I’m going to retract any bitching I did after hearing A Ghost Is Born was pushed back two weeks. The reason is that Jeff Tweedy has checked into a Chicago rehab clinic. Says Greg Kot of the Chicago Tribute:

“Wilco singer Jeff Tweedy canceled a European promotional trip for the band’s new album last week to check himself into a Chicago rehab clinic.

Tweedy has had a long history of migraines, and has unsuccessfully battled them with prescription painkillers. In response to the rehab stint, Wilco’s Nonesuch label has postponed release of the band’s fifth album, “A Ghost is Born,” by two weeks, to June 22.

The band, recently expanded to a sextet, was to begin a brief tour April 21 in Missouri and ending June 1 at the Coachella Festival in California, but a Wilco spokesman said a decision won’t be made until this week about whether those dates will be fulfilled.”

Best wishes to Jeff and his family and I hope he gets through this soon.

Attention Toronto: Pixies are skipping our fair city for the exotic destination of… Mississauga. MISSISSAUGA. November 24, Arrow Hall. Yeeeeeesh. I can’t remember the last time I had to borrow the car to get to a concert! Someone needs to build a large-capacity venue in the city NOW. Tickets on sale April 15. Other North American dates just announced:

September 4 – Les Schwab Amphitheatre, Bend, OR

September 6 – Bumbershoot, Seattle, WA

September 18 – Austin City Limits, Austin, TX

October 14 – Fox Theatre, Atlanta, GA November

November 11 – Wilkins Auditorium, Minneapolis, MN

November 13 – Aragon Ballroom, Chicago, IL

So east-coasters waiting for dates should plan around early November. From NME

Lazy i is reporting that Rilo Kiley have jumped ship from Saddle Creek to a major label, one of EMI’s imprints (it’s unclear which – either Capitol or Virgin) for the release of their new album. It’s unknown how this affects the original July release date.

Pierce Brosnan has left the 007 franchise. I never liked Brosnan anyway – he looked the part, but was too smooth and too smug. I’m probably one of the four or five who liked Timothy Dalton in the part. The question is – who shall replace him in the sort-of flagging series? Bond films used to be special, but there’s been such a glut of high-tech spy movies of late, the last few have had a hard time standing out of the crowd. It’d be nice if there was someone who could breathe some life into the character, but I don’t think it’s going to be Quentin Tarantino.

Pics of Christian Bale as Bruce Wayne from the set of Batman Begins.

I reread the entire run of Miracleman this weekend, and having just finished issue 24, am left with the same irritation I felt eleven years ago when it was published… WHAT HAPPENS NEXT? I’ve found this ad for issue 25 which shows the cover painting by Barry Windsor-Smith and a plot synopsis, but that does nothing to quell my hunger. But I’ve bitched about this before, and will stop. Grr.

My Jays got drubbed 7-0 yesterday by Detroit in the season opener. That’s right, DRUBBED. A good old fashioned drubbing. Mr Cy Young Roy Halladay on the mound, no less. Not an auspicious start. I blame the new uniforms. Back to the powder blue outfits, gentlemen!

I don’t know if I should make jokes about painkillers as one of my musical heroes goes into rehab, but I should warn you in advance that I’m getting my wisdom teeth removed this afternoon, so tomorrow’s post will most likely be written under the influence of something under-the-counter and potent. Here’s a sneak preview:

“Ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow”

I can’t wait.

np – Pavement / Terror Twilight

I saw Hellboy this weekend, and have nothing bad to say. Visually, it’s nearly perfect – everyone and everything looks terrific, with Ron Perlman perfectly cast as the titular demon. Visuals are apparently director Guillermo del Toro’s strong point and he doesn’t do anything to contradict that reputation. There’s a lot of humour and good frenetic energy. What there isn’t a lot of is plot or exposition – the main storyline with Rasputin trying to destroy the world is pretty patchy. It doesn’t really get into more detail than what I just said – Rasputin tries to destroy the world. Because he’s the bad guy and that’s the sort of thing that bad guys do. Hellboy excepted, most of the rest of the characters are left pretty underdeveloped, but they get away with by using pretty time-tested archetypes (stereotypes?). You know what the deal is with each character because you’ve seen them dozens of other times in other films in other incarnations. Not great storytelling, but sufficient for a popcorn flick. I’ve never really read the comic – just some short stories or online comics – but I’ve been advised that the film was very faithful to the source material, which seems a little like damning it with faint praise. Visually impressive and thin on the storytelling, but fun enough overall to let the shortcomings slide. I could pick it apart if I felt so inclined, but I enjoyed it so I’ll leave it be.

