What makes you think I'm enjoyin' being lead to the flood?

Matt Berninger of The National, live at the House of Blues, Boston, May 23 2009. Photo by Ian Doreian, Melophobe.

Have I told you lately how much I love The National? They're kind of a little bit amazing, and one of those rare bands that sound like they have a driving need to create music.

To tide you over until their next album (late this year/early next year, hopefully), here is some post-Boxer material, culled from two shows they played in May. All of these songs have gone through various, sometimes extensive revisions, and may change further before the album is released, or they may not appear on the album at all, but they're all basically amazing, so, enjoy.

The National - England (Radio City Music Hall, NYC 03.05.09) (zShare)
The National - Vanderlylle Cry Baby (feat. Bon Iver) (Radio City Music Hall, NYC 03.05.09) (zShare)
The National - Blood Buzz Ohio (House of Blues, Boston 23.05.09) (zShare)
The National - The Runaway (House of Blues, Boston 23.05.09) (zShare)

Gotta say, the "I never married, but Ohio don't remember me" in Blood Buzz gets me every time. Definitely one to get stuck in your head. Of course the others ain't exactly shabby, with England being a perfect illustration of how, to quote Amrit at Stereogum who captured my feelings on it perfecly, "The National are at their best when they push to a climax they never fully punctuate, which is why "England" is the National at their best." Vanderlylle Cry Baby, from the same night, features here a shout-along chorus and an electrifying guitar solo from Mr. Justin 'Bon Iver' Vernon. The Runaway (formerly 'Karamazov', which is apparently a reference to this book which I now feel compelled to read) was probably the slowest-burner of the bunch for me, but after seeing the radio session footage of it below (which also features frequent National collaborator Thomas Bartlett aka Doveman, plus a two-piece horn section which I think was the same one present at the Boston show), I can't stop listening to it.



Pretty sure I could watch Matt sing like that all day.

The National official site
Buy Boxer: CD / Vinyl / iTunes

And in case you forgot how great The National were in the first place:

The National - Fake Empire (zShare) from Boxer

I'm not too comfortable

Jim Ward feat. Tegan Quin - Broken Songs (zShare)

A quiet song; not necessarily sonically, but possessing the intimacy of wide-open country roads and long days spent travelling upon them, acoustic guitar and a lone maraca providing backdrop to the yearnng, beautifully double-tracked vocals, weary-but-hopeful, aided by a rather wonderful turn from the Tegan half of Tegan & Sara. Lyrically a page out of the Springsteen songbook, but Ward delivers the lines with a rawness of his own that doesn't appear so unrestrained anywhere else on the EP.

"I'll build a home, from these broken songs".

[Buy]

Like seemingly half the music I listen to these days, Jim Ward's In the Valley, On the Shores EP was discovered through Tegan & Sara's Twitter (@theteganandsara). I'm not as familiar with Jim Ward as I probably should be, but I do know he played in seminal post-hardcore act At the Drive-in (who I've been meaning to check out but haven't) before co-founding Sparta and the more alt-country Sleepercar. Anyway, the rather excellent five-song EP from which this song is taken can and should be purchased for $7 in your choice of download or CD format (including worldwide shipping) from the link above. Initially the download was a pay-what-you-want deal, but I see that I took too long to write about it and now it's also $7. Still more than worth it, and the physical CD is a gorgeous package, plain blue and gold ink screen-printed on a cardboard sleeve and hand-numbered (at least mine was, not sure if any of those are still in stock). The other four songs are sadly lacking in Tegan, but they're still every bit as good as this one.

Give me one more chance

Wow, so apparently me insomia posting = a bad idea. Who would've guessed? Gonna leave it up anyways, though, cos, why not?

As you may have noticed, I kinda disappeared for a month or two there. Was busy/lazy. But, now that school's out, exams are over and I have long days to fill with nothing but scouring music blogs (not exactly true, but one of the few advantages of my current [hopefully short-term] jobblessness¹), expect things round here to get back to normal (as if they ever were). Probably won't be posting daily, but something close to it. (Like, at least a few times a week. Promise.)

Anyways, rambling, so; here's the new Bloc Party single. I happen to love it. Exactly what you're not expecting, which, with Bloc Party, is basically the point. (And of course, that lyric was too fitting not to use for the title of this post). You should give it a spin. I'd worry about getting a take-down notice for posting a not-yet-released single from a fairly popular band, but honestly, nobody fucking reads this blog, so it really doesn't matter (but of course, as usual, if the label is reading this and do want it taken down, contact me at the address on the sidebar and it will be done). Oh, and feel free to follow me on the Hype Machine. Shiny.

Blco Party - One More Chance (zShare)

By the way, this is not a rip, but it is rather low quality (96kb/s). The single is out 10/08 via Wichita and will be available from their recently refurbished and rather excellent online shop and blocparty.com.

I think I'm gonna start working on a minor redesign that I've been meaning to do since, oh, forever. That should be done by the end of the week. Mark your calenders. Later!

¹I make it sound as if that were some horrible consequence of the recession; in fact I'm just too lazy/pathetic/insecure to go apply at the movie theater down the street that I'm almost certain would hire me.

