Frank YangGoing to as many shows as I do, I’ve come to expect a certain demographic in the audience with me. Which is to say largely male and frequently bearded. The audience at Friday night’s Rachael Yamagata show at the Mod Club, on the other hand, was most definitely predominantly female and for the most part, beardless. No, this was not one of my usual indie rock shows.

The audience was also impressively well-behaved, polite and attentive to support act The Low Anthem from Rhode Island. And they were easy to like, a trio with obvious and impressive musical ability – there was lots of instrument swapping on display – but able to check any muso inclinations in crafting a warm and gentle brand of country-rock, heavily indebted to Neil Young’s softer side but also able to turn it up a bit when the need arose. They may have been a bit too gentle to immediately spur me into seeking out their stuff, but a definite positive impression was made.

Rachael Yamagata has been through town a number of times in the past few years, supporting artists as disparate as Ryan Adams and Mandy Moore, but to my recollection this was her first headlining show in Toronto since her October 2004 show at the El Mocambo – that’s a long time. She even acknowledged as much early in the show, leading one to think she might make up for lost time and draw as much from her debut Happenstance as the just-released follow-up Elephants… Teeth Sinking Into Heart, but the set list still leaned heavily on the new material.

And that was perfectly fine – Elephants is a solid record, showcasing Yamagata’s ability to draw endless inspiration from the subject of hurt and heartbreak and spin them into either bruised balladry or pointed rockers. I don’t necessarily agree with the choice to split the two sides into separate discs – Happenstance blended them and offered a stronger impression of her range – but it’s a minor quibble. Her live show mixed up the fast and the slow, with Yamagata moving from keyboard to electric guitar as need be to lead her three-piece band. Though it seemed at a few points she was favouring her lower register, her voice was rich, raspy and appropriately torchy, and capable of heart-rending emotion.

Though Yamagata’s songs tend to dwell largely on sadness, she’s an engagingly chipper performer, chatting and joking with the audience at length. It was quite nice seeing a dynamic between artist and audience based on such genuine affection, where the former doesn’t have to try and win over the latter, but because of that fact gives it their all. The crowd – attentive and dead silent while she played – obviously loved her, and the feeling was mutual. Elephants should lift Yamagata to the stature of one capable of headlining her own shows, no longer the perennial support act. In Toronto, at least, she’s already there.

Metro, NOW and A’N’E Vibe have interviews with Yamagata, the latter also adding a live review of the Mod Club show. The Toronto Sun was also there. Paste profiles The Low Anthem.

Photos: Rachael Yamagata, The Low Anthem @ The Mod Club – December 12, 2008
MP3: The Low Anthem – “To Ohio”
Video: Rachael Yamagata – “Faster”
Video: Rachael Yamagata – “Sunday Afternoon”
Video: Rachael Yamagata – “Elephants”
Video: Rachael Yamagata – “Sidedish Friend”
MySpace: Rachael Yamagata
MySpace: The Low Anthem

The long-discussed Will Sheff/Charles Bissell split-7″ – Will Sheff Covers Charles Bissell, Charles Bissell Covers Will Sheff – was released last week, and features Sheff covering The Wrens’ “Ex-Girl Collection” and Bissell doing Okkervil River’s “It Ends With A Fall”. Essential? Yes. Italian site Maps, the morning show for Italian radio station Citta Del Capo Radio Metropolitana, is also featuring a video/audio interview/session with Sheff. The site is in Italian but the interview is in English. Mostly.

MP3: Okkervil River – “Calling And Not Calling My Ex” (live on Maps)
MP3: Okkervil River – “Lost Coastlines” (live on Maps)

Maps also had The New Year in for the same deal. Thanks to Jonathan from A Classic Education (and also a host on the show) for the tip.

MP3: The New Year – “Wages Of Sleep” (live on Maps)
MP3: The New Year – “Seven Days And Seven Nights” (live on Maps)

The good news is A Camp’s Colonia will be getting a North American release. The bad news is it will happen on April 28. The good news is the European label is still listing their street date as February 2.

Though I had Bruce Peninsula’s debut A Mountain Is A Mouth as one of the “next big thing”-ey releases for 2009, it’s actually available digitally as of today – but the CD proper isn’t out until February 3. The band has lined up a number of dates in the new year to promote it – they’re at the Horseshoe on January 31 supporting The Tom Fun Orchestra, will do an in-store at Soundscapes on release day February 3 and play a proper release show of their own on February 22 at the Polish Combatants Hall. If you can only make one, I’d say that’s the one to circle.

