New England Underground Music Festival with Coke Weed, Pile, Keith Fullerton Whitman, Ovlov, Bobb Trimble, Dozens More | 4-5 Oct. | Cambridge Elks, Democracy Center

Well this is ridiculous. The good people that bring you the Boston Hassle, Boston Compass and B.O.W. Shows are hosting the above-referenced festival this weekend, a super-ambitious event that presents as complete a picture of the regional music scene as it presently stands as you will likely ever experience. If you were an alien from space (and don't be so sure you are not), this would be your Cliff's Notes on, like, everything that matters, delivered at what we can only describe as a Chuck-Bartowski-flashing-the-entire-Intersect blinding pace. This means 20-minute sets set up like a line of dominoes across 14 hours spread over two days. Can you handle this? Probably. It's all ages, too, sliding scale price -- it's an inclusive thing. Besides the short set times -- which we think it's not unfair to say are a bit *too* short -- this is what those larger festivals in town should aspire to. But there's more to be excited about than just the structure and ambition: there's a crapload of insanely good indie rock and electronic acts. From the dusty twang of Portland, Maine's Coke Weed to the face-Brillo-ing fuzz of Connecticut college rock titans Ovlov, from the sonic explorations of Keith Fullerton Whitman to the psychedelic wandering of legendary New England psych veteran Bobb Trimble, this festival boasts an impressive scope.

So what else can we tell you? How about some key sets we think you need to see? Allow us to break it down for you below, where you will also find some streaming music embeds.

Oct. 4 // Cambridge Elks Lodge
[venue]

6:20 -- Coke Weed
7:00 -- Hands and Knees
9:20 -- Pile
9:40 -- Neptune
10:20 -- Keith Fullerton Whitman

Oct. 5 // Democracy Center
[venue]

4:20 -- Ovlov

After Party // Lilypad

Bobb Trimble (Burger Records Tape Release)
TYVEK

Today's Hotness: Mobius Band, Dirty On Purpose, Neptune

>> So we didn't have to wait until Thursday to learn cyborg rockers Mobius Band's aforementioned surprise after all. As we suspected, and as the band hinted, the surprise is recordings from Mobius Band's recent woodshedding in Western Massachusetts collected under the titled Love Will Reign Supreme EP. The EP is comprised of six covers including versions of Daft Punk's undeniable dance anthem "Digital Love," Neil Young's "Razor Love," Bob Dylan's "I'll Keep It With Mine" and Daniel Johnston's "True Love Will Find You In The End." Which is proof, in case you didn't already know, that Mobius Band are bigger music nerds than you. Love Will Reign Supreme will be available for free (and with cover art) at the band's web site on Thursday. It is unclear whether the tunes will continue to be available thereafter, so it'd be best for you to make a mental note to snatch them that day. As we noted previously, Mobius Band begins a seven-week UK-and-European tour Feb. 21 in Dublin. Since the band is kicking it old school with its choice of covers, how about some old school Mobius Band? Here is the original version of "Taxi Cab," from the band's self-released 2002 EP Two.

Mobius Band -- "Taxi Cab" -- Two
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[buy Mobius Band records from Newbury Comics here]

>> Dedicated readers may recall in December when we reported that Brooklyn shoegaze quartet Dirty On Purpose would be releasing a series of four digital singles via the irritatingly spelled rcrdlbl blog. Well, it turns out the second single is now available, and the series of singles is now being referred to as the digital-only free EP Dead Volcanoes -- although now that we look at the ID3 tag for the first rcrdlbl release, "Leaving," we see the information was there all along. The new song is called "Hard To Tell You" and you can download it here. It is surprisingly anchored by acoustic guitar and has bleepy synth tucked into its eaves. And, frankly, it doesn't approach the sublime bliss-out that is "The Audience In The Room" from Dirty On Purpose's recently issued Like Bees EP. But the folksy vibe and neatly organized layers of sound complement each other and give the song an interesting early '70s feel.