Boy, what you gonna do with your life?

Image from flotownblogger.typepad.com.

Bloc Party - Rhododendrons (zShare)

This is a song for long nights spent lying awake on top of the sheets with the windows flung open in the humid summer air worrying about not having a job; for sitting on the side of your bed with your head in your hands knowing that she's never going to come running back into your arms; for spending the night out with good friends that you don't see often enough and ending up back at somebody's house at four in the morning passing around the bottle of Jack Daniel's and being completely exhausted beyond the point of endurance and drunk as much on the sheer fucking beauty of the world as the alcohol. Afterwards, is it worth it for that one moment of drunken lucidity, before you finally collapse for the night? Yes. [Buy.]

"Drunk again in the rhododendrons."


Image by G.D. Jewell II on Flickr.

Go Here Now

http://saveterminator.blogspot.com/

I'll Tell You A Secret

Silversun Pickups - There's No Secrets This Year (zShare)

Noisy, loud, catchy and irresistable.

"Who would know, all the reasons you're alone?"

I was going to write a review of this album, Swoon, the second by SSPU (and I still might), but for now, I think ya'll would be better off just listening to this song. Track one, side one, as it happens, and while I can vouch for the rest of the album being every bit as good as/better than this, for now I'm happy to leave this one on repeat.

"I'll tell you a secret, let's make this perfectly clear, there's no secrets this year."

Silversun Pickups offical site / Twitter
Buy Swoon: CD / Vinyl / iTunes

This Is Easy As Lovers Go

Photo by lolo368 on Flickr

I was talking about Dashboard Confessional the other day, so here're a few songs.

Hands Down is magic. All the angst, hopefullness, hopelessness, romance, innocence, wisdom, longing, pain and beauty of being a teenager, rolled into one perfect song. Like I said, my guitar teacher from way-back-when introduced me to Dashboard (and good music in general [meaning music that I cared about, not necessarily music that you'll like, as I'm fully aware of the large number of people who dismiss DC as being devoid of any artistic integrity, on which point I would respectfully disagree]) with this song, and the first time I listened to it was one of the most important musical moments of my life. That version was the opening track on 2003's A Mark, A Mission, A Brand, A Scar, which (although I didn't know it at the time) marked the first time Dashboard had expanded to a full-band effort from Chris Carrabba's previously solo-acoustic work. Perhaps simply because I heard it first, that remains the definitive version for me, but the earlier acoustic take from the So Impossible EP is still an excellent tune, and it's interesting to hear how the song progressed.

I've probably sung along to As Lovers Go more than any other song in the world. One particular instance some to mind, of a car trip (can you tell I listen to a ton of music on car trips?) soon after I got my first iPod, when the Shrek 2 soundtrack was one of the only things I had loaded on it. I don't know how long I spent alternating between the Ron Fair remix and the original, trying to figure out what the difference was, but it seems to have been enough to drill the song permanently into my memory.

Dashboard Confessional - Hands Down (zShare) from A Mark, A Mission, A Brand, A Scar
Dashboard Confessional - As Lovers Go (zShare) from A Mark, A Mission, A Brand, A Scar
Dashboard Confessional - As Lovers Go (Ron Fair Remix) (zShare) from Shrek 2: Motion Picture Soundtrack
Dashboard Confessional - Hands Down (zShare) from So Impossible EP

Dashboard Confessional official website / Buy

This Could Be An Opportunity

Image by Pete Duffield

I reckon I haven't been very good at this whole "blogging" thing since I started back in October.

Thing is, I love music. Of that I am in no doubt. Naive though it is to assume that it would follow that I'd be any good at writing about it - that's basically exactly what I did. With results that have been mixed, at best.

I got into music when I started taking guitar lessons, back when I was thirteen. At the time I didn't have any taste in music to speak of. When my teacher asked me what I listened to, I mentioned a mix of classic rock and whatever was popular at the time that my friends were listening to. At the end of my first half-year of lessons, right before summer break, he took a class to basically just chill out, jam a bit, and play some songs from his iTunes library on his laptop.

One of those was "Helicopter" by Bloc Party. I had never heard anything like it before. I hadn't realized before then that music could be that raw, that beautiful, that emotional, that fucking exciting. I loved it. He played me a few other songs, something by Rise Against from Siren Song of the Counter Culture and "Hands Down" by Dashboard Confessional from A Mark, A Mission, A Brand, A Scar.

I bought all those records that summer and they changed my life. Dashboard soundtracked my early teenage years, the hopeless romanticism of Hands Down having been seemingly tailor-made to fit my every turbulent emotion. Siren Song was loud, angry, articulate punk music, and Swing Life Away remains one of the most breath-takingly perfect songs I've ever witnessed.

Mixed in with some Slipknot, some Foo Fighters and some U2 (and I know I'm forgetting plenty of others), those were the artists and albums that shaped my early music-listening habits. I discovered them through friends, through commercials, through videos on MuchMusic (the Canadian version of MTV), through compilations and movie soundtracks (Shrek 2 and the first two Spider-man movies were big ones), and every time felt like something magical.

