Photo by Steve Gullick

So next Sunday night, when most are sitting down to carve up a turkey or tofurkey or turducken and giving thanks for the last long weekend for more than two months, others – presumably those without families who love them – will be gathering at the Phoenix to welcome Austin’s Okkervil River to town.

And they’ll be giving thanks that the Okkervil M.O. of releasing an album (last year’s sublime The Stage Names), touring to support (last September’s barn-burner at Lee’s Palace), then releasing a second album from those sessions (last month’s The Stand-Ins) and again touring to support (the aforementioned Phoenix show). And odds are, as soon as they’re off the road this time out, they’ll be right back in the studio. Lather, rinse, repeat.

The album that’ll likely be focused on this time out – The Stand-Ins – is a worthy companion to The Stage Names. It’s consistent in theme, focusing on the relationships between performer and audience and the price of fame, but with a more rollicking delivery that gives it a more sprightly and sloppy feel than its more meticulous a-side. It’s impossible to imagine that anyone would enjoy the first record but find the second one in some way lacking, so while it might be a little less a coherent whole or as immediately memorable as last year’s release, it’s still a very worthy work that proves the band to be at the very top of their game. The more music they release whilst in this zone, the better.

And courtesy of Against The Grain, I’ve got two pairs of passes to give away to next Sunday’s show with Crooked Fingers as support. To enter, email me at contests AT chromewaves.net with “I give thanks for Okkervil River” in the subject line and your full name in the body. Contest closes at midnight, October 9.

MP3: Okkervil River – “Lost Coastlines”
Video: Okkervil River – “Lost Coastlines”
MySpace: Okkervil River

Photo by Frank Yang

Electro-funk duo Chromeo were far and away the best act at this year’s Rogers Picnic, pulling off the not insignificant feat of getting the crowd dancing even though every move sunk them deeper and deeper into the mud pit that was Fort York. Things should be a little bit drier when they headline the Red Bull Big Bang dance party at Muzik next week on October 9.

They’re performing alongside the likes of Jamie Lidell and Calvin Harris (DJ duties) and courtesy of Last Gang Records, I’ve got two pairs of passes to give away to the festivities. To enter, email me at contests AT chromewaves.net with “I want to show off my fancy footwork” in the subject line and your full name in the body. Contest closes at midnight, October 6.

UGO has an interview with P-Thugg and Billboard talked to Dave 1 about the band’s plans for their next album.

And Muzik is at the Dufferin end of the Exhibition Place grounds in the former Horticulture building, if you were wondering. ‘Cause I sure as hell didn’t know.

MP3: Chromeo – “Fancy Footwork”
Video: Chromeo – “Bonafide Lovin'”
Video: Chromeo – “Fancy Footwork'”
Video: Chromeo – “Tenderoni'”
MySpace: Chromeo

Photo by Frank Yang

Dear every other touring band in the world: we appreciate your interest, but your services are no longer required. We have Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds.

My ticket to their show at the Kool Haus had been sitting on my corkboard for something like six months, and with every listen to Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!, to say nothing of my ongoing explorations of his back catalog, I couldn’t wait for Wednesday night to come fast enough. Cave’s live show has long been regarded as legendary and as a recent convert, I was most anxious to see the spectacle for myself.

The openers were Black Mountain, who were making the most of their visit to the 416 with two shows – three if you include their Polaris gala performance – in five days. As they took the stage, one helpful audience member called out, “please don’t suck!” – no worries there. Despite myriad opportunities, I’d never seen the Vancouver quintet live before and was quite handily impressed. Despite their sludgy, stoner-rock reputation they weren’t unnecessarily loud and displayed considerable musical nimbleness in delivering tracks from In The Future, highlighted by Stephen McBean’s guitar heroics and Amber Webber’s unearthly vocals. And it’s quite an endorsement that the full house of Cave devotees seemed to quite enjoy their set, sending them off with an enthusiastic “you guys were pretty good!”. Which they certainly were.

But on this night, the bar for performance would be set considerably higher than “pretty good”. With the Bad Seeds taking up every square foot of the expanded Kool Haus stage – and if I can make a comic geek joke, Warren Ellis looks an awful lot like Alan Moore – Cave bounded on stage and turned “Night Of The Lotus Eaters” from a relatively low-key, mood piece on album into a searing and sleazy opening salvo that would set the tone for the show. Cave, natty in a purple pinstripe suit, prowled and pounced around the stage looking like the mad preacher offspring of Mephisto and Elvis here to welcome the apocalypse and convince the audience that they should as well. By rights, the persona that Cave inhabits in song and on stage should come off as theatre but he inhabits it so bloody well that there is no questioning it.

