• It's baaaaaaack.

Per usual, fans will be buying in on well-earned faith in Goldenvoice's ability to throw a festival worth attending. The lineup won't be revealed until early next year, but perennial speculation rituals never really stop (dozens of forum threads on whether 2014 be the year that we get lucky and see Daft Punk's long-awaited return are already buzzing). One minor quirk: festival junkies heading out early for Sasquatch or already raving at Primavera should plan their proximity to wifi carefully: the Coachella pre-sale opens on Friday morning at 10 PDT and, if past performance is an indicator of future results, the early bird ticket pool will probably be exhausted within an hour or two. Plan your internet connections accordingly.

While more tickets will likely be available next year, the pre-sale is the only window of opportunity to get in on the the payment plan option, which takes a 20-percent down payment and splits the remaining charges over the remainder of 2013.

Questions, answers, and more details are available at the Coachella Advance Sale FAQs; eager buyers can prepare their accounts for weekend one and weekend two ahead of time to make purchases slightly less chaotic during Friday's pre-sale.

Via The Quietus

One of the most potent psych-rock bands of the ’80s/’90s, Loop, will be reforming to play a series of shows this year and next and curating All Tomorrow’s Parties’ End of an Era Fest Part 2 in Camber Sands, England, in November. Let us hope a US tour with a stop in Seattle materializes. I was lucky enough to witness Loop play live in Detroit in 1990 and it was a magmatic experience; their cover of Can’s “Mother Sky” tore the roof off the Majestic Theater; luckily it was spring, so we didn't freeze.

Read band leader Robert Hampson’s statement on the reformation of Loop, who split in 1991, after the jump. Now please enjoy one of Loop’s most lysergic trips.

Side note: Both Hampson’s site and a Loop fan page are down now due to bandwidth limits being exceeded. People are stoked.

Continue reading »

In this week's music section we ran an Up & Coming for the upcoming Jaymay show at the Vera Project, but after the paper had gone to press, Jaymay's manager announced that the tour has been cancelled. Via jaymaymusic.com:

Over the past few days Jaymay has become increasingly sick with what we now know to be advanced symptoms of Crohn’s disease. Regrettably, due to both the severity of her symptoms and the advice of her doctors, we have no choice but to cancel all upcoming dates of her current tour.

Jaymay is deeply disappointed and truly sorry for the inconvenience this causes venues, concert promoters and her fans. We intend to spend the coming months helping Jaymay regain her health and will make every effort to reschedule all cancelled performances at a future date.

Lots of good vibes sent your way, Jaymay! Hope you're feeling better very soon.

From the BBC today: The Greater Manchester Police have begun recognizing attacks on subcultures like goth and emo (and punk and metal, etc.) as hate crimes.

Assistant Chief Constable Garry Shewan said this new understanding of hate crime was a "major breakthrough", adding: "This means that we can recognise the impact that alternative subculture hate crime has on its victims and the wider community. Any crime motivated by hate is an insidious and evil crime and I hope other forces will follow our lead."

So awesome. Read the article here.

Carly Rae Jepsen, singer of "Call Me Maybe" (you're welcome for screwing your afternoon with that ear worm!), has withdrawn her participation in this summer's Boy Scouts Jamboree, after an online petition from gay Eagle Scout Derek Nance asking her and Train not to perform for the organization because they still ban gay members got tens of thousands of signatures and garnered attention from GLAAD.

This morning, Jepsen tweeted: "As an artist who believes in equality for all people, I will not be participating in the Boy Scouts of America Jamboree this summer..."

On Friday, Train released this statement:

When we booked this show for the Boy Scouts of America we were not aware of any policy barring openly gay people from participation within the organization. Train strongly opposes any kind of policy that questions the equality of any American citizen. We have always seen the BSA as a great and noble organization. We look forward to participating in the Jamboree this summer, as long as they make the right decision before then.

The Boy Scouts of America board members are set to vote again on the policy sometime in May. In a press release this morning, Nance, who came out and left the Scouts earlier this year, said, "A Scout is brave, and I'm thrilled that Carly Rae and Train have joined me in standing up for what is right. I hope the Boy Scouts of America also choose to be brave this May." Good work, all around! (Except for the Scouts board, so far.)

The juiciest tidbit of Whitney Houston's newly released FBI file must be the fact that she was allegedly extorted for a tidy sum of money in the early 1990s. Apparently a woman threatened to reveal "intimate details regarding [Houston's] romantic relationships" and would agree to sign a confidentiality agreement if compensated. Houston's FBI file also includes a confidentiality agreement allegedly signed by the woman.

What could the intimate details be? How much money does it cost to suppress such information? If Houston wasn't saving all of her love for me, who was she saving it for?

The world will probably never, ever know.