Topic: Karl

JOHN DARNIELLE & JUSTIN VERNON join MEGAFAUN on the Grateful Dead's "Friend of the Devil."

THE PAINS OF BEING PURE AT HEART advance stream Days Of Abandon, which often recalls The Cure at their poppiest.

TEMPLES performed live in the KEXP studio with songs from their 2014 album, Sun Structures. 

THE PIXIES stopped by Morning Becomes Eclectic to play new songs and old faves.

ALL SONGS CONSIDERED: Tracks from Tori Amos, Zee Ami, Solvents and more highlight the latest edition.

CHRISSIE HYNDE drops “You Or No One” ahead of Stockholm.

HAMILTON LEITHAUSER (The Walkmen) drops “In The Shallows,” the B-side to his "Alexandra" single.

SIR PAUL McCARTNEY: "Birthday."

THE BLACK KEYS talks to All Songs Considered about the making of Turn Blue.

SHARON VAN ETTEN talks to Exclaim about her "open-ended" LP, Are We There.

JULIANA BARWICK has a new EP and a new...craft beer?

EIGHTEEN SONGS WITH SEQUELS, compiled by The A.V. Club.

ANGELINA JOLIE opens up at Elle, by which I mean she's promoting Maleficent. 

WILL & JADA SMITH are not concerned their 13-year-old daughter is tweeting pics of her in bed with a 20-year-old dude.

NEIL PATRICK HARRIS is on the cover of the Rolling Stone. Naked.

MILEY CYRUS advises kids that smoking weed will keep you young and get you laid.

BRUCE WILLIS is now a proud father of five girls after his wife Emma gave birth to their second daughter together.

GEORGE CLOONEY and Amal Alamuddinare reportedly telling friends to save the date.

UKRAINE: Russian President Vladimir Putin appeared to take steps Wednesday to pull Ukraine back from an escalating cycle of violence, asking pro-Russian separatists in the country to postpone a Sunday referendum on independence and indicating that he may be willing to recognize a national election later this month.

VENEZUELA: The government said today it will start rationing electricity in western Zulia state and water in Caracas as drought drains hydroelectric reservoirs.

SAUDI ARABIA: A Saudi court sentenced Raef Badawi, the founder of a human rights group, to 10 years in jail and 1000 lashes Wednesday over "insulting Islam," an activist said.

NIGERIA: Boko Haram militants in armored vehicles stormed the town of Gamboru Ngala in Borno near the Cameroon border, killing at least 300 people, and burning down 200 vehicles and nearly all of the houses and shops, in a 12-hour rampage.

SYRIA: About 1200 civilians and rebels, including fighters with the Al Nusrah Front and other Islamist groups, exited Homs in a deal with the Assad regime; each fighter was allowed to keep a rifle; and each of the buses evacuating them was allowed to take a rocket launcher and a machine gun. As part of the deal, the rebels agreed to allow aid into the pro-regime villages of Nubul and Zahra, which the rebels have besieged for over a year; and the Islamic Front released 45 hostages, including women and children, in Aleppo and Latakia who had been seized by the Islamic Front and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Sham in August 2013.

ELMO: The small dog with the quick reflexes.

THE SQUIRREL THREAT: A militant rodent forced a truck off a bridge in Speegelville, TX.

A CHICKEN struck by a car at 70 m.p.h. lived and damaged the car.

GIANT CARNIVOROUS SNAILS...and they aren't slow.

COURTNEY LOVE is often a blithering idiot, but "You Know My Name" is pretty darn sharp.

WALTER MARTIN (The Walkmen) is advance streaming the kid-friendly We're All Young Together, with cameos from Karen O and the National's Matt Berninger.

LA SERA advance streams the less kid-friendly, but nevertheless nifty Hour of the Dawn. (Picks up for me after the first track.)

CHROMEO advance streams White Women via iTunes.

GERONIMO! advance streams Cheap Trick.

GUIDED BY VOICES drop “Table At Fool’s Tooth”ahead of Cool Planet.

ANTLERS drops "Hotel" ahead of Familiars.

SWANS leader Michael Gira talks to The Quietus aboutthe new LP's ferocious grooves, his role as band leader, Haitian history, the early days of the group, and his terror at the ever-increasing commercialisation of our society.

