From the “What the hell happened to this band” file – January. Originally signed to Alan McGee’s Poptones label, their 2001 debut album I Heard Myself In You was a fantastic bit of shoegaze/country hybrid – it sounded like Mojave 3 crossed with Ride, which is a recipe for success to my ears. After that record, however, they seemed to vanish off the face of the Earth – I couldn’t find any information about them anywhere (you try doing a google search on ‘January’ sometime, see how far you get). I’d also heard they’d split up recently, so I stopped looking… But there is news! The good news is that there is indeed a new record – Must Destroy Music released their sophomore effort Motion Sickness in the UK at the end of February. Unfortunately, there is also bad news – reports of the split were correct – it just happened after this album was recorded. Lead singer Simon McLean is still performing under the name of January, though. I hope he recruits a new band – their sound demands a full-on sonic assault that a solo artist just can do justice to. Preview an mp3 from the new album at Picadilly Records (do a search for ‘January’).

From the “While on the topic of” file – Some news from the Mojave 3 camp. The faithful were getting worried about the state of the band, what with the cancellation of the February North American tour and the constant moving target of release dates for Rachel Goswell’s solo material. As it turns out, these happenings were a result of Ms Goswell requiring some surgery in January that left her out of commission for a bit. But it was a success and she has been recovering – her solo album will be released as soon as she’s well enough to promote it. Mojave 3 will be heading into the studio in the next few months to record the follow-up to Spoon And Rafter. There is a letter from the band on the Mojave 3 website with specifics.

From the “Getting past the hype” file – With all respect to the sizable NYC blogging community, there are so many bands from down there that get hyped up that it’s hard to separate wheat from chaff and I tend to just glaze over when another ‘hot new band’ starts getting the buzz. But sometimes when I do tune in, it pays off. Of course, it helped that the tip this time came from a Motown-er. Case in point – Brooklyn’s Sea Ray. This six piece makes wonderfully lush dream-pop that’s never too fey. Thanks to Whatevs for piquing my interest with this post where he describes them as “Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space-era Spiritualized without the crappy blues interludes (and the copious amounts of smack) crossed with Bewitched-era Luna“. The Grambo certainly knows what qualifies as sweet sweet music to my aural receptors.

From the “I think I can make this album better” file – Stylus conducts some revisionist history on Teenage Fanclub’s Thirteen.

From the “This is really quite good” file – Wig In A Box: Songs From and Inspired by Hedwig & The Angry Inch. It is, really.

np – various artists / Wig In A Box: Songs From and Inspired by Hedwig & The Angry Inch

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