Bishop Allen, Rock and Roll Hotel, Washington, DC, 3/27/07

Headlining a marathon midweek quintuple bill at the Rock and Roll Hotel Tuesday, Bishop Allen took the stage around 11:30 to play tunes from their yearlong EP project as well as debut Charm School, which is much beloved in the iff household.

In their review of the show, DCist dubs them "the most uncynical band in the world" (really?) and provides a good recap of the music, which managed at its height to create an atmosphere of guilt-free, bouyant revelry not often seen on the indie tour circuit. The band operates as sort of an anti-Hold Steady, writing clever and anthemic throwback pop that's hip but hopeful at the core.

Now that they've signed to new Secretly Canadian/Jagjaguwar family label Dead Oceans, it can only be a matter of time before superstardom comes a-callin'. You'll want to catch them while they still have the hunger, so see if you can Craig your way into the sold-out final date on the tour with +/- and Say Hi To Your Mom, tonight at NYC's Mercury Lounge.

MP3: Bishop Allen - Click Click Click Click
MP3: Bishop Allen - Like Castanets
MP3: Bishop Allen - Things Are What You Make of Them

Morning Shorts

The Boston Phoenix reviews Lucina Williams' show, in which she's way too modest:

“It’s not that often that a 54-year-old woman achieves her greatest success,’’ said Lucinda Williams from the Orpheum stage last Saturday, referring to the trajectory of her career. “It’s about the talent, about the work. Thanks for letting me into the fold.”

The Detroit Metro Times covers the Sebadoh reunion:

Before the band came out, my friend Dave said he was at the show simply to see if Gaffney was a real person. And that comment gives some perspective to how long it’s been since those late 1980s and early 90s days when lo-fi was still this thing that applied to records such as Sebadoh’s Weed Forestin’ or dudes like Daniel Johnston and East River Pipe.

A few new tour dates of note: Bert Jansch will be at the Musuem of Fine Arts in Boston on June 6 and the Bowery Ballroom in NYC on 6/10 (via Brooklyn Vegan); the Innocence Mission will play 6/7 at Club Passim in Cambridge and 6/8 at the Iron Horse in Northhampton, in addition to a few previously announced dates.

At long last, a Bill Callahan download from the upcoming Woke on a Whaleheart, due in April from Drag City.

MP3: Bill Callahan - Sycamore

New Release Tuesday: Walter Kong

It's a quiet week for new releases of interest round these parts. The strongest contender is Walter Kong's Deliver Us From People (buy it), which gets points for that title, as well as their label, Magic Marker, which brought us Boat's swell Songs That You Might Not Like last year.

"Andy Warhol and the Honey Bees" is a big shiny 60s pop song, almost Monkees-esque. Ba-ba-ba, etc. This is a good bit more distinctive than similar recent revivalists The Magic Numbers, whose songs I burned out on 10 seconds into the second listen. Other songs on MySpace are, promisingly, chimier and more heavily accented.

MP3: Walter Kong - Andy Warhol and the Honey Bees

Stream: Several songs at MySpace

Elliott Smith comes alive

Listening to a late-period Elliott Smith show, at Austin's Steamboat May 3, 2003, at the Live Music Archive, really makes me miss him, both individually as an incredibly gifted songwriter and performer and as a part of a scene that doesn't have anyone like him. His voice is a bit shaky, but he's mostly solo here, which is best for my taste (I caught him on the Figure 8 tour and while the band set bored me, his solo encore was incredible; this is probably partly my inclination for solo songwriters and partly that Smith was simply much more powerful alone). He managed to make deep melancholy, paranoia and alienation so accessible and hummable, it even showed up in mainstream Hollywood schlock like Keeping the Faith.

It's a nicely balanced set list, with several songs from Either/Or and earlier, favorite "I Figured You Out" (which he gave away to Mary Lou Lord since he thought it sounded "too much like the Eagles"),and unreleased gem "Somebody's Baby" (not Jackson Browne's), which didn't show up on In a Basement on a Hill and might well have not been properly recorded. UPDATE: "Somebody's Baby" turned up on IABOAH at "Twilight". Thanks, Hugh.

