Good Weather For Airstrikes

So to wrap up the whole UK Invasion theme - I’m not going to stop writing about UK artists completely, I still love the UK scene right now, I’m just going to stop getting myself pigeonholed into only writing about the UK scene - here is the latest (and greatest) from Arctic Monkeys, whose buzz has basically reached critical mass. Fuck, Arctic Monkeys are cool. Even Pitchfork has jumped on the bandwagon, saying: “The Sheffield, England-based baby band Arctic Monkeys have somehow harnessed the power of the video iPod, Asian bird flu, the Arcade Fire, and Samuel Alito into one big blazing ball of buzz” and going onto lament about Arctic Monkeys’ lack of a Chicago stop on their upcoming brief US tour. So yeah, if Pitchfork is giving you madd props like that, then you know you’re going places.

So after the whole sold out UK tour thing and all the buzz surrounding the then-pending release of their first formal single, “I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor”, Arctic Monkeys finally released it and it shot to number one on the UK charts as predicted. This really was no surprise though, what with their hype, and as Drowned In Sound so astutely pointed out, the Arctics could have basically released anything and it would have gone to number one. However, it was unseated by Madonna’s new single the next week, but it still remains firmly entrenched in the number two spot. In a pleasant turn of events, Domino has actually released the single here on iTunes already (despite the fact that the single is technically slated for a November 29th release), so you can grab it there, or you could just pick up the essential tracks (secondary b-side “Chun Li’s Spinning Bird Kick” is a fairly repetitive and somewhat grating instrumental track), as well as the music video, below.

MP3s:
A-Side
“I Bet That You Look Good…” (Single Version) - Arctic Monkeys [highly recommended]
“I Bet That You Look Good On The Dancefloor” (Video) - Arctic Monkeys
Watch with: WMV or Quicktime

B-Side
“Bigger Boys and Stolen Sweethearts” (Studio Version) - Arctic Monkeys
“Chun Li’s Spinning Bird Kick” - Arctic Monkeys

Yeah, so it’s Halloween, woo. In case you haven’t seen this yet on the thousands of other sites that featured it, the NORTH AMERICAN HALLOWEEN PREVENTION INITIATIVE (NAHPI) has released a parody of the Live Aid classic, “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” for Halloween, logically titled, “Do They Know It’s Hallowe’en?”. Anyway, the NAHPI is made up of a star-studded cast, featuring: Arcade Fire, Beck, David Cross, Devendra Banhart, Feist, Syd Butler (of Les Savy Fav - he went to Maret, the round room in the library is named after his mom (Kay Kendall), I went to a couple hockey games with him once, we’re totally bffxlxl), Peaches, Postal Service (Jimmy Tamborello), R.E.M., Rilo Kiley, Smoosh, Sonic Youth, Sum 41 (omgz), Wolf Parade, and Karen O (of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs). If I were less lazy I would make a joke about Sum 41 being the odd band out in that group, but it’s obviously been done before and, yeah, I’m too lazy. It’s a fun song, definitely the best Halloween-themed song ever (I said it), and you can watch the video below if you need to get in the mood for tonight’s festivities.

Video:
“Do They Know It’s Halloween” - NAHPI [Halloween-approved!]

Awh yeah, Happy Halloween y’all. I’m actually at Lynchburg College tonight (about an hour south of UVA) visiting the incredible Samantha Halbreich, so I can’t upload anything, but I’ll hook you up with a formal Halloween update tomorrow after my monstrous Psych midterm demolishes me. Anyway, for Halloween I’m being Ralph Waldo Emerson - we didn’t get a chance to make it to the costume store so I just borrowed a bunch of my friends clothes and started theorizing about transcendentalism and shit - and my costume consists of a tweed jacket, a v-neck sweater, a scarf, and a corncob pipe, and I’m also staunchly opposed to organized education and institution, and I’m a big fan of embracing nature and intuition. My future-roomate Eric is Henry David Thoreau (so we’re like a transcendentalist tag-team), and my other future-roomate Andrew completes the theme as, um, a witch. We’re pretty much the most badass triumvirate since Caesar, Crassus, and Pompey. The transcendentalist shit was a decent hit last night with the UVA crowd, but so far of a random sampling of the Lynchburg population, only Sammy knew who the notorious R.W.E. actually was. So we’ll see how that goes. But yeah, I’ll be sure to update with pictures and Halloween-themed MP3s later.

