Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Moonlander, Track #3: Both Live


Stone takes a distinctly different, folky turn on Moonlander's third track.  No streaming on this one, folks, sorry. 
"It's a song I wrote while paddling on Lake Washington thinking about a friend who I dreamed set me free from a past restraint. It's more-or-less about how meditation on a conflict can give way to a new understanding. One person doesn't have to lose for the other to win."
Stone also called in The Bob Rivers Show yesterday for a long interview about Moonlander, fatherhood, the Sonics, and Pearl Jam #10, which he claims will be "done in a few weeks."

Photo Credit: Once Upon a Drawing

Friday, April 26, 2013

Stone Giving Away Plush Moonlander Artwork


Want a plush toy to go with your Moonlander vinyl?  Stone will be tweeting a weekly message about softies created to resemble the artwork created for his album by himself and his daughter.  Retweeting enters you into a contest to win one plus a signed print of the original artwork.  From Stone's Facebook page:
Follow Stone Gossard (@SGossard) on Twitter for your chance to win a one-of-a-kind Moonlander softie and limited edition art print signed by Stone.

All fans who retweet the weekly Twitter messages with #MoonlanderGiveaway will have a chance to win a softie and print package. Each package corresponds with Stone's original Moonlander artwork for each track on his forthcoming album.

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

RNDM Coming to World Cafe

RNDM!!

According to RNDM's Twitter account, RNDM will be following up their shows next month with an appearance on National Public Radio.
RNDM has a beef with @worldcafe. Tune in on May 15 for a broadcast of the session. more info at worldcafe.org.
Check the broadcast studio, check here.

Locomotive / Black Book of Fear White Vinyl

Sorry that we're a little late to the game with this one ...



... but earlier this month, Mad Season started giving away white vinyl singles of Locomotive and Black Book of Fear through independent record stores.  If you follow @madseasonmusic or search twitter for #madseasonvinylhunt you'll see pictures of the vinyl at various independent stores around the country.  Head to the store and you can get one of the (limited to 100) vinyl singles.

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Stone Talks to Spin Magazine


Stone talked to Spin Magazine about his recording process and what it took to pull together his friends (and daughter) to create his sophomore effort, which Spin describes as a sidewinding, psychedelic smattering of material that, whether it's cycling between left-field folk, gospel, and rock'n'roll, has audible ties to his work as chief songwriter on Pearl Jam's early, career-defining LPs.

It's not clear whether Stone considers the album to be artistic expression or just some random twiddling on his guitar.

"At the heart of it," he says, "the things I was attracted to then are still the same things I'm attracted to now: oddball riffs that strike my ear as being different, wanting anything to be as cool as 'Down on the Street' by the Stooges or some Jimmy Page riff. I feel shockingly the same. But I think that I was focused much less on lyrics then. Now I'm fascinated by how a lyric can really impact a song."
You can read the whole interview at spin.com.

Moonlander, Track #2: Moonlander


The title track for Stone Gossard's second album, Moonlander, is today's release from the project.
"It's a play on the word honeymoon…it's a song about love and its astronomical odds…the odds of landing on the moon are right up there with finding love, and yet, both happen." - Stone

Monday, April 22, 2013

Mad Season Press and Record Store Day


If you're basking in the glow of Record Store Day at Easy Street Records, you'll probably enjoy this short clip of Mike and Barrett discussing their late friend John Baker Saunders posted by Revolver Magazine (which is also offering a chance to win a Mad Season test pressing).


Also, Ten Club members who missed their opportunity to purchase the Above vinyl on Record Store Day can now pick one up via the Ten Club.  $34.99 plus $8.01 domestic S&H.


Soundgarden Adds Mexico City, May 31


Soundgarden has just tweeted an additional date to their tour next month.
Soundgarden will be playing The Sports Palace in Mexico City on May 31st. Tickets go on-sale Friday at 12:00 PM.

