NEWS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
February 22, 2008
Contacts:
James Duft, Utne Reader
jduft@ogdenpubs.com
(785) 274-4439
Andrew Perkins, Utne Reader
aperkins@ogdenpubs.com
(785) 274-4378
Move over mainstream music … Anti-/Utne’s coming to town
Utne Reader and Anti- Records partner to host energetic, eclectic SXSW showcase
AUSTIN, Texas – What do a Grammy-nominated indie rock band, a rapping, post-modern Beck-like bluesman from Brooklyn and an Englishman who fuses Woody Guthrie-like folk with angst a la The Clash have in common?
They, along with three other diverse acts, will rock the Anti-/Utne Reader showcase March 13 at the South By Southwest Music and Media Conference and Festival (SXSW). The showcase’s esteemed artists include an English populist with an axe – and an electric guitar – to grind, and a Denver quartet that uses everything from a bouzouki to a violin in its version of pop music. The complete lineup includes Billy Bragg, DeVotchKa, Tim Fite, Islands, Man Man and The Weakerthans. See below for more information on each of the Anti- artists performing at the Anti-/Utne Reader showcase at SXSW.
Alternative press icon Utne Reader and acclaimed independent record label Anti- have teamed up to present this impressive bill. The concert will take place at the Cedar Street Courtyard, 208 W. 4th St. in Austin, Texas, and attendees must have an SXSW badge to join the fun.
About Utne Reader
Utne Reader (www.Utne.com) has been a purveyor of independent ideas and alternative culture for almost 25 years. Culling material from more than 1,500 independent publications, Web sites, blogs, zines, books, films and other off-the-beaten-path sources, Utne Reader distills the best writing and most compelling topics into a single source, keeping readers at the forefront of emerging culture by covering trends and ideas that won’t appear in the mainstream media for months or even years. In everything from the environment to the economy, politics to pop culture, those who want to know what’s happening next read Utne Reader first.
About Anti- Records
Anti- Records (www.anti.com) has made its name over the years as the label that supports “real artists creating great recordings on their own terms,” and is home to such notables as Tom Waits, Bettye Lavette, Nick Cave, Michael Franti and Neko Case, among others.
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Featured artists at the Anti-/Utne Reader showcase March 13 at Cedar Street Courtyard:
Billy Bragg
Considered a “national treasure” in his native England, populist Billy Bragg has long been a cult hero in the U.S. In more than two decades of carrying the torch, Bragg has melded the folksy populism of Woody Guthrie with the anger and indignation of The Clash. Both are perfectly encapsulated on his Anti- debut, Mr. Love and Justice.
DeVotchKa
Perhaps best known for the Grammy-nominated soundtrack to the hit indie film Little Miss Sunshine, DeVotchKa captures the dramatic grandeur of the American Southwest and imparts it onto their gallant version of Eastern European folk and indie rock. Their Anti- Records debut, A Mad and Faithful Telling, is cinematic in its richness, crossing borders and continents as the instruments unspool and singer Nick Urata’s voice soars.
Tim Fite
Straight out of Brooklyn comes the quirky, dense genre bender, likened to both “a novelty rapper and a postmodern, Beck-like acoustic bluesman” by Jim DeRogatis at the Chicago Sun-Times. 2007 saw the release of Fite’s scathing examination of consumerism, greed and the farcical nature of hip-hop stardom on Over the Counter Culture, a free, Web-only record that, despite its seeming obscurity, topped many critics’ top-10 lists for the year. On May 6, Fite will release his defining work, Fair ’Aint Fair, which combines his anti-consumerist message with rich, compelling music and strong degrees of humor and humanity.
Islands
The indie rock innovators from Montreal have just signed with Anti-, and Arm’s Way, their follow-up to 2005’s inaugural and magnificent Return to the Sea, will be released on May 20. Sprawling and symphonic, the new album finds singer/writer Nick Thorburn truly coming into his own as a composer, and the band at the height of its considerable power as performers.
Man Man
Part swampy juke-joint brawlers, part smooth Philly warehouse doo-wop crooners, Man Man brings its incomparable vision of “pop music” to bear with Rabbit Habits, its Anti- Records debut. Having honed their legendarily exuberant live show to hypothalamus-tickling perfection opening for such indie stalwarts as Modest Mouse, Arcade Fire and Cat Power, the band has captured the fiery spirit and essence of a Man Man show and etched it into 45 minutes of the most raucous, weirdly moving, spiritually uplifting music this side of Oppenheimer’s great beyond.
The Weakerthans
The 2007 release Reunion Tour is a superb tome from indie rock’s most singular narrators. Recorded after-hours above a closed factory in the cold Canadian spring, the record weaves the frontier loneliness of the environment into rich lyrical yarns four years in the making. Songs such as “Sun in an Empty Room” and “Civil Twilight” tell of individual journeys with a melancholic empathy that Paste magazine has described as “songs of brutal beauty, little rock ’n’ roll vignettes that perfectly capture the malaise of the peculiar, disorienting times in which we live.”
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NOTE: Photos or logos of acts available at www.anti.com/press.