Funny thing for a horror/suspense movie, From Hell wasn’t really scary or suspenseful. I mean, it was alright – I didn’t dislike it, not at all. I thought they telegraphed the identity of Jack the Ripper way in advance, but the way the rationale unfolded was compelling enough to keep me interested. Still, it felt kinda flat overall for reasons I can’t quite put my finger on. The look of the film was lacking, at no point did I believe in the slightest that I was look at turn-of-the-centuty London. It looked like sets on a soundstage. I think this is mostly due to the lack of any sky or environment whatsoever in the scenes aside from some establishing shots, it’s all walls and alleys. A minor niggle, I guess, but it really affected how absorbed I got in the film. I haven’t read the graphic novel so I don’t have a point of comparison, but I’m reasonably sure that the book, as always, is better. Moving on.

A happy St Patrick’s Day to all – I was going to post some Irish-themed MP3s, but Teaching The Indie Kids To Dance Again has done a bang-up job instead. Pogue mahone! Yes, I know what it means.

Wilco has posted a new old song from the YHF sessions on their website. You can download “Cars Can’t Escape” in either mp3 OR MP4 format. That’s my boys, always on the cutting edge. I have a different, more downbeat version of the song on the YHF Demos bootleg as “Rhythm”, but more Wilco is always a-ok with me. Meanwhile, Said The Gramophone has an mp3 of “At Least That’s What You Said” recorded live in Oregon last September. What’s strange is that I have another mp3 of the same song that purports to be from the same show, BUT IT’S NOT THE SAME. One of these tracks is lying. LYING. Trust no one. It’s slated to be the leadoff track on A Ghost Is Born, out June 8.

Update: Don’t trust Winamp. Its browser said Sean’s download was a live track, but it’s not – it is, as he said, the actual album track. Leak leak leak!

Plexifilm are well on their way to becoming my favorite people in the world. In addition to having already released DVDs for Pavement, Ted Leo and Wilco’s I Am Trying To Break Your Heart doc, they will be putting out a Galaxie 500 double DVD in June featuring live footage from the band’s personal archives, music videos, an interview and “acoustic” session filmed for UK television, and two complete “bootleg” shows. It’s enough to make a man weep with joy. Details from Damon & Naomi.

How great is it that the Dalai Lama has his own listings on Pollstar? The spiritual leader of all things Buddhist drops phat beats from his latest album April 25 at the Skydome. Kid Koala and Barenaked Ladies to open.

Strong Bad email #100!

np – Centro-Matic / Distance And Clime

And the winners are… Moby (best music) and Mezzoblue (best Canadian). And a whole bunch of other folk in categories I wasn’t nominated in. Still, thank you very much to everyone and anyone who nominated and voted for me. It was a fun ride, but it’s over so let’s all get back to business. However, for today I declare the patron saint of Chromewaves shall be: Susan Lucci.

And I bet I coulda won if I had a street team.

Young & Sexy return to Toronto to play the Drake Hotel on May 7 as part of a CBC Radio 3 tour. Hopefully this means that some more cool acts will be added to the bill.

Said The Gramophone has some mp3s taken from the new Feist album. Let It Die is already out in France but doesn’t get a domestic release for a while yet.

John Darnielle declares Shannon Wright’s new album Over The Sun “Emo Album Of The Year”. That’s meant as praise, by the way. And speaking of Mr Darnielle, today is his birthday – you can send him a gift from his Amazon.com wish list if you like. Link from LHB.

Cause for celebration – The Commitments finally gets the deluxe widescreen DVD treatment, out today. It was a travesty that until now, there was only a feature-less pan-and-scan version on the market. And if you’ve never seen this film, for the love of God go get it.

The crazy title tags you’re seeing on links comes courtesy of Vic. He didn’t program it, but he provided it. It’s neat. Combined with the fading colours mouseover, I have the most ostentatious links on the internet. If I can just get them to make a sound like a choir of angels whenever they’re clicked on, I’m all set.

np – Rainer Maria / Long Knives Drawn

Now I will say I really enjoyed the premiere of Wonderfalls on Friday, but have a slight nit to pick with the producers. While the show is ostensibly set in Niagara Falls, NY (I infer from the use of American currency in the show and the fact that Fox would NEVER set a show in Canada), the location shots are most definitely from the Ontario side of the Falls – that is, the side where there’s actually something to look at. From the American side, it’s just “hey look at all the water — oops, it’s gone, where did it go? Let’s go find a factory outlet mall and buy discount socks.” Not very compelling. But at least lead actress Caroline Dhavernas is unarguably Canadian (Quebecois, no less). Anyway, apparently the ratings for the premiere weren’t outstanding so as with most quality shows, it probably won’t last long. It is repeating this Thursday with the second episode on Friday, so catch it, as the Dutch say, while you can. As a bonus, Andy Partridge of XTC does the theme song. There’s even a video on the show’s website. As for XTC themselves, their new album Music To Help You Breathe More Easily is supposed to be out sometime this year on Caroline Records. Hmm, Caroline Records? Caroline Dhavernas? Coincidence? I think so.

