"Mary Christmas" video from Juan Huevos

Durham rapper Juan Huevos brings us a special gift this holiday season--a video for "Mary Christmas." Key line: "Santa Claus drinks a whole lot of liquor yo/He let the whiskey flow/Pissin' Kringle in the snow"

Free live record from Floating Action and Park The Van Records

Floating Action, the project of Black Mountain songwriter Seth Kauffman, has released a free Web-only live album recorded at The Grey Eagle in Asheville, via Floating Action's label home, Park The Van Records. This comes as a follow-up to Kauffman's 2007 album under his own name, Research. The 10-track live set is streaming at Kauffman/Floating Action's profile on Park The Van's Web site. Or, to cut out the middle man, downlaod the whole thing in a .zip file by clicking here.

Word is, Floating Action's self-titled studio (kinda)debut is expected to arrive in stores in March.

New Death Becomes Even The Maiden: "Closing In"

As a special, wintertime treat, Columbia, S.C.'s Death Becomes Even The Maiden unveiled an exclusive new track, "Closing In" via the band's Web site. Some lucky fans caught first wind of the download from a handbill distributed at the band's Dec. 13 show at The Whig in Columbia. Others, including Shuffle, saw the following post in the band's Twitter feed.

if you didn't get a handbill last night at the whig, go to http://dbetm.com/december and enter "cuernavaca" to download "closing in."

Others are just hearing about it now. Regardless, enjoy the new jams.

Kooley High announces LP release

Kooley High has announced plans to follow this year's old-school awesome Summer Sessions EP, with an official long-player, to be titled The High Life, in February.

Here's a promo video:

CyTunes launch party in Chapel Hill

As previously reported, CyTunes.org, the Triangle-based music download retailer founded in honor of local music's fallen friend Cy Rawls, is up and running, offering exclusive recordings from area heavyweights including Polvo, Superchunk, Sorry About Dresden, The Rosebuds and Double Negative. But wait! There's more! Tonight at Chapel Hill's Local 506, the site celebrates its launch with a free party featuring DJs, karaoke and performances by The Magic Babies and The Flute Flies (which features The Rosebuds' Ivan Howard, Schooner's Reid Johnson and Zeno Gill of The Sames).

Shuffle wholeheartedly approves of this event.

Also, check out the CyTunes write-up on Pitchfork.

Reminder: Black Congo NC says sayonara tonight

Eric Deines (left, shirtless) is leaving N.C. for Indiana, which means the dissolution of Black Congo NC, the band Deines (a sometime Shuffle contributor) fronts, and which was featured in our most recent issue. The band bids its final adieu tonight at Snug Harbor. The loss of BCNC is a bummer for Charlotte, for sure.

Also, if you're in the neighborhood early, check out Raleigh's Whatever Brains at Lunchbox Records around 8 p.m.

Is Schoolkids Records' Raleigh location in trouble?

Schoolkids Records lost its longstanding Chapel Hill location last year, much to the dismay of the local record-buying community (myself included). And it seems as if the regional chain's Raleigh shop might not be doing so well, either. Raleigh News & Observer music critic David Menconi reports the store's movement to a smaller, cheaper location in Raleigh, and quotes Schoolkids owner Mike Phillips as saying, "I will keep this thing open as long as I can without losing too much money." To these ears, that doesn't sound overly optimistic. Bummer.

Check out Menconi's original post here.

CyTunes launches at midnight tonight (12/12/08)

Cy Rawls, a longtime friend and fan of the Triangle music scene, lost his battle against a malignant brain tumor in early October. But his friends haven't forgotten. CyTunes.org, a digital music retailer started with the intention to benefit Cy's mounting medical bills couldn't be completed in time, but the organizers soldiered on anyhow, shifting the site's monetary benefactor from the Raws family to the Tisch Brain Tumor Center at Duke University.

Here is a list of artists whose music will available on CyTunes at launch:

Studio Tracks:

All Night
Chew Toy
The Dirty Little Heaters
Evil Wiener
The Ex-Monkeys
The Flute Flies
Greenades
Hammer No More The Fingers
I Was Totally Destroying It
Josh Zaslow
Mercury Birds
The Nein
Red Collar
Ryan Pound
Starmount
Wes Phillips

Live Tracks:

Superchunk
Polvo
The Rosebuds
Birds Of Avalon
Cantwell Gomez and Jordan
Fin Fang Foom
Magic Babies
Double Negative


** For more info on what CyTunes is about: http://test.cytunes.org/about/about_cytunes.html

**For more info about Cy Rawls: http://test.cytunes.org/about/about_cy.html

**For more info about the Tisch Brain Tumor Center: http://test.cytunes.org/about/about_tisch.html

Cast Your Bruce Hazel and Some Volunteers Ballot by Dec. 12!

