Free Music Monday Ty Segall and White Fence I Am Not a Game

Ty Segall and White Fence. Two lo-fi bros making stoner garage-rock cut with warmth and humility, studying bright melodies as obscured by the thick textures of saturated, overdriven, in-the-red tape recordings. Now that they've come together, the results sound as you expect, but no less righteous for the fact.

The pair's collaborative LP, Hair (due April 24 on Drag City), is full of loose, woolly, rough-hewn jammers in which the tape sound —and the different qualities of different takes— is used evocatively. "I Am Not a Game" sounds cool and sweet when ripped back to gentle organ patterns, but the snarling guitars in the background forever threaten assault; and when Segall and Fence-boss Tim Presley's guitars fire up togther, suddenly the song is peaking in pained, fried-out fashion.

"I am not a game," Segall snarls, and the retort may not mean much to those listening at home. Or may mean everything. It's poetic shorthand, syllables to be sung before the shredding; words that sound great as a refrain even if we know not the game that's being played.

Ty Segall and White Fence, "I Am Not a Game"

Free Music Monday Ty Segall and White Fence I Am Not a Game

Ty Segall and White Fence. Two lo-fi bros making stoner garage-rock cut with warmth and humility, studying bright melodies as obscured by the thick textures of saturated, overdriven, in-the-red tape recordings. Now that they've come together, the results sound as you expect, but no less righteous for the fact.

The pair's collaborative LP, Hair (due April 24 on Drag City), is full of loose, woolly, rough-hewn jammers in which the tape sound —and the different qualities of different takes— is used evocatively. "I Am Not a Game" sounds cool and sweet when ripped back to gentle organ patterns, but the snarling guitars in the background forever threaten assault; and when Segall and Fence-boss Tim Presley's guitars fire up togther, suddenly the song is peaking in pained, fried-out fashion.

"I am not a game," Segall snarls, and the retort may not mean much to those listening at home. Or may mean everything. It's poetic shorthand, syllables to be sung before the shredding; words that sound great as a refrain even if we know not the game that's being played.

Ty Segall and White Fence, "I Am Not a Game"

Free Music Monday Ty Segall and White Fence I Am Not a Game

Ty Segall and White Fence. Two lo-fi bros making stoner garage-rock cut with warmth and humility, studying bright melodies as obscured by the thick textures of saturated, overdriven, in-the-red tape recordings. Now that they've come together, the results sound as you expect, but no less righteous for the fact.

The pair's collaborative LP, Hair (due April 24 on Drag City), is full of loose, woolly, rough-hewn jammers in which the tape sound —and the different qualities of different takes— is used evocatively. "I Am Not a Game" sounds cool and sweet when ripped back to gentle organ patterns, but the snarling guitars in the background forever threaten assault; and when Segall and Fence-boss Tim Presley's guitars fire up togther, suddenly the song is peaking in pained, fried-out fashion.

"I am not a game," Segall snarls, and the retort may not mean much to those listening at home. Or may mean everything. It's poetic shorthand, syllables to be sung before the shredding; words that sound great as a refrain even if we know not the game that's being played.

Ty Segall and White Fence, "I Am Not a Game"

Free Music Monday Ty Segall and White Fence I Am Not a Game

Ty Segall and White Fence. Two lo-fi bros making stoner garage-rock cut with warmth and humility, studying bright melodies as obscured by the thick textures of saturated, overdriven, in-the-red tape recordings. Now that they've come together, the results sound as you expect, but no less righteous for the fact.

The pair's collaborative LP, Hair (due April 24 on Drag City), is full of loose, woolly, rough-hewn jammers in which the tape sound —and the different qualities of different takes— is used evocatively. "I Am Not a Game" sounds cool and sweet when ripped back to gentle organ patterns, but the snarling guitars in the background forever threaten assault; and when Segall and Fence-boss Tim Presley's guitars fire up togther, suddenly the song is peaking in pained, fried-out fashion.

"I am not a game," Segall snarls, and the retort may not mean much to those listening at home. Or may mean everything. It's poetic shorthand, syllables to be sung before the shredding; words that sound great as a refrain even if we know not the game that's being played.

Ty Segall and White Fence, "I Am Not a Game"

Free Music Monday Ty Segall and White Fence I Am Not a Game

Ty Segall and White Fence. Two lo-fi bros making stoner garage-rock cut with warmth and humility, studying bright melodies as obscured by the thick textures of saturated, overdriven, in-the-red tape recordings. Now that they've come together, the results sound as you expect, but no less righteous for the fact.

The pair's collaborative LP, Hair (due April 24 on Drag City), is full of loose, woolly, rough-hewn jammers in which the tape sound —and the different qualities of different takes— is used evocatively. "I Am Not a Game" sounds cool and sweet when ripped back to gentle organ patterns, but the snarling guitars in the background forever threaten assault; and when Segall and Fence-boss Tim Presley's guitars fire up togther, suddenly the song is peaking in pained, fried-out fashion.

"I am not a game," Segall snarls, and the retort may not mean much to those listening at home. Or may mean everything. It's poetic shorthand, syllables to be sung before the shredding; words that sound great as a refrain even if we know not the game that's being played.

Ty Segall and White Fence, "I Am Not a Game"

Spiritualized Unveil Single Tour Dates Sweet Heart Sweet Light Track List Bizarre Cover Art

Sweet Heart, Sweet Light, the seventh Spiritualized album, is due out, on Fat Possum in North America and Double Six worldwide on April 17. And full details have now been unleashed, including the positively head-scratching cover-art you see to your right. 'Huh?', indeed.

The LP also has a first single: "Hey Jane," a nine-minute epic —and pseudo title-track— that finds Jason Pierce (or, if you prefer J. Spaceman) scaling the kind of rock'n'roll grandeur that's become Spiritualized routine. The album now has a track list and some points of interest, too; "So Long You Pretty Thing" features guest vocals by Pierce's 11-year-old daughter Poppy Spaceman, and "I Am What I Am" was co-written with legendary voodoo bluesman Dr. John.

In support of Sweet Heart, Sweet Light, Spiritualized will be hitting the road, with a UK tour in March and a North American leg in May.

'Sweet Heart, Sweet Light Track List:
1. "Huh (intro)"
2. "Hey Jane"
3. "Little Girl"
4. "You Get What You Deserve"
5. "Too Late"
6. "Headin' for the Top Now"
7. "Freedom"
8. "I Am What I Am"
9. "Mary"
10. "Life Is A Problem"
11. "So Long You Pretty Thing"

You Got It On the Road:
March 16: Nottingham, England - Rescue Rooms
March 17: Portsmouth, England - Wedgewood Rooms
March 19: London, England - Hackney Empire
March 20: Oxford, England - O2 Academy
March 21: Bristol, England - O2 Academy
March 22: Glasgow, Scotland - ABC
March 23: Belfast, Northern Ireland - Mandela Hall
March 24: Dublin, Ireland - Vicar Street
March 25: Manchester, England - Academy
May 2: Minneapolis, MN - First Avenue
May 3: Chicago, IL - Metro
May 4: Detroit, MI - The Majestic Theatre
May 5: Toronto, ON - The Phoenix
May 7: New York, NY - Terminal 5
May 9: Boston, MA - Paradise
May 10: Washington, DC - The 9:30 Club
May 11: Philadelphia, PA - Theatre of Living Arts
May 12: Carrboro, NC - Cat's Cradle
May 13: Atlanta, GA - The Variety Playhouse
May 15: Dallas, TX - The Granada Theatre
May 16: Austin, TX - Emo's East
May 18: Tucson, AZ - The Rialto Theatre
May 19: Phoenix, AZ - The Crescent Ballroom
May 20: San Diego, CA - Belly Up Tavern
May 22: Los Angeles, CA - The Wiltern
May 23: San Francisco, CA - The Fillmore
May 25: Portland, OR - The Wonder Ballroom
May 26: Vancouver, BC - The Rickshaw Theatre

Free Music Monday Shout Out Out Out Out Never the Same Way Twice

There was a hint of dance-punk fervor when ridiculously-named Albertan outfit Shout Out Out Out Out arose in the mid-'00s, with 2006's Not Saying/Just Saying. Six years on, and they've grown ever-more sleek and stripped-down; the six-person mania of their live shows producing spartan synth-pop jams.

