Bits and pieces today. Drips and drabs.

With the release of The Cardigans’ Super Extra Gravity in Europe last week, the press is starting to descend on the band for features, interviews, etc. Here’s some of the first salvo – pieces from The Independent, Gigwise and Contact Music. There’s also a radio session with XFM up for your streaming pleasure. Last I checked, the record was still due for a Canadian release tomorrow, but I suspect it’ll be more like a couple weeks before actual copies start showing up in shops. Oh, Said The Gramophone has another track from the new album available to download.

Wilco have put up a 4-song preview of Kicking Television in their Roadcase. The full double-album will be in stores November 15.

Harp makes sweet sweet interview love to Sigur Ros.

Metromix declares Arcade Fire “rookie of the year”. Win Butler accepts the award by phone.

Toronto Life interviews the man behind the curtain for Broken Social Scene – producer Dave Newfeld. The Boston Globe settles for the Great and Powerful Oz – ak Kevin Drew.

Colin Meloy of The Decemberists confesses to The Daily Nebraskan that he’s downloaded leaked records before, even though he asked that anyone who had a leaked copy of Picaresque before its release earlier this year to not post it online.

I stopped in at the release party for the new Fall issue of Shameless magazine yesterday afternoon and caught performances by Republic Of Safety and Couger Party. Neither act was really my thing, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t take pictures. Just a few, though.

With the release of The Complete Calvin & Hobbes, the Associated Press takes a stab at tracking down Bill Watterson. With little success. I saw the three-volume hardbound set in a store the other day – it looked absolutely gorgeous.

Oh yeah, check this out:

SELL! SELLLLL!!!!

np – Okkervil River / Black Sheep Boy

We’ve got a sort of covers theme going on today…

various artists / This Bird Has Flown (Razor & Tie) At first glance, it looks like a can’t-miss proposition. In honour of Rubber Soul‘s 40th anniversary, gather up fourteen top-notch, mostly indie-friendly acts and get them to cover one track a piece from the album. Compile, simmer, salt to taste. Serves 4. But that’s actually why This Bird Has Flown (out Tuesday), for all its good intentions, ultimately fails – it’s just too by-the-numbers. Almost every act contributes versions so faithful, they’re pretty much pointless. I don’t expect grand reinvention from The Donnas (“Drive My Car”) or Ben Kweller (“Wait”), but I expect better from Low (“Nowhere Man”). Some of the artists who do try something a little different succeed in putting their own stamp on the material, like Ted Leo’s echoplex-driven “I’m Looking Through You” or Sufjan Stevens’ “What Goes On”, but others fail miserably (The Fiery Furnaces’ abhorrent “Norwgian Wood”). But really, better the spectacular failure than the utterly bland – and sadly, that’s what most of this is.

Sun Kil Moon / Tiny Cities (Caldo Verde) Everyone who had “An album of Modest Mouse covers” in the “What is the next Sun Kil Moon album going to be?” pool, hands up. Liars. But that’s what Mark Kozelek has given us with Tiny Cities (out November 1) – an album of Isaac Brock compositions. The conceit is largely lost on me, however, since I’ve only got one Modest Mouse album (yeah, that one) and have only ever heard two (I sold my copy of The Lonesome Crowded West a long time ago). The only song I can make an education comparison of is the album closer, “Ocean Breathes Salty”, originally one of the poppier numbers on Good New For People Who Love Bad News, and frankly, if I hadn’t compared track lists, I’d never have known that I had the original of this tune in my collection. Like all of these songs, Kozelek performs musical alchemy on the original, turning it into a beautiful, meditative ballad that actually make Brock’s lyrics listenable (I’m not the biggest MM fan…) and you know what? The dude can write. Though brief at barely 30 minutes long, Tiny Cities shouldn’t disappoint Kozelek fans no matter what they think of Modest Mouse. The San Francisco Chronicle interviews Mark Kozelek (via Largehearted Boy).

The Arrogants (MySpace) The Arrogants serve up note-perfect indie-pop, striking the perfect balance between crunchy upbeat numbers and dreamy slow songs, all anchored by Jana Heller’s sugar-sweet vocals. While you can follow their influences directly across the Atlantic to the UK’s C86 scene, but they also sound quintessentially Californian (which fits, since they’re from California). I hear bits of The Sundays, Heavenly, Belly, but it’s never derivitive. Superb stuff. They’ve just released their third album, You’ve Always Known Best When To Say Goodbye, is available at TweeKitten and comes with a bonus DVD. Go listen to their MySpace samples, check out some more bits and pieces here and then go buy the record. Covers content? Here’s The Arrogants doing some Jesus & Mary Chain and New Order: MP3: The Arrogants – “You Trip Me Up” MP3: The Arrogants – “Shell Shock”

np – Shearwater / Everybody Makes Mistakes

I usually like to think I have decent taste in films. Brainless popcorn movies are kept to a minimum, pure schlock avoided at all costs. In this day and age with resources like Metacritic and Rotten Tomatos at our disposal, there’s really no excuse for seeing BAD films. Unless you want to. Which I did last night. Enter Daredevil AND Elektra.

