A free evening and some guest list action translated into a good old fashioned rock and roll double-header for me last night – but in the interests of milking what content I do have, I’m spreading the reviews out over a couple of days. This blog thing is all about advance planning, man.

First up was local atmospheric pop combo The Airfields, who I sang the praises of a couple months ago. Despite having a few chances since then, I hadn’t managed to see them live though I did get their lovely City-State EP some time ago (the entirety of which is available to download off their website). They were playing an early set at the Cameron House last night, so scheduling allowed me to pop in and see what they were about outside the studio setting.

Live, they’re a good deal louder (though you couldn’t really get quieter) and punchier. Whereas the EP played like a long-lost Sarah Records release, onstage the Airfields widen the lens a bit to encompass all things C86-ish. New elements like frantic Wedding Present strumming and Jesus And Mary Chain bursts of noise did well to broaden the sonic palette.

Despite the extra challenge of being the debut show for their new keyboardist/glockenspielist/melodicaist/vocalist, the Airfields still impressed and I’m excited to see some good old school indie pop coming from the Big Smoke. I know there’s an audience out there for their sound, if they can find them and connect with them, I think good things could come. Photos here.

The second half of the double header was The Magnolia Electric Co at Lee’s Palace – look for that writeup come Monday.

LiveDaily interviews drummer Murph about Dinosaur Jr’s return from extinction. Enjoy it while it lasts. Via Prefixblog.

Eisley tells Chart they like it when you stare at them.

PopMatters talks to Eric Johnson of Fruit Bats about marine life. Their Spelled In Bones came out last week and reviews are pretty good.

Chuck Klosterman riffs on the abundance of animal-named bands, the fashionability of wolves in particular. Zoilus is not impressed with the absence of any substance in Klosterman’s piece and challenges him to a fight at the jungle gym after school. I have just started reading Killing Yourself To Live – no, Chuck isn’t the most profound writer around but he makes me laugh. Like Ziggy.

np – Slowdive / I Am The Elephant, U Are The Mouse Original Soundtrack

I don’t know if actually knowing who Werner Herzog is would have increased my appreciation for Incident At Loch Ness or at least given me a different angle from which to enjoy it, but I somehow doubt it. I rented it for… well, no real reason I can articulate. I think I read something good about it before and, um, I’m a fan of the Loch Ness Monster.

The conceit of the film is rather clever, though fundamentally unwieldy and unworkable. Herzog wants to make a documentary about the cultural phenomenon of the Loch Ness Monster. His producer (also director of this film), Zak Penn wants to make it a flashy Hollywood adventure film. The whole production is being filmed by a crew making a documentary about Herzog, which is ostensibly the film you are actually watching. And then there’s the Loch Ness monster. A crew of actual actors might have been able to pull off something reasonably convincing, but the non-actors the film uses (not counting the actress/Playboy model Penn brings in to be a “sonar operator”) simply aren’t capable of selling what they’re trying to peddle. It’s ineffective as a drama, too dull for an adventure film and not nearly sharp or incisive enough to function as satire. The fact that you can clearly see what their goal was just makes it that much more obvious how far off the mark they fell.

Yeah, oh well. If you want to see a really excellent film about the disastrous making of a film, rent Lost In La Mancha, which documents Terry Gilliam’s doomed attempts to bring Don Quixote to the screen. It’s fascinating and all true.

While I don’t usually link to complete album MP3s, I’ll make an exception here – someone on the Mojave 3 message boards has uploaded the score/soundtrack to the film I Am The Elephant, U Are The Mouse which was written and recorded by the Pygmalion-era Slowdive. These are easily the best sounding versions of these tracks I’ve heard (224 Kbps!), and are worth saving and keeping. Every once in a while someone hears news that the rights to these recordings are getting sorted out and it might see a proper release, but I’m not holding my breath. Grab em while you can – if the links go down for whatever reason, I have the zip files on my computer.

Broken Social Scene reveal to Billboard that their new album will not be called Windsurfing Nation as had been promised for well over a year now, but will instead be self-titled. It’s still coming out on October 4, though, and will be followed next Spring by yet another album.

Prefix (the magazine) interviews Iron & Wine. The I&W/Calexico EP has leaked and people are gushing about it. I haven’t heard a note and am holding out until In The Reins comes out on September 20… but damn it’s hard. No east coast tour dates yet, but they are expected on this half of the continent in November.

Prefix (the blog) has an update in Absolutely Kosher’s quest to liberate the first two Wrens albums from the evil clutches of their old label, Wind-Up. Unfortunately, it’s still fruitless. Every once in a while, I get emails from Wind-Up asking if I want to play blog-buddy with their label. I should send them a reply back that I’ll pimp whatever Creed side-project they’re trying to sell in exchange for the rights to the Wrens records. Because surely THAT is worth more than the $100,000 AK offered…

Bradley’s Almanac is working a Canadian theme with live reviews and recordings from recent shows by Picastro, A Northern Chorus and SIANspheric.

