!!! (Chk Chk Chk) Coming To The Independent In August

Former local-boys now turned Brooklynites Chk Chk Chk will be coming to SF for a show in late August. On August 27th the band will be playing a show at The Independent. We've seen them a number of times, and we have to say, for high-energy dance music, this show is not to be missed. In a hot small room in late August, doubly so. Tickets go on-sale this Sunday at 10 AM...

Nick Cave Tickets Go On-Sale This Sunday

Tickets to the previously mentioned Nick Cave Warfield show, plus another show the night before. go on-sale this Sunday at 10 AM via ticketmaster. Looks like it's gonna be one of those pick-your-priorities ticket Sundays....

Nada Surf Returning To SF In September

Continuing to ride the release of their latest release Lucky, and two successful SF shows this past Spring, Nada Surf will be returning to the city for a pair of dates at the beginning of September. On September 2nd and 3rd, the band will be playing Great American Music Hall for two nights. After the Cafe Du Nord and Fillmore dates, it seems that perhaps the band is intent on hitting all the city's classic venues in one calendar year. Tickets go on-sale this Sunday at 10 AM....

Treasure Island Presale, Thursday @ 10 AM

Treasure Island Festival tickets will be going on sale Thursday at 10 AM for a special "early bird" price of $99 for both days. Click here for tickets, the password is "sunset".

The National Release Documentary, EP

As we previously mentioned, The National are releasing an EP as well as a documentary of the making of Boxer. Well, the EP and documentary (entitled A Skin, A Night) have both been released, and are available for order. If you're warming up for Saturday's gig at the Greek, this might be a good place to start.

Treasure Island Festival Lineup and On-Sale Announced

This past week the Treasure Island Festival lineup was officially announced. Similar to last year, day 1 is more dance music and electronica, while day 2 is more rock and roll. While we're not quite as stoked as we were last year (it happened to feature some of our favorite acts), this year's lineup is still quite a contender. The set of bands seems to be leaning quite favorably towards more experimental and "indie" acts, and (thankfully) Jack Johnson is nowhere to be seen. As we mentioned last year, the festival experience at Treasure Island was unbeatable in both location and organization. We're definitely going to be heading back to check out this year's fest: the artist selection stays away from the easy festival choices, and instead focuses on some really artistically choice independent acts. Tickets go on-sale (with a variety of options) May 30th.

The lineup is as follows:

Greetings From Japan

Hello, dear readers. We here at H.A.D. have been sorely remiss in our correspondence over the past week, and we figured it's time to let you know why: We're in Japan! The H.A.D. train headed over to Tokyo for a few weeks, and as such we've been slacking on the daily updates. Over the next hour or so, we're going to get some of the latest and greatest SF music news up for your consumption, but in the meantime, here are some rock n' roll tidbits from Japan...

Port O'Brien's latest on display in Tower Records (yes, somehow they still exist here) Tokyo. Not sure what it says, but it's nice to see a local band getting some international love.

A display of Kansai's Bowie suits from the Ziggy era. The display was no-photos, so we had to back up a bit and be covert.

That's all for now....SF updates forthcoming! Kisses. H.A.D.

Triple Header At The Rickshaw Stop: Port O'Brien, Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, and Girls

These days, it's tough to get two decent bands in a room together, much less produce a stunning triple-act that satisfies on all fronts. And yet, last night at the Rickshaw Stop, Port O'Brien, Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, and Girls, did exactly that. The three bands complimented each other perfectly, and created a night of awesome entertainment that was completely fitting for the celebration of Port O'Brien's latest CD.

Local band Girls were first on stage, and to be frank, having neither heard nor heard of them, we had no idea what to expect. Suffice it to say, this is (probably) the best band you've never heard. We were pleasantly surprised by an awesome set of fuzzed out, experimental rock that was still extremely strong in both melody and structure.

The sound itself was extremely hard to characterize, and is perhaps better heard than described. We enjoyed the band immensely, and would give you an mp3 - unfortunately, there's no CD yet, so you'll have to make do with myspace streaming. That being said, the band is fantastic, and is playing again in July at Hotel Utah. We'll be there, and we recommend you do the same.

Next up was Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin. The band clearly had a following in the audience, and delivered a very straight forward pop-rock punch. The melodies were tight, the songs were well written, and the band was technically sound. They upped the ante a bit by switching instruments and vocalists half way through the show, while still maintaining the same tight delivery.

