Last Week's News Roundup: Febuary 3rd - 10th

(Tuesday 5th Feb) Meet Me In St. Louis Split Up

Despite attempts to continue playing live shows after the departure of lead vocalist Toby Hayes in November, Guildford rock group Meet Me In St. Louis have decided to call it a day after drummer Paul Phillips also decided to leave the project.

The news wasn’t a massive surprise for fans of the group, but still comes as a disappointment, especially considering the band were beginning to get some respect for their dedication and hard work.

However, it’s not all bad news, as Toby Hayes is now focusing on the awesome ‘Shield Your Eyes’, another promising upstart that has already received some positive reactions.

(Wednesday 6th Feb) Meshuggah Put ‘Bleed’ on MySpace

Swedish math-metaller’s Meshuggah are gearing up for a March 7th release of their eagerly anticipated new album ‘obZen’, and have whetted fan’s appetites by providing a sneak peak of what the full length has to offer, in the form of ‘Bleed’.

The track wastes no time in reminding us why we love this band – a bone crushing riff leads to Jens Kidman’s guttural and raging vocals. The track is fast, furious and is definitely a fantastic sign of things to come. You can listen to the song right here.

(Friday 8th Feb) The Verve and Kings of Leon will join Jay-Z as headliners of Glastonbury festival ’08

Glastonbury, the UK festival of choice for hippies and shit weather fanatics around the globe, has announced its much anticipated headliners for this year’s events.

Despite rumors abound all over the internet, Radiohead will not be making a reappearance, with Kings of Leon, The Verve and rap icon Jay-Z taking top slots on the famous Pyramid stage.

It’s going to be an interesting year for the festival, as it continues to struggle amongst the multitude of other indie events, and that’s before the competition from the big boys such as Reading/Leeds and Download is considered. Organizer Michael Eavis said that Jay-Z “will appeal to the young people and under-25s for sure, so that's a big pull for them” and with the addition of British favorites Kings of Leon, it looks like choosing your festival just got a whole lot more troublesome.

(Saturday 9th Feb) Godspeed You! Black Emperor seemingly laid to rest

After four years under the depressing but somewhat hopeful guise of “in hiatus”, it would seem that any chance of the orchestral post-rock standard bearers Godspeed You! Black Emperor reforming have now dwindled to nothing.

Talking to Drowned in Sound, Efrim Menuck revealed that the war in Iraq was the catalyst that has led to the demise of the group, stating that he felt the events caused him to have an “existential freak-out” regarding how the band could overcome their profound difficulties in offering a political message in their chosen style of music.

It’s a really disheartening piece of news, especially given the sheer talent and power the group were capable of outputting into both their recorded and live performances. However, Efrim is continuing to play with A Silver Mt. Zion, who’s new album ’13 Blues for Thirteen Moons’ should see a March 10th release.

[EDIT 12/02/08] It would seem that Efrim has refuted the claims made by Drowned in Sound, and contacted them regarding the story. In his email to the website, Efrim accused the writers of lazy journalism "in the name of scoring some bullshit 'news exclusive'" after the website claimed that the Iraq war took a fundamental role in the band parting ways. He went on to say "a whole host of internal disagreements and external pressures contributed to us ending our long march together".
At the moment, the comments seem a little bit on the agressive/defensive side, but hopefully facts can be fully clarified when Drowned in Sound publish their interview with Efrim later this month.