Concert news – Lou Barlow has cancelled his October 3 show at the Horseshoe because he’s now part of the opening for The Posies at Lee’s Palace that night. San Francisco’s Oranger are also on the bill. Also coming to town are Ohioan blues boys The Black Keys, playing the Opera House on November 19.

np – Son Volt / Okemah And The Melody Of Riot

Despite long hiatuses, constantly-shifting lineups and generally keeping a low profile, Burlington’s SIANspheric have still managed to establish themselves over the past decade as one of the bands keeping the true space-rock/shoegaze flame alive. To celebrate their tenth anniversary, they recently released the RGB DVD/CD collection which functions as an aural and visual retrospective of their career. I haven’t watched the DVD yet, but I suspect this is another case where advertising it as a DVD with a bonus CD is a bit of false advertising, as the CD invariably has far more interesting content on it. But anyway…

Despite going way back with SIANspheric (My first band shared a bill with them at my high school’s coffee house in… Fall 1993? They were still called Gleet then), I confess I’ve never really listened to them. They always seemed to be a little too intent on exploring the noisy end of the space-rock genre, perfectly happy to do away with conventional song trappings like hooks and structure in pursuit of the perfect drone. Seeing them live for the first time back in March really only seemed to confirm that, as their set was a full-on aural assault that, while viscerally enjoyable, was also pretty exhausting. So on listening to the CD portion of RGB, I was a little surprised how listenable their studio output was.

Stylistically, they’re hard to pin down. There’s huge echoey hazes that recall early Verve, songs recalling the liquid beauty of Slowdive, drones worthy of Spacemen 3 and massive piledriving walls of distortion that could be Loveless run through four or five more Big Muffs. Sound still sometimes takes priority over songwriting, but there’s enough here to appeal even to a pop-centric sort like myself. Fellow shoegaze-nut Mystery & Misery just ran a review of RGB as well and The Toronto Star (Bugmenot) talked to the band about the process of looking back and what lays ahead.. Sonic Unyon has some songs available to stream off their website as well as offering this download:

MP3: SIANspheric – “The Stars Above”

SIANspheric will be celebrating the release of RGB last week as well as the end of a brief tour through the American east coast (a couple reviews of their Chicago show, courtesy of a couple of Big Takeover listers) with a show at the Drake this Friday, August 5. They’re playing with Off The International Radar and Sunriser, tickets $10 at the door. Bring earplugs. For the love of God, bring earplugs.

James and Emily Metric tell MuchMusic about going all DIY in the making of new album Live It Out, out September 27 (and not October 4 as previously reported, at least if their website is to be believed). They’ve also got audio from one of the new tracks, “Monster Hospital”, available in RealAudio.

Anyone who didn’t feel like mortgaging their house to see Black Mountain open up for Coldplay this past week will be pleased to know that they’re doing their own show at Lee’s Palace on October 1. Tickets a non-bank-breaking $10.50.

The Magnolia Electric Company plays Lee’s Palace tomorrow night. Maybe you noticed I was giving away passes? Oh – too late now. Anyway, JAM! talks to Electric Magnolia Jason Groth about the band and their undeniable Neil-isms.

You had a couple days off from the Sufjan Stevens content… No more. MTV has an interview, via Prefix.

Torontoist week in shows. Wheeeeee.

np – Luna / Bewitched

Fans of Canadian indie royalty will be shelling out twice as much to their local record stores on October 4 as in addition to being the release date for Broken Social Scene’s long-awaited Windsurfing Nation, Metric have chosen that date to release Live It Out – the follow-up to Old World Underground, Where Are You Now?. Update: The proper release date for the new record is actually September 27. MTV is wrong, and my entire preamble paragraph is null and void. Goddammit.

MTV talked to Emily Haines about the roller-coaster ride that was the making of the new record and how the band almost disintegrated in the process. Having fled their Los Angeles homebase for sunny Toronto, the band have laid out an extensive Fall tour to support the new album, including a September 29 date at the Phoenix. I note that they have nothing booked for the two days prior to that show – perhaps just in case they have a repeat of this past January when they sold out four night at the Mod Club?

I was all about Old World Underground when it came out in the Summer of 2003, but I guess I OD’ed on it a bit because it fell out of heavy rotation after a few months and now only gets occasional spins. I don’t think I’ve heard any of the new material, having not been to a single Metric show since their Horseshoe gig almost two years ago. Not really intentionally, I just… haven’t. Maybe the new record will reignite my interest in the band.

Another much anticipated sophomore effort (at least by me and Aaron is Nellie McKay’s Pretty Little Head, which will be in stores October 18. Billboard has some details on the album, which will apparently only be one-disc but feature 23 songs, as opposed to Get Away From Me, which was a double-album but with only 18 songs. Hmm.

The Age (Bugmenot) declares Sigur Ros the coolest band in the world. I won’t argue with that – they’re from ICEland, after all. Oh God that was bad. Takk is out September 13 and they’re at Massey Hall on September 19. Via Coolfer.

Music video blog Cliptip has been on a tear lately with vids from The Fiery Furnaces, Grandaddy and Bloc Party, among others. Excellent work.

Jeff Mangum sighting in New York City last night! Billboard was on the scene, Prefix has pictures.

