Things I'd Rather Be Doing

Meat Puppets + STP: Is this a good idea?

2009-07-16T08:54:00.002-05:00

The publicist for the Meat Puppets sent a note out today announcing that the band had been picked to open three dates for the reunited Stone Temple Pilots, urging recipients to "Party like it's 1993!" I'm not sure that's such a good idea.It's great to have the band back in fighting shape after more than a decade in the wilderness, and I for one would like to keep it that way. But to casually

Richard Hell 'repairs' Destiny Street for September release

2009-07-14T12:38:00.003-05:00

Richard Hell's sophomore album, Destiny Street, is being resurrected 27 years after its initial release, but some of Hell's fans aren't happy about the Frankenstein's monster he promises to unleash under the name.Hell announced recently that he plans to re-release the album, but in a very different format. “At the time of the original recording I was so debilitated by despair and drug-need that I

Why don't artists cover Dylan any more?

2009-07-13T09:31:00.005-05:00

A fortuitous browse through the CD rack at the local library brought me to Bryan Ferry's fantastic album of Bob Dylan covers, 2007's Dylanesque, and had me thinking this weekend about the phenomenon of Dylan covers.What I decided, and what I would be happy to be proven wrong about in the comments, is that Dylan has already written his last great song when measured solely by the stick of cover

First listen: Dead Weather's Horehound

2009-07-08T14:25:00.004-05:00

Facebook's iLike is streaming the forthcoming Dead Weather album, Horehound, and what follows are my initial thoughts on hearing the album for the first time. It's due out July 13 on Third Man Records.1. 60 Feet Tall - This lets the listener know right from the outset that this is not simply a female-led White Stripes. Jack White knows dynamics better than most of his peers, but he rarely does

Jayhawks anthology offers treasure trove

2009-07-08T07:47:00.005-05:00

I'll just get this out of the way right at the top: Record labels that augment hits collections with a disc of rarities are greedy. These should be separate releases. The uninitiated want the hits, while those interested in rarities surely already own all of the previously released material.With the new Jayhawks anthology, Music from the North Country, the rarities and bonus material are of

R.E.M. issues digital EP of live Reckoning tracks

2009-07-07T11:11:00.003-05:00

After the rousing return of 2008, R.E.M. is back in rearview mode in 2009. First up was the deluxe edition of Reckoning, the band's sophomore disc. That package, released June 23, included the original album and a show recorded 25 years ago today: July 7, 1984 at the Aragon Ballroom in Chicago. It's an FM broadcast from WXRT. That show found the band playing all of it's then two-month-old album

Monday Interview: Craig McDonald

2009-07-06T07:00:00.001-05:00

Any time I think about Craig McDonald, two things come to mind. First, if you think you know a lot about crime fiction, at best you're in second place. McDonald is a like a walking encyclopedia of the genre. Second, knowing all of that information doesn't guarantee that one's own efforts at writing crime fiction would succeed, but McDonald's two novels prove it certainly doesn't hurt.I first came

Auto-Tune explored on Nova program

2009-06-30T13:37:00.002-05:00

The public television show Nova Science Now will have an interesting segment tonight on Auto-Tune, the program used by music producers to sweeten the vocals of many performers by putting their warbling notes back on pitch. It's not much of a factor -- I don't think -- in the music I listen to, but in pop, R 'n' B and hip hop music, its use is rampant. Some use it subtly to keep someone who is

Monday Interview: Steve Kilbey

2009-06-29T18:49:00.000-05:00

Many people probably left the Church behind sometime around the fadeout of "Under the Milky Way." Given the path the band has taken since, it's members are probably OK with that. And those fair-weather fans? It's definitely their loss.Thirteen albums after the band's breakthrough with Starfish, the group has issued its best album in a decade or more. That album, Untitled #23, is the band's 23rd,

Beck tackles VU's "Sunday Morning"

2009-06-19T12:49:00.003-05:00

It's no surprise that Beck has found a way to use technology to communicate directly with his fans and offer some exclusive content. A web site revamp allowed him to focus on a new project he's calling Record Club. It's a straight-forward concept: He gathers some friends in the recording studio, and they cover an album in one day. He'll upload a track to the site once a week. That's it.First up:

10 years later: New Yorker fiction issue

2009-06-18T07:59:00.003-05:00

Ten years ago today, the June 21 & 28, 1999 issue of the New Yorker hit the mailbox (yes, we get it late out here in flyover country). It was the fiction issue, though this one came with a twist: It identified 20 writers who were dubbed "The Future of American Fiction."The list: Sherman Alexie, Donald Antrim, Ethan Canin, Michael Chabon, Edwidge Danticat, Junot Diaz, Tony Earley, Nathan

Deer Tick deserves 'next big thing' tag

2009-06-17T09:02:00.004-05:00

I don't throw something like this around lightly, but Deer Tick may be the band to finally take up the mantle laid down by the Replacements. First things first: the two bands sound nothing alike. There have been plenty of gravel-throated pretenders to Paul Westerberg's throne who fronted grungy rock combos. What I'm talking about here is something more: an attitude mixed with talent to burn that

Paste shrinks; print seems an afterthought

2009-06-16T16:23:00.003-05:00

So, despite raising more than $166,000 from fans and friends last month Paste magazine is downsizing. Literally. The magazine is about the size of the old TV Guide, though shorter, with only 46 pages. Publisher Nick Purdy writes that the full-size magazine has shifted to a once-every-two-months schedule, with smaller, single-topic issues to "tide you over" in between. "We've designed these