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

Mike McCready and Barrett Martin at Easy Street


If you're heading to Easy Street Records in West Seattle on Record Store Day, April 20th, for your copy of Mad Season's Above on vinyl or for the deluxe reissue, go between 10 and 11am PDT, and you can get it signed by Mike McCready and Barrett Martin.

Tuesday, April 16, 2013

The Moonlander Project

Songs from the album were recorded between 2003-2011," explains Gossard. "Over the last year, I went through all of my old demos and recordings that weren’t used as Pearl Jam or Brad songs and picked my favorites. With the help of Floyd Reitsma (Studio Litho engineer), Pete Droge (Executive Producer), and Hans Teuber (multi-instrumentalist and long time Hank Khoir collaborator) I went about trying to finish them. This included lots of re-singing tracks, fleshing out and re-editing, adding new instruments...
It seems that referring to Stone Gossard's, Moonlander as a "project" rather than an "album" is very apropos.  Do not look for a Moonlander CD.  The plastic is most likely too damaging to the environment for Mr. Gossard.  Moonlander is a collection of 11 songs, written by Gossard, but featuring a bevy of impressive artists: Matt Cameron (Pearl Jam, Soundgarden), Matt Chamberlain, Regan Hagar (Brad, Malfunkshun, Satchel), Pete Droge, Brandon Harper, Gregg Keplinger, Keith Lowe, Barbara Ireland (The Fags) and Hans Teuber.  Each Tuesday for the next 11 weeks, we will be graced with a new song and accompanying artwork.
My daughter loves to paint and draw and when she would, I would as well," says Gossard. "I hope the pieces convey a sense of freedom from formal rules and of playfulness that comes from hanging with your lovely 5-year old.
The first song, I Want Something Different, was released last night and can be streamed or downloaded via SoundCloud.  The Moonlander album is scheduled for digital and limited-edition vinyl release on June 25th.  Leading up to that, Gossard will be releasing two EPs, the first of which can be pre-ordered on iTunes now, with a May 7th release date and the second of which, Luna, will follow on June 4th.  

The full Moonlander tracklisting is below:
  1. I Need Something Different
  2. Moon Landing
  3. Both Live
  4. Your Flames
  5. Battle Cry
  6. King of the Junkies
  7. Remain
  8. I Don't Want To Go To Bed
  9. Bombs Away
  10. Witch Doctor
  11. Beyond Measure

Monday, April 15, 2013

Pearl Jam to Play the Voodoo Music and Arts Experience


Billboard has just announced that Pearl Jam will be appearing at the Voodoo Music and Arts Experience at the City Park Festival Grounds in New Orleans, Louisiana over the weekend of November 1st through the 3rd.  This announcement was followed by an announcement by Pearl Jam which reminded us that there are more US dates coming.  This show will be the final in a series!

Other acts that will be appearing are Nine Inch Nails, Calvin Harris, Bassnectar, Paramore, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, Afrojack, Boys Noize, The Gaslight Anthem, Big Gigantic, How To Destroy Angels, Cults, Alkaline Trio, Desaparecidos and Robert DeLong.

Ticket information is available HERE.

Friday, April 12, 2013

Vedder Jams with Twins Pitcher, Jared Burton

Jared Burton

Eddie Vedder was in Kansas City this week visiting his friend,Twins broadcaster, Ron Coomer.  After watching the Twins drop 3 in a row to the Royals, Vedder soothed their wounds by playing an impromptu set with pitcher, Jared Burton, at the team's hotel.

After singing Better Man and Yellow Ledbetter with Burton on guitar, Vedder took the guitar and continued the set with Porch and the Beatles' cover, You've Got to Hide Your Love Away.


Burton had this to say about his now signed guitar:

That was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, to play with a guy that's a no-doubt rock-and-roll hall of famer.  That's pretty much the end of that guitar, and he was the last guy to play it.

Thursday, April 11, 2013

Catching Up on RNDM News


I sat down to write a post about RNDM  making an appearance on Conan next month, May 9th (Check out teamcoco.com for your local listings), and realized that I missed the news that RNDM had been working on a new album this past January.  According to Joseph and Richard's Facebook pages, they were in the studio around the first of the year working on a new album.

