Frank YangThe technology woes that made the end of last week so unexpectedly… interesting have largely been resolved – hello from my new laptop – but Thursday night was most definitely an evening that I was perfectly fine with not having anything to do with anything electronic. In other words, an ideal time for The Head & The Heart.

The acoustically-inclined Seattle six-piece’s self-titled debut was originally self-released last year but being rootsy, harmonious and from the Pacific northwest it was inevitable that Sub Pop would come a-calling. And so it was that between the digital re-release of the record back in January and its physical re-release on April 16, the band were on a transcontinental tour, both as support for the likes of Dr. Dog and The Walkmen and as headliners, as they were this evening. So even though the full promotional push for the record was probably yet to come, word had clearly already gotten out to some degree and a decently-sized crowd as in place to welcome them to Toronto for the first time.

It’d be easy and not entirely inaccurate to assume from the beards and toques that The Head & The Heart would be easily comparable to their geographic and label brethren in Fleet Foxes or Band Of Horses – certainly they’d be listed as RIYLs – but to my ears the best reference point comes a few thousand miles southeast and a decade in the past – specifically, Pneumonia-era Whiskeytown. Though they build their sound on Kenny Hensley’s piano rather than with guitars, there’s more than a bit of Ryan Adams twang in frontman Joseph Russel’s voice and Charity Rose Thielen’s contributions on vocals and violin are reminiscent of Caitlin Cary and her fiddle. And more than that, their songs share the sort of rich and finely-arranged melodicism that Whiskeytown achieved on their swan song once the punk-rock raggedness was fully contained.

But that’s just a reference point, and doesn’t account for the fact that rather than evoke the sort of weariness that Whiskeytown did – even when smoothed out – The Head & The Heart come from a much more wide-eyed and optimistic place, and the enthusiasm that goes along with that was fully on display in performance. You wouldn’t think that they were dancing in the studio while recording the record but after seeing them play, you can’t imagine that they weren’t – rarely were they stationary while playing, instead stepping and sliding around the stage, moved by the music. With Josiah Johnson and Russel alternating lead vocals – the former’s croon contrasting nicely with the latter’s rasp – or together with Thielen filling out the three-part harmony, often delivered with a gospel-ish fervor. Though the record only clocks in at around 35 minutes, they managed to fill out an impressive and energized hour-long set with a couple new songs and humble, charming and appreciative banter. A superb local debut from an act that we will be hearing much more of in the future.

Creative Loafing and Seattle’s City Arts have interviews with the band.

Photos: The Head & The Heart @ The Horseshoe – February 24, 2011
MP3: The Head & The Heart – “Down In The Valley”

Filter pits tourmates Josh Ritter and Frightened Rabbit’s Scott Hutchison in an interview throw-down.

Spinner talks to Lissie.

Paste catches up with Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes, who’re at the Sound Academy on March 13.

Incendiary interviews Wye Oak, whose new record Civilian is out on March 8 and available to stream at NPR right now. They play The El Mocambo on April 9.

Stream: Wye Oak / Civilian

Also streaming at NPR is The Mountain Goats’ latest All Eternals Deck, even though it’s not out for over a month – it has a street date of March 29. They’ll be at The Opera House on April 3.

Stream: The Mountain Goats / All Eternals Deck

Portugal. The Man, whose latest American Ghetto came out last year, have put together a Spring tour that stops in at Lee’s Palace on May 27.

MP3: Portugal. The Man – “People Say”

Spinner chats with J Mascis, whose new solo record Several Shades Of Why is out on March 15 and who has a couple of performances on tap in Toronto for March 11 – an in-store at Sonic Boom at 5PM and a full and proper show at The Great Hall later that evening.

Drive-By Truckers work the media as Patterson Hood of talks to Jambands, Mike Cooley chats with The Lincoln Journal-Star and Shona Tucker with The Las Vegas Review Journal, all for their latest album Go-Go Boots.

Tiny Mix Tapes talks to some of the performers taking part in the Elephant 6 Holiday Surprise Tour that rolls into Lee’s Palace on March 18.

The Wall Street Journal profiles DeVotchKa, who release their new record 100 Lovers tomorrow. They play The Mod Club on March 30.