BUT FOR NOW: In the comments tell me what you’re gonna be for Halloween and I’ll send custom mix CDs to whoever has the most indie/awesome/creative costume or just whoever has a costume that I think is particularly clever. Laura Wilson has already reported that she’s being a bunny, so the bar has already been set pretty high, because that’s basically the most indie/original/creative thing I’ve ever heard. So yeah, comment and whatnot. Alright, time for a night of girls dressing overly-conservatively, Capri Sun, and Halloween-themed board games.

Sorry about the lack of posts recently, been going through a lot this past week, but if I can recommend one thing to all of you, it is that you should all go out and buy Stars’ album, Set Yourself On Fire. It’s lush and incredible and ethereal and ridiculously cathartic, so if that’s your kind of thing buy it immediately. Also look into to their two older LPs, Heart and Nightsongs. I got Set Yourself On Fire in March and immediately fell in love with “Your Ex-Lover Is Dead”, but it took me a while (like until now) to fully appreciate this masterpiece of a CD, but I haven’t listened to anything else in days. So yeah, purchase it now. Consult previous posts for MP3s, I have to go find a Halloween costume (fingers crossed that the slutty girl scout uniform isn’t sold out yet).

Wow. That was an amazing concert. Like, I know I’ve seen better live bands, Arcade Fire (who I saw last January), for example, are definitely the best in the business when it comes to live performances, but I’ve never enjoyed myself more at a concert. I was legitimately beaming the entire time. Everything was perfect. They didn’t play a few songs I was hoping to hear, but when you’ve got such a massive library with so many incredible songs as Death Cab does, it’s impossible for them to play everything everyone wants to hear. Unfortunately this meant I didn’t get to hear “We Looked Like Giants”, “A Lack of Color”, “405″, or “Champagne From A Paper Cup”, which I would gladly have taken in place of “Company Calls”, “Amputations”, “Expo ‘86″, “For What Reason”. (Correct me if I’m wrong, but I definitely feel like if there was a weak spot on Transatlanticism - and that’s a big “if” - it was “Expo ‘86″, I just think it’s pretty forgettable in relation to the rest of the songs on that album). HOWEVER, it was still an amazing experience and the best concert I’ve been to.

Stars got things started with an awesome set, marred only by slightly soft vocals that could have been louder. This wasn’t too much of a problem, but “Your Ex-Lover Is Dead”, definitely the song I was most excited to hear, was adversely affected by this. “What I’m Trying To Say”, with it’s awesome drumming and energetic chorus, was the definite highlight of their set, and they also played some awesome songs from their older releases, Nightsongs and Heart, which I hadn’t heard (download those below). Vocalists Tarquil Campbell and Amy Millan have a great stage presence, and Millan is definitely the hottest unattractive girl ever. But anyway, their setlist (roughly - it may be slightly out of order or I may be excluding one song) is below and you can download a couple of the best tracks also.

Video: (download and watch with Quick Time)
“Title and Registration” - Death Cab For Cutie (high quality)

Also, NPR recorded and webcasted live Death Cab’s Monday night performance at the 9:30 Club, so you can go there to hear it or just compare the setlist to Sunday’s. If you want. Or you could just not.

So I’m hesitant to make this post because it will knock We Are Scientists from the top spot on the page, and everyone really needs to hear that band, so make sure you check them out below this when you’re done here.

