2011 has come and gone and it was quite a year for good tunes. We will provide the full update and Spotify playlist link in a couple of days, but I wanted to throw up some selections for AP&E’s picks for best music of 2011. Check it out!

Yuck – Get Away
The Black Keys – Lonely Boy
Deer Tick – Let’s All Go To The Bar
The Coasts – Poltergeist
The Joy Formidable – Chapter 2
SURGEONS IN HEAT – The Price
Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. – We Almost Lost Detroit
Rodeo Ruby Love – Secrets
Stepdad – My Leather, My Fur, My Nails
Arctic Monkeys – Suck It and See
Avril Lavigne – What The Hell
The Strokes – Taken For A Fool
Sloan – Unkind
Walter – Man Or Muppet
M83 – Midnight City
Childish Gambino – Fire Fly
LMFAO – Hot Dog

Come celebrate New Years Eve in Wrigleyville at Yak-Zies on Clark Street! Open bar all night, live music, Yak-Zies famous wings and food and a couple hundred of your closest friends! We will be sharing the stage with two other bands and we promise to help you ring in the New Year in style.

The event is a benefit for Prevent Child Abuse America, so come on out and party for a cause.

Join us for a concert that will boost your holiday cheer into overdrive! NOISE FOR TOYS will feature Archie Powell & The Exports as well as your other favorite local Chicago acts turning the holiday volume knob to 11–curing your seasonal depression and aiding local charities in the process.

Bring a packaged, unwrapped toy to be donated to the US Marine Corp Reserve “Toys For Tots” charity and receive *HALF OFF* the price of admission.

Along with seasonal cover songs–exclusive to this show only–Santa will be making a special, in-venue appearance. For those looking to relive childhood memories, Santa’s visit includes a photobooth to capture concertgoers’ lap-sitting and gift-requesting. Local businesses will raffle off prizes, and attendees are encouraged to wear their favorite holiday sweaters and outfits for a chance to win a gift pack assembled by the bands.

Come and take part in this wonderful charity concert to benefit Chicago’s children in need this holiday season!

NOISE FOR TOYS will feature :
State and Madison (http://www.stateandmadison.net/)
Archie Powell & The Exports (http://www.archiepowell.com/)
The Noise FM (http://www.thenoisefm.net/)
The Scissors (http://www.thescissors.com/)

Doors: 8:30 | Music: 9:00
Tickets: $10 or $5 if you bring a packaged toy for donation | 17+

PRESALE TICKETS : http://tktwb.tw/noisefortoys

1. The second leg of TOURANNOSAURUS 2011 is kicking off this week. East coast, prepare yourselves for many many shows (including two (this and this) CMJ Day Parties. Come out and get your limited edition SKIP WORK koozie.

Click here to view the embedded video.

2. Our last video from the SKIP WORK for “The Darndest Things” is up and running. Take a peek and reminisce in all the goodness our 2010 debut has brought you.

3. Did you know our Kickstarter project for BURRITO LUNCH has skyrocketed way above our initial dreams? Check out the update here. We don’t believe it…

To the east coast we go!

-AP&E

Your new favorite band, Archie Powell & The Exports, are hitting the road once again. We will be going into brand new territory as we make our way down south before going jetting back to the east coast (do you guys over there get it yet?).

There are a couple of extra cool things happening this tour as well.

1 – On a select few of these dates we will be playing with our new friends from the UK, The Indelicates. This is their first US experience, so make sure to come on out and show them a good time.

2 – We will also be making a couple of appearances during the CMJ festival at day parties. On Tuesday October 18th we will be playing at Spike Hill at a party sponsored by PBR, EventBrite, and Vita Coco, which looks like it will be a ball. We will also be playing the “#LETSGETMESSY” day party at Arlene’s Grocery on Saturday October 22nd. There are a ton of cool bands playing and if you RSVP on www.letsgetmessycmj.com you’ll get a free mixtape with all the bands (pretty cool, huh?). So don’t say we never gave you nothing!

