Transcendent folk-pop artist Shannon Lay will release August, her Sub Pop debut, on CD/LP/DL/CS worldwide on August 23rd. You can now watch to her latest offering “Death Up Close” which serves as the album’s centerpiece. “With that song, I wanted to recognize that everyone else is going through something and reflect on that. Don’t be so close-minded to think you’re the only one who’s got issues, in fact, find comfort in the thought that everyone is on their own journey” Lay explains. What starts as an Eastern-influenced song morphs into an avant-garde sound bath. “I had this idea of the violin ascending. Then Mikal Cronin came in with the saxophone and just blew me away.  I love the idea of building a song like that, take people by surprise.” 

August is now available for preorder from Sub Pop. LP preorders of the album through megamart.subpop.com and select independent retailers in North America, UK, and Europe will receive the limited Loser edition on orange vinyl (North America) and Sun Yellow vinyl (UK/EU) while supplies last. 

As previously reported, Shannon Lay will be a member of Ty Segall’s Freedom Band for his upcoming full album residencies in Los Angeles, New York, Paris, London, Berlin, and Haarlem. Click here for a full list of upcoming performances. 

World tour dates announced for September, October, and November.

On September 6th, Sub Pop will release Frankie Cosmos’ fourth studio album, Close It Quietly. This album is a manifestation of the band’s collaborative spirit: Greta Kline and longtime bandmates Lauren Martin (synth), Luke Pyenson (drums), and Alex Bailey (bass) luxuriated in studio time with Gabe Wax, who engineered and co-produced the record with the band at Brooklyn’s Figure 8 Studios.

Early this year, Frankie Cosmos released Haunted Items, a digital-only collection of new stripped-down songs for the piano which the band’s latest single, “Rings (On A Tree)”, first appeared. As the band’s frontwoman Greta Kline describes, it’s “a fictional tale of a breakup from the point of view of a mistress. After I wrote it I realized what it meant to me– even though I’ve never been a mistress, I related to the character from being in a relationship where my feelings weren’t prioritized. I originally wrote it just on piano and released the solo version that way. The band version really takes it somewhere else and felt very collaborative. I love everyone’s parts. Alex wrote the funky guitar part I play in the middle section, based on an idea Luke and Lauren verbalized.” You can listen to the band version of “Rings (On A Tree) above, and also by clicking here. 

[Photo credit: Jackie Lee Young]

Frankie Cosmos Tour Dates + Ticket Links

Frankie Cosmos has announced a World Tour, splitting these shows into three legs. The first leg of dates will begin on September 18 in Boston, MA, and end on Sep. 29 in their hometown of New York City. They will then head overseas beginning on Oct. 8th in Munich, Germany with shows in Prague, Amsterdam, and Paris, ending on Oct. 22nd in London. The final leg of dates will run from Oct 31st - Nov 16th with shows in Portland, Seattle, Vancouver, Los Angeles, and Berkeley.

Sep. 18 - Boston, MA - Royale
Sep. 19 - Burlington, VT - Arts Riot
Sep. 20 - Montreal, QC - L’Astral
Sep. 21 - Toronto, ON - Horseshoe Tavern
Sep. 22 - Detroit, MI - Deluxx Fluxx
Sep. 23 - Chicago, IL - Thalia Hall
Sep. 25 - Columbus, OH - Ace of Cups
Sep. 26 - Pittsburgh, PA - Spirit Hall
Sep. 27 - Washington, DC - Black Cat
Sep. 28 - Philadelphia, PA - PhilaMOCA
Sep. 29 - New York, NY - Webster Hall
Oct. 08 - Munich, DE - Heppel & Ettlich    
Oct. 09 - Vienna, AT - Chelsea 
Oct. 10 - Prague, CZ - Underdogs’
Oct. 11 - Cologne, DE -  MTC
Oct. 12 - Luxembourg, LU - Rotondes 
Oct. 13 - Amsterdam, NL - Bitterzoet 
Oct. 14 - Paris, FR - Badaboum 
Oct. 15 - Reims, FR - La Cartonnerie
Oct. 16 - Brighton, UK - The Haunt  
Oct. 17 - Bristol, UK - Exchange 
Oct. 19 - Leeds, UK - Belgrave Music Hall 
Oct. 20 - Sheffield, UK - Delicious Clam (Sold Out)
Oct. 21 - Manchester,  UK - Night & Day
Oct. 22 - London, UK - Islington Assembly Hall
Oct. 31 - Portland, OR - Wonder Ballroom
Nov. 01 - Tacoma, WA - Alma Mater
Nov. 02 - Vancouver, BC - Hollywood Theatre
Nov. 03 - Seattle, WA - Laser Dome @ Pacific Science Center
Nov. 07 - Denver, CO - Bluebird Theater
Nov. 08 - Denver, CO - Larimer Lounge
Nov. 10 - Tucson, AZ - Hotel Congress
Nov. 12 - Anaheim, CA - Chain Reaction
Nov. 13 - San Diego, CA - Che Cafe
Nov. 15 - Los Angeles, CA - 1720
Nov. 16 - Berkeley, CA - The UC Theatre

