show addendum

I mentioned the other night that there were no nearby dates for Bob Mould on the fall tour. Just announced: Mould will be at the Mod Club in Toronto on Oct. 2. Should be good, but I've got a couple of other things coming up that month in TO. Don't you wish you could go there weekly (and I don't just meant by ferry)?

schedule

last night: Sufjan Stevens, Bob Mould, Jason Collett
7/25: Magnolia Electric Co, Scout Niblett
8/1: The Click Five, Nine Black Alps, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
soon: Posies, St. Etienne

Still sifting thru some big piles of discs, some goodies coming up.
BTW, it's kind of pricey, but the new issue of Uncut is in 3 different editions with 3 different cover discs this time out, each one with hand-picked selections from a member of R.E.M. It's kind of annoying that the British like multiple formats to keep you buying, but in this case this really is a pretty cool thing, with some old favorites and exclusive cuts that make like a super-grand mix-tape or radio show. So far I'm in the middle of Mike Mills' picks and they are ace.
The total price is like getting a 3-disc comp for the price of a 1-disc import, so I can't quibble,
and Stipe's selection looks to have a whole lot of enjoyable exclusives to boot. Check it out.

Czars update

I stand slightly corrected on the Czars having split up; apparently the only one remaining is John Grant, he of the distinctive voice, and is still running under the Czars name, evidenced over here. Rumbles of acrimony abound, and it still remains a bit of a shame.

Not sure how I feel about this. Grant has a marvelous instrument, but I don't believe he was the band's whole picture, rarely the case. Almost sounds like a Beach Boys scenario, but in their case the focal point choose to remain simply as the almost-childlike Brian Wilson, while Mike Love runs what remains into a gargantuan joke (witness the footage of them playing someplace this 4th of July). I think I'd fell better if it was the John Grant Band or something like that, but this threatens to tarnish the legacy of what was a band that had stupendous potential and never received their due.

Mighty Czars

Just on a whim, I wandered over to the website for Denver's Czars, one of the loveliest bands I came across in the past few years, and found that they are no more. Wander over to their website and at the very least order one of their CDs ("Before..But Longer" is an excellent place to start).

Mid-year review

For what it's worth, here's my favorite CDs of 2005 so far, as played on last night's show:

1. Sleater-Kinney--"The Woods" (duh!)
2. M.I.A.--"Arular" (also duh!)
3. Low--"The Great Destroyer"
4. LCD Soundsystem--s/t
5. Gorillaz--"Demon Days"

Lots of stuff to still look forward to as well:
8/23: New Pornographers, Big Star (power-pop ground zero!)
9/13: Freakwater, Rob Dickinson
9/20: Goldfrapp, Paula Frazer, Iron & Wine/Calexico EP
10/4: Broken Social Scene, My Morning Jacket
10/18: Brian Wilson Xmas album
and I'm sure there will be more surprises in the weeks to come.

Here's a quick look at the next couple of weeks SR schedule:
7/18: Bob Mould, Jason Collett, Sufjan Stevens
7/25: Magnolia Electric Co., Scout Niblett
8/1: The Click Five, Nine Black Alps, Coldplay?
Stay tuned.....

Still here

Real quick: tune in Monday for the Spotlight's fave CDs of 2005 so far. We've been doing this for all these years and now I notice a bunch of bloggers are doing the same thing. I'll go into more detail after the fact, but my top 3 picks at least should be fairly obvious to anybody who's been paying attention. And my #5 pick is one I didn't even get around to reviewing on the show.

Real quick: here's what I've actually finished reading over the past few weeks:
John Crowley--"Lord Byron's Novel"
Greil Marcus--"Like a Rolling Stone"
The 2005 Rhysling Anthology
Harry Frankfurt--"On Bullshit"
Kramer's Ergot 5
The Dark Horse Book of Witchcraft
Thomas Wharton--"The Logogryph"

NR: Geoff Ryman--"Air"
NP: Beach Boys--"Sunflower"

And here's some books I'm reeally looking forward to in the next several months, not out yet, but I'm hoping will be worth the wait:
Peter Ackroyd--"Shakespeare: the Biography"
Bob Spitz--"The Beatles: a Biography"
Peter Guralnick--"Dream Boogie"
Margaret Atwood--"The Penelopiad"
Anne Carson--"Decreation"
Polyphony 5
David Marusek--"Counting Heads"
Dark Delicacies

I know there's more, but that's what I found so far on the dozens of pieces of scrap paper I carry around in my front pocket. Don't even get me started on the CDs I'm waiting on (well, you can, I'm just saving it for the next post).

Oh, and the new Posies album, thank ghod it's great.