Ahoy! Sorry for the tardy update this month but we are still getting settled in the new Matinée office. The move is over, and we finally have all the Matinée stock in one place again. Thanks for your patience! This is a fairly short update as we plan to resume our timely news reports next month.
As you may have noticed if you visited the site during the past week, the April Artist of the Month is Lovejoy! One of the early signings for the label, Lovejoy released their debut "A Taste of The High Life" EP (matinée 012) in January 2000. Later that year came the magnificent debut album "Songs in the Key of Lovejoy" (matcd008) and a special holiday single "A Christmas Wish" (matinée 025). The band followed up with the highly anticipated "Lovejoy Plays Biff Bang Pow!" single (matinée 028) in 2001 and the daring "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire" album (matcd018) in 2002. Since then, Lovejoy has contributed exclusive songs to our recent collections "Matinée 50", "The Matinée Autumn Assortment" (matinée 051) and "Romantic and Square is Hip and Aware" (matcd030). So yes, they are a prolific bunch only limited by the size of the meager Matinée recording budget! Lovejoy are responsible for so many fantastic moments in the Matinée history that it is really difficult to pick a highlight, but for those of you who have not discovered their magic, we suggest that "Butter Wouldn't Melt," "Radio," "Hug Me Honey" and "You Fell From Grace" (all featured on the sounds page) may be a good place to start.
To coincide with the Artist of the Month residency, we have updated the Lovejoy artist page with links to a bunch of interviews and the very cool "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire" video produced by Alistair Fitchett of the superb Tangents website. The page also includes a poll about your favorite Lovejoy song and everyone who enters has the chance to win a special prize. On the sounds page, we have added three Lovejoy mp3s, including an exclusive demo of "Nicotine + Love" which will feature in different form on a forthcoming Lovejoy album this summer. Finally, now is the time to complete your Lovejoy collection as all releases are on sale at the mailorder this month only. We're including free Lovejoy badges with all orders so get to it! Those 7" singles all have exclusive tracks so they won't last forever and you will kick yourself if you wait until they are only available on eBay.
Respondents to the Artist of the Month poll in March awarded "I Do Not Not Love You" a narrow victory over "Summerness" as the favorite Melodie Group song. "Wildest Dream" came in third. Thanks to everyone who voted!
In tour news, lucky Antipodeans can witness live dates with The Lucksmiths and Pipas in just ten
days! The bands hit it off at last year's San Francisco Pop Holiday and reconvened for a handful of shows in London
and Madrid last October before hatching a plan for this series of Australian dates:
April 30th Melbourne, Australia at Corner Hotel (+ The Smallgoods & Mid State Orange)
May 1st Canberra, Australia at Tilley's
May 6th Brisbane, Australia at The Troubadour
May 7th Sydney, Australia at The Annandale (+ The Smallgoods & The Zebras)
May 8th Katoomba, Australia at The Clarendon (Pipas & Darren Hanlon but no Lucksmiths)
For more information, check the Pipas,
Lucksmiths or Candle
Records webites. Pipas play an Australian warm-up show tomorrow (April 21st) in London at the Arts Café with
new Rough Trade band Aberfeldy so if you happen to read this in the next 24 hours and are already in London well off
you go.
Staying with Pipas for another moment, their brilliant "Bitter Club" EP (matinée
052) is still featured on a new release rack near you! In reviewing the disc,
Tangents pulled out all the alliterative punches, calling it "a perfectly
proportioned parcel of pure Pop...pocket masterpieces that light up the sky with brittle cracks of spangled
phosphorescence." Erasing Clouds wrote "whether
Pipas are teasing you with a hint of a manic dance groove or calming you into a Sunday afternoon spent crying over
old photos, they know the path to your heart," while
Pennyblack
concluded "quite frankly, Pipas could probably put the stations of the London Underground to music and we'd all still be
fawning over it!" Yes, we would! Check out what all the fuss is about...pick up "Bitter Club" or a copy of the freshly
repressed album "A Cat Escaped" today.
Also receiving a lot of respect is the celebrated "Romantic and Square is Hip and Aware" compilation
(matcd030) featuring 12 Matinée bands remaking a favorite song by 80s legends
The Smiths! In reviewing the album, Delusions of
Adequacy wrote "what makes this tribute so perfect is that these are talented bands putting their own take on
Smiths songs, giving them a fresh and new feel while showcasing the Smiths' brilliant songwriting. And since Matinée
is at the forefront of the best modern indie-pop, the quality here is assured. In short, this is the perfect tribute to the
Smiths." Meanwhile, Losing Today wrote a second
piece on the CD with a nice track-by-track analysis, summarizing with "all in all a beautifully gathered collection of long
forgotten memories and a long overdue reminder of some of the greatest treasures to be found in pop's crown." Yes sir;
believe the hype. You can see the full tracklisting and read the excellent reviews here,
or just head straight to the order page because you know you want one, right?
Also glistening are recent albums "Tide" (matcd029) from The Liberty Ship,
"Now Is Then" (matcd028) from The Windmills, "A Little Distraction"
(matcd027) from The Lucksmiths, and "Singles 1989-1992"
(matcd026) from Brighter, plus our "Matinée Autumn Assortment" CD
(matinée 051), "True Love Waits Volume Two" EP (matinée
048) from The Pines, and "California Morning" EP (matinée 043) from The
Young Tradition. Click those links to read all the latest reviews, and catch up with this essential Matinée listening
while there is a break in the new release action!
Next up on the release schedule are brilliant new albums from The Fairways and Would-Be-Goods. "This is Farewell"
(matcd031) is the swansong for San Francisco pop darlings The Fairways.
The CD is held up slightly in the art department, but the good news is that we may be adding three more tracks to the
CD! More news on the release in the May update. For now, have a listen to "The Back of Her Hand" playing on the
sounds page.
The brilliant new album "The Morning After" (matcd032) from Would-Be-Goods
is also awaiting final artwork but should be ready very soon. The tracklisting is now set as 1. Pantomime Devil, 2.
Morning After, 3. Bluebeard, 4. Big Cat Act, 5. Le Crocodile, 6. Too Old, 7. What Adam and Eve Did Next, 8. I Broke the
Spell, 9. The King of Lace, 10. Miss La-di-dah, 11. Innocent Abroad, 12. Dear St Valentine. You can preview "Morning
After" and "Miss La-di-dah" now playing on the sounds page. Look for complete release
details next month.
Ten other Matinée artists are currently in the studio, so the summer is shaping up to be our best yet!
The Matinée mailorder is closed April 28th through May 5th, but feel free to send orders anyway and we will ship everything on the 6th. Thanks again for your support! Finally, the March hit parade confirms that "Romantic and Square is Hip and Aware" is tops!
10. Various - The Matinée Spring Collection! CD
9. Various - Matinée 50! CD
8. The Windmills - Now Is Then CD
7. The Lucksmiths - A Little Distraction CD
6. Brighter - Singles 1989-1992 CD
5. Various - The Matinée Summer Splash! CD
4. The Liberty Ship - Tide CD
3. Pipas - Bitter Club CDEP
2. Various - The Matinée Autumn Assortment! CD
1. Various - Romantic and Square is Hip and Aware CD
See you next month with more news.
adios,
Jimmy