Austin becomes the center of the indie rock universe every spring for the South by Southwest music festival. But while that 15-year-old fest has grown pretty unaffordable for anyone who doesn't own a record label, another Austin festival is stepping up to the plate with something a little more every-rocker.

The Fun Fun Fun Fest, now in it's third year, takes place this weekend in Austin's Waterloo Park. FFFF doesn't have SXSW's 1,000-plus bands, but they do bring a pretty stellar lineup this year, with indie A-listers like The National, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Minus the Bear, and ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead.

And with tickets starting at $25--including free after-parties around Austin--we might have a reason to start moving our annual Texas trip to November.

Related Stories:
· Fun Fun Fun Fest [Official Site]
· SXSW coverage [Jaunted]
· Music Travel coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: Fun Fun Fun Fest]]]> BS 2008-11-06T11:00:08-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2008/11/4/4281/57666

What do a hipster band from Boston and ancient temple ruins have in common? Apparently, something. On December 7, MTV will host a rock concert featuring the pop phenom The Click Five in front of the world’s largest religious monument, Cambodia’s Angkor Wat.

Organizers picked the band because they’re touring the region and have a particularly avid fan base in Southeast Asia. The concert will attempt to draw attention to the country’s human trafficking problem.

Whether you consider it sacrilege or humanitarianism, at least MTV is doing something other than creating faux-reality TV shows for once. Not that we don’t enjoy those--it’s just good to change things up from the evil wrought by Spencer Pratt to look at some of the real ills plaguing the world. If we can’t have music videos and Loveline back, at least we can watch a band of attractive, floppy-haired musicians churn out some catchy tunes in front of a kick-ass backdrop.

Related Stories:
· US Rockers to Play Cambodia’s Angkor Wat [AFP, via Google]
· Jaunted's Guide to Angkor Wat [Jaunted]
· Live Music coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: ilovekyle_click5]]]> ced138 2008-11-04T16:00:07-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2008/10/29/234734/57

Break the bounds of Broadway with our coverage of the Brooklyn arts scene.

Despite its old-timey sound, the Music Hall of Williamsburg wasn't around for A Tree Grows In Brooklyn: The combination bar and concert space opened last fall out of the bones of former venue Northsix, which itself found life in a former mayonnaise factory.

With three levels and two bars, it's far from a neighborhood dive, but there are some couches too--in case you prefer your indie rock basement style.

This week at the Music Hall of Williamsburg: It's sold out, but if you're savvy you can still catch nouveau glam rockers MGMT Friday (if you can stand all that glitter); Saturday brings the works of arcane folkie Rachael Yamagata, and not only the lonely will appreciate next Thursday's show by Joseph Arthur and the Lonely Astronauts.

Related Stories:
· Music Hall of Williamsburg [Official Site]
· Neither Arenas Nor Dives, New Clubs Hope to Succeed with More Style [NYT]
· Brooklyn Travel coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: Bryan Bruchman] ]]> egw 2008-10-30T11:00:04-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2008/10/29/125549/17

Break the bounds of Broadway with our coverage of the Brooklyn arts scene.

The route to the former spice mill that now holds St. Ann's Warehouse, the performance venue named for its former Brooklyn Heights home, is a forbidding trek through underpasses and still-deserted city streets. But every once in a while, you look up and see, framed by buildings, a lighted strip of the Brooklyn Bridge.

Such surprising brilliance seems to come naturally to St. Ann's, which retains its large indoor space to be reconfigured for events both grand and intimate. Aimee Mann recently used the space for a three-night stand to record a concert DVD, and both the Brooklyn Opera Society and the Coen brothers have felt right at home here.

This week: March over to St. Ann's to see the National Theatre of Scotland in "Black Watch," an incredible meditation on the war in Iraq through the eyes of a famous (and since disbanded) regiment; Ben Brantley of The New York Times called it "One of the most richly human works of art to have emerged from this long-lived war," and we heartily concur.

Related Stories:
· St. Ann's Warehouse [Official Site]
· Get Bowled Over By BAM [Jaunted]
· Make a Splash in Williamsburg [Jaunted]
· Brooklyn Travel coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: StAnnsWarehouse.org]]]> egw 2008-10-29T14:35:03-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2008/10/28/172247/21

Break the bounds of Broadway with our coverage of the Brooklyn arts scene.

Don't bring your swimsuit to this party: Williamsburg music club Union Pool gets its name from a past life as a pool supply shop, not an aquatic center. But you'll be swimming in hipsters in no time, whether you arrive in time for happy hour or for one of the up-and-coming bands featured nightly.

There's space for turntables, but it was Union Pool's reputation as a haunt for the tastemakers that got it a spot in teen romance "Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist." With its own MySpace page, no wonder the Village Voice mentioned Union Pool as a venue that doesn't suck in its preview of annual music festival, CMJ.

This week: Catch Britpoppers Michael Talbott & The Wolfkings Saturday night or squeeze in for Tuesday's election drinkathon. Spoilin' for a fight? Enter the Classy Ladies Arm-Wrestling Tournament tomorrow night.

Related Stories:
· Get Bowled Over By BAM [Jaunted]
· Jaunted's Guide to CMJ [Jaunted]
· Brooklyn Travel coverage [Jaunted]

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If you've noticed a marked increase in New York's already sizeable collegiate and post-collegiate hipster population this week, you're not mistaken: It's CMJ week.

Indie rock's biggest group orgy takes over the island of Manhattan (and slivers of Brooklyn) for the College Music Journal Music Marathon, with hundreds of up-and-coming bands playing all over town. If you've read about a band on a blog this year, they're probably here.

The problem of course, is where the eff to go first. CMJ's own site is maddeningly complex, with no simple rundown of what bands are playing where and when.

So if you're reading this and happen to hold one of those awesome all-show badges--and are too worn out from last night's party at Terminal 5 to figure out where the bands worth seeing are--here are the shows you're really gonna care about: ]]> BS 2008-10-22T13:30:48-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2008/10/13/9559/9634

Summer's end usually means the end of massive outdoor music festivals for the year, but 2008 is letting live music stretch way into the fall.]]> BS 2008-10-13T12:30:43-05:00 Search Jaunted string http://www.jaunted.com/search/