Scripted Failures

If you head on over to Kori’s blog on Babble, you can hear about a minute or so worth of one of the new Mates of State songs, albeit while Mags (that’s Magnolia their daughter) sings over it.  The song sounds beautiful, and the video is just too cute!

So today, Joy Electric posted the title track of their new album, “My Grandfather, the Cubist”, which comes out May 27th, on their myspace.  It’s sweet.  Here’s my review of the song:

Opening up with the atmospherics and percussive elements that have become a Joy Electric trademark, the song then blooms into a sweet chord progression with a beautiful, and instantly catchy lead line.  The minimalism promised on this record is instantly noticeable and it works incredibly well.  It’s like the elements that need to be there to have a full fufilling song are there, but any extraneous elements that might detract from the song aren’t.  Ronnie’s non-effected upfront vocals are also noticeable right off the bat.  I was very interested to see what these would sound like and they sound absolutely wonderful.  They sound very emotional and very fragile.  As a comparison point, think of the vocals on the verse of “Write Your Last Paragraph”, and you’ve got your sound.

Basically, this song sounds like a more minimalistic version of the Joy Electric I fell in love with way back in 1997.  Based on this song, it seems like this album may be the a return to the “Melody” era of songwriting in terms of chord progressions and lead lines which isn’t a bad thing at all.  I enjoy every Joy Electric record, but “Melody” and “We are the Music Makers” are the two records that have had the most emotional impact on me.  That said, this song has me more excited for this new Joy Electric record than I have been for any of the recent ones, besides maybe “The Otherly Opus”, and it should be noted I get very excited for the release of every new Joy Electric record.  All that said, this maybe their “Talking Voice vs. Singing Voice”, which, like that Starflyer 59 record, fully renews my love of the band and makes me remember all the things that made me fall in love with them all those years ago.

I really don’t know what else to say.  It’s a wonderful song and everyone definitely needs to check it out.  If you didn’t notice, check out that bitchin’ cover art.  Best Joy Electric cover ever? Possibly!  May 27th is going to be a good day.

So as you can see, the new Bon Voyage record has moved from being tentatively called “Lies”, to being definitely called “Lies”.  As you can also see, the album has a stellar seductive cover.  This is the most seductive sensual cover I’ve ever seen Tooth and Nail put out.  If you’re wondering where I found the cover someone on the Velvet Blue Music Message Board was checking out the Invisible Creature Blog, and found it.

Speaking of which, that message board is quite the interesting place to hang around.  Check it out!  Jim and I are on there as happinessiseasy and lfh respectively.  Send us private messages and say hi!

Semi back on topic, Invisible Creature is the studio that is also doing artwork for the new Joy Electric album,  “My Grandfather, the Cubist”.  It’s run by brothers Ryan and Don Clark who were in the Tooth and Nail hardcore band Focused, then the Solid State (Tooth and Nail’s hardcore label) band Training for Utopia, if I’m remembering my history correctly.  The Clark Brothers used to run Asterik Studios who did tons of album sleeves for Tooth and Nail, including Starflyer 59’s “Talking Voice vs. Singing Voice” and Joy Electric’s “The Tick Tock Treasury”, as well as the album sleeve for Funeral for a Friend’s “Hours”.  Asterik Studios has now split into two different studios: Wonderful Union and the aforementioned Invisible Creatures.

Random asides aside, there’s more yummy Bon Voyage info to feast upon.  Here it is, straight from Bon Voyage’s Myspace Blog:

“The new album “LIES” is completed and scheduled for a release date this
June on Tooth and Nail Records. New photos have been completed, and the
artwork for the record is currently underway. The myspace page will be
going thru an overhaul with new photos, new music, and release
information…please check back periodically as we are hoping to have
the new page up here in the next month or so.”

June can’t come soon enough, not to mention a tracklist, and some new tracks to listen to!

So this is sort of week old news, but we’ll pretend like we’re on the cutting edge and this news just surfaced today.  Everyone play along okay?  So here it goes!  Mates of States new record, “Re-Arrange Us” is due out May 20th on Barsuk Records. (You realize this means that May is going to have three straight weeks of killer releases with Death Cab’s “Narrow Stairs” out on the 13th, the aforementioned Mates of State out on the 20th, and then Joy Electric’s “My Grandfather, the Cubist” out on the 27th.  All we need now is something rad to come out on May 6th to have a whole month of badass music!)  Things in parentheses aside here’s the scoop straight from the album page on the Barsuk website:

“Though conceived as a duo, Mates of State have never failed to generate a trademark wall of sound built on dozens of varied voicings of keys, drums, and alternately lushly-layered and playfully-dueling vocals. On re-arrange us they move beyond these boundaries (their traditional organ sound is a distant memory, replaced with organic piano and synth sounds) with additional instrumentation — not to mention a quantum leap in songcraft apparent on instantly indelible gems like now, jigsaw and get better. Throughout re-arrange us, Kori’s piano and the emergence of both Mates’ lead vocals from their trademark harmonizing signal the next stage of Mates of State’s evolution.”

