YouTube Rodeo: Good Dangers' Patient Pop "Dress You"

Still, Good Dangers makes us wait. Embedded above we have a live rendering of the London-based quintet's very pretty ballad "Dress You," filmed in a church in Shoreditch, fronter Gavin Dwight and band confident within the solemn setting, laying it down, the bassist plain grooving at one point, mindless of the surroundings. It's affecting and sweet guitar pop, mildy hypnotic with its repetitions and perfect for these summer nights where the sun is down and the windows thrown open but the sweat won't quite stop. Good Dangers here exhibit the element of restraint in its music that underscores its growing musical maturity; indeed, gone are the bash-and-pop days of pre-cursor band Assembly Now. The Dangers have been biding their time over the last few years, building up a formidable repertoire: the sublime single "DFYF" was issued this past March and the digital split "So Unkind" a year ago. But it all leaves us wanting more -- when will there be a full-length? We're left to just press repeat over and over and wait it out, like we're waiting for the heat to break.

YouTube Rodeo: Good Dangers' "DFYF"

There's finally a day when we're no longer waiting for something official from London-based Good Dangers, and thankfully for us, that day is today. The quintet, concocted from many parts of the defunct guitar pop band Assembly Now, released today in the UK its first official single, "DFYF," the spectacular video for which is above. The single is out on the band's own Brasilia Records and if you are in the UK you can buy it from ITunes right here. If you are not in the UK, you can stream "DFYF" at this Soundcloud page right here. Can't wait to hear more from Good Dangers, and hopefully we won't have to wait years and years for the next thing of theirs to come along. The band plays a launch party for the single March 29 in London at the Sebright Arms, and two additional London dates are booked for April 19 and May 17. So, Americans: sell everything! Move to London! Get into it!

YouTube Rodeo: Good Dangers' Live Take on "Abigail"

Sure, in at least our part of Los Estados Unidos it feels like winter never came. But all the same it is nice to have a reminder that spring is inevitable, and with it good times in the sun. And today we're getting that vibe from the live clip embedded above of London-based Good Dangers' new song, "Abigail." The song is the lead track from the quintet's cryptically titled forthcoming single "DFYF," which will be available March 19 via Good Dangers' own Brasilia Records (the label takes its name from another early Good Dangers tune, the Vimeo video for which has now gone private). No word on a traditional b-side, but Gav Dangers tells Clicky Clicky that the release will be complemented with some remixes.

The band would seem to be the most patient ever. Years beyond its prior incarnation as Assembly Now (subject of Show Us Yours #6 in March 2007), indeed, years beyond announcing that it had transmogrified into Good Dangers, we finally have a glimpse at what the band's first UK single will be. Although this isn't the first noise we've heard from the band; late last spring the track "So Unkind" was released by Cosine as the label's inaugural release (which we wrote about here), and we were jazzed to such an extent that we featured the tune in our playlist for New Music Night 1. You remember that tune, right? It goes like this:

Today's Hotness: The Swirlies, Good Dangers

>> [PHOTO CREDIT: Brad Searles] That distant rumbling you half-hear and half-feel can only mean that legendary chimp rock superheroes The Swirlies are powering up for an indeterminate span of time. We caught wind of the activity via a well-informed Facebook friend Tuesday, and confirmed this afternoon that, yes, in fact The Swirlies will play Philadelphia's Johnny Brenda's Saturday July 23rd. Curiously, the gig will be a matinee. We can't find other dates, not even at The Swirlies' web dojo, but we did notice that the band's bio was updated only last week. We have heard pretty credible information that additional but limited East Coast appearances beyond the JB's date are a possibility. Watch this space for more information. The Swirlies are best known for a series of spectacular releases on Taang! records in the early '90s, including 1992's What To Do About Them EP [MP3s], 1993's mind-blowing Blonder Tongue Audio Baton [MP3s] and 1994's Brokedick Car EP [MP3s]. The mercurial act last roared to life in the winter of 2009, and we wrote about the Philly and Cambridge shows here and here respectively.