MP3: Elliott Smith - I Figured You Out

MP3: Elliott Smith - Somebody's Baby

Morning Shorts: New National

Let me be the 5,293rd music blog to hurriedly post up the new song from The National's upcoming album Boxer, due May 23rd on Beggars. This follows up their nigh-unassailably great Alligator. Plenty o' upcoming dates, too.

MP3: The National - Fake Empire

Kirstiecat has another installment in her wonderful ongoing series, "Awkward Conversations About Music".

Amy Annelle talks to Willamette Week:

I've been a laborer, a forest ranger, a cook, a carny, cleaning lady, bartender. I've done drug studies and medical experiments, I've busked on the street and in the subway. I can't hold down straight jobs. It's just a matter of time before I get the guillotine.

A new blog discovery I've been enjoying is Records I Buy. See their recent posts on stalking Yo La Tengo in Hoboken and a review of the bonus track on the new Innocence Mission vinyl.

Mark Eitzel tours Europe

Somewhere long ago, I read that Mark Eitzel couldn't handle extended touring due to voice limitations caused by working some sort of Bukowski-like job in a smoke-filled office. (Possibly in the oddly uncompelling Eitzel/AMC bio Wish the World Away). Fortunately Mark seems to have recovered enough to traipse across Europe for a truckload of dates this Spring:

March 28th - Cadiz - University of Cadiz

March 29th - Sevilla - South Pop Festival

March 30th - Barcelona - Pocket Club

March 31 - Madrid - tba

April 6th - Zurich - El Lokal

April 8th - Halle (Saale) – Objekt 5

April 9th - Nurenberg - Jazzstudio
April 10th - Münster - Gleiss 22

April 11th - Bremen - Kioto Lagerhaus

April 12th - Stuttgart - Laboratorium

April 13th - Munchen - Zerwirk

April 15th - Vienna - Chelsea

April 16th - Zagreb - Teatre & TD

April 17th - Innsbruck - Weekender

April 18th - Aberdeen - Lemon Tree

April 19th - Edinburgh – Cabaret Voltaire

April 21st - Exeter - The Phoenix

April 22nd - Cardiff - Clwb Ifor Bach

April 23rd - Wolverampton - Little Civic

April 24th - London - Luminiare

April 29th - Norwich - Arts Centre

April 30th - Cambridge - Junction

May 4th - Cork - Cyprus Ave

May 5th & 6th - Kilkenny - Roots Festival

MP3: Mark Eitzel - It Is Important Throughout Your Life to Proclaim Your Joy

Morning Shorts: Joni, Richard, Dean & Britta

The Guardian's Paul Sexton talks to a musically born-again Joni Mitchell:

Mitchell makes frequent eye contact, smoking prodigiously. She talks about the "pornographic pigs" of the modern music machine, who care only about "golf and rappers"; it's a subject she can now tackle with a hearty laugh, no longer bothered by their belief that her sell-by date has been reached, and delighted to be embarking on her busiest and most productive schedule for more than a decade.

Kirstiecat has the requisite pics, review and setlist from the Chicago Dean & Britta show, which featured lots of Luna classics.

Aquarium Drunkard has Gillian Welch doing Radiohead's "Black Star", and The Rawking Refuses to Stop! is featuring Elliott Smith covers of the Kinks and the Beatles.

Richard Thompson has a new anti-war song, "Dad's Gonna Kill Me", available on his web site.

MP3: Richard Thompson - Dad's Gonna Kill Me

New Release Tuesday

The Zincs recall The National with a touch of Jens Lekman on Black Pompadour (Thrill Jockey) (buy it), full of subtle pop songwriting that sneaks up on you.

MP3: The Zincs - Head East, Kaspar



Also out is a 2-track single in advance of Bill Callahan's post-Smog coming-out, Woke on a Whalehart, featuring Diamond Dancer (Drag City) (buy it).


Elsewhere, the top tier of late-90s indie rock cannot be stopped. Low plugs on with Drums and Guns (Sub Pop) (buy it), still making me wonder if I need to add to my current Low collection of The Curtain Hits the Cast and Christmas. Meanwhile, Modest Mouse plugs in Johnny Marr like a bizarro Cousin Oliver to keep you guessing. Will We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank (Epic) (buy it) keep them on the commercial Alternative charts next to the likes of Three Days Grace and Breaking Benjamin? Is there anything here to match my favorite woozy MM of "Custom Concern" and "Baby Blue Sedan"? The song's all right, I guess, but the production on "People" is a bit too nu.

