Champagne Champagne & Thee Satisfaction/Photo via Rabid Child Images on Flickr

Champagne Champagne & Thee Satisfaction’s “Magnetic Blackness” was arguably Seattle’s favorite hip hop track of ‘09. Both groups gained a lot of momentum last year, and a performance of “Magnetic Blackness” was featured in Lynn Shelton’s $5 Cover Seattle series for MTV. The song is catchy and dancey, giving it a wide appeal, and quickly making it the most anticipated song of every Champagne Champagne show.

The song has finally been recorded, and Champagne Champagne/Thee Satisfaction will be releasing a 7″ single (out on Members Only) at a Phizz reunion show tonight at Can Can.

Phizz was a monthly series of free shows put on by Champagne Champagne at Belltown’s McLeod Residence in 2008, featuring performances by local hip hop acts like Mad Rad, Cancer Rising, Fatal Lucciauno, Mango Dunks, and Champagne Champagne.

The Single’s B-side, “Bird Lives”, (which also features both groups) is equally awesome, and can be heard here:

Tonight’s show features performances by Champagne Champagne & Thee Satisfaction, as well as sets from DJ’s Dev, Darwin and Swervewon. $8 at the door, 21+.

Photo via sparkrobot on Flickr

It was announced yesterday that Ancacortes all-stars The Lonely Forest have been signed to Trans, Chris Walla’s newest label (an imprint on Atlantic Records).

The signing is not the first time Walla–of Death Cab for Cutie fame–has shown interest in The Lonely Forest. Last May, he mentioned the band in an interview with CNN:

There’s a band from Seattle called the Lonely Forest whose record I just picked up. They’re a new band, it came out few weeks ago, and that’s totally doing it for me right now.

Walla has done his fair share of producing, mostly for Northwest acts like Telekinesis, The Long Winters, The Decemberists, The Thermals and The Postal Service.

You can catch The Long Winters playing an all-ages show at Neumos on March 2nd, opening for We Were Promised Jetpacks.

Anywayyyy without further ado, I’m happy to announce that this year’s lineup includes:
My Morning Jacket, Massive Attack, Public Enemy, Pavement, Ween, Vampire weekend, MGMT, Band of Horses, The National, LCD soudsystem, Tegan & Sara, BSS, Passion Pit, She & Him, Nada Surf, New Pornographers, The XX, Dirty Projectors, OK Go, Drive By Truckers, Kid Cudi, DEADMAU5, The Long Winters, Minus the Bear, The Mountain Goats, Quasi, Camera Obscura, Fruit Bats, Brother Ali, Midlake, Dr. Dog, The Hold Steady, Caribou, Simian Mobile Disco, City & Colour, No Age, The Temper Trap, Vetiver, Miike Snow, Portugal. The Man, Telekinesis, The Middle East, Mayor Hawthorne, Why?, Girls, Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros, Wale, The Lonely Forest, Japandroids, Boys Noize, YACHT, Laura Marling, Patrick Watson, Freelance Whales, Past Lives, Cymbals Eat Guitars, The Low Anthem, The Very Best, Phantogram, Neon Indian, Hudson Mohawke, Nurses, The Tallest Man on Earth, Fresh Espresso, Mumford & Sons, Jets Overhead, tUnE YarDs, Shabazz Palaces, Fool’s Gold, Morning Teleportation, Z-Trip, Dam Funk, Local Natives, Avi Buffalo, Booka Shade, A-Trak, Yes Giantess, Craig Robinson, Rob Riggle, Garfunkel & Oates, Luke Burbank…

…and more to be announced tomorrow!

The Oregon-based ‘indie roots’ festival–held at Pendarvis Farm just outside Portland–features six stages, with various artists playing multiple times over the course of the three-day event.

This is the first I’ve heard of this festival. I’m surprised by how sorely underpublished Pickathon is in the Seattle area–arguably due to overshadowing by the Capitol Hill Block Party, Bumbershoot and Sasquatch. Either way, I’m excited about Pickathon’s great 2010 lineup, which thus far includes:

Bonnie Prince Billy & The Cairo Gang (Sat, Sun), Heartless Bastards (Fri, Sat), Billy Joe Shaver (Fri), Langhorne Slim (Sat, Sun), Frazey Ford (Sat, Sun), The Cave Singers (Fri, Sat), T-Model Ford (Sat, Sun), Black Prairie (Fri, Sat), These United States (Sat, Sun), Megafaun (Fri, Sat), Richmond Fontaine (Fri, Sat), Michael Hurley (Fri, Sat), Roadside Graves (Sat, Sun), Elliott Brood (Sat, Sun), Stone River Boys (Sat, Sun), Red Stick Ramblers (Fri, Sat), Chatham County Line (Sat, Sun), Cotton Jones (Sat, Sun), Breathe Owl Breathe (Sat, Sun), The Deep Dark Woods (Sat, Sun), Black Lillies (Sat, Sun), Casey MacGill’s Blue 4 Trio (Sat, Sun), Foghorn Stringband (Fri), Captain Bogg & Salty (Sun), Martha Scanlan (Fri, Sat), Seth Bernard and May Erlewine (Fri, Sat), Jill Andrews (Sat, Sun), Weinland (Fri, Sat), Sallie Ford (Fri, Sat), Frank Fairfield (Sat, Sun), Water Tower Bucket Boys (Sat, Sun), Town Mountain (Fri, Sat), Woody Pines (Sun).