Now the race to the finish begins.  Which album will we see first?  RNDM? Moonlander? Pearl Jam #10? Soundgarden B-Sides?  Mike McCready's solo album? Only time will tell.

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

Moonlander!


What is it?  Stone's solo album?  A new charity?  A chance to win tickets on a space flight?  We don't really know, but according to the Ten Club, Stone's doing it.  In case it is Stone Gossard's sophomore album, follow him on Facebook or Twitter for the updates on Stone's "new Moonlander project."


UPDATE: Moonlander is definitely Stone's second solo album, due out June 25th.  He spoke with Veja São Paulo last week and dropped the song names I Just Need Something Different (would fit on a Pearl Jam album) and Moon Landing.

Ten Club Improvements


For those of you who are members of Pearl Jam's fan club, you got an e-mail today that updated you on some changes they made to their website.

  • Monthly wallpapers (see above)
  • A printable (pdf) membership card
  • Previously-unreleased Yield-era videos by Kevin Shuss
  • New merch - At $40, these dog collars aren't for those of us scraping by, but the artwork is pretty cool.
  • A poster giveaway - To enter this contest for a set of South America 2013 posters, email contest@tenclub.net with the subject: SA Poster Set.

Mike on Shameless and Upcoming Soundtrack for Free Ride


At the tail end of his interview with The Rob in Chile, Mike McCready dropped a little news about two other projects he has worked on.

The first was an episode of Shameless that aired last month.  The episode, called Frank the Plumber, aired on March 17th.
Yeah, if you listen, there some stuff that’s the standard stuff, but they threw some of my stuff throughout it. One of the specific scenes is when he was breaking up with the blonde girl. I can’t remember her name right now. You can hear some stuff on that, ... some weird mood stuff and psychedelic guitar. I just had a great meeting with Ann Kline and the people from Shameless. They were super nice to me and super receptive to ideas. Any time I can do that kinda stuff, it’s a happy thing. 
I think I have something else coming up soon, but I’m not sure. I hope I can do more of that.
The second is a track for the upcoming movie directed by Shana Sosin [Betz] called Free Ride.
I’m just gonna throw out there is one more thing that’s in the works that Barrett [Martin] and I and Stone [Gossard] actually played on and that’s a movie called Free Ride by Shana Sosin and Brandy Carlisle sang on that track. So we’re hoping that that movie gets picked up and does some stuff. I’m very excited about it and Anna Paquin is in it.

Tuesday, April 9, 2013

Mike Says #10 Is Almost Done


Well, the 2013 vs. 2014 debate continues.  GrungeReport caught a Mike McCready interview with The Rob in which Mike gives us a preview of the album to come.

The sessions went really well, they went very quick. We were with Brendan O’Brien, and he was kind of whipping us into shape. We all teamed together to bring in another section of songs, we started this project 2 years ago. We just recently finished another 7 or 8 from that or so, we’re listening to them to see which ones are going to end up ultimately on the record. We’re close to the end zone right now, football analogy!
Did you like Pearl Jam's cover of Pink Floyd's Mother or Ed's song with Roger Waters at the Sandy Benefit?  You may be in luck!
I think the fans will hear what we are and where we are at now, it’s going to be to their liking I think, it is to us. We haven’t figured it out exactly what everything is that is going to be on this record. Some of the standout tracks on there are pretty amazing. Matt wrote a really cool one that’s kind of ethereal meets U2ness, I wrote kind of a punk rock one and a Pink Floyd thing, so there’s all these kinds of things going on. Ed has written some beautiful numbers, some kind of garagy type stuff and then also some beautiful lyrical kind of things. We’ll put all of those things in the Pearl Jam thing, and hit mix, and mix it up.
Are we ready for this? Whatever the final product, the answer is clearly "yes."

Congratulations to the #iforgivetsis Contest Winner!

Well, here's your proof!  The random number was 15, and the 15th person to tweet in our #iforgivetsis fake Pearl Jam song contest.