Monday Interview: J. Robert Lennon

2009-06-15T07:41:00.000-05:00

J. Robert Lennon has a new novel out, and it's about time. About time that someone finally stepped up to publish him, that is. You see, he has written books since 2003's Mailman. Four of them, in fact. But for those of us in the U.S. -- you know, his home country -- it has been difficult to read any of it.First came Pieces for the Left Hand, a brilliant collection of 100 very short stories, each

The Clean, Bats to issue new discs

2009-06-04T15:38:00.002-05:00

Two giants of New Zealand pop will issue new albums this year. First up, the Bats, who follow 2005's wonderful At the National Grid with The Guilty Office. The disc, which was actually issued outside the U.S. in early 2008, is the band's seventh album. It's due June 23 on Hidden Agenda Records.Next up is The Clean. Mister Pop will be released by Merge Records on September 8. It's the band's first

First listen: Sonic-Youth - The Eternal

2009-06-03T10:53:00.003-05:00

iLike is streaming Sonic Youth's 15th proper album, The Eternal, and I thought I'd share my thoughts on first listen. It's the band's first for Matador as it returns to the indie world after nearly two improbable decades with a major label. The disc is due June 9.1. Sacred Trickster - This is Sonic Youth, no question. A nice blast of rocking guitars that, while interestingly tuned, are fairly

Face-off: Dookie vs. 21st Century Breakdown

2009-06-02T21:21:00.004-05:00

A long car trip today afforded the chance to conduct a listening experiment that pitted Green Day's breakout disc, 1994's Dookie, against the new 21st Century Breakdown. The quick takeaway: 21CB is a good, remarkably solid sounding disc from a slick band, the kind of group that the Dookie-era trio likely would have crossed the street to spit on.In 1994, I probably listened to Dookie every day for

Pet Ghost Project, Antlers issue great new tunes

2009-05-28T14:17:00.003-05:00

The great thing about writing a blog is that people will contact you and ask if they can send you their book or CD, with the hope you'll review it. Sometimes that leads to an awkward, "Um, it's not quite my thing" sort of exchange when they get in touch to see what I thought. Those instances are more than balanced by the times when I'm blown away by something about which I'd been unaware.Such was

New Yorker cover features innovative art

2009-05-27T16:50:00.002-05:00

This week's New Yorker cover is causing a stir -- justifiably so -- because of the way it was created. Artist Jorge Columbo has been creating streetscapes of New York with an iPhone app, Brushes. The results are pleasingly impressionistic and surprisingly detailed at the same time.I first heard of Columbo back in April when his work was featured at the great art site 20x200, where prints of four

It's a great time to be a Big Star fan

2009-05-26T14:04:00.004-05:00

Big Star has long been like a secret handshake among hardcore music fans. As Paul Westerberg sang, "Never travel far, without a little Big Star." If you don't, your tastes are always a little suspect. The band's Anglophilic mix of Byrdsian chime and R'n'B swagger is oft-imitated but never equaled.That makes the relative glut of Big Star news and product of late a godsend. First came Bruce Eaton's

Lawrence Block steps out to discuss new book

2009-05-22T08:24:00.004-05:00

So, it's starting to feel like Lawrence Block week around here, but it isn't every day that your favorite author stops in your area with a brand new book, so I think it's justified.Block appeared at the Out Loud! Author Series in Cedar Rapids last night, and drew about 60 people who came to hear him talk about his new book, Step by Step. He spoke about the book's genesis, read a couple of

Dark Night of the Soul worth the hype

2009-05-20T10:47:00.004-05:00

Funny how the web-based news cycle works. I'd heard months ago that Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse planned to collaborate on an album. Then, just a few days ago, word of that project was everywhere. Credit a controversy of the sort that sets blogs, Twitter feeds and message boards afire: A major record label was somehow blocking release of a shadowy project featuring the work of some enigmatic,

Lawrence Block speaks about Step by Step

2009-05-19T05:00:00.000-05:00

I read my first Lawrence Block book in 1994. I was living in Ottumwa, a small, dying town in Southern Iowa. I came to work for the newspaper there. My goal was to be gone in a year; I turned in my two-week notice somewhere around my first anniversary. There was little to recommend the town, but if nothing else, I took away a love affair with Block’s work. I found that first book, A Ticket to the

Monday Interview: Castle Freeman Jr.

2009-05-18T05:43:00.000-05:00

When Paul Ingram from Prairie Lights Books in Iowa City places a book in my hands and says, "This is one of the best things I read last year," I usually walk from there to the counter, exchange money for the book, head home and crack it open. He did so a couple of weeks ago with Castle Freeman Jr.'s third novel, Go With Me, recommending Freeman's new novel, All That I Have in the process.Reading

Johnson's Nobody Move is a flawed hoot

2009-05-15T14:36:00.004-05:00

Hearing that the author of a 600-page National Book Award-winning novel about the Vietnam War is going to write a short, pulpy crime novel might make your head turn. Hearing that Denis Johnson is going to do so is no surprise. Fans know, of course, that these two authors are one and the same, and it is testament to Johnson's breadth that he can tackle each and make it feel like the perfectly