"Never the Same Way Twice" —the lead single from third LP Spanish Moss and Total Loss, due June 19— is six minutes of twitchy minimalism; working determinedly robotic rhythms and ersatz synth sounds. The vocoder vocals carry the Kraftwerk-by-way-of-Trans-Am vibe that SOOOO have given off from their breakout days, but the song seems almost straitjacketed by its taut rhythms.

Only, after four minutes, in come the horns. Proving that 2012 is suffering no post-Year of the Saxophone hangover, all of a sudden a swam of hot brass comes huffing in, lacerating the mechanized repetition with an orgy of fire-music bluster.

Shout Out Out Out Out, "Never the Same Way Twice"

From the Vaults Friday Bill Fay Time of the Last Persecution 1971

The Year: 1971
The Album: Bill Fay, Time of the Last Persecution
Who it Influenced: Damon & Naomi, Jim O'Rourke, Wilco, Damien Jurado, Okkervil River, Destroyer

Once upon a time, I assembled a list of biblically-influenced indie records, a look at a slew of '90s/'00s albums that found alt acts, both secular and faithful, taking cues from the Good Book as inspiration for works of devotion, satire, and/or transcendence.

Bill Fay's 1971 freakout Time of the Last Persecution is a spiritual antecedent (so to speak) to these works. Inspired by the Books of Daniel and Revelation, it's a hymnal for the imminent End Times; a singer-songwriter album from a singer-songwriter whose faith, in the space of one album has gone from reassuring to terrifying.

As his sad piano songs are laced with lacerating electric guitar and free-jazz horns, Fay sings constantly of Christ and Caesar, two symbols of mankind's capacity for kindness and cruelty. There's no a doubt in his voice that a rapture is looming —and, in 1971, there were plenty of cultural cues that the end of the world could be nigh— and that sincerity carries Time of the Last Persecution to some wild places.

• Full review: Bill Fay, Time of the Last Persecution

From the Vaults Friday The Shaggs Philosophy of the World 1969

The Year: 1969
The Album: The Shaggs, Philosophy of the World
Who it Influenced: Beat Happening, Maher Shalal Hash Baz, Danielson Famile, Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti, Deerhoof, Cibo Matto

Have The Shaggs becoming, somehow, part of the indie-rock canon? The alternative establishment? Have the outsider art marvels —whose sole LP, 1969's Philosophy of the World, is regarded as either one of the worst or 'best-worst' albums of all— become not just a cult act, but an accepted one?

There have been multiple tribute albums, proud pledges of fandom from figures ranging from Kurt Cobain to Sufjan Stevens, and, finally, a stage musical of the band's life and times.

The staging of The Shaggs: Philosophy of the World treated the band and its bizarre back-story —monomaniacal stage-father foists dreams of pop stardom upon ill-equipped teenage sister— as a curio both comic and tragic, but the fact that The Shaggs' had reared a Broadway musical into life, over four decades after their locally-pressed, self-released album disappeared into complete obscurity, will, this was sure sign that The Shaggs had, finally, made it.

• Full review: The Shaggs, Philosophy of the World

Free Music Monday TV Girl The Wild The Innocent The TV Shuffle

The Wild, The Innocent, The TV Shuffle is the debut album for San Diego duo TV Girl. But it's being called a mixtape, due largely to the fact that it's assembled almost entirely from the "nebulously legal" practice of sampling. TV Girl made their name by a song, "If You Want It," that rather brazenly lifted a large Todd Rundgren sample, and that holds throughout their free-to-have mixtape.

TV Girl aren't coming at samples from your standard hip-hop crate-diggers angle, but from a far more inspired, 2010s specific one. When confronted with the deluge of pop-cultural stimulus that pours from computers every second of every day, sampling becomes a necessary daily skill, a coping-mechanism that helps us make sense of all that's coming at us.

"There aren't enough television shows or songs on radio to keep me distracted," sings either Trung Ngo and Brad Petering —biographical and technical details are very thin on the ground thus far— as a symbol of just how lovelorned the narrator is mid-"Keep Me Distracted"; the idea that anyone could find a lack of television or music circa 2012 being utterly absurd.

The duo use television as a symbol of the constant noise of contemporary life: their band name a commentary on the modern day; The TV Shuffle that feeling of constant flicking between entertainments in search of something, anything. They flick through samples like a wandering channel surfer, endlessly restless and happy to mash up genres. And they even invite the "TV in the Bedroom," singing "I don't know what's real or dream" as bedroom gymnastics reflect the sex acts on the television, and every night you drift off to sleep to the soft blue light of the screen.

TV Girl, The Wild, The Innocent, The TV Shuffle

Animal Collective Will Release New 12Inch for Record Store Day

Animal Collective will be releasing a new 12-inch for Record Store Day. April 21 will find Domino releasing Transverse Temporal Gyrus on limited wax.

The recordings come from a 2010 multimedia installation that Animal Collective staged, in collaboration with Oddsac director Danny Perez, at New York's Guggenheim Museum. The label's description of the record as "an aural collage consisting of the original tracks and live recordings" suggests the contents will land at the most 'difficult' end of Animal Collective's ever-experimental spectrum.

Britt Daniel Spoon Dan Boeckner Wolf ParadeHandsome Furs Are Divine Fits

Divine Fits are the new band for Spoon frontman Britt Daniel and Wolf Parade/Handsome Furs bro Dan Boeckner, who're joined by drummer Sam Brown (a former member of greaser-rock outfit New Bomb Turks). The band were formed in the wake of the break-up of Handsome Furs, the project Boeckner split with his (ex-?) wife Alexei Perry over three impressive LPs.

Divine Fits will release their first LP, A Thing Called Divine Fits, on August 28, via Merge Records. Two singles from the set are already kicking 'round online: "Would That Not Be Nice" and "My Love Is Real" each up on Merge's Soundcloud.

"My Love Is Real" will be pressed up as a 7" for vinyl lovers, with Merge releasing the single on July 31. No Divine Fits tour dates have yet been scheduled, but they do have one festival appearance booked: October 13 at San Francisco's Treasure Island Music Festival. As it stands, this would mark their first-ever show; they may have an LP under their belts, but Divine Fits are yet to debut as a live-band...

A Thing Called the Divine Fits Track List:
1. "My Love Is Real"
2. "Flaggin a Ride"
3. "What Gets You Alone"
4. "Would That Not Be Nice"
5. "The Salton Sea"
6. "Baby Get Worse"
7. "Civilian Stripes"
8. "For Your Heart"
9. "Shivers"
10. "Like Ice Cream"
11. "Neopolitans"

From the Vaults Friday Yoko Ono Yoko OnoPlastic Ono Band 1970

The Year: 1970
The Album: Yoko Ono, Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band
Who it Influenced: Public Image Ltd., Sonic Youth, Boredoms, Deerhoof, Tune-Yards, Gang Gang Dance

It's refreshing to listen to Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band with 21st century ears. To come at the LP not as a contemporary, reared on rock'n'roll and tainted by the tabloid's demonization of Yoko Ono as the she-villain that meddled the Beatles to pieces. But as someone divorced from the scandal —and sound— of the era.

Digital technology has afforded listeners a chance to experience musical history anew, to explore things with fresh ears, to hear sound from all comers and all corners without familiar baggage and narrow-minded judgment. And, thus, has afforded listeners the opportunity to listen to Yoko Ono's debut LP with the kind of open-hearted sentiment it nearly requires.

Though it was made simultaneously alongside John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band, there's no mistaking anything herein for the singer-songwriter confessionalism of her husband's work. Here, Ono screeches, screams, growls, croaks, creaks, and cries out over free-form improvisations ranging from super-funky to utterly abstract.

And, whilst doing so, she pushes rock'n'roll —so staid, so traditionalist— into new, strange, unexpected places; setting a precedent that artists from Public Image Ltd. to Crazy Dreams Band will one day pick up.