The Swirlies' "Wrong Tube"

>> Speaking of 2009: it's been a long time coming, but Good Dangers, the London-based guitar pop outfit that rose from the ashes of spiky pop purveyors Assembly Now, has finally issued a debut single. We'd been in touch with the quintet -- which touts the core members of Assembly Now along with new member Jenny on keys -- as far back as November 2009 and had been waiting on new recordings ever since. We are happy to report it has been well worth the wait. The digital-only single -- a split with Peppercorn issued by Cosine Records May 31 -- features the Good Dangers' "So Unkind;" catch the stream below and watch the video right here. The music isn't jarringly different from the latter Assembly Now efforts, particularly the earnest vocals, but there is a new lush density and hypnotic repetition that clearly sets "So Unkind" apart. While the song is the band's first official release, we are excited to find that there are already three other videos posted to Vimeo: "Brasilia;" "Waves;" and "Beat Of Your Heart." All of the tracks are strong, and we're hopeful an EP or even full length is in the offing. Longtime readers may recall that Assembly Now's song "It's Magnetic" was [still is] one of our favorites of 2007, although our blog post from December 2007 saying as much was rendered useless by the shuttering of web playlister Imeem.

Good Dangers' "So Unkind"

Today's Hotness: Revelation Records, Metal Hearts, Assembly Now

>> According to this engrossing interview with Revelation Records head Jordan Cooper, a second notable documentary about the hardcore punk scene -- in addition to the excellent "American Hardcore," this one focusing on the New York Hardcore scene that produced legendary acts like BURN, Quicksand, Judge and Bold -- has been underway for some time. Originally helmed by krsnacore posterboy and former Youth Of Today and Shelter fronter Ray Cappo, the film is nearly complete, although Cappo apparently had to switch his focus to his own work and family matters. Says Cooper, "I agreed to take it over and find someone to finish it which is something I'm in the process of doing. It will definitely come out, but there are more interviews to get and we're pretty much starting from scratch with the editing." We're particularly excited to see this, as by the time we got turned onto New York Hardcore in 1990, the scene was pretty much dead.

>> Notable neo-slowcore duo Metal Hearts has officially disbanded, according to this MySpace bulletin. Anar Badalov is busy with his new band Travels, which just released its first full length, while Flora Wolpert Checknoff is apparently traveling (weird coincidence, no?) and has posted some solo material online here. The erstwhile Baltimore-based act released the full-length Socialize in 2005 on Suicide Squeeze. We reviewed the record here. The title track is wholly mesmerizing and excellent and you can download it from the band's MySpace. We'll save you the trip and post it below. Bradley's Almanac has more info about Travels and an MP3 here; dig it.

Metal Hearts -- "Socialize" -- Socialize
[buy Socialize from Newbury Comics here]

>> The New York Times presents this morning a very interesting examination of so-called 360 (as in 360 degrees) record deals. One interesting thing we learned was that the label concern Fueled By Ramen is affiliated with Atlantic Records. Granted, none of the indie bands we follow will likely ever score a major label deal, let alone a "360" deal, but it is interesting to note what the growing trend is at the top of the food chain, and how it is viewed -- by both proponents and detractors -- by the capital I industry. Read the whole piece here.

>> Did we mention London indie rock foursome Assembly Now is recording a full-length record? It's true. To date we think the band has only released three singles, all of which are very good. So good, in fact, that at least as of now Assembly Now's "It's Magnetic" is in our top ten most played tracks of 2007 in ITunes. We'll likely do a year-end list of favorite albums and songs, so consider this information a bit of a preview. Here are our favorite records of 2006.

Today's Hotness: Assembly Now, Answering Machine, Qui, Silver Jews

>> The electronically affable (we've only ever "met" him via email) Lush, drummer for London indie rock quartet Assembly Now, is now the former drummer for London indie rock quartet Assembly Now. Lush chalks his departure up to musical differences in a departure message to fans. In his stead for the foreseeable future (or at least foreseeable from across the Atlantic) will be John Sutton, brother to current bassist Howard Sutton, meaning now perhaps the rhythm section will have some sort of fraternal telepathy. Or maybe they will just pound each other like the Davies, Robinson and Gallagher brothers. Either way it will be exciting, no? We bid a fond farewell to Lush, who happily answered our questions when we featured Assembly Now in our on-again, off-again featurette Show Us Yours. Check out Show Us Yours #6 featuring Assembly Now here. The band's most recent release, the single "Graphs, Maps & Trees," was issued on the Kids label Aug. 6. Lush drummed on some pretty great singles. Here are the a-sides of the first two.