Maybe it was the placement between two more experimental acts, or maybe it's just a taste thing, but by the time SSLYBY finished their set, we almost were left feeling like it was a little too tight, poppy, and accessible. It's not that there was anything wrong per se, but the band just seemed to wear their hearts on their sleeves and have a "what you see is what you get" delivery. Which is to say: four typical dudes from Missouri playing accessible, likeable indie pop. And there's nothing wrong with that.

With SSLYBS headed off stage, Port O'Brien arrived and delivered the culmination of the night's expectations. The band started out with a slower, acoustic driven set of their albums' slower songs. The tunes were fantastic, and the band was dead on. Van Pierszalowski's voice was in fine form, and he led the band through a number of driven, melodic, folkish tunes.

Just when perhaps things were feeling a tiny bit too mellow, Van put aside his acoustic, and announced that it was now time for some rock. Indeed. With telecaster in hand, the band busted into a blazing set of rock tunes that showed off just how versatile this band is. They can proceed from mellow, folkish, lyrical music to all out feedback drenched rock on the flip of a switch.

Both of the bands "sets" were fantastic, and as the show neared to an end around midnight, we were both shocked and disappointed that the end had come so quickly. There is little doubt in our minds here at H.A.D. that Port O'Brien is a force to be reckoned with in the Bay Area music scene. Moreover, with bands like Girls on the horizon, it makes us think that we may have a full on music "scene" growing up out of the fog. Gee whiz.

To close the night, Van invited the audience on stage for a pots-and-pans driven sing along. It was a great way to end an awesome evening, and congratulate this killer band on the arrival of their latest disc. Job well done.

Many more photos available at the H.A.D. Flickr Feed.

Ariel Pink Coming To Bottom Of The Hill On May 25th

Ariel Pink, lo-fi magician and "haunter", will be coming up from LA to headline at Bottom Of The Hill on May 25th. Pink's material is just about as lo-fi as you can get, often sounding like a 70's tv show theme song mashed up with glam rock outtakes. Still, the tunes have something of a unique charm to them, and we've been digging on The Doldrums for quite some time. Pink is on the PawTracks label run by Animal Collective, and as such, could definitely be associated with the same "scene". Although, to our ears, we'd have to say that Pink's tunes are a tad more inaccessible. Still, we think it's worth the effort. To be frank, we're curious to see how Pink's layers of noise and tape could work out in a live setting.

mp3: Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti - Crying (YouSendIt, click through)

Britt Daniel Solo MP3's Arrive

You may recall that last week we posted some sweet videos of Britt Daniel playing at The Belly Up. Well, some kind soul has managed to put audio from the show online at archive.org, and it sounds great! One of the oft-mentioned "boom box" shows, the set is Britt Daniel accompanied by a prerecorded boom box percussion track. It includes two new songs, as well as a pair of covers by Wolf Parade and The La's. All in all, a great, great, set. Check out the mp3's below - click through to archive.org for lossless audio.

1) Everything Hits At Once
2) Lines In The Suit
3) I Summon You
4) New Song (New York Kiss)
5) Something To Look Forward To / Metal Detektor
6) Modern World (Wolf Parade cover)
7) Don't Make Me A Target
8) The Delicate Place
9) I Am The Key
10) Stay Don't Go
11) New Song
12) Anything You Want
13) Chicago At Night
14) The Way We Get By
15) They Never Got You
16) Black Like Me
17) The Underdog
18) Fitted Shirt
19) The Beast And Dragon Adored
20) Paper Tiger

This Wednesday At Rickshaw Stop: Port O'Brien and Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin

We're pretty psyched about a show coming up tomorrow at the Rickshaw Stop. The venue is one of the up-and-comers in town, and suitably it will be hosting one of the Bay Area's most up and coming recent bands: Port O'Brien. The show is a CD release party for the band's latest All We Could Do Is Sing. As an added bonus, the opener is the band Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, who are also being hyped up as a pop powerhouse. Really, it's two great bands in one of the city's smallest rooms - you can't go wrong. Tickets are on sale now.

mp3: Port O'Brien - I Woke Up Today
mp3: Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin - Glue Girls

My Morning Jacket To Play The Greek

My Morning Jacket have just announced their late summer/fall dates, and it's looking good if you like the out of doors. Specifically, the band will be playing Berkeley's Greek Theater on September 19th. We haven't seen the band live since they opened for Doves way back when, but given the strength of the new single and the awesomeness of the Greek, we're thinking we might have to get in on this one.