• Full review: Yoko Ono, Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band

From the Vaults Friday Anne Briggs The Time Has Come 1971

The Year: 1971
The Album: Anne Briggs, The Time Has Come
Who it Influenced: Isobel Campbell, James Yorkston, Richard Youngs, Meg Baird, Devendra Banhart, The Decemberists

During the brief, blossoming freak-folk era —an era which may or may not've actually just been one 2004 summer— old, forgotten folk albums made by odd, quiet women 30 years before were suddenly a hot currency. But for all those who flipped for Vashti Bunyan or Linda Perhacs, few seemed to get smitten by Anne Briggs; perhaps due to her records lack of freakiness.

There's no daft, hippy air to Briggs recorded works; no Incredible String Band guest spots or psychedelic freakouts. Instead, there's almost an ascetic air to her performances, in which she sings originals and traditionals in a warm, unaffected, direct voice of such honesty that it borders of purity.

Briggs first album found her singing traditional ballads unaccompanied; interpreting these songs via solely her voice, turning words with her tongue until they seemed both spontaneously her own and weighted in history; in blood and tears. The Time Has Come found Briggs making a more 'contemporary' record, performing her own acoustic compositions. It may've lacked the ties to tradition, but the album was instantly more personal, more passionate, more heartbreaking, even as its sound remained stark, Briggs voice unadorned and never theatrical.

But sales of the LP were, upon its 1971 release, tepid to say the least; the record soon disowned as the music industry abandoned folk music with the '60s soon receding into the rear-vision mirror. Not long after Briggs would retire from music, and turn into somewhat of a recluse. Though she never became a Bunyan-styled flavor-of-the-month, her influence was slowly incremental. And for those who revere her spartan sound, Briggs is a figure reverential; someone to be spoken of in hushed awe.

• Full review: Anne Briggs, The Time Has Come

Free Music Monday Unknown Mortal Orchestra Ill Come Back 4 U

The front cover of Unknown Mortal Orchestra's 2011 self-titled album bore a picture of a Spomenik, a futuristic monument of the former Yugoslavia abandoned and left to decades of decay. It was an image that worked well with the music: which sought to recreate the progressiveness of '60s psychedelic pop, then douse it in lo-fi recording effects to artificially age the jams.

That striking sound made UMO one of the best new bands of last year, and is found, once more, on their new single. "I'll Come Back 4 U" is the first new material from Ruban Nielson's project since last year, and is the first tune to come out in Adult Swim's annual program of free summer singles.

"I'll Come Back 4 U" has all the hallmarks of that UMO sound, and sounds brilliant the way it quietly arises out of the darkness, fading in with a rattling beat-loop and a groovy bassline, before a glassy guitar-line chimes in. Nielson's vocals are dowsed in enough effects as to turn his singing into something more tonal than textual; but it's hard to dodge the refrain, where the tune's title is sung with astonishing sweetness, over and over.

• Unknown Mortal Orchestra, "I'll Come Back 4 U"

From the Vaults Friday Life Without Buildings Any Other City 2001

The Year: 2001
The Album: Life Without Buildings, Any Other City
Who it Influenced: Thomas Tantrum, Maximo Park, Love Is All, Evans the Death, Los Campesinos!, Sleeping States

Life Without Buildings were a band from Glasgow, Scotland, who lasted all of three years. They released one LP, 2001's Any Other City, three B-sides, and, in 2007, a long-posthumous live album, Live at the Annandale Hotel, recorded in Sydney on an Australian tour in 2001.

That scarcity also extends to things beyond the music: the band were barely photographed, didn't give too many interviews, and only played a certain number of shows. Since they broke up, there's been no inklings of a reformation; no ATP to, as yet, lure them back.

Yet, back in 2001, I interviewed their unique, maddening, magical, manic vocalist Sue Tompkins', whose erratic, tourettic, sputtered and stuttered delivery was and is and always will be Life Without Buildings' defining instrument. Reading it over a decade on, it provides plentiful insight into the working ways behind such a unique artist; someone who, though quietly influential, could never be replicated.

"It begins totally from written stuff; I write constantly, with and without the band," Tompkins said. "When we have rehearsal, I'll take, maybe, 10 sheets of paper, with typewritten stuff on it. It might be just one word on one piece of paper, or the paper might be just full of writing. And, then, they play, and I listen to it, and I just take from what I've written, and try and fit it into what I've done. So, it becomes more freeform --if that's the word for it-- further into rehearsals; and, sometimes, further into gigs. But, then, a lot of the time, what I do might sound really freeform, but it's just the way the words are, and everything's actually really precise."

• Full review: Life Without Buildings, Any Other City

Free Music Monday Young Galaxy Youth Is Wasted On the Young

"I wouldn't mind dying at all," Catherine McCandless sings, "if it weren't for the songs I'd miss." And with that, "Youth Is Wasted On the Young" nails a sentiment transcendent: how the parade of pop-songs that play out through a devotee's life can feel less like the soundtrack to a life, more the life itself.

Young Galaxy's latest single is a pitch-perfect piece of new-wave recreation whose pop-cultural references, rebellious-youth narrative drive, and pop-music-in-place-of-Catholicism sentiments remind me, in a deep way, of My Favorite, a forgotten turn-of-the-'00s band from New York who may, one day, be rediscovered as some cult entity. Referencing a half-forgotten outfit of little acclaim may not seem like much, but it's a huge compliment. Oh, and whilst I'm at it: it reminds me a bunch of The Organ, too.

"Youth Is Wasted On the Young" has that feeling of making pop-music seem as mythical as religion —its own religion— and it does so with wit, verve, insistent bass, and a ear towards the dancefloor. Young Galaxy pirouette through a run of references both lyrical (Skip Spence, the Velvet Underground, Joni Mitchell) and musical (The Smiths, New Order, Psychedelic Furs) in a way that both pays tribute to recorded audio whilst carving out its own niche therein.

Young Galaxy, "Youth Is Wasted On the Young"

Animal Collective Release New Single Unveil Transverse Temporal Gyrus Website

Animal Collective have unveiled two new songs via their website. "Honeycomb" and "Gotham" can be streamed online and bought digitally as of now, and will be pressed up on wax for a June 26, seven-inch release on Domino.

The two new tunes —which may or may not be the first taste of their Much-Anticipated follow-up to Merriweather Post Pavilion— sound plenty like Animal Collective: rippling, watery effects, slow build from noisiness into joyous pop-song, wailing Avey Tare vox. Welcome back, old friends.

The band have also unveiled the Transverse Temporal Gyrus website, an online replication of their so-named installation art-piece. The soundtrack, of course, was released pressed as 12-inch for Record Store Day, but the website gives the full audio-visual effects of the collaboration with longtime video-bro Danny Perez.

John Peels Record Collection to Be Archived Digitized Hosted Online

The John Peel Centre for Creative Arts has announced that plans to digitize and make public the entire record collection the late, great John Peel have come fabulously to fruition.

The John Peel Archive is now online, though what's been uploaded —and is freely accessible by any curious listeners— represents just a tiny fraction of the "26,000 LPs, 40,000 singles and many thousands of CDs" that make up Peel's personal connection.

The archive is being publicly released thusly: on May 1, the first 100 titles under A were made available; after that, May 8 will bring the first 100 Bs, May 15 the first 100 Cs, and so on, hopefully until the entire thing is online as one of the most astonishing cultural resources ever collected.

Here We Go Magic to Release 3rd LP in May

Here We Go Magic have announced the release of their third LP, A Different Ship. Recorded by Radiohead's 'fifth Beatle' Nigel Godrich, the album will be released, on Secretly Canadian, on May 8.

A Different Ship is being preceded by the single "Make Up Your Mind," which you can stream at the Secretly Canadian Soundcloud.

Here We Go Magic just have a couple of festival dates booked in —at Sasquatch! and London's Field Day Festival— but, surely, they'll be hitting the road and bringing their jittery jams with them for much of 2012...

A Different Ship Track List:
1. "Intro"
2. "Hard To Be Close"
3. "Make Up Your Mind"
4. "Alone But Moving"
5. " I Believe In Action"
6. "Over The Ocean"
7. "Made To Be Old"
8. "How Do I Know"
9. "Miracle Of Mary"
10. "A Different Ship"

Bat for Lashes Back with New LP The Haunted Man

Natasha Khan has announced the imminent arrival of her latest Bat for Lashes album. The Haunted Man will be released on October 15, via EMI. It marks Khan's third album, and first since 2009's Two Suns.