Close It Quietly is now available for preorder from Sub Pop. LP preorders of the album through the megamart.subpop.com and select independent retailers in North America, UK, and Europe will receive the limited Loser edition on blue pearlescent (North America) and opaque yellow (UK/EU) while supplies last.

Preservation Hall Jazz Band has released the video for their song “Keep Your Head Up” today, premiered via Billboard. The track, which features Cuban singer Eme Alfonso, appears on their new album A Tuba To Cuba, the soundtrack to the critically acclaimed documentary directed by T.G. Herrington and Danny Clinch, out now via Sub Pop. Watch and share “Keep Your Head Up” here. Stream and order A Tuba to Cuba here. 

“Keep Your Head Up” is simple message with a big meaning,” says Ben Jaffe.  “Walk with your head high, walk with pride, and live your life with grace and honor and an appreciation for all humanity.  Don’t let things break you down and don’t allow anyone or anything to diminish your spirit.”

“We met the wonderful Eme Alfonso at a performance at an amazing old factory that’s been converted into a multi-disciplinary art space called Fabrica Del Arte.  That same evening we met she came up and improvised lyrics in Spanish on the spot. Eme later told me the words she sang have a deep meaning in Cuba,  the translation is something like “walk with your head out front, don’t be so down, walk with joy.”

“To say Preservation Hall Jazz Band is to refer to the purest essence of our traditions and to discover NOLA, through the band and Ben its director, was for me one of the most beautiful experiences of my life,” says singer Eme Alfonso. “Because in New Orleans… Jazz and art flow from the streets of this city and it’s clear that it has a direct connection to Cuba, Havana, and all of those who came before us. Our grandparents are connected through these rhythms, dances, melodies, and customs and this shared history of our ancestors unites us all. 

“New Orleans and Cuba are deeply connected,” Alfonso continues. “This collaboration is a conduit, a lesson to show our people, and others in the world that we are all family and that art and music has the power to unites us.”

“We went to Cuba in prayer position,” says Preservation Hall band leader and bass player Ben Jaffe when he speaks of the pilgrimage he and the group took to Cuba in December 2015. “We went to receive and offer at the same time. We had never experienced a moment like this, it felt as though all roads were intersecting at once.” The critically acclaimed 2019 documentary A Tuba to Cuba documented the band’s journey as they explored the links that connect New Orleans and Cuba so indelibly – their shared, tragic history as destinations where enslaved Africans struggled to simply survive, and their current status as places where the cultural inheritance from those ancestors is kept alive in both song and deed – but that was only half the story. This collection of songs, a musical account of a generations-in-the-making reunion of musical families separated by time, politics, and distance, tells the other half.

When asked to describe the collection of songs assembled on Tuba to Cuba, Jaffe sums it up by saying, “It’s like listening to the radio.”  And yes, A Tuba to Cuba actually feels less like an ordinary soundtrack and more like a living document, a recording of a broadcast that’s been waiting to exist, a modern version of the static-y radio signals that were broadcast between America to the Caribbean in the early and mid-20th century, sending the sounds of jazz and mambo and R&B and more back and forth across the vast divides of water and culture and politics. It’s a story, this album, and the tale being told mirrors the band’s experience.

The resulting collection of songs is what Jaffe describes as “a beautiful conversation.” The music of A Tuba to Cuba is an ecstatic expression of that ongoing conversation, a restless and lush trip up and down strange FM wavelengths bridging thousands of miles and hundreds of years, where all involved are talking with each other and over each other in excitement, charged with the thrill of recognition of the evidence of their shared familial roots, an undeniable kinship rooted in bloodlines, rhythm, and melody.