It was a year later, when I got an iPod, that I discovered The Album That Changed My Life. It was called Silent Alarm, it was by Bloc Party, it had the coolest cover art I'd ever seen and, on one long car journey somewhere in British Columbia, I listened through its entirety for the first time.

I don't need to tell you how it affected me (but that probably won't stop me from doing so, in a future post) since, after all, I named my blog after something bassist Gordon Moakes said and will easily cite BP as my favourite band ever (Tegan & Sara would, on a technicality, be my favourite "musical artists" ever, since they don't write together and their band line-up changes from album to album). Simply, that first listen through Silent Alarm marked the beginning of my change from someone who accepted music as it came at him, to someone who actively sought it out.

I should mention that the catalyst for me taking a step back and writing this is a post I came across on To Die By Your Side about the 15 albums that changed his (the author's) life. It made me think, I couldn't really list 15 albums that changed my life. In this day and age of leaks six months before release and dowloading individual tracks from blogs and fifty thousand remixes of every popular track on The Hype Machine and labels crumbling under their own weight, things are different. Not worse, though.

When I decided to start a blog, I knew exactly what I was going to call it. "Hate the past regret the future" isn't the pessimistic mantra that you may think it is. To me, it means you can't rely on anything that's happened or that might happen. The only thing that's real is the moment. And that's kind of beautiful.

---

Here're two songs that I meant to post with this but was too lazy to upload last night. Something new and something old, as it were.

Tulips was originally released pre-Silent Alarm as a non-album single; this version is the b-side to the Banquet 7-inch. The performance is a little raw and unpolished (as radio performances are wont to be), at least compared to the studio version, but suffers nothing for it. If anything, the performance lends the song in general and Kele's yelps in particular a greater sense of explosive urgency (and nobody does "explosive urgency" like early Bloc Party), showcasing just how good a song it is.

The acoustic version of Gimme Sympathy is one of the bonus download-only tracks that come with the pre-order of Fantasies. I've been listening to it constantly on repeat and enjoying it more and more each time. The guitar sounds, dare I say it, Dylan-esque, while Emily's vocals are as vulnerabley weary as they've ever been on a Metric song and James delivers one of his rare-but-always-fantastic back-up vocal performances.

Bloc Party - Tulips (Peel Session) (zShare)
Metric - Gimme Sympathy (Acoustic) (zShare)

Bloc Party official site / Buy
Metric official site / Pre-order Fantasies

We're so close

Shiny new Metric video for the Stones-and-Beatles-referencing Gimme Sympathy, from the upcoming Fantasies. Great song + epic clip = win. (Oh my god I sound like Stereogum commenters.) (I say that lovingly.) Also, damn can Emily dance.

Metric official site / Pre-order Fantasies

ZOMG New Music Explosion!!!!11!1

Wow, my internet goes down for a day and look what happens!



Metric have (finally!) announced their new album, entitled Fantasies, their first since 2005's Live It Out, and have also opened up pre-orders at their site. The album will be released digitally on 3/31 and physically on 4/14 and is available in a bunch of different formats, ranging from the $8.99 download to a mighty impressive limited deluxe-edition package. Regardless of the package you choose, you'll get some gorgeous artwork by Buenos Aires graffiti art collective Hollywood in Cambodia, as well as an instant download of the album version of "Help I'm Alive" and two other exclusive tracks, with another track available for only the price of your email address. In case you need any more convincing, you can stream the full album below.

Yeah Yeah Yeah's latest, It's Blitz! is out digitally, like right now (physical release 3/31 US / 4/6 worldwide), and includes a bunch of bonus acoustic tracks. They're pretty amazing, take a listen to one of them (as well as two album tracks) below.



In other YYYs news, their video for Zero is my new favourite thing ever. Karen O looking to dance the night away. Catch it below.





Röyksopp have completely taken over the world (seriously, have you seen the Hype Machine lately?). Given the insane danceability of the tunes on their latest, the forthcoming Junior (out 3/23, now streaming at MySpace), I'm gonna say it's about damn time. Witness their Space Invaders-inspired plan for world domination below.



Finally, LA noise-rockers Silversun Pickups have released the first track from their sophomore effort Swoon, and it's possibly the catchiest, most epic song they've graced us with yet. Stream below, Swoon is out 4/13.

...and leaves 3 ghosts in Birmingham

Johnny Foreigner - Yr All Just Jealous (zShare)

It's rainy here today, or at least you'd think it was rainy what with all the nice dark clouds and snow melting everywhere. Anyways, it's close enough to rain to make me think it must officially be spring, which puts me in the mood for something loud, fast and joyous. Johnny Foreigner to the rescue! (I always thought their band name sounded vaguely super hero-esque.) This song makes me want to go jump on a skateboard and start busting some moves (the fact that I've never skated in my life evidently has no bearing). Johnny Foreigner have something of a talent for packing more lyrical wit into a three-minute song than most bands do in an entire album, and it's a thing of beauty to witness. Take some of my favourite lines: "Hot girls know the words to our songs and I'm terrified of what comes next", and, "You got stars on your hips you got scars on your wrists and I'm wondering which you got done first". Exciting punk music for indie kids.

