News Roundup: Jack Johnson, Andrew Bird, Mason Jennings, MGMT

Andrew Bird shows are supposed to be a religious experience. This December, Bird will embark on a tour of churches in Minneapolis and Chicago. The singer/songwriter says he will be playing mainly instrumental violin pieces under ambient lighting, and taking advantage of each church’s natural acoustics. The concept behind the tour is to create a feeling of “Gezelligheid,” a Dutch word that roughly translates to “coziness.”

“What I hope to do with these shows is adapt my music completely to the atmosphere of the space and the season,” says Bird in a statement. “I’m inspired to do this based on childhood memories of performing Handel’s Messiah in various churches on an annual basis. The music will be mostly original instrumentals using my voice only to intone. I want the audience to be both lifted and comforted as we head into another cold and dark winter. I feel the space should be sacred so the audience can experience my music in a different atmosphere.”

Can’t wait until December? Tune in to Austin City Limits to watch a performance by Bird and St. Vincent this Saturday.

Jack Johnson fans should be stoked for October 27, when the surfing singer/songwriter will release the live DVD En Concert. Directed by manager Emmett Malloy, the film captures live and backstage footage of Johnson’s sold-out tour of Europe during the summer of 2008, and includes guest appearances from Ben Harper, G. Love, Matt Costa and Neil Halstead.

There will also be an En Concert CD, which will differ from the film’s soundtrack. It features a duet with Eddie Vedder on Johnson’s “Constellations” from last year’s Bonnaroo. Johnson says that his fifth studio album could potentially be out next year.

Johnson’s label-mate Mason Jennings, who also appears on En Concert, is back with a rock-centric new album, Blood Of Man, his 8th full-length. He wrote and recorded it over a couple of weeks while holed up in a remote location in the woods of Minnesota. “I made music for myself, really, recording all the instruments and everything,” Jennings tells BIllboard.com. “Out there you can make noise and nobody is going to hear it. You can make a lot of mistakes and have the freedom to work on that stuff. At the end of the winter I listened back and said, ‘Y’know, I think this might be a record…’ I was pretty stoked about what happened. I didn’t know if people who liked my music would like this stuff, but I did so I decided to put it out.”

Jennings explains in a statement that “I wrote about how hard it is to be 34 and be a parent and sane and married and true and positive and yourself and a man and funny and a decent person and a not decent person and human and in love.” The 11-track Blood Of Man is available now via Brushfire Records.

Harper Simon, son of Paul, who’s new album Harper Simon is earning raves, shares his father’s warm voice and plaintive fingerpicking style. But he’s enamored with another songwriting icon –- Nick Drake. Check out a video of Harper Simon’s cover of the Pink Moon classic “From the Morning” at Rollingstone.com.

MGMT will release their sophomore album, Congratulations, in early 2010. The album was produced by Pete “Sonic Boom” Kember of Spacemen 3/Spectrum, and Royal Trux’s Jennifer Herrema contributes guest vocals.

Congratulations is the followup to the band’s 2007 hype-magnet of a debut, Oracular Spectacular. “The song ‘Congratulations’ itself is pretty dark,” MGMT’s Andrew VanWyngarden recently told the Examiner. “It’s us trying to deal with all the craziness that’s been going on since our last album took off. Sometimes it just doesn’t feel natural.”