Assembly Now -- "It's Magnetic" -- "It's Magnetic" b/w "Out On 24s"
Assembly Now -- "Leigh-On-Sea" -- "Leigh-On-Sea" b/w "Tenement"
[right click and save as]
[buy the "Leigh-On-Sea" and "Graphs, Maps & Trees" singles from ITunes here]

>> According to a recent interview in the 'zine Noize Makes Enemies, The Answering Machine's next single will likely be for a track called "Light Bulb." According to the parley with band fronter Martin, the track was produced by Robin Houseman, who also produced the Manchester, England-based quartet's excellent "Silent Hotels" single, which streeted June 18 and sold out its vinyl edition of 500 in two days. According to the interview The Answering Machine's next single will be out in November. Will new drummer Ben play on it? We guess we'll find out in a couple months. In the meantime, kids in the UK have scads of chances to see the band live. Check out all the tour dates at the band's MySpace teepee here.

>> More news out of the Johnny Foreigner camp... so the signing was with Best Before as we expected. If you are a "friend" of "the band" on "MySpace" then you got the awesome bulletin the band sent out Friday night showing their names (and BLOOD) on the proverbial dotted line, as well as some shots of the recent recording session at Southern Studios and sundry other scruffy label and A&R types. The planned EP Arcs Across The City may be more of a November thing, as opposed to October, according to the latest missive, and is going to come in a cool package with pop-up art. Did we mention the Southern Sessions were recorded by a fellow named Harvey Birrell, whose credits include the Irish act Therapy? (whose song "Teethgrinder" errr, "Screamager" is totally the band's best jam). After stalking them via the Internet for half a year, we are hoping to get a proper interview with Johnny Foreigner later this fall. Watch this space.

>> Drowned In Sound has an informative and amusing interview with badman rocker David Yow, former fronter of The Jesus Lizard and newest addition to the trio Qui, here. Qui's record Love's Miracle streets next week on Ipecac. To hear Yow tell it, since leaving The Jesus Lizard he's spent most of his time drinking too much and playing with Photoshop. On the new record Yow is mostly singing vocal parts writting by Qui's Matt, but the now trio did write one song together, "Today, Gestation." We reviewed a recently released The Jesus Lizard live DVD here, and our foreign correspondent Zoz reviewed a Qui live date in January here.

>> More news from Drowned In Sound, who are really holding shizz down lately, no? The site reports that there will be a new Silver Jews record in 2008. The band, led by troubled poet David Berman, was to have finished recording the set last month and may be released as soon as January. More details are here.

YouTube Rodeo: Assembly Now's "Graphs, Maps & Trees"

We've been saddled with a Tuesday deadline for a week's worth of work at the day job, so things are going to quiet here for a while, with the exception of some action over the weekend perhaps. In the meantime, check out this new video for London quartet Assembly Now's forthcoming single, "Graphs, Maps & Trees," which is released in the UK on Kids Aug. 6. The video seems to be a sort of trippy homage to the weirder MTV videos of the early '80s. Think Duran Duran's earlier clips, or maybe Greg Kihn's. Or The Cars' video with the cartoon fly, "You Might Think." "Graphs, Maps & Trees" is Ass Now's third single. You can download MP3s of the first two, which are barn burners, at the band's web site here. Well, it appears the band has revamped its web site, so those singles aren't there anymore. How about this XFM session we recently posted? Oh, and we just found the links to the MP3s of the first two singles -- they are at the band's MySpace shack right here and at the bottom of the left column. Among other things, we previously featured Assembly Now in Show Us Yours #6 in March.