PS: The whole MMJ back-catalog just got added to eMusic.

Grant-Lee Phillips To Play Swedish American

On Friday, June 13th, Grant-Lee Phillips (also known as the lead singer of Grant-Lee Buffalo) will be playing the Swedish American Music Hall. We here at H.A.D. have never seen Phillips live, but we love the Buffalo discs, and seeing this guy in a small room with great acoustics should be a treat. The man writes great tunes, but moreover, has an amazing voice. Be there.

Tickets are on-sale now.

mp3: Grant Lee Buffalo - Mockingbirds (live) Thanks to Captain's Dead for the mp3!

Nice Tom Petty Show From The Winterland

Here on HAD, we try to keep a tab on some classic San Francisco concerts that are available online. If you're anything like us, you can take a little bit of nostalgia along with your hearty meal of the latest and greatest. Well, Wolfgang's Vault has posted a nice Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers concert from '78 at Bill Graham's Winterland. The Winterland was a classic venue of the 70's, and is now the site of, you guessed it, condos! Ah, what is this world coming to? Anyway, back to the Petty: The show is a prime late-seventies recording, from the night before New Year's Eve. It's a fantastic show with the band in their prime, an honest to goodness intro by Bill Graham himself, and a few rarities to boot! It's not only a great show, but a nice warm up for Outside Lands as well. Enjoy...

Stream: Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers - Live At Winterland

Another Spoon Presale

In case you missed last week's presale for the Spoon Fillmore residency, Live 105 is having another starting tomorrow (Thursday) morning. Click here, the password's "evah".

New Broken Social Scene On Tap For July

From the looks of things, when BSS play the Outside Lands Festival, they'll be doing so with a slew of new material, and a lot more front-man time for Brendan Canning. On July 22nd, the band is releasing the next in the "Broken Social Scene Presents..." series with Brendan Canning's Something For Everyone... For those of you not keeping track, the first record in the series was Kevin Drew's Spirit If...., which was one of our favorite records of last year. Since Drew and Canning tend to be the lead voices for the "regular" BSS albums, this should provide a nice companion piece to that release, and if the first mp3 is any indication, it's going to be a good one.

mp3: Broken Social Scene Presents Brendan Canning - Hit The Wall

Laura Veirs @ Bottom Of The Hill

Adrian over at ipickmynose has some nice pics and a review of the Laura Veirs show at Bottom Of The Hill Monday night. We're bummed we missed this. Life is hectic. Bah. Well, next time.

No Age To Play Great American In July

You may recall that we really dug No Age's opening set for Liars a few months back. Well, good news: along yesterday's release of their new album Nouns, the band is touring and coming our way. No Age will be at The Great American Music Hall on Tickets go on sale this Sunday, May 11. The new album's great, BTW.

mp3: No Age - Eraser

MBV Reunion In SF = Fail

We just spotted this little news item while reading ipickmynose. Wow. Just wow. We couldn't agree more. MBV in SF? Awesome. At the Design Center? What a mess. Who decided to turn that place into a music venue we'll never guess, but this is just one on a long string of bands we wish could have escaped its grasp...

New Elvis Costello Up And Streaming

Okay, we're kinda torn on this one. As you may remember, we were pretty stoked that Elvis Costello had transcended the digital revolution, and decided to release his latest, Momofuku, only on vinyl. Well, today it turns out that you can stream the disc over the internets to your hearts content. Cool? Yes. In line with an all-analog ethos? Not exactly. Well, take it for what you will.

That being said, a first background listen while we wrote this post seems to indicate that the disc is a nice fuzzy pop guitar return to Blood & Chocolate era Elvis, which is awesome. Even though our vinyl's on the way, we're gonna go give it a listen. Thanks to stereogum for the tip.

