Spoon - Gimme Fiction - 5/10/2005 !

The Crooked Fingers website has undergone a major revamp, you should go check it out. I will summarize the important news bits for you though:

Dignity and Shame is out on the 22nd, on both CD and vinyl. The vinyl version features special bonus tracks: “The Ballad Of El Cuchillo” and “New Drink For The Old Drunk (new version)”.

If you are one the first 50 people to pre-order, either from Crooked Fingers site, or the Merge site, you’ll get a free autographed bonus disc featuring Red Devil Dawn demos, plus 2 bonus tracks: “It Takes A Long Knife”, which eventually became the song “Sleep All Summer”, and also “You Are Alone”, which is featured in the film titled, coincidentally, “You Are Alone”.

And if you happen to miss out on being one of the first 50 pre-orders, you can still purchase the demos disc from the CF site on the 11th.

Finally, there’s also an iTunes-exclusive EP out tomorrow, featuring the first Dignity and Shame single, “Call To Love”, plus a new unreleased song called “Carousel”, and a remix of “There’s A Blue Light”.

< ! - - End Crooked Fingers Transmission - - >

Frank pointed out that CBC Radio 3 has posted a master list of their past 102 radio sessions. There is some absolutely incredible stuff in there. Notably absent as I scanned through the list, though, was a recent session from Wolf Parade. In any case, there’s a “Wolf Parade CBC Session” out there on the P2Ps, so happy hunting.

You know what’s really good? This track from Okkervil River’s new EP, For Real (There’s Nothing Quite Like The Blinding Light), out March 1st (on Jagjaguwar of course).

And hey Columbus folks: I just got a letter letting me know that Wexner members can now pre-order tix for some upcoming “Black Box” performances:

- Joanna Newsom (Mar. 5)
- Rachel’s (Mar. 10)
- Superwolf (Apr. 13)

Pre-orders are available through Feb. 7th, at which point the tickets go on sale to the great unwashed masses.

You can now stream 3 tracks, “Spanish Teeth”, “Japanese Girls”, and “Montefiore”, from the Robbers On High Street’s so-excellent Tree City, out February 22nd on New Line. Also, note that I’ve removed the Tree City mp3s I had up. You had your chance, shit don’t last forever.

* Or, if you don’t feel like “streaming”, Dan points out that you can actually download those tracks:

Guess it pays to root around in the source code once in a while…

Pinder was kind enough to hook up a Nathan Lawr mp3 for all y’all to check out:

In other news o’ the North, Joel Plaskett’s new album, La De Da is now available for pre-order at Maple Music.

And finally, a track from The Minus Story’s Heaven and Hell EP:

I’m really pretty sorry that I didn’t hear about Nathan Lawr’s album, The Heart Beats A Waltz, back in 2003 when it first came out. I mean, I coulda been soaking in this goodness for the past 2 years! Anyway, better late than never. It’s a damn fine record, and you can get it from Maple Music or Miles Of Music.
And I wish I could track down some mp3s, but you can at least stream samples over at the nathanlawr.com. From his bio, I see that Nathan has played with Royal City, Sea Snakes, Gentleman Reg, The Hidden Cameras, and basically every other Torontoid music outfit you can think of. Dude gets around.

Plus also, you can pick up the excellent Nathan Lawr & The Minotaur Orchestra EP, featuring live orchestral versions of 6 tracks, over at the super cool Blue House online store.

So wait, so did I mention that Nathan Lawr used to be the drummer for Royal City? See, that’s my weak-ass segue into this: My Mean Magpie has delved once more into his vault of goodies and brought out an unreleased Royal City track (from the Rush Hour sessions), called “Don’t Be Scared Of My Dog“.

And finally: it looks like some Spoon news is imminent over at Merge. ‘Bout damn time.

Insound has added :::An Actor’s Revenge::: to the list
of freely downloadable tracks from Notorious Lightning and Other Works. That’s one-third of the disc available
online now.

The new Hot Hot Heat single. Ehh.

That Minus Story t-shirt is pretty sweet.

Lekman atDoFS update.

DOA reports that Black
Mountain’s upcoming NW mini-tour is with Oneida. Christ, that’s
gotta be an intense show. Sheesh. Oneida’s upcoming full-length, The Wedding, is out in May.

And tim heard that Spoon will be opening for Elvis Costello at SXSW this year.

You’d think that with all that blathering on about Destroyer I did last year that I’d be done by now.

But no.