Fox has cancelled Wonderfalls. Why? Because they’re stupidheads. And they suck ass. Cancelled after four episodes… what’s the point? Why invest in it in the first place? So you can replace it with some other ass-sucking feces-spewing craptacular reality show about people willing to utterly degrade themselves so they can be mocked in the pages of US Weekly? How do they calculate viewership, anyway? Is it still with those ridiculous Neilson family boxes that purports to provide an accurate sampling of viewership numbers? It saddens me to think that all the hours I spent watching television as a child didn’t make a difference for the shows I liked one way or another. I can only hope it finds life on another network or on DVD. Or else I’ll… stew quietly, for the most part. Dumbasses. To help ease you through these troubled times, The Big Ticket has an mp3 of the Andy Partridge-penned theme song for you to download and play ad nauseum while sobbing uncontrollably.

This pic of Alanis Morrissette in a naked suit at last night’s Juno awards is far more disturbing to me than a million Janet Jackson nip slips. What the hell is that coming out of her crotch? It looks like Prince’s head.

An American English teacher in Japan assigns his students The Penny Arcade Remix Project. They’re practically zen.

Epic will be re-releasing Franz Ferdinand’s self-title debut domestically in the US on April 20. It’s already been available in Canada at domestic prices for the past month, on account of the fact that we’re much more hip and forward-looking than our dear American cousins…

Ellipses = joke. No hate mail, please.

np – Old 97’s / Too Far To Care

What an amazing show.

I don’t remember ever seeing a show advertised so emphatically as ‘sold out’ before. No tickets in stores, no tickets at Ticketmaster, no tickets at the door, no room on industry guest lists. If you have no ducats, GO HOME. I didn’t even see scalpers outside of Lee’s Palace. The show, of course, was the first night of Neko Case and Sadies’ five-night sort-of-residency in the city for the month of April. The shows weren’t to promote an album, as is usually the case, but to create one – Neko & co. were travelling with a full mobile recording van with the intention of creating an album of new material recorded live as opposed to a typical live album which would double as a greatest-hits collection (NOW talked to Neko about her intentions for the live album). What this meant was that the audience would be treated to a pretty unconventional set list and performance.

I got there well before the advertised start time for the openers, and was surprised to see them already onstage when I walked in the door. It turned out that Carolyn Mark had recruited Jim & Jennie & The Pinetops as her backing band and was belting out a few country numbers to start things off. When she was done, Jim & Jennie came back out to do a full set of their own – How anyone could not get their feet tapping when confronted with expertly played, high-energy bluegrass is beyond me. They get extra points from me for daring to tell the notoriously chatty Toronto crowd to shut up. They didn’t oblige, of course, but it was worth a shot.

Neko took the stage just after midnight and the next two hours were an almost non-stop set of unbelievably good music. Neko has a voice like a force of nature and with the Sadies offering a rock-solid although slightly more restrained perfomance than usual (they were backing after all) and Carolyn Mark and Kelly Hogan along as backup singers, she had all the ingredients for an amazing performance. Requests for old favorites were greeted with an apologetic, “We have to play what the van tells us” – there would be no deviation from the predetermined set list on this evening. What the audience got was an ecletic mix of covers and new material ranging in style from country (natch), gospel, pop and folk. Despite having a voice steeped in twang and put on this earth to sing songs of yearning, Case is an amazingly versitile talent (see The New Pornographers for proof). The highlight of the show for me was their performance of the traditional “This Little Light Of Mine” with Jim & Jennie, centered around jaw-dropping seven-part roundabout vocal harmonies. It’s nigh-impossible to describe in words, you’ll just have to hear it when the record comes out. The encore was quite literally an encore – for the purposes of the live recording, they reprised a good portion of the set to get alternate takes to even more rapturous applause. Sure, they encouraged the crowd to pretend they hadn’t heard the material just an hour previous, but I think they’d have gotten the same response even without cajoling. The band, with Case as the gregarious and engaging frontperson, had the audience eating out of the palm of their hands.

