Many bands are hitting the road and we can't be happier.  Also the return of Rodrigo y Gabriela and Orbital make this a great week for music news.  Enjoy!

Lots of good tour news last week.  I bought tickets to see Godspeed but got my scheduling messed up because it's on the same day as Coachella.  Damn, would've loved to see Godspeed at Big Sur, CA.  If you ever get a chance to drive up the California coast, do it.  But remember, it's a LONG drive so make sure you plan accordingly.

So let's try something new.  I've been on vacation for over a week and have gathered up a ton of links to interesting stories.  Instead of writing a bunch of little stories for each thing, I'm just going to lump them all in this one post.  This should get me all caught up and ready for the rest of the week.

Remember back in the 90's when the term "techno" didn't describe all the new "electronic dance music" bands?  So someone (probably MTV) came up with the new sexy name, "Electronica", to describe The Chemical Brothers, Prodigy, Orbital, and Underworld?  Yeah, awesome music, crappy genre name though.

The Chemical Brothers have an album review up on BBC Music:  "Horse Power is mental in a superb off-your-box polyphonic rave assault style, giving way to the My Bloody Valentine-inspired Swoon with shards of weaving noise fizzing across grin-inducing acidic bliss-pop"  Yeah, I'm really excited for this album.

Also, Underworld has announced the details of their new album, "Barking".  It's their first album in 3 years and they received some help from Paul van Dyk and Dubfire (who's known for being 1/2 of Deep Dish).  The album is expected to be released on September 13th and I'm hoping a tour will follow.

To help get us through Hump Day, the legendary UK elctronica group Underworld will be taking over the interwebs for a new live internet radio broadcast, starting at 1pm EST. This will be the first of their quarterly series, with broadcasts taking place in June, September and then March of next year - Source

Enjoy the clip for their new single, 'Boy Boy Boy', below. Visit Underworld on MySpace. - Source

Moving in Brilliant Timing
Underworld live at the Kool Haus, Toronto
October 16, 2002

I generally try to avoid sex and music comparisons, as I tend to find the two incomparable. While they both have uses as entertainment (and indeed may be used together to further their entertainment value), the ways which they provide entertainment are so different that it's usually difficult to draw intelligent comparisons. However, I'm fully prepared to make an exception to that self-imposed rule and say that Underworld's show at the Kool Haus last night was like truly amazing sex with a good friend you haven't seen in a long time.

Robert Moore sent the list some info from V2 about the new Underworld album. It has a working title 'Ansum' and is scheduled for release on September 16. It will be preceeded by a single, 'Two Months Off', which will be released on Sepember 2nd.

NME is confirming this morning that UNDERWORLD have split. Though the group will be continuing under the Underworld name, it will be without Darren Emerson, who has officially left the trio. The reasons behind the split apparantly involve both financial issues (Emerson made less money than programmer Rick Smith and vocalist Karl Hyde) and the birth of Emerson's first child last May. The break-up will not affect any of Underworld's festival commitments this summer.

For the past few years, the Tibetan Freedom Concert has arguably been the United States live music event of the year. This year, however, the COACHELLA FESTIVAL seems destined to be the event to remember. The show, which is October 9-10 at Coachella Valley, near Palm Springs, features a lineup including UNDERWORLD, BECK, THE CHEMICAL BROTHERS, SUPER FURRY ANIMALS, GUS GUS, and CIBO MATTO, just to name a few. The event also features a good deal of intrigue. The U.S. debut of the new SPIRITUALIZED live lineup is bound to be interesting.