More bands will be announced in the coming months.

This year’s festival dates are August 6-8, find out more info about camping, tickets and everything else at the festival website.

Image courtesy of Kill Rock Stars Records

Legendary Olympia riot grrrl band Bikini Kill has set up an archive that will feature stories, photos and video footage from fans.

A message from the band:

We are collecting stories of how people got into the band/shows they saw/memories/testimonials etc.

It would be awesome if you wanted to contribute. It doesn’t have to be fancy or well-worded, we’d just like you to leave a record of your experience and get an idea of what Bikini Kill means to you. Maybe it’s your reaction to a song we wrote, something weird that happened at one of our shows, a personal anecdote or just WHATEVER. Send yr story to bkillarchive@gmail.com and we will post it or just leave a comment somewhere on the site. You can also send us images to post.

Please help us spread the word. To document the history (or herstory) of the band it is necessary to include an oral history from “the fans”. We say fans for lack of a better word–a more expansive term would be inclusive of friends, peers, comrades, co-conspirators and imply participation rather than an audience separate from the band–which is what we hope to achieve with this interactive approach.

Also, if you have video/film footage of the band, please contact us, Thanks!

Next Monday, Esurance will be hosting a Sasquatch! launch party at the Crocodile featuring performances from Surfer Blood, Atlas Sound and Fresh Espresso. The show is free, and tickets can be picked up at Easy St. Records on Friday starting at 9 a.m. (get there early, because they will go very fast).

Tough Pavement is the only act confirmed by the Sasquatch! website, bands like Vetiver, Miike Snow, Why?, Neon Indian, Wale and Morning Teleportation are all but officially confirmed for this year’s lineup. And, because of their sets at the launch party, chances are pretty good that Surfer Blood, Atlas Sound and Fresh Espresso will all be there as well.

Check out some of Ear Candy’s Sasquatch! predictions here.

The duo’s first video is for “The High Road”. The song highlights Mercer’s distinctive swooping vocals while contrasting them beautifully with some very un-Shins-like instrumentals. The sound is a little more electronic, with heavier drum breaks and whimsical synths.

The song has a deceptively playful feel, while Mercer’s darker lyrics describe the difficulty of life on ‘the high road’.

Broken Bells’ album is set to be released March 9th on Columbia Records.

Photo courtesy of Kill Rock Stars Records

April 17th is Record Store Day, a day that brings great in-store performances and special releases to record stores across the nation.

This year, Record Store Day means a special release from Portland punk rockers The Thermals, who are dropping a split 7″ single with former tourmates The Cribs.

The single will feature a new song from each band. The Thermals will be contributing “Separate”, and The Cribs “So Hot Now”.

In addition to their Record Store Day release, The Thermals are working on a new album Personal Life, which is being produced by Death Cab renaissance man Chris Walla. The album is scheduled to be released Sept. 7th.

This weekend, The Thermals will embark on a quick California tour with Kill Rock Stars labelmates Thao with the Get Down Stay Down (with whom they released a Record Store Day single last year) before touring through Australia and China, followed by an East Coast tour with Seattle post-punk (and post-Blood Brothers) darlings Past lives.

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On Feb. 11, The Moore is hosting a variety show event called “Defriending Cancer” to benefit the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.

For $28-$48 dollars, you can see comedians Eugene Mirman, Tig Notaro (Sarah Silverman Show), Todd Barry, Natashe Leggero (Cheslea Lately), Tim Heidecker (Tim and Eric Awesome Show), and Neil Hamburger share a stage with The Shins’ James Mercer and Modest Mouse’s Isaac Brock.

This super rad event will be Mercer’s first solo show in Seattle in three years. In March, he’ll be releasing a collaborative record with Dangermouse under the moniker “Broken Bells”.

At some point, one of the admins on this sight designated the Maldives’ 2009 album Listen to the Thunder as a “staff pick”.  This led to a flurry of downloading, making the Listen to the Thunder the #3 downloaded album ever for this site–just behind two Beatles albums.

The record has now been snatched 6,327 times. That’s 702 GB of data.

That’s a lot of money this small band (and their small independent label) are not making.