I will be going, along with my adorable sidekick Zack Friendly, to see Death Cab For Cutie w/ Stars this Sunday at the 9:30 Club in DC and I legitimately could not be more excited. Not only do I get to see Death Cab, who are firmly entrenched on my top 5 favorite bands list, I also get to see Stars, who I also love. Like I’d pay a good deal of money to see either of these bands separately, and the fact that I’m seeing them together just has me over the moon (as Grandma Jamarv would say). I probably have never been more excited for a concert ever, and proof of this can be found in the fact that I’m pulling an Ellen Malinowski and showing up an hour before doors open to assure that I can be front-row, as close to Ben Gibbard as possible. But anyway, in honor of this momentous occasion I am making a Death Cab/Ben Gibbard megapost (akin to the “More Bloc Party Than You Can Handle” post of last month) that’s as chock full of MP3 hotness as it is long-winded. But I’ll kick things off with some special goodness courtesy of Stars, as they are amazing in their own right.

If you haven’t heard them already on M3 Volume 1 or The OC, Stars (which includes members of Broken Social Scene) are your prototypically fantastic Canadian band featuring the lush arrangements and ethereal instrumentation that only Canadian artists seem capable of creating as of late, as well as the beautiful boy-girl harmonies of dual-vocalists Torquil Campbell and Amy Millan. They’re most recent album, the often wrongly overlooked Set Yourself On Fire, released earlier this year on Arts & Crafts, propelled them from obscurity on the strength of lead single “Ageless Beauty” and heard-it-on-The OC classic “Your Ex-Lover Is Dead”, the latter being one of my favorite tracks of the year.

“Your Ex-Lover Is Dead” - Stars [highly recommended… as always]
“Ageless Beauty” - Stars
“Celebration Guns” - Stars
“Elevator Love Letter” - Stars

In an interesting turn of events, both Stars and Death Cab have released fantastic covers of The Smiths classic, “This Charming Man”. Death Cab decides to speed things up and gives us an uptempo interpetation of the song, while Stars opt to slow things down and transform it into a ballad of their own. Download both below, as well as the original Smiths version.

“This Charming Man” - Stars
“This Charming Man” - Death Cab [highly recommended]
“This Charming Man” - The Smiths

Death Cab, on the other hand, needs no introduction, especially since their 2004 signing to major-label Atlantic Records. Rather than post my favorite DCFC songs that everyone’s already heard and fallen in love with, I’m posting some more obscure gems and other Ben Gibbard-related material. Up first are these two gems from Death Cab’s early You Can Play These Songs With Chords, before Gibbard had perfected his voice and discovered that now-famous falsetto of his. “TV Trays” which was also featured as the b-side on the “Sound of Settling” single release, perfectly captures the feelings and emotions of the transitional period between late summer and fall/winter, and You Can Play… also features Death Cab wonderfully re-imagining The Smiths’ classic “This Charming Man” (available for download above).

“TV Trays” - Death Cab

I also am posting this awesome unreleased track from Death Cab, “This Temporary Life”, a b-side from the Transatlanticism sessions. The song was featured on the Barsuk-organized compilation, Future Soundtrack of America, a joint project between MoveOn.org and Music For America (purchase here). However, don’t take it’s b-side status as a statement about it’s quality, as it’s a great song that just didn’t flow well with the rest of the material on Transatlanticism.

“This Temporary Life” - Death Cab [highly recommended]

The final segment of this post is devoted to Ben Gibbard’s legendary solo material, accumulated from live shows and his self-titled solo album, which Gibbard released under the alias, All-Time Quarterback. Gibbard’s legendary solo live shows have yielded priceless material, and frequently include covers (some awe-inspiring, some hilarious) of his bands’ (Postal Service, Death Cab, ATQB) classics. Below you can download Ben’s top tracks from his All-Time Quarterback days, “Plans Get Complex” and “Dinner At Eight”, an original song, “You Remind Me of Home”, as well as his flawless collaboration with Belgian electro-pop master Styrofoam, “Couches In Alleys”, which is one of my favorite songs of all time. Covers are futher below.

“Plans Get Complex” - All-Time Quarterback
“Dinner At Eight in the Suburbs” - All-Time Quarterback
“You Remind Me of Home” - Ben Gibbard
“Couches In Alleys” - Styrofoam [highly highly recommended]

Finally, here are Gibbard’s legendary live covers. Gibbard offers incredible acoustic renditions of Dntel’s “This Is The Dream…” and Postal Service’s “Recycled Air”, as well as awesome covers of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”, Cindi Lauper’s “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun”, and a hilarious version of Avril Lavigne’s 2000 chart-topper, “Complicated”. All of these are [highly recommended] and demand that you download them.

