Artist of the Month: We the Kings

We the Kings American pop-punk band is making a big splash in the music scene! These Kings are the new teenage heartthrobs serenading us with lyrics like “Heaven can wait up high in the sky it’s you and I.” Talented and under 25 they have already released a self-titled album back in 2007. Their new single Heaven Can wait is now out with a new video premiering on MTV. Their second highly anticipated album Smile, Kid is to be released on December 8^th.  If you haven’t heard about them by now, you will soon!

We the Kings grew up in Bradenton, Florida and got there name from their middle school they attended King Middle school. We the Kings have four band members ranging in ages 19-22; Travis Clark standing out not only because of his red hair, but for his awesome vocals. Hunter Thomsen guitar and backing vocals and Drew Thomson bass player are brothers. While Danny Duncan bangs out the drums. The band attributes their musical performance blend to Jimmy Eat world and Third Eye Blind. Determined to make music that you will still sing, long from now, and I think that We the Kings is on the right track with the catchy melodies that are easy to sing along to.

Five Crown Points that make them the Kings of the Month

• They are young and upcoming Artist
• New single and video for heaven can wait is Awesome
• New album Smile, Kid comes out in December
• They are on tour Glamour Kills Tour with All time low, Hey Monday, and Friday Night boys.
• In Phoenix 11.05.09 at the Marquee theater
• You won’t be able to stop singing their songs!

Check We the Kings out for yourself at: http://www.myspace.com/wethekings

Artist of the Month Franz Ferdinand

Franz Ferdinand has been selected as our August Artist of the Month and will be performing in Phoenix on August 22 supporting Green Day.   Fan reviews have been poping up all over the internet since they started their supporting role of this tour, and it appears that Franz Ferdinand lives up to their 2006 NME award for’ Best Live Band’, which makes From the Crowd even more excited for the upcoming concert.

Formed in Glasgow, Scotland the band is composed of Alex Kapranos (lead vocals and guitar), Bob Hardy (bass guitar), Nick McCarthy (rhythm guitar, keyboards and backing vocals) and Paul Thomson (drums, percussion and backing vocals).  The band is named after the Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, whose assassination preceded World War I.  The band picked it after seeing a racehorse called The Archduke Ferdinand. They began discussing the Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria assassination and World War I and eventually decided to use the name as their band name

You might be thinking, this band sounds familiar, and they should be.  In January, they released their third album, “Tonight: Franz Ferdinand” which debut at #9 on the Billboard charts. Anything?  Their sophomore album, “You Could Have It So Much Better” also hit it big on the Billboard charts in 2005. Ok, remember that song in 2004 that had everyone seeing ‘I donno’ and then bopping around, well maybe that was just us, however, this Scottish rock band hit it big that year with single ”Take Me Out”.  The addictive beat and lyrics helped them cross across the pond to become fairly main stream here in the states.  If this still doesn’t ring any bells, you might remember their performance at the Grammy Awards in 2005 where they performed “Take Me Out” as a live medley with Los Lonely Boys, Maroon 5, Black Eyed Peas and Gwen Stefani. Still not there, play guitar hero? “Take Me Out” is a featured song.  Yes…  see you do know them.

Coming back to present day,  “Cant Stop Feeling”  is the third single to recently hit the airways, released on 6 July.  You can hear it playing on 103.9 in Phoenix.  Then again, just go out and grab their latest CD, you won’t be disappointed.  Better yet, grab a ticket to the concert on August 22.  Two great bands in one night?  Well worth the price.

We will be sure to link our concert review and photos shortly after the August 22 performance.  In the mean time, here is the Franz Ferdinand official bio, to provide you with a more intimate look at the band:

The marquee of a theatre before a show.

It’s music of the night: to fling yourself around your room to as you psyche yourself for an evening of hedonism, for the dance-floor, flirtation, for your desolate heart-stop, for losing it and loving losing it, for the chemical surge in your bloodstream. It’s for that lonely hour gently rocking yourself, waiting for dawn and it all to be even again.

By the end of 2006 we were exhausted - physically, emotionally and creatively. We’d been in the studio or on the road for three years without a break and we needed one. Alex went to Vancouver with the Cribs, Paul raised a family, Bob made a film and Nick disappeared in South America. We met up again in Glasgow a few months later, happy to be in each other’s company and excited about creating something new.

Nick found a building for our HQ. He has a knack for it. It was a crumbling Victorian town hall, recently vacated by the drug rehabilitation unit that was the last tenant. The flock wallpaper was peeling a little and the psychedelic municipal carpet was browned with fifty years of council nicotine, but the vibe was great and the monthly rent was half the daily rate of a London studio. There was a noise complaint from the nearby home for the deaf after our first session, but after we blocked the windows with fibreglass and rockwall nobody knew we were there. Daylight disappeared and night became permanent. We didn’t notice it, but the mood of the record began to form.