R.E.M. bassist Mike Mills talks to Billboard about why the band won’t be touring behind their new record Collapse Into Now after it’s released on March 8. A stream of the record will be posted at NPR tomorrow at 2PM EST.

Frank YangYou would think that my appreciation of a triple-bill of artists familiar and favoured would be of the “comfort food” variety more than anything else, but Saturday night’s lineup at the Horseshoe featuring Jenn Grant, Rae Spoon and Olenka & The Autumn Lovers offered up more than its share of pleasant surprises.

By rights, Olenka’s superb second album And Now We Sing should have gotten a proper writeup hereabouts by now, but having stuck it on my 2010 year-end list without having uttered a word about it beforehand, it felt like that was the more compelling endorsement. I’ll expand a bit now, though, and say that with this record, the London, Ontario outfit has gone from a Balkan-inflected orchestral folk collective to an astonishingly ambitious and versatile band – the core of their sound remains, but their songs are richer, more melodic and dynamic and able to include heretofore foreign elements like a big rock guitar solo or countrified steel twang and make it feel like the most natural thing in the world. Each song on Sing is its own distinct and fully-realized work but fit perfectly alongside each other, strung together on Olenka Krakus’ rich and rangy voice, to make a whole even greater than the sum of its impressive parts. And this, very briefly, is why And Now We Sing was one of my favourite listens to come out of 2010.

Which brings us back to Saturday night; whereas she played her last show at The Horseshoe last November solo, this time Krakus brought along the Autumn Lover ladies string section – Sara Froese on violin, Kelly Wallraff on cello and both on vocals – and a non-lady (read: guy) on upright bass. Yes indeed, there were a lot of f-holes on stage and accordingly, the song selection leaned towards their more old world eastern European roots both in sound and lyrical theme. Now Krakus is a strong solo performer, but it can’t be overstated how much the strings and more crucially, Froese and Wallraff’s harmonies brought to their sound, nor the fact that even though the band configuration meant that most of my favourite songs from Sing were left out of the set, it was still a wholly satisfying performance. Think about that.

Seeing as how Rae Spoon performs solo, it’s more difficult for him to mix things up but even so, it wasn’t the same show as I saw when he play The Rivoli in November 2009. For starters, that show was in support of his mostly-folky and wholly-beautiful Superioryouareinferior and since then, he’s put out the decidedly more electro-dance Love Is A Hunter and picked up an electric guitar. But even plugged in and backed by a laptop, Spoon couldn’t hide his countrified roots and even made the relative failure to completely reinvent himself as a disco maven a recurring joke throughout the set, amongst many other jokes – he had some top-notch comedic material at the ready. That, and a voice of heart-breaking clarity and a brace of great songs were really all he needed for a successful set.

I had been more than a few years since I saw Halifax’s Jenn Grant, celebrating the release of her third album Honeymoon Punch, in a live setting so it’s entirely possible that she’s grown from fronting a basic four-piece band to leading a six-piece keyboard-loaded musical army… but I am guessing not. Nevertheless, she and her bandmates clearly came set to do full justice to the bouncy, synth-heavy pop of her latest effort – a sound which to these ears, at least, suits her the best of the singer-songwriter/adult-contemporary/folk-jazz styles that she’s touched on over the years. The sophisticated flourishes in her singing and songwriting couldn’t be suppressed if you tried, so having them accent big, hooky tunes that match her own natural effervescence sounds like a no-brainer and make for a pretty terrific record.

The show was front-ended with a mix of older and newer material, keeping the dynamic at a fairly steady keel and if anyone in the packed house had not yet heard the new record, it probably would have felt perfectly familiar for the first while. But a solo turn on Punch‘s gentlest moment, the Sarah Harmer-ish “Paradise Mountain”, marked the start of what was basically a recital of the new record; all of it ended up getting aired and that was absolutely fine with me and, it seemed, the rest of the packed house. Care was taken to reproduce as many of the album’s tones and textures as possible – hence the five-part synth orchestra on “Walk Away” and the marching band tom which Grant took great delight in banging around stage for the outro of main set closer “Stars To Waves”. For the encore, there was a cover of Ron Sexsmith’s “Dragonfly On Bay St” and finally her first single “Dreamer”, before calling it a night and capping a performance that affirmed that if Honeymoon Punch makes Jenn Grant a star – as it rightly should – she’s more than ready to take the call.

