Photo by Frank Yang

Two words you hate to use when talking about Smoosh are “novelty” and “adorable”. But it can’t be helped, and it shouldn’t always be interpreted as a negative. And if it’s taken as such, then the fact that when all is said and done, they’re a pretty terrific pop band no matter how novel their set-up or how old they are is all the more impressive.

They were in town at the end of last week wrapping up a tour in support of Tokyo Police Club and found the time to squeeze in an in-store performance at Sonic Boom to a smallish crowd. I’d been impressed when I first saw them in 2006 opening for Eels and now, a couple years later and decidedly more road-tested, they played with a good deal more confidence though I’m sure the store’s rec room vibe also helped put them at ease. Drummer Chloe is even more of an accomplished drummer now, and she was no slouch before, and keyboardist/singer Asya’s vocals are reaping the benefits of the adult lung capacity I mentioned last time I say them. And if there was a risk of them outgrowing the “pre-teen sister act” angle, they’ve addressed that with the addition of youngest sister Maia, all of ten years old, on bass. When was the last time you saw a band member skip on stage? Too adorable.

The performance encouraged me to revisit their last record, 2006’s Free To Stay. It’s a terrific little pop gem that’s youthfully exuberanct without being childish, yet casts an unexpectedly wistful and minor-key shadow and has a musical and melodic sophistication that’d be impressive for an artist of any age. They’re due to release their third record sometime this year and while it’s always interesting to see how artists mature from record to record, that’s even more so the case for them.

Photos: Smoosh @ Sonic Boom – May 2, 2008
MP3: Smoosh – “Find A Way”
Video: Smoosh – “Find A Way”
MySpace: Smoosh

Wireless Bollinger, JAM and MTV talk to Death Cab For Cuties Nick Harmer, Chris Walla and Ben Gibbard, respectively, about Narrow Stairs, set for release next Tuesday. No one wants to talk to Jason McGerr. Poor drummers. They’re at Olympic Island on June 7.

Hot on the heels of the announcement of a new Radio Dept EP in Freddie & The Trojan Horse, due June 4, comes the official word on album number three, from which the single is taken – Clinging To A Scheme will be released on September 10. So very excited.

Also good news in the new release department – thanks to A Good Day For Airplay for tipping me that Gemma Hayes will release her third album The Hollow Of Morning in Ireland and the UK next week. I don’t expect there’ll be any sort of North American release for this one, so it’s just as well I’ll be in Dublin in a couple weeks and can pick up a copy that way. Where The Lions Weep has an interview with Ms Hayes about where she’s at these days.

Spinner gets some info on the next album from Antony & The Johnsons, The Crying Light, slated for a late 2008 release.

Female First and The Age meet Nicole Atkins.

The Independent profiles the boys of Nada Surf.

Honeysuckle Weeks, the new album from The Submarines isn’t out till next week but you can stream it in its entirety now. They’re at the Drake on May 24.

Stream: The Submarines / Honeysuckle Weeks

A few more show announcements of note – though just here in February, Nina Nastasia returns for a show at the Drake on June 20, this time accompanied by her collaborator on You Follow Me, Jim White of The Dirty Three. Tickets are $15.

MP3: Nina Nastasia with Jim White – “Jim’s Room”

Calexico are back on July 6 for a show at the much-smaller-than-their-usual-digs Mod Club, tickets $22.50, full Summer tour dates here. Presumably there’s a new record in the works – Garden Ruin was two years ago.

The Swell Season, riding their Oscar win, will return to town for a show at Massey Hall on September 20 accompanied by Bill Callahan. Full tour dates at Pitchfork, tickets for the Toronto show will run from $25.50 to $39.50 plus attendant fees.

And if you happen by the El Mocambo Friday night and see a massive lineup of people, those are the people who got Queens Of The Stone Age tickets. And if this is the first you’re hearing about it, you’re too late.

Photo by Frank Yang

The story of The Verve has always been a tumultuous one. In the late ’90s while the likes of Oasis, Blur, Manic Street Preachers and Pulp were all enjoying their greatest successes, they technically didn’t even exist. And when they finally achieved that level of worldwide success with “Bittersweet Symphony”, effectively a coda for the Britpop era, they didn’t end up seeing a penny of the royalties from the song and the band disintegrated again on the North American tour in support of Urban Hymns. If ever there was a band that had unfinished business to attend to, that needed and deserved a victory lap, it was The Verve.

And so it is they’ve returned, almost a decade on from their last dissolution and on Thursday night capped a brief North American tour with a date at Toronto’s Ricoh Coliseum. High ticket prices and a large venue kept it from being a sell-out, but there was a definite air of anticipation amongst the audience (mostly guys in their mid-30s – shock!) leading up to showtime, an atmosphere aided by the absence of an opening act. People were here to see The Verve and Verve only. And perhaps the Toronto FC. The local soccer team were playing right next to the arena and judging from the number of jerseys in the crowd, more than a few were making the evening a double-header – perhaps the band as well, considering that when they finally bounded onstage both bassist Simon Jones and guitarist Nick McCabe were sporting Toronto FC scarves.