Carl Newman, chief songwriter for The New Pornographers, has a solo project coming out in June on June 8 on Matador under the name of A.C. Newman. The album is called The Slow Wonder and you can grab an mp3 of the first single, “Drink To Me Babe Then”, here.

Looking for more Franz Ferdinand than you can shake a stick at? This site will hook you up. Link from Stereogum.

Thanks to Garry for reminding me what a kick-ass site CBC Radio 3 has. Every week there’s a new issue with great articles, music, interviews, all done uber-slick-like. Next week’s issue (Mar 19) will feature a Sarah Harmer radio session, and you can go digging through the last 2 years’ worth of archives for more great stuff. My tax dollars at work, and I couldn’t be happier about it.

Guitarist catches up with Evan Dando, but alas, doesn’t find out what kind of strings he uses.

Sex advice from Liz Phair, Vol. 2

The Microphones are in town June 11. Venue TBA.

Everyone who bought tickets for the Winnipeg show of the Pixies reunion tour hoping to have bragging rights about being the first to see the band in a decade can thank the people of the Twin Cities for robbing them of that honour – the tour now kicks off the day before in Minneapolis. Once again, Manitoba is trumped by Minnesota. A time-old tale, I tells ya.

np – Preston School Of Industry / Monsoon

I’m not sure what exactly prompted me to rent David Mamet’s State and Main this weekend – I think we were talking movies at work recently and someone mentioned it and it stuck in my cranium. Then yesterday I was at Queen Video looking for something to offset the weightiness of my other selection (From Hell, if you were wondering) and it just popped into my head, so I grabbed it. It’s an ensemble comedy about a movie crew trying to shoot a film in a small Vermont town with the predictable Hollywood-types vs local-yokels schtick, but it’s well-written and pretty clever – sometimes too much so. But the formidable cast (Alec Baldwin, Sarah Jessica Parker, William H Macy, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Julia Stiles, David Paymer) does a good enough job with their parts and it was a pretty enjoyable watch. And who’d have ever thought they’d see Hoffman in a non-creep romantic lead?

This weekend has been pretty nuts for me buying scads of DVDs and CDs – besides getting an order from Truthflies.com delivered, the used CD shops in my area were well-stocked for a change. A good thing that all the time spent not shopping has been dedicated to working, so as to afford my indulgences. A run-down of my acquisitions for past couple days, keeping in mind I haven’t had a chance to really give any of them a close listen yet so impressions are very preliminary:

• Centro-Matic / Distance And Clime – More fuzzed-out rootsy rock from Austin, this one’s less focused than last year’s Love You Just The Same but still very good.
  

• various artists / Wig In A Box: Songs From and Inspired by Hedwig & The Angry Inch – As I said yesterday, surprisingly good. Really, the only track that I haven’t taken to is Bob Mould’s “Nailed”, and that’s mostly because it’s done in his Loudbomb/Modulate electronic persona. Now I want to see the movie again.
  

• Laura Cantrell / When The Roses Bloom Again – I already talked about discovering Laura Cantrell through mp3s a few weeks ago, and I’m happy to say that she’s even better over an entire album.
  

• Belle & Sebastian / Fans Only DVD – A really nice package, and doing well to remind me of why I loved this band so in the first place.
  

• Hawaii / Hawaii – Local dream-pop/rock band whom I’ve seen live before and piqued my interest. The album is pretty all over the place, stylistically, and it’s going to take some more listens before I can really comment. It’s a little heavier than I was expecting.
  

• Preston School Of Industry / Monsoon – Haven’t listened to this one yet at all. But it’s Spiral Stairs, so I’ve a pretty good idea of what to expect.
  

• Songs: Ohia / The Magnolia Electric Co. – Long-standing presence on my “haven’t heard but sounds like something I’d like” list, and as it spins right now, I think I’m right. Update: Looks like somone has hacked the Songs: Ohia website – Brasilians for Osama Bin Laden? Weird.
  

• The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring Extended Edition DVD – Yeah, I’ve seen it a few times already but it’s nice to have, y’know.
  

I’ve also got the Director’s Label The Complete Works Of Spike Jonze on loan from 517, and that’s going to take a while to get through. The man truly made some brilliant videos, and Sofia Coppola as a gymnast in the Chemical Brothers’ “Electrobank” vid is too cute. Watch the vid here.

I am all awash in media.

np – Songs: Ohia / The Magnolia Electric Co.

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