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The line-up was finally revealed for the Bumbershoot Festival in Seattle, WA. The event takes place at the Seattle Center each Labor Day weekend. The good news: The Festival has Death Cab For Cutie, Lou Barlow, American Music Club, Nancy Sinatra, Pedro The Lion, Robyn Hitchcock, The Black Keys, Liz Phair, Public Enemy, The Beta Band, The Walkmen, Built To Spill, The Killers, and The Pixies. The Bad news: these bands are spread out over the course of 4 days. If only they were on one, maybe two nights... I would be inclined to make the trip up from Portland. If only.

The Mercury Music Prize shortlist nominees were announced today to limited fanfare. The members of the Excellent Mailing List have been split as to who is deserving of the UK's highest prize for 2004's best record. So what is the list this year?

Basement Jaxx - Kish Kash
Belle and Sebastian - Dear Catastrophe Waitress
Franz Ferdinand - Franz Ferdinand
Jamelia - Thankyou
Keane - Hopes and Fears
Snow Patrol - Final Straw
Joss Stone - The Soul Sessions
The Streets - A Grand Don't Come For Free
Ty - Upwards
Amy Winehouse - Frank
Robert Wyatt - Cuckooland
The Zutons - Who Killed....The Zutons

Music industry insiders, artists and journalists will be voting for the final prize which will be announced September 7th. Who do you think is deserving?

After an online plea to fans some months ago, SING-SING have managed to raise the cash to start putting together their second record...

You know when celebrities say when they have won an award, "I couldn't have done it without my fans"? Well, literally - we could not have done it without you guys. Some of you already know this but we are making Sing-Sing album number 2! Yes, our appeal raised enough cash for us to go back into the studio and record the songs that have waited to be recorded all this time. The response was really beyond our wildest dreams so we both want to say a big THANK-YOU to you all!! This band is continuing because of you lot. You can all pat yourselves on the back!

Update - we are working on an 11-track album which we hope will be released sometime late 2004. Like the EP, Mark Van Hoen and El Drezidente are producing and Alan Moulder will be mixing again. It's all very exciting as it's sounding very good in this early stage. We haven't thought of an album title yet but here are some track names 'Come, Sing Me A Song', 'Lover', 'Mr Karachi', 'Going Out Tonight'......

Well according to the song he was a mod before we was... but what he's not right now is a recording musician. Who? Dan Treacy of THE TELEVISION PERSONALITIES. After dropping off the face of the earth (oh, quite literally after turning up on a prison boat in Dorset some months back), he's compiled 21 new songs that need to be recorded... but as these things happen when you're sobering up and coming out of jail... he hasn't got any money.

It just so happens that quite a few musicians count the Television Personalities amongst their influences and friends... and there's been a benefit show organized for Dan by members of The Baskervilles and other New York area artists. The show will be July 30 at Sin-e in New York (150 Attorney St @ Stanton St) and will be featuring the likes of The Mad Scene, My Favorite, The Baskervilles, The Insomniacs, Burnside Project and notTVPs.

Well, news of a new BJORK record is bound to make someone happy. The album, titled 'Medulla', will be stocked onto your local record store shelves on August 31 courtesy of Elektra. As always Bjork worked with a wide variety of artists on this one from Matmos to Rahzel from The Roots to Mike Patton (formerly of Faith No More). (Damn... I wanted to hear more from Matthew Herbert.)

In a recent interview with W Magazine, Bjork leads us on a bit of a goose chase trying to figure out what the new record will sound like... "I just got really bored with instruments. I started doing everything with my voice. Then suddenly I didn't want to work with any musicians, which is a bit weird. I only wanted to work with vocalists." ... "I wanted the record to be like muscle, blood, flesh," she says, pumping her fist. "We could be in a cave somewhere and one person would start singing, and another person would sing a beat and then the next person sing a melody, and you could just kind of be really happy in your cave."

Hmm... an album sung in a cave with no instruments named after bone marrow, how... Bjork.