But with the crashing opening chords of “A New Decade”, there was no doubt that the band was back and they were making up for lost time. Sounding loud and as glorious as the boomy arena acoustics would allow, they tore through a set that hit on most all the essential points of Urban Hymns and A Northern Soul, well balancing the ballads with the cosmic jams, and reaching back to A Storm In Heaven for “Already There”. They also interjected a couple of new songs that leaned markedly into the jammier, groovier reaches of their repertoire – the first, “Sit And Wonder”, was a bit of a stunner and probably should have been swapped in the set list with the encore closer “Love Is Noise” which, following “Bittersweet Symphony”, came off feeling decidedly slight. The absence of “On Your Own” from the set was felt but otherwise, most everything you’d want to hear was in the cards – after all, this is a band with only one more album than they’ve had break-ups. There’s not really a huge repertoire to draw from.

It was especially impressive how in almost no time at all, frontman Richard Ashcroft was able to wipe away the bitter taste of a wholly lamentable solo career. Looking as healthily cadaverous as ever, Ashcroft has lost none of his immense charisma – the man was born to be a rock star and this is the band he was meant to front. But he knows, as everyone knows, that that band is nothing without Nick McCabe. The famously volatile guitarist had been essentially MIA since abruptly leaving the band during that last North American tour was astonishing to see and hear. Though few would dispute he’s one of the best British guitarists of the last 20 years, his influence and profile is limited by the fact that his style is simply uncopyable. In his hands the guitar is less an instrument than a conduit to sounds not of this world and on this night, that antennae was pointed straight skyward and receiving at full strength.

Perhaps the most significant thing to take away from the show and the reunion as a whole, thus far, is that the band has managed to recover the chemistry that made them so formidable a decade ago and they seem absolutely determined to once again be a vital creative force. And though we’ll have to wait until their fourth album – already recorded and waiting to be mixed – arrives in late Summer to see just how creative they are, they definitely have the vital part down.

Reunions can be notoriously dodgy – I only have to think back to the Pixies show in 2004 to remember what it is to see a technically perfect but utterly soulless affair they can be – but for the Verve, there was none of that. They were everything you would have wanted them to be and more. Welcome back.

More reviews of the show from The Toronto Sun, eye, BlogTO and The National Post.

Photos: The Verve @ Ricoh Coliseum – May 1, 2008
MP3: The Verve – “Lucky Man”
MP3: The Verve – “The Thaw Sessions”
Video: The Verve – “Bittersweet Symphony”
Video: The Verve – “The Drugs Don’t Work”
Video: The Verve – “Lucky Man”
Video: The Verve – “Sonnet”
Video: The Verve – “History”
Video: The Verve – “All In The Mind”
MySpace: The Verve

I should mention that when I walked into the arena, the first song I heard being played by the DJ was… Spacemen 3 (thanks for the correction, Greg). Thought that was kind of funny considering the history between Richard Ashcroft and Jason Pierce over Pitchfork piece last week that the UK and North American release dates for Spiritualized’s Songs In A & E, originally set a fortnight apart, have met halfway and the record will now be released the same week in both territories – over here, it will now be out on May 27.

That’s the same day as This Is Not The World, the new record from The Futureheads from which they’ve just released a new video (via This Is Fake DIY). There’s also a remix of their previous single, “The Beginning Of The Twist”, available for grabs at RCRDLBL.

Video: The Futureheads – “Radio Heart”

The Independent has a five-minute interview with the once and future king monkey, Ian Brown.

Head over to the band’s MySpace to hear a couple of tracks from The Wedding Present’s next album El Rey, out May 20. Wired ran an interview with Dave Gedge a couple weeks ago covering topics like concept records and Steve Albini.

Incoming – TV On The Radio will be at the Kool Haus on July 2, tickets $25, while Joan Of Arc play Lee’s Palace on July 17, tickets $10. Their new album Boo Human will be out May 20.

MP3: Joan Of Arc – “A Tell-Tale Penis”

If you were waiting for the V Fest Vancouver lineup… keep waiting. For a year. They’ve canceled the event for this year on account of not being able to find any acts. Another casualty of the busiest festival season on record (see also: Vineland, Vegoose – V apparently does not necessarily stand for “victory”).

Saw Iron Man this weekend… my objective, non-fanboy opinion? IT KICKED ASS. Seriously, immensely satisfying, like a good steak dinner. Or if you’re vegetarian, a fine falafel. The only thing I found wanting was the fact that I’ll have to wait at least two years for another one. Batman, the ball is in your court.

