St. Vincent and Other Exciting Things

There are several music related tidbits that I have found out about recently that have me as excited as a music freak can possibly be.

First off, I'm going to be seeing St. Vincent (or Annie Clark to her parents) at The Horseshoe tomorrow night. Her album "Marry Me" has been in constant rotation on my ipod for the past week in preparation for the big show. I was completely blown away by her, when she opened for Midlake back in February, and then, after further research, I realized that I was already sort of a fan, thanks to her association with The Polyphonic Spree and Sufjan Stevens. Her performance that night was quite a bit different than the way she sounds on this release, but I'm a big fan of both. Live, she was just a crazy, brilliant and endearing performer with a guitar and piano, shifting easily between hyperactivity and sensitivity. She does the same on the album, only with a much fuller sound. Apparently she plays the bulk of the instruments herself (and there's a heckuva lot of them) and, for me, she comes across as sort of a Kate Bush for the new millennium.

Download:
Now Now mp3
Visit St Vincent on myspace.

Also, on Monday, I'm finally seeing They Might Be Giants, which is something that I've been wanting to do since my late teens. But what has recently added to my excitement is the news that Hamilton's Young Rival (formerly known as The Ride Theory) are going to be opening the show. To this day, I still consider them to be one of the most fun bands to see live. It's like entering into a time warp to the late 60's, perhaps dropping into one of the club scenes in Antonioni's Blow Up. A mod show at The Mod Club. Hmm. Interesting.

Speaking of opening acts, I also recently found out that The Last Town Chorus will be opening for Camera Obscura on August 26th. That is going to be one outstanding double bill. Sadly, it's being held at The Phoenix, in all of its glorious packed in like sardines-ness. That means we'll have to get there early so that we can stand at the front so that I can see something. Because I'm short. Either that or everybody that goes to a concert is tall. Whatev's.

As I've been mourning the absence of The Weekend in my life (I'm speaking about the band, although I often miss the literal weekend as well,) I've recently discovered that frontchik Andrea Wasse (who is apparently residing in L.A these days) has started another side project called Macleod. Judging by the songs on their myspace, Andrea's still got it man. Purrfect pop that everybody would be better off listening to.

And finally, I recently heard from the Pop Kulcher blog, who recently heard from the I Am Fuel blog, that R.E.M. has been debuting several new songs at their Olympia Theatre shows in Dublin. One of those shows is available for download on that site. If the final songs sound as good as the live versions posted here, than R.E.M. will officially have made their third comeback, in my opinion, which puts them one up on U2. I haven't heard them sound this exciting since 1986. That's pretty significant. Huzzah!!!