MP3: Low - Breaker
MP3: Modest Mouse - People as Places as People

Robyn Hitchcock tours, releases new EP

I missed this earlier in the month, but Yep Roc has released an EP from Robyn Hitchcock & the Venus 3, Sex, Food, Death and Tarantulas, with six live tracks from the Ole! Tarantula tour and 2 videos for "Adventure Rocket Ship".

Hitchcock is also touring after a performance at SXSW:

March 19th - The Nick, Birmingham, AL
March 20th - Smith's Olde Bar, Atlanta, GA
March 21st - 40 Watt Club, Athens, GA
March 22nd - Handlebar, Greenville, SC
March 23rd - Cat's Cradle, Carrboro, NC
March 25th - Ramshead, Annapolis, MD
March 26th - World Cafe Live, Philadelphia, PA
March 27th & 28th - Knitting Factory, New York, NY
March 29th - Iron Horse, Northampton, MA
March 30th - TT The Bear's, Boston, MA
April 6th - Crocodile, Seattle, WA
April 7th - Doug Fir, Portland, OR
April 8th - Sam Bond's Garage Eugene, OR
April 10th - Slims, San Francisco, CA
April 12th - Spaceland Los Angeles, CA
April 14th - Club Congress, Tucson, AZ

The documentary Robyn Hitchcock: Sex, Food, Death and Insects played at SXSW and will be on the Sundance Channel on Tuesday, March 27 at 10pm ET/PT.

There's a good deal of Hitchcock recordings at the Live Music Archive, including a show from 2005 at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco, where Hitchcock performed what might be my favorite song by him, "Queen Elvis". It's an especially direct and intimate character study for Hitchcock, who's usually prone to more oblique narratives ("Coming out's the hardest part/when you're Queen Elvis..."). This solo version with harmonica might be better than the original.

MP3: Robyn Hitchcock - Queen Elvis (live)

Trumpeting Slarffenland

The trumpet is a powerful thing, especially when it shows up in the middle of a doomy, cinematic song of alienation. "Polaroids" by the Danish band Slarffenland builds and builds, from a few lonesome guitar wails to a verse just slightly warmer than your average Joy Division tune. Then the trumpet's lonesome wail comes in just as the singer lets out "let me out" and the scope of the song expands considerably.

Slarffenland appear tonight at SXSW at Hometapes' Friend Island venue. Their new record Private Cinema is out on Hometapes May 15th.

MP3: Slarffenland - Polaroids

Bright makes right: new track from Cassadaga

This is more like it. Hopelessly affected, but with feeling. The latest teaser Saddle Creek has released into the wild from Cassadaga swells like a bee sting with orchestration. "From the madness of the government to the vengeance of the sea"! Ghostly background sirens ring out. All is right with the world again.

MP3: Bright Eyes - No One Would Riot for Less

New Release Tuesday: Paula Frazer says, Tarnation

Paula Frazer and Tarnation - Now It's Time (Birdman) (buy it)

Sure is odd, the listed artist on this record, seeing how Paula Frazer was always, basically, Tarnation. And the new songs on her MySpace are in line with her artistic development over the years, rather than any sort of clear throwback to the mid-90s Tarnation sound. Either way, definitely worth a listen; I like how her voice has become more tempered, still a distinctive spooky instrument but more finely tuned, less showy.

MP3: Paula Frazer - Always On My Mind (from 2005's Leave the Sad Things Behind)

Stream: A few songs from Now It's Time on MySpace

Kevin Hume - The Truth About Ants and Aphids (Premium Fantasy) (buy it)

Indie folk with a post-rock/romantique feel, recorded at Kevin Hume's own Shabby Road studio in New Mexico; his influences include Jacques Brel, Scott Walker and John Renbourn.

Stream: Three songs at MySpace

The Innocence Mission - We Walked in Song (Badman) (buy it)

One of my favorite bands, they've been reducing their sound into a purer ideal of narcotic, wistful pop with each album. Based on lead track "Into Brooklyn, Early In the Morning" they're still moving in the right direction. Can't wait to hear it all.

MP3: The Innocence Mission - Into Brooklyn, Early In the Morning

Novi Split - Pink In the Sink (Hush) (buy it)

See yesterday's Uncommon Folk from main Splitter David J for the soundtrack to the making of Pink In the Sink.