Johnny Foreigner on MySpace
Buy Waited Up 'Til It Was Light: HMV / iTunes

New Dollhouse Episode Tonight!

Hi all, just a reminder; the new episode of Dollhouse (the greatest show currently on television) airs tonight at 9/8c on Fox. It's the second episode of the series, so if you missed last week's, this will still be a great jumping-on point (in fact, any of the first six episodes make great jumping-on points, as they're all relatively stand-alone). In case you miss it, you'll be able to watch online after it airs at Hulu and FOX.com. (You can also watch last week's debut episode at either of those places right now!) Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, which airs directly before it, is also a really great show, so you might want to check it out, too. Finally, episodes of Dollhouse can be purchased for download at iTunes and Amazon, if you prefer that method of viewing.

Top Chef, etc. (Spoilers!)

Jeff and Fabio just got eliminated! Gotta suck for Jeff, since he was clearly in the top 3 for the elimination challenge and still got sent packin'. And I'm gonna miss Fabio, even if I didn't always love him. I didn't think this show would ever again reach the peak of Season 2 (not that it hasn't been good since then, really really good in fact, just not that exceptionally good), but everybody in this season has been so talented and interesting that it's really hurting to see them go.

So, looks like I haven't been posting too much lately (again). I have, however, been listening to and/or buying a lot of new music and catching up on a lot of great albums from last year that I missed (Cars by Now, Now Every Children, Waited Up 'Til It Was Light by Johnny Foreigner, Life Processes by ¡Forward, Russia!, Rearrange Beds by An Horse, Common Reaction by Uh Huh Her). Expect posts in the near future on the following:

Now, Now Every Children
Johnny Foreigner
¡Forward, Russia!
Uh Huh Her
Allison Weiss
Zoe Keating

i've also been listening to a lot of old (well, older) music - The Smiths, New Order, Sonic Youth. i picked up the New Order Singles compilation and Washing Machine by Sonic Youth (mostly because, since hearing that amazing Yeah Yeah Yeahs cover, i've been curious to check out the original Diamond Sea). it's interesting to me how i can listen to a band like, say, Bloc Party, whom i adore, and be absolutely blown away, but when i go to listen to some of their most major influences (ie. Radiohead, Joy Division, New Order, The Smiths, Sonic Youth, Smashing Pumpkins, Weezer, Pixies), the music that must have inspired them the same way they do me, i often don't connect with it (or at least, not nearly as much). i was at a record store in Calgary (Sloth Records, nifty place, check it out) and saw a bunch of those Smiths reissued 7" singles. they were $14 each (some with a b-side, some without) so i didn't pick any up, but i kinda think i should've just randomly grabbed one that i had never heard, just so i could put it on the turntable when i got home and hear something new, and maybe recapture some of that feeling that kids in the 80s must have had when they heard Morrissey's voise for the first time.

Dollhouse

Dollhouse, the new show from writer/director Joss Whedon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, Serenity, and a whole bunch of other awesome things), premiered last Friday on Fox. In case you missed it, you can watch the full episode below via Hulu (unfourtunately only if you're in the US, although international viewers can use Hotspot Shield to bypass that restriction). For those who don't know, here's the premise; somewhere in LA, a very illegal organization operates what is known as the Dollhouse, in which volunteers' memories and personalities are wiped clean, allowing them to be imprinted with new personas. These "Actives", as they are called, are rented out to extremely wealthy and well-connected clients, who can have them be absolutely anyone they want them to be. "Engagements" can be sexual, romantic, criminal - literally anything the client desires. Amidst this, one of the Actives, Echo (Eliza Dushku, Buffy, Tru Calling), is slowly beginning to become aware of her situation and the fact that she does, in fact, exist.

Dollhouse - Season 1/Episode 1 "Ghosts"

(Embedded video may not display properly; if so, just click on it to watch directly at Hulu. If you prefer, episodes can also be viewed on FOX.com, and can be purchased from iTunes and Amazon Video on Demand).

Joss has never disappointed, and after only one episode, I'm already in love with this show. I can't recommend highly enough that you watch it; if you like funny, tragic, intelligent, dramatic, emotional storytelling, brilliant dialogue, and intensely humanized characters brought to life by some incredible actors (and who wouldn't?), it doesn't get any better than this. Anyways, since this is after all a music blog, here're a couple of tunes from the show:


(Complete with (very) poorly photoshopped fake album artwork! If anybody here has better image editing software/grpahic design skillz than me (which would be pretty much everyone), feel free to give it shot and post your work in the comments. My iTunes cover flow will thank you.)

Jonatha Brooke & Eric Bazilian - What You Don't Know (Title Theme) (zShare)

30 seconds long and sooo damn catchy. Sexy, dark and mysterious. Fits the show perfectly. Note that this was Zamzar'd from this video clip, resulting in very slight (ie. unnoticeable) audio degradation. Fox had a music video for the full version of this song (with lyrics!) up on their site for about a day, but it's since been taken down. Hopefully it'll be released on iTunes soon.

