Did you hear about the new Stars album? Everyone’s been talking about the novel approach that Arts & Crafts is taking by releasing the new album digitally at the same time promos go out (someone finally took my advice from, like, 2 years ago, hee hee hee!), but I’m also really interested in the novel approach that Warner Bros is taking: Release a new Built To Spill digital single to iTunes et. al, but also just go ahead and give away both tracks to the blogs for free! Go grab them at Stereogum, and pick up the already-legendary OKX Radiohead Tribute while you’re there, if you haven’t already. UPDATE: Cripes, the ‘Gum’s got a new Pinback track, too! UPDATE: As I suspected, the whole “BUY THE B2S TRACKS ON ITUNES OR, ALTERNATELY, JUST GO AHEAD AND DOWNLOAD THEM FOR FREE” thing was, in reality, a label eff-up.

A reminder: in just less than 2 days, Internet Radio will be dead and gone. I don’t mean to sound like a pessimist, but it’s pretty much the 11th hour now, so unless there’s some Deus Ex Machina lurking in the wings, that’s it, done.

UPDATE: Net Radio saved. I think? Maybe?

…SPEAKING OF ‘je ne sais quoi’… of late, I’ve been quite taken with the acoustimological guitaristical quirkipop of young Mr. Kaz Nomura, code name: PWRFL POWER. He’s a Japan -> Seattle emigre, armed with an acoustic guitar, an easy charm, and some kind of brilliantly awkward / awkwardly brilliant, silly genius.

::: PWRFL POWER - It’s Okay :::
::: PWRFL POWER - Tomato Song :::

You can get to know Kaz even better via his videos:

PWRFL POWER is playing a number of East Coast dates in the next few weeks, before returning to Seattle on July 28 to play The Stranger’s Capitol Hill Block Party.

July 14 - Providence, RI - Foo Fest @ AS220
July 15 - Boston, MA - Great Scott
July 16 - NYC - Fat Baby
July 17 - Brooklyn - Glasslands
July 21 - Baltimore, MD - Whartscape (I’d call it “Baltimorapalooza“)
July 22 - NYC - Mercury Lounge

“It’s okay to release your pwrfl power! Because it feels good!”

In case you were wondering: writing posts like this, my friends, is exactly how you earn yourself a big, free package of discs.

Secretly Canadian is putting out a new June Panic release in September. Songs From Purgatory will be a three-disc collection of June’s early tracks, culled from 200 recently-restored master tapes, and remastered by Kramer. The collection will be priced to sell as a single disc, which is probably a very good idea considering the state of the music marketplace today.

I’ve been meaning to mention this for awhile: pre-order Jason Anderson’s upcoming Tonight right now, and not only will you get the record a week prior to the August 21st release date, you’ll get it for only $5 postage-paid.

Even though you only just got “Myriad Harbour” downloaded, there’s another new New Pornographers track just been released. It’s called “The Speed Of Luxury,” and you can read about it here. But you can’t download it (or even hear it (yet)), unless you’ve pre-ordered the “Executive Edition” of Challengers. Remember? All that extra bonus stuff? It’s starting to trickle out.

Guaranteed Web Sheriff boot up your ass if you go posting that track.

FWIW, the band The Battles (not Battles) is now called Giantess, meaning that their upcoming record on Soft Abuse (their third) will actually be self-titled.

Fluxblog has posted a new Bejar song, from the new New Pornographers’ album, called “Myriad Harbour.”

This is not going to be of much interest to anyone who’s not a certified Destroyer fanboy, but they’ve got 2 new live Destroyer videos up over at Pitchfork, featuring 2 new songs, “Foam Hands,” and “Rivers.”