Today's Hotness: Assembly Now, Maybe It's Reno, Vice Kills Jamaica

>> A friendly chap repping London indie quartet Assembly Now got in touch to say the lads had recently recorded four songs for an XFM radio session. The band is offering two of the tracks for download, including a smoking, goes-to-11 version of the single "It's Magnetic" and a more mid-tempo track "Cool To Be Kind." We were kind of hoping that latter track was mislabeled and was actually a cover of the classic Nick Lowe cut "Cruel To Be Kind" [YouTube; YouTube]. Alas, no, although the rep said he thought that might have been Assembly Now's original title for the track. Anyway, definitely check it out. And make certain to download the XFM version of "It's Magnetic." The breakneck pace of the single is there, but the live production is a bit red-lined, so that the verse practically explodes right out of the gate, driven by bass and kick drum. The lead guitar line threatens to go off the rails at one point, and singer Gavin transposes words in our favorite lyric, but that just makes this live version that much more crucial. Check the MP3s out below. Assembly Now releases its third single, "Graphs Maps & Trees," Aug. 6 on Kids. In March the band participated in our Show Us Yours feature, which you can read right here. Ass Now is gigging all through the summer in the UK; you can peruse all their live dates here.

Assembly Now -- "It's Magnetic (Live)" -- XFM Radio Session
Assembly Now -- "Cool To Be Kind (Live)" -- XFM Radio Session
[right click and save as]

>> Teenbeat Records reports an Unrest reunion of sorts in the form of the forthcoming debut from Maybe It's Reno. The prime mover in the band is former Unrest / Air Miami bassist Bridget Cross, who was also in a very early incarnation of Velocity Girl. Ms. Cross is abetted by her former Unrest bandmates on the recordings, with Phil Krauth contributing drums and Teenbeat honcho and transplanted Cantabrigian Mark Robinson playing guitar and doing other things on most of the tracks. No hard release date yet, but the set is expected to be issued this fall.

>> Those of you who took our advice from over the weekend and checked out VBS.tv's very watchable series on dancehall in Jamaica: we heard from a fellow at Vice who wanted to make sure we knew about a 48-minute megamix of tunes that includes tracks from many of the artists featured in the series. We've listened to about half of it so far, and if you have any interest in dancehall (we love some of the wilder production, but know very little about dancehall in general) you should download this mix and throw it in your IPod or onto a CD-R. All manner of big beats and blunted toasting, dub plate touting and just general party vibes. Some of the stuff is pretty explicit, so it may not be the sort of thing you'll want to rock while driving your kids to gymnastics, or whatever kids do these days. Here's the (gigantic) MP3, with the track list below the link -- we're not sure what the file title is about, but this is what it says when it drops into your ITunes.

Restation Is A Must! -- "Vice Kills Ja!" -- Michael Raphael's Album
[deleted]

Mavado -- "Even If Dem Kill Me"
Einstein -- "Rise Di Machines"
Mavado -- "Amazing Grace"
Asassin and Mr. Easy -- "Big Man Ting"
Timberlee and Ward 21 -- "Bubble Like Soup"
Chico -- "Let's Get It On"
Vybz Kartel -- "Beat'n Beat'n"
Mr. Vegas -- "Nuh Fight Over Man"
Elephant Man -- "Bring It Come"
Leftside and Esco -- "The Tribute"
Sizzla -- "Pum Pum Hard"
Sizzla -- "Nuh Apology"
Sizzla -- "Fix Dem Business"
Sizzla -- "Ain't Gonna See Us Fall"
Pressure -- "Love and Affection"
Spice -- "Tight Pussy Gyal"
Mega Banton -- "Grindin"
Leftside and Esco -- "Tuck In Yuh Belly"
Voicemail -- "Informer"
Mr. Vegas -- "Nuh Frien From Dem"
Mavado -- "Shotta Nuh Miss"
Mavado -- "Dying"
Mavado -- "Me And My Dogs"
Jr. Gong -- "Something For You"
Akon -- "Don't Matter"
Busy Signal -- "Shoot Nuh Miss"
Vybz Kartel -- "Cyan Cook"
Bounty Killer -- "Try Fi Stop Killa"

>> Philly-based indie rock sensations The A-Sides just announced a slate of tour dates leading up to the release of their sophomore record and Vagrant Records debut. We're posting the dates below. Vagrant will release The A-Sides' Silver Storms Aug. 28, which we hope means that promos should be sent out sometime soon. We've been waiting a long time to hear this one. We might have posted some of these dates already, but what are you gonna do? We've never seen these guys live before, so we're obviously pretty excited about that Boston date.

