of Immigrant Song by Led Zeppelin, but with far more power. I can almost see lead singer Annlouice Loegdlund at the helm of a Viking longboat singing this into a stormy sea.

I’ll maybe review the Butcher’s Ballroom album in the next few days. If you want to get yourself a copy of it, go to Amazon or check out their blog for a list of online stockists.

As far as I’m concerned, Diablo Swing Orchestra are the most original thing to hit the metal scene in decades. I simply can’t remember the last time I’ve been so excited about a metal band as I am about this one. D:S:O are a breath of fresh air for the heavy metal scene and I hope we start to hear more of this cross-genre madness in the future!

You can listen to more songs from the album below:

[tags]Emerging Artists, Rock, Diablo Swing Orchestra, Heavy Metal[/tags]

Needless to say, The Pretender doesn’t disappoint on any level. It starts out with some innocent sounding arpeggios, but soon bursts into life delivering the frenzy that has become a Foo Fighters trademark.

The intro is subject to a bit of debate – some are claiming it’s a “Stairway To Heaven” rip-off, but it sounds more like a snippet from one of those Tenacious D songs he helped out with. It doesn’t matter, because the whole damned song rocks, so stop complaining!

We like hairy Grohl by the way – the more beard the better!

I discovered a couple of old tunes by bands I used to love – like Megadeth – and got introduced to a couple of metal acts I’d never heard of before, but really liked.

I might be wrong, but the quality of playback and the user experience on brightcove videos seems to be a bit better than what you get on YouTube. And while YouTube undoubtedly have a bigger database of tunes, MetalVideo.com hand picks them, which makes it easier to discover new bands.

Let’s face it, any chump can search for a band they know about. It’s discovery services like this that make it easy to find music you’ll like. I’m sure there are plenty of others out there for different genres.

Just so you can get a sample of the quality of Brightcove, here’s Machine Head’s From This Day video.

Their music is best described as psychedelic rock – thick harmonies, reverb and tremolo guitar effects and slow, shuffling beats. The band say their aim is to beat the musical mediocrity that has taken over the industry.

Bizarrely, the members of the band were all born without surnames, so we can only know them by their first names: Tim is guitarist/vocalist, Al plays bass, sings and plays strings (which give a nice dimension to the music without ever sounding like The Corrs). Rick is the lead guitarist and Kenny is the guy who keeps the beat. C’mon guys, get some surnames!

The Minority cite their influences as being bands like Radiohead and Elbow, and songwriters like Nick Drake and David Kitt.

There are three great tracks online now: Empty City, Give Me Time and Know Your Enemies. I particularly like Empty City – quite a haunting track which makes good use of Al’s talents on violin and has a brilliant (slide?) guitar running through it.

Magic. Be sure to check them out – The Minority.

I think legally no publication in the UK is allowed to criticise the Gossip or Beth Ditto at the moment. Ditto seems to have become an overnight sensation and media darling in the UK. It’s not without substance either, because while you’ll read a lot about her view on weight issues, she’s a disarmingly funny and entertaining personality. I watched her guest stint on the Friday Night Project, and loved her sense of humour.

Having addressed the cult of Ditto, Gossip are in the unfortunate position of having masses of tabloid coverage, but little in the way of musical legacy for us to refer to. The biggest release to date was Standing In The Way Of Control, a punk/disco anthem that had virtually universal appeal.

In fairness, if Gossip had released another song like Standing In The Way, I’d have written them off as an unimaginative gimmick act. Other commentators have said that Jealous Girls lacks the substance of the other track, but I’d argue that it shows they have some diversity.

This song is much more minimalist, with a basic drum beat and basic bas and guitar backing, allowing Ditto’s excellent vocal to shine through. It may not have the immediacy of its predecessor, but I reckon folk will warm to it.

By the way, loved the quote over on Fake DIY about how

finally ‘Jealous Girls’ is seeing the light of day, and hopefully about to rescue Gossip’s much-touted credibility. Or, at least convince Beth Ditto’s New Look fanbase she’s not just ‘that girl what sings that song off tv’”

The Jealous Girls Video

WTF? Venetian blinds and a red and blue lighting scheme from the 80’s. Denim jacket and white bow in Ms Ditto’s hair. The Jealous Girls video is a celebration of all things lo-fi.

The bowl haircut makes her look a bit too much like her mucker, Kelly Osbourne:

Apocalyptica are a band best known for their string-based covers of Metallica songs. Frustrating for the band, as they’ve been around since 1996 and doing a variety of different things in the intervening years.

Ahead of the release of their latest album, Worlds Collide, they’re releasing the new single I’m Not Jesus, which features Corey Taylor of Slipknot.

I’m Not Jesus is a healthy dose of old-skool metal: driving riffs and impassioned vocals from Taylor. No gimmicks.

Judging from the lyrics, it seems to be an attack on the church and abusive priests:

I’ve thought you were a good man,
I’ve thought you talked to god.
Your hippocratic messiah and child abusive turned satanic.
Do you remember me?
Do you remember me?
And the kid I used to be?
Do you remember?

What I especially like about this track is the fact that Apocalyptica are pulling such heavy sounds out of traditionally classical instruments. I’d love to see this stuff done live.

Stunning track, it’s released on 3 September in the UK.

We are the angry mob
We read the papers every day
We like who we like, we hate who we hate
But we’re all so easily swayed

It just conjures up those images in The Simpsons, where the entire town of Springfield has a knee-jerk reaction on the basis of some ill-founded news item and goes on the rampage. I think the Kaisers do an excellent job of bringing home the ignorance of the populace and how easily the public can be sucked in by the media.

I think a lot of the strength of Angry Mob comes from it being the title track for the new album and the repetition of the chorus on the lead out. Also not to be missed are those biting, suspended guitar chords that are left to hang as the bass and drums carry the track forward.

The Angry Mob: The Video

The video brilliantly sends up hen night culture, with two rival groups of hens clashing on a night out. They’re vulgar, offensive and drunk and there’s some spectacularly violent scenes as the two hen parties square up to each other. That headbutt looked especially nasty…check it out;

Big thumbs up from us. Classic Kaiser Chiefs.