Now, let's start this of with...

Shearwater - "Never Come Again"

What are you listening to?

"Home Life" Shearwater

And next I'm going to play "You don't pull no punches, but you don't push the river," so I can compare...

This thread needs more diversity.

The last thing I listened to was Armed Forces by Elvis Costello and the Attractions.

A Lesson in Science by Cinderpop

It's actually better than the band's last release (which was well-received and got some fairly good press). The first song kind of throws me a bit, because it's more "rock" than I was expecting, but the remaining tracks slide seamlessly into that sweet spot somewhere between Smiley Smile, Odessey and Oracle and guilty pleasure 80s pop that several clever Canadian bands seem to have located lately (Seriously, is there something in the water in East Vancouver? Some sort of orchestral organism has found its niche right off of Commercial Drive.)

I'm actually supposed to be writing a review of this, but I got caught up reading a fellow writer's essay on being the enemy. ()

As I have written about and contemplated this very issue millions of times since first crossing the lines, it was interesting to see someone else's take. It was also frustrating, because I was literally writing about it again last week with intent to publish this time (damn collective consciousness!)! Of course, the writer in question is coming from an entirely different place than I am, being both incredibly young, and a guy, which is interesting to read as well, because he doesn't have all the history, expectation and often negative association that comes with being a female "fan-emy."

And I'll stop derailing this thread now and take the friend-fan-enemy rant over to a blog.

Back on topic, I next plan to listen to Jason Falkner's Bedtime with the Beatles part 2, and then I'll probably finally get Momofuku.

Arthur Russell - "A Little Lost"

In the early '90s, my mom worked at a radio station, and would occasionally bring home interesting tapes or promo materials that the station wasn't interested in. One such thing was a promotional compilation cassette from some label whose name I've forgotten. I've also forgotten all but a couple of the artists featured, but it was an eclectic comp of semi-fringy stuff: Victor DeLorenzo, one of the other guys in the Violent Femmes - stuff like that. I listened to it all the time. I remember playing one of the sides more often than the other, one stretch of songs that I really liked. This was Iowa, pre-internet, and so if I heard something I liked, there weren't many ways to go about finding more, or even any information about it at all. Before long, I went off to college and lots of new music filled my ears, old tapes got shoved into boxes and eventually into closets. Over the years, I lost track of the tape, as you do with cassette tapes, and eventually the whole thing vanished from memory and I didn't think of it again.

Fast-forward to a year or so ago, I'm driving home from work listening to one of the local college radio stations, and I hear a voice singing that sounds very familiar. I realize that it's one of the artists from that compilation I used to listen to 15 years ago, so easily recognizable because it's such a distinctive voice and unique sense of melody. It sounds corny, but it was the sound of something that had always been with me, but nearly forgotten. Luckily the radio stations around here keep live playlists on their websites, and so I went and looked it up as soon as I could. It was Arthur Russell.

I went and looked him up, eager to find more music from him. Turned out he was from Iowa too, rather amazingly. I got all the Arthur Russell stuff I could from emusic, loved it all, but I wanted to find that song that I had heard way back then. I couldn't remember anything about it - couldn't recall any of the words or a piece of the melody. It wasn't on any of the records that emusic or iTunes had available. I tried scanning his full discography for titles that would ring a bell, but nothing did.

And then, today, after I got home from work, I was sitting down to waste time online when a song popped into my head. "I'm so busy, so busy thinking 'bout kissing you..." it went. And suddenly I realized that it was that Arthur Russell song, the song I'd heard 15 years ago and had been trying to recall for months and months, just popped into my head, no idea why. It was in there all along. I typed the lyrics into Google and within minutes had found not only the name of the song, but also some mp3 blogger offering up a . A nice little surprise for an otherwise lazy Tuesday evening.

That is so cool!

(And now I'm going to dig through all my old promo stuff from back then, because I seem to recall a similar sounding comp...not that I think I have it anymore--I often give away promo stuff and swag as white elephant gifts and party favor/door prizes--but you never know!)

that is a beautiful story, la1itree! It reminds of something I always oberserve, that everything got it's own unpredictable time, when they come to us.

Sadly, the file seems to be down, I can't download it right now.

That's a shame. It worked yesterday. Hmm.

I have been on a three-week Pavement binge. I was sort of unbearable to be around the first week.

Also a lot of Alphabeat.

I'm listening to the new album from Frightened Rabbit, "The Midnight Organ Fight", which is an excellent bit of Scottish indie rock. If you don't mind a strong Scots accent in your vocals, this might be for you. Opening track is one of my favourite songs of the year so far. is another gooder.

I suspected it 17 years ago, and now I know it's true.

Jason Falkner is a genius!

(and just as cute now as when I was a teenager, but that's another story...)


I'm listening to his brilliant Bedtime With The Beatles-Part Two.

In terms of bumping old threads, I'm now listening to Rook.

But for the last two days I've listened to nothing but the new TV On the Radio album.

"Babies" - Jana Hunter.

She feels just right for fall, which has just, just flirt through the air this week!

It's finally starting to feel like fall around here, so I'm listening to the War On Drugs - Wagonwheel Blues, which has just the right amount of warmth and cold.