Just when you thought you were done voting -- here is your chance to support someone else you might like. He may not be a matinée idol like Barack Obama, but we happily endorse the gravel-voiced Bruce Hazel, his volunteers, and their music.

Hazel and his crew are one of the thirteen remaining bands vying for the honor of "Best Unsigned Band in the World," as deemed by Genya Ravan's Sirius Satellite program, "Goldie's Garage." Just click on it to register, which you must do to vote. The next round of voting runs through Friday, Dec. 12.

The top three bands will head to NYC to play live on January 17th 2009 at PIANO’S, and the winner of this live show gets a record deal with Little Steven's Wicked Cool Records.

For more info, visit www.wheelerstmusic.com or www.foolsbrigade.org.

Party Tomorrow

FRIDAY, DEC. 5 @ THE WORLD FAMOUS MILESTONE CLUB, CHARLOTTE, N.C.

CALABI YAU (LAST SHOW EVER!)
THANK GOD
KING TUT
THE CURTAINS OF NIGHT
GRIDS
BATTLE BEASTS

ALL FOR FREE!

Baumer's last show: video

The fine folks over at the SceneSC blog were kind enough to film Baumer's final show at Headliner's in Columbia in its entirety.


Baumer-Full Show from Scene SC on Vimeo.

Miley Cyrus <3 obscure Raleigh punk band Th' Cigaretz

Mike Smith over at Comboland Radio made an interesting discovery recently while editing audio samples from a recent episode of "Dancing With the Stars." The episode in question featured Miley Cyrus performing her latest single, "Fly On The Wall," which Smith immediately recognized--except the version is his head was by the influential if obscure Raleigh punk band Th' Cigaretz.

Smith has the two tracks clipped side-by-side at combolandradio.com.

More info on Th' Cigaretz from Sam Hicks' essay "How North Carolina Got Its Punk Attitude":

In 1977, the first full fledged N.C. punk band was Raleigh's th' Cigaretz. Band members' punk identities included Throb, Bindee, Johnny Guitar and Jimmy Jones. They had been in cover bands for years, but were sick of heavy metal, poodle haircuts, and trying to play wah wah pedals wearing platform shoes. House painters by day, they say it was a combination of paint fumes and Never Mind The Bollocks, that inspired them to "...just say fuck it!." The problem was, original music wasn't of interest to anyone at this time. The only club that would allow them to play regularly was the Free Advice; their Thursday nights were dead so they made them into "Punk Night" to fill the void. "Then we came under the influence of Iggy," relates Byron. "We became every visual and interactive because we wanted the audience's total undivided attention." They started throwing junkfood, toilet paper & cereal into the crowd... anything they could think of. "We gave up on soda and shaving cream because it made the stage so slick and we couldn't get paid after ruining people's monitors." The original drummer left the band when he decided he wasn't paying for all this crap they were wasting just trying to get people's attention.

After efforts to record demos at Reflection Studio failed, they decided to try recording themselves live from the soundboard at several shows, including a fantastic Halloween show. It was in this way that they succeeded in getting enough material together to press an album. The Crawl Rite Outta My Skin (34796) live LP, begins with them yelling "Get this guy off the stage! Yeah, you fuckin' stupid asshole, what is this shit!" Eventually released in 1980, it contains classic songs like "Fuckin' Up Bad," "Skullfuggin" and "Just Another Piece Of Meat." Crawl came out on their own Cancer Records and was embossed with a hand silk screened cover; each one slightly different. Due to this record's 100% D.I.Y. existence it might be hard to say how far it traveled or how much their Heartbreakers-style music had an effect on the rest of the state. But gauging from the response of their fellow musicians, it would be on par with the first Arrogance single in its scope of influence.

Legend has it that this was the band that set the Triangle afire with punk rebellion. A well-remembered gig in their career was with the H-Bombs, but the most infamous Cigaretz show was an outdoor May Day block party in '78 or '79. They had basically finished their set and started playing the finale, a "Rolling Stones / Get Off My Cloud Medley," when the police arrived. The city of Raleigh had recently assembled a SWAT Team and dispatched them on a complaint of "obscenities over the P.A. system" for their first assignment. Since the band had almost finished, the crowd was already dispersing, but the SWAT Team overreacted and the situation turned violent. News crews arrived at the scene of the "riot," and broadcast footage of police beating people, some of whom turned out to be well respected and famous people. Public outcry resulted in an investigation. It's no wonder that th' Cigaretz moved to NYC in 1980, but it was only a year before the big city broke them up. Jerry "Johnny Guitar" Williams later took up studio engineering, moved to NYC and recorded the Bad Brains, MDC & Reagan Youth. Scott "Throb" Jarvis engineered and produced the first Beastie Boys LP and was their tour manager when they opened for Madonna. He currently plays in the Workdogs. Byron "Jimmy Jones" McCay followed a similar path, but moved back to Raleigh to start his own studio, which would play an integral part in the upcoming Hardcore movement.