THE PAINS OF BEING PURE AT HEART frontman Kip Berman talks to Billboard about changing lineups and labels before their new pop opus.

ROSE ELINOR DOUGALL talks to Under The Radar about tapping into more equivocal emotions on her latest album. (Thx, Frank Yang.)

ARE GUITARISTS' BRAINS different from everyone else's?

MONICA LEWINSKY writes in Vanity Fair for the first time about her affair with President Clinton...and why she's writing about it.

JESSICA ALBA explains the no-nudity clause in her contracts.

JON HAMM: The star of Mad Men and Million Dollar Arm talks to Vanity Fair about his long road to success—and his formative friendship with Paul Rudd.

TOM BRADY sports blonde fauxhawk, twerks. Good thing he's already drafted.

STAR WARS EPISODE VII: The Ancient Fear?

GERARD BUTLER drops out of the Point Break remake. You're heartbroken, I know.

UKRAINE: Russia and the West maneuvered on Tuesday ahead of a seemingly inevitable clash over Ukraine’s plan to hold a presidential election on May 25 that Western powers view as crucial to restoring stability and that the Kremlin says will be illegitimate, particularly if the government in Kiev cannot first stabilize the country.

VENEZUELA: U.S. automaker Ford has halted operations in Venezuela on Monday due to a lack of foreign currency to import parts for assembly, workers at its plant said.

EGYPT: Egyptian presidential frontrunner Abdel Fattah al-Sisi on Monday appeared to rule out reconciliation with the Muslim Brotherhood movement, raising the specter of a prolonged conflict with a group he said was finished.

LIBYA: U.S. intelligence now assesses that leaders from at least three regional al Qaeda affiliates—al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and members of the organization of Al-Mulathameen Brigade loyal to Algerian terrorist, Mokhtar BelMokhtar—have all established havens in the lawless regions of Libya outside the control of the central government.

A MAN becomes a mother duck.

THE SQUIRREL THREAT: This.

A GIANT GATOR crossed the road near Sandy Island in South Carolina.

WILDCAT RED, the 18th-place horse in Saturday's Kentucky Derby, was hosed down by firefighters during a traffic jam.

SHARON VAN ETTEN covers Springsteen's "Drive All Night" at the Stone Pony.

THE BLACK KEYS advance stream Turn Blue via iTunes.

AMEN DUNES advance streams Love.

SEAN NICHOLAS SAVAGE advance streams Bermuda Waterfall.

TOBACCO (Black Moth Super Rainbow) advance streams Ultima II Massage.

JULIANA HATFIELD covers Elliott Smith's "Needle In The Hay" for a Wes Anderson tribute.

I WANT CANDY from The Strangeloves and a super-charged Bow Wow Wow for Twofer Tuesday.

LIZ PHAIR, BEN FOLDS, WEIRD AL & MORE audition for the Star Wars Cantina Band.

FATHER JOHN MISTY talks to Pitchfork about misbehavior, marriage, music and more.

LIAM FINN talks to Magnet about recording The Nihilist.

NELS CLINE is profiled by the L.A. Times.

SHAILENE WOODLEY talked to TIME about sisterhood, revenge and her reasons for avoiding the "feminist" label.

KIM KARDASHIAN & KANYE WEST deny a secret wedding.

BRYAN SINGER picks up a second accuser. Singer has adamantly denied the allegations.

ADELE teases a third album on Twitter.

LINDSAY LOHAN is desperately trying to conceal her wild partying from Oprah Winfrey. 

HAYDEN PANETTIERRE's wedding to Wladimir Klitschko has been delayed by Ukrainian unrest.

THE BIG BANG THEORY creator Chuck Lorre responded to being banned in China...on Chinese social media.

NIGERIA:The US says it considers the abduction of more than 200 Nigerian schoolgirls by Islamist militants "an outrage" and is offering help to try to rescue them.

UKRAINE: There was heavy fighting Monday on the outskirts of the eastern Ukrainian city of Slovyansk, as government security forces resumed operations aimed at wresting control of the town from pro-Russian militants. But the government lost another helicopter, and it isn’t winning the battle for hearts and minds.

