We’re currently putting the finishing touches on a rockin’ live release from Frank Black & the Catholics: Live at Melkweg / Amsterdam / March 24th, 2001, which is due out March 20th, 2012, nearly 11 years to the day after it was recorded at the legendary club in the Netherlands (Melkweg = The Milky Way).

Below is a bit from the official blurb for those of you wanting to know more (and of course, we’ll be back with more details on the release as soon as they trickle in):

Frank Black & the Catholics “Live At Melkweg” was recorded in the aftermath of the classic album, Dog in the Sand, which “plays as a true classicist rock ‘n’ roll album, without resorting to cliches or sounding reactionary.” Reminiscent of “Exile on Main Street-era Stones and early Bowie . . . all the tracks share a rootsy feel, accented by Rich Gilbert’s frequent use of a pedal steel guitar.” The Catholics represent “rock as large, expansive, and over-romanticized . . . as the western skies hanging over the rural-route honky-tonk dives whose atmosphere they so readily evoke.” -Pitchfork

In their usual high-energy fashion, Black and the band unapologetically tear through their expansive catalog, banging out with uncanny familiarity some of Black’s greatest Pixies’ tunes like “Mr. Grieves”, “Monkey Gone to Heaven” and “Where is My Mind?”

In anticipation of the definitive FB & the C’s 6-disc box set to be released later this year, we bring you Frank Black & the Catholics “Live At Melkweg / Amsterdam / March 24th, 2001”.