I have lived in Virginia my entire life, so I am allowed to pick on the state’s capital. For the time being, I am going to lay off of Richmond because the city has managed to score an unbelievable concert. The National, which I can attest to being a fantastic venue, will host My Bloody Valentine and an unannounced guest on July 30th. If only that special guest was a reunited Slowdive, but I suppose this will suffice. As far as I know, aside from an August 1st appearance at All Points West in New Jersey, this is the only currently announced show that the shoegaze legends will be performing on the east coast. Tickets go on sale this Saturday, June 20th.

Tip courtesy of Pam. Image courtesy of Pitchfork.

This is a re-post of my August 2006 interview with Chad VanGaalen. I remember calling Chad up just before the release of his second album, Skelliconnection. We talked a lot about his recording process, building homemade instruments, and his endless backlog of unreleased songs. Chad released Soft Airplane on Sub Pop last year and on August 11th Flemish Eye will release the debut from his alias Black Mold.

Hugh Miller: Who was the first person who encouraged you to release your music?

Chad VanGaalen: I was putting out tapes and CDRs independently for a long time by myself. Ian Russell, the guy that runs Flemish Eye [VanGaalen’s label in Canada], the label that put Infiniheart out originally, was probably the first person that was seriously interested in putting anything out.

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