Due to the sheer number of shows I’ve got on the docket for the next few days, I’m going to have to run on a one-day delay just to keep my sanity. So thoughts and images from last night’s show at the Boat with Land Of Talk et al will be forthcoming in the next day or so. In the meantime, enjoy this hastily-assembled fill-in post!

Behold – the first burro-powered video from Amy Millan’s Honey From The Tombs. In addition to the video, there’s four Honey tracks streaming on Amy’s MySpace. The Toronto Star talks to her about the new record and previews her shows at the Reverb tonight and the Mod Club tomorrow and eye gets the scoop on some of her collaborators on Honey. Based on the sheer amount of press she’s been getting, it’s probably safe to say that Amy is this year’s “it” act at NxNE. Don’t forget that only the solo Reverb show is a formal NxNE show – the full band Mod Club thing is limited to the first 50 wristbands/badges/whatever. After that, you need a ticket and there aren’t many left, if any. Ticketmaster and Rotate are both sold out.

Video: Amy Millan – “Baby I” (MOV)
MP3: Amy Millan – “Skinny Boy” (ZIP)

Just Keep Bloggin’ has high school yearbook photos of Broken Social Scene’s Kevin Drew and Metric’s Emily Haines. Oh, like yours are any less embarressing.

Billy Bragg isn’t down with MySpace. Aversion reports that Billy read the fine print in the user agreement and didn’t like the bit about how MySpace gets a royalty-free license for all posted materials – MySpace’s PR and lawyers are in damage control mode, insisting that they in no way own the music posted on the site. More info here. So while Rupert Murdoch may not own the artists music, all the pictures of the kids pouting into their webcams are his to do what he wants with. And it’s best if you don’t ask any more questions about that.

Paste discusses the deeper meanings behind Built To Spill’s You In Reverse. The Seattle Times also talks to Doug Martsch.

Chart talks to the far-too neglected half of Television’s legendary guitarists, Richard Lloyd. The Age still prefers to talk to Tom Verlaine. Call it heresy, but I’ve always preferred Lloyd’s earthier melodic leads to Verlaine’s more abstract melodies. How to tell whose is whose? The album liner notes say who plays what solo – didn’t you ever notice? Very handy for picking sides. And it’s not really possible to articulate in words how excited I am about tonight’s show at the Phoenix.

NOW is similarly excited about this Sunday’s Tilly & The Wall show at the Mod Club.

Stylus wonders if The Flaming Lips were due for a backlash regardless of whether or not At War With The Mystics was any good or not. I only got a copy last week and have listened to it maybe twice so I’m not really in a position to say one way or the other, save to say that in that limited amount of time my overall impression has been a resounding “meh”. But I admit I’ve not been in the mood for Lips-ian wackiness for some time.

Apparently Ambulance LTD has fractured into little itty bitty pieces, with singer Marcus Congleton carrying forward with the band name and the rest of the crew now plugging along as The Red Romance, who sound incredibly unremarkable. It’s too bad, their New English EP was really pretty good and boded well for their future. Considering that the second Ambulance full-length was due out at the end of the Summer, mayhap the departed still played on it? Via Torr.

And that Gnarls Barkley fellow that the kids are all about these days has a tour date schedule for Toronto on September 9 at what Pitchfork calls “Toronto Islands Park”. Either this means Olympic Island or they’re going to run roughshod over Centreville. I kind of like the latter scenario.

Fluxblog interviews Scott Pilgrim creator Bryan Lee-O’Malley.

np – Land Of Talk / Applause Cheer Boo Hiss