back from the dead

As everyone else on the internet has been pointing out, details are out for a new Pains single and album to be released on Slumberland in the not too distant single. There are also a few new songs available to download from their myspace. While their London shows earlier in the year were impossibly brilliant, I do have to confess to being a touch non-fussed by their EP. I love 'Hey Paul' and 'Orchard Of My Eye', but I found the others a touch "theme songy". I'm not entirely sure what that means, but I'm happy to find I really love all the new songs. My favourite thing about them is they don't show the fear of classic rock you in plenty of indie bands; just because something is delicate and sincere doesn't mean it can't have fat riffs and killer solos.


There are a number of reasons for my recent absence from this blog. One is that I have found myself listening to pretty much no new music recently. Currently stuck on my stereo is Lee Hazlewood's 'Trouble Is A Lonesome Town', Denim's 'Back In Denim' and The Clientele/Relict split 7". I hate when this happens, especially when I hear new stuff by Cause Co-Motion! and Crystal Stilts and hear what I'm depriving myself of. I know the best why to remedy this is to buy a bunch of new releases, but every time I'm about to I spy some record on ebay I should be saving my money for.

In less than two months I'm going to be moving back to New Zealand so I'm trying to make the most of the pop shows on before then. So it's Ballboy tonight, Sunny Day In Glasgow on Saturday and Love Is All / Je Suis Animal on Tuesday - phew. I was deeply disappointed to not be able to make Indietracks last weekend, but am doing my best to be happy to hear it was such a success.

[edit] I meant to post this yesterday, but forgot. So I can now confirm Ballboy were great last night. Although I have to say they were possibly upstaged by their supports: Pocketbooks and The Smittens. I wasn't that interested in Pocketbooks first time I saw them, but they just keep getting better.

closed week saviours

"Librarians shelve to catchy romantic pop songs" may not be as catchy as "cows milk to Mozart", but based on my experience over the past week it's just as accurate. It seems that for me 'Closed Week' means a week of shelving and to get through this requires lots of music. After experimenting with loads of different music it seems the likes of The Bats, Pants Yell! and The Aislers Set are the best for getting me through it. Although, as well as these old favourites I've also been going for Boy Genius album 'Anchorage' a lot.

They've been written about fairly steadily throughout this year and seem to have already been compared to pretty much every band ever. Though of all the bands it seems REM and Pavement crop up the most, so maybe I'll just go with that. To me it's intersting these two bands get mentioned, as in my mind they seem slightly contradictory. When I think of Pavement the first thing that comes to mind is that label 'slacker rock' they had forced upon them, then with REM I always think of the frenzy that characterised their early albums. But I guess what makes Boy Genius interesting is that this makes sense, as they combine these two simultaneously and effortlessly. It's fun pop songs full of life and enthuasiasm, but cut with enough ennui to keep it worthwhile and interesting. A large chunk of the songs are streaming from their myspace, so if you're interested you can head there and make up your own mind.