The Autumn ringers, which is to say local Torontonian musicians, will sit in with Olenka when she opens up for Mark Berube at The Garrison on March 3 and the full and proper Autumn Lovers will be on hand for their Canadian Musicfest showcases, Friday March 11 at 4PM at a venue to be announced and then 8PM that same night at The Drake Underground. The Vancouver Sun, Northern Life and The Georgia Straight have interviews with Rae Spoon. The Waterloo Record and NOW have features on Jenn Grant.

Photos: Jenn Grant, Rae Spoon, Olenka & The Autumn Lovers @ The Horseshoe – February 19, 2011
MP3: Jenn Grant – “Dreamer”
MP3: Rae Spoon – “Death By Elektro”
MP3: Rae Spoon – “You Can Dance”
MP3: Rae Spoon – “Come On Forest Fire” (CPI Remix)
MP3: Rae Spoon – “There Is A Light”
MP3: Rae Spoon – “Come On Forest Fire Burn The Disco Down”
MP3: Olenka & The Autumn Lovers – “Odessa”
Video: Jenn Grant – “Getcha Good”
Video: Jenn Grant – “You’ll Go Far”
Video: Jenn Grant – “Heartbreaker”
Video: Jenn Grant – “Dreamer”
Video: Rae Spoon – “There is a Light (But It’s Not For Everyone)”
Video: Rae Spoon – “Joan”
Video: Rae Spoon – “Love Is A Hunter”

PS I Love You have released a new MP3 that features a little vocal help from compadre Diamond Rings. PS I Love You is at The Garrison on April 7.

MP3: PS I Love You – “Leftovers” (featuring Diamond Rings)

I don’t recall having seen either of these videos by The Besnard Lakes from The Besnard Lakes Are The Roaring Night – maybe you haven’t either.

Video: The Besnard Lakes – “Albatross”
Video: The Besnard Lakes – “And This Is What We Call Progress”

China Shop talks to Stephen Ramsay of Young Galaxy, who are at Lee’s Palace on March 10 and have made a new remix EP available to download for free.

ZIP: Young Galaxy / Cover Your Tracks

The National Post and JAM caught up with members of Arcade Fire in the immediate wake of last week’s big Grammy win, while New York Magazine addresses the whole “never heard of them” reaction that also occurred in the wake of the big Grammy win. The National Post also has an interview with the band about their collaborative short film with Spike Jonze.

Frank YangFact one: The Radio Dept. are not, by any conventional standard, an exciting live band. Fact two: I was terribly excited to see The Radio Dept. make their live Toronto debut on Monday night. The first point I’d gained first-hand knowledge of when I took a pilgrimage to see them in New York City in May 2009 for what I figured would be my only chance to see the band who’d made some of my favourite records of the past decade live, and so the fact that I was wrong about that and they were finally coming to my own hood cemented point two. And I wasn’t the only one who’d been waiting patiently for this day, judging from the other 500 people who sold out Lee’s Palace for the occasion.

Theirs wasn’t the only Toronto debut happening on this evening, though technically Young Prisms took their first Hogtown stage earlier that afternoon across the street at Sonic Boom for an in-store. Still, this was probably the first introduction for most to the group of San Francisco youngsters who just released their debut album Friends For Now and even for those of us who’d heard them in advance, there were still some revelations. For example, so effectively is the album sonically obscured and wrapped in distortion that I didn’t realize their lead singer was a girl until she took the mic. Live, they were less about the fuzz and more about the pummel, the bass and guitar often working in tandem for a unified, full-frequency drone attack with one or the other occasionally breaking formation to contribute some melody. All of which would have been overly dull if not for the fact that they had some solid pop tunes anchoring it all and a pleasantly goofy demeanour – in particular, they seemed really excited about both the concept and execution of poutine.