Khan has been fairly quiet over the past two years; a recent handful of English shows were her first on home soil since 2010. A full UK tour has been scheduled for after The Haunted Man's release, with assumedly scores more tour dates to come...

Under Wild Blue Skies:
October 18: Inverness, Scotland - Ironworks
October 19: Edinburgh, Scotland - Picture House
October 21: Glasgow, Scotland - O2 ABC
October 22: Manchester, England - Cathedral
October 25: Leeds, England - Metropolitan University
October 26: Norwich, England - University of East Anglia
October 28: Leicester, England - O2 Academy
October 29: London, England - HMV Forum
November 1: Birmingham, England - HMV Institute
November 2: Bristol, England - Anson Rooms
November 3: Portsmouth, England - Pyramids
November 4: Brighton, England - Dome Concert Hall

Italians Do It Better Announces After Dark 2 Comp Details

Italians Do It Better, the moody-disco imprint powered by the peerless productions of Johnny Jewel, have announced the release of After Dark 2, the long-awaited sequel to their landmark 2007 compilation After Dark.

After Dark 2 will be released on October 15. It features new works from the whole family: Chromatics, Glass Candy, Mirage, Desire, Symmetry, and the long-lost Farah.

I recently interviewed Johnny Jewel about the compilation, Chromatics' ascent on the back of Kill for Love, and how the huge success of the movie Drive ushered in a whole new world of listeners.

After Dark 2 Track List:
1. Glass Candy, "Warm in the Winter"
2. Mirage, "Let's Kiss"
3. Desire, "The Nightshift"
4. Appaloosa, "Fill the Blanks"
5. Glass Candy, "Pain Relief Is Fun"
6. Chromatics, "House of Models"
7. Symmetry, "Heart of Darkness"
8. Twisted Wires, "Half Lives"
9. Glass Candy, "The Possessed"
10. Desire, "Tears From Heaven"
11. Chromatics, "Johanna"
12. Farah, "Into Eternity"
13. Mirage, "Lucifer"
14. Glass Candy, "Soft Celebration"
15. Chromatics, "Looking for Love"
16. Glass Candy, "The Price"

Free Music Monday Co La Egyptian Peaches Cold Oranges Mix

Co La caught my ear, late last year —right around CMJ time— with his debut LP, Daydream Repeater, a set of slippery cut-and-paste-pop that found ex-Ecstatic Sunshine bro Matthew Papich trading in his guitar for an overworked sampler.

"Egyptian Peaches" was one of the standouts, and now it's been remixed by Animal Collective wailer Avey Tare. Avey's kinship with the material is obvious; he, too, is fond of squeaky samples and wobbly tape-edits. But, as he tends to when away from the franchise, he plunges deep into the truly strange.

Where the original almost felt dancefloor-friendly in its finely-crafted sound, the "(Cold Oranges Mix)" yanks all the disco and '80s pop overtones and leaves the loose threads hanging. Here, the samples are smashed and warped, and there's a woozy quality to the inconsistent vocal scrawl and the restless contact-mic squelch that gargles away underneath; leaving listeners on unsure footing for six freaky minutes.

Co La, "Egyptian Peaches (Cold Oranges Mix)"

Free Music Monday El Perro del Mar Innocence Is Sense

El Perro del Mar has a new LP< Pale Fire, due out before 2012 is over. If we're to go by the two singles that have preceded it —last year's "What Did You Expect" and, now, "Innocence Is Sense," it's going to be a pretty radical departure.

Where the Gothenburg-based songstress made her name making the most depressed, downcast take on '60s girl-group pop ever heard, pre-Pale Fire jams are now two-for-two for eerie, icy, synthesized soundscapes. Where one song is an anomaly, two is a trend; and "Innocence Is Sense" suggests a radical departure for Sarah Assbring on her fourth EPDM LP.

There's no singing and, in turn, no lyrics to interpret; which makes it a completely different proposition to Assbring's beauteous back-catalog, which is full of lyrics loaded with emotion and meaning. "Innocence Is Sense" feels a lot like an overture, a tone-setting piece with —in spite of its uneasy mood— a big build. It's setting the stage for the LP as a single, but I'm also wondering if it won't be the first song on the album. From there, with the tone set, hopefully the rest of the album finds Assbring getting back down to some singing...

• El Perro del Mar, "Innocence Is Sense"

Dinosaur Jrs New LP I Bet On Sky Out September

Classic Indie-Rock OGs Dinosaur Jr. have announced their new album. I Bet On Sky will be released September 18 on Jagjaguwar. It's the follow-up to 2009's righteous Farm, and the band's third album since reuniting their original line-up in 2005.

The band have a host of tour dates lined up in support of their new LP. And, as you can see from above, it definitely has the requisite stoner artwork of a DJ LP...

I Bet On Sky Track List:
1. "Don't Pretend You Didn't Know"
2. "Watch the Corners"
3. "Almost Fare"
4. "Stick a Toe In"
5. "Rude"
6. "I Know It Oh So Well"
7. "Pierce the Morning Rain"
8. "What Was That"
9. "Recognition"
10. "See It on Your Side"

The Jr. Mint:
June 22: Chicago, IL - Subterranean
June 23: Chicago, IL - Green Music Festival
July 6: Des Moines, IA - 80-35 Music Festival
July 13: Dour, Belgium - Dour Festival
July 14: Herk De Stad, Belgium - Rock Herk Festival
July 18: Giffoni, Italy - Neapolis Festival
August 25: St. Louis, MO - LouFest 2012
September 8: Portland, OR - MusicfestNW
September 16: Italy, Catania - Mercati Generali
September 24-26: Toronto, ON - Lee's Palace
September 27: Detroit, MI - St. Andrew's Hall
September 28: Cincinnati, OH - MidPoint Music Festival
September 29: Champaign, IL - Pygmalion Festival
October 1: Nashville, TN - Mercy Lounge
October 2: Atlanta, GA - Variety Playhouse
October 3: New Orleans, LA - Tipitina's
October 4: Austin, TX - Mohawk
October 5: Houston, TX - Fitzgerald's
October 6: Dallas, TX - The Prophet Bar
October 8: Flagstaff, AZ - Orpheum Theater
October 9: Santa Ana, CA - The Observatory
October 10: San Francisco, CA - The Fillmore
October 11: Eugene, OR - WOW Hall
October 12: Seattle, WA - Neptune Theatre
October 14: Salt Lake City, UT - Urban Lounge
October 15: Denver, CO - Bluebird Theater
October 17: Omaha, NE - The Waiting Room
October 18: Minneapolis, MN - Cabooze
October 19: Madison, WI - Majestic Theatre
October 20: Grand Rapids, MI - The Orbit Room
October 22: Bloomington, IN - The Bluebird
October 23: Cleveland, OH - Beachland Ballroom
October 24: Millvale, PA - Mr. Smalls Theatre
October 25: Washington, DC - Black Cat
October 26: Charlottesville, VA - Jefferson Theater
October 27: Philadelphia, PA - Union Transfer

Top 10 Tuesdays 5 Best Albums of 2012 So Far

In a slight variation on that eternal music nerd's question —"what have you been listening to?"— that proved telling, a compadre recently asked of me "what have you been listening to this year?"

And, sure enough, I rattled off a list of the records that had ruled me 2012 thus far; that had soundtrack these six weeks of the Mayan apocalypse with audio rising head-and-shoulders above the soundfile rank-and-file.

For some, doing a 'best of the year' list after six weeks would seem comically absurd; but in the blogosphere six weeks is an eternity, roughly the length of an entire discovery/hype/backlash cycle.

And so I set about typing up a list. For the world to read. This list will grow and grow, over the next 10+ months, until it swells to something more like 50, but at the moment it's so slight, so specific, and so focused to as seem ascetically pure. Five albums. Just five. But what a five!