I was excited about the prospect of a Daredevil film when the idea was first floated some years ago, he’s a great character and wouldn’t require all the super-power CGI like most comic-book adaptations. At first Kevin Smith was attached and I was, “okay, he did alright writing the comic, this could be alright”. Then the bad news – Smith left, Affleck was cast… Dread grows. I tried to keep a postive attitude till the trailers and reviews started coming out. Then it was abandon all hope time. Still, I was curious for a couple of years about just how bad it could really be? Finally I know. Pretty bad.

It’s an old film, so I won’t discuss too much – just go point form. The costume – what the hell. More than the obvious Daredevil as bondage fetishist concerns, I was confused by the collar which was always upturned Fonzie-style. That made the cowl look utterly ridiculous – it made me nostalgic for the black outfit Rex Smith wore in The Trial Of The Incrdible Hulk… What else. The horribly cliched narration. The compression of almost every bit of action into the last half hour. Jennifer Garner as the most un-Greek-looking Elektra possible, a Ben Urich who looked more like a paparazzi than an investigative reporter, the idea that Daredevil would spend time writing out his logo in gasoline on a subway platform with perfectly square lines… It was just bad. So very bad. But at least it was fun in that incredibly cheesy sort of b-movie way. The same couldn’t be said for Elektra.

Elektra was just boring. Straight out, stone cold dull. Everyone looked bored, the story was boring… it’s hard to single out particularly intense moments of boring-ness to focus on. It was a pretty across-the-board snooze-fest. Did I mention that the story has the supposedly bad-ass assasin protecting an annoying tween girl who fights with a friendship bracelet from hordes of ninjas? Imagine how bad that could possibly be, now imagine it worse. You’re pretty much there. It boggles my mind that director Rob Bowman is talking sequel. Anyone with any power in Hollywood should make it their personal mission to prevent such a thing from ever happening. It’s just not right.

The biggest crime with these films, besides the waste of celluloid, is the fact that these were two perfectly good, interesting characters who could have been translated to film quite well if anyone involved with the production had any clue, and now the opportunity has been wasted, the characters tainted. I think Ben Affleck claimed he was a big Daredevil fan as a kid – what’s his excuse? Shame, Mr Aflac. Shame. Still, I knew what I was getting into when I rented these, so I’ve no one to blame but myself, I suppose. I am now going to read Born Again to get the bad taste out of my eyes.

And as a way of apologizing to Dirty On Purpose for using one of their song titles for the title of this post, I’d like to direct you to their MySpace page. They’ve posted a demo for what I can only assume is a track that will appear on their debut full-length, due out sometime next year. Sounds good. Sorry guys. You’re better than Daredevil AND Elektra put together.

Have I linked this page of My Bloody Valentine videos before? I don’t think so. I may have linked the site, but I don’t rightly remember linking (or even seeing) the videos before. I don’t know. I forget things sometimes. Either way, here you go.

JAM! thinks the vocals of Doves’ Jimi Goodwin are “sugary”. JAM! needs to get a dictionary.

Mogwai have completed recording their new album. And they’re disgusted with the state of the world. They may be calling their new record Mr Beast, to properly articulate their disgust.

Ex-Ride frontman Mark Gardener will be at Lee’s Palace on December 7 to promote his debut solo album, These Beautiful Ghosts. You can stream the album in its entirety here. Whlie I’ve been bitten badly by post-Ride projects (hello Hurricane #1, The Animalhouse) so I’m a little wary of this record, but if I’m feeling nostalgic around then, I may well turn up at this show. His first solo acoustic tour a couple years ago was quite good, but it was probably a lot Ride-heavier in the setlist than this outing will be. Silly boy thinks he’s going to move on creatively? Not if I have anything to say about it.

np – Rogue Wave / Descended Like Vultures

Blogotheque talks to Will Scheff and Travis Nelsen of Okkervil River while San Diego CityBeat has a more general profile of the band. Also worth pointing out is ORNAG, or the “Okkervil River Navigational Auxilliary Guild”. Yeah. Basically a fansite, but with lots of exclusive downloadable goodies, both aural and visual. And if you’re unsure about the Okkervil, Home In Your Radio makes its blogging debut with a nice roundup of the merits of the band with supplementary audio evidence. This MSNBC piece from back in June also makes a compelling case. Okkervil River began their North American tour in Texas yesterday, and will wind their way up to Toronto on November 7. I expect this to be a concert highlight of the year. For God’s sake, be there.

Another Texan outfit hitting the road this Fall is Spoon, working Gimme Fiction for the second time. Ukula talked to Britt Daniel their last time through Toronto back in June. They return to the Phoenix on November 1.