The Radio Dept. are about their songs. The writing of and the recording of those heartrendingly sublime synth/fuzz pop gems, first and foremost, and not the performing of or heavens forfend the promotion of, hence their taking years upon years to release a new record and reluctance to take it on the road. But because those records and songs are so good, their fans around the world can’t help but clamour to hear them live and when they oblige, as they’ve done so more frequently in the past couple of years, it’s on their terms. I think this is important to appreciating their show, which is stripped-down to say the least. Playing in near-darkness with Martin Larsson on guitar and bass, Daniel Tjäder on keys and laptop and Johan Duncanson on guitar run through a cheap-as-you-get practice guitar amp, they were clearly not about spectacle.

With the simplicity of their presentation and reliance on pre-recorded backing tracks, they often seemed like they were jamming overtop CDs or drum machines in their basements, making music for the joy of making music, never mind anything else. And that was really what it was – rather than recontextualizing their songs for the stage, it was as if they instead invited the audience into their studio to hear them work. And really, though I’m as much pro-live drummer as anyone you’ll ever meet, it would have just been wrong on many of these songs, whose simple, distorted mechanical rhythms are like their beating hearts. All of which is to say that yes, The Radio Dept. are understated performers – almost to a fault – but it’s how it has to be.

Happily, the audience seemed to understand this and there was no restlessness in the house over the course of the set. In fact, the enthusiasm of the packed house was rather at odds with the band’s reservedness – between the hearty applause after every song, each one someone out there’s favourite, and hollered requests or just thanks, their Scandinavian stoicism cracked more than a few times into smiles or even grins. They may not like touring but that doesn’t mean they can’t enjoy it. In return, they played a set that leaned heavily on their breakthrough Clinging To A Scheme and featured only a couple each from Pet Grief and Lesser Matters, but in keeping with the theme of their Passive Aggressive compilation, long-time fans were still rewarded with a good number of non-album singles and b-sides. At an hour including the one-song encore – the soaring “Pulling Our Weight” b-side “The City Limits” – it was far too short a night with too many wonderful songs left unplayed – especially considering that the odds of them returning soon, if ever, are long at best – but that, like expecting rock moves or extended banter, was the wrong perspective to take. That they were here at all was a gift, and a near-perfect one.

Exclaim also has a review of the show while Toronto Star and The Boston Globe have interviews with The Radio Dept. SF Weekly has an interview with Young Prisms, who are back for a show at Parts & Labour on April 21 supporting The Fresh & Onlys.

Photos: The Radio Dept., Young Prisms @ Lee’s Palace – February 7, 2011
MP3: The Radio Dept. – “On Your Side”
MP3: The Radio Dept. – “The One”
MP3: The Radio Dept. – “The New Improved Hypocrisy”
MP3: The Radio Dept. – “Never Follow Suit”
MP3: The Radio Dept. – “Heaven’s On Fire”
MP3: The Radio Dept. – “Freddie & The Trojan Horse”
MP3: The Radio Dept. – “David”
MP3: The Radio Dept. – “The Worst Taste In Music”
MP3: The Radio Dept – “A Window”
MP3: The Radio Dept – “Pulling Our Weight”
MP3: The Radio Dept. – “Why Won’t You Talk About It?”
MP3: Young Prisms – “Sugar”
MP3: Young Prisms – “Weekends And Treehouses”
Video: The Radio Dept. – “Never Follow Suit”
Video: The Radio Dept. – “The Worst Taste In Music”
Video: The Radio Dept. – “Where Damage Isn’t Already Done”
Video: The Radio Dept. – “Pulling Our Weight”

The Fly talks to Lykke Li, whose Wounded Rhymes arrives March 1. She’s at The Phoenix on May 22 and just released a new/alternate video from said record.

Video: Lykke Li – “I Follow Rivers”

Jonsi has released a video from his live album/video Live At The Wiltern, available digitally only.

Video: Jonsi – “Go Do”

A second Jeff Tweedy solo show has been announced for March 23 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre; ticket presale goes today at 10AM regular on-sale is Friday. Support for both Tweedy shows and his whole solo tour comes from Toronto’s Snowblink, whose debut Long Live is out next Tuesday and who has an in-store at Soundscapes on March 3 and an album release show at The Music Gallery on March 5.

