Did someone say “new My Morning Jacket album”?

Well, yes… actually it was Jim James (also, Brooke over in the Spunk Records office). Jim has also announced a MMJ “Unstaged” livestreamed concert, in same vein as Arcade Fire’s Unstaged Madison Square Garden concert (directed by Terry Gilliam), as well as Duran Duran’s Unstaged concert (directed by David Lynch) last month.

The My Morning Jacket installment of the (American Express) Unstaged Concert Series takes place at the Palace Theatre in the band’s hometown of Louisville, Kentucky. It will be directed by Todd Haynes, who is also responsible for Velvet Goldmine and the stunning Dylan biopic I’m Not There.

So whilst the crowd is sweating it out in KY, USA, I’ll be sitting right by my computer watching youtube.com/mymorningjacketVEVO. The broadcast will start Wednesday June 1 at 11 AM (Australia AEST) / Tuesday May 31 at 9pm (USA EST). Oh, and the new album Circuital is out in Australia May 27. Here’s the title song:

Last Hope is a collaboration between surfing filmmaker Andrew Kidman (Glass Love, Litmus) and Spunk Records.

Andrew Kidman chose six of his favourite surfing filmmakers to create short films that were inspired by the sea. The filmmakers include Albert Falzon (Morning Of The Earth), Jon Frank (Litmus), Monty Webber, Michelle Lockwood (Kids) and American underground surf filmmakers Patrick Trefz (Thread) and Richard Kenvin (Hydrodynamica). Kidman also provides four special cuts of his own.

The filmmakers created their short films to music selected by Aaron Curnow from some of the greatest independent contemporary artists; Smog, Sufjan Stevens, Mogwai, My Morning Jacket, Dirty Three, Holly Throsby, Vetiver, Bonnie Prince Billy, The Brown Birds From Windy Hill (Andrew Kidman + Neal Purchase Jr) and Machine Translations.

See the film preview here and Machine Translations (Chapter Two) Oh Ma The Sea Is Rising here.

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Jim James (My Morning Jacket), Conor Oberst (Bright Eyes), M Ward and Mike Mogis have teamed up to form the SUPERGROUP TO END ALL SUPERGROUPS!

After over a year of “will they, wont they?” musings, the aforementioned gods of indie folk rock have confirmed they have been writing together under the name Monsters Of Folk and will be offering up their debut self-titled record late September on Spunk.

All four collaborators shared song writing duties and perform all the instruments on the album, producing an excitingly varied and courageous record that journeys from subtle folk melodies to brash rock moments.

We can’t wait for you to hear it!

…or ‘Twenty Minutes of MMJ Bliss on a Thursday Morning’

Kentucky may not be a hot tourist destination, but the fact that the Louisville mayor is cool enough to host My Morning Jacket gigs makes it somewhat more appealing. The band have delivered a live EP recorded partially at Waterfront Park in their hometown, called Celebración De La Ciudad Natal (Celebration of the Town). Thankfully, they’ve filmed the day for us unfortunate mega-fans (I may or may not be wearing my MMJ tee right now) based outta town.

Bliss out to Aluminum Park, Highly Suspicious, Dodante, One Big Holiday, and an army of schoolkids playing glockenspiels with the band.

Several things to note:

• It appears Jim James has kidnapped Goldfrapp’s owl. Check out the puppets during the epic One Big Holiday.
  
• We weren’t aware fellow ISWO blogger Glenn Dickie was part of the band. Check out the check-shirted, hat-donning, mustached G from 1:16-1:28
• The live footage confirms that Jim James does actually sing “peanut butter pudding surprise” in Highly Suspicious, the highly addictive experimental Mike-Patton-esque number from album Evil Urges. EMI HQ has been pondering over this for months.

MMJ toured Australia in January, dishing out an overwhelming, unrelenting, sweaty, & life-changing 3 hours of An Evening With My Morning Jacket at each venue. Not to overstate things, but experiencing Gideon or Touch Me I’m Going To Scream pt II bears comparisons to being touched by the hand of God. If you’ve not seen them live, make it a life priority.