“(This Is) The Dream of Evan and Chan” - Ben Gibbard (Dntel)
“Recycled Air” - Ben Gibbard (Postal Service)
“Thriller” - Ben Gibbard (Michael Jackson)
“Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” - Ben Gibbard (Cyndi Lauper)
“Complicated” - Ben Gibbard (Avril Lavigne)

Video: (coming on Saturday or Sunday, can’t post them right now)
“Ageless Beauty” - Stars
“Reunion” - Stars
“Plans Get Complex” - All-Time Quarterback (hi-res)
“Title and Registration” - Death Cab For Cutie (hi-res)
“Such Great Heights” - Postal Service

I need a nap now, but check back on Monday for a summary of the show and some unreleased Plans b-sides for download.

So for the last week I’ve been having a major life crisis of sorts, as I was being forced to decide between attending the UVA/Virginia Tech game at UVA on the night of November 19th, or attending the Hot Hot Heat/We Are Scientists concert in Baltimore which was to take place at the same time. In the most awesome turn of events ever, as I was walking to class today, I spotted a flyer alerting me of the fact that the HHH/We Are Scientists tour had in fact scheduled a date at UVA the next night. So yeah, best news ever. As for the artist profile of We Are Scientists, continue reading below.

We Are Scientists can be summed up in two words: “awh yeah”. They’re like a musical version of the comedy group Stella (speaking of which all of the unbelievable Stella movies are now back up here at College Humor). Actually, to be more precise, I’d say they sound like what you’d get if you crossed Hot Hot Heat’s herky-jerky danceable antics with Stella. But yeah, they’re awesome, and they’re definitely one of my favorite bands based on sheer likeability.

Though not actually from the UK - the band formed in New York in 2000 - they, like The Killers before them, are signed to a British distribution deal, and have just released their debut album, With Love & Squalor in the UK this past Tuesday (a US release is expected in early 2006). In their own words, they create “rock music of the thoughtful, sometimes epic, often loud, vaguely danceable, implicitly humanist variety”. Not only do I love their frantic brand of indie rock, I also love their brilliant sense of humor, as is expressed in their incredible music videos (which are available for streaming here) and their reviews and advice sections of their website (seriously, go visit, its as funny as any other comedy website on the internet). This band is probably the catchiest indie rock band I’ve ever heard, and Pitchfork pretty much nails the band with the description from their review: “[With] hooks aimed straight for your jugular… [We Are Scientists] straddle the line between indie and pop-punk”.

Also awesome about WAS is the fact that they’re apparently committed to making a music video for every song on their album. They already have fantastic videos for their first two singles, “Nobody Move, Nobody Get Hurt” (from M3 Rock Edition) and “The Great Escape” - both of which are available for download below - and they recently debuted a video for album track, “Inaction”, which you can download and view as well. All come highly recommended. Can’t wait to see these guys next month.

MP3s: [all highly recommended]
“Nobody Move, Nobody Get Hurt” - We Are Scientists
“Inaction” - We Are Scientists
“The Great Escape” - We Are Scientists

Video: (download and watch with Quicktime)
“Inaction” - We Are Scientists

Previous UK Artist Profiles
KT Tunstall
Arctic Monkeys
James Blunt
Maximo Park
Editors
The Subways

Friday marks the two-year anniversary of the death of legendary singer/song-writer Elliott Smith, and yesterday Gorilla vs. Bear brought to my attention 22 “new” previously-unreleased Elliott Smith tracks, currently being called From A Basement On The Hill II, to my attention. All 22 songs, many of which are thought to be from the original Basement sessions, are available for download here, courtesy of Elliott Smith B-Sides. MTV.com also has an article on the leaked tracks, which you can read here. Below you can download “Needle In The Hay”, my favorite Elliott Smith song, and “Miss Misery” the song that propelled him to fame on the Good Will Hunting sound track. Also, if you’re like me and like everything to have album art so it can be displayed beautifully on your iPod/iTunes, you can download/see the cover art that I took the liberty of creating for the album above (click image to enlarge). Feel free to leave opinions or thoughts on the cover art in the comments section, or check out the rest of my artwork here.

