Clap Your Hands Say Yeah’s Frontman Alec Ounsworth Releases A Surprise Solo Album, Skin and Bones, Buy It Here; Ounsworth’s Solo Debut (Uh, I Guess Not Anymore…Follow-up?) Mo Beauty Released October 20 [Brooklyn Vegan]

Stream New Wavves Song, “Cool Jumper,” Allegedly Featuring Hella’s Drummer Extraordinaire Zach Hill…It’s Six Minutes Long, And, Hate To Admit It, Pretty Cool [Gorilla Vs. Bear]

Stream The Notebook Star Ryan Gosling’s Band Dead Man’s Bones’s New Song “My Body’s A Zombie For You”…Weirdly, That’s Exactly What The Song Is About, And Features A Chorus Of Children Singing About Said Zombies; Dead Man’s Bones Released October 6 [Pitchfork]

MTV Gives Up Times Square Studio, Famous As TRL’s Home – Backstreet Boys Unsure Of Where They’ll Announce Umpteenth Reunion Tour, And Perform A Capella Cover of Some Boyz II Men Song In Front Of Dwindling, School-Cutting Preteens [Idolator]

Stream Justin Vernon’s (Bon Iver) New Project Volcano Choir’s First Song “Island, IS” (This Song Is Proof That Bon Iver Could Record A Dance Album); Volcano Choir’s Debut, Unmap, Released September 22 [Pitchfork]

Dave Grohl, Queens of the Stone Age’s Josh Homme, and Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones’ Them Crooked Vultures Unveil 14 Seconds of Song, “Nobody Loves Me And Neither Do I” [Spin]

The Lower East Side to Tribeca And Now to Williamsburg New York Venue The Knitting Factory Announces Les Savy Fav Will Headline Their Opening Show On September 9; Knitting Factory Also Announces Plan To Get Priced Out In a Few Years, And Be Forced To Move Again [NME]

Popular LA Venue (And Birthplace of No Age and Abe Vigoda) The Smell Announces DVD Live at the Smell; Released September 1 [Pitchfork]

Britpop Giants The Verve Break Up For The Third Time (Which Is Good, Because Without The Verve Making New Music, They Can Be Properly and Exclusively Remembered For This) [Guardian]

Norwegian Electopop Queen Annie’s Second Album Don’t Stop To Finally Be Released October 19, Nearly A Year After It Leaked [Pitchfork]

Deerhunter’s Bradford Cox, AKA Atlas Sound, Releases Fleetwood Mac Cover, “Walk A Thin Line”; Stream It [Deerhunter Blog]

compiled by Max Sebela

Reporting for NPR, Jacob Ganz referred to the “perfect storm of Internet hype, e-commerce, and rabid fan response” to describe the fast rise of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. But perfect storms are meteorological coincidences, whereas rock bands on the rise - even unsigned, “independent” ones - are the product of human actions. Thus, Internet hype, e-commerce and a rabid fan response require posting MP3s and getting them to the right bloggers, connections with online distributors, and booking the right shows. A band’s success today might not include a label but it will require managers, publicists, and, of course, distribution, all of which was available to CYHSY from the beginning.

Photo by Davey Wilson

The truly unique feat of CYHSY was that an unsigned band sold about 100,000 copies of its first release within a year without a label. Today it has sold about 300,000 copies including domestic and international sales; surely the envy of thousands of local bands. Many onlookers believed that the 9.0 rating on PitchforkMedia.com (Pitchfork) was the reason for their success. But it was the road to Pitchfork and its aftermath that reveals the band’s rise to be a product of talent and hard work, but not without help from people in the music business.

In late 2005, when I first heard about the CYHSY explosion, I cynically asked myself: “Is there a music industry person operating behind the scenes”? There were two, both friends of the band from Connecticut College. Dave Godowsky was in the publicity department at Rounder Records, and then Nick Stern was Director of Publicity for Atlantic Records. Some big label industry experience was behind the rise of a band touted as the poster child of the “independent” and DIY music business.

Nick Stern, manager of CYHSY, takes little credit for the band’s success. His role, he says, was essentially giving “advice to good friends from college;” asserting that the band exemplifies the DIY ethos. Moreover, Stern is adamant that “No one can do anything without a great fucking record.” Stern also notes that most bands have managers. But anyone who has a friend in a great band will tell you that most bands starting out don’t have managers or close friends in the business. Furthermore, many in today’s new music business understand that managers and publicists are more important than labels.
More on CYHSY: The Rise of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah; Hard Work and College Friends in the Music Industry Can Really Help