It's not exactly news since I posted it all before, but the full dates for the Northwest Passage Festival are now posted online at the official website: http://www.northwestpassagefestival.com/whenwhere.html
To reiterate:

11/03 - Maja Ratkje & Arve Henriksen @ 964 Natoma, San Francisco, CA
11/04 - Jaga Jazzist & Supersilent @ Great American Music Hall, San Francisco, CA
11/05 - DJ Strangefruit, DJ Bjorn Torske & DJ Kent Horne @ 111 Minna Gallery, San Francisco, CA
11/05 - Supersilent @ Dance Centre, Vancouver (CAN)
11/08 - Supersilent @ Tonic, NYC, NY
11/08 - Jaga Jazzist @ Black Cat, Washington DC

Jaga Jazzist appears to be scheduling a few more US dates around their appearance at the Northwest Passage Fest in November:

11/04 - Great American Music Hall, San Francisco, CA (Northwest Passage)
11/05 - tbc, San Francisco, CA
11/07 - Black Cat, Washington DC

Things are starting to come together a bit more for the Northwest Passage Festival here in San Francisco in early November. As mentioned before, it will mark the US debut of renown Norwegian avant-jazz-improv act Supersilent and will also be their first show together with countrymen Jaga Jazzist. And if that wasn't enough already, also now confirmed on for the fest are DJ Bjorn Torske, DJ Strangefruit and DJ Kent Horne, vocal/electronic artist Maja Ratkje and a solo performance from trumpet player Arve Henriksen of Supersilent. Tickets are already on sale so far for the Supersilent/Jaga Jazzist show and you can get full details here: http://www.northwestpassagefestival.com

See you there?

The latest from renown Norwegian label Smalltown Supersound:

"Where We`re At" is a collection of present and future supersounds from Smalltown. The album contains 9 tracks from the lastest releases and from upcoming releases, and is meant as an introduction to the Smalltown Supersound label. This is also to show "where we`re at" after having split Smalltown Supersound in two; Smalltown Superjazzz and Smalltown Supersound. The Smalltown Supersound label will be presenting leftfield pop music (or our definition of pop) and the Smalltown Superjazzz presenting the jazz, (or our definition of jazz). In short time we will also put together a Smalltown Superjazzz compilation.

"Where We`re At" comes in slimline cover, and will be sold at budget price. None of the tracks are exclusive. The compilation also introduces 2 new acts; Toy from Bergen who has released one 7” on Telle Records (Royksopp, Kings Of Conveniece) and Mental Overdrive which released the first albums on the seminal R&S Records in Belgium (the label that among others discovered Aphex Twin) and was later signed to Virgin, before managing to get out of that contract to get signed to Smalltown Supersound. The other acts on the compilation are Jaga Jazzist, Kim Hiorthøy, Lars Horntveth, Sir Dupermann, Yuichiro Fujimoto, Sonic Youth/Mats Gustafsson and Martin Horntveth.

Release date is set to 4th of September.

Jaga Jazzist has posted some pics from their current recording session in Germany: http://www.jagajazzist.com/v2/pictures

Also via DJ Martian comes this feature from The Beat Surrender on the reissue of Jaga Jazzist's first album "Magazine": http://www.thebeatsurrender.co.uk/news/news_detail.php?news=110

Jaga Jazzist reminisces about their just-completed US/Canada tour: http://www.jagajazzist.com/v2/news.php

The Warp Records Bleep mp3 webstore is now fully stocked on releases from a huge assortment of international electronic labels such as Merck, Ghostly International, Def Jux, Ninjatune/Ntone/Bigdada, Benbecula, Skam, Arcola, Fomm, World of Osymyso, Breakin' and Lex, which of course includes a number of Scandinavian artists like Jaga Jazzist and Lackluster: http://www.warprecords.com/bleep/

Check out an mp3 for the song "Cowboys and Cactus" from the upcoming Home Groan album "The Opening Act", due out September 20: http://www.homegroan.net/snd/cowboys.and.cactus.mp3
Home Groan is the band of Martin Hagfors who regularly collaborates with members of Motorpsycho in other projects such as HGH and Cream of the Crop and the song in question features Lars Håvard Haugen from Jaga Jazzist on guitar. The first single for the album will reportedly be called "I Drive".

Jaga Jazzist has posted some updates from the road on their just-finished North American tour: http://www.jagajazzist.com/v2/news.php

Pics from the current Jaga Jazzist tour in North America: http://www.jagajazzist.com/v2/pictures.php/

Lars Horntveth manages to claim NME's runners-up spot. Here's what Robert had to say about him:

"Norwegian person constructs unbelievably graceful instrumental. Not, sadly, a cover of Steve Miller's 1974 classic (don't front - those bluegrass harmonies are the bomb), but still high quality. Horntveth is the man behind Jaga Jazzist, a ten-piece outfit who have radically retooled - gulp - jazz, and come up with something a little more experimental. He's also written for psycho-metallers Turbonegro, so you can imagine it's not quite Acker Bilk we're dealing with here. 'The Joker', though is in a universe all of its own, touching on ocean-deep electronica, groovy string quartets, minimalist jungle and tropicala. Four Tet have turned in their best remix in about three years, too - a jumble of spliced beats trimmed down to tiny shards, seemingly by some monomaniacal lunatic with some dangerous fucking scissors - so it's all good."

Jaga Jazzist will be entering a studio in Cologne, Germany in July to record a new album with producer Marcus Schmickler of Pluramon. The finished product probably won't be released until early 2005, but there should be a 'taster' of some sort available before the end of the year.

I am unbelievably stoked: Supersilent and Jaga Jazzist are playing a show together at the SF Jazz Festival on November 4 at the Great American Music Hall. I'm not sure when tickets go on sale, but I'll most certainly be in attendance. Look for more California dates to be announced soon.

Cream of the Crop summer tour dates in Norway:

05/30 - Månesfestivalen, Fredrikstad
06/30 - Kongsberg Jazz festival
07/06 - Gamle Ormelet, Tjøme
08/03 - Musikkfestuken, Bodø
08/04 - Varanger festivivalen

Gebhardt will be taking Martin Horntveth's place on these dates while he's busy with Jaga Jazzist is in US on tour. Jørgen Munkeby (ex-Jaga Jazzist, Shining) will also be joining the group on saxophone.