Not all was fire and brimstone, though. If his demon-possessed orator wasn’t able to convince you to join his merry voyage of the damned, then with jacket doffed and extra shirt button undone, his seductive balladeer would surely seal the deal. Not that he needed to try that hard to get the crowd to follow him anywhere or even at all – judging from the many declarations of love from the audience, all returned by Cave of course, they were his from note one. Credit must also go to the Bad Seeds, an absolutely crack musical outfit capable of moving from anarchic skronk to elegiac beauty at the drop of the hat, but at the end of the day it’s about Cave, who is definitely one of the most charismatic performers I’ve ever seen.

The one hour, forty-five minute set was pretty much a perfect blend of old material and new, one third drawn from Lazarus and the rest from the entire breadth of his 25-year career. He even seemed to take requests, delivering an elegant “Ship Song” in response to a placard in the audience, though set lists from the rest of the tour implied that it’d have made an appearance anyways. But gestures like that, as well as designating a girl in the audience as “keeper of the towel” – as in the increasingly sweat-soaked implement that he and she tossed back and forth throughout the show – are what make Cave such an engaging frontman. Well, that and an incredible voice, presence, catalog of songs and mustache.

For the encore, Cave and company delivered the two lead tracks from the double-disc masterpiece Abbatoir Blues and The Lyre Of Orpheus, the former turned into a squall of punk rock anarchy and the latter a lurching bit of audience call-and-response, and as a show finale, a scorched earth “Stagger Lee”. Oh mama. So worth the wait.

With Cave’s entire catalog being remastered and reissued in expanded form, I’m waiting a bit before delving further into his works but having now gotten a taste of what awaits me beyond The Best Of and what I’ve already gotten – I just ordered up the Abbatoir Blues Tour set – I can’t wait. The Globe & Mail has an interview with Cave and there’s more joyous reports from Wednesday night’s congregation at eye, Exclaim!, The Toronto Sun and Chart.

Photos: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Black Mountain @ The Kool Haus – October 1, 2008
MP3: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – “Dig, Lazarus Dig!!!”
MP3: Black Mountain – “Tyrants”
Video: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – “Dig, Lazarus Dig!!!”
Video: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – “Night Of The Lotus Eaters”
Video: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – “More News From Nowhere”
Video: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – “Midnight Man”
Video: Black Mountain – “Wucan”
MySpace: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
MySpace: Black Mountain

Oasis’ new record Dig Out Your Soul is currently streaming in its entirety over at the band’s MySpace. It’s out for reals on Tuesday. NME has a piece on Gold And Silver And Sunshine, the making-of doc that’s going to accompany the album in some form, and JAM has some more from Noel Gallagher on the infamous stage attack from last month. Speaking of which, the band have announced a North American tour in December… and curiously, there’s not Toronto date? I wonder why?

Stream: Oasis / Dig Out Your Soul

Radiohead have selected the winner of their “make a video for In Rainbows” contest and made it the official video for “Reckoner”. Which they’re also holding a remix contest.

Video: Radiohead – “Reckoner”

Dave Gedge of The Wedding Present talks about life in California to LiveDaily and reveals to The Georgia Straight that after recording El Rey with Steve Albini, they went back and re-recorded the whole of their debut George Best with him. The Wedding Present are at Lee’s Palace tonight and if you’re going, remember it’s an early show – doors 7:30, Dirty On Purpose at 8:15 and Wedding Present at 9:30 – all over by 11.

Filter discusses matters sartorial with Flight Of The Conchords.

The Secret Machines have offered up the first taste of their new, self-titled album, out October 14. They’re at Lee’s Palace on October 22.

MP3: The Secret Machines – “Atomic Heels”

The Denver Post talks to Oliver Ackerman of A Place To Bury Strangers.

Last seen opening up for The Dandy Warhols, Los Angeles’ Darker My Love are at the Horseshoe for their own show on November 30, tickets $8.50.

QRO interviews The Coast, who are also profiled by The Guardian.

Sloan’s Jay Ferguson chats with The Muse.

The Wilmington Star-News rightly acknowledges both parts of a kick-ass tour crossing the continent, talking to both Okkervil River’s Will Sheff and Crooked Fingers’ Eric Bachmann. The latter’s Fortune/Forfeit is out on Tuesday.