As if Adam Schlesinger didn't have enough going on with Fountains of Wayne continually on a global tour, he's apparently been in the studio with Andy Chase and Dominique Durand laying down new material for a new IVY record. The trio has been putting the finishing touches on seven tracks in their NY studio with the help of James Iha (ex... oh do I need to spell it out?) and Scott McCloud (of Girls Against Boys). It has been several years since the world has heard original Ivy material (obviously not counting the brilliant, yet still covers record 'Guestroom'). Although there hasn't been any new 'Ivy' material in quite awhile, Chase and Durand have not been sitting by idly. They just released a new album under the moniker of 'Paco' with composer Michael Hampton and last year Chase released a record with his other, other side project 'Brookville'. Can't keep it all straight? Well just resolve yourself to the fact that we should see new material from Ivy not far into the new year.

I know you're thinking, 'that's great and all Liz but what's this new material sound like?' Well the band has gone back to the basics as Durand told Rolling Stone in a recent interview, "On this one, everything is played live - we have no loops, no drum machines, and there's not many keyboards. It's mostly going back to our roots, which is much more pop, light drums and lot of guitars, voice and bass."

For all those (and I assume that I am not the only one) who loved the cosmic country sounds of the Beachwood Sparks, and lamented their demise. Buck up. Christopher Gunst has a new project, just released on Rough Trade. It is called Mystic Chords Of Memory. After the Beachwood Sparks ended, Christopher went back to school to pursue teaching special education, but did not stay away from the music too long. He and his current musical partner Jen Cohen released their self-titled album on June 22. It is a bit more lo-fi than the Beachwood Sparks albums, but his wonderfully fragile voice makes these tunes sparkle.

Also to look forward to: Sub Pop Records is going to release an album by former Beachwood Spark's bassist/vocalist Brent Rademaker. His new band is called Frausdots, and they will be releasing Couture Couture on September 28. This is said to have more of an 80's gloom sound. According to Sub Pop's website, this is closer in nature to classic Echo & The Bunnymen. I greatly look forward to hearing it.

This was my fourth Glastonbury, and my third in the not-as-swish-as-you'd-expect-it-to-be backstage area. I was working the entire weekend, but I did manage to see a fair few bands, as you'll see below. This was my first "muddy" year, but it'd didn't really spoil anything apart from my hiking boots. If it started to rain while a band was on, everyone just put their hoods up. If it REALLY started to rain, then everyone rushed into the tents, which actually helped quite a few bands that would've otherwise been overlooked (namely, Buck 65).

England's Glastonbury Festival went off this past weekend, with most reports coming back very positive. One band that certainly won't forget the experience is MUSE, who closed the festival with a headlining slot on Sunday night. Playing to easily their largest audience ever, the band rolled through an expansive set that many critics are calling the highlight of the festival. Muse frontman Mat Bellamy yelled to the audience, "This is the best gig of our lives," shortly before leaving the stage. Tragedy, however, struck moments later, as the father of drummer Dominic Howard collapsed and died on the festival grounds. Muse have cancelled all immediate festival appearances as a result of the death.

Another lovely year of third grade in Brooklyn comes to an end in three days. The kids can't wait to splash in fire hydrants and eat bombpops until their mouths turn purple, and I can't wait to jump in the car and drive aimlessly around brooklyn, but we all had a really nice, happy year. Kids in several grades took time from their busy end of the year schedules to muse on their summer plans, cookies, marriage and the meaning of life.

After three years of interviewing kids about music, I want to take a moment that I should have taken a long time ago to acknowledge David Greenberger, the creator of Duplex Planet. Duplex Planet is stories and interviews from the nursing home in Boston where Mr. Greenberger worked for years. They've been on NPR and the comic books based on them, Duplex Planet Illustrated, are excellent. Check them out! Though kids were being interviewed during radio serials about all kinds of topics long before Bill Cosby was in the picture, David Greenberger's interviews of retirees about pop music inspired me to interview kids about it too.

~Sarah Allen