We started writing, but there wasn’t a plan. There has never been a plan. As we wrote songs, we played them out at gigs - not huge gigs, but sweaty pub basements and social clubs, keeping it word of mouth and chaotic, giving the new music room to live or die. You don’t realise what’s good about a song until you play it to people. You also don’t know if a song’s crap until you play it to people. ‘Anyone In Love’ died in the Captain’s Rest, but Turn It On turned us on. ‘English Goodbye’ died in the British Aluminium Club, Fort William, but Ulysses became something more than it was when we left Glasgow.

We spent a few days with Brian Higgins and his Xenomania team in Kent. We enjoyed the time and it was inspiring, but it became clear to both of us that we shouldn’t make a record together. Our worlds are too different.

The HQ evolved into a studio with the help of Paul Savage. Paul was drummer of the Delgadoes and the engineer at Chem 19, the Chemikal Underground studio in Glasgow. We brought over an old Flickinger console that Bill Skibbe found for us in Michigan and Allen Johnston wired the rooms.

Then we met Dan Carey. He was perfect as a producer - a mad mixer, a chaotic experimenter. Recording with him is like breaking into a science lab with a mischievous brainbox who wants to see what we can blow up. We had a laugh.

Nick climbed into the rafters of the hall to hang a mic from a thirty foot cable which Dan swung across an amp kicked over and feeding back from Alex’s guitar, so we could warp the sound with the Doppler effect of a passing racing car or a diving spitfire on What She Came For. A gaggle of obscure and long forgotten 70’s synths were mobilised for the likes of Can’t Stop Feeling & Lucid Dreams. Superslinkies hung from the ceiling as primitive spring reverb. Sometimes, on the likes of Live Alone, we’d go super hi-fi and tight in the dead room, then, on tracks like Send Him Away we’d rock out in the cellar under the stage, playing to one mic, so it sounded like it was just you and the band in the room when you played the tape back. We rattled human bones for percussion on No You Girls and sang into the darkness, nothing for company apart from the tingle on your spine and the ghosts of the Saturday night dancing.

Anyway, here it is. Tonight: Franz Ferdinand. You can listen to it quiet, but it’s better loud. You can listen to it

Jack’s Mannequin Artist of the Month

Originally a side project started in 2004, Jack’s Mannequin has taken on a life of its own.  Jack’s Mannequin, which Andrew McMahon formed in 2004 with guitarist Bobby Anderson, bassist Jonathan Sullivan, and drummer Jay McMillan in Orange County, CA.

Currently, you can find Jack’s Mannequin on tour with The Fray promoting their sophomore effort, “The Glass Passanger”. “Swim” the new single from the album is currently making quite an impact at Hot AC radio. A new video for the track was filmed last week and directed by Steven Murahsige and features a cast of JM fans and a performance filmed in Hollywood that underscores the song’s passionate and empowering lyrical perspective. The “Swim” video is expected to impact airwaves and various video outlets by mid-July.

Remaining Tour Dates with The Fray

Jul 14 Dodge Theatre Phoenix, AZ
Jul 16 Journal Pavilion Albuquerque, NM
Jul 17 The Pearl Las Vegas, NV
Jul 18 USANA Amphitheatre Salt Lake City, UT
Jul 21 Target Center Minneapolis, MN
Jul 22 Starlight Theatre Kansas City, MO
Jul 24 Superpages.com Center Dallas, TX
Jul 25 Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion Houston, TX
Jul 28 Cricket Wireless Amphit San Diego, CA
Jul 29 Verizon Wireless Amphit Los Angeles, CA
Jul 31 Sleep Train Amphit Sacramento, CA
Aug 1 Shoreline Amphit/ Mountain View San Francisco, CA
Aug 4 Rose Garden Arena Portland, OR
Aug 5 U.B.C. Thunderbird Arena Vancouver, BC
Aug 6 White River Amphitheatre Seattle, WA
Aug 7 Spokane Arena Spokane, WA

If you’re unable to ge to a show, you can also check out Jack’s Mannequin on Jimmy Kimmel Live on July 30th.     

Street Sweeper Social Club May 09 AotM

Photo Credit: Romy Suskin

Taking the music scene by storm once again, Tom Morello and Boots Riley seem to have another iconic band on their hands. Street Sweeper Social Club, the new band unifying Tom Morello and Boots Riley, first album does not even debut until June 16th, but they’ve already packed houses in NYC and have had the groups first single “100 Little Curses” added to KROQ.

