Good Weather For Airstrikes

NOTE: I meant to post this two days ago when the Decemberists/Capitol news broke on Pitchfork, but I kind of got bogged down by working/sleeping, so bare with me.

Today was a big day for Pitchfork readers (well for me at least), as Pitchfork not only broke the “exlusive” news that The Decemberists have signed with Capitol Records, but they also announced their top five music videos of the year (as well as their top five live performances).

First is the news regarding The Decemberists signing to Capitol. This has been the subject of much speculation in the indie community for a while, and I think this is a great move for The Decemberists, especially after seeing Death Cab benefit from such a transition. However, I’m not sure that The Decemberists’ breed of whimsical lit-rock is necessarily conducive to massive commercial success (unlike Death Cab and Modest Mouse before them), as it’s hard to imagine things ever getting to a point where 13 year-old girls are screaming along to Meloy’s choruses about chimneysweeps, legionnaires and pantaloons. Also announced is the fact that lead singer Colin Meloy and company will be returning to the studio next spring with Chris Walla to work on the follow-up to last spring’s fantastic Picaresque, a definite top-ten record of 2005 in my opinion. To celebrate all of this I would like to post the Colin Meloy solo show (Live @ Schuba’s Tavern, January 19, 2005) that had been on You Ain’t No Picasso a while back, but I don’t know how to upload a .zip or .rar file to ezarchive, so if anyone wants to enlighten me I will gladly do it (this will also allow me to post future M3s as one big .zip or .rar file, as has been requested by multiple readers). So for now I’ll just be posting the band’s fantastic Wes Anderson-esque (read: Rushmore-esque) video for their latest single, “16 Military Wives”.

Video: “16 Military Wives” - The Decemberists [highly recommended]

ALSO, Pitchfork announced their top 5 live performances and music videos of the year today, but what is most of interest to me is the music videos portion of the article. My top five videos differ drastically from there’s, and the only one of their’s, M83’s “Don’t Save Us From The Flames” that I would even consider including in my top 25 (which will come closer to Christmas, completely downloadable). However, I’ll be letting you decide for yourself as I have four of them on my computer that I am making available for you to download, and I can link you to where you can watch the other one. Here’s what Pitchfork said and below are my thoughts.

Video:
“I Gave You” - Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy’ ~ Well if this were an award for the most hauntingly dramatic video of the year, “I Gave You” would win hands down, with an excellent performance from Will Oldham portraying the pain and mental anguish of a broken man pushed over the edge. All is fine and well but the plodding pace of the video is not justified by the not-terribly-suprising “twist” at the end and this one probably won’t make my top 25 (or top 15, I haven’t yet decided) music videos of the year, but a well-shot clip nonetheless.

“Cold Hands (Warm Heart)” - Brendan Benson ~ This is a great video, my second-favorite on this list after M83’s clip, in which stick figures frolic about as Benson and co. play in the background. At first the figures prance about keyboardist (and Waxwings’ frontman) Dean Fertita’s twinkly keyboard line, but things soon turn dark and tragic for all of the stick figures, finally culminating in a wasteland of stick-figure death to close out the clip.

“Don’t Save Us From The Flames” - M83 ~ The best of the bunch, French technowizard M83’s video for “Don’t Save Us From The Flames”, perfectly captures the angst and awkward tribulations of everyday teenage life (over synthesized moans of “teeeeeeen loooooove”), climaxing in the teen in question’s ascendence to a heavenly existence where she is joined by her crush in ephemeral matrimony.

“War Photographer” - Jason Forrest ~ Meh, I don’t really like this one. Animated vikings battling each other with searing guitar riffs and debilitating brass lines (?), climaxing in a Mighty Morphing Power Rangers-inspired showdown between the two ships, which have at this point morphed into larger robots, a la the part at the end of every Power Rangers episode when the Rangers would all combine their powers and form that big robot that always won over whatever opponent it faced). Sweet song though.

“Low C” - Supergrass ~ I don’t have this one available for download (i.e. I don’t have it on my computer), and frankly I’m not too concerned as it’s the weakest of the bunch, a kitschy documentary-style video about the existence of real mermaids of Weeki Wachee, Florida. Lame. If you are so inspired by my praise for this video that you feel the need to watch it, you can view it here in RealPlayer format and here in Windows Media format. Have a blast.

As much as this post probably wasn’t that exciting for anyone involved, I can promise this next week will be a doozy, with the Good Weather For Airstrikes Best of ‘05 lists finally seeing the light of day. Everett and I will be alternating our picks, beginning this weekend with our miscellaneous rewards (Live Show of the Year, Best Debut Artist, Lyrics of the Year, Vocals of the Year, basically whatever we feel like giving awards for), followed by our individual Music Videos of the Year lists, Song of the Year lists, and climaxing in our Album of the Year lists, all between now and Christmas. Just in case this wasn’t already implied, there will be massive amounts of downloadable content, so get your hard drives ready. Also, if you haven’t yet (or are a new reader), be sure to download M3 Holiday Edition, surprisingly the feature that’s been getting me the most new readers and attention in the blog scene.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 15th, 2005 at 3:20 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.