Congratulations to @tourney1867!  Matt has a copy of the 2000 Atlanta bootleg heading his way!

Wednesday, April 3, 2013

The "I Forgive TSIS" Bootleg Giveaway

OK, by now you have no doubt figured out (whether you could get the mp3 files to play or not) that there was never a leak of seven demos meant for Pearl Jam's tenth album.  We made it up as an elaborate prank because ... well, because we're tired of waiting for the new Pearl Jam album, and we thought the Pearl Jam community needed some excitement.  Are we jerks?  Yeah, we are, but if we have to be jerks in order to spark more excitement for Pearl Jam, we're happy to play that role.  Please forgive us our boredom.

That being said, we'd like to make it up to you.


Would you forgive us for a contest?  A bona fide, not-a-prank contest?  OK.  We happen to have one copy of the official Atlanta, Georgia 2000 bootleg (gently used) that we'd like to give away to one of our U.S. followers.  All you have to do is craft a tweet containing three things:
  1. our twitter handle (@thesky_iscrape)
  2. the hashtag, #iforgivetsis
  3. your best made-up Pearl Jam song title.  
I would recommend something like this:
Those jerks at @thesky_iscrape should have used Neurotoxic as a fake @pearljam song title, but #iforgivetsis
On Sunday, April 7th at 8pm ET, we will draw one tweet at random and send you the bootleg.  I know, it's not the greatest prize you ever won, but hey ... it's a Man/Ape show and all ya' gotta do is write 140 characters.

Again, ... sorry ... now quit whining and get tweeting!

Reminder: We can only offer it to fans in the United States.  If you're in Europe or South America or Australia, we love the snot out of you, but you'll have to find an American friend and give us their address if you win.

Podcast: Mad Season Above


Who better than Matt Pinfield to give you the history of Mad Season.  Check out the four-episode podcast released today by 93 XRT in Chicago.
There were also a series of four podcasts recorded chronicling the band’s history and the box set. It features present-day interviews with McCready and Martin, and also an interview featuring Staley before he died.

Tenth Album Demos

Recording Studio June11 II

It has been a truly weird and harrowing experience obtaining the files below.  

Given that these were likely recorded or compiled in September 2011 and Pearl Jam has been in the studio as recently as last week, it's unlikely that these will sound like the album we have built up in our mind.  Especially given that permissions have loosened over the past three weeks, I can only imagine that these are now cast-offs.

Still, TSIS is proud to present to our loyal readers and exclusive stream of seven unreleased Pearl Jam demos.  Please crank the volume, and rock out to your heart's content.  When you're done, please share your thoughts on our forum!

NOTE: You must have a browser capable of handling HTML5 for the player to work.

3,2,1


Believed In



Mercury



Transience



The Gift



Jumbled



Alford Pleas

April 3: Pearl Jam in Buenos Aires

Pearl Jam Buenos Aires, Argentina 11-13-11

Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Unboxing Above

For those of you still waiting on your copy of Mad Season's deluxe reissue of Above or for those of you on the fence above the purchase, we have filmed an unboxing.  Have a look at the contents and see if you don't get excited about tearing into your own.



It's the first YouTube video made by TheSkyIScrape.com.  Want to see more?  Let us know in the YouTube comments.  If we see some good ideas that we can do, you might see more content!

And for anyone who already has the box, maybe you'll want to check out the three new t-shirts ($24.99 plus S&H) or the three new hats ($20 plus S&H) that the Ten Club is offering up to Mad Season fans.


RNDM Shows and Schwag


Buried in the news about the incredibly awesome reissue of Mad Season's Above, was a quick announcement by Pearl Jam that RNDM has added two shows to their spring itinerary.

May 5, 2013 - Seattle, WA - Tractor Tavern

May 8, 2013 - Los Angeles, CA The Bootleg Theater

... and some really great new RNDM goodies: T-shirts ($24.99 plus S&H), wristbands ($10 plus S&H), and Acts back on vinyl with a chance at a variant vinyl color ($24.99 plus S&H).