Rob Simonsen & Mychael Danna - Echo Chamber (zShare)

Kindly ripped from Fox's rather cool Echo Chamber promo site by Mel_Anton at Whedonesque. I'm not 100% sure this was actually composed by Rob Simonsen & Mychael Danna, since it's uncredited on the site, but it does sound a lot like the score from the actual show, so I figure it's probably by the series' composers.

Aaand finally, go here to watch the music video for "Just Dance" by Lady Gaga, the song Echo dances to near the beginning of the ep in a rather stunning dress that, as noted by a Whedonesque commenter, is probably illegal in some states.



Dollhouse airs Fridays at 9/8c on Fox.

Watch full episodes online: Hulu / FOX.com
Buy: iTunes / Amazon Video on Demand

Top Covers

Not a lot to say. I love a good cover. Here're a few of my favourites:

Ted Leo - Since U Been Gone (Kelly Clarkson Cover) / Maps (Yeah Yeah Yeahs Cover)


Allison Weiss - Kids (MGMT Cover)


Elle240 - I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You (Black Kids Cover)


Tegan & Sara - Dancing In The Dark (Bruce Springsteen Cover)


phoenix7blue - Call It Off (Tegan & Sara Cover)
Embedding disabled by request, so go here to watch.

Alkaline Trio feat. Tegan Quin - Wake Up Exhausted (Tegan & Sara Cover)


Sixx and Seven - John Wayne Gacey Jr. (Sufjan Stevens Cover)


And a few mp3s:

Metric - Don't Think Twice It's Alright (Bob Dylan Cover) (zShare)

Disclaimer: I'm not a fan of Bob Dylan, and haven't actually heard the original version of this song. I am, however, quite infatuated with this cover. It's actually just half of Metric, Emily and James, and I imagine they stick pretty close to the original (just vocals and a lone acoustic guitar), but it's a treat hearing the two of them trade vocals on the verses and harmonize on the choruses.

From War Child's Help! A Day In The Life comp (Canadian version only), available from Maple Music and iTunes. Proceeds go to War Child Canada's humanitarian programs.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Diamond Sea (Sonic Youth Cover) (zShare)

Another perhaps surprising cover, although not in the choice of song (the link between YYYs and Sonic Youth is not un-obvious) but in the execution, which is mostly acoustic. Karen O.'s singing regularly blows my mind but here the "ooh-ooh-ooh"s are really etherally beautiful. You can literally hear her voice cracking with emotion on every line, and when everything opens up with "You're never not alone on a diamond sea"... chills.

From YYYs' excellent iTunes exclusive live session, available here. Their latest, It's Blitz, is out this spring, release date TBA.

I will tear myself apart, if you promise to paint me, as a work of art

Bloc Party - Always New Depths (zShare)

The guitar starts up before you even have a chance to get your bearings, always catching me a little off-guard no matter how many times I listen to it. Then the classic Bloc Party assault of angular/melodic rhythm guitar riff + complimentary lead riff + killer bass line + dancey drums kicks in for a few bars, before the vocals start up. The lyrics are abstract, the delivery almost monotone throughout the intro, yet still begging to be sung along to, until Kele finally explodes like only he can with "Summertime has come and gone / All used up with wishful thinking / Get sussed out, get cynical / In this world there are no second chances". Throughout, Russell's lead guitar is building in intensity, almost anxiously, leading up to a climax you didn't even see coming until everything drops out at 2:19, following one of my favourite lyrics ever (found in the title of this post, not to mention the name of countless mixtapes I've put together). The drums, the bass, both the guitars, even the vocals, all clash chaotically together until the song finally explodes into shouted "Always new depths!"'s, maintaining its energy until everything fades out into a blanket of swirling delayed guitars. It's the kind of joyous explosion of sound that only early Bloc Party can evoke for me; maybe because they're one of the first bands, if not the first, that I truly fell in love with and felt like I'd "disocvered." I've loved everything they've done since Silent Alarm every bit as much as their initial releases, but in completely different ways, and sometimes it's breathtaking to look back at how much ground they've covered.

Bloc Party official site / Buy (Amazon) / Buy (Recordstore) / iTunes

2009 Albums I'm Most Excited About

Alright, now that all that year-end madness is finished with, allow me to present my list of the albums I'm most excited for in the (now not-so-)new year. I didn't deliberately go for 10, it just kinda happened that way. In no particular order:

Photo by David S. Rubin

Pin Me Down had talked about releasing their as-yet-untitled debut album last year but it didn't happen, so hopefully we'll be seeing it in 2009. The band is made up of 1/2 Russell Lissack from Bloc Party and 1/2 New York singer/songwriter/guitarist Milena Mepris (formerly of electro-punks Black Moustache), and is rounded out by drummer/producer extrordinaire Alex Elena (plus regular collaborations with ex-Battle guitarist Jamie Ellis and a whole bunch of other awesome people), so you can see why I would be more than a little excited about them. Their debut single, Cryptic, released last year via Kitsuné, did not disappoint, and the two other tunes on their MySpace have only added to my enthusiasm. Here's that debut single:

Pin Me Down - Cryptic (zShare)

As I may have mentioned a couple times previously, Norwegian electronica duo Röyksopp have a new album coming out, on March 23 via Astralwerks to be exact. It's been four years since their last studio outing, and that album (The Understanding) remains one of my favourites. New disc's called Junior and will be preceded on March 9 by the single Happy Up Here, which you may stream right here, or buy from iTunes here. The album was recorded and engineered in Bergen, Stockholm, Copenhagen and London, and features contributions from Robyn, Lykke Li, Karin Dreijer (of The Knife and Fever Ray) and Anneli Drecker (via Stereogum).