Basia Bulat will play at The Great Hall on March 26 as part of JunoFest; tickets for the show are $17.50 or free with the $30 JunoFest wristband. And who doesn’t want a JunoFest wristband? They’re like the new LiveStrong wristband. Except not.

MP3: Basia Bulat – “Gold Rush”

Titus Andronicus have assembled a Spring tour that includes an April 1 date at The Horseshoe. Tickets are $11.50, medical bills for the bedlam that will ensue are on you.

MP3: Titus Andronicus – “A More Perfect Union”

The Civil Wars, who’ve just released their debut Barton Hollow, will camp out at the El Mocambo for two night across April 5 and 6, tickets for each show $10.50 in advance.

MP3: The Civil Wars – “Barton Hollow”

Liam Finn will be at Lee’s Palace on April 7 with The Luyas as support. Tickets for the show are $15.

MP3: Liam Finn – “Plane Crash”
MP3: The Luyas – “Tiny Head”

Just as they promised last week when opening for The Decemberists, Wye Oak will be back on April 9 for a show at The El Mocambo. Their new record Civilian will have been out a month and a day by that point. Let’s hope Jenn Wasner’s guitar amp survives the duration of the show this time.

MP3: Wye Oak – “Civlian”

Nashville rock-rockers accumulating quite the buzz overseas Mona will be in town for a free show at The Horseshoe on April 19. Advance word likens them to Kings Of Leon so maybe make plans to get there early or stay far far away. Their self-titled debut is out May 16.

Video: Mona – “Teenager”

Frank YangIt’s a testament to the devotion of Decemberists fans that even the threat/promise of the Winter storm of the season/year/decade/century couldn’t deter them from making the trek down to the waterfront to see the Portlanders bring their recently-anointed number-one record in America The King Is Dead to town. I do, however, assume that most checked forecasts and confirmed that the storm wasn’t supposed to reach the 416 until around midnight, which is about when the band were estimated to be done. Or at least I did. I like me some Decemberists but I like me not driving into a frozen Lake Ontario due to whiteout conditions more.

At any rate, a nearly full house made it out for the show and luckily, so did the bands as they were coming from the opposite direction of the storm, though they’d already pre-emptively cancelled the following night’s performance in Royal Oak, Michigan and had accepted being snowed in in Toronto for at least a day. These should have been familiar environs for Baltimoreans Wye Oak, seeing as how this was their third visit here in the past 10 months. This time was intended as a preview for their forthcoming third record Civilian, due out March 8, and judging from the applause that net the duo of Andy Stack and Jenn Wasner when they strode out onto the stage, it was evident that their regular visits had been successful at building a fanbase. And making good records has probably also helped. Another benefit of the steady touring is that they’ve become a much more confident live act. Certainly the amount of showmanship they can indulge in is limited by their configuration, but Wasner’s vocals were deeper and more dramatic than I recall – perhaps some lessons learned while touring with Shearwater – and when she stepped out for one of her many guitar solos, they were delivered more theatrically. And while Stack remained anchored behind the kit handling percussion and keyboard duties, the rhythms and tones he was pulling off simultaneously were nimbler and more complex. They managed to incorporate both new material and old into their set, which was cut extra short – about 20 minutes total – when Wasner’s new guitar amp gave up the ghost. Unfortunate, but still impressive and they promised they’d be back in April so they can make it up to us then.

The last time The Decemberists came to town, it was on the back of their folk-rock opera opus The Hazards Of Love and the live production was appropriately grandiose. But just as The King Is Dead represented a stylistic retreat to their folk-rock roots, their latest tour was a back-to-basics sort of affair. Not in a casual coffee house sense – Colin Meloy’s checkered shirt and Chris Funk’s jaunty cap were as much costume as anything they’d have worn on past tours – but without the need to adhere to a particular theme or narrative, they were freed up to, for the most part, showcase their best material from throughout their career.