And speaking of Austin, I did some pricing of flights and hotels to SxSW for next year… apparently my insistence on going for the full four days of the music festival and staying in a hotel closer to downtown are going to price this thing right out of my budget – All said and done, the week could end up costing me over $2K Canadian. I love the rock and I loved SxSW last year, but that’s just too much goddamn money.

Losing Today and Paste both interview the reunited Posies and Seattle Weekly plays jukebox with Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow (via LHB).

The Marquee and The Baltimore Sun both profile Son Volt.

Look for a new Drive-By Truckers album in the Spring, sez Billboard.

Jenny Lewis of Rilo Kiley tells MTV that she’s going to celebrate her 30th birthday by releasing her first solo album Rabbit Fur Coat on January 24.

Portastatic confess to The Houston Chronicle that they love the Manchego. Hey, who doesn’t? Via LHB.

Thanks to Katie for pointing out this Arts & Crafts piece which appeared in last weekend’s The Toronto Star (Bugmenot). This totally should have gone in Wednesday’s post. Alas.

The AV Club compiles a list of the most underrated films of the last 10 years. I am totally with them on Josie & The Pussycats. No, I’m serious – it was great. Even with Tara Reid.

np – The American Analog Set / Set Free

I had been on the fence about attending the My Morning Jacket show last night on account of my well-documented ambievalence about Z and the fact that it was an expensive show. Well a last-minute guest list spot changed my mind (thanks Georgi!), and it didn’t hurt that I’ve been coming around on Z in the last week or so, and last nights show eliminated any bit of fence-sitting that may have remained. In fact, in the afterglow of the show, I will declare that Z is a freakin’ classic.

I last saw My Morning Jacket just over two years ago when they were working the southern rock stylings of It Still Moves, and the material lent itself quite nicely to the explosive live show that MMJ were already known for. Z, however, is a much more eclectic and complex record than its predecessor, with fewer foot-on-the-monitor-approved rock outs. How would it translate live? Really well, actually. Starting off with Z opener “Wordless Chorus”, the band played almost completely in the dark, punctuated by strobe spotlights during the chorus – the effect, coupled with Jim James’ cosmic field holler of a voice, was otherworldly. James’ whooping overtop the outro of that song sounds amazing on record, but when you hear him live, you realize that he was holding back in the studio. Amazing.

That set the tone for the night – by performing the Z material (and the older stuff) flawlessly, My Morning Jacket proved their power as a live act goes far beyond just ripping solos and hair whipping around (though there was still a goodly amount of that). Though they still rock out hard – after all, you don’t strap on the Flying V if you’re not going to rock – they’re now working on a different level completely. They’ve just got that ineffable ability to captivate the audience with their performance – no gimmicks, just music. And volume. Actually, they seemed quite loud but the mix was damn near perfect. At an hour and a half, the set seemed a little short for a veteran jam-band circuit act, but with the thunderous closing one-two punch of “Mahgeetah” and “Anytime”, there’s no way anyone could have asked them to come back and top that. Plus they hit curfew right on the nose.

I’d initially felt a little cheated that Kathleen Edwards, who was supporting MMJ on every other date of the tour, was sitting this one out (likely because she’s got her own headlining show at the Phoenix in less than a month), but was quite pleasantly surprised to find the two acts they enlisted in her stead to be very much up to the task. Megan Hamilton offered up a short and sweet set of plaintive country-ish tunes, with very tasteful backing from electric guitar and drums and quite sophisticated arrangements. She was followed by another local, Royal Wood, whose Rufus Wainwright meets Harry Connick Jr jazzy-folk seemed a bit of an odd fit for the crowd. His smooth tunes, rich voice and sharp, laid back banter did much to win the crowd over.

My Morning Jacket seemed to be very much into the mood lighting, as darkness was very much the theme of the night. When they did hit the lights, they did so with strobes and intense colour gels, basically making photography damn near impossible. Still, I think I did alright. And I know this isn’t the best piece of writing I’ve ever done, and I apologize – but it was late and I was tired. Zzz.

Supplementary materials – Harp has their cover story on the band online (well, co-cover story. They’re also running Liz Phair covers, which is the one my local store had. Oh well, better than Blues Traveller). The Louisville Courier-Journal has a feature on their hometown boys and The Marquee and The Free Times round things off with more band interviews. And as a chaser, Filter points the way to the video for Z‘s first single, “Off The Record”.

John Darnielle of Mountain Goats declares Scarlett Johansson to be played out and submits some new hipster crush nominations to Nerve. Via LHB.

Behold – part 2 of Chart’s interview with Death Cab’s Ben Gibbard.

Joe Pernice is not letting his Indie Rock Cribs idea go gently into that good night. He’s posted the third episode, wherein he introduces us to some of his sweet, sweet wheels. We love you, Joe.

Calexico/Iron & Wine tickets for their December 9 show at the Docks are $25. Do with that information what you will.

The Torontoist week in shows.

The Associated Press and Austin 360 follow Neil Gaiman around on his book tour for Anansi Boys. Austin 360 link via Achtung Baby.

np – My Morning Jacket / At Dawn