David Berman’s Silver Jews called it quits. Despite the fact that they’re one of the great enduring bands of the ’90s indie rock boom, the blogosphere couldn’t seem to find the time to blog about it. Animal Collective has a sweet new video and might be in league with Us Weekly. And we talked about the Oscar nominations (and the Oscar snubs).

(Silver Jews photo by Redheadwalking)

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The Week in Rawk: This is really happening. Click below for more.

Important breaking news!

Hipster Runoff has been Twittering at Ed Droste of Grizzly Bear, trying to pull an indie rock dinner invite (e-vite?) for some gumbo so he doesn’t have to go to Chili’s — and it appears this has been the beginning of a beautiful blogship. “Are we ‘real friends’ or just ‘fake internet friends’?” HRO asked. To which Ed replied, “Hopefully both and more!!!” Awww. Ed happens to be bloggy buddies with us, too, and sent us his list of his favorite five recipes of 2008 a while back. Feast your eyes. In actual news, Grizzly Bear’s latest album is due in March (so, like, a leak in two weeks?) and should be totally awesome. (Sorry, guys, I just got caught up on Gossip Girl. It’s one of those days.)

Buy Animal Collective Tickets, Get An Us Weekly Subscription: This is Live Nation’s doing, but that doesn’t make it any less hilarious.

No walls or adobe slabs (or girls — sigh) in this one, folks, but the underwater video for Animal Collective‘s current jam of the year is bubbly and bizarre enough to warrant a viewing. Then again, it also kinda looks like an iPod ad — let the backlash begin!

Previously: First Look: Animal Collective – Merriweather Post Pavillion

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Click below for more Videos.

Photo by Redheadwalking

Bad news, folks — indie rock’s poet laureate, David C. Berman, announced today that he’s calling it quits with the Silver Jews and moving on to greener pastures: “screenwriting or muckracking.”

“If I continue to record I might accidentally write the answer song to ‘Shiny Happy People,’” he wrote, and while nobody wants to see that, last year’s Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea was a great J00s record; arguably their best since their seminal release, 1998′s Malkmus-aided American Water. Berman remains at the top of his game and was just getting comfortable with touring after refusing to do it for years, so all in all, this is quite the loss. I met him after a show on their inaugural tour and he was incredibly charming, even while discussing his dislike of the nickname “Dave,” which yours truly obviously goes by. “We should be free to be Daves and Davids,” he said at the time. D.C., you should be whatever you want. Best of luck.

Silver Jews – “Smith and Jones Forever”: mp3

(Buy Silver Jews albums — all of ‘em — on Drag City)

B-roll from Emil’s 90210 audition, perhaps? “Airport Surroundings” is the first single from Loney Dear’s tear-stained love letter of a new album, Dear John, out Jan. 27 on Polyvinyl. It sounds a lot like the last one, which you’ll remember was one of my 10 favorites of 2007. Angelenos, he’s opening for Andrew Bird on February 18 at the Orpheum, if you’re looking for the year’s best double bill thus far.

Loney Dear – “Airport Surroundings”: mp3

Some quick thoughts:

– Nobody saw The Reader coming. I haven’t seen it (I was boycotting all the Nazi movies this year), but I guess I’ll have to now. What a turnaround from the Golden Globes, where Revolutionary Road dominated the nominations. Unfortunately, it took the fifth Best Picture slot everyone (read: me) hoped would go to The Dark Knight — and the directing slot which should’ve gone to Christopher Nolan (or Darren Aronofsky for The Wrestler, a film which should’ve also gotten a screenplay nod, and Best Picture, too).

More after the jump… [Continue reading...]

I have to be up in the pre-dawn hours tomorrow for work, which means I’ll probably be watching tonight’s two-hour premiere on ABC.com tomorrow, but, uh, get excited in this thread! And no spoilers!