That the evening would be a romp through their repertoire became clear from the very first song, when instead of spotlighting their latest effort, they opened with “Song For Myra Goldberg” from their second record Her Majesty. And while King would be well-represented over the course of the evening, making up nearly half the set, the liberal amount of back catalog favourites that comprised the other half naturally got the strongest response. One curious choice, however, was “Won’t Want For Love” from Hazards in which the lead vocals were handed over to touring Decemberist Sara Watkins (late of Nickel Creek). Not the strongest offering from the Hazards libretto to begin with, it was even odder out of the context of the record and Watkins’ voice, as clear and strong as it is, lacked the distinct character of Becky Stark on the original – all of which is to say it stood out from the rest of the set and not for the right reasons. Otherwise, selections like “The Crane Wife 3” and “The Sporting Life” were executed with aplomb, and the new songs sounded excellent alongside them.

One interesting facet of the evening was Colin Meloy’s punchy mood; usually his demeanour is akin to a charming carnival ringleader, so seeing him take some uncharacteristically acerbic jabs at some of the louder members of the audience at the start of the show was rather odd. His rough edges did smooth out as the set went on, though, and by the time they rolled into main set closer “16 Military Wives” with its audience participatory singalongs, he seemed to be his playful old self again. As such, the encore double-shot of “The Chimbley Sweep” and “The Mariner’s Revenge Song” played like a greatest hits of Decemberists live antics. On the former, Meloy commandeered an audience camera to take a series of impromptu band portraits and then swapping places with drummer Jon Moen to allow him to… sing? Freestyle? Rant? I’m not sure, but it was pretty funny. And on the latter, they revisited the Chris Funk-directed whale devouring simulation I remember from their visit to the Phoenix way back in 2005. But hey, the classics never go out of style, right? And though by this point many had already headed home, there were enough who hung around to invite one more encore, King‘s lovely “June Hymn”. And with that, it was time to say goodnight and head out into the just-arrived storm front.

BlogTO also has a review of the show and City Pages talks to bassist Nate Query. The Decemberists also premiered a new song during a visit to kids’ television show Yo Gabba Gabba – Rolling Stone has the clip.

Photos: The Decemberists, Wye Oak @ The Sound Academy – February 1, 2011
MP3: The Decemberists – “Down By The Water”
MP3: The Decemberists – “The Engine Driver”
MP3: The Decemberists – “The Soldiering Life”
MP3: The Decemberists – “Here I Dreamt I Was An Architect”
MP3: Wye Oak – “Civilian”
MP3: Wye Oak – “Take It In”
MP3: Wye Oak – “Warning”
Video: The Decemberists – “O Valencia”
Video: The Decemberists – “16 Military Wives”
Video: The Decemberists – “The Tain”
Video: The Decemberists – “The Soldiering Life”
Video: The Decemberists – “Here I Dreamt I Was An Architect”
Video: The Decemberists – “The Bachelor & The Bride”

R.E.M. has premiered a video from their new record Collapse Into Now over at Pitchfork. The record is out March 8.

Video: R.E.M. – “Mine Smells Like Honey”

NYC Taper is sharing a recording of Mission Of Burma’s show at Maxwell’s in New Jersey last weekend.

Under The Radar interviews Sufjan Stevens.

Fleet Foxes frontman Robin Pecknold discusses their just-announced new record Helplessness Blues, due out May 3, with Rolling Stone.

Jayhawks record from Gary Louris, though nothing more concrete in the way of release date than the first half of this year.

The Wall Street Journal talks to Annie Clark of St. Vincent.

Paste catches up with Nicole Atkins, whose new record Mondo Amore comes out next week and who will play The Horseshoe on February 26.

Death & Taxes gets some insight into the low end on Telekinesis’ new record 12 Desperate Straight Lines, out February 15. They’re at The Horseshoe on March 6.

DeVotchKa have released a video for the almost-title track from their forthcoming 100 Lovers. It’s out March 1 and they’re at The Mod Club on March 30.

Video: DeVotchKa – “100 Other Lovers”

Old 97’s play a World Cafe session for NPR; they’re at The Horseshoe on April 6.

Frank YangMy affection for The Jayhawks goes a long ways back, but not quite far enough. I became a fan around ’96, when I got a copy of Tomorrow The Green Grass via the old BMG Music Club – remember that? – by which point co-frontman Mark Olson had already left the band. Which meant that the only Jayhawks I got to experience in real-time was the second incarnation of the band, led solely by Gary Louris. And so while I appreciate why folks refer to the lineup that made Green Grass and Hollywood Town Hall as the “classic” lineup, I will always rise to the defense of any of Smile, Sound Of Lies or Rainy Day Music should someone try to diminish their worth.

