Amelia ShawBrisbane is a long way from Toronto. So long that many Australian artists barely make it over here once in their careers, let alone as many times as An Horse have been here in just the last 10 months. The duo of Kate Cooper and Damon Cox brought their scrappy two-piece pop to town five – that’s FIVE – times in 2009 at venues of all sizes; in March at the Tranzac as part of Canadian Musicfest, at the Horseshoe in April and again in June supporting The Appleseed Cast and Telekinesis respectively, they had their own show at the Drake Underground in September and were again in the support slot in October at the massive Sound Academy with Silversun Pickups. Sufficed to say, if you didn’t see them live last year, it’s because you were actively trying not to.

And if you want to keep that An Horse-less streak alive – and I can’t imagine why you would, they’re a charming and entertaining band and their debut Rearrange Beds well worth a listen – you’d best avoid Massey Hall on January 19 and Criminal Records on January 20. That’s because the first night they’ll be at the grand old lady of Shuter Street opening up for Tegan & Sara and then they’ll go from one of the biggest stages in the city to one of the smallest – really, it’s a floor – when they play an in-store at Criminal Records the next night at 6PM.

Auto Straddle has an interview with Cooper, who now apparently resides in Montreal. So I suppose her commute is easier, at least.

MP3: An Horse – “Postcards”
MP3: An Horse – “Camp Out”
Video: An Horse – “Camp Out”

Quiet and lovely will be the watchwords on January 21 at the Garrison when the bill will feature The Wilderness Of Manitoba, Ghost Bees and Ohbijou’s Casey Mecija. Admission $8 at the door.

MP3: The Wilderness Of Manitoba – “Bluebirds”
MP3: Ghost Bees – “Vampires Of The West Coast”
MP3: Ohbijou – “Black Ice”

Patterson Hood of Drive-By Truckers talks to Spinner about their new album The Big To-Do, out March 16.

Guitar International talks guitars and songwriting with Joel Plaskett.

The Mountain Goats perform a Tiny Desk Concert for NPR.

Under The Radar talks to Love Is All’s Josephine Olausson about their just-completed third album, due out in the Spring.

The Brother Kite have completed their new album and while details like label and release date are still to be determined, it has a title – Isolation – and a companion EP entitled The Eye To Eye EP. As I make a point of saying every opportunity I get, their last effort Waiting For The Time To Be Right was one of my favourite albums of the last decade so expectations are high for this one. If you have a label and want to put out an awesome record, get in touch (with them, not me).

Spinner looks at the trend of uber-fancy CD packaging, as practiced recently by The Flaming Lips and Pixies. The Quietus has a conversation with one of the men responsible for the latter’s ridiculously fancy Minotaur box set (and the unique style of 4AD in general), Vaughan Oliver of 23 envelope/v23.

IMDBAnother year, another… year. This here blogsite turns seven years old today, a milestone which simultaneously fills me with pride, amazement and some degree of despair. If you told me seven years ago that I’d still have enough free time and energy to be blogging extensively on an almost daily basis, I’d have thought you mad. Mad, I say. How would I have time on top of tending to the wife and kids and other domestic responsibilities I’d surely have acquired by then? Ahem. Yeah.

The last few anniversary posts have tended along the lines of “hey, this site is another year older and I still haven’t gotten a life – that’s awesome, thanks for stopping by” but this year, I’ve decided to do something just a little more involved and put together one of those things that bloggers live for – a top ten list. “Top Ten Favourite Records That Have Come Out Since This Blog Has Been In Existence”, to be precise.

While the specific criteria for inclusion in said list was a bit nebulous, the selections weren’t – they were actually completely obvious. Each of these albums are ones that I have completely fallen in love with over the past seven years, initial infatuation evolving into long-term, meaningful relationships. I intend to grow old and sit on rocking chairs on a veranda with these records. They are my go-to records for when I’m feeling overwhelmed and need to be reminded of why I continue to seek out new music. My desert island discs of the past 7/10 of a decade. Did these records change my life? Maybe not, but they definitely made it better.

