Bolt of Blue

Behold, OK Go‘s awesome new video for End Love is now online, featuring Orange Bill, the goose!

Watch for us in the blur… starting at 3:27.

Friday night was magical fun.

Premiere party for OK Go’s new video at LACMA… featuring pieces of the Rube Goldberg machine from the video, a DJ set by Tim, and an acoustic set by the band (minus Dan).

Half the party was on a rooftop terrace with the lights of Los Angeles all around. The short set was lovely and included my favorite “Last Leaf” and a cover of the Pixies’ “Wave of Mutilation”.

All that and I got to find out just how big a fan of LEGO a certain lead singer truly is.

Trailer for the new Blur film “No Distance Left To Run” that chronicles the history of the band and their reunion last year. Due to be a 2 disc DVD released next month in the UK. No word on when it’ll make it over here. Disc 1 is the documentary. Disc 2 is one of their live shows at Hyde Park from last July. And the Royal Mail has just issued 10 stamps of classic album covers. Included is Blur’s cover for Parklife. Also New Order’s Power Corruption and Lies, Coldplay’s A Rush of Blood to the Head, and David Bowie’s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. View more details. Me want.

Yay! OK Go’s new album is out today and their new awesome video for This Too Shall Pass is up. All done in a single shot with the Notre Dame marching band backing them up.

Earlier awesome video for WTF below.

You can listen to the new album on Myspace. Last Leaf is brilliant. I about died when I heard it live last spring. So achingly beautiful.

If you should be
the last autumn leaf
hanging from a tree
I’d still be here
waiting on the breeze
to bring you down to me

I love this band to pieces. Hurry up and tour the US already!

Start of this month was full of Discworld goodness.

Start of October will be full of Lego goodness.

In between: amazing Flogging Molly show at the Greek, work, work, work, catching up on TV shows (Dexter, I’m not digging this Lila chick) or getting into new ones (thanks Flash Forward for giving me goosebumps), and lots of building, building, building.

Duran Duran Tour ’09 is sadly over for me… I attended two shows. One in Vegas on July 10 and the other in the OC on July 11.

Both shows lived up to the DD standard. Entertaining, polished, exciting, and full of fun and incredible music. Of course, I’m biased. I’ve been a Duranie since I was 7 years old. They make up the soundtrack of my life. We heard some rare songs like Election Day (!) and thankfully no Hungry Like The Wolf or The Reflex (two songs that are over played when you’ve been to as many DD shows as I’ve attended.)

One disappointment was that they didn’t perform any new material. They are currently working with Mark Ronson on their new album and I’ve very curious to hear the results of their collaboration. His influence was evident in their live show despite the lack of new material. Ronson’s mixing of old and new DD songs together was showcased on this mini-tour. Below is an example with their new take on on old classic – the only Bond theme to reach number 1. I took this video at the Pacific Amphitheatre show. While not the best quality and I missed the beginning of the song where they played a medley of various Bond themes over the years, this moment was really incredible.

I wasn’t sure I’d post anything about Michael Jackson’s passing… I was never really a fan. Of course, there’s no denying the impact he had on popular culture. I find the whole situation very sad but not surprising. Here’s an interesting blog response from John Taylor…

A Blog from John
June 26th, 2009

Oliver Hunt from Manchester asked why there was nothing on our website about MJ. You’re absolutely right Oliver, there ought to be.

But let’s see, what can one say that hasn’t already been said, over and over and over… So Madonna has been in tears? Really.. I’ve not been in tears, but it has been an extremely sad 24 hours.

I was glad we were in rehearsals today for the summer shows and were all able to process our feelings with each other. When I heard the news my first call was Nick, then Roger.

To say he was the greatest entertainer of his generation…Well yes, perhaps he was. He made one of my favourite albums, ‘Off The Wall’, and ‘Thriller’ is pretty fucking amazing and even ‘Bad’ had a renaissance with me a month or so ago.

It’s all terribly sad. The rumours, and the court appearances. It’s been sad and depressing and frustrating for years now. I’ve been so sick of the jokes for years, but this morning? Not for me thanks.

It was a surprise to get the news, but maybe less surprising than if he had turned up at the 02 and rocked the house, played all the songs we wanted to hear and left London in one piece.

His music and his legend will live on. His life is an inspiration to us all but also a caution. I’m very very sorry he’s not with us anymore, but for my Madonna tears I’ll probably have to wait until ‘Rock With You’ catches me unawares one evening, alone on a motorway somewhere.. By then I’ll be really missing him.