06.20 -- Darkhorse Tavern -- State College, PA
06.21 -- The Nite Owl -- Dayton, OH
06.22 -- Schubas -- Chicago, IL
06.23 -- Continental Switchyard Festival -- Chicago, IL
07.20 -- XPN/YROCK Festival -- Camden, NJ
08.07 -- Black Cat -- Washington, DC
08.08 -- Middle East -- Cambridge, MA
08.30 -- Record Release at Johnny Brenda's -- Philadelphia, PA
09.02 -- Test Pattern -- Scranton, PA

>> We were pleased to learn that one of our favorite up-and-coming acts has a new label deal in place. It is still unannounced and the information was off the record. But we wanted to write this so that when Pitchfork gets the exclusive in a couple months, we can link back to this item and say, "yeah, we knew that." The interesting thing about the deal, and we don't think this is giving anything away, is that the band had initially been scouted by this label five years ago. So there you go, several worthless sentences about how we know stuff.

Today's Hotness: Frightened Rabbit, The Beatings, Assembly Now

>> BrooklynVegan isn't saying how it knows (oh wait, here is the confirmation at Fat Cat)... Anyway, BrooklynVegan reports here that roundly excellent Glaswegian indie trio Frightened Rabbit has signed to Fat Cat, which is already home to acts including Mice Parade and The Twilight Sad. Frightened Rabbit's debut Sings The Greys, yet to be released in the U.S., is currently being remastered by indie go-to guy Alan Douches, and Fat Cat plans to issue the remastered version this fall. That release will be preceded by a single, the album track "Be Less Rude." The band is working with producer Peter Katis (Interpol, Mobius Band) on material for a sophomore record. We've already heard some demos of new stuff and can say there are hot songs in the works. You can download Frightened Rabbit's original three-song demo from Fat Cat's demo archive here. The band has one U.S. date slated, June 24 at the Mercury Lounge in New York. Here's an MP3 of "Go Go Girls" from the 2006 issue of Sings The Greys, courtesy of the upstanding citizens over at the Self Starter Foundation.

Frightened Rabbit -- "Go Go Girls" -- Sings The Greys (2006)
[right click and save as]

>> A lot of news out of the Midriff Records camp. About 18 months on the heels of the release of the record that spawned it, Boston noise-rock quartet The Beatings' blistering fist-pumper "Feel Good Ending" has been given a video treatment. The tune was one of several highlights of the 2006 release Holding On To Hand Grenades, and you can watch the video clip here. As we reported previously, The Beatings have begun work on the follow-up to Hand Grenades. You can see forthcoming tour dates at the band's MySpace lean-to here. Beatings side project E.R. will release an digital-only EP entitled ...And The Thunder Chief June 26. The short stack features five new tracks and will only be available via the Midriff Records web site. And finally, The Spanish Armada, the most recent backing band of E.R.'s Eldridge Rodriguez, will release an album on Midriff this fall. Dig the video for "Feel Good Ending"? Here's the MP3:

The Beatings -- "Feel Good Ending" -- Holding On To Hand Grenades
[right click and save as]

>> That forthcoming Assembly Now single we mentioned last week? It's going to be for the track "Graphs Maps & Trees," which has been streaming for some time on the London quartet's MySpace player. The single will be issued in early August on 7-inch vinyl. Once the vinyl run is exhausted, the tune will be available for sale via digital storefronts including ITunes. This all according to a MySpace bulletin from the band a week ago.

>> Pitchfork reports here that Pink Floyd's 1967 debut The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn is being expanded and reissued by EMI. The three-disc set will contain stereo and mono mixes of the album, four singles from that period, and other rarities. Full details here. We already bought one reissue of the album, and we don't think we need another one. We'll see.

