The knock against every new Pernice Brothers record, however well-reviewed, is probably that it sounds an awful lot like its predecessor. This is not untrue – Joe has certainly settled into a certain musical comfort zone and his style is unmistakeable, but it’s also a little unfair as it implies that if you’ve got one Pernice Brothers record, you probably don’t need to hear any of the others. What this criticism fails to address is the fact that a Pernice Brothers record isn’t about the sound but about the songs.

Their latest record Live A Little does indeed sound a good deal like last year’s Discover A Lovelier You, but there’s a reason that I’ve probably already listened to the new one more in the past three weeks than I have the last one in the past year – the songs are just better. The melodies more memorable and the lyricism sharper, but still gloriously bummed out. You can simply hear the twinkle in Joe’s eye as you listen to his wordplay on highlights like “Conscience Clean” or “Somerville” and it’s good to have it back.

But as good as the official release is, I found some of the most interesting listening to be on the bonus disc that came with preorders – while most of the disc are demos that mainly feature Joe with acoustic guitar and drum machine, singing the vocal melodies sans lyrics (interesting but not essential), the first six songs are alternate version outtakes from the record and some feature drastically different arrangements from the final products. In particular, the outtakes of “Conscience Clean” and “Microscopic View” feature not the electrified rock that defines the recent records but the orchestral folk pop of the earliest (and most beloved) records. Hearing these, you can’t help but wonder if Joe was at one point considering a stronger shift in sound than he eventually settled on? The new version of the Scud Mountain Boys’ “Grudge Fuck” that closes Live A Little certainly shows he’s not adverse to looking back. So while it certainly doesn’t diminish my enjoyment of the new album, hearing hints of what might have been certainly gets the imagination working… maybe the next one.

The tour to promote the new record is conspicuous by its Americanism – perhaps the visa issues alluded to here discouraged them from crossing the border? Though if that’s the case, Joe will still have to come home sometime… maybe a solo show is in order? The last one went quite well. Pernice recently gave Harp a guided tour of his Toronto home and no, I didn’t try to figure out where he lived from the photos. Much.

You still have to sign up to the Pernice Brothers mailing list to get the MP3 and video for “Somerville” but it’s worth your time. Otherwise, you can stream the whole of the album below.

Stream: Pernice Brothers / Live A Little (Flash)

From Clicky Click – the House Of Love‘s double-disc Complete John Peel Sessions comp came out on Monday, and I’m torn on this – on one hand, I already have all of disc one on the now-deleted John Peel Sessions 1988-1989 collection, but it’s also one of the best House Of Love recordings in existance (says me) so I really would like to hear the second disc… And also, the House Of Love fansite has confirmed from Terry Bickers that the band is, in fact, still together and working on new material. Sweet.

British Sea Power, who will be camped out in Montreal next month recording their third album, have booked a show at Lee’s Palace for November 15 in order to stretch their legs and preview the new material. Tickets are $12.50 in advance, Heroes & Villains open. Also noteworthy – The Coast will be playing a CD re-release party (?) at the new Ukula store at College and Bathurst on November 9 at 10PM. Haven’t been in the store but I did see a friendly-looking dog through the window the other day, that’s a plus. Pity their website is still a disaster area. Via For The Records.

Patterson Hood of Drive-By Truckers has been keeping a blog at Gibson Guitars while on tour. Thankfully, it’s not actually about his guitars. “Had the strings on my Les Paul changed. Dropped a pick. Found it again. Whew.” Via Nine Bullets.

I Heart Music, nattily redesigned, has an interview with Zach Rogue of Rogue Wave.

np – Norfolk & Western / The Unsung Colony

A generation of indie kids may only now know him as being on the receiving end of Camera Obscura’s “Lloyd, I’m Ready To Be Heartbroken” but Scots-fraternizer Lloyd Cole is far from ready to be just a footnote in someone else’s song. Long a pop songsmith of the highest order, he’s got a new record out – Anti-Depressant – and a tour that will bring him to Toronto’s Mod Club on November 5. BlogCritics has a nice summation of Cole’s career so far as well as a review of the new record.

Courtesy of Against The Grain, I have three pairs of passes to give away to this show. To enter, email me at contests@chromewaves.net with “I Want To See Lloyd Cole” in the subject line, your full name in the body and tell me if you are or are not ready to be heartbroken. I’m conducting a poll. This contest will close at midnight on October 31.

MP3: Lloyd Cole & The Commotions – “Are You Ready To Be Heartbroken?”
MySpace: Lloyd Cole

So here you have it, the trailer for 24 season 6. Keeping in mind that they material shown probably only comes from the first 6 hours or so of the show (I doubt they’ve filmed – or even written – beyond that yet), we can see a few things (props to Wikipedia for some details).