I don’t speak French, so I have no idea what Yelle is singing on her debut record Pop-Up but I don’t need a French-English dictionary to translate the squelchy ’80s-approved synths that form its musical foundation. In any language, they mean fun, and if there’s any lingering doubt as to the interpretation then then technicolour costumes and visuals that accompany Ms Julie Budet wherever she goes should dispel those. Big European electro-pop beats are the universal language.

And so is “free stuff”. Courtesy of Fusion3, I’ve got two copies of the new Yelle single “Je Veux Te Voir” on 12″ vinyl, featuring the original track, two remixes and another album track, to give away. If ye wants, send me an email at contests AT chromewaves.net with the English translation of “Je veux te voir” in the subject line and your full mailing address in the body before midnight, May 7. And this contest is open to residents of Canada only, please and thank you.

Video: Yelle – “Je Veux Te Voir”
MySpace: Yelle

Illustration by Johnnie Cluney

Tomorrow is Free Comic Book Day – the happiest day of the year where comic shops give free comic books to good boys and girls all around the world. To mark the occasion – or perhaps it’s just coincidence – Daytrotter has posted a three-song session with Lightspeed Champion, whose secret identity Dev Hynes is an avowed comic book nut. He’s also currently running a contest in which fans are invited to remix “Everyone I Know Is Listening to Crunk” or shoot a video for it with a prize of €2000. Speaking as someone who has to get to the currency exchange in the next couple weeks, that’s not nothing. Lightspeed Champion is coming to town with a full band on June 11 for a show at at Lee’s Palace.

And other comic-related happenings… Iron Man, which is getting absurdly good reviews – especially for a Hollywood Summer blockbuster – opens today. Of course, going to see comic book movies on opening night is too geek for words – that’s why I’m going tomorrow. And I fully expect to see this new trailer for The Incredible Hulk before it. I actually watched them film a couple of the scenes in the trailer at the University of Toronto campus. It still boggles my mind how little they dressed up Yonge St in trying to pass it off as Harlem. Because no one would notice The Apollo Theatre isn’t actually beside Sam The Record Man.

Trailer: The Incredible Hulk

And some bits and pieces to crawl into the weekend.

NPR is streaming a Word Cafe interview and session with Drive-By Truckers.

The Los Angeles Times and Christian Science Monitor talk to She & Him.

The Independent profiles Tift Merritt.

There’s now a preview MP3 from the South San Gabriel half of the Dual Hawks double-album with Centro-Matic, out June 3. The latter outfit will roll into the Horseshoe on June 11.

MP3: South San Gabriel – “Trust To Lose”
MP3: Centro-Matic – “I, The Kite”

Featured on the cover of Exclaim this month, Kathleen Edwards.

Muzzle Of Bees asks five questions of Megan Hickey of The Last Town Chorus.

The Dallas News and The Pitch ask Steve Earle pretty much the same questions.

Prefix and LAist interview Aimee Mann, in town for an in-store at Sonic Boom on May 9 and then a proper gig at the Kool Haus on August 28. She releases @#%&! Smilers on June 3. Here’s a video.

Video: Aimee Mann – “31 Today”

Filter has a rather remarkable feature on Husker Du, interviewing all three members (separately, of course) about the band’s rise and fall. And more in the present, Drowned In Sound interviews Bob Mould.

WOXY has posted the video of a session Okkervil River recorded for them recently.

The National Post talks to Stephen Malkmus, who will be in town at the Phoenix on July 16.

Check out the video for Spiritualized’s “Soul On Fire”, the first single from Songs In A & E. Pitchfork has details on all the myriad formats that you can pick the record up in when it’s released on June 3. You may recall that Spiritualized albums have always come in elaborate packaging, though I don’t think they’ll ever top the medication blister-pack of Ladies & Gentlemen. That was brilliant. Wired has an interview with J Spaceman about his fixation with fire and they will be at day one of V Fest, September 6 at the Toronto Islands.

Video: Spiritualized – “Soul On Fire”

Check out the first MP3 from Sloan’s new album Parallel Play, out June 10. Via Prefix.

MP3: Sloan – “I’m Not A Kid Anymore”

Beatroute meets MIA. She’s at the Sonic Academy on June 2.

eye and Chart talk to Wye Oak, who are playing Sneaky Dee’s tonight as part of Over The Top.

Eef Barzalay, formerly of Clem Snide, will be in town for a show at the El Mocambo on June 27. His new record Lose Big is out June 15.

Beth Orton will be at the Danforth Music Hall on July 8.

JAM chats with Wilco bassist John Stirratt about the band’s recent and very welcome decision to expand their live repertoire to cover the band’s entire career.

Click Music interviews Lykke Li and Pitchfork talks to El Perro Del Mar, both of whom are playing the Mod Club on May 11.

Metric talk to Spinner about the state of their new record, slated for a Fall release. Update: The band also played a couple new songs for Spin, who are streaming the video of the performance.