This is fine.
Singer-songwriter John Vanderslice is set to release his 7th album, Romanian Names, via Dead Oceans on May 19th. This album supposedly is crafted of shorter songs, some more upbeat, but this song here isn’t that at all. This is the album’s longest, and possibly slowest, tracks.
Download: John Vanderslice – Fetal Horses [MP3]
One of our favorite labels, Merge Records, has compiled a great set of covers as part of their subscription series SCORE! Unlike the rest of the series, Merge will be offering up this series of covers to the masses, but only a limited amount will be released. Not to mention, all proceeds will go to the charity of the curators choice! Good tunes and humanitarianism? Count us in. Head over to pre-order the album now. And in the meantime, check out this new Shins cover of Tenement Halls.
Download: The Shins (Tenement Halls Cover) – Plenty if Never Enough [MP3]
Normally we wouldn’t just throw Daytrotter session after session in your face, but that site is the place to be, as they’ve gathered two greats in their studios. Earlier this week it was Stephen Malkmus, and now it’s our Number One Gay Dude That Rocks, Bob Mould. The man goes into the studio to play four new songs off his upcoming album for Anti Records titled Life and Times. This track is a great preview into the album, as is the entire session.
Download: Bob Mould – I’m Sorry Baby But You Cant Stand in My Light [MP3]
The Continental Club has a nice local lineup this Friday night with Li’l Cap’n Travis and Brothers and Sisters on the bill. We give a lot of coverage to both these bands and feel like they maybe haven’t gotten their due praise just yet. Tickets will be sold only at the door for $8 with music starting at 10pm.
Download: Brothers and Sisters – You’re Gone [MP3]
California band The Parson Red Heads have a new song for their fans to check out. The new track is called “Raymond” and will appear on upcoming 7″ Orangufang due out April 28th on JAXART Records. You likes?
Download: The Parson Red Heads – Raymond [MP3]
Back in the day, the great band XTC recorded a few albums under the moniker Dukes of Stratosphear, pressing their music in the way of 60s psychedelia. They recorded two albums, under this name, 25 O’Clock and Psonic Psunspot, both which are pretty hard to come by nowadays. Lucky for us, a certain Andy Partridge of XTC fame will be reissuing said albums on Ape House. Also, staff-writer Corey would be mad if we didn’t also tell you to check out XTC album Black Sea, which he loves. Here is one of the tracks from The Dukes of Stratosphear.
Download: The Dukes of Stratosphear (XTC) – Brainiac’s Daughter [MP3]
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Toronto’s Great Lake Swimmers have consistently managed to put out albums of sufficient folk-pop, resting on the tightrope between overtly melancholy and cleverly sprawling acoustic-pop. Their newest album, Lost Channels is of precisely the same vein; this isn’t an entirely bad thing considering it’s done so gracefully.
Immediately, “Palmistry” establishes the album’s purpose, as the gentle voice of Tony Dekker is accompanied by a similarly gentle strumming of guitar, as other instrumental pieces flesh out the song; it’s as if the band is painting precision landscapes with a brush so gentle it barely scratches the surface of the canvas.
Every number on this album has a familiar touch, as the band never tries to push too far beyond their pre-established boundaries. The one admirable quality here is that they can continuously add layer after layer to each individual song, but never take away from the crystal-clear quality of the song. Take, for example, “Concrete Heart;” it opens with a basic approach to a soft folk tune, just before strings creep into the background, and all the while there is a tinkering piano waiting to enter stage left, completing the song. It is this delicate approach to songwriting that makes Great Lake Swimmers crafters of the perfect song; no tune has too much, or too little for that matter.
Even with a majority of the songs resting in the same spectrum of the genre, the band never stays in one place for too long, which allows them to keep the listener from growing bored. Just a song away from solemnity comes “The Chorus in the Underground,” which shifts the approach over to a more bluegrass playing field, equipped with banjo and all. It’s a pleasant enough number, but the focus always rests around Dekker’s voice.