The Telegraph examines the economics driving the repackaging of Bob Dylan for a new generation. Via Largehearted Boy.

PopMatters has a little tete a tete with Stephen Malkmus.

Newsarama talks to Brian K Vaughan about the process of turning Ex Machina into a feature film.

I’ve long fancied myself as something of a Neil Gaiman fanboy, but after scoring just 54% on this Neil Gaiman purity test, I am somewhat unsettled that there are people out there who are obviously far more obsessive than I… and I have one question for those people. The one question on the quiz – “Do you know the relation between Stardust and Howl’s Moving Castle?” I do not and am very curious what that relation is. Anyone?

Meet Rusty – the narcoleptic dachshund! Awwwww.

np – American Music Club / United Kingdom

I think it would be an exercise in futility to try and offer up any sort of proper introduction to Richard Thompson for those unfamiliar with his work – kind of like trying to introduce Bob Dylan to someone but without at the least being able to say, “Blowing In The Wind – surely you know that one?”. What I can say without an ounce of exagerration or hyperbole, is that Thompson is one of the finest singer/songwriter/guitarists alive today. From his early days with 60s English folk-rock legends Fairport Convention through his present-day solo career, Thompson has released countless records featuring his droll, dry English wit, dark and incisive songwriting, distinctive baritone and searing fretwork on both acoustic and electric guitars.

I read somewhere that apart from maybe Neil Young, no one else ever arrived on the music scene as such a fully-formed creative entity. Young is actually an excellent parallel for Thompson, as both are equally at home in folk and rock idioms, forged their own often-unfashionable career paths and have been gifted with incredible longevity for it. Granted, Neil is a little bit more of a household name, but the comparisons are valid. It’s probably not surprising, then, that I’m such a fan of both. I’d like to go so far as to say that RT’s been a big influence on my guitar playing but that’d be grossly overstating my abilities – his bagpipe/Celtic-influenced style is so singular I don’t think anyone could say they’ve copped his style. Instead, I’ll just mention that I bought my acoustic guitar based largely on how much it looked like Thompson’s Lowden and my Telecaster has the same odd pickup configuration as his custom Ferrington. And I used to have a Fender Vibroverb reissue like him, but couldn’t get it to sound any good. Win some, lose some.

While he always has and probably will always remain beneath the radar of the mainstream, it’s nice to see he’s getting some attention on the eve of the release of his new album Front Parlour Ballads (out next Tuesday) – The media page at Thompson’s website does a fine job of rounding up RT-related links on the interweb. He tells The Times about coaching Arnold Schwarzenegger’s son in football and the joys of working in the cultural void that is Los Angeles, while The Sunday Herald finds out about the problems of being a Muslim – even a white one – in the current political climate. And a few months ago Being There ran a piece on one former Thompson-hater’s proverbial moment on the road to Damascus.

Thompson’s bio offers a better summary of the man’s work than I ever could. Interested parties could start with his Watching The Dark three-disc compilation, Action Packed!, which collects his work for Capitol in the 80s and 90s, or wait for the 5-CD box set (plus a bonus disc with early pressings) planned for release in early 2006.

Here’s a sampling of both the folk and rock sides of Thompson’s work in a live setting – “Vincent Black Lightning 1952” comes from his Rumour & Sigh album and may be as close to a signature song as he has (though I’d still vote for “Shoot Out The Lights”). “Hard On Me” comes from 1999’s Mock Tudor and has some truly terrifying guitarwork. And don’t worry – his songwriting is strong enough to appeal even to non-guitar geeks.

MP3: Richard Thompson – “Vincent Black Lightning 1952” (live)

MP3: Richard Thompson – “Hard On Me” (live)

Guitar Player, incidentally the first place I heard of Thompson (natch) proves to be a good source of blog-fodder too, with interviews with Sleater-Kinney’s Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker and New Order’s Bernard Sumner and Phil Cunningham.

And continuing on theme – The Washington Blade talks to Bob Mould, avowed Thompson devotee. Check out the mp3 of the week, if you haven’t already. Link via Bob.

For a minute this post over at Brooklynvegan got me all excited because it looked like the National/Clap Your Hands Say Yeah tour had actually been rescheduled a bit such that the Toronto show was now on September 3 instead of the 18th – in other words, when I was still in town! Unfortunately, closer inspection shows that CYHSY will be in town at the Horseshoe on September 3 for their own show, and will not be accompanying The National across the border a couple weeks later. Boo. Clap your hands and say whatever. Also boo – For The Records reports that Jens Lekman has cancelled his October 18 show at the Music Gallery, but hopes to make it up here in November for a solo show. Again – boo. But finally, a yay – The Fiery Furnaces will be at Lee’s Palace on October 10. I’m not the hugest fan of their records but am convinced that the live show is something I must see.

The Nonist has published a helpful brochure to assist those suffering with Blog Depression. My God, I thought I was the only one! Thanks to Lots Of Co for the pointer. I’m not alone! I can be free! I quit!

See you tomorrow.

np – Uncle Tupelo / No Depression