Music News

Weekly Round Up: Friday 30th May

Friday 30th May, 2014 3:47PM

The tour announcements started early this week, with the legendary Bob Dylan celebrating his 73rd birthday last Sunday by revealing his return to New Zealand for two shows later this year, at the somewhat unlikely cities of Hamilton and Christchurch. From then the announcements came rolling in, so here they are in chronological order: Ex-pat Renee-Louise Carafice is making a rare trip home in early June to take her newly reworked album Power Animals on a four-date tour around the country. The incredible All Seeing Hand are heading on the road with their unique throat-singing-drum-thrashing-turntable-rumbling act for a bunch of dates kicking off next month, with support from Seth Frightening. Also in June, Brooklyn-based producer Sweater Beats will be hitting these shores with his dream-pop variety of r 'n' b that is reported to impress the ladies. Then later in the month, Australian punks DZ Deathrays and local lot Die! Die! Die! are joining forces to play a couple of shows across Wellington and Auckland. In July, bluegrass musician Marlon Williams will be coming home to New Zealand from his current locale in Australia for a nationwide tour to celebrate the release of his new single 'Strange Things'. August will see renowned nu-soul act Ladi6 go on an extensive top-to-toe tour of the country with hip hop crew Team Dynamite. Scottish rock trio Biffy Clyro will be popping over for their first ever New Zealand show in September. Pop icon Katy Perry will be bringing New Zealand "an early Christmas present" by heading over in December to perform two Auckland shows. And finally, English folk musician Passenger has gotten in early to announce two gigs in January next year.

In release news, Earth frontman Dylan Carlson shared a solo track under the moniker Drcarlsonalbion, the song, which is titled 'Gold I' isn't a huge step away from the drone-doom he usually plays but was written as part of a film score he composed for German film Gold. New York punks Parquet Courts unleashed their new album Sunbathing Animal which had been teased out with a couple of solid singles over the last few months, check out our review over here while you simultaneously have a listen to the whole thing. Also on the higher-paced side of sound, hardcore act Trash Talk unveiled a video for thrashy single 'The Hole', which is from their new album No Peace that came out this week via Odd Future Records. Speaking of videos, our very own David Kilgour and his backing band The Heavy Eights have shared a clip for 'Comin' On', a track taken from the upcoming album End Times Undone, due out August 5th through Merge Records. And while it wasn't strictly out this week, we have been enjoying the new offering from The Brian Jonestown Massacre. Titled Revelation, the album saw a very quiet release last week and pleasantly surprised us by showing up in the mailbox a few days ago.

This week's Caught Live is an awesome video of Beast Wars playing a brand new tune (the name has not been divulged) at Cherry Rock in Australia last weekend...