That said, seeing Olson centre-stage at The Phoenix on Tuesday night fronting the reunited Jayhawks on the occasion of the deluxe reissue of those two timeless records, it was impossible to deny there was a certain kind of magic about the show generated by the reunion of he and Louris. Most obviously it was there in their vocals and the way their harmonies interlocked – as good as they sounded individually it was like their voices were meant to be together for always – but also in the way their guitars played off one another, Olson’s acoustic rhythm and Louris’ searing electric leads reminding that they played both sides of the country-rock tag equally and just that undefinable but undeniable chemistry between them. I’d seen the Louris-led Jayhawks in this same room back in 2004 and a short Olson solo in-store in 2007 and both more than stood tall on their own, but together with their old bandmates and those songs? Wow. If you ever want an example of two artists who just belong together, it’s them.

As befit the occasion, the hour-forty-five set stopped the clock at 1995 (save for a short excursion to 2003 when drummer Tim O’Regan sang “Tampa To Tulsa” from Rainy Day Music) and showcased broad swathes of Tomorrow The Green Grass and Hollywood Town Hall along with b-sides from the aforementioned reissues, as well as going back to their self-titled debut for a few and airing out some new songs from their just-completed new record. While it’s too early to comment on the quality of the new songs, they certainly had that vintage Jayhawks feel about them which, as far as first impressions go, is all anyone can ask. And as good as it is that The Jayhawks are intent on being a creatively active concern, on this night the fans were out to hear the old stuff and they got it.

The execution wasn’t always perfect – there were some off-harmonies, some missed cues, and by the show-closing jam on “Lights” the band’s tiredness was showing – but the spirit of the evening, both the celebration of their works and the gratitude that so many had come out to witness their return, more than carried them through those patches. Even though they promised a return engagement later in the Summer after their record was released, this first night of the tour and the official return of The Jayhawks was a special, singular occasion.

The Calgary Herald, Chicago Tribune, Exclaim, Blurt and The Aquarian have interviews with Louris and Olson while Spinner, Exclaim and American Songwriter were in attendance at the show.

Photos: The Jayhawks @ The Phoenix – January 18, 2011
Video: The Jayhawks – “Save It For A Rainy Day”
Video: The Jayhawks – “Big Star”
Video: The Jayhawks – “Blue”
Video: The Jayhawks – “Waiting For The Sun”
Video: The Jayhawks – “Settled Down Like Rain”
Myspace: The Jayhawks

Donewaiting talks to Sharon Van Etten and The National’s Aaron Dessner, who is working with her on her next record, while Philadelphia Weekly chats with her on her own. Van Etten is at The Drake Underground on April 12.

The National’s episode of Austin City Limits, which also features a set from Iron & Wine Band Of Horses, is now available to stream online.

Iron & Wine’s new record Kiss Each Other Clean is currently available to stream at Team Coco in advance of its release next Tuesday. The Sydney Morning Herald has a talk with Sam Beam.

Stream: Iron & Wine – “Kiss Each Other Clean”

Under The Radar and The New Zealand Herald talk to Alex Scally of Beach House.

There’s an MP3 available from the new Drive-By Truckers album Go-Go Boots, due out February 22. The Broward Palm Beach New Times talks to Patterson Hood about the new record.

MP3: Drive-By Truckers – “Used To Be A Cop”

There’s a new She & Him video. Yes, it’s full of Zooey. Yes, it’s adorable. No, that’s probably not Matt Ward dancing.

Video: She & Him – “Don’t Look Back”

The first MP3 from The Mountain Goats’ new record All Eternals Deck is now up for grabs. It’s out March 29 and they’re at The Opera House on April 3.

MP3: The Mountain Goats – “Damn These Vampires”

And also in the “why couldn’t they have released this yesterday when I posted the tour dates”, the first MP3 from the new DeVotchKa record 100 Lovers, out March 1. They’re at The Mod Club on March 30.

MP3: DeVotchKa – “One Hundred Other Lovers”

Rolling Stone gets some specifics on the new Strokes record, out March 22 and possibly called Angles.