Supergrass, The Strange Ones

Modern Rock

By Kristi Kates | Oct. 12, 2019

Supergrass fans will be glad to see that the band — following its reunion, after 10 years apart, at Glastonbury’s Pilton Party — has just announced a full reunion tour as well as the release of a career-spanning box set (which includes a great cover of The Police’s “Next to You”). Supergrass: The Strange Ones 1994–2008 will feature the band’s six albums on CD and vinyl picture disc, plus posters, a book, badges, and over six hours of previously unreleased material. The tour doesn’t have many stateside dates booked just yet — one in Los Angeles and another in Brooklyn this spring — but will kick off in winter with shows in Paris (Feb. 4); Dublin (Feb. 14); Manchester, England (Feb. 26); and Birmingham, England (March 3) …

English rockers Muse will celebrate the 20th anniversary of its debut album, Showbiz, with a box set, too. Origin of Muse will include nine CDs and four records, including a plethora of demos and B-sides. The set will be collected in a 48-page casebound book that also features interviews with the bandmates, photos, set lists, posters, reproduced artwork from the original albums, and more. Origin of Muse will be in stores just in time for the holidays on Dec. 6 (but you can preorder it now at a variety of outlets) …
 
Singer Angel Olsen’s fourth studio album, All Mirrors, just arrived last week, and with it some of her most experimental music yet, thanks in part to producer John Congleton. Olsen worked with a 14-piece orchestra for many of the tunes on this set, which added even more intensity to her already forceful music and filtered in quite a large amount of drama, as well. Included on the album, which is being offered by Jagjaguwar Records, are must-listen tracks “Too Easy,” “New Love Cassette,” “Impasse,” and “What It Is,” as well as the title track; all of the music includes Olsen’s usual mix of ’80s synths and quirky vocals …

Emmylou Harris, Jackson Browne, Patty Griffin,and Steve Earle are among the musicians putting together a national music tour to assist those affected in the migrant/asylum-seeking situation on the U.S./Mexico border. Called The Lantern Tour II: Concerts for Migrant and Refugee Families, the events will kick off Nov. 5 with a show at Washington, D.C.’s Warner Theater, then New York City’s Town Hall on Nov. 6. Additional dates and venues for the tour are expected to be announced soon, with the trek planned to continue through next summer …

LINK OF THE WEEK
Noel Gallagher (Oasis) and his High Flying Birds band have released a new track from Gallagher’s upcoming new EP, This is the Place. Check out “A Dream is All You Need to Get by,” available at NGHFB.lnk.to/ADIAINTGBTw …
 
THE BUZZ
Ben Rector and Andy Grammer are teaming up for an Oct. 20 performance at 20 Monroe Live in Grand Rapids …

Grand Rapids band August has just released its new album, Bloom, which was recorded at the local River City Studios …

Fellow GR band The Skinny Limbs has also released its latest album (its second), Seafarer, which the band calls its “most mature work yet” …

One for the vintage fans: Arlo Guthrie will perform Oct. 23 at Ann Arbor venue The Ark … and that’s the buzz for this week’s Modern Rock…
 
Comments, questions, rants, raves, suggestions on this column? Send ’em to Kristi at modernrocker@gmail.com.