Their debut self-titled album is out June 16th through Warner Music Group’s Independent Label Group. The 11-song set was produced by Tom Morello and features Boots Riley on vocals, Morello on guitar and bass, and Stanton Moore (Galactic) on drums.

As if all of the buzz the band has been getting is not enough, Street Sweeper Social Club’s debut tour will be opening all dates in North America on the Nine Inch Nails and Jane’s Addiction May-June Tour (confirmed dates below).  The tour will find Nine Inch Nails and Jane’s Addiction sharing a stage for the first time since the debut of the Lollapalooza festival in 1991 (as well as the first tour by the original lineup of Jane’s Addiction in seventeen years).

Phoenix, why would you miss this? SSSC’s debut tour with Nine Inch Nails and Jane’s Addiction will be here on Friday May 15 at the Cricket Wireless Pavilion.

Tom Morello of SSSC performs at the Tempe Music Festival Photo Credit: Stephanie Baldwin

Tom Morello is a founding member and guitarist of the rock bands Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave. The two bands are responsible for multiple Grammy Awards and a combined 30 million albums sold worldwide. Morello has also received critical acclaim as a solo artist known as The Nightwatchman. Widely celebrated for his unique voice as a master electric guitarist, he is recognized by Rolling Stone Magazine as one of the “100 Greatest Guitar Players of All-Time (#26).” He is also one of only two guitarists featured as a playable animated character in the overwhelmingly popular Activision video game Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock. Tom Morello graduated from Harvard University with honors as a Political Science major and has been a widely recognized political activist throughout his career. With System of a Down’s Serj Tankian, Morello formed Axis of Justice, an organization whose purpose is to bring together musicians, music fans, and grassroots political organizations to fight for social justice.

Boots Riley is best known as the leader of The Coup, the seminal Hip-Hop group from Oakland, CA. As a producer and lyricist, Riley has crafted critically acclaimed albums for The Coup that have graced the year-end Top 10 lists of Rolling Stone, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, and more. They have also received “Album of the Year” honors from The Washington Post, Time Out New York, while Billboard Magazine declared the group “the best hip-hop act of the past decade.” Born in Chicago and raised in East Oakland’s Funktown neighborhood, Boots became a teenage community organizer. From his history of student organizing in Oakland’s public schools, serving on the central committee for the Progressive Labor Party, being the President of Youth InCar (Youth International Committee Against Racism), organizing to build California’s Anti-Racist Farm Workers’ Union, to developing “guerrilla hip hop concerts” (mobile concerts on flatbed trucks), Boots Riley has been an integral part of the progressive struggle for radical change through culture.

Street Sweeper Social Club with Nine Inch Nails and Jane’s Addiction

May 14 - Albuquerque, NM Journal Pavilion
May 15 - Phoenix, AZ Cricket Wireless Pavilion
May 16 - Chula Vista, CA Cricket Wireless Amphitheatre
May 20 - Irvine, CA Verizon Wireless Amphitheater
May 21 — Santa Barbara, CA Santa Barbara Bowl
May 22 -Mountain View, CA Shoreline Amphitheatre at Mountain View
May 24 - The Gorge, WA Sasquatch Festival
May 26 - Englewood, CO Fiddler’s Green Amphitheatre
May 27 - Kansas City, MO Starlight Theatre
May 29 - Chicago, IL Charter One Pavilion at Northern Island (NIN/SSSC ONLY)
May 30 - Noblesville, IN Verizon Wireless Music Center Indianapolis
May 31 - Clarkston, MI DTE Energy Music Theatre
June 02 - Toronto, ON Molson Amphitheatre
June 03 - Mansfield, MA Comcast Center
June 05 - Camden, NJ Susquehanna Bank Center
June 06 - Holmdel, NJ PNC Bank Arts Center
June 07 - Wantagh, NY Nikon at Jones Beach Theater
June 09 - Columbia, MD Merriweather Post Pavilion
June 10 - Burgettstown, PA Post-Gazette Pavilion
June 12 - Charlotte, NC Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre Charlotte

Myspace:
www.myspace.com/streetsweepersocialclub
The songs “Fight! Smash! Win!,” “Clap For The Killers,” and “The Oath” by Street Sweeper Social Club can be heard now at: www.myspace.com/streetsweepersocialclub and www.streetsweepermusic.com

Street Sweeper Social Club Track Listing: 

1. Fight! Smash! Win!
2. 100 Little Curses
3. The Oath
4. The Squeeze
5. Clap For The Killers
6. Somewhere In the World It’s Midnight
7. Shock You Again
8. Good Morning, Mrs. Smith
9. Megablast
10. Promenade
11. Nobody Moves (Til We Say Go)