Yo, JV has links for slideshows of both the recent Mt. Goats/Vanderslice tour, and the recent Mt. Goats recording sessions, if that’s your thing.

Secretly Canadian has promised new Jens Lekman demos and other rarities biweekly through February, plus also, the video for “You Are The Light”. One problem: their bandwidth seems to be currently blown.

Finally, if you’re a Midlake fan, a Jason Lee fan, or both, you may want to check out
Stereo Skateboarding’s new DVD, Way Out East, which features 5 Midlake songs, and the Jason Lee-directed video for “Balloon Maker”.

Peter of the Spoon List notes that Britt Daniel’s solo show from 10/29 in SF has been upped to the Live Music Archive. There are quite a few “newish” songs in the set.

And, since everybody’s doin’ it, Subpop has put up some notes on their upcoming releases for the new year, including the new Low record on January 25th, another Postal Service single (”We Will Become Silhouettes” b/w “Be Still My Heart” + 2 remixes) on February 9th, and a new(!) Iron & Wine EP, titled Woman King, out on the 22nd.

Frank pointed out that CBC Radio 3 has done up The Arcade Fire with that sweet-ass “feature” treatment that they do. In-studio tracks are “No Cars Go”, “7 Kettles”, “Naive Melody”, “In The Backseat”, and “Haiti”. Mac users I will again remind about that nifty utility called “WireTap“.

That upcoming Enon singles and rarities collection will be titled Lost Marbles and Exploded Evidence. Tracklist:

Knock That Door
The Nightmare Of Atomic Men
Adalania (Not So Fair)
Drowning Appointments
Normal Is Happening
Grain Of Assault
Genie’s Got Her Bag
Kanon
Blow Infinite Ways
Tilt You Up!
Marbles Explode
Raisin Heart
Evidence
Fly South
Making Merry! Merry!
Party Favor

There will also be a limited DVD with the initial pressing, featuring videos for:

Carbonation
Pleasure And Privilege
In This City
Mikazuki
Murder Sounds
Daughter In the House Of Fools

My indefatigable comrade Kaleb is at it again. He’s put together another great mix disc, hand-painted, plus extras. First 10 people get one: kaleb@sctas.com.

Mason Dixon have been in the studio and have emerged with a “studio” version of “Soft and Swollen Summer”:

There’s also a studio version of “All About You” now, but you’ll have to pick up the upcoming March Records compilation to get that one.

I just happened to stumble upon this: Just this week, Darla released 2 discs of My Morning Jacket early recordings and other rarities:

Disc 1- Chapter 1: The Sandworm Cometh
- Weeks Go By Like Days
- What Will I Do?
- White Rabbit
- Downtown
- I Just Wanted to Be Your Friend
- Time Never Gets
- They Ran (acoustic)
- Evelyn Is Not Real (be-mixed)
- Isobella with the White Umbrella
- Josta Dreams and Bitter Hands
- Old September Blues (gaed out version)
- When Will They Come
- Somebody Cares About The Maestro
- Rocket Man

Disc 2- Chapter 2: Learning: The Early Recordings
- Tonight I Wanna Celebrate With You
- Just One Thing
- Take My Breath Away
- West End Girls
- Dream a Little Dream of Me
- Death is the Easy Way
- Bermuda Highway (live at KVRX)
- Nothing To Me
- I Won’t Cry
- Why Don’t You Love Me?
- That Someone Else Was You
- Tyrone
- I Will Be There When You Die (2 meter session)
- Good Nights In Others’ Beds

Finally, one more thing:

“Mea Culpa: 2004″

There are a number of records that, for whatever reason, I
never actually got around to adding to my recs list for the year. Here, I shall make amends:

The Fiery Furnaces - Blueberry Boat
I was so excited for this one to come out, but the transition
from 2-minute Gallowsbirds Barkers to 9-minute Blueberry Boaters
was a tough sell on me. I mean, I still thought it was a good
record and all, but…this wasn’t a collection of songs,
it was an album, and ultimately, that just made it
take a hell of a lot longer to grow on me. Now, I get it.

The Hidden Cameras - Mississauga Goddam
Now, I *loved* The Smell Of Our Own, and the
songs on that record hooked me on the first listen. Mississauga
Goddam did not, unfortunately, hook me on the first listen. Or
the second, or the fifth. It’s only now, months and months later,
that I realize that I would hate to part with it (although I still
like The Smell Of Our Own better).

Midlake - Bamnan and Silvercork
Quite honestly, I was surprised just the other day when I
noticed that I hadn’t put this in the recs column; I really
thought I had. This record was one of the best surprises
I got this year. My 75orless review is here.

The Pink Mountaintops - s/t
This one’s a sludgy, slabby, sexed-up delight. The press materials
ask “Can a sexually frustrated Canned Heat seduce a hot and bothered
Neu into a cheap one night stand?” The answer is apparently “yes”.
This record, coupled with the slow-sweating groove of the prerelease
single, “Druganaut”, has also put that Black Mountain full-length
onto my list of most-looked-forward-to releases for ‘05.

Parasol has graciously offered up another track from Unbunny’s Snow Tires:

A few more tracks have been posted from Gentleman Reg’s
Darby and Joan, which I have not heard yet, but I expect is very very good.

Frank points out that the Pernice Brothers
live DVD/CD is up
for preorder now.

Frank also apparently has no love for Mr. Nicolai Dunger:

“…looking and sounding like an accountant who likes to unwind with some guitar picking…”

“…annoyingly smug, faux-soul vocal acrobatics…”

“…a worse form of white man blues than the Blueshammer phenomenon…”

Frank, I think you may have a future in music writing over at Pitchfork!

Australia’s Low Transit Industries is
releasing a Singles Club Split 7 Inch Collective Compilation featuring unreleased tracks
from Royal City, The Essex Green, and others.

Ted Leo’s new site is up.

Merge has released their list
of releases for early ‘05. January brings that Destroyer/Frog Eyes EP,
now officially titled Notorious Lightning and Other Works. It should be
incredible. Also in January: a new Lou Barlow record. February
brings Crooked Fingers‘
Dignity and Shame, and M Ward’s Transistor
Radio. Also, they should probably have The Arcade Fire’s Funeral
vinyl out early in the year as well.

Which, by the way, you noticed the Bradley’s Almanac live Arcade Fire tracks, right?

Teenbeat turns 20. There’ll be a CD comp, and 2 nights of shows, featuring reunions of Unrest, Eggs, Tuscadero, and Versus. Should you have any questions, ever, about *anything* even remotely related to Teenbeat Records, direct them to The Magpie.

12xu has made their first update in forever, with news about a new Chris Brokaw disc, an updated Joel RL Phelps site, and a release date for Sally Crewe’s new one (February).

Courtesy of Robot Blair: It’s the video for the Go Team’s “Ladyflash”. It’s pretty much just *exactly* what you’d expect, but goddamn! that shit’s so catchy.

Hey, Gregory has posted a nice Autumn Mix. Go check it.

Wha-wha-what?! Columbus, The Arcade Fire just announced a show at Little Brothers next week.

Columbus’ own Mark Eitzel is at Lil Bros. tonight. Will Johnson opens.

Hey, since when is Wolf Parade available on Insound?

TMT reports that Kill Rock Stars has signed The Robot Ate Me and will soon be re-releasing On Vacation, sans all the nice handmade packaging of course. Does this mean I’ll be able to make bank on ebay selling my limited version???

The big news on the interweb today is the release of the xbox game Halo 2. Young Americans are advised to pick it up and “practice”: you’ll find yourself in real “strange lands”, fighting real “alien warriors”, soon enough.