[Photo credit: Josh Goleman]

Preservation Hall Jazz Band Tour Dates + Ticket Links:

Jul. 28 - Newport, RI - Newport Folk Festival
Aug. 02 - Happy Valley, OR - Pickathon
Aug. 03 - Happy Valley, OR - Pickathon 
Aug. 05 - Folsom, CA - Harris Center For The Arts
Aug. 06 - Folsom, CA - Harris Center For The Arts
Aug. 08 - San Francisco, CA - SFJAZZ
Aug. 09  - San Francisco, CA - SFJAZZ 
Aug. 10 - San Francisco, CA - SFJAZZ (7:00PM)
Aug. 10 - San Francisco, CA - SFJAZZ (9:30PM)
Aug. 11 - San Francisco, CA - SF Jazz Center - Miner Auditorium
Aug. 15 - Philadelphia, PA - Old Pool Farm
Aug. 16 - Philadelphia, PA - Old Pool Farm
Aug. 17 - Philadelphia, PA - Old Pool Farm
Aug. 18 - Philadelphia, PA - Old Pool Farm
Aug. 24 - Arrington, VA - Lockn’ Music Festival 
Sep. 20 - Louisville, KY - Bourbon & Beyond Festival
Sep. 21 - Franklin, TN - Pilgrimage Music Festival
Sep. 22 - Franklin, TN - Pilgrimage Music Festival
Oct 22 - Ridgefield, CT - The Ridgefield Playhouse
Oct 23 - Red Bank, NJ - Count Basie Theatre
Oct 24 - New York, NY - Town Hall Theatre
Oct 25 - Boston, MA - Berklee Performance Center
Oct 26 - Portsmouth, NH - The Music Hall
Oct 28 - Montreal, QC - Place des Arts - Theatre
Oct 29 - Toronto, ON - Roy Thomson Hall  
Oct 30 - Pittsburgh, PA - Byham Theatre
Nov 01 - Kent, OH - The Kent Stage
Nov 02 - Goshen, IN - Goshen College Music Center
Nov 04 - Chicago, IL - Thalia Hall
Nov 05 - Saint Paul, MN - Fitzgerald Theatre
Nov 07 - Denver, CO - Paramount Theatre
Nov 09 - Phoenix, AZ - Music Theater at the Musical Instrument Museum
Nov 11 - Livermore, CA - Livermore Valley Performing Arts Center
Nov 13 - Chico, CA - California State University Chico - Laxson Auditorium
Nov 15 - Santa Rosa, CA - Luther Burbank Center for the Arts
Nov 16 - Arcata, CA - John Van Duzer Theatre  
Nov 17 - Portland, OR - Revolution Hall
Nov 18 - Seattle, WA - Benaroya Hall – Taper Auditorium
Nov 20 - Santa Cruz, CA - Rio Theatre
Nov 21 - Santa Barbara, CA - UCSB Campbell Hall
Nov 22 - San Diego, CA - Wonderfront Music Festival
Nov 23 - Cerritos, CA - Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts
Nov. 29 - Baltimore, MD - Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall
Nov. 30 - Baltimore, MD - Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall
Dec. 01 - Baltimore, MD - Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall

★★★★ - MOJO

“Like the best classic albums, its pleasures run deep.” - Pop Matters

“Like a cocaine-fuelled jam between David Bowie, John Lennon and Leon Russell, the Louisiana-bred, Portland-based rocker would’ve played Max’s Kansas City” [8/10] - Uncut

Kyle Craft & Showboat Honey’s new full-length Showboat Honey is out today July 12th, 2019 worldwide from Sub Pop. The album, which features the singles & official videos for “Broken Mirror Pose,” “2 Ugly 4 NY,” and “Deathwish Blue,” was recorded and produced by Kyle Craft, Kevin Clark, and Billy Slater at their own Moonbase Studios in Portland over 2018. The album was mixed by Trevor Spencer and mastered by April Golden at Golden Mastering. Stream it now on YouTube, Spotify and Apple Music.

Showboat Honey is available through Sub Pop Mega Mart. Purchases of the LP through megamart.subpop.com and select independent retailers in North America, the UK and Europe will receive the limited Loser edition on a clear blue translucent mix with spots red hi-melt (while supplies last).  There is also a new T-shirt design available.

Kyle Craft and Showboat Honey Tour Dates + Ticket Links

Kyle Craft & Showboat Honey’s previously announced headlining dates for 2019 in support of the album resume tonight, July 12th in Seattle with an in-store at Easy Street Records, and currently end on August 24th in San Francisco at Cafe Du Nord.