First, they do NOT pick up from the cliffhanger ending of last season where Jack was taken by the Chinese to make sneakers. Instead, they’ve let 20 months elapse, enough so that an election could be held in the wake of Logan’s ousting, Wayne Palmer could become president and Jack could grow one bitchin’ beard (but not as bitchin’ as his between-season-4-and-5 mullet). And judging from the carnage that kicks off this season, CTU is still inept at heading off attacks before they actually occur. But it’s good to see that they’re branching off from just tormenting Los Angeles – Baltimore and St Louis, among other US cities, get targeted by the terrorists (it’s the Middle East’s turn to be evil again) and apparently the only way to stop them is to kill Jack Bauer. Again.

24 begins airing on January 14 and 15 of next year and will almost certainly once again run every week, uninterrupted, until Jack has killed everyone. BRING IT ON.

Footnote – on the 24 website, you can stream the show’s theme song. Five seasons I’ve been watching this show and I didn’t even know there WAS a theme song.

Trailer: 24 season 6

Did you know that the new Hold Steady album came with a free comic in some stores? No stores around here, though. Considering that quantities were super-limited and it’s two weeks since they were probably all snatched up anyway, I’m going to assume that no one is going to get their feathers too ruffled if I make available scans of the comic – the only format that I was able to find it in. The file is in a .cbr format, which you can read with an app like this or you can just change the extension to .rar and uncompress it that way – it’s just a set of JPGs inside. And if that’s too much trouble, I also have it up as a simple .zip. Anyway, the comic is cute, just interpretations (both literal and not so much) of Craig Finn’s lyrics to Boys And Girls In America, done pictograph style.

The Hold Steady continue to garner headlines – The Minnesapolis Star-Tribune and The Seattle Times talk to the band about the influence of Kerouac on the new record (besides providing the album title) while Craig Finn tells The Straight that he’d rather talk about baseball.

There’s also a new live version of “Stuck Between Stations” up for grabs on the band’s website, taken from a radio session for Minneapolis Public Radio. The band is in their studios again today so look for that session to be made available soon after. If you couldn’t tell, I’m really enjoying Boys And Girls In America. It’s always over before I know it, which is usually a good sign that it’s burrowing its way into my skull for the long haul. Got your ticket for the Hold Steady show at the Horseshoe Saturday? You really should.

Comic: Boys And Girls In America (5.13 MB) (.zip)
MP3: The Hold Steady – “Stuck Between Stations” (live on MPR)

Another Minneapolis native dude from the frigid north of America moved to New York getting some attention is Chuck Klosterman, who has a new book out in Chuck Klosterman IV : A Decade of Curious People and Dangerous Ideas. PopMatters and Glide both interview the author and (pop) cultural observer.

Now that Dean Wareham and Britta Phillips are releasing records as “Dean and Britta” (versus “Britta Phillips & Dean Wareham”, as L’Avventura was credited), I’m not sure where I should be filing their CDs in my collection. Under D, as if the name is read literally? Under W, as if it should if put under “Wareham”? Under “P”, so that it sits nicely against the other album? YES I AM THAT ANAL. But that’s not your problem. The new Words You Used To Say EP is out – somewhere – and the album Back Numbers will be out January 30. So I have until then to figure this one out.

The Dears have added two more shows to their long weekend at Lee’s Palace in November. In addition to playing the 16th and 17th with Land Of Talk, they have now scheduled a double-header for the 18th – a dry, all-ages matinee performance and a properly liquored-up evening show. There’s also a new video from Gang Of Losers. Grok it now.

Video: The Dears – “Whites Only Party” (MOV)

M Ward is the latest artist to record a session for AOL’s Interface. The podcast features three performances and an interview.

The DePaulia asks Feist, “What’s a Mushaboom”?

Bradley’s Almanac comes through with a recording of Broken Social Scene’s show last week at Brandeis University in Boston. Note the Beantown shout out cover of Dinosaur Jr’s “The Wagon”. Good and sloppy, just like J’d want. But cut them some slack, it’s been a while since those Broken Mascis Scene shows. Less slack, however, should be allowed if reports like some of those cropping up at Stereogum are to be believed. Check out the review of the Knoxville show, in particular, 28 comments down. Bizarre doesn’t even begin to cover it.

np – Tanya Donelly / This Hungry Life

This keeps up I’m going to be spending more time running contests than writing posts.

This one comes courtesy of Vice Records – a prize pack for Favourite Sons, who may hail from Brooklyn but sound like they stare longingly across the Atlantic at Dear Old Blighty for inspiration. I’m giving away a copy of their debut CD Down Beside Your Beauty and a pair of passes to their upcoming show at the El Mocambo on November 4, a bill which also features The Drones and Devastations all the way from Australia.

To enter, email me at contests@chromewaves.net with “I want to see Favourite Sons” in the subject line. Contest closes at midnight, October 27 – that’s this Friday night.

MP3: Favourite Sons – “Tall Grass”