With Grimes (pictured!) sitting atop like a queen on her throne, here is the countdown in question. Read them and rejoice, anew, in the brand new: it's the Top 5 Albums of 2012 So Far...

Second Mount Eerie Album for 2012 Ocean Roar Due September

Earlier this year, Mount Eerie mastermind Phil Elverum announced plans to release two new LPs in 2012. And, sure enough, P.W. Elverum is a man of his word. Following the recent release of Clear Moon, its companion album has now been added to the release sheet: Ocean Roar will come out come September 4.

After 2009's Wind's Poem and then Clear Moon, this continues a thematic study of the elements. Ocean Roar is an attempt to be "the audio equivalent of the blanket of thick dark water vapor that covers the Pacific Northwest for most of the year," and was recorded in Elverum's new studio, The Unknown.

You can listen to an excerpt of "Pale Lights," and peer into "a total wall of blue-grey oceanic fog"...

Ocean Roar Track List:
1. "Pale Lights"
2. "Ocean Roar"
3. "Ancient Times"
4. "instrumental"
5. "Waves"
6. "Engel Der Luft (Popol Vuh)"
7. "I Walked Home Beholding"
8. "instrumental"

Toro y Moi to Issue HomeRecordings from June 2009

The ever-busy Toro y Moi believes firmly in keeping the releases coming. "The music industry is moving so fast, it's a business move to keep putting things things out, to keep your name out there," ol' Chazwick Bundick told me in an interview last year.

True to such spirit, Bundick has a new release on the cards, in follow up to a 2011 that gave the world Underneath the Pine and the Freaking Out EP.

It's called June 2009, and, as its title suggests, it's a collection of home-recordings from June of 2009, catching Bundick working at his still-fledgling project. The set will be released by Carpark on April 24, both as single CD and as 5x7" box-set.

You can source a new/old track, "Pontoon," from the Toro y Moi blog, which shows the more muggy, folkie sound Bundick was working through long before he went disco.

Toro y Moi is also currently on tour through Asia through February, P.S....

Everyone's Here:
February 4: Melbourne, Australia - Laneway Festival
February 5: Sydney, Australia - Laneway Festival
February 8: Sydney, Australia - Manning Bar
February 9: Melbourne, Australia - Hi Fi Bar & Ballroom
February 10: Adelaide, Australia - Laneway Festival
February 11: Perth, Australia - Laneway Festival
February 12: Singapore, Singapore - Laneway Festival
February 14: Taipei, Taiwan - The Wall Livehouse
February 15: Manila, Philippines - Hard Rock Cafe
February 16: Busan, South Korea - Interplay
February 17: Seoul, South Korea - V Hall
February 19: Tokyo, Japan - Yebisu Garden Hall

Free Music Monday Silver Jews Secret Knowledge of Back Roads

It took a long time for the world to twig that the Silver Jews weren't some Pavement side-project, but the vision of poet/mystic/philosopher David Berman. Early Times heads back to the source of that initial confusion; the newly-assembled compilation (due for imminent dispatch via the Drag City Empire) gathering the tracks from the 1990 seven-inch "Dime Map of the Reef," and the 1993 12-inch EP, The Arizona Record.

The elegant storytelling and country licks that'd come to define latter-day Joos —from roughly American Water on— are absent in "Secret Knowledge of Back Roads," which finds Berman and Stephen Malkmus riffing together on a primitive song recorded in ultra-primitive technology.

The sizzle of tape-hiss, clatter of percussion, and scratchy electrics guitars are reminiscent of Pavement's own pre-LP efforts; and Malkmus' voice pushes past Berman's. The lyrics are sing-song-ish —"kick the can/then you kicked the sand/kicked it in the face of another man"— and certainly won't be mistaken for "Smith and Jones Forever" anytime soon.

But Early Times is hardly supposed to be about polish; about the finished product. It's the earliest of tentative sketches that barely even suggest all that came thereafter, and listening to them knowing all that would is like some oddball form of time-travel eavesdropping.

Silver Jews, "Secret Knowledge of Back Roads"

Jim ORourke to Curate Tokyo ATP Recreate Eureka Live

All Tomorrow's Parties is staging a two-day I'll Be Your Mirror festival in Tokyo on April 14 and 15. Day one will be curated by ATP themselves, and day two's line-up will be assembled by Jim O'Rourke.

As part of O'Rourke's contributions, he'll recreate his classic 1999 LP, Eureka, in its entirety. With a twelve-piece band. Shinji Aoyama undoubtedly approves.

The rest of the festivities, thus far announced, include O'Rourke's picks of Michel Rother performing music by Neu! and Harmonia, plus Australian improv minimalists The Necks and eternal provocateurs Borbetomagus, who'll play on the Sunday.

On Saturday April 14, ATP's assembled the the recently reunited Codeine, the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, the Magic Band, the Drones, Factory Floor, and Nisennenmondai.

More details at the ATP website.

Free Music Monday Princeton Remembrance of Things to Come

Princeton didn't want their second album to be as "twee-sounding" as 2009's Cocoon of Love, and so Remembrance of Things To Come dodges the jangly, indie, polo-shirt clad sensibility of the Californian crew's sunny debut disc.

Instead, there's the disco influence of Jesse Kivel's Kisses side-project, and glorious orchestral arrangements. The lead single, and title-track, shows this smooth sonic development; guitars entirely swapped out for mallet percussion, multi-layered string parts, polyrhythms, and pianos.

"I'll be waiting," a Kivel twin (Matt?) carols in sweet falsetto, "she won't be waiting so long, I know." Here, too, lyrics are sanded away from indie wordiness into simple refrain; voice just another instrument in a heady, complex mix. The title of this title track is plenty evocative, but at most the jam itself gently flirts with that feeling where anticipation takes on a life of its own.

Princeton, "Remembrance of Things to Come"

The Shins Announce Tour Dates for Port of Morrow

The Shins' Port of Morrow, their first album in five years, is one of the most awaited albums of the year. With its March 20 release date looming ever closer, James Mercer and co have announced a fresh slate of tour dates.

The band, these days, includes Richard Swift on keys, Jessica Dobson of Deep Sea Diver on guitar, Yuuki Matthews ex-Crystal Skulls on bass, and Modest Mouse/Mister Heavenly drummer Joe Plummer behind the kit. They'll be playing through the US, with stops at Coachella and Sasquatch! on the slate.

Away They Did Run:
March 22-23: London, England - HMV Forum
March 25: Amsterdam, Holland - Melkweg
March 26: Paris, France - Bataclan
March 28: Berlin, Germany - Kesselhaus
March 30: Stockholm, Sweden - Berns Salonger
April 13: Las Vegas, NV - Cosmopolitan
April 14: Indio, CA - Coachella
April 17: Honolulu, HI - Neil S. Blaisdell Center
April 18: Maui, HI - Castle Theatre
April 21: Indio, CA - Coachella
April 22: Santa Cruz, CA - Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium
April 23: Davis, CA - Robert Mondavi Center
April 25: Reno, NV - Grand Sierra Resort & Casino
May 25: Bend, OR - Les Schwab Amphitheatre
May 26: George, WA - Sasquatch!
May 28: Salt Lake City, UT - Red Butte Garden Ampitheatre
May 29: Morrison, CO - Red Rocks Ampitheatre
May 31: Council Bluffs, IA - Harrah's Council Bluffs
June 4: St. Louis, MO - The Pageant
June 5: Columbus, OH - LC Pavilion
June 6: Detroit, MI - Fillmore Detroit
June 8: Cleveland, OH - Masonic Auditorium
June 9: Louisville, KY - Iroquois Ampitheatre

Top 10 Tuesdays Albums of the Year So Far

With the indie super bowl in the rear-vision mirror and March almost over, the year in indie music is starting to take shape. Or, if not, at least we can start to shape it. And by 'we' I mean 'I'. And by 'shape' I mean 'make into a list'.

And what better list than an Albums of the Year one? For anyone snoozing through 2012 thus far, there's been piles of killer LPs issued thus far, from Grimes to Julia Holter (pictured!). There's also new LPs for AU and Beach House that, whilst not actually out, have graced my ears with their greatness.

So, let me pre-amble no more. You know this drill: the Top 10 Albums of 2012 So Far...

