​So the big punks-not-dead news, that is actually a rumor, of the past 24 hours comes from a post on Gothamist claiming that the people who have access to a bunch of CBGB’s old things (although not the awning) are planning to reopen the iconic punk club “somewhere in Manhattan,” though not at the club’s old space on 315 Bowery because it’s currently being used to hawk expensive menswear and way-marked-up vinyl. So serious are these unnamed folks’ apparent intentions, in fact, that they have set up a Twitter account. Yesterday its timeline was studded with missives asking Courtney Love and Duff McKagan if they’d play a big festival happening this summer; there was also a Shepard Fairey-ish rejected poster for the fest. Those tweets have been deleted, but the image of the poster—as well as musings about Guns N’ Roses and Sid Vicious—remain.

Also remaining: Questions about this whole enterprise. Namely, is breathing new lifeinto the dessicated husk of CBGB really a necessary thing at this point? And is the club that results from this revival going to be any good—by which I mean “fun to go to, with decent bookings and not too many tourist trappings”—at all?

I’m not so sure. Call me a pessimist, but I suspect that any attempt to revitalize the CBGB “brand” with a club in Manhattan will likely result in a somewhat tourist-trappy club with overpriced drinks, awkward attempts to recreate the old “vibe”, museum-y honorings of punk legends past (even though wasn’t the whole point of punk… oh, forget it)—and, most importantly, lousy bookings studded by the occasional stunt show from a big-name artist that people not affiliated with the media or the biz can’t get into, but that will be promoted to the skies for “brand recognition” on both sides. (I can see the “SKRILLEX TO HEADLINE CBGB” press releases now!) This isn’t to say that I don’t have faith in whoever the people might be; I just think that maybe, at this point and especially given recent history, it’s better to let the idea of CBGB and what punk once was live on in everyone’s collective memory, whether those early notions were forged at Ramones shows in the ’70s or a Tsunami show in the ’90s. And no, it’s not a tragedy if future generations don’t get to share in those memories by going to a show “at CBGB”; let’s face it, the experience provided by a reconstituted version of the club in some other area of Manhattan will be more of a theme-park one that the kids will probably see right through and eschew for events that are more in keeping with their generation’s own ideas of what punk is, and what it can be.

(And real talk: If the people behind this CBGB revival will not sleep until their desire to bring a prismed version of Oldish New York City into the slicker, meaner, more moneyed New York of the present is satiated, why not revive Brownies? Or Tonic? They haven’t been exploited for nearly as many licensing opportunities—but, you know, that’s probably for the best. And during their twilights they generally had better bookings, too.)

(Source: The Village Voice)

Allen Stone, a 24-year-old Seattle songwriter, was an unabashed throwback when he performed at a packed S.O.B.’s on Wednesday night. He talked about cellphones and social networks and sang about, among other things, the clout of the Christian right and a culture of greed. But his music reached back four decades to the late 1960s and early ’70s, when songwriters like Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Donny Hathaway and Bill Withers brought introspection and social commentary to soul music.  

He didn’t look the part. “I will never ask for immunity/ because I was born and raised in the Caucasian community,” he sang in “Last to Speak,” a song that reels off political observations, then apologizes for a lack of humility. “We will never find racial unity/ unless we find equal opportunity,” the song adds.

With long blond hair and chunky eyeglasses, wearing a Sonics jersey under a mismatched sweater, Mr. Stone was a study in looking unstudied — the better, perhaps, to surprise the audience when he let loose a tenor voice with the eagerness and frisky syncopations of Mr. Wonder, coupled at times with Michael Jackson’s percussive flourishes. Between songs he professed modesty, yet when he sang he was long-breathed and confident, savoring every complaint and exhortation.

His band used a vintage, gospel-rooted lineup including both organ and (electric) piano, with Mr. Stone often strumming an acoustic guitar. Most of the set came from his second album, “Allen Stone,” released on Oct. 4 on his own entirely independent Stickystones label. “I would love every single one of you to leave with a copy of that record,” he said near the end of the set, and went on to urge anyone who couldn’t afford its $10 price to talk to him about a discount.

Mr. Stone is a pastor’s son who grew up singing in church, and every so often he offered preacherly cadences. In an implicit challenge to some of his fellow soul revivalists — like, perhaps, the very buttoned-down Mayer Hawthorne — Mr. Stone declaimed: “I’m sick and tired of soul music looking so crisp and clean and proper! Because my soul — I said my soul! — is just a little bit greasy.”

It’s also strategic. His songs don’t hide their kinship to the past, but he gives them clear-cut melodies of his own. Mr. Stone has also absorbed the pacing and showmanship of his heroes, switching off between party tunes and messages, mingling sincerity and shtick. He split the room for a dance off, urging “Get nasty!” Midset, he dismissed the band to play two songs by himself, exposing the thinner side of his voice.

But he was better off with the band, and he was saving musicianly exploits for the set’s homestretch. He unleashed a supple, Prince-like falsetto for “Unaware,” an economic commentary disguised as a love ballad. He whistled a solo in “Satisfaction,” which shares only its title with the Rolling Stones song. And for “Reality,” a mournful but benign breakup song, he sat solo playing electric piano, an instrument he hadn’t yet touched, as if hinting that there’s still more of his music to be discovered.

Article originally appeared on the NY Times (http://www.nytimes.com) and was written by Jon Pareles.

The deluge begins Tuesday when the 31st annual CMJ Music Marathon, which has grown into a five-day overload of musicians, begins with acts who are all hoping for some kind of attention: a record deal, a gig, a blog post, a tweet.

The payoffs of a career in music have grown increasingly uncertain, but there is no shortage of aspirants. This year’s official CMJ schedule lists nearly 1,400 acts: indie-rock, hip-hop, electropop, punk, metal, singer-songwriters, funk, reggae, disc jockeys, blues, even a little jazz. The marathon sprawls across Manhattan and Brooklyn, and across the Hudson to Maxwell’s in Hoboken; it runs past 2 a.m. nightly.

And that’s just the event organized by CMJ, the college-radio newsletter that began the annual showcase in 1980, and that also presents daytime panels on the music business for badge-holding convention-goers. Clustered around the CMJ Music Marathon itself are additional showcases, most of them free, presented by corporate sponsors, music blogs and anyone else who can line up half a dozen bands and rent a club for an afternoon. People who are used to hearing recordings free online can spend afternoons, Tuesday through Saturday, surfing live music on the Lower East Side – most conveniently in the strip of clubs along Ludlow Street – and in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

Bands that are in demand, and willing to knock themselves out, can literally perform day and night. Caveman, for instance, a New York City band that mingles sustained, moody melodies and walloping percussion, has 10 shows scheduled; it’s hardly the only one. The unoffical parties give bands a chance to build momentum, striving for that amorphous anointment as a buzz band. Will it be the hardcore of Trash Talk? The goth electronica of Zola Jesus? Thebillowing, new-agey hip-hop of Main Attrakionz? The somnabulistic shimmer of Memoryhouse? The dizzying electronic minimalism of Purity Ring? The guitar-distortion-meets-rap of Young Magic? Will longtime indie-rock troupers like Wild Flag or Eleanor Friedberger show the newcomers how it’s done? Perhaps none or all of the above.

There’s a lot of retro out there, from neo-Appalachian to neo-psychedelic to punked-up girl-group to 1980s synthpop to shoegaze. There are also new hybrids incubating, just waiting to claim their own -wave or -core or -delic suffix.

Article originally appeared on NY Times (http://www.nytimes.com) and was written by Jon Pereles.