Today's Hotness: Lubec, Los Campesinos!, Winterpills

>> Should you be so foolhardy as to not be a friend to Clicky Clicky on The Facebook, then you are likely not aware of the most recent recording from Lubec. The guitar-pop band has posted a startlingly brilliant new song to its Bandcamp dojo, so dig the embed below, and then click over to download the thing for free. Oh, right, the song: "You're A Good Idea (Theme From Lubec)" is a melodic tour de force of kaleidoscopic guitar, simple cascades of piano and punchy bass playing. Not bad for an act that re-invented itself from scratch last year. Indeed, it is heartening to find that fronter Eddie Charlton was able to constitute a very potent band after making the move from Richmond to Portland. We checked in briefly with Mr. Charlton this evening and he says his new iteration of Lubec is firing on all cylinders and is considering a number of different options for releasing new material (although the planned single we posted about on Facebook Jan. 19 may be scotched in favor of something different). We last wrote about Lubec some 13 months ago here upon the release of the act's amazing "Cherry Adair" video; the band released its debut EP Nothing Is Enough in October 2010. Lubec is definitely one to watch, but for now, just listen.



>> Clicky Clicky faves Los Campesinos! will issue March 19 a second single from the Cardiff-based act's Best of 2011 collection Hello Sadness. The single is the riffy, warbling and anthemic album cut "Songs About Your Girlfriend," and a video will precede the single's release next week on St. Valentine's Day. On the heels of the single's release, Los Campesinos! will launch an 11-date UK tour. You can stream "Songs About Your Girlfriend" right now at the Soundcloud embed below; full tour dates are online right here. Los Camp! is currently rounding out a very extensive U.S. tour, the final dates of which we're posting below the song embed. We previewed Hello Sadness, the band's fifth full-length, right here.



02.08 -- DOUG FIR LOUNGE -- PORTLAND, OR
02.10 -- GREAT AMERICAN MUSIC HALL -- SAN FRANCISCO, CA
02.11 -- ECHOPLEX -- LOS ANGELES, CA
02.12 -- CASBAH -- SAN DIEGO, CA
02.15 -- CLUB DADA -- DALLAS, TX
02.16 -- FITZGERALD’S -- HOUSTON, TX
02.17 -- THE PARISH -- AUSTIN, TX
02.18 -- THE PARISH -- AUSTIN, TX

>> Props to our pals at the Ash Gray Proclamation for this post making us aware of the new full-length release coming from Northampton, Mass.'s Winterpills. The folk-rock act will release next week All My Lovely Goners on CD and as a digital download. At the same time the band is running a Kickstarter campaign for a vinyl release of the album, with a goal of raising $7,000 in order to get a deluxe vinyl package ready for Record Store Day, April 21. Pledging 20 bucks here gets you the LP when it's available, and additional tiers of giving offer access to premiums topping out with Executive Producer credit or house shows. We first turned on to Winterpills with the release of their eponymous 2005 debut, which we wrote about for Junkmedia right here. Winterpills play two shows to mark the release of All My Lovely Goners, Saturday the 18th in New York and Saturday the 25th at the Iron Horse in Northampton. We jotted some brief remarks about a July 2009 Winterpills set supporting Clicky Clicky faves Varsity Drag in Cambridge right here. Here's an oldie-but-goodie from the 2005 set:

Remarks: Varsity Drag, Grownup Noise, Winterpills

[Our exponentially increased work and parenting responsibilities have made it so we can no longer adhere to the rigid format we actually really, really like that we've developed for album and show reviews over the years. And so we are creating a new quasi-category for items we are simply titling Remarks. -- Ed.]

Friday night's wholly satisfying Varsity Drag show at the Middle East Up held some surprises. Not the least of which was the supporting act Grownup Noise, a bunch of locals we'd never heard of who were launching or celebrating the pending launch of a national tour. The band blends the voice of Richard Buckner, the cello work from Built To Spill and indie hooks filtered through a cracking pop sense, which for some reason made us think of Paul Simon. The fronter looked to us like former Junkmedia scribe Jonathan Donaldson, but now that we think about it we don't think we've ever seen Mr. Donaldson. Anyway, we were very impressed with Grownup Noise -- right up until they bafflingly (although ably) covered House Of Pain's "Jump Around." This ruffled our feathers a fair amount, and caused us to turn to compatriot Rock P. and remark "well, this certainly took a turn." Thankfully, Grownup Noise did two more numbers, as we'd hate to have our final thoughts on their excellent performance totally colored by the shlocky cover.

Varsity Drag stepped up and delivered a hot show as well, its first as top-liner on any of the stages at Cambridge's venerable Middle East. We've seen the trio numerous times, but fronter Ben Deily (you know, he was in that band...) and cohort continue to have aces up their six sleeves. This night it was an electrifying, slightly stripped down cover of The Cure's triumphant guitar anthem "Push," a highlight of the damn-near-perfect 1985 long player The Head On The Door. The already-lean Varsity Drag didn't have enough hands to recreate the full instrumental bombast of the track, but the trio gave "Push" a rough edge that made a keen match for the song's desperate tone. The Drag are prepping a long-awaited second set of new material, and we can't help but get the sense that Friday's performance put a lot of wind in their sails. Varsity Drag were celebrating the release of a live set Rock N' Roll Is Such A Hassle -- Live In Europe, which is out now on Boss Tunage in the UK and which domestic fans can purchase digitally right here. A lot of bands have taken on The Cure's "Push" over the years; our favorite might be this rendition by the late, great Garden Variety.

Garden Variety -- "Push" -- Step On A Crack Volume 2 comp (Go-Kart Records)
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buy Garden Variety records from MusicStack.com right here
buy Garden Variety music from EMusic right here

Northampton, Mass.'s Winterpills held the second slot, the first we witnessed upon making the scene. The band's self-titled debut from 2005 holds several songs that we enjoy, but we've never been fully into the band's lighter, folksier fare. Friday's performance didn't change that, but we were pleased to hear the quintet -- which struggled with a recalcitrant keyboard and ended up re-working its set -- play the up-tempo strummer "Laughing." Our hopes of hearing "Threshing Machine" were not met, but regardless Winterpills are charming on stage and we still enjoy their peppier stuff. -- Jay Breitling