Playlist: Indie Rock vs. Baby Wakefulness, Vol. 1

This is currently the go-to soundtrack to our efforts to get our baby girl to go to sleep and stay asleep. A sad by-product is the fact that we are starting to get sick of a lot of these songs, some of which have been favorites forever and ever (we first got The Glove record around 1989 or 1990, for example). That said, we still find almost all of these to this day to be very moving in their way whenever we stop and sit and listen to them go by on the IPod docked in the nursery. The Logh and Spent tracks in particular are sublime and evocative. We've started piecing together a second mix for nighttime in the nursery. But for now, this is on heavy rotation.

1. The Glove -- "A Blues In Drag" -- Blue Sunshine [AmazonMP3]
2. Sam Prekop -- "A Cloud To The Back" -- Sam Prekop [Emusic]
3. The For Carnation -- "On The Swing" -- Marshmallows EP/Promised Works [Emusic]
4. Esquivel -- "Snowfall" -- More Of Other Worlds, Other Sounds [AmazonMP3]
5. Haywood -- "Plow" -- We Are Amateurs, You And I [Emusic]
6. Logh -- "The Big Sleep" -- A Sunset Panorama [Emusic]
7. Mogwai -- "Christmas Song" -- Mogwai EP+6 [AmazonMP3]
8. Jon Brion -- "Spotless Mind" -- Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind [AmazonMP3]
9. Jon Brion -- "Phone Call" -- Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind [AmazonMP3]
10. Jon Brion -- "Bookstore" -- Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind [AmazonMP3]
11. Archer Prewitt -- "Along The Coast" -- Gerroa Songs [Emusic]
12. Drop Nineteens -- "My Aquarium" -- Delaware [AmazonMP3]
13. Spent -- "Brighter Than Day" -- Songs Of Drinking And Rebellion [Emusic]
14. September 67 -- "Bring Back The Weight" -- Lucky Shoe [Emusic]
15. Lilys -- "Kodiak (Alternate)" -- Send In The Subs [Unreleased/MP3]
16. Velocity Girl -- "Wake Up, I'm Leaving" -- Simpatico! [AmazonMP3]

Clicky Clicky 200: Jon Brion's "I Believe She's Lying"

[Photo Credit: Robert Gauthier/LA Times] Readers are likely familiar with L.A.-based Jon Brion because of his brilliant soundtrack work over the past decade, or his production work with big names like Fiona Apple and Spoon (Brion recorded "The Underdog" from the Texas quartet's brilliant Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga). The most interesting thing, to us anyway, about Jon Brion is that we had a couple opportunities to get on board with the formerly Boston-based songwriter and producer long before we picked up his solo set Meaningless at the short-lived Harvard Square location of Other Music about seven years ago. Whilst an undergrad in the early '90s, our compadre Mr. Obb emphatically recommended to our attention the work of Jellyfish, a combo that featured Mr. Brion along with whoa, wait a second, Jon Brion wasn't actually in Jellyfish, his future bandmate Jason Falkner was (Brion did, however, apparently play guitar on Jellyfish's Spilt Milk). OK, fast-forward to 1998 or so, and our co-worker Max recommended we check out The Grays, which featured Mssrs. Brion and Falkner. Even so, nothing from Jellyfish or The Grays fired our imagination.

However, we certainly found what we were looking for when we bought Meaningless. The set is packed with immaculately produced indie rock, and features clever and melodic pop numbers and ballads. The crown jewel is the up-tempo scramber "I Believe She Is Lying." According to Brion's liner notes, the lyrics were co-written with fellow Boston scenemaker Aimee Mann. Those circular words provide a sharp focal point for the tune, which rides a dizzying jungle breakbeat -- think Scooby Doo's legs spinning before he gets moving -- and brilliantly layers in vocoder backing vocals and harmonies over syncopated and arpeggiated guitars. The only other comment Brion offers in the liner notes is the short description "fear of commitment anthem." Which is sort of like calling Mount Rushmore an interesting hill. "I Believe She's Lying" is #90 on the Clicky Clicky 200, the countdown of our 200 most-listened-to favorites; read prior CC200 posts right here.

Jon Brion -- "I Believe She's Lying" -- Meaningless
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[buy Meaningless from CD Baby right here]

Jon Brion: Internets | MySpace | YouTube | Flickr

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
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>> 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.