The Tripwire interviews Jose Gonzalez.

The Stranger stops being strangers with Silver Jew David Berman.

After ceasing publication in the real world this past Spring, No Depression is back as a newfangled website, and they’ve got a feature on Basia Bulat. Welcome back.

Earlier this week Pitchfork put together a listing of all the medium and major album releases still due in 2008. I also maintain such a calendar for my own purposes but less interesting than what they noted that I didn’t – a new Wheat album on November 11 and a Cat Power EP on December 9 that shows she’s still in covers girl mode, guess The Sun isn’t coming this year – was what is apparently not showing up this year after all. I don’t necessarily know if these would show up on the ‘Fork radar, but I had been anxiously awaiting First Love from Emmy The Great and Clinging To A Scheme from The Radio Dept, both of which had been originally targeted for a September release. Obviously that’s not happened. My fingers are crossed that at least one will surface before the year’s out, but more than likely their reserved spots in my year-end list will have to carry over to ’09.

Photo by Liam Maloney

Say you’re a band who’s been around a while and whose last album got a good amount of critical and popular acclaim and a nomination for a major music prize in your home country. How do you follow that up? Well, if you’re Murray Lightburn of The Dears, you dissolve the whole band with the exception of your wife (that would probably have been too awkward) and make the follow-up entirely on your own. That is the context for Missiles, the fourth proper album released under the Dears name, out October 21.

The whys of it all are unclear – interviews between Lightburn and Hour.ca and Spinner hint at the usual “creative differences” (as well as referencing a sorta funny and almost certainly fake thread at Stille Post) – but having cut the rest of the gang loose, the net result is an album with a creative process considerably different from past efforts, done entirely by the remaining two members.

Compared to Gang of Losers, which was a fairly concise and straight full band rock record, Missiles is more stripped down and introspective. Rock outs are few and arrangements, while still on the lush side, are decidedly leaner and more prone to wander. It’s not nearly a stark, singer-songwriter record – though there are some decidedly raw voice and acoustic guitar moments, there’s still sonic indulgences like soaring guitar solos, sweeping synths and a children’s choir – but it is a far cry from the grandiose musical statements that defined the band in their early days. It’ll take more listens than I’ve been able to give it to determine if this is a creative step forward, backwards or just a sort of contemplative pause, but considering that The Dears will be hitting the road this Fall as a seven-piece, it’s safe to say that keeping things small isn’t in Lightburn’s long-term plans.

Chart talks to Murray Lightburn and Natalia Yanchak about the album and the fact that it’s apparently now leaked to the internets.

The Autumn tour will bring the all-new, all-different Dears to the Music Gallery next week for two shows, October 9 and 10, and courtesy of Maple Music and Filter, I’ve got a pair of passes to give away to each show. To enter, email me at contests AT chromewaves.net with “I want to see The Dears on the 9th/10th” (only put one of the dates, please) and your full name in the body. Contest closes at midnight, October 5th.

MySpace: The Dears

Exclaim features Land Of Talk, whose Chris McCarron is a touring member of The Dears. Some Are Lakes is out next Tuesday.

Chart talks to Chad Van Gaalen about his two new records out this Fall – Soft Airplane, out now under his own name, and an electronic record to come out under the Black Mold moniker. The Georgia Straight, Metro, The Hour also have interviews. Van Gaalen is playing the El Mocambo on Saturday night and will do a brief in-store beforehand at Sonic Boom at 6PM. And congrats to Matt who won the contest for passes and a copy of the album on LP.

And Van Gaalen’s tourmates/bandmates in Women will also be doing an in-store, this one at Soundscapes on October 5 at 1PM. Their self-titled debut has been out in Canada since July but gets a US release on October 7.

MP3: Women – “Black Rice”
MP3: Women – “Group Transport Hall”

The UK discovers the wonders of Woodpigeon, with writeups in The Guardian, Q and Metro. If you haven’t grabbed a copy of their limited-edition Treasury Canada Library album, you really really really should.

The New Pornographers have made a new video, though not of pornography.

Video: The New Pornographers – “Mutiny, I Promise You”

Also with the new video action – Final Fantasy, with a clip for one of the tracks from his new Spectrum, 14th Century EP. Still forthcoming is Plays To Please, out October 21. Not entirely sure where you get them in physical form right now, but checking in at his label will surely yield some info in that direction.