Jul. 12 - Seattle, WA - Easy Street Records instore
Jul. 13 - Seattle, WA - Ballard Seafood Fest
Jul. 14 - Spokane, WA - The Bartlett
Jul. 15 - Billings, MT - Pub Station Taproom
Jul. 17 - St. Paul, MN - Turf Club
Jul. 18 - Chicago, IL - Empty Bottle
Jul. 19 - Louisville, KY - Jimmy Can’t Dance
Jul. 20 - Cleveland, OH - Grog Shop
Jul. 22 - Toronto, ON - Horseshoe Tavern
Jul. 23 - Northampton, MA - Iron Horse
Jul. 24 - Allston, MA - Great Scott
Jul. 26 - Newport, RI - Newport Folk (Museum Stage)
Jul. 30 - Woodstock, NY - Colony
Aug. 01 - Brooklyn, NY - Baby’s All Right
Aug. 02 - Philadelphia, PA - Boot & Saddle
Aug. 04 - Washington, DC - Pearl Street Warehouse
Aug. 05 - Carrboro, NC - Cat’s Cradle
Aug. 06 - Athens, GA - Georgia Theater Rooftop
Aug. 07 - Atlanta, GA - The Earl
Aug. 08 - Birmingham, AL - Saturn
Aug. 09 - Nashville, TN - The Basement
Aug. 10 - Oxford, MS - Proud Larry’s
Aug. 11 - New Orleans, LA - One-Eyed Jacks
Aug. 14 - Shreveport, LA - Minicine
Aug. 15 - Dallas, TX - Three Links
Aug. 16 - Austin, TX - The Mohawk
Aug. 18 - Phoenix, AZ - The Valley Bar
Aug. 19 - Tucson, AZ - 191 Toole
Aug. 22 - San Diego, CA - Soda Bar
Aug. 23 - Los Angeles, CA - The Moroccan
Aug. 24 - San Francisco, CA - Cafe Du Nord

What “The People” are saying about Kyle Craft & Showboat Honey:

“Kyle Craft and his backing band Showboat Honey provide a glam-tastic Bowie-esque joyride, full of meaty Stones riffs and sprinkled with caustic soda lyrics that a true Dylan devotee has processed and posted from the heart.” [4/5]- NARC

“The result is a cohesive set of tracks centered around a rough patch that hit at the same time as Craft was falling in love…Fans of his glam rock-influenced sound will find plenty to latch onto.” - Billboard

“Having been the darling of the moment when his solo debut was first released, Craft clearly shows that he has more to offer than just being that guy with wild hair that sounds like someone else. He has a range and depth that is showcased beautifully on this new album, his third on Sub Pop, and first as Kyle Craft & Showboat Honey. “ - Eleven PDX

“On the track, his typically wailing voice is stunted by almost spoken-word verses that ride along with a slow-rolling piano progression. It’s a suspense-building element that pays off when the song eventually crashes into a wave of horns, electric guitars and sheer swagger.” [“Broken Mirror Pose”/ Heavy Rotation] - World Cafe

“A glammy, ’70s style anthem with a soaring chorus.”  [“Broken Mirror Pose”] - Brooklyn Vegan

“Craft, whose lyrics and electric guitar hooks have drawn comparisons to Bob Dylan and The Rolling Stones, is no stranger to vintage sounds.” [“Broken Mirror Pose”] - PASTE

“Craft has brought his signature twang into a more Raconteurs-esque world with his latest release.” [2 Ugly 4 NY] - Alt Citizen

[Photo credit: Peter Karaviaw]

METZ, our own widely-adored and delightfully noisy 3-piece punk band from Toronto, released their Sub Pop self-titled debut in 2012 and, in the time since, have cemented their reputation as one of the planet’s most exhilarating live acts and trusted providers of bombastic outsider rock. The band is made up of Alex Edkins, Hayden Menzies, and Chris Slorach. 

Automat is a collection of METZ non-album singles, B-sides, and rarities dating back to 2009, available here on LP for the first time, and including the band’s long out-of-print early (pre-Sub Pop) recordings. A chronological trip through the lesser known material of METZ, Automat is out now, worldwide on Sub Pop.
 
The band’s Alex Edkins shares, “The idea to release Automat came after realizing our early 7” singles were being sold online for upwards of $60 bucks a pop. We wanted to make those songs available and affordable to anyone who might want them in the physical format. What started as reissuing a couple of 45s, quickly morphed into an entire LP, compiling rarities, demos and alternate takes from over the years.”

Consumers of the vinyl format of Automat will be rewarded with a bonus single that includes three additional tracks: a cover of Sparklehorse’s “Pig,” from a very limited 2012 Record Store Day split single originally released by Toronto’s Sonic Boom record shop; “I’m a Bug,” a cover of The Urinals’ art-punk classic, originally released on YouTube (not an actual record label) in 2014; and METZ’s previously unreleased rendition of Gary Numan’s “M.E.”

METZ are currently hard at work on their 4th full-length LP which will be released on Sub Pop when we are all damn good and ready.
 
All tracks on Automat have been lovingly remastered by Matthew Barnhart at Chicago Mastering Service.