MP3: Novi Split - Leaving It

MP3: Novi Split - California Skies

Neil Young - Live At Massey Hall (CD/DVD) (Reprise) (buy it)

All Music has a fine write-up detailing what sounds like an amazing installment in the nascent Neil Young archive series, a solo acoustic performance from 1971, on both CD and DVD.

Uncommon Folk: David J of Novi Split

Uncommon Folk is a feature in which artists we admire talk about the music and other media that inspired and influenced their own work. Pink in the Sink is the second album by Novi Split, the first to be released on Portland's Hush Records. Novi Split leader David J might be familiar from recent Kind of Like Spitting records and tours - and Pink in the Sink opens with "You Got Served", the J-penned track sung by Ben Barnett on KOLS' The Thrill of the Hunt - but Pink in the Sink is a different animal entirely, thanks in part to...Rod McKuen? Read on.

Pink In the Sink picks up where Out of the Mist ends. Out of the Mist was a movie i was trying to make showing the duality between my life and the Frogs' It's Only Right and Natural album. Now, the movie stinks and i shouldn't have worked on it as hard as i did, but i can't start a project without finishing another.

Visit the Frogs audio archive

Anyways, it was the period in my life where the small-town boy moves into the city to find himself. But what he really finds out is that he's just gotten robbed, kicked out of his house, and stranded in a Best Western on the California/Oregon border due to a freak blizzard watching infomercials, dead broke.

So the album officially starts back at my mom's house. I write all my songs on the toilet of one bathroom. When I write I usually turn off the lights and spark up one of those old wall space heaters with the burning coils and stare into it while I mumble words and strum. And those chords and mumbles which I then sing into my phone become the starting points to all my songs.

Looking back on it now, the first year of trying to write this record was a mess. I was broke, freaked out by a batch of bad Salvia, getting dressed up in rayon shirt to go chase tail at the local 80's club. But I remember coming home every night and listening to Rod McKuen's The Single Man on a loop, which sort of steered the direction of the album into the genre of soft rock. The Single Man spoke to me on multiple levels and told me what I needed was a gentle touch, a softly spoken voice, and poorly played viola. And so after that terrible summer I bought a viola, a few new drum-breakbeat LPs, moved into a house of strangers and started the whole miserable process of making a record by myself.

The subject matter of the record was to deal with multiple forms of humiliation. Should've taken me a week and a half, tops. But three and a half years later here we are. The problem is that every time I was inspired by different music, I would want to be that band. So over three years I added to and gutted out all the songs on the record, and there are countless hours of audio to prove it. These artists are responsible for turning the record into an ongoing project that kept me up for nights at a time. Like I said before, one of my greatest influences is The Single Man by Rod McKuen, but i would also like to say that the songs "If You Go Away" and "Jean" are really amazing as well. You've heard his songs your whole life. Johnny Cash, Dusty Springfield, Frank Sinatra, Nina Simone, Neil Diamond, and Scott Walker all cover McKuen. Rod McKuen owns a copy of Pink in the Sink. I kid you not.

Listen to Rod McKuen at MySpace

I like everything Bill Fay does. He has a way of making you love overproduced, underdeveloped music in the worst way. He somehow can sing about his love of God, record after record, without making you feel like he's trying to convert you. "I Hear You Calling" and "Tell It Like It Is" make you feel like drinking wine coolers at temple. Any unnecessary explosive endings to any song on the record have Bill Fay to blame.

On the other side of the fence I'd like to say I really like that first Knife record, the 13 & God record and the second Kanye West record. All those records are bedroom-made when you get down to it. Preproduction must count for at least 80% of those records, and that gets me excited about never having the opportunity or want to step into a "real" recording studio.

One last thing. I have to say that Tanita Tikaram is also very beautiful to me. The first time I heard one of her songs was on a bus going to the airport. It was playing over the speaker system on the bus and I had to record it with a hand held voice recorder after I thought I was hearing an unreleased Will Oldham song. After losing a bet I found out that Ms. Tanita sounds just like a young Will Oldham. They should duet together. The song was called "World Outside Your Window", and tell me she doesn't sound like Will Oldham during the chorus. I guess you'd have to hear it on a bus.