Video: Final Fantasy – “The Butcher”

LAist talks to Stars frontman Torq Campbell. They’re at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre on December 12 and 13.

PitchforkTV has a two–part video session with Broken Social Scene, who will be at the Sound Academy on November 27.

Photo by Frank Yang

So technically, I was correct a few weeks ago about there being a surprise appearance involving My Bloody Valentine’s Kevin Shields and Gemma Hayes while the two were in town last week. Except instead of Shields sitting in on Hayes’ show at Supermarket on Friday, it was Hayes making an unannounced appearance as support at the My Bloody Valentine show at the Kool Haus the night before. A set I missed because I was elsewhere.

Friday’s was a much more suitable setting, however, even with the usual chatty crowds in the restaurant area of the venue. Shortly after taking the stage, Hayes asked the audience, “so what are you all doing here?” in reference to the fact that she’d never been to Toronto before, even though that was exactly why we were there. And it was a surprisingly large crowd that showed up to welcome her – maybe no more than fifty, but considering the short notice of the show’s announcement and her general low profile in North America, still impressive.

For her part, Hayes played acoustically but accompanied by multi-instrumentalist Joe Chester who added much-welcome electric guitar and keyboard accents to the songs, reproducing some of the depth and texture of the studio versions. Even so, the setup kept her more in her singer-songwriter guise than the rock side that evidences itself far too rarely, opting to stick to the quieter material of her last two records though the fact that her voice cracked a couple times in the set perhaps indicated that there was some exhaustion involved as well. The set was a bit on the short side – forty-five minutes or so – but she largely sounded wonderful in that time and I felt fortunate that she was even playing a show of her own at all. With her new record The Hollow Of Morning getting a domestic release this week, perhaps it’ll get a proper push and she’ll be back to play some more before long.

Photos: Gemma Hayes @ Supermarket – September 26, 2008
MP3: Gemma Hayes – “Happy Sad”
Video: Gemma Hayes – “Back Of My Hand”
Video: Gemma Hayes – “Hanging Around”
Video: Gemma Hayes – “Let A Good Thing Go”
Video: Gemma Hayes – “Happy Sad”
MySpace: Gemma Hayes

Ah the best laid plans… part of my intention for going to New York City during CMJ was to catch Emmy The Great in addition to Lucky Soul – I was hoping that she’d be playing one of the three days of the festival that i was in town but alas, she’s playing the BrooklynVegan showcase on the 21st, fully two days before I arrive, so unless she’s got more shows lined up there will be no Emmy for me. As a consolation, The Brother Kite have a show on the 23rd, when I arrive, so that’s something. Anyways, though the targeted September release date for Emmy’s debut First Love has come and gone with no new date announced, there’s a single for “We Almost Had A Baby” coming out on November 10 and hopefully the album will be out this calendar year. You can stream a few new tracks, presumably from the new record, at her MySpace and there’s a new video for the single.

Video: Emmy The Great – “We Almost Had A Baby”

Duffy tells Wales Online that she’s a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

The San Francisco Bay Guardian, Metro and LAist interview David Berman of Silver Jews.

The new Okkervil River vid was actually released to the internets last week, but only in the US. It now belongs to the world. They’re at the Phoenix on October 12.

Video: Okkervil River – “Lost Coastlines”

And via Matablog, information about a forthcoming Shearwater digital-only release in the form of an EP for “The Snow Leopard” from Rook. It will be released October 14 and in addition to the album track (which you can hear below), it will contain some b-sides and live recordings.

MP3: Shearwater – “The Snow Leopard”

A couple new videos from Fleet Foxes and The Jealous Girlfriends.

Video: Fleet Foxes – “He Doesn’t Know Why”
Video: The Jealous Girlfriends – “Organs On The Kitchen Floor”

Blurt chats with Kurt Wagner of Lambchop, whose OH (ohio) hits the streets on October 7. And at the same time Wagner hits the road for a solo tour which brings him to the Drake Underground on October 6.

The Los Angeles Times and Wireless Bollinger talk to Joey Burns of Calexico, in town at the Phoenix on November 18.

Norwegian crooner Sonde Lerche has a date at the Mod Club on November 14. Tickets $18.50.

CSS will ride Donkey into the Opera House on December 15. Full tour dates at BrooklynVegan.

MP3: CSS – “Alala”
MP3: CSS – “Rat Is Dead (Rage)

This Is Fake DIY has a video session and a video interview with Sky Larkin.

The Huffington Post gets political with Ted Leo.