Wilco, R.E.M. Members Team for Big Star Tribute Concert
Wilco‘s Jeff Tweedy and Pat Sansone, R.E.M.‘s Mike Mills, Yo La Tengo‘s Ira Kaplan, Jessica Pratt and more will come together April 27th to perform Big Star‘s classic Third/Sister Lovers in its entirety at Los Angeles’ Alex Theatre. The Big Star Live concert, which also features live renditions of beloved tracks from the band’s first two albums, will be filmed for a DVD release scheduled for 2017.
The performance also boasts Big Star drummer Jody Stephens, the lone surviving original member of the influential rock group, as well as Robyn Hitchcock, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers keyboardist Benmont Tench, Semisonic’s Dan Wilson, second-era Big Star members Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow and more. Carl Marsh, who wrote all of Third/Sister Lovers orchestrations, will also be on hand to guide a full chamber orchestra helmed by the Kronos Quartet, Pitchfork reports.
Visit the Alex Theatre site for ticket information. The Big Star Third Live tribute – led by mainstays Stephens, Mills, Let’s Active’s Mitch Easter and the dB’s Chris Stamey – have performed together sporadically over the past six years since singer Alex Chilton’s death in 2010. However, it’s been four years since the group performed at London’s Barbican, a May 2012 concert that was also attended by Sharon Van Etten, Brendan Benson, Hot Chip’s Alexis Taylor and Ray Davies, who joined the supergroup to perform the Big Star-covered Kinks track “Till the End of the Day.”