::

MP3: Novi Split - Leaving It
MP3: Novi Split - California Skies

Pink in the Sink is out tomorrow on Hush.

See also:
Novi Split at Hush
Novi Split page (with more downloads)
Cloak and Dagger Feature (with downloads of Springsteen, Pink Floyd, Material Issue and Robyn Hitchcock covers)

Weekend Shorts: Richard Swift covers Prince

Secretly Canadian has stuck up a cover of Prince's "Paisley Park" by Richard Swift, which comes from the Kisses For the Misses 7". Makes you wonder what Swift couldn't cover. The 7" is out May 22nd.

MP3: Richard Swift - Paisley Park (Prince cover)

The New York Times reports on the passing of folksinger Mark Spoelstra, who moved from Kansas City to New York in the 1960s and performed with Dylan, and later showed up in Chronicles Vol. 1 and No Direction Home. Collector's Choice records recently reissued his first two albums, Five and Twenty Questions and State of Mind, both of which touch on the Vietnam war. There's not much in the way of sounds online for Mark, but the samples at the Amazon links above show a classic 60s folk sound and nicely rough-hewn voice.

The Guardian reports that Pope Benedict XVI once tried to stop Dylan from performing at the Vatican.

Uberdrivel has a review and pictures of the NYU Mirah/The Blow/Liz Isenberg show; included are lots of downloads from Mirah and The Blow sessions at KSDT.

Bright Eyes was guest DJ on NPR's All Songs Considered, which you can download as a podcast. Selections include Neil Young and Jackson Browne.

Across the Rooftops review and provides the setlist for the final Sodastream show.

Pitchfork has the details and track lists for two upcoming releases: Joanna Newsom's EP And the Ys Street Band and Iron & Wine's full-length The Shepherd's Dog.

Stereogum spots a familiar indie folk voice in the trailer for The Hills Have Eyes 2.

Lisa Germano tours Europe

Lisa Germano has announced a string of European dates. Her set last year in Arlington was a near-perfect mix of In a Maybe World and the best of her catalog ("Small Heads", "My Secret Reason", "Wood Floors") so if you're around these cities, don't miss it.

4/17 - Douglas Hyde Gallery - Dublin

4/18 - Pusterviksbaren - Gothenburg

4/19 - John Dee - Oslo

4/22 - Loppen - Copenhagen

4/23 - Studenterhuset - Aalborg

4/24 - III & 70 - Hamburg

4/25 - Babylon - Berlin (with Mick Harvey)

4/26 - Kulturbunker Mühlheim - Köln

4/28 - Klub na Brestskoy - Moscow

4/29 - Place - Petersburg

5/2 - Sinister Noise - Rome

5/3 - Capella Bonajuto - Catania

5/4 - Bronson - Ravenna

5/5 - Spazio 211 - Turin

5/6 - Indieclub Sintetika - Firenze

5/8 - La Maroquinerie - Paris

5/10 - Les Nuits de Botanique - Brussel

5/11 - Paradiso - Amsterdam

5/12 - Cactus club - Brugge

5/13 - Boa - Luzern

5/14 - Bad Bonn - Düdingen

MP3: Lisa Germano - Too Much Space

Lisa Germano at MySpace

Lisa Germano online

Lisa at Young God Records

Papercuts, Black Cat, Washington, DC, 3/4/07

The Black Cat, post-DC-smoking-ban, is a nicer place to be. Besides the air, the long arm of the law pushes junkies outside to smoke between sets, letting slightly late-arriving folks there to see the middle band get up close without much trouble.

The crowd was thick with Beach House and Grizzly Bear loyalists; Papercuts, in the middle, had their work cut out for them. Fortunately they've got some of the best pop songs of the year, and their showmates, whatever their virtues, didn't have many hooks between them.

Lead Papercut Jason Quever's pop is somewhere between dream- and power-, alternately ethereral, upbeat and desperate. Backed by Hammond organ, bass and drums, he played the songs' melodies on acoustic and electric guitar with a relish that was fun to watch. The incredible "Dear Employee" (which you can hear on their MySpace), unlike the recorded verison, started with Quever solo ("Treat me just like a dog/I don't mind at all/I feel bad but babe come on/you're a big girl now"), then slowly built into all its chiming, morose majesty, The Zombies cut with irony and extra regret.