As, incidentally, have all of you who come by, read and made this whole exercise worthwhile over the past years. So for that, I thank you. Now make with the clicky.

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thekills.tvWhile I’m very much on record as believing The Kills’ 2008 release Midnight Boom to be a superb album, I’m sure part of that was due to the fact that it was the first Kills record I’d heard. Their reputation to that point was as a garage-blues-scuzz-punk rock duo and that’s not generally my thing, so discovering them to be – at least on that record – all those things but also exceedingly pop was a most pleasant surprise. But this shift in direction, while garnering new fans like myself, probably cost them some as well. Such is the karmic balance of the universe. And with the reissue tomorrow of their debut album Keep On Your Mean Side, The Kills that those long-time fans fell in sleazy lust with is fully on display.

Whereas Boom had me wondering how the duo would recreate all the sounds and textures in a live setting (answer: quite well), there’d have been almost no such question circa Mean Side. Besides some basic drums, Mean Side is all about VV, Hotel, two guitars and a healthy dose of sneering attitude. The prevailing aesthetic is loose and raw, like delta blues by way of The Velvet Underground, and made noteworthy by Jamie Hince and Alison Mosshart’s remarkable presence. The songs aren’t all that memorable individually, but collectively they create a definite atmosphere – gritty, grimy and driving – and while what they’re doing isn’t exactly fresh, their execution and charisma commands attention.

Or it did, circa 2003. Since then, The Kills have taken their sound and gone downtown, less juke joint and more nightclub but most importantly, still seedy. I’m not sure what the impetus for this reissue is, and according to this interview with hour.ca neither does Hince, but the most obvious answer is to capitalize on the success of Boom and perhaps get new fans to pick up the old stuff and use the five bonus tracks to reel in some of the older ones. To the former, it’s far enough removed from where they are now to offer another fix while waiting for album four and to the latter, five extra tracks – one new song, one dictaphone piece and three covers – probably isn’t enough to justify the expenditure but either way, there it is.

The Kills are at The Phoenix on Thursday night, May 7, and courtesy of Against The Grain and Outside Music, I’ve got one prize pack to give away consisting of a pair of passes to the show and copies of both Midnight Boom and the Keep On Your Mean Side reissue on CD to give away. To enter, email me at contests AT chromewaves.net with “I want The Kills” in the subject line and your full name and mailing address in the body. Contest closes at midnight tomorrow night, May 5.

And for this week only, PitchforkTV is streaming the 2005 Kills tour documentary I Hate The Way You Love.

MP3: The Kills – “Black Rooster”
MP3: The Kills – “Cat Claw”
Video: The Kills – “Fried My Little Brains”
Video: The Kills: I Hate The Way You Love
MySpace: The Kills

Ear Farm and Billboard interview Thomas Mars of Phoenix, who will release Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix on May 29 and follow that up with a show at The Phoenix on June 15.

Each Note Secure talks to Aaron Pfenning of Chairlift.

Blurt, Rolling Stone and Entertainment Weekly talk to Flaming Lip Wayne Coyne about the absurd controversy over their “Do You Realize?” being named the Oklahoma state song.

Beirut’s Zach Condon gives Filter a guide of Santa Fe, New Mexico. They have a date at the Phoenix on July 9.

If you didn’t know, the June 12 Malajube show at Lee’s Palace is free, tickets at Rotate This and Soundscapes and also at the door. Don’t ask why, just go.

The Brother Kite continue to work on the much-anticipated follow-up to Waiting For The Time To Be Right, and a sneak preview of some of the new material in progress can be heard at Bandcamp. And unsurprisingly, it sounds marvelous.

New York Magazine and Decider interview Natasha Khan of Bat For Lashes.

Deer Tick have a date at the Horseshoe for July 17. Their new album Born On Flag Day is due out June 23.