>> Our new favorite podcast? Glad you asked. Apparently the Touch label has had a podcast going back to 2005. We just got on board with the most recent episode, which is field recordings from the Island of Islay in the Scottish Hebrides. There's a bit too much narration for our tastes, but I guess with field recordings you do need a certain amount of context. But anyway, check out the site for TouchRadio here, and try a few of the podcasts. We're digging episode 25 -- it's like the last minute of "CBS Sunday Morning" where they show wild red foxes just chillin' for sixty seconds, except longer.

Today's Hotness: Shellac, Bedhead, Dinosaur Jr., Assembly Now

>> Venerable label Touch + Go has launched a digital music storefront selling 256Kbps MP3s of albums from its impressive catalog. Fine. But the big news is that Touch + Go is selling the wares of storied grind trio Shellac as well -- we just never thought fronter and renowned recording engineer Steve Albini would ever agree to release the stuff digitally, given his anti-CD stance over the years. Since MP3s are even more of an aural abomination than CDs, who would have thought the Shellac catalog would ever get sold digitally? It turns out Touch + Go is honoring Albini's audiophiliac (even a word?) beliefs, as the new Shellac set (out today) Excellent Italian Greyhound is being sold digitally as CD-quality 16-bit and above-CD quality 24-bit WAV files. Apparently, the 24-bit WAV format available for purchase at touchandgorecords.com does not play and/or burn with certain Mac and PC software. So there you go.

>> Incidentally, we got Excellent Italian Greyhound on vinyl in today's mail (with the label-less CD version of the album inserted in it, natch) and we are about 80% of the way through the opening track "The End Of Radio." We love the tune, in part because we have a soft spot for all songs that talk about radio. As a greyhound owner, we're obviously completely nutty for the gatefold album art and slip cover (pictured) for Excellent Italian Greyhound. If you haven't seen it, it's worth walking into your local indie rock store and checking it out.

>> But wait, there's more: according to the web site for the Touch + Go MP3 shoppe, the label is the first place to present the digital-only reissue of two stunningly good Bedhead EPs first released in the mid-'90s by Trance Syndicate. The slow-core heavyweights' two titles are 4Song19:10CDEP and The Dark Ages. The former includes one of the best covers of Joy Division's "Disorder" ever recorded. The title track to the latter may be the best Bedhead song ever written. In short, these are crucial records. Get them now, or when they arrive at other digital storefronts July 10.

>> Speaking of new things, we watched the just-released Dinosaur Jr. DVD Live From The Middle East Saturday night after a day of painting, and here are our very brief notes from the screening: "Very good. Very trebly. Holy Crap -- "The Wagon." Holy Crap! "Raisins." Soloing is complete mayhem. Murph looks like [old time pro wrestler] George "The Animal" Steel when the shirt comes off and the light is just wrong."

>> Remember a couple of weeks ago when we said here that one of the new Spoon numbers sounded a bit like Thin Lizzy? Well, the veteran quartet's tune "The Underdog" has been made an official promo track and now you can judge for yourselves by downloading the MP3 linked below. This is the sole track on the new record recorded in LA with producer extraordinaire and former Jellyfish / Greys guy Jon Brion (of whom we are a big fan -- have you heard the Jon Brion solo record from 2000? Hot.); the rest was recorded in Austin with a fellow named Mike McCarthy. Spoon's Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga will be released July 10 on Merge, and you can pre-order the set here and stream it at the Merge site. We've heard the whole leak and can say Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga is our favorite Spoon record to date.

Spoon -- "The Underdog" -- Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
[right click and save as]

>> London-based indie rockers Assembly Now, previous featured here in Show Us Yours #6, will release a new single in July. Few details are available currently, but the platter will be issued on Kids Records, which, in addition to releasing (or at least selling) two earlier Ass Now singles, has also issued recordings by The Wombats and Band Of Horses. Assembly Now has a broad slate of dates schedule from June 14 through the end of July in the UK. Check them out at the band's MySpace yert here.

Show Us Yours #6: Assembly Now

London-based Assembly Now, which charmingly and self-deprecatingly refers to itself as Ass Now, has burst out of the rock 'n' roll gates with two air-tight singles, and it doesn't appear to be letting up any time soon (get a load of the details in the answer to question five below). The two-year-old quartet's small catalog recalls early, sparer Bloc Party, but Assembly Now's music carries a frenetic pop undertone that gives it a singular flavor.