VENEZUELA: Judges and prosecutors in Venezuela have repeatedly ignored evidence of systematic human rights abuses by government security forces, a prominent human rights group said Monday.

PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES: Hamas isn't giving up its weapons, despite the reconciliation agreement with Fatah. Shocka.

LIBYA: Ahmed Mitig, a Misrata businessman backed by Islamists, was named prime minister, but the president of the GNC instructed current prime minister Abdullah al Thinni to remain in office as Mitig lacked the requisite number of votes.

HE IS THE WALRUS: Goo goo goo joob.

A LARGE BIRD tried to make off with a small dog in Washington State.

A RARE GOBLIN SHARK was caught in Florida. A promo for The Amazing Spider-Man 2?

A WHALE washed ashore in New Jersey...and someone tagged it with graffiti.

THE CINCO DE MAYO WEEKEND STARTS HERE: 

...with LOS LOBOS: "I Got Loaded" (with an added snippet of "Turn On Your Lovelight") from their fabulous first full-lengther, How Will the Wolf Survive? "Don't Worry Baby," "Evangeline," "Our Last Night," and "A Matter of Time" were on that album, too.

PEE WEE HERMAN: "Tequila." Obvs.

HERB ALPERT & THE TIJUANA BRASS: Rare video of "A Taste of Honey" from 1967.

CHEAP TRICK brings you the Mariachi mash-up of "Surrender."

JIMMY BUFFETT: Margaritaville. Obvs.

LIZ PHAIR: "Cinco de Mayo." Obvs.

SHARON JONES, MIKE McCREADY, ALYNDA LEE SEGARA & MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO talk about what makes them go.

PATRICK STICKLES of Titus Andronicus defends Lily Allen and disses Courtney Love.

LYKKE LI is profiled in the latest Pitchfork cover story.

TELEVISION's coolest and weirdest musician cameos.

CUTOUT BIN:  From Paul Westerberg to the Hollies, from The Clash to The Association, from the Minutemen to the Supremes, plus Aztec Camera, the Four Seasons, Bob Mould, R. Dean Taylor and more -- this Friday's fortuitous finds are streaming from the Pate page at the ol' HM.

THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2 is this weekend's sole wide release, currently scoring 56 percent on the ol' Tomatometer. And as I was on record as suggesting the reboot of this franchise was mostly about a cash grab (and it is), I should say I actually preferred this one to the last one, though: (a) this is a fairly low bar; and (b) I think this would put me in a distinctly minority position if I was an actual film critic (Note: The original averaged 6.7/10 on RT; this one to date is at 6/10; that smaller gap juxtaposed against a much wider difference in overall Tomatometer suggests this one is more polarizing).  I'm also on the record as being predisposed against the multiple-villain sequel, but unlike a number of critics who find the result jumbled, I think this script sequences things to (mostly) avoid the overstuffed effect you get from other sequels.  The script also handles its characters fairly well, although Electro's backstory is a bit too Batman Forever-level of ham-fisted. The script also returns to more of the core themes of the Spider-Man comic, i.e., the personal toll being Spider-Man takes and how the characters (and we) deal with loss. And the reboot series continues to exploit the more comic tone Spidey often displays in the books, moreso than the original Sam Raimi-directed films (though I would still take his first two over the two reboots).  Given how premature the reboot is, this film succeeds--to the extent it does--on the strong chemistry of its cast, particularly Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone.  And in that context, the script makes one particularly brave choice, though not one surprising to old skool comic book nerds. So count me as pleasantly, but not enthusiastic...and now with more reason to think another Spidey will disappoint as much as Spider-Man 3.

ROB FORD: The Toronto Mayor's latest spiral into substance abuse began on St. Patrick's Day and has a Justin Bieber cameo.

GEORGE CLOONEY proposed over a home-cooked meal. Aw.

SAMUEL L. JACKSON is catching flak from adult video performers.

JOSH HARTNETT talks about his hiatus from Hollywood.

ELIZABETH OLSEN is profiled by Marie Claire.

PEACHES GELDOF: Heroin is “likely” to have played a role in her death, an inquest has revealed.

JASON PRIESTLEY is dishing on his 90210 co-stars, Brad Pitt, and others in a new book.