>> Finally, we'd be remiss not to mention the Neptune record release show Saturday at Great Scott in Boston, because the bill is one of the best to come around in a while. Noise-rock behemoths Neptune will be supported by the unhinged and angular rock of Helms, among others, which makes this pretty much the best show this month. A second Neptune record release spectacular will occur Sunday in Providence, RI at AS220 and the official street date for the trio's forthcoming fifth set Gong Lake is the following Tuesday, Feb. 19. As we noted here in November, the new set will be issued by Radium/Table Of The Elements as part of the two-record deal announced in August 2006. Neptune will tour for much of March to support the release of Gong Lake, and you can check out all the dates here.

Today's Hotness: Ted Pauly, Neptune

>> "I love this song, I used to sing it falling asleep..." We were scrobbling last night after a crazy week of work when we noticed the little icon at Last.fm that indicated a free Ted Pauly track was available. We followed the thread to find that Pauly, fronter of the tragically defunct indie rock act Haywood, has posted 13 tracks for free download as a set called Tadpoley. Many of the tunes are re-recorded (or at least more crisp- and clean-sounding) versions of the demos that formed the foundation for the second posthumous Haywood set released earlier this year; we noted As Long As There Is Track, I Will Not Go Back's new availability via Insound here last week. Perhaps more exciting is Last.fm now hosts a somewhat sketchy video of Pauly performing "A Light At The End" live in a club somewheres (although we can't resize the video as we can with YouTube clips -- boo). There is sadly zero video documentation of Haywood left on the web these days. The erstwhile quartet once had shows available via Digital Club Network back when there was such a thing (someone tell us: who owns those videos now that DCN is dead? Seems like those shows would have greatly increased value now that video on the web has taken off), so this video is sort of a big deal for fans. Plus, it is funny when Pauly gets derailed by an audience member cheering. Anyway, of the Tadpoley tracks we particularly recommend the non-Haywood-ified tracks "Your Mix Tape Broke" and "No One Knows His Part," so here they are.

Ted Pauly -- "Your Mix Tape Broke" -- Tadpoley
Ted Pauly -- "No One Knows His Part" -- Tadpoley
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[grab all the Tadpoley tracks at Last.fm here]

Ted Pauly: Interwebzez | MySpace | YouTube | Flickr

>> Boston noise juggernauts Neptune have released a limited edition, five-song EP entitled Paris Green. The title track is taken from the band's forthcoming full-length Gong Lake, which will be released in February on Radium/Table of the Elements. Only 100 handmade copies of Paris Green are available, so compulsive collectors should click here now to get in on the action. The home-made instrument-wielding band is on tour now and will be out on the road for the next couple of weeks. If you haven't seen Neptune live, we just feel bad for you [see here], so get thee to etc. The trio is in Philly tonight. Here are the dates:

11/03 -- Philadelphia, PA -- West Philly Warehouse
11/04 -- Washington, D.C. -- Velvet Lounge
11/05 -- Winston-Salem, NC -- The Wherehouse
11/06 -- Asheville, NC -- Harvest Records
11/07 -- Knoxville TN -- The Pilot Light
11/08 -- Chicago, IL -- AV-aerie
11/09 -- St. Louis -- Lemp Arts Center
11/10 -- Iowa City, IA -- The Picador
11/13 -- St. Paul, MN -- The Turf Club
11/14 -- Bloomington, IN -- Bear's Place
11/15 -- Cincinnati, OH -- Art Damage Lodge
11/16 -- Columbus, OH -- Skylab Gallery
11/17 -- Cleveland, OH -- Cleveland Museum of Contemporary Art
11/18 -- Buffalo, NY -- Soundlab

Today's Hotness: Helms, Interpol, Archers of Loaf

[PHOTO CREDIT: Brad Searles] >> We were intent on seeing Friday night's Callum Robbins benefit without writing about it. Sometimes we just like to go to shows without constantly considering "well, how are we going to describe that?" But, as usual, we feel compelled to discuss the show, held at Somerville, Mass.'s P.A.'s Lounge and arranged by former Karate band leader Geoff Farina. The bill had Drew O'Doherty opening, Mr. Farina and indie rock journeyman Chris Brokaw supporting as a duo (with a record of interpretations of folk and blues classics on the way), angular rock luminaries Helms supporting and noise provocateurs Neptune top-lining. As we've seen Neptune a couple times [one, two] previously, we ducked out before they began. But we were especially impressed with Mr. O'Doherty and Helms. The former is a very compelling singer-songwriter with an effortless baritone not dissimilar to that of Richard Buckner. He had been an unknown quantity to us before Friday evening despite some glowing (and, it turns out, well-deserved) praise coming from The 'Nac.