I don’t know if it’s because it was a live recording or if the renovations to Lee’s Palace were just that effective, but the sound was the best I’ve ever heard in the venue – perfect levels and clarity. I hope to God that it’s Lee’s – I would love it if everything there sounded this good in the future. The other renovations I’m a little more lukewarm about. The stage is pretty high now – I’m sure it’s greatly improved sightlines for everyone else, but if you’re one of those up front, you have to be prepared to crane your neck a little. Overall it feels much more like a proper concert venue a la the Phoenix as opposed to a bar or club. I also hope the lighting will always be as good as it was last night, though I suspect things were better lit to accommodate those videotaping the show though I was perfectly happy to take advantage of the lighting to get some choice pics.

With four more shows over the next few weeks, I’d certainly love to catch at least one more, maybe the Horseshoe show on the 28th if I turn out to be too old and creaky to make the 2AM after-hours gigs at the Matador next weekend. But even if I don’t, having been to this one will be enough to keep me going for some time. Amazing.

Hot damn, it’s been a great week for live music.

New Old 97s album! Drag It Up is in stores June 29.

Some new goodies from American Music Club – visit their website for photos from the recent tour, a live video of “Ladies and Gentlemen It’s Time” and an mp3 of another track from the new record – “Another Morning”.

Cardigans tickets for the May 13 show at Lee’s Palace will run a reasonable $18.50 and be on sale April 10 at Ticketmaster and Rotate This.

Daylight savings time is fucking me up. Well, so is being up till 3:30 – sorry, 4:30 AM – but farmer time certainly isn’t helping.

np – Neko Case / Canadian Amp

Yeah, they’re just long American Express commercials, and no, I’ve never really been a Seinfeld fan or a Superman fan… but together? Directed by Barry Levinson? GOLD. Check it out. And yeah, that’s Patrick Warburton doing Supes’ voice. From The Big Ticket.

VH1 talks to Joseph Alberto Santiago about the Pixies reunion tour. Rock me, Joe. From Burned By The Sun.

Sarah Harmer’s Live At The Rehearsal Hall airs tonight at 8pm on Bravo!. How much do you want to be that even with this reminder, I’ll still forget to tape it? The Toronto Star has a piece on Sarah and her new album.

Wow, short post today. Well come on – it’s Saturday, I did nothing last night except sleep. Today will be a little more eventful – going to see Hellboy this afternoon, then Neko Case and Sadies tonight.

np – Nellie McKay / Get Away From Me

I swear, I should just move into the Horseshoe and be done with it. I wash the hand stamp from last time off just in time to get another one. Lather, rinse, repeat. My third night there in the past eight days was to see Preston School Of Industry support their new album, Monsoon. I admit that I’d been getting worn out with all the shows and activites and whatnot, so I made a point of not going down until right before the headliner was scheduled in order to minimize standing around time and maximize sitting at home time. And apparently I missed out as Carla gave the second openers The Frontier Index a solid thumbs up. Next time, perhaps.

PSOI is now and will probably always be known as ‘the band of that other guy from Pavement‘. For good or for ill, Spiral Stairs will never fully escape the legacy of his old band but it doesn’t really sound like he’s trying. For the most part, the PSOI material sounds like his Pavement contributions with angularly anthemic guitar pop songs and yelp-y laid back vocals. The man just keeps doing what he’s doing. He did, however, score a moral victory over the folks inevitably calling out requests for “Two States” by playing a very good set without including a single Pavement song. I was pleasantly surprised by how good their show was – lots and lots of energy and songs that were stronger in live presentation than on record. Their secret weapon was the second guitarist (whose name I don’t seem to be able to find) who bopped around manically from guitar to pedal steel to keyboards. He’s also taken on the role of sonic anarchist, sporting a pedalboard just barely on the right side of excess (my hero!) and creating the whacked out sonic textures that his boss was largely responsible for in Pavement. Kannberg mostly stuck to rhythm last night, but did throw off a number of his trademark solos just to remind everyone who was in charge. Overall I was glad to have hauled my ass out on this drizzley evening to catch the just-long enough set. Photos here.

File under things that suck: The release of Wilco’s A Ghost Is Born has been pushed back a fortnight to June 22. No reason given, and this is not an April Fool’s joke. Bastards. I’m going to go figure out how Soulseek works.

Longwave will be releasing a new EP, Life Of The Party, on June 8.

The current edition of Stylus’ “Ask A Girl” column features a woman’s guide to picking up indie boys. Interesting reading, but overlong – here’s my condensed version: “Show up. If they don’t keel over from a heartattack (think chinchillas), you’re in”.

np – Rhett Miller / The Instigator