And while the 2008 concert year is pretty much done with, 2009 is already stacking up quite nicely. Jayhawks by any other name, Gary Louris & Mark Olson will hit the road in support of Ready For The Flood, out January 27, including a February 4 date at the Mod Club in Toronto. Tickets are $22.50 for this seated show. Seats! At the Mod Club! Zounds!

Blitzen Trapper are at The Horseshoe on February 21, tickets $10.50. They’re offering up a second MP3 from Furr and are the subject of interviews at Chart and The Georgia Straight.

MP3: Blitzen Trapper – “Gold For Bread”

Jason Isbell & The 400 Unit will take their new eponymous album on the road following its release on February 17 and play the Horseshoe on March 4, tickets $12. There’s full dates at Paste and a new song streaming at their MySpace

Bloc Party continue their habit of coming to town only when it’s entirely inconvenient for me to attend (excepting festivals). Case in point, their just-announced March 14 date at the Kool Haus, tickets $35. Inconvenient because that’s the final night of CMW and I would hope that there’s worthwhile stuff going on at the festival, far from the foot of Jarvis St. Bloc Party also just rolled out a new video.

Video: Bloc Party – “One Month Off”

Australia’s Presets have a date at the Mod Club on April 6. Full dates at The Music Slut.

Aubrey EdwardsNever have I claimed to be the fastest to get turned on to something, to be the one who discovers the next big thing. I’m far more tortoise than hare in these sorts of matters, but even then there’s not really any excuse for taking, oh, seventeen months to get around to writing up Bishop Allen’s last album The Broken String – or even longer if you think back to the year-long “one EP a month” series in 2006 from which much of the album is taken.

And it’s a pity I’ve waited so long, because I am very much in this record’s target market – namely fans of sprightly indie rock of the wordy variety. As such, stylistically and sonically, it’s very familiar stuff built on earnest boy lead vocals with sweet girl backing vocals and just enough interesting instrumental flourishes to disguise the fact that it’s pretty straight guitar-driven folk-pop. Where Bishop Allen stands out is in the songwriting, which is never less than solid but on a few occasions, is outstanding. Leadoff track “The Monitor” is a stirring and evocative piece about a Civil War naval battle, but that sort of lyrical grandeur is the exception rather than the rule – the standouts tend to be those the simple, slice of live observationals that are rendered in exquisite detail, as in “Flight 180” or “The Chinatown Bus”. They also handle the peppier stuff with vigor and aplomb, but it’s the slower, more thoughtful stuff such as above that really sticks.

Because of my neglect, I missed the band when they came through last Summer but I shan’t be skipping out on their just-announced January 17 date at the El Mocambo. Similarly, when their next album Grr… is released on March 10, you can be sure I won’t be taking a year and a half to give it the attention it deserves. The Justice has an interview with band principal Justin Rice.

MP3: Bishop Allen – “Click, Click, Click, Click”
MP3: Bishop Allen – “Middle Management”
MP3: Bishop Allen – “Rain”
Video: Bishop Allen – “Click, Click, Click, Click”
Video: Bishop Allen – “Middle Management”
MySpace: Bishop Allen

Ben Kweller and The Watson Twins are at the Mod Club on February 22, tickets $25. Spinner, The Smith College Sophian and The Irish Independent talk to Kweller, who will release a new album in Changing Horses on February 3. Stereogum are sharing the first single.

The Airborne Toxic Event, last spotted hereabouts for V Fest, have a date at the El Mocambo on March 4. Tickets for that are $12.50.

Blurt, Glide, ArtistDirect and The Toronto Sun make time with Rachael Yamgata, who will be at the Mod Club on Friday for an early show. She’s got not one but two new vids from Elephants… Teeth Sinking Into Heart.

Video: Rachael Yamagata – “Faster”
Video: Rachael Yamagata – “Sunday Afternoon”

Brooklyn noiseniks Dirty On Purpose have formally called it a day. A moment of silence for a great band who created my favourite trebuchet-themed video of all time.

Video: Dirty On Purpose – “Car No Driver”

The Independent, The Oxford Mail and This Is Nottingham interview Hold Steady frontman Craig Finn.

Ra Ra Riot are in session overload – Laundromatinee has a video session, NPR an audio one. They also find time to squeeze in an interview with The Courier-Journal.

Austin360 talks to Johnathan Martin of The Uglysuit.

Lots of session action lately for School Of Seven Bells with audio and video sets for for Radio K, KCRW and Spinner’s Interface and video only at Lime.

Paste reports that Hazards Of Love, the new record from The Decemberists, will be coming out on March 24 of next year.

The Long Winters have released a live DVD entitled Live At The Showbox and are giving away a few live tracks taken from it. Check it out.