The Shins Announce Tour Dates for Port of Morrow

The Shins' Port of Morrow, their first album in five years, is one of the most awaited albums of the year. With its March 20 release date looming ever closer, James Mercer and co have announced a fresh slate of tour dates.

The band, these days, includes Richard Swift on keys, Jessica Dobson of Deep Sea Diver on guitar, Yuuki Matthews ex-Crystal Skulls on bass, and Modest Mouse/Mister Heavenly drummer Joe Plummer behind the kit. They'll be playing through the US, with stops at Coachella and Sasquatch! on the slate.

Away They Did Run:
March 22-23: London, England - HMV Forum
March 25: Amsterdam, Holland - Melkweg
March 26: Paris, France - Bataclan
March 28: Berlin, Germany - Kesselhaus
March 30: Stockholm, Sweden - Berns Salonger
April 13: Las Vegas, NV - Cosmopolitan
April 14: Indio, CA - Coachella
April 17: Honolulu, HI - Neil S. Blaisdell Center
April 18: Maui, HI - Castle Theatre
April 21: Indio, CA - Coachella
April 22: Santa Cruz, CA - Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium
April 23: Davis, CA - Robert Mondavi Center
April 25: Reno, NV - Grand Sierra Resort & Casino
May 25: Bend, OR - Les Schwab Amphitheatre
May 26: George, WA - Sasquatch!
May 28: Salt Lake City, UT - Red Butte Garden Ampitheatre
May 29: Morrison, CO - Red Rocks Ampitheatre
May 31: Council Bluffs, IA - Harrah's Council Bluffs
June 4: St. Louis, MO - The Pageant
June 5: Columbus, OH - LC Pavilion
June 6: Detroit, MI - Fillmore Detroit
June 8: Cleveland, OH - Masonic Auditorium
June 9: Louisville, KY - Iroquois Ampitheatre

Top 10 Tuesdays Albums of the Year So Far

With the indie super bowl in the rear-vision mirror and March almost over, the year in indie music is starting to take shape. Or, if not, at least we can start to shape it. And by 'we' I mean 'I'. And by 'shape' I mean 'make into a list'.

And what better list than an Albums of the Year one? For anyone snoozing through 2012 thus far, there's been piles of killer LPs issued thus far, from Grimes to Julia Holter (pictured!). There's also new LPs for AU and Beach House that, whilst not actually out, have graced my ears with their greatness.

So, let me pre-amble no more. You know this drill: the Top 10 Albums of 2012 So Far...

The Velvet Underground and Nico Turned into a 6CD Boxset

"This is the way that pop ends," Simon Reynolds wrote, in his incisive cultural survey Retromania. "Not with a bang, but with a box set whose fourth disc you never get around to playing." These wise words seem plenty pertinent when surveying the latest reissue of the Velvet Underground's immortal 1967 debut The Velvet Underground and Nico.

On October 1, Universal will issue the album in its latest incarnation: a 6CD(!) boxset filled with all kinds of alternate takes, rarities, and minutia to solicit the obsessive fan. No word on its RRP, but this thing will surely cost the serious fan some serious coin.

As well as stereo and mono versions of the album itself, there's its 'sister' album, Nico's Chelsea Girls, and a host of live recordings on stage, in studio, and at Andy Warhol's factory. Let's see if you make it through to disc four...

The Velvet Underground and Nico Box Set Track List:
Disc One:
The Velvet Underground & Nico [Stereo Version]:
1. "Sunday Morning"
2. "I'm Waiting for the Man"
3. "Femme Fatale"
4. "Venus in Furs"
5. "Run Run Run"
6. "All Tomorrow's Parties"
7. "Heroin"
8. "There She Goes Again"
9. "I'll Be Your Mirror"
10. "The Black Angel's Death Song"
11. "European Son"
12. "All Tomorrow's Parties [Alternate Single Voice Version]"
13. "European Son [Alternate Version]"
14. "Heroin [Alternate Version]"
15. "All Tomorrow's Parties [Alternate Instrumental Mix]"
16. "I'll Be Your Mirror [Alternate Mix]"

Disc Two:
The Velvet Underground & Nico [Mono Version]:
1. "Sunday Morning"
2. "I'm Waiting for the Man"
3. "Femme Fatale"
4. "Venus in Furs"
5. "Run Run Run"
6. "All Tomorrow's Parties"
7. "Heroin"
8. "There She Goes Again"
9. "I'll Be Your Mirror"
10. "The Black Angel's Death Song"
11. "European Son"
12. "All Tomorrow's Parties [July 1966]"
13. "I'll Be Your Mirror [Alternate Ending, July 1966]"
14. "Sunday Morning [Alternate Mix, December 1966]"
15. "Femme Fatale [December 1966]"

Disc Three:
Nico, Chelsea Girl:
1. "The Fairest of the Seasons"
2. "These Days"
3. "Little Sister"
4. "Winter Song"
5. "It Was a Pleasure Then"
6. "Chelsea Girls"
7. "I'll Keep It With Mine"
8. "Somewhere There's a Feather"
9. "Wrap Your Troubles in Dreams"
10. "Eulogy to Lenny Bruce"

Disc Four:
Scepter Studios Sessions:1. "European Son [Alternate Version]"
2. "The Black Angel's Death Song [Alternate Mix]"
3. "All Tomorrow's Parties [Alternate Version]"
4. "I'll Be Your Mirror [Alternate Version]"
5. "Heroin [Alternate Version]"
6. "Femme Fatale [Alternate mix]"
7. "Venus in Furs [Alternate Version]"
8. "Waiting for the Man [Alternate Version]"
9. "Run Run Run [Alternate Mix]"
The Factory Rehearsals [January 1966]:
10. "Walk Alone"
11. "Cracking Up/Venus in Furs"
12. "Miss Joanie Lee"
13. "Heroin"
14. "There She Goes Again [with Nico]"
15. "There She Goes Again"

Disc Five:
Live at Valleydale Ballroom, Columbus, Ohio:
1. "Melody Laughter"
2. "Femme Fatale"
3. "Venus in Furs"
4. "The Black Angel's Death Song"
5. "All Tomorrow's Parties [Lou Reed]"

Disc Six:
Live at Valleydale Ballroom, Columbus, Ohio:
1. "Waiting for the Man"
2. "Heroin"
3. "Run Run Run"
4. "The Nothing Song"

From the Vaults Friday The Smiths The Smiths 1984

The Year: 1984
The Album: The Smiths, The Smiths
Who it Influenced: Anyone whose guitar ever jangled

Despite what all those five-star, greatest-English-albums-ever type plaudits for The Queen Is Dead are telling you, The Smiths never really released a definitive album; being a band who did their best work on singles. In fact, their singles compiles —1984's Hatful of Hollow and 1987's The World Won't Listen— do a far-better job of capturing the band at their best, capturing why The Smiths were so meaningful to so many.

But their self-titled 1984 debut captures a band at their brilliant beginnings; bursting with energy, vitality, anger, anxieties; barreling along through a host of killer tunes penned by the incomparable Morrissey/Marr songwriting partnership.

Whilst its Morrissey —his tortured croon, his elusive sexuality, his fervent politics— that defines The Smiths, their legacy lays with Johnny Marr. The man with the golden jangle is the godfather of the classic indie-pop guitar sound; and, amidst the simple, stripped-down, otherwise-stark-sounding The Smiths, it rings out brilliant, a sublime marriage of melody and tone that continues to influence countless bands with each passing year...

• Full review: The Smiths, The Smiths

Free Music Monday MV EE Too Far to See

MV & EE's latest LP —due out May 15 on Woodsist— is named Space Homestead. It's, likely, a tongue-in-cheek name for the sound the Vermont duo turns out. The veteran acid-folkies —whose infamous '90s band, the Tower Recordings, basically forged the freak-folk blueprint— make rustic, down-home Americana laced with interstellar psychedelia; sounding at once rural and cosmic.