FHM'S 100 SEXIEST WOMEN OF 2014 is just in time for Gratuitous Friday.

UKRAINE: Pro-Russian activists and Ukrainian riot police clashed Thursday inside the compound of the prosecutor's office in the eastern city of Donetsk, as simmering tensions escalated into violence. Ukraine's acting President Olexander Turchynov has reinstated military conscription to deal with deteriorating security in the east of the country.

VENEZUELA: Authorities have arrested a suspect in the mysterious murder of a Venezuelan ex-intelligence chief, Eliezer Otaiza, who had close personal ties to the late President Hugo Chavez.

NIGERIA: A negotiator for the Boko Haram militants who have kidnapped over 200 schoolgirls said the kidnappers are demanding a ransom and that the military knows their location; some reports said the girls had been taken to Chad or Cameroon. Protests demanding the girls' release have spread since their abduction on April 14.

A HUNGRY MONKEY slaps a teasing TV host.

WHEN GOATS ATTACK: On the evening of 19 April, the goats broke free and walked all over a neighbor’s Ford Focus in Richmond, Maine.

AN OX charges through a hospital in Rio.

NAME THAT ANIMAL: Dizzy Canadians Don't Even Know What Kind Of Adorable Tiny Animal They're Bottle-Feeding.

WE ARE SCIENTISTS drop a groovy clip for "Sprinkles."

DRIVE-BY TRUCKERS stopped by World Cafe for a chat and mini-set. 

SUZANNE VEGA played the City Winery for WFUV Live.

DAN WILSON stopped by World Cafe for a chat and mini-set. 

QUILT played a Tiny Desk Concert at the offices of NPR.

PERFECTPUSSY's cover of Springsteen's "Candy's Room" is, um, out there.

THE THRILLS visit "Big Sur."

SUPER-EARTH is the new name (for now) for Peter Buck, Corin Tucker, Scott McCaughey, Bill Rieflin, and Kurt Bloch.

THE SCORPIONS' longtime drummer has been jailed for a month for swearing at Muslims, gesturing indecently and dropping his trousers while drunk at Dubai airport.

COURTNEY BARNETT talks to Stereogum about her new/old record, and what she plans on doing next.

JONI MITCHELL: Ten of the Best, according to The Guardian.

EMMA STONE is the latest celeb to wage a lip sync battle with Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show.

BOB HOSKINS, who was best known for roles in The Long Good Friday and Who Framed Roger Rabbit, died of pneumonia at the age of 71.

LINDSAY LOHAN is dating a 39-year-old married man who has two children. 

JENNIFER LAWRENCE was so drunk after the Oscars that Miley Cyrus told her to pull it together.

ZAC EFRON talks to THR about trying to reinvent his career as an adult, and fighting on skid row.

SELENA GOMEZ has ended her small feud with Kylie and Kendall Jenner, who were texting her ex, Justin Bieber.

MIRANDA KERR talks about the breakdown of her marriage to Orlando Bloom.

UKRAINE: In the eastern Ukrainian city of Luhansk, makeshift barricades, concertina wire and masked men in camouflage greeted visitors to the regional administration building Wednesday.

VENEZUELA will raise the minimum wage and pensions by thirty percent; official figures put the level of annual inflation at 56.2 percent for 2013. A month after airlines thought they were about to receive the almost 4 billion in revenue trapped in Venezuela, the government has been seeking meetings with carriers to try to negotiate discounts on how much of the money it will repay.

BRUNEI: The Sultan of Brunei announced that the first phase of the implementation of sharia law in Brunei will begin tomorrow. The new penal code, which will be adopted in three phases by the end of next year, will provide for punishments including stoning, flogging, and amputation of limbs.

THE UNITED STATES State Department's latest annual Country Reports on Terrorism said a growing number of terrorist groups are threatening the US, and noted a 43% increase in the number of terrorist attacks worldwide in 2013 from 2012.

TINY HAMSTERS, eating tiny burritos.

THE SQUIRREL THREAT: Okay, I'll let the attacks on selfies slide.

A DEAD BLUE WHALE may explode in a Newfoundland town. The sea was angry that day, my friends.

A TINY BEAR CUB named Boo Boo debated whether to get his hair done. He's now headed to rehab.