Sounds like this is going to be another curve ball in a month of curve balls, considering the new Death Cab is supposed to be quite the “divisive” record, and the new Joy Electric is supposed to be their most minimalistic ever featuring the truest recordings of Ronnie’s voice ever.  It’s gonna be a good curve ball though, since Mates of State have yet to disappoint me.  Here’s the tracklist for all you crazy Mates kids, like me:

01. Get Better
02. Now
03. My Only Offer
04. The Re-Arranger
05. Jigsaw
06. Blue and Gold Print
07. Help Help
08. You are Free
09. Great Dane
10. Lullaby Haze

The Barsuk website promises mp3s up soon.  Sounds good to me!  And, if you didn’t know Kori has an awesome blog called “Band on the Diaper Run” on Babble.  It’s hilarious and heartwarming.  You should all read it.  As a last odd aside,”Help Help” was also the title of a killer song, written by bassist Jeff Ament, on the Pearl Jam album “Riot Act”.

The Weakerthans put on a hell of a show last night in Birmingham, AL.  My wife and I arrived a few minutes late, but caught most of Christine Fellows‘ set.  I need to listen to some of her albums now.  Afterwards, The Bottletree pulled down the famous “screen” and we waited.  Next up was local singer/songwriter AA Bondy, who sang mostly acoustic love songs with strong Christian overtones.  Then came the screen again

Finally, the main act arrived.  John Samson looked so much different than I remember from pictures.  I thought I remembered him with facial hair and glasses, and a bit older.  I realize he must be going on 30 at this point, as he started The Weakerthans in 1997, but he looked really young for some reason.

They started off with “Bigfoot!”, a slow, almost lullabye-like number from the new album.  After that, they broke into “Our Retired Explorer (Dines with Michel Foucault in Paris, 1961)” from Reconstruction Site.  Then they hit “Civil Twilight,” followed by “Night Windows,” both from Reunion Tour.  The full set list (from my faulty memory) is below.  The slashed tracks comprise the section I’m not too sure of, but I think I have the order mostly right.  I’ll confirm with someone else that was at the show.  (If you were, feel free to comment and correct me).

“Bigfoot!” [Reunion Tour]
“Our Retired Explorer (Dines with…etc.etc.)” [Reconstruction Site]
“Civil Twilight” [Reunion Tour]
“The Reasons” [Reconstruction Site]
“Sun in an Empty Room” [Reunion Tour]
“Night Windows” [Reunion Tour]
“Tournament of Hearts” [Reunion Tour]
“Benediction” [Reconstruction Site]
“Reconstruction Site” [Reconstruction Site]
“Aside” [Left and Leaving]
“Virtue the Cat Explains Her Departure” [Reunion Tour]
“Watermark” [Left and Leaving]
“Left and Leaving” [Left and Leaving]
“Confessions of a Futon-Revolutionist” [the only track from Fallow]
“Plea from a Cat Named Virtue” [Reconstruction Site]
[Encore]
“One Great City!” [Reconstruction Site]
“My Favourite Chords” [Left and Leaving]
“This Is a Fire Door, Never Leave Open” [Left and Leaving]
“(Manifest)” [Reconstruction Site]

It was a fairly balanced set.  I was expecting a run-through of the new album with some older songs interspersed, but I was happy to hear a good mix of new songs plus some of the songs that I never had a chance to see when they were touring for previous albums (esp. “Aside” and “Watermark”, both of which I was very excited to hear).

It’s hard to pick highlights when the whole show was excellent, but I think the encore might’ve been my favorite part.  John Samson came back onstage to play “One Great City!” (before which I kept hearing people yelling “I Hate Winnipeg!” and during which I sang “I Hate Birmingham!” which elicited a smile from a couple of people next to me).  “My Favourite Chords” is such a great song, and when I was convinced these two solo songs were going to end it, the band came back and joined in on cue for the ending, after which they threw in “This Is a Fire Door…”, a song I hadn’t thought about in a while, and had forgotten how much I loved, and then, to top it off, a postlude of “(Manifest),” my favorite of the 3 segues on Reconstruction Site (due to how much more rocking it is than the others, and how awesome the words are).