MP3: The Long Winters – “Scared Straight” (live)
MP3: The Long Winters – “Clouds” (live)
MP3: The Long Winters – “Cinnamon” (live)

John Darnielle of The Mountain Goats salutes heavy metal for the The New Zealand Herald.

Hilary WalshWell this certainly took a while. Four years on from the release of her debut Happenstance, Rachael Yamagata has finally released the follow-up in Elephants … Teeth Sinking Into Heart, and perhaps in an effort to make up for the wait, it’s a double album. Well, sort of.

Though the physical release is divvied up into two CDs, the contents could quite easily fit onto one. The separation is intended to be thematic, with the first disc – Elephants – consisting of intimate and sometimes smouldering balladry that treads the well-worn terrain of lust and love and the brokenheartedness that ensues, while the second – Teeth Sinking Into Heart – does much the same, except with louder guitars and a defiantly snarling delivery. Perhaps tellingly, it’s not an even split. Elephants runs ten songs long (one instrumental, one hidden) while Teeth only lasts five, and the last of those, “Don’t”, hardly qualifies as a rocker. It’s more of a final note of resignation.

As she proved on Happenstance, Yamagata is perfectly capable of handling both sides of the musical coin – her smoky rasp of a voice is just as suited to the downcast weepers as it is the more venomous sentiments and she’s just as deft behind the guitar as she is the piano, though the Teeth end of things is decidedly more aggressive than the more uptempo moments on her debut. The imbalance on the album is probably meant more as a mirror of reality – anger is intense but only lasts a short while, but sadness can drag on forever. Or maybe she just had more slow songs.

It’s easy and probably quite accurate to file Yamagata under adult-contemporary singer-songwriter likely to soundtrack Grey’s Anatomy, though the rich-yet-lean production from Mike Mogis probably sounds like it was done by Steve Albini when compared to her more slickly produced peers. And even if she doesn’t transcend that particular style, she’s still damn good at it and everyone – I don’t care who they are – is capable of having their heartstrings tugged by a sad song, if it’s the right sad song. And Yamagata has got lots of them – surely one will do the trick.

Yamagata is hitting the road this Fall and will be at the Mod Club on December 12 for what, I think, is her first headlining show in Toronto in four years and even that was an industry showcase deal. She’s been through a couple times in a support capacity but never on her own. So again, a long time in coming.

BlogCritics talks to Yamagata about the Hotel Cafe Tour which makes up the first leg of her Fall tour, Deseret News also has an interview and NPR is streaming a radio session.

Video: Rachael Yamagata – “Elephants”
Video: Rachael Yamagata – “Sidedish Friend”
MySpace: Rachael Yamagata

The Kills have rolled out another vid from their excellent Midnight Boom.

Video: The Kills – “Tape Song”

Drowned In Sound talks to Grizzly Bear’s Ed Droste about the band’s progress on their next album, for which he’s eyeing a late Spring 2009 release.

Laundromatinee is offering a session with The Acorn in video and MP3 forms, WRAL.com has an interview. They’re at Lee’s Palace on November 27.

Pitchfork interviews Calexico. They’re at the Phoenix November 18, passes are still being given away.

When Okkervil River released The Stand-Ins this year, it cut the life cycle of The Stage Names down from what it arguably should have been (or doubled it, whatever), and as a result this video from the first album never made it out there. So the director has put it up himself. Via Antville.

Video: Okkervil River – “A Hand To Take Hold Of The Scene”

Noah & The Whale’s December 9 show has been moved from the El Mocambo to the Rivoli.

Cut Copy return to town for the third time in a year with a show at Circa on March 20.

It’s almost the holiday season, and that means traditions like the Skydiggers Christmas shows at the Horseshoe on December 19 and 20 and The Sadies ringing in the New Year at the ‘Shoe, as always, on December 31. Tickets for all are $20.

Photo via Murmur

Those fancy double-disc deluxe edition reissue sets have become fairly commonplace recently as the labels try to take advantage of the type of people willing to buy the same album over and over again while they’re still alive, but that doesn’t mean they’re not – at least sometimes – getting it right. Case in point, the announcement that R.E.M.’s debut album Murmur will be getting said treatment this Fall.

Pitchfork has your specifics, but basically you’re looking at the standard remastered album on disc one – maybe the same remaster job as the last couple times Murmur was re-released? – and for the second disc, a complete live show recorded here in Toronto circa 1983. The gig was held at a no-longer existent dive called Larry’s Hideaway which if memory serves (and by memory I mean Google – I was 8 at the time and wouldn’t have had the experience with Toronto’s live music dives that I do now) was located just a few blocks from here at Carlton and Jarvis. Anyone know if the place still exists in some form and if so, what it is now? I’m curious.