The set included most of Don't Go Back, including lead web track "John Brown", and seemed to make the Grizzly crowd happy. Here's hoping they come around again soon. Their final show is tonight in Baltimore at the G-Spot, with Beach House.

MP3: Papercuts - John Brown

Clem Snide's new live album

Clem Snide has a new mail-order-only live album available, Have a Good Night: Live Recordings 1999-2005. Details are sparse on the shows this disc draws from, but it's a pretty representative mix of Snide classics performed both solo and with a full band, along with some covers and unreleased tracks. The covers are worth more than a few spins, especially Neil Young's ever-covered "Cortez the Killer" and Sonic Youth's "Schizophrenia". And hearing solo acoustic versions of band songs like "Fill Me With Your Light" is a reminder of what an amazing vocalist Eef Barzelay is, especially when singing an unguarded song like this one.

His tone is rich and distinctive, but most of all it's elusive, shifting between irony and sincerity in a single breath. This quality, along with a degree of showmanship and storytelling in concert, reminds me most of Loudon Wainwright III.

New song "Enrique" scores with a classic power-pop descending vocal melody in the chorus: "It may have been the last hope for our poor empty souls/Enrique Iglesias' mole". Eef admits to being an US Weekly fan, too. The album's available via their website.

MP3: Clem Snide - Enrique (live)

Clem Snide, in both band and solo Eef forms, have some upcoming dates:

Band Shows:

3/8 - Nashville, the Basement

3/15 - Austin, Emos (Onion Party, SXSW, 3:15 PM)

3/16 - Austin, Buffalo Billiards (SXSW)

Eef Barzelay Solo (opening for Ben Folds):

3/24 - Worcester, MA, Plourde Recreation Center

3/25 - Allentown, PA, Memorial Hall Gymnasium

3/27 - Blacksburg, VA, Burress Hall Auditorium

3/28 - Chapel Hill, NC, Memorial Hall

3/30 - Indiana, PA, Memorial Fieldhouse

4/2 - Normal, IL, Braden Auditorium

4/3 - East Lansing, MI, MSU Concert Auditorium

4/10 - Harrisonburg, VA, James Madison University

New Release Tuesday: Bright Eyes

Lots of new releases this week, but not too much to get me going. There's a new Bright Eyes EP, Four Winds (buy it), that has five exclusive tracks to go along with the Cassadaga lead single of the title. In what will undoubtedly be remembered as the awkward adolescence of a career that was launched on the finest adolescent angst in a generation, Conor Oberst is trying to be mature and seems to be trying too hard. It's still pretty good in spite of it, though.

MP3: Bright Eyes - Four Winds

Phil Elverum has returned under the old trusty Microphones moniker to issue this 7", Don't Smoke/Get Off the Internet (buy it) via his own P.W. Elverum & Sun label. Supposedly this is a punkish departure from the Koz-on-acid acoustics of Mt. Eerie.

MP3: Mt. Eerie - Universe

Also out of some note: new records from Son Volt and Canadian indie poppers Apostles of Hustle.

Chad VanGaalen's Skelliconnection vinyl with bonus album

In breaking Chad VanGaalen news: Canadian vinyl specialists Melodiya Records are issuing a very limited-edition, double-disc, 160-gram Skelliconnection with an entire bonus album included. 11 extra tracks - outtakes from the sessions and some new songs, including "The Gun" below. It's a gatefold issue with 40+ drawings, and basically sounds amazing. It's due out March 13th, and you can order a copy here.

MP3: Chad VanGaalen - The Gun

VanGaalen is also appearing at the Flemish Eye/White Whale SXSW showcase with the Cape May, Castle Project and The Mohawk Lodge.

Skelliconnection didn't quite match the greatness of Infiniheart for me, but I'm willing to bet there's some worthy tracks in the bonus album to even it out a bit.

Morning Shorts: Dan Bern tours, Sebadoh speaks

Dan Bern has announced a bunch of new tour dates in the US in May:

May 16th - Alexandria, VA, The Birchmere
May 18th - Doylestown, PA, Puck (2 shows)
May 19th - Newark, DE, East End Cafe
May 20th - Piermont, NY, Turning Point Cafe (2 shows)
May 22nd & 23rd - Boston, MA, Club Passim

MP3: Dan Bern - Trudy

Lou Barlow and Jason Lowenstein talk to Seattle Weekly about their reunion and the lo-fi movement vs. the sound quality of MySpace:

"You would have to really intentionally make something go terribly wrong on a cassette multitrack recording to make it sound as bad as the warbly, compressed, pinched, thin-sounding underwater crap sound of a sound file played through the MySpace file compression engine. MySpace is a needle-in-a-haystack kind of way to find new music, and then even if you do find something, it really sounds like fried shit."