Anglo-Icelandic electronica-folk crew Fields created one of my favourite albums of 2007 with their debut Everything Last Winter, and it looks like they're back in 2009 to repeat the magic (sans guitarist Jamie Putman, who left on amicable terms). Not a lot of info on this one - their entire website has been taken down, replaced with a very purple MySpace page featuring a scary profile pic - but there are two new songs available for streaming on said MySpace page, and they sound hella good. They also did a fair bit of touring over the past year, so keep your eyes open for any more dates, especially if you're in Europe.

Photo by Edwin Tse

Metric recently unveiled the first single from their as-yet-untitled third (depending on how you count them) studio album, called Help I'm Alive. You can stream it at their MySpace or buy it at iTunes, or watch a lovely video put together by Emily Haines about it, and the evolution of her songwriting, at their website. The song is likely my favourite thing Metric have produced yet, which is really saying something, but I think its simplicity (discussed by Emily in the vid, you should really go watch) adds a lot to it, and it just sounds more focused almost than Metric's previous work. Expect the album early this year via Last Gang.

Photo by Autumn de Wilde

Back in Novemeber, Tegan & Sara spent some time in New Orleans writing songs together for the first time ever (see this post by Tegan and this one by Sara on their wonderful MySpace blog). The promise of new Tegan & Sara material, and the fact that Tegan plays "absursdly wonderful" drums (to quote Sara) on all of it, is enough to have me shaking in anticipation; even more exciting, they recently sent off a stack of demos (40, to be exact) to the excellent and talented Mr. Chris Walla, who produced their previous album, 2007's The Con, with plans to get into a studio and record in the spring. As if that weren't enough, they're also releasing a series of T&S books, designed by the ever-talented Emy Storey, with the first one coming out in the spring. Here's a pretty good-quality live recording of a new song that may or may not make it onto the album, from a show a couple weeks ago in Sydney (thanks to Autumn Nocturne for recording the whole show, you can download it at the Internet Archive here):

Tegan & Sara - Give Chase (Enmore Theatre, Sydney, Australia 08.01.09) (via the Internet Archive)

Photo by Autumn de Wilde

There isn't a lot of information about Silversun Pickups' upcoming second album, apart from its title, Swoon, and the number of tracks on it (17). Lead singer/guitarist Brian Aubert has said, however, that "some songs are very quiet and delicate, [while] others are just fucking loud." It's also been confirmed by the band that Darren Waterston and Sara Cumings will again be lending their considerable talent to the album's artwork and graphic design/lettering, respectively, as they did on 2006's Carnavas, which happened to be one of my favourite albums from that year (not to mention one of the most visually gorgeous). As well, Tony Hoffer and Dave Cooley are returning to mixing and mastering duties. Look out for it this year via Dangerbird.

Photo by Drew Reynolds

I love An Horse. Regular readers may have caught on to that by now. Technically their debut album, Rearrange Beds, was released digitally in 2008, but it just came out physically this month in Australia and is set for March 17 everywhere else, so it qualifies for this list. I seriously haven't been this excited about a new band in a long damn while, and I really want as many people to discover their greatness as possible. Go listen to some songs at their MySpace, or go back to this post to grab a couple mp3s from the album.

Uh Huh Her are a band I haven't talked about on the blog yet, mostly because I first listened to them just a couple a weeks ago, around the same time I first heard An Horse actually (and for the same reason; both bands were touring with Tegan & Sara). I'm kinda cheating with this one because their debut album, Common Reaction, came out back in August, but since I just came across it so recently (and because it's so great) I thought I'd include it. The band is made up of singer and multi-instrumentalist (and I do mean "multi", she litereally plays every instrument on the record) Camila Grey, formerly of Mellowdrone, and singer/synth-player Leisha Hailey, who played in a couple bands prior to this but more recently has been busy as an actress on The L Word. Uh Huh Her (named after the PJ Harvery album) have a rather cool sound, blending the best of 80s pop and 90s electronica to create something that's refreshing yet retro, without ever veering into irony. If that sounds like your thing, go stream some songs at MySpace. Here's the title track:

Uh Huh Her - Common Reaction (zShare)

Photo be Katie Evans

Now, Now Every Children are another band I've been addicted to lately, but then, with songs as catchy as Cars, it would be hard to listen to them and not get addicted (seriously, just try not to sing along with "Oh my god, I don't care about the car" at the top of your lungs). They basically just use guitars, drums and keyboards for their sound, but it feels much bigger than that, largely thanks to some amazing drumming that really pops out at you and interlocks beautifully with the guitars. The album's also called Cars and is available right now from Afternoon Records' online shop and iTunes (although Amazon's claiming it won't be released until Frebruary 10), and is highly recommended if you like urgent, driving, sometimes joyous, sometimes heartbroken indie pop-rock. Stream some songs at MySpace.