MP3: Deer Tick – “Easy”

This tweet from Labrador certainly seems to imply that we’ll see a new EP from The Radio Dept this Summer in advance of the release (fingers crossed) of Clinging To A Scheme this Fall. Alls I know is that in less than two weeks, I’m going to be in New York City to see the reclusive Swedes live for the first time and I am stoked. And also for Shake Shack. Stoked for Radio Dept and Shake Shack. And Coney Island. I think I’m going to go to Coney Island.

Still not sure if I’m going to make it out to see Thao With The Get Down Stay Down at the Bowery Ballroom the night I get in, though. Will play that one by ear. There’s an interview with her at the Idaho Statesman.

The National Post has an extensive feature piece on Scott Pilgrim, both the comic and the film, and gets creator Bryan Lee-O’Malley to identify and annotate various locales around Toronto that play roles in the comic and will, presumably, make appearances in the film. Filming is ongoing around the city right now and video blog entries on the film’s website now number four.

And a reminder that the Toronto Comic Arts Festival will take place this coming weekend at the Toronto Reference Library at Yonge and Bloor (another Pilgrim location!) and feature appearances from both Lee-O’Malley and Phonogram artist Jamie McKelvie. Issue two of The Singles Club finally came out last week, by the way, and was worth the wait though that shouldn’t be taken as permission for issue three to take another five months to put together, no sir.

Frank YangNormally I try to cover stuff chronologically, but in summing up my time in New York City this past weekend, I’m going to jump around a little bit for the sake of grouping things together. And so I’ll start off at the end of Thursday night in the basement of a little club called Lit in the East Village.

Providence’s The Brother Kite would be well within their rights to ask me to stop coming to their gigs. In each of the three times I’ve now seen them play, their set was… marred by circumstances beyond anyone’s control. The first, last year at my Pop Montreal showcase, was a bit of a mess on too many levels to get into. The second at this year’s SxSW was significantly better but with singer Patrick Boutwell dealing with a cold, they still weren’t in top form. And this past Thursday night, at their CMJ showcase, their supposed headlining slot at the showcase for their label Clairecords appeared at real risk of being cut down to nothing because of every preceding act running long. It’s not my fault, I swear.

They were eventually given a truncated but still decent-length set with which they showcased both new material from the can’t-come-soon-enough follow-up to Waiting For The Time To Be Right alongside highlights from that utter gem of a record (one-liner for those who haven’t heard it – Ride crossed with The Beach Boys, but better). The new stuff sounded good – similar enough to the old in the ways that matter but also exploring enough new ground to not be a retread – but I still loved hearing the Time songs the most. And considering they were playing once again in less than optimal conditions – they hardly got any soundcheck despite having a decidedly complex equipment setup – they once again delivered a superb performance. I can’t imagine how good they’d sound if they were playing under optimal conditions. Though this is a band that gives new meaning to the phrase “flying under the radar”, it’s certainly not for lack of ability – their songwriting and performance both live and on record are sublime.

The band have been documenting the recording of the new record over at their MySpace blog.

Photos: The Brother Kite @ Lit, New York City – October 23, 2008
MP3: The Brother Kite – “Get On, Me”
MP3: The Brother Kite – “I’m Not The Only One”
Video: The Brother Kite – “I’m Not The Only One”
MySpace: The Brother Kite

Yuki Chikudate of Asobi Seksu tells The Georgia Straight she doesn’t buy into the idea of an ongoing shoegaze revival. Their new album Hush will surely do nothing to propagate that idea when it’s released in February.

The Montreal Gazette, JAM and BlogTO converse with Murray Lightburn of The Dears. While over at This Is Fake DIY, the band’s other/better half Natalia Yanchak ponders the meaning(lessness) of labels.

R.E.M. have a new video.

Video: R.E.M. – “Until The Day Is Done”

Sweden’s Love Is All, on the cusp of releasing A Hundred Things Keep Me Up at Night on November 11, have padded out their tour dates and will now be hitting the Horseshoe on December 11, tickets $11.50.

MP3: Love Is All – “Wishing Well”
Video: Love Is All – “Wishing Well”