It’s a Merge kinda day.

The label has confirmed that Teenage Fanclub will be coming over to North America in mid-July to tour in support of their new album Man-Made, which gets a North American release on June 7. No confirmed dates yet, but those should be announced very soon. The Fannies haven’t to Toronto since 2001 when they played a fantastic “greatest hits”-type show at the Opera House, so this is definitely one to get excited about. Raleigh husband-and-wife popsters The Rosebuds will support throughout the tour.

Head over to Elefant to grok all of Camera Obscura’s videos, including the new one for “I Love My Jean”. The wee band of Scots are set to record their third album this June with Richard Hawley producing – an interesting choice, I wonder if he’ll be moving them into duskier musical teritory?

20/40 gets into it with J Mascis about Dinosaur Jr, guitars and the band’s notorious (and hilarious) chapter in Michael Azerrad’s Our Band Could Be Your Life. Remember when I commented about the conspicuous four-day gap in the Dino Jr tour dates between Boston and Cleveland? Well the scuttlebutt is that J, Lou and Murph will indeed be taking a jaunt north of the border that third week of July. Still nothing official, but fingers are crossed.

The new Portatstatic album Bright Ideas has a release date of August 23. Whole lot of guest players on this one, including members of Superchunk (duh) and American Music Club.

Pitchfork reports that The Wrens will finally be reissuing their Abbott 1135 EP, originally released in 1997, along with bonus materials later this year. It’s great that they’re revisiting their past, but I’d rather hear some NEW material rather than stuff over eight years old.

And as a footnote to Thursday’s Rogue Wave post, My photos from Thursday’s Rilo Kiley show are now up. As I said, not my best work by a long shot, but not awful, considering the distance and lighting conditions.

Jack Bauer is a sell-out! What happened Keifer? It used to be about the torture, not the snack foods – though it does answer the question about when the hell does he find the time to eat. The two-hour season finale of 24 goes this Monday at 8pm. If it doesn’t end with Jack doing a Slim Pickens on the missile, I will be very disappointed.

As predicted, the past week has really wiped me out. I don’t even remember going to the Doves show, and that was just Monday! One more show tonight, The Decemberists at the Phoenix, but it’s an early show and anyway, this is a long weekend so I’ve got lots of time to recharge.

np – The Meeting Places / Find Yourself Along The Way

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