MP3s:
“Needle In The Hay” - Elliott Smith [highly recommended]
“Miss Misery” - Elliott Smith

1. “The Frug” - Rilo Kiley
2. “Alright” - The Lost Patrol
3. “Parade” - Heypenny
4. “Treehouse” - I’m From Barcelona
5. “White Collar Boy” - Belle & Sebastian
6. “I’m A Cuckoo” (Avalanches Version) - Belle & Sebastian
7. “Punchlines” - Mates of State
8. “Goods (All In Your Head)” - Mates of State
9. “Hounds of Love” (Phones’ Wolves At The Door Mix) - The Futureheads
10. “I Ain’t Saying My Goodbyes” (Phones’ 12″ Version) - Tom Vek
11. “Hung Up On Soul” - Death Cab For Cutie/Madonna
12. “The Wrath of Mikey” - The Go! Team
13. “Skeleton” - Bloc Party
14. “Insomnia” - Electric President
15. “Such Great Heights” - Ben Gibbard

So in anticipation of The OC’s November 3rd return, even though it’s been a fairly disappointing season to this point, I am posting the best songs from this season’s first four episodes here today. For me the two musical highlights of this season have been Bloc Party’s “Blue Light” (also available on M3 Volume 5) closing out the first episode, and the inclusion of Royksopp’s awesome “Triumphant” in the dance scene of the most recent episode. Other highlights are former Husker Du frontman Bob Mould’s “Circles” and Death Cab’s “Soul Meets Body”. This season has also featured four cover songs: Cobra Verde’s terrible cover of “Get The Party Started” (which I didn’t bother to post), All Sad Girls Are Beautiful’s cover of Badfinger’s “Baby Blue” (which is like non-existent, I couldn’t find it anywhere, the band doesn’t even have a website), Matt Pond PA’s so-so rendition of Neutral Milk Hotel’s classic “In The Aeroplane…”, and Youth Group’s great cover of Alphaville’s “Forever Young”. Other notables are “Song For No One” by Ian Broudie, Shout Out Louds’ “Wish I Was Dead Pt. 2″ (from the new Music From The OC: Mix 5), and “I Don’t Want To Fall In Love” by She Wants Revenge (which blatantly, blatantly rips off the synth line from Fischerspooner’s “Emerge”). Download them all below.

MP3s:
Episode One: “The Aftermath”
“Beretta” - Menshivitz
“Hide Another Mistake” - The 88
“Song For No One” - Ian Broudie
“Way To Go” (Teen Wolf Theme) - Teen Wolf
“Blue Light” (Anti-Gravity Mix) - Bloc Party [highly recommended]

Episode Two: “The Shape of Things To Come”
“Soul Meets Body” - Death Cab For Cutie [highly recommended]
“Get The Party Started” - Cobra Verde
“Do You Want To” - Franz Ferdinand
“California” (No Whistling) - Phantom Planet [not yet available]

Episode Three: “The End of Innocence”
“Wish I Was Dead Pt. 2″ - Shout Out Louds [from OC Mix 5]
“Gangsters and Thugs” - Transplants
“Salvation” - Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
“Baby Blue” - All Sad Girls Are Beautiful [unavailable]
“In The Aeroplane Over The Sea” - matt pond PA

Episode Four: “The Last Waltz”
“Circles” - Bob Mould [highly recommended]
“Fire Fire” - M.I.A.
“Ain’t No Game” - Basko [unavailable]
“I Don’t Want To Fall In Love” - She Wants Revenge
“Natural” - Infusion
“Triumphant” - Royksopp [highly recommended]
“Forever Young” - Youth Group [from OC Mix 5]

Previously:
Music From The OC: Mix 5