The Murmur deluxe edition is out November 25. Update: Blurt has some thoughts on what they view as a flawed reissue (thanks to Eugene for the link).

Video: R.E.M. – “Radio Free Europe”

Though guitarist Damian Cox has recovered from his stroke well enough to blog, he’s not sure if or when he’ll be able to play guitar again so as a result, The Long Blondes have called it a day. Details at NME. Singles, the compilation of their early singles, is out in the UK today.

MP3: The Long Blondes – “Once And Never Again”
MP3: The Long Blondes – “Here Comes The Serious Bit”
MP3: The Long Blondes – “Guilt”

Relix has specifics on M Ward’s new record Hold Time, due out February 17.

Pitchfork has an interview with a surprisingly lucid and non-crazy pills Kevin Barnes. Of Montreal’s new one Skeletal Lamping is out tomorrow and they’re at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre on October 28.

The Minneapolis Star-Tribune talks to Lucinda Williams.

Pop Reckoning and Paste interview Rachael Yamagata.

Sloan’s Chris Murphy talks to The Halifax Chronicle-Herald. They’re at the Air Canada Centre on Wednesday night.

So while I usually try and actually get a substantive post up for Mondays, this week will instead kick off only the slim bits above and a weak-ass apology. Rather than actually do any listening or writing this weekend, I was instead coding, trying to get a fairly significant upgrade to this here site working and while it’s tantalizingly close, it’s not there yet. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe the day after. Hopefully before I leave for New York, at the very least.

Photo by Elizabeth Weinberg

So most everyone I know is referring to next Tuesday night’s show at Lee’s Palace as “the Frightened Rabbit” gig, and quite reasonably so – they released one of the year’s best records in The Midnight Organ Fight back in April and have toured North America a few times since then, but have yet to visit Toronto and also, we do love those thick Scottish accents. But as much of an attraction as they are, there’s another touring band on the bill, the one that goes on after them. What’s the word… oh yeah – the headliner.

And the lucky band that gets to follow Frightened Rabbit (and possibly see the crowd thin considerably?) is the hottest thing out of Deleware right now – Joe Biden. Okay, second-hottest – The Spinto Band, who just released a new album in Moonwink. As was established when the tour was first announced, it’s an odd pairing of acts. Frightened Rabbit trade in deadly earnest folk-rock with a particular interest in bodily fluids and listening to The Spinto Band is like mainlining pure refined sugar through your eyeballs (or eardrums), but apparently they’re quite big in Europe so there you go.

Moonwink is unrelentingly cheerful and bursting with tight harmonies, runaway off-kilter melodies and quirky instrumentation. Imagine Clap Your Hands Say Yeah overdosed on cotton candy or Of Montreal without the general batshit crazy. Moonkwink‘s unrelenting glee gets a bit exhausting, even over the record’s brief 35-minute running time, but its masterfully executed and all evidence is that the sextet put on a terrific show so if your blood sugar is within safe levels, they may offer the perfect pick-me-up to follow Frightened Rabbit.

Metro and ArtistDirect have interviews with The Spinto Band.

MP3: Spinto Band – “Summer Grof”
MySpace: The Spinto Band

The Quietus has an interview with one of Of Montreal frontman Kevin Barnes’ alter-egos. As I said: batshit crazy. Skeletal Lamping is out next week, they play the Queen Elizabeth Centre on October 28, and if that show is even a fraction as insane as the New York one – though I think the venue IS next door/part of to the equestrian building at the CNE – it’s going to be ridiculous. Update: New video!

Video: Of Montreal – “Id Engager”

Spinner and LiveDaily talk to Rachael Yamagata about her new record Elephants… Teeth Sinking Into Heart.

Pitchfork has an interview with Sigur Ros bassist Georg Holm about the making of Med sud I eyrum vid spilum endalaust, which NME points out will be re-released on November 24 with a fancy 200-page hardcover book and DVD video content and costing a pretty penny (approx $85). Gotta combat that collapsing Icelandic economy somehow, I guess.

The Globe & Mail and Canadian Press talk to Feist about the charitable aspect of her upcoming cross-Canada tour which has two dates in Toronto – November 1 at Massey Hall and November 3 at the Air Canada Centre.

JAM, The Portland Mercury and Canada.com have features on Chad Van Gaalen.

Minnesota Public Radio welcomes The Magnetic Fields to their studios for a session.

Daytrotter has a downloadable session with Black Kids.

NPR is streaming Ra Ra Riot’s show in DC this past weekend in its entirety.