"To Far to See," an in-advance taste of Space Homestead, is a curious 'single' choice for the prolific pair. After early Erika Elder murmurings about "special flowers" and "circular shapes" amidst milling noise, the jam settles into a lazy groove and Matt Valentine gets to wigging out. There's bascially two solid minutes of exploratory soloin', with effects-draped lead licks left lingering, trailing out bright then fading into space.

MV & EE, "Too Far to See"

Gossips New Album A Joyful Noise Out in May

Gossip have announced the imminent release of a new album. A Joyful Noise, the fifth full-length for the queer-friendly crew, will be released on May 22 via Sony worldwide. It marks the band's first LP since 2009's Music for Men.

"Perfect World," the first single from the record, is now available for online listening. It —and the album that follows it— finds the one-time blues-punks moving further towards glittering disco-pop. To wit: the set was produced by Brian Higgins, best known for his work with Kylie Minogue and Pet Shop Boys.

A Joyful Noise Track List:
1. "Melody Emergency"
2. "Perfect World"
3. "Get a Job"
4. "Move in the Right Direction"
5. "Casualties of War"
6. "Into the Wild"
7. "Get Lost"
8. "Involved"
9. "Horns"
10. "I Won't Play"
11. "Love in a Foreign Place"

Top 10 Tuesdays Bands to Watch at Coachella 2012

The rise of the outdoor rock festival into the indie equivalent of the Hollywood blockbuster —the tentpole event around which the rest of the release schedule revolves— has been surely, eternally symbolized by Coachella, 2012. After all, Hollywood loves nothing more than a sequel, and this year Coachella will run from April 13-15, then return to the Empire Polo Club a week later to do it all again. Same festival, same times, same bands.

Oh, and, the bands. The many, many bands. They'll be performing in their dozens upon dozens, for the sunburnt thousands. There'll be '90s revivalists (Pulp, Mazzy Star, At the Drive-in, Godspeed You! Black Emperor), alt-rock heavy-hitters (The Shins, Bon Iver, Radiohead), and even a handful of charmed unknowns (like Keep Shelly in Athens (pictured!)).

But there's only ten bands who've been enshrined, for all eternity, on my 10 Acts to Catch at Coachella 2012 list...

Free Music Monday Sun Kil Moon Sunshine in Chicago

"My back it fucking hurts, but otherwise I'm fine," sings Mark Kozelek, in that inimitable drawl, over that fingerpicked guitar that can still cut through the noise, and slice straight to the bone. It's a big-picture status update for a man who's hit 45, and "Sunshine in Chicago" (from the sprawling new Sun Kil Moon LP Among the Leaves) surveys the songwriter's middle-aged life.

Early Red House Painters records — like the aching Down Colorful Hill, now 20 years old— were steeped in the trauma of one's early 20s; in the existential doubts about growing up, the painful on-again/off-again relationships, the lost childhood friends. It makes sense, then, that Kozelek is writing, now, as elegantly about being in your 40s, in the sad resignations, quiet humiliations, and decades of memories.

The song is steeped in the banality of life-on-the-road, being a touring musician at an age long past the rock'n'roll pale. The words reflect that banality with their factual note-taking —"sitting in the Days Inn Hotel in Chicago/Room 222, with the ceiling fan low"; "I took a walk down Lincoln Avenue/got myself a full massage and a manicure, too"— but, when sung by Kozelek, every utterance seems epic. "Sunshine in Chicago," he drawls, in the song's best verse, "makes me feel pretty sad/my band played here a lot in the '90s when we had/lots of female fans, and, fuck, they all were cute/now I just sign posters for guys in tennis shoes."

It's straight-up funny, of course, but in this context it sounds loaded with sadness, with regret. Much of that's due to the tone of the song, which reminds me of the nostalgic melancholia of Kozelek's greatest-ever song: Red House Painters' "Have You Forgotten," even rhyming "name" with "name" as he once, then, rhymed "nice" with "nice." But maybe that's because "Sunshine in Chicago" can only put you in a reflective mood, and, then, the past is sure to fold back on you.

Sun Kil Moon, "Sunshine in Chicago"

Jack White to Release Debut Solo LP in April

Jack White has been involved in a lot of records over the years, but he's never made a solo LP. Now, with the demise of his popular rock'n'roll duo The White Stripes, White —Third Man czar, Raconteur, Dead Weatherman, Black Belles svengali, etc— has gone out on his lonesome.

"I've put off making records under my own name for a long time but these songs feel like they could only be presented under my name," White offers, in a press-release heralding the arrival of Blunderbuss. White's wackily-titled solo debut is out April 24 via Third Man/Columbia.

At the Jack White website, you can listen to the lead single "Love Interruption" for free, order its imminent seven-inch version, and grow used to the idea of John Anthony Gillis standing at the front of a stage minus a Meg at the back.

From the Vaults Friday Dolly Mixture Demonstration Tapes 1983

The Year: 1983
The Album: Dolly Mixture, Demonstration Tapes
Who it Influenced: Talulah Gosh, Tiger Trap, Brilliant Colors, Saint Etienne, The Pains of Being Pure at Heart

Even in indie music circles, Dolly Mixture remain an obscure proposition; a 'lost' early-'80s act that play only to a small audience of true believers. But in the history of twee, there's something near-canonical about the trio; their jangly, scraggly, shambling indie-pop presaging the developments of the genre —Talulah Gosh, the Shop Assistants, The Pastels and the rest of the C86 crew— that would arrive soon after.

Their only album was, in fact, a double album: the band pressing up their entire collection of 'non-professional recordings' on double wax, putting it in blank white-label artwork, and releasing it themselves. In 1983, that was a recipe for obscurity; calling your LP Demonstration Tapes a proud embrace of amateurism that consigned the record to a staunchly-underground crowd.

But listening to the 27 pop gems herein, contemporary fans of feather-light indie-pop —and of the provocative, anti-rock spirit at the birth of jangle— will hear Dolly Mixture's effective career-retrospective as a treasure trove of glorious, glorious twee-pop.

• Full review: Dolly Mixture, Demonstration Tapes

The MakeUp Reform to Play MowgaiCurated ATP

Last year, it was announced that Mogwai would curate an ATP festival in May. With May suddenly looming soon, ATP has just announced a new host of bands to perform at their I'll Be Your Mirror shindig in London.

And amongst those names is an exciting announcement: garage-soul outfit The Make-Up will be reforming to play at the festival. Formed out of the ashes of conceptual punks The Nation of Ulysses —and lead by the same firebrand singer (and Psychic Soviet author!), Ian Svenonius— the Make-Up made a string of classic records for Dischord and K in the late-'90s, from the furious Destination: Love - Live! At Cold Rice to the psychedelic Save Yourself. Since their demise, many of the band went on to Weird War, and, from there, Svenonius began recording as Chain and the Gang.

The Make-Up joins a string of new additions including other '90s comebacks Chavez and Archers of Loaf, plus Dirty Three, Death Grips, the Soft Moon, Sleepy Sun, Tennis, Thee Oh Sees, Death Grips, Demdike Stare, Balam Acab, Forest Swords, Siskiyou and more.

The ATP I'll Be Your Mirror jamboree takes place at the Alexandra Palace (Ally Pally, yes) from May 25-27. All the details you could ever want at the ATP website.

Free Music Monday Moonface Teary Eyes and Bloody Lips

Spencer Krug knows opening lines. "Teary eyes and bloody lips/make you look like Stevie Nicks," he sings at the beginning of his latest Moonface single; introducing a refrain whose initial comedy doesn't disguise the fact that it's a piece of evocative imagery.

The minimalist plod of Krug's captivating Moonface debut —Organ Music Not Vibraphone Like I'd Hoped, one of last year's best LPs— is gone; "Teary Eyes and Bloody Lips" clocking in at under three minutes, and featuring more than one instrument.

This is the first taste of the second Moonface album, With Siinai: Heartbreaking Bravery, due out April 17 on Jagjaguwar. As its title suggests, it finds Krug collaborating with Finnish outfit Siinai, an outfit steeped in krautrock and cosmic synth music.