After the show, we waited outside for a few minutes, hoping John would come out.  Stephen came by, and I looked at him, but by the time I recognized him, he had gone inside.  He looked to be in a hurry, and I’m not for hassling bands after a show, but I did want to meet John and tell him how much I enjoyed it.  I bought a tour poster and Reconstruction Site (I’m horribly embarassed that I didn’t own that until yesterday), completing my Weakerthans catalog.

I have pictures!  But they’re at home and I’m at work, so bear with me.  They will be posted tonight post-haste!  To everyone that came out, I hope we gave ‘em a warm enough welcome that they’ll consider hitting AL again on their next tour!

Update: I found a video someone took of Civil Twilight from the show at al.com.  Check it out here (http://videos.al.com/2008/03/the_weakerthans_live_at_bottle.html).

Death Cab revealed the art for Narrow Stairs.  I don’t know what to think, really.  Anyone else?

Straight from Starflyer’s Myspace Blog:

“The new Starflyer 59 album “Dial M” has just been completed and is off
to be mixed next week by JR McNeely. We are looking at a late summer /
early fall release with select tour dates to follow. We are very
pleased with the results and hope you enjoy the new record. More info,
new songs, etc. coming soon.”

I guess I’ll be finding out soon if my supposition was correct that all the A-sides of “The Ghosts of the Future” 7″ boxset are an album to themselves and not the next true album Starflyer 59 was recording.  Either way, I’m excited and you should be too.  After all the release of a new Starflyer 59 or Joy Electric album is always a monumentally exciting event.  Speaking of that, don’t forget that the new Joy Electric record “My Grandfather, the Cubist” comes out May 26th!  Hopefully we can get some rad coverage of that leading up to the release.

Okay kids, it’s finally available to order!  You know you want it!  So go order it at Velvet Blue Music!  Of course you can order it from CDbaby, but I’d rather give Cloud my money!  That said I just ordered it!!  Oh yeah, for those of you weirdos who don’t like owning actual copies of the album and would rather buy mp3s you can get it at the iTunes store.  I just used it to find out that the name of the song in the video we posted months ago is called “Strength Early”.  I guess I may as well give a tracklist, while I’m starting at the iTunes store listing. Here you are:

01. A Concealed Weapon
02. Strength Early
03. Business Casual
04. The Life Highrise
05. The Mayflower Compact
06. It’s Not Effective
07. That’s Getting Personal
08. Love My Way (Psychedelic Furs Cover)
09. Don’t I Know the Way
10. The Pure in Heart

Death Cab for Cutie released (streaming from their MySpace) the first single from their forthcoming album, Narrow Stairs.  It’s an 8 and a half-minute jam called “I Will Possess Your Heart,” where the at least the first half is a bass-infused groove reminiscent of a more mid-tempo, jammier, “National Anthem.”  It’s pretty good.  The lyrics strike me as typical Gibbard fare.  I think it could’ve been shorter, but they warned us.  People are already preemptively calling this Album of the Year, which is a bit far to go after one single, but it definitely has promise.

Honestly, though, it’s not quite as much of a change as I was expecting, given the original promises/threats.  Take a listen:

EMI is still sore about In Rainbows, so they’re doing the only thing they can do: trying to milk as much money from the Radiohead properties they do control as they can.  They’ve already released all the old albums in a box set.  What else can they do?  Oh, yeah, a Greatest Hits album.

How can you blame them?  If I owned stock in a major record label, I think I’d be on the phone with my broker right now.  Granted, not everyone can afford to take the Screw You approach that Radiohead did, but it’s definitely becoming less and less important to have a deal with a major.  The music industry is in a tizzy over the fact that technology is just plain making them unnecessary.  It makes sense.  Home recording software has been lessening the cost of getting quality recordings, and the internet/digital media have made distribution methods cost nothing.  Scripted Failures has been recording pretty good DIY recordings for years, and we have practically no funds.  With just a little money spent on the right equipment, we could probably make a pretty good sounding album at home.

So this Greatest Hits thing.  It’ll sell.  It’ll sell well.  If you casually like Radiohead, you’ll probably pick it up.  If you’re a die-hard fan, and you own all the original albums, you might still pick it up, as Justin says, “just to have”.  Radiohead can’t do much about it, but drummer Phil Selway doesn’t seem to pleased about the prospect: “It’s well within their rights to do it. *sigh* So we’ll have to see.
But as I say, for us the main thing is that we’re excited about the
process of releasing In Rainbows and what we’re doing, around the
touring, around the way we’re able to release it, and most importantly
around the music itself.”

(Read the full interview with Analogue here)