Sure, most bands rest their case on the singer’s voice, but not all bands will utilize this as an instrument all its own. Dekker has a certain softness to his voice, which lends it to rest carefully in several different ranges of music; he can go from traditional folk to country-pop to bluegrass. Up and down he rides with his voice, but it still maintains its very distinct quality, which seems as if current artists have borrowed from its fragility.
And with each new moment on the album, comes an entirely new picture to be painted in your mind, hidden in the caverns of your subconscious. The band, like Gravenhurst, crafts their songs around a certain moment within the group dynamic, and these moments are later fleshed out to create enjoyable moments for the listener. You could describe it as organic, or as folksy soundscapes, but you best describe it as restful beauty, as this is the ultimate adjective for Lost Channels.
[audio:https://austintownhall.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/04-concrete-heart.mp3]Download: Great Lake Swimmers – Concrete Heart [MP3]
Mark Everett and his band Eels have a new single hitting the internet like wildfire today. The new single is called “Fresh Blood” and will appear on upcoming album Hombre Lobo out June 2nd via Vagrant. Here’s to hoping that this guy never looks on the sunny side of life.
The Black Kids are coming to town on April 28th at La Zona Rosa and they want to play at your house. No kidding, the band wants to play one free house show in every town on their current tour with Mates of State. All you have to do to is submit a video to the contest website explaining why you should be the lucky winner. Sounds easy enough. If anyone who reads our website enters this contest, shoot us a clip of your video and we’ll gladly link to it. Enter the contest here or just get some tickets early.
Download: Black Kids – I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance With You [MP3]
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In the year 2002 and 2003 the Yeah Yeah Yeahs hit the indie scene with a certain verocity and vitality that kept us all on the edge of our seats, seething with anticipation for future releases. Fever to Tell, for the most part, lived up to the expectations, though it still felt a little clean in comparison. Jump seven years ahead, and we have It’s Blitz, the latest effort from the band. The distance couldn’t be greater.
One of the first elements that you will notice upon listening to the first track “Zero” is that frontwoman, Karen O, seems to have lost a bit of her animalistic prowess, as if she has been caged in a zoo. The ferocity in her voice on the opening track, and the entirety of the album is rather lacking. Where we once lauded her for her passion and energy, we’re now left confused by what seems a sort mild indifference. Still, she does demonstrate her ability to carry a note here, but we saw such abilities on “Maps.”
Much will be made in the press for this album about the entirely new sound the band has come to take upon themselves. The brashness and angular guitar work from previous efforts has completely disappeared; electronics samples and tired beats have replaced the fervor that once existsed as a tractor beam for listeners everywhere.
Mellow songs, such as “Skeletons” do show the band willing to explore that sonic range outside of their traditional forays, but such moments don’t seem as well mapped out this time around. It’s difficult when listening to such tracks to figure out where the band was going, which loses some listeners, encouraging them to skip ahead to the next track. “Runaway” is another such song, and the piano structure just isn’t enough to psuh the song in any new direction.
“Dull Life” is one of the few songs on the album that seems to recall the past greatness of Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Still, even when this song picks up the pace, where are those demonic guitar licks from Nick Zinner? It’s as if the man traded in his trusted axe for a child’s hatchet, a bejewled one nonetheless.
All in all, the album has some moments that every listener will most likely enjoy, but it doesn’t seem like this is really enough to warrant repeated listens. The band shows their maturity as a group, but they discard everything that made them abrasive and frightening, exchanging them instead for a bunch of furry rabbits that you keep in a cage behind your house. Sure, electronic moments make for great sound, but this band isn’t the one that was supposed to be giving those to us. We asked them to break us down with passion and voice, but instead they just want to hold hands and walk along the beach.
[audio: https://austintownhall.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/yeah_yeah_yeahs_-_zero.mp3]