Enamored with the propulsive melodicism and the curious mention of rollerskating in the band's debut single "It's Magnetic" b/w "Out On 24s," we got in touch with the band to see if it would submit to our usual battery of "what's going on" and "what's your practice space like" questions. And we're happy to report that the band, or at least drummer Andrew "Lush" Lusher, obliged, and in doing so provided us with the artiest practice space picture we've received from a band to date for our Show Us Yours features (early visitors to the band's new bulletin board have already seen part of it). The band has no current plans to visit the U.S. at the moment, so unless you live in the UK or are planning on visiting soon (see all their current bookings here), this is as close as you're going to get. Get comfy. So about that practice space...

1. Why do you use this space?

It's located in Deptford, which is basically the ghetto of London. Every day there's some sort of police chase or gang bust-up, so naturally it's the cheapest place to practice because no one wants to go there. However, we haven't figured out yet if saving money is worth getting knifed by a screaming homeless guy reeking of piss and crack. We also have a profound attachment to 'The Starry Night' by Van Gogh, and we wanted a rehearsal space that emulated those hypnotic shades of blue.

2. Explain how an idiosyncracy or quirk of this space or a former practice space has affected a song (or even your overall sound).

The walls are covered in carpet, so the room is completely dead-sounding. We occasionally enjoy creating tight sections of music with distinct spaces between notes, so the lack of natural reverb in the room probably has something to do with that. The vocal PA is also annoyingly quiet, so we've learned to control our volume at certain points which creates interesting dynamics in songs. We can't just have loud songs all the time because we'd never hear the singer.

In terms of actual writing and inspiration, we tend to write first in someone's bedroom with the lights down low and then bring those half-completed ideas into the rehearsal studio. Most of the songs we write from scratch in our little blue room tend to be extremely technical and self indulgent, which is fun for us to play but ultimately ends up sounding less like Don Caballero and more like Assembly Now Being Shit. There are exceptions though; "Calculate" was mostly written in the rehearsal space, you can hear that on our Myspace profile. We might have just got lucky with that one though.

3. You walk into your space. What's the first thing you smell? Why?

Teenage man-sweat, stale smoke and carpet. Who knows why, perhaps it's just the way of things. Zen. The rehearsal room is both everything and nothing.

4. We see producer Howard Gray worked on one of your singles. Did he offer any anecdotes about his time working on The Cure's The Head On The Door sessions? Barring that, how did he affect the sound of "It's Magnetic"/"Out On 24s"?

Howard Gray is a recording studio wizard, a modern-day audio Gandalf. If something isn't working, he'll sit intently in the corner stroking his beard. After a few minutes he'll suddenly glide out of his chair and twiddle dials or move microphones and things magically come to life. He has loads of war stories about The Cure and U2 and all those bands, but he'd probably turn us into newts if we mentioned any of them in public.

5. What do the next six months look like for your band?

We've just finished a handful of new songs with producer John Fortis, who has done records for everyone from The Prodigy to Art Brut to Razorlight, so we'll be releasing those on the Internet in a couple of weeks. We're doing a few dates on the VICE tour with The Noisettes and Goodbooks in March, John Kennedy has asked us to do an XFM session at the end of March, we've got our own headlining tour booked for April, a support tour with an amazing band called The Wombats in May/June and we'll definitely be doing a few UK festivals in summer. There's also been talk of doing another single or EP, we haven't decided what yet. Oh yeah, getting a record deal might be nice too. We're keeping busy.

How about a couple A-sides, courtesy of the Assembly Now site?

Assembly Now -- "It's Magnetic" -- It's Magnetic b/w Out On 24s
Assembly Now -- "Leigh-On-Sea" -- Leigh-On-Sea b/w Tenement
[right click and save as]

Assembly Now: InterWeb | MySpace | YouTube | Flickr

Read earlier Show Us Yours features:

Show Us Yours #1: Shapes And Sizes
Show Us Yours #2: Dirty On Purpose
Show Us Yours #3: Relay
Show Us Yours #4: Mobius Band
Show Us Yours #5: Frightened Rabbit