Finally, The Boss's latest, entitled Working On A Dream, is out January 27 via Columbia. Stream the whole thing right now at npr.org. 'Nuff said.

2008 Albums You Should Hear Wrap-up + One To Watch in 2009

So, first of all; profound apologies that it's fucking half way through January and I'm still catching up on my year-end stuff. New to blogging, didn't realize how long it would take to write (semi-)serious album reviews/underestimated my own lazyness, exams, excuses excuses, etc. Anyways, I'm all done, and since I didn't really offer any explanation at the outset, figure I should probably see to that now. Basically; I just wanted to turn people on to a few of my favourite albums from the past year, some of which happened to receive not a lot of attention from the general music-listening/blog-reading public. I enjoy reading other people's year-end lists, but I know I'm not capable of objectively ranking music that truly matters to me, hence the unranked, two-paragraph, two-mp3 format of the posts. Hopefully you've discovered something you like; that's really what this blog is largely about (actually I'm lying, it's largely about me working out my personal issues by whining to a crowd of internet strangers). Anyways, with that in mind (the discovering-new-music-you-love thing, not the personal-issues/whining thing. Actually, just forget I ever said that.), here's a band that's been dominating my listening habits since I picked up their album on the 4th of this month, and I'm sure will continue to due so for a very long time indeed.



The only reason I listened to An Horse was because they were touring with Tegan & Sara. Although, initially, that alone wasn't enough to pique my interest. Even Sara's glowing MySpace blog about them here, which you'd think would have been enough to convince a rabbid T&S fan like myself to give 'em a go, failed to do so due to the fact that I'm a total fucking idiot. So instead of taking advantage of the Interwebs and spending the two seconds at myspace.com/anhorse that it would have required for me to realize I was in love back in October, I waited until the beginning of January, when all my year-end list recommendations had run dry and I figured, Alright, fine, it's not like I have anything better to do, I guess I'll go listen to some An Horse.

SO DAMN GOOD.

That's seriously all I could think. (In fact, proof of my speechlessness can be found right here.) Following the initial rush of spinning all the songs on their myspace several (hundred) times, I started asking the important questions; namely, do they have any more music, and how might I purchase it? Why, as a matter of fact, they did have an album. It was called Rearrange Beds and was currently available on iTunes, with physical release in their native Australia in January and the rest of the world in March (on the 17th). After nearly two seconds of deliberation, I did something I almost never do and bought the whole album on iTunes. SO GOOD. I think you get that by now. But listening to it every night in my bedroom alone wasn't enough: I had to make sure as many people heard this band as possible, and make sure no one else fell into my (seriously, it's patented) deadly pitfall of equal parts ignorance and apathy. Hence, this post. Yes, it's not the greatest piece of journalism ever conceived, but at least I gave you an mp3! Anyways, to quote Sara's blog post, which put it excellently:

"i rarely, and with much less fever, promote/pimp what sends my heart racing but i feel compelled to drive the masses towards this band. if i was a teenager i would buy a poster and put it over my bed. but im just a nerdy late twenty-something and find it more appropriate to just carry a photo of damon and kate in my wallet. respectable. i adore them. please go see them. and tell your friends. also, their new album is available on itunes. it is SO good. please buy it."

So, in short; Kate Cooper and Damon Cox rock. An Horse roxxorz my soxxorz. You should all go stream some tunes at theirspace and maybe buy the album at iTunes. Or, if you happen to live in Australia, pick up a CD here and check tour dates here. Aaaaand here's two mp3s (the one I posted before and another one), enjoy.

An Horse - Camp Out (zShare)
An Horse - Scared As F**k (zShare)

(I seriously had an impossible time choosing which two songs to post, they're all equally amazing.)

An Horse on MySpace / Buy (Australia)* / iTunes

*Cheap international shipping, though.

2008 Albums You Should Hear: Thrice - The Alchemy Index Vols. III & IV: Air & Earth

2008 marked the 10th anniversary of Thrice, likely one of the most remarkable bands you'll ever hear. Formed by Dustin Kensrue (guitar/vocals) and Teppei Teranishi (guitar) while they were still in high school, Thrice was one of many acts to pioneer the melodic post-hardcore sound that defined much of punk music for the early 2000s. Building a strong local following due in part to their incendiary live shows and support of local charities, Thrice's first two albums showcased them as an incredibly talented band, leading to a major label deal with Island and a fair amount of commercial success for their third offering, The Artist In The Ambulance. It wasn't until Artist's follow up, though, 2005's Vheissu, that it became clear just how ambitious and talented Thrice was. Utilyzing a wider range of instrumentation and some incredible lyrics to expand well beyond their initial hardcore roots, that album still stands as a major accomplishment, but it's possible that The Alchemy Index is Thrice's first true masterpiece.

