Kingdom of Rust

Doves just rolled out a video for the title track to their new one, out April 6. Me gusta.

Yay

One of my favorite bands, Doves, is finally getting ready to release their fourth album, a mere four years after their last one. Hope it’s worth the wait.

Air conditioning is my friend

I spent the morning sitting on the patio at one of the seven Starbucks within legitimate walking distance of my building reading The Historian, Elizabeth Kostova's enthralling novel about a hunt for the historical Dracula, but when the temperature got hot enough that I was sweating through my shirt just sitting there, I did what any sensible person would do... I went running. Now that my temporary insanity is over and I've hydrated myself back from the brink of collapse, I'm devoting the rest of my day to indoor pursuits, starting with listening to my new music purchases. Before settling in at Starbucks, I stopped by Luna Music and picked up Fountains of Wayne's new double-disc b-side collection, Out of State Plates, and Doves' Live at Eden, an import EP from 2002. If this EP is half as good as their show I saw in Chicago, it's bound to be be worth every penny of the $6.99 it cost.

I also threw together two more mixes. The first is mellow and largely acoustic, and the other is because I decided to capture a momentary bout of nostalgia for high school on CD. Here's the track lists:

Disc One:
The Man Who Told Everything, Doves
On The Bus Mall, The Decemberists
Still Be Around, Uncle Tupelo
Part of the Queue, Oasis
Going To California, Led Zeppelin
Scattered Black And Whites, Elbow
Weight Of The World, Chantal Kreviazuk
Paul Simon, The Russian Futurists
Only The Strongest Will Survive (James Lavelle Remix), Hurricane #1
The Sulphur Man, Doves
Come With Me Tonight, Bob Schneider
It's All in My Mind, Teenage Fanclub
A Message, Coldplay
Wires, Athlete
Casimir Pulaski Day, Sufjan Stevens
May This Be Love, The Jimi Hendrix Experience
Fix You, Coldplay
Buffalo Herds And Windmills, The Samples

Disc Two:
The Needle And The Damage Done, Neil Young
Get Off My Cloud, The Rolling Stones
American Girl, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers
I'm Looking Through You, The Beatles
Rock & Roll, Led Zeppelin
Limelight, Rush
Can't Stand Losing You, The Police
Swingtown, The Steve Miller Band
Feel Like Makin' Love, Bad Company
White Room, Cream
Don't Stop Believin', Journey
Sweet Emotion, Aerosmith
Communication Breakdown, Led Zeppelin
Peace Frog, The Doors
You've Got To Hide Your Love Away, The Beatles
Cold As Ice, Foreigner
Hey Hey, My My (Into The Black), Neil Young & Crazy Horse
Beast Of Burden, The Rolling Stones
Eleanor Rigby, The Beatles
Baba O'Riley, The Who
Take Me Home, Phil Collins

Holy cow.

Pretty unassuming trio of guys, right? Nothing in this photo would ever lead you to believe that they were capable of producing the best small-venue concert of my life to this point. These are Doves, and they currently rule my musical world. I'm not even going to try to describe Friday's show other than to say, every time I was feeling fully satisfied, thinking they had played all the songs I wanted to hear, they would start into another of my favorites. The five-week break since their last show worked in the audience's favor, since the band was fired up to be back onstage and were clearly feeding off the crowd response. It also helped that the Vic was a great venue. We stood in a couple different spots during the show, and the sound and view of the stage was always good. Even the lighting kicked ass, and that hardly ever registers with me. Two hours of straight-up bliss.

Odds and Ends

My concert future is starting to look very bright. Just got tickets for my brother and I to see Gift of Gab and Lateef the Truth Speaker from Blackalicious in two weeks. Ben Folds is going to be here the first weekend in May, and the week after I'm heading up to Chicago to see Doves. Add in back to back U2 shows in October, and I've got a pretty good stretch coming up. Hopefully, there will be a few more to fill in this summer. I'd love to see Coldplay, Stereophonics and Elbow if they get over to the US this year.

Todd passed this along from Kottke.org. It's a pretty ballsy example of culture jamming, which just happens to be the last chapter I read in Naomi Klein's excellent book, No Logo, a look at globalization and the growth of corporate conglomerates that spun into a movement (and of course, requisite website). I forgot how much I was enjoying that book before I got sucked into Gormenghast, so I've added it to my sidebar. And no, the irony of linking to her book for sale on a giant corporate conglomerate website is not lost on me. If you want to buy it, try your local bookstore, as long as Barnes & Noble hasn't squashed them out of business. (Steps off soapbox.)

And finally, apparently, laughter really is the best medicine. Well, maybe not the best, but good enough for a physician in India to start a laughing club 10 years ago and for the idea to spread to the US. That's funny stuff, people.

Paste Recommends... that I spend more money on CDs

Regular readers (all three of you) may remember my post about my last visit to Luna Music, a local CD shop. Tonight I stopped by again to pick up the new CD from one of my favorite bands, Doves. When I got there, I discovered to my delight that Luna has a promotional listening booth set up by my favorite music magazine, Paste. For those of you not familiar with the magazine, it covers a lot of alt country, roots rock and British artists that you may not hear on the radio (at least not yet), and each issue comes with a 20+ track sampler CD. Since subscribing a year ago, I've spent more than my normal amount of money on music, because I discover some great artists on each new sampler CD. Well now, to make matters worse, Paste is placing these listening stations, called Paste Recommends, in independent music stores like Luna. You can listen to a variety of CDs by different artists and also listen to the sampler from the current issue of Paste. So to make a long story short, not only did I pick up Doves' stellar new disc, "Some Cities", but I also got Ivy's "In the Clear" and the self-titled debut from The Shore. It's both a blessing and a curse to love music so much. Blessing on my ears, curse on my wallet.