We would love to see old and new faces at every single one of these shows, so please, share this with all your friends in the areas of these shows.

AP&E TOURANNOSAURUS 2011
(* = w/ The Indelicates)

09.30 Tin Can – St. Louis, MO

10.01 P&H Cafe – Memphis, TN

10.02 Swan Dive  – Austin, TX

10.03 Poor David’s Pub – Dallas, TX

10.04 Igor’s Checkpoint Charlie – New Orleans, LA

10.05 Super Happy Fun Land – Houston, TX

10.06 Maxine’s – Hot Springs, AR

10.07 The Bridge – Columbia, MO

10.09 Chicago Marathon – Chicago, IL

10.10 TBA (anyone wanna host?)

10.12 The Space – New Haven, CT

10.13 Can Tab Lounge – Cambridge *

10.14 The Speakeasy @ Local 121 – Providence, RI *

10.15 Mr. Beery’s – Bethpage, NY

10.16 Pianos Presents – New York, NY *

10.17 Tritone – Philadelphia, PA *

10.18 Spike Hill – New York, NY
(CMJ day party)

10.19 Mill Hill Basement – Trenton, NJ

10.20 Kelly’s Logan House – Willington, DE

10.21 PARTY AT STEVE WOLF’S HOUSE – Summit, NJ

10.22 #LETSGETMESSY at Arlene’s Grocery – New York, NY (CMJ)
(CMJ day party – RSVP to www.letsgetmessycmj.com for a free mixtape)

10.26 The Frequency – Madison, WI *

10.28 Elbo Room – Chicago, IL *
(special Halloween set)

We’re going to make this quick we know that everyone has fun in the sun activities to do outside. No reason to be at the computer longer than necessary.

»»» The poster above (as always, designed by the talented @RyanExport) is for our show with our good buddies Devon Kay & The Solutions. They are releasing their brand spankin’ new EP entitled Never Punt that night and it is shaping up to be a barnburner of a show. Facebook event here / presale tickets here.

»»» This will be our last show for a while since we will be concentrating on getting the new material ready for recording in September. More details will be released on that later.

»»» We recently added our new t-shirt to our webstore, so if you’re looking for fashionable summer threads, hop on over.

»»» We’ve also been working on some awesome extra curricular activities as of late. As mentioned above @RyanExport has been designing some rad stuff as of late, which we will share more of when it’s done. I (@AdamExport) have started to DJ out more, mainly at The Bedford in Wicker Park. @ArchiePowell/@RJExport (and roomie extraordinaire @miketewing) have just finished our first home brew for Dirty Shirt Brewery entitled “Sari, IPArty” (get it? Sari is a shirt and it’s an IPA). So if you’re in the Windy City and want to do fun stuff, just hit up The Exports.

NOW GO OUTSIDE! IT’S BEAUTIFUL OUT!

- @AdamExport

• 06.09 : Chicago, IL @ The Beat Kitchen
• 06.10 : TBA
• 06.11 : Cleveland, OH @ Wilbert’s
• 06.12 : Washington D.C. @ Solly’s U Street Tavern
• 06.13 : Brooklyn, NY @ The Rock Shop (w/ Eastern Conference Champions)
• 06.14 : Asbury Park, NJ @ The Saint
• 06.15 : TBA, NY
• 06.16 : Rochester, NY @ Lovin Cup
• 06.17 : Toronto, ON @ Rancho Relaxo (part of NXNE Music Festival)
• 06.18 : Grand Rapids, MI @ Mulligan’s Pub

Are your taxes done yet? Mine neither. Help ease the pain with our newest music video. The tune is “Skip Work”. The original title was “Skip Work (Because They’ll Totally Just Mail You Your W-2 Anyway)”, but it was decided that brevity would be more beneficial. Enjoy!

Please tell all your friends and share this all over the various internet social media platforms the world has offered you!

ENJOY!

-AP&E

Here’s a live cover for our third week of “Money” by Barret Strong

Enjoy and stay tuned for the last video next Monday.

-Adam Export