For a number of late ’90s/early ’00s years, Fred Thomas, Betty Marie Barnes and a rotating cast of twee-pop players were Saturday Looks Good To Me, one of Michigan’s finest bands. Thomas has gone on to a number of left-field projects, including the tape-noise experiments of City Center and garage-pop act Swimsuit (more on them later), but amid all that, he and Betty reconnected and made a record: It, and their band, is called Mighty Clouds, it’s out now, and it is as quirky and charming as Saturday Looks Good To Me’s legacy would imply.
Lovely stuff from High Highs, a new New York act whose “Open Season” evokes the Morning Benders ramshackle folk-pop by way of XO-era Elliott Smith. Look for a full-length in 2011.
“You probably heard I went away,” Ryan Adams sings in “Breakdown into the Resolve,” the first track on III/IV — his ostensible comeback record. After a couple of comfy, commercially successful albums released relatively free of drama, the singer took time away from music — resting his Ménière’s-addled ears, writing a pair of books (which I, fanboy, read), doing an art show, skateboarding with No Age, getting married. You know, typical stuff. Free from his label shackles at last, he self-released Orion — a relatively serious (and pretty good!) sci-fi metal concept album earlier this year as a sort of test of his independence. It sold out within days. Now, we have III/IV, a two-disc set recorded during the Easy Tiger era (and before that album relaunched him into the mainstream’s good graces, presumably keeping him from dropping, say, three records in a year again).
Expectations play a bigger role than most would like to admit with music; with Adams, context is everything. III/IV is a Cardinals record, but it’s far from the dusty Grateful Dead ramblings of Cold Roses. The album shares a track and a mood with the unreleased but digitally (illegally) available Let It B-Minus and Fasterpiece, which he recorded in 2006 (probably?) as Sad Dracula, albums driven by electric guitars and charged with Replacements influence. When all is said and done, albums like Let It Be might be Adams’ most powerful touchstones: Paul Westerberg’s ragged growl and the band’s blend of propulsive rockers and frayed, reverb-heavy ballads lay a shadow on Adams efforts from the post-Gold paranoia of “Nuclear” and the Pinkhearts sessions through Rock N Roll to what must’ve been an emotionally fraught 2006. Read the rest of this entry »
Episode 2! We haven’t been canceled yet! Todd Goldstein of ARMS will be joining us to kick out assorted jams and talk EP, Summer Skills and Chanukah. 7 p.m PT/10 p.m. ET., Yowie Dot Com.
Announcing you’ve just seen a great Jens Lekman concert’s a bit like saying you really enjoyed last week’s Mad Men, but my favorite Swedish songwriter brought plenty of Twitter-worthy material to the Mondrian SkyBar on Saturday night: he played fresh/future favorites “The End of the World Is Bigger Than Love,” “An Argument with Myself” and debuted (?) “Waiting for Kirsten,” a surreal ditty about attempting to meet apparent Lekman fan Kirsten Dunst at a Gothenburg bar and subsequently getting drunk outside her hotel over the summer. That he ties this handily into the political situation in Sweden only raises his game. Viktor Sjoberg assisted on beats, Tig Notaro started the evening with laughs and I tried not to pee my pants when he played “Maple Leaves.” (I was successful.) Watch most of the show via YouTube on yesterday’s post.
“The End of the World is Bigger Than Love” (above)
On Saturday night, Jens Lekman played poolside at the Mondrian SkyBar and it was pretty much the best. Luckily, some members of the Internet sacrificed their enjoyment of the evening (guys, seriously, at least go have a drink or something) to YouTube almost the entire show, which you can watch after the jump (Via TwentyFourBit). Four (count ‘em!) new songs, phew.
Mark your calendars for January 20, when the Dismemberment Plan will perform on network television and I will pee my pants. Mark them, too, for March 12, when they’ll play what the band claims is the only West Coast date of this current reunion tour at Seattle’s Showbox SoDo. Yes, I’m already looking up flights. (Alternatively: (b)road trip? It’s the D-Plan!)
It’s my favorite time of the year: Dragon Wars The Rawky Awards! For the third year in a row, after the jump, you, dear reader, can thrust your trusty opinion into the critical fray. Votes will be tallied from right now until Sunday night at 11:59 p.m., with winners (and losers) revealed next week. Choose wisely, my friends. Read the rest of this entry »
For a number of late ’90s/early ’00s years, Fred Thomas, Betty Marie Barnes and a rotating cast of twee-pop players were Saturday Looks Good To Me, one of Michigan’s finest bands. Thomas has gone on to a number of left-field projects, including the tape-noise experiments of City Center and garage-pop act Swimsuit (more on them later), but amid all that, he and Betty reconnected and made a record: It, and their band, is called Mighty Clouds, it’s out now, and it is as quirky and charming as Saturday Looks Good To Me’s legacy would imply.
“You probably heard I went away,” Ryan Adams sings in “Breakdown into the Resolve,” the first track on III/IV — his ostensible comeback record. After a couple of comfy, commercially successful albums released relatively free of drama, the singer took time away from music — resting his Ménière’s-addled ears, writing a pair of books (which I, fanboy, read), doing an 
Episode 2! We haven’t been canceled yet! Todd Goldstein of ARMS will be joining us to kick out assorted jams and talk EP, Summer Skills and Chanukah. 7 p.m PT/10 p.m. ET., 