Pitchfork also has some pictures of their first reunion show in San Diego.

Linda Draper plays tonight at the Sidewalk Cafe, the spiritual home of antifolk in NYC. She's got a new record, Keepsake, that we'll talk up soon. In the meantime head over to her MySpace to listen.

Stereogum has a new Laura Veirs song, "To the Country".

iff fave Saturday Looks Good to Me sign to K Records and announce some West coast tour dates. Their next record Fill Up the Room will be out September 11th. The Metro Times Music Blahg has more details.

Just in case you didn't see it anywhere else, Absolutely Kosher has made available Chris Garneau's cover of Elliott Smith's "Between the Bars".

MP3: Chris Garneau - Between the Bars (Elliott Smith)

Predicting the soundtrack for Noah Baumbach's Margot at the Wedding

Anyone who enjoys the music covered in this blog and hasn't seen the films of Noah Baumbach needs to hit the Netflix queue. He made my favorite film, the post-college-paralysis cult classic Kicking & Screaming (recently released in a nice Criterion edition), the charming, low-key Mr. Jealousy, and 2005's shoulda-won Oscar screenplay-nommed The Squid and the Whale (any film that namechecks Vitas Gerulaitis oughta be a shoo-in).

The glue that holds every Baumbach film together is the carefully curated soundtrack, typically a mix of top-notch, semi-obscure singer-songwriter fare with a few songs outside that realm that capture the time and place. Kicking & Screaming features Nick Drake, Freedy Johnston, and an incredible, dusty, solo acoustic version of Jimmy Dale Gilmore's "Braver Newer World" playing on the townie bar jukebox (and nowhere else; the album version's produced bombast has startled more than a few K&S fans who have sought out the full song on the album of the same name).

Artists often appear multiple times in one movie, but seemingly never in more than one (except for Dean Wareham; he's been involved in everything post-K&S, and even appears in Baumbach-disowned Highball). Mr. Jealousy featured Leonard Cohen and Harry Chapin. And his breakthough The Squid and the Whale was precient in its appreciation of Bert Jansch and John Phillips; just months later, Jansch would enjoy a resurgence of interest and issue a new album on Drag City, and John Phillips' John the Wolfking of LA would get the deluxe reissue treatment. Squid also used Loudon Wainwright III's "The Swimming Song", long a favorite of my from his essential live album Career Moves (Baumbach introduced me to the studio version).

Which brings us to his next film, Margot at the Wedding, completed but sitting in movie-calendar limbo until festival and Oscar seasons. It stars Nicole Kidman, Jack Black, and his wife, Jennifer Jason-Leigh. News of the story is slim (two sisters, life lessons) and the only hint of the soundtrack comes from, of all places, Robert Fripp's blog, where he reveals a request for a King Crimson track. Presuming the music isn't all prog...what will pop up on the soundtrack? I'm taking some stabs...

Jackson C. Frank
Who? 60s folksinger who was recorded by Paul Simon, covered by Nick Drake, and then led an almost unbelievably unlucky life of depression, homelessness, and a random drive-by shooting that blinded him in one eye.
Used in other indie film? "Milk and Honey" showed up in one of The Brown Bunny's many riveting, too-brief driving scenes.

Stream: Several songs at MySpace

Paul Siebel
Who? Songwriter's songwriter from the early 70s with a Dylanesque voice, covered by Linda Ronstadt and Waylon Jennings. Last seen working at a bakery somewhere in Maryland.
Used in other indie film? None I can find. This track reminds me a bit of Gilmore.

Tim Hardin
Who? Great songs, one-in-a-billion voice, died too young. If you don't know him, you should. Recently introduced to indie kids by Okkervil River, but you really want to hear the original.
Used in other indie films: Nope. Why not?

Watch: Tim play "If I Was a Carpenter" at Woodstock
Stream: Several songs at MySpace