The Alchemy Index isn't exactly an album, though. It's basically four distinct volumes, each six tracks long, packaged as two double albums for CD purposes, with each volume corresponding to one of the natural elements (Vols. I and II, Fire and Water respectively, were released in 2007). If this sounds like pretentious concept album territory, don't be fooled; The Alchemy Index is one of the purest expressions of artistic deluge to ever be committed to the medium of music. Thrice (which is rounded out by brothers Eddie Breckenridge on bass and Riley Breckenridge on drums) has clearly never demonstrated a lack of talent, but the music on the The Alchemy Index is so transcendent and elemental as to defy description. Of no small part in this are Kensrue's lyrics, often biblical in topic and illuminatingly evocative, delivered in a voice that's expressive and weathered well beyond his 28 years. Slip on some headphones, turn out the lights and spend some quality time with Air and Earth.



Thrice - A Song For Milly Michaelson (zShare) (from Vol. III: Air)
Thrice - Come All You Weary (zShare) (from Vol. IV: Earth)

Thrice official site / The Alchemy Index official site
Buy The Alchemy Index Vols. III & IV: Air & Earth: CD / iTunes

2008 Albums You Should Hear: The Teenagers - Reality Check

I don't even know what to say about The Teenagers. Maybe it's easier to describe them like this; think back to high school. You there? Good. Now think about everyone you ever had a crush on, everyone you ever dated, all the painful rejections, your first kiss, drunken parties, prom night, emotionial insecurities offset by vodka-fuelled antics, awkward sex (lots and lots of sex). It doesn't matter if half this stuff didn't happen to you, specifically, because listening to The Teenagers is like living it all over again. Sound fun? Maybe that's not the adjective you'd choose, but the The Teenagers' debut album, Reality Check, may be enough to change your mind.

Calling most bands "formulaic" would be meant as an insult, but in the case of The Teenagers, it's a compliment. The songs on Reality Check are so effortlessly catchy and addictive that every time a track ends, I find myself thinking the next one can't possibly top that, and then, invariably, it does. The instrumentation is simple enough; a few guitars, plenty of synths, drums. The lyrics are a different story, often consisting of biting sarcasm coupled with potentially offensive subject matter that veers between deadpan and (perhaps deceptively) heart-on-sleeve earnesty, all sung in occasionally French-accented English. Fuck Nicole, for example, about a teenage girl strung out on "aspirins and alcohol", was allegedly inspired by MySpace fan messages, while Homecoming is the catchiest song you'll ever hear with a chorus of "I fucked my American cunt". Add to that a sweetly stalker-ish ode to Scarlett Johansson (You don't believe in monogamy / I'm not jealous, Scarlett / Will you marry me?) and you've got one of the cleverest, catchiest, most surprisingly intelligent and heartfelt albums you'll dance to all year. And if you don't think so, they don't care, just by their t-shirts and talk about them everywhere.



The Teenagers - Homecoming (zShare)
The Teenagers - Starlett Johansson (zShare)

The Teenagers official site
Buy Reality Check: CD / iTunes

You wanna camp out and I wanna fuck around

Photo by Amelia Shaw

An Horse - Camp Out (zShare)

This is the first song on the debut album by a band I've fallen desperately in love with, in a way that doesn't happen often. I don't feel sufficiently capable of saying anything else about An Horse right now, so: click here to get the album, entitled Rearrange Beds, from iTunes (it's worth it, I promise). Physical release is this month in Australia and March in the US.

Stream more songs at An Horse's MySpace.

2008 Albums You Should Hear: The Ting Tings - We Started Nothing

The Tings Tings make insanely catchy, raw pop music with guitars, drums, vocals, and the occasional synthesizer. Simple though that description may be, it seems fitting for the UK duo of Katie White and Jules de Martino, who's entire aesthetic is based on nothing if not simplicity; following the implosion of their previous act, Dear Eskiimo, the two decided to get together and create a sound "driven by personality, unstoppable momentum, friendship and the love of great pop music - however stylised it arrives." (via their bio.) This passion and raw adrenaline, as well as an astonishing talent for instantly-sing-along-able choruses, comes through loud and clear on their debut album, We Started Nothing.

Catchy guitars and dance-punk rhythms aren't the only things The Tings Tings have going for them, though; in fact, probably more arresting than both is the sheer expressive quality of Miss White's voice. Growling and shouting through opener Great DJ before bursting into a chorus of ah-ah-ah-ahs and letting a chuckle slip through on kiss-off to her "foolish boy" Fruit Machine, then slipping seemingly effortlessly into a perfectly smooth delivery for Be The One and never dropping a syllable in Shut Up And Let Me Go's rapid-fire choruses, with her British accent always poking through, the vocal delivery throughout is sure to leave you wanting more. On the evidence of We Started Nothing, The Ting Tings are well on their way to achieving their goal of rocking the foundations of manufactured pop music, and the world is a little better off for it.


Photo by Karen McBride

The Ting Tings - Great DJ (zShare)
The Ting Tings - Shut Up And Let Me Go (zShare)

The Ting Tings offical site
Buy We Started Nothing: CD / Vinyl / iTunes