But, no matter the musical backing —be it the boysy chug of Wolf Parade, the mad chaos of Sunset Rubdown, or the repetitious minimalism of Moonface— the highlight, as always, is Krug's lyricism. Beyond the killer opening couplet, there's nostalgia ("we used to laugh until we crashed our bikes/the moon was nothing but a rock in the sky"), zen philosophisin' ("we can embrace the blindness that comes with embracing the night"), and straight-up romance ("you looked so beautiful then/you look so beautiful now").

Moonface "Teary Eyes and Bloody Lips"

Top 10 Tuesdays Bands to Watch at SXSW 2012

Ahhhhh, SXSW. With your bounty of bands, your bevy of beverage companies, your culture of ad creep. Your unending revelry, your nascent springtime, your people endlessly texting on their telephones. Your shows upon shows, your proper showcases, your free day parties. Your people, spilling outwards like an unending see, in pursuit of buzz bands from hither to yon.

2012 may've only just begun, but already mid-March feels like five minutes away. And, when the SXSW Music Jamboree takes over Austin from March 13-18 this year, hype will be in the air, whilst thousands of bloggers, bands, and music-biz stooges are on the ground.

As always, attempting to cull together a list of recommendations from the unending list of Performing Artists — which I think is about 1400, officially— seems like an insurmountable task. But, that's what any festival attendee is forced to do, anyway: their only so many hours in a day, so many day parties to raid.

Going through the ranks with a highlighter, I avoided (well, mostly) doubling up on people from my award-winning Acts to Look Out for in 2012 list. And settled upon old loves (Beach Fossils), ferocious live acts (Tearist) mysterious Bandcamp entities (Tashaki Miyaki), impressive '11 debutantes (Blouse (pictured!)), and, of course, Grimes.

So, for those throwing themselves into the South-by fray, or those merely following from home, read these and rejoice: 10 Bands to Watch at SXSW 2012...

From the Vaults Friday Mercury Rev Deserters Songs 1998

The Year: 1998
The Album: Mercury Rev, Deserter's Songs
Who it Influenced: Grandaddy, My Morning Jacket, Andrew Bird, Arcade Fire, The Shins, Youth Lagoon

"I remember the first mix-CD I ever got, from a friend when I used to work in this movie theatre, the first song on it was the opening track from Deserter's Songs," Alan Palomo recalled to me, last year, in speaking of the dreams-come-true nature of working with producer (and the Flaming Lips' 'fifth Beatle') Dave Fridmann. It made clear a sentiment that the release of Youth Lagoon's The Year of Hibernation had me already thinking about: Mercury Rev's fourth album as a from-a-past-generation touchstone for a new crop of early-20s indie acts.

Deserter's Songs had already been hugely influential on its release; bands like My Morning Jacket, The Shins, and Arcade Fire were among those who were taken by its grandeur, its sincerity, its devotion to chasing dreams both musical and otherwise; the way it peeled out like a wide-screen vision. But where albums that once would've seemed like of-the-era peers —Neutral Milk Hotel's In the Aeroplane Over the Sea and the Flaming Lips' The Soft Bulletin— have grown only increasingly revered over the years, the mythology of Mercury Rev had faded.

In such, it seemed surprising to stumble upon Youth Lagoon, and find someone so utterly devoted to the sound of Deserter's Songs, to its mix of painful, intimate confession and sweeping, giddy grandeur. Yet, one listen to the LP's evergreen opener "Holes" is enough of a reminder of why Deserter's Songs so struck listeners in its day; and why the album will never really fade away.

• Full review: Mercury Rev, Deserter's Songs

RIP Jason Noble of Rodan Rachels Shipping News

Jason Noble died on Saturday. The native son of Louisville was the founder of no less than three significant indie bands in the '90s, all of whom played a huge part in the development of post-rock.

First came the ferocious post-hardcore outfit Rodan, who picked up the mantle laid down by Slint; then Rachel's, who took influence from chamber music and modern composition to create gloriously beautiful soundscapes; and, finally, the Shipping News, who explored the more rock side of post-rock's exploratory aims.

Noble had been battling cancer since 2009, but his condition took a turn for the worse last week. He was 40 years old, and is survived by his wife, Kristin Furnish-Noble.

A recent benefit cassette was released to help Noble pay for his medical bills, and all future proceeds from sales of the digital version will go directly to his family.

Flaming Lips Unveil Crazy Collaborations for Record Store Day

Record Store Day —that grand day in which nostalgia, guilt, commerce, and collectorism come together in a glorious celebration of physical product (and also music)— is looming soon. On April 21. But we can, a month in advance, go ahead and crown the kings of RSD 2012: the Flaming frickin' Lips.

The Oklahoman oddballs have been undertaking a string of adventurous collaborations over the past year, and the fruits of all their cross-pollination and improvisation will come to bear with The Flaming Lips and Heady Fwends, an awesomely-titled double-LP platter being released for Record Store Day.

On it, Wayne Coyne and crew collaborate with Chris Martin of Coldplay(!), Nick Cave, Bon Iver, Erykah Badu, My Morning Jacket's Jim James, Tame Impala, Neon Indian, Prefuse 73, Lightning Bolt, Yoko Ono, and other figures strange, unexpected, and —fingers crossed— perhaps inspired.

For collector scum of the world: the 2LP package is pressed on multi-colored wax, comes individually numbered, uniquely presented, and is never-to-be-repressed. Flippers, start your engines. Its tracklist is below. Merry Christmas. Or, um, Record Store Day.

The Flaming Lips and Heady Fwends
1. "2012 (featuring Ke$ha and Biz Markie)"
2. "Ashes in the Air (featuring Bon Iver)"
3. "Helping the Retarded to Know God (featuring Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros)"
4. "Supermoon Made Me Want To Pee (featuring Prefuse 73)"
5. "Children of the Moon (featuring Tame Impala)"
6. "That Ain't My Trip (featuring Jim James of My Morning Jacket)"
7. "You, Man? Human? (featuring Nick Cave)"
8. "I'm Working at NASA On Acid (featuring Lightning Bolt)"
9. "Do It! (featuring Yoko Ono)"
10. "Is David Bowie Dying? (featuring Neon Indian)"
11. "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face (featuring Erykah Badu)"
12. "Thunder Drops (featuring New Fumes)"
13. "I Don't Want You to Die (featuring Chris Martin of Coldplay)"

M Ward Talks New Album Adds More Tour Dates

I'm a bit more unsure of it, but M. Ward is a big fan of his new album, A Wasteland Companion. "I think it has the best balance of anything I've ever made," Ward dared to offer mid-interview, in a conversation with me last week. "Records need to have a good balance between shadow and light... and I feel like, honestly, this new one has the best balance that I've ever struck."

The seventh album for the mumblin' bluesman comes out April 10 on Merge. To go with, Ward's playing countless upcoming shows, with dates at Coachella and Sasquatch amongst them.

Pure Joy:
March 21: Paris, France - Le Zenith
March 22: Lyon, France - Transbordeur
March 23: Lille, France - Theatre Sebastopol
March 25: London, England - Royal Albert Hall
March 26: Manchester, England - O2 Apollo
March 27: Glasgow, Scotland - Royal Concert Hall
April 11: San Francisco, CA - The Fillmore
April 12: Santa Cruz, CA - The Coconut Grove Ballroom
April 13: Indio, CA - Coachella
April 17: Phoenix, AZ - Crescent Ballroom
April 18: Flagstaff, AZ - The Orpheum
April 20: Indio, CA - Coachella
May 5: Portland, ME - State Theatre
May 6: Burlington, VT - Higher Ground
May 7: New Haven, CT - Toad's Place
May 8: Boston, MA - House of Blues
May 11: New York, NY - Webster Hall
May 12: Philadelphia, PA - Union Transfer
May 13: Washington, D.C. - 9:30 Club
May 15: Durham, NC - Page Auditorium
May 16: Athens, GA - Georgia Theatre
May 17: Atlanta, GA - Buckhead Theatre
May 18-20: Gulf Shores, AL - Hangout Music Festival
May 20: Nelsonville, OH - Nelsonville Music Festival
May 22: Chicago, IL - Vic Theatre
May 23: Madison, WI - Barrymore Theatre
May 24: Minneapolis, MN - First Avenue
May 26: Missoula, MT - Wilma Theatre
May 27: George, WA - Sasquatch!