Helms we've been a fan of since the release of 2002's McCarthy, which we reviewed here for Junkmedia. Friday afternoon we'd gotten a tip that Helms guitarist Sean McCarthy had broken his arm, so we were fearful the band might not play and another chance to see them would elude us. But, not unlike when we saw Neptune open for Mission Of Burma, Mr. McCarthy showed up (we heard it was actually a broken collar bone at the show, and not a broken arm, but still), presumably played through considerable discomfort, and kicked a lot of ass along with bassist/wife (we think) Tina and drummer/brother Dan. Helms was an unstoppable force Friday night, humorous between songs but driving and hypnotic when playing. There's no excuse why we've never seen them all these years, but you can bet we will see them again. And we're buying their latest record, 2006's Secret Doors on History Major Records, as soon as we finish writing this. The band is offering the excellent track "It Takes Skin To Win" as a download at its MySpace wigwam here, and it is one of our favorites, so we'll offer it, too, even though we already did about 11 months ago here. What can we say, we can't get enough. Speaking of digital audio, Mr. 'Nac recorded both nights of the Callum benefits and we expect you will have the opportunity to hear them sometime pretty soon over there.

Helms -- "It Takes Skin To Win" -- McCarthy
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[follow the links at the Helms web site to buy their music]

And because we had joked with Mr. 'Nac prior to the show that we'd donate an extra $10 if Farina played the old Karate classic "Today Or Tomorrow" from 1997's In Place Of Real Insight, here's that track, too.

Karate -- "Today Or Tomorrow" -- In Place Of Real Insight
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[buy Karate records from Newbury Comics here]

>> We finally made it to Newbury Comics Thursday for some record shopping. You are reading the words of the man who received the last Interpol/Newbury Comics co-branded pint glass given away as a promo with the sale of the new Our Love To Admire. We also received with our purchase of Interpol's major label debut a vinyl single for "The Heinrich Maneuver" backed with an instrumental version of the album track "Mammoth." And it was by inspecting the vinyl single that we learned that the latest Interpol set was produced with Rich Costey, who around these parts is best known for producing the Lilys' peerless third record Eccsame The Photon Band. Interesting.

>> Other notes from our shopping trip. We had previously stated that the new They Might Be Giants record The Else was produced by Jon Brion. It was actually produced by The Chemical Dust Brothers [DOH!]; we regret the DOUBLE error. We don't know how we got that into our heads. Oh well. We listened to the record and it falls a little flat in our opinion. Interestingly enough, the set comes with a bonus disc that we enjoy more. It's titled Cast Your Pod To The Wind and it's got a bit more quirk, the compositions seem a little brighter and sharper and have a bit more of the duo's characteristic humor. So there you go.

>> Hey, did you know that Last.fm offers on-demand streams of some of the Archers Of Loaf's catalog, including the vinyl singles? Not only that, but also the social networking site offers downloads of a number of Archers tracks, including "Step Into The Light" and "Harnessed In Slums," the first two cuts of the excellent 1995, Bob Weston-recorded masterwork Vee Vee. And certainly if you've never heard "Web In Front" and "Wrong" from the band's debut full length, Last.fm's got free downloads of those, too. "Web In Front" might be the quintessential '90s indie rock track.

>> A couple odd requests: anybody have an MP3 of Lint's one-sided 7" "Fifth Floor," released on Plumb Records in 1996 or so? For those of you who don't recall it, there is more information here, including this description: "Lint is a "supergroup" of sorts. Members of The Swirlies, Spore, Milkmoney, Victory At Sea, SK-70, Landfill, AM Stereo, Grace Budd and more get together to play music unlike anything else they do... every song features a different singer and somewhat different sound." We're also hoping someone has ripped an old 7" by a band called Retriever for the song "Q-Tip." Get in touch if you've got the songs handy. It's been years since we heard them, and we've lost the cassette we recorded them to in college.