Notorious Lightning and Other Works is out next week and I’m stoked. And I don’t know how I missed this mp3, but luckily, it was noted by my suddenly new favorite, The Imaginary Jenny:

That track comes courtesy of Soft Abuse, who are doing the vinyl edition.

Also worth noting is that Acuarela is releasing the Spanish edition of Your Blues with three bonus acoustic tracks: “Chosen Few”, “Goddess Of Drought”, and “Students Carve Hearts Out Of Coal”.

I got a promo of that new Jack Logan disc, Nature’s Assembly Line, and hey, fans of Bulk and/or Mood Elevator: you will dig this album. The press material explains how the record was made, too; it’s pretty cool:

“The album was recorded in Athens, Georgia over the course of 2003 by Logan and a revolving cast of some of the best musicians in town. Calling themselves the Monday Night Recorders, the group got together every Monday night at various houses with the goal of writing and recording 3 new songs.”

(and, note to largeheartedboy, Patterson Hood is one of the “Monday Night Recorders”…)

And here’s some day-old news swiped from Chromewaves and Brooklynvegan:

Bradley’s Almanac has mp3s of the Arcade Fire KCRW appearance from the other day. I’ma have to agree with 517 on these tracks: “…meh.”

Everyone’s favorite Mormon Director kid just did the video for The Postal Service’s “We Will Become Silhouettes”. Watch it here.

Wha-wha-what? A Marvel Team-Up featuring Calexico and Iron & Wine?! Answer: yes. Calexico/Iron & Wine will release the Lays In The Reigns EP later this year.

The Early Day Miners‘ All Harm Ends Here is out today. A few tracks, including the sublime “Errance”:

You’d think that June Panic would be way too busy compiling his 4-disc retrospective set, but he somehow managed to put together one of those “1-Sided LP”s for Burnt Toast. Should be released sometime in the spring(?)

Midlake’s Balloon Maker single will be out in March on Bella Union, and feature a coupla extra songs plus that Jason Lee-directed video for the track.

And regarding that Iron & Wine note I made yesterday: Dan asked me to point out that you really don’t need to spend your hard-earned cash on that entire soundtrack disc; you can get that Trapeze Swinger track for a mere 99c. from the iTunes Store. I would have mentioned that, but I continually forget about the existence
of the iTunes Store until it’s a Friday afternoon, I’ve had a cocktail lunch, and I suddenly remember that there’s this Steely Dan/Doobie Brothers/Van Halen song
that I absolutely must hear right now.

Kaleb has put together another great mix CD, The 22nd Step
In God’s 80-Step Plan. First 10 people to e-mail him get
a free copy.

And speaking of free (as in, holy shit!!! Free!?!), Secretly Canadian has
graciously posted up the Impossible Shapes Tum LP (out on vinyl tomorrow),
as a free 192k mp3 download. They’re
on tour with Lekman right now, so check your
local listings. The Impossible Shapes *other* LP, Horus, is
out February 1st.

The Arcade Fire are on Morning Becomes Eclectic today at 11:15 Pacific. That’s what,
2:15 EST? Listen here.

Lou Barlow’s Emoh is out tomorrow. Did you know that it’s not “Emoh” as in “Emo”? It’s just “Home” spelled backwards. I mean, I think I read that somewhere. Anyway, here’s a track from the disc, and it’s called “Home”, so there you go.

You know what? There’s an amazing, AMAZING, Iron and Wine song
called “The Trapeze Swinger”. The fucked-up part? It’s only available on the In Good Company soundtrack.

Merge just sent out notice that M Ward would be appearing on a new Starbucks CD,
covering “Let My Love Open The Door”. A quick glance also shows that the disc features Calexico covering Joy Division, Joseph Arthur covering the Smiths,
The Old 97s covering the Kinks, and more.

On a Starbucks CD.

Starbucks.

Anyway, whatever. Tomorrow is National Druganaut Day.

Pitchfork redesigned so that they could fit on 20 more seizure-inducing animated banner ads. I can’t imagine what their motivation might be for that…

Carl Wilson predicts big popularity
for Owen Pallett of Les Mouches, aka Final Fantasy,
aka the guy that did that Joanna Newsom cover that
everyone was downloading a while back. Yes, opening for the Arcade Fire on their upcoming tour
may indeed work to his advantage.

For kicks (via Slatch), here’s some big, dumb rock from Louis XIV:

And for more kicks, here’s some bigger, dumber rock from Oh My God:

Good stuff to pick you up on a Friday afternoon.