Stream - Elvis Costello And The Imposters - Momofuku

Tapes N' Tapes This Weekend At The Fillmore

We got their latest Walk It Off from eMusic last week, and we have to say that we've been digging us some Tapes n' Tapes. They'll be playing the Fillmore on Saturday, and we thought it was worth a mention. Tickets are still available here.

mp3: Tapes n' Tapes - Hang Them All

Britt Daniel Live At The Belly Up (New Songs, Etc.)

Some kind soul has gone and posted a bunch of live videos from Britt Daniel's solo show on Saturday night at the Belly Up in SoCal. In addition to the new (and frankly, great) song in the video above, there are 7 other similarly high quality vids if you click through the link. Here's hoping we get to hear some of the new material at The Fillmore in September...Yes, we're going all three nights.

Update: Pitchfork has photos, complete with snarky utensil-based jokes.

New Nine Inch Nails Album: Yes, For Free, Again

You know the two free Nine Inch Nails singles that came out over the last two weeks? Well, it turns out they were just a handy preview of the band's latest album, The Slip. Conveniently, the disc is now available on nin.com for for free. We're not exactly sure what Reznor's plan is here, but I guess the Ghosts thing was to his liking, and frankly, we think it's awesome.

Dandy Warhols: New Record, Listening Party Tonight @ 111 Minna

So, do you remember that post back at the beginning of March about the Dandy Warhols starting their own label? Well, the label has borne fruits, and the Dandies have a new record on the way! The disc will be entitled ...Earth To The Dandy Warhols..., and will launch in two "phases". The first phase, which starts today, includes free play of the record on 10,000 jukeboxes (seriously?) as well as the free first single linked below. The second phase will be the release and digital downloadability of the record on May 19th.

Now here's the cool part: The Dandies will be in San Francisco tonight at 111 Minna for a free listening party. Drinks, food, records spinning, the whole bit. Get over there and check it out.

mp3: The Dandy Warhols - The World The People Together (C'Mon)

Rogue Wave Plays The Fillmore

Well, it's been a while since we here H.A.D. were pleasantly surprised by a band we hadn't heard, but last night was one of those nights. Rogue Wave played a fantastic set at the Fillmore, and managed to pretty much completely convince us that their albums are worth more than a little attention.

The band delivered a tight set of mid-tempo rock, that to our ears probably seemed most reminiscent of Wilco in their less experimental moments. It was heavily populated with solid melodies, great guitar work, and a general sense of musical well-being. Local favorite John Vanderslice, as well as Kristen from opener Grand Ole Party both joined the band on stage for a number of tunes, which added additional spice to the show.

The band closed with a nice version of "California", followed by a Neal Young cover that we (sadly) failed to recognize. All in all, frankly, a great night.

More Free Nine Inch Nails

Following their free release of "Discipline" last week, Nine Inch Nails is back with another free release, "Echoplex". This time the song is available for free via the facebook iLike application, although it doesn't appear that you need to be a member to get the mp3. The song seems to be in the same vein as "Discipline" in that it reaches back to the more synthy beats of Pretty Hate Machine, but also calls upon the sizeable instrumental catalog Reznor has built up over the years. And there are handclaps. Yes, in a Nine Inch Nails song. Check it out for yourself.

mp3: Nine Inch Nails - Echoplex

Rogue Wave At The Fillmore Tonight

We fully admit we have very little familiarity with the band, and we're a tad skeptical because the last album didn't get the best reception. However, a friend had an extra ticket, and Zach Rogue is a San Francisco native, so we figured it was worth mentioning that Rogue Wave will be at The Fillmore tonight. We'll be there, and we'll let you know how it goes. Tickets are still available, if you're into the last minute thing. Kisses.

Robert Plant and Alison Krauss To Headline Hardly Strictly

On the heels of their well received album Raising Sand, Robert Plant and Alison Krauss will be headlining the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival in Golden Gate Park this October. The lineup this far also includes Loudon Wainwright III, Gogol Bordello, and Bonnie Prince Billy. It will always be host to such bluegrass heavyweights as Earl Scruggs and Del McCoury. As always, the festival is free, and sure to be completely mobbed from start to finish. Do as you will.

Did You Get Your Spoon Tickets?

Just a reminder: the pre-sale for the Spoon Fillmore run is going on now.

Second Jakob Dylan Show Added At DuNord

For those of you who missed the first batch of tickets, a second Jacob Dylan show has been added at Cafe DuNord on the night before, May 17th. Tickets are on-sale now.