Today's Hotness: Lilys, Piebald, Frightened Rabbit

>> Rejoice. We've had a one-day reprieve from our work project, which now starts tomorrow. Here's some odds and sods that have been kicking around for a while.

>> Since we're gaga over the Lilys, you can imagine how pleased we are that the car commercial their music is currently being used in has drawn so much attention (based on the number of Google searches that are hitting :: clicky clicky ::, that is). Coincidentally, we've just encountered some incredibly rare live video of the band via the new, pretty sharp video search thing Chime.TV. The clip atop this item is about 72 seconds of the Lilys doing "Ginger," the tune in the aforementioned car commercial, during the band's all-too-brief 2006 tour supporting the Manifesto release Everything Wrong Is Imaginary. And this is a link to 87 seconds worth of a scorching version of "Touch The Water," the Apples In Stereo tune Lilys have covered for years and which first appeared on the 2001 Selected release on File 13. Or maybe it first appeared on the Send In The Subs bootleg. We'll look into that. Anyway, yeah, the Lilys: they're awesome.

>> We remember Piebald breaking up like five or six years ago, don't we? Well, apparently the Boston emo superheroes are calling it quits again after wrapping their current tour, according to Pun Canoes. Don't care? Then obviously you've never heard the towering rockfest that is "Grace Kelly With Wings," the opening track to 1999's If It Weren't For Venetian Blinds, It Would Be Curtains For Us All. The song starts all (erstwhile label mates) Get Up Kids, and ends all Queen, and it's great. You can download a live version of the cut here, where some cat has posted Piebald's set from the 2001 MacRock fest. Dig it. We've posted the studio version below.

Piebald -- "Grace Kelly With Wings" -- If It Weren't For Venetian Blinds, It Would Be Curtains For Us All
[right click and save as]
[buy Piebald records from EMusic here]

>> You know that Frightened Rabbit single that we noted was right around the corner? AngryApe has some more details about it here, including the fact that the flipside to "Be Less Rude" will be the quasi-title track to the trio's first record, "The Greys." The "Be Less Rude" single streets Sept. 24, and Fat Cat issues a remastered version of the band's debut full-length Sings The Greys in October, if memory serves.

From The Admin Cubicle: Man Keeping Us Down

Team Clicky Clicky has been saddled with a big project at the day job that carries an 8/31 deadline. As such, :: clicky clicky :: will be largely dark through the end of this month. There may be an odd post at the weekend, but we are not optimistic. See you in September. -- The Management

That's No Moon, It's A Ringo Deathstarr...

After our initial, breathless assessment of Beaumont, Texas-spawned shoegaze behemoth Ringo Deathstarr here in February, we sort of took our eyes off the ball. It turns out the ball hasn't moved too far in the interim. But a MySpace bulletin from the band today sucked us right back into the trio's world, one that alternately pummels and drifts in beautiful aural shag. The act, led by a fellow named Elliot Frazier, is streaming a new, palindromically titled cut at its MySpace for a limited time. So hit this link and have a listen to "Rats Live On No Evil Star."

The two-year-old Ringo Deathstarr, whose regular lineup changes are detailed in this excellent Austinist interview, is also offering for download at its MySpace hacienda some indispensable tracks. One titled "Your Town" seems to be from the same recording effort as a mysterious and intensely gorgeous RD track we have in our ITunes with no discographical info. The two have identical production values, similar breathy vocals. "Your Town" is a ballad based on layers of guitars, fuzz and murmuring. We're posting an MP3 below to save you the trip to MySpace.

Spoilt Victorian Child Records intends to release in the UK a Ringo Deathstarr EP later this year, and we are eager to hear it. In the Austinist interview linked supra Frazier says the record doesn't have US distro yet, so start saving your nickels for the import. Frazier also says the EP will be self-titled and was to have been mastered late last month. It was recorded at The Bubble in Austin, where apparently The Meat Puppets had just made a record, in case that sorta thing interests you.

Ringo Deathstarr -- "Your Town" -- MySpace download
[right click and save as]
[obsessively click this link to Spoilt Victorian Child Records daily until you can pre-order the planned Ringo Deathstarr EP]

Every Band I've Ever Loved Has Let Me Down Eventually

[Photo CREDIT: Vicky] There are some days when we wish we were the guy who runs the blog Another Form Of Relief, because he turns up amazing music we've never heard of often and, you know, it'd just be easier to cut out the middleman (us). AFOR's most recent post is about the recently defunct Croydon, England duo Nosferatu D2. The fact that the band is no more extends our recent streak of discovering erstwhile UK bands we like a lot to three (the other two being Eddyfink and Distophia). Like :: clicky clicky :: faves Frightened Rabbit, Nosferatu D2 is a brother act, and a duo (although FR started as one dude and ultimately became three dudes). The music -- which constantly references other bands and vomiting in asphyxiating, chain store-filled suburbs -- can be as stark, tense and confessional as early Karate; as misanthropic as vintage Smiths; as obsessed with sickness and decay as Greg Dulli; as desperate and solitary as the aforementioned Frightened Rabbit. In short, this band is the whole package.

Or was. After slogging it out for two years, Nosferatu D2 broke up a couple months ago seemingly at a high point, as their last gig was supporting the hotly tipped septet Los Campesinos! in March (the latter act is now, of course, signed to hip Canadian label Arts + Crafts). That final show was recorded by this fellow and is available for download here. We've haven't gotten to the live tracks yet, but the 10 songs posted for free download at Nosferatu D2's Last.FM page are 1000% quality. Really stunning stuff. While we are supremely disappointed the band is broken up, all is not lost. ND2 guitarist and singer Ben has started a new project called Superman Revenge Squad, which of course AFOR is already all over (read their post here); ND2 drummer Adam is apparently playing in other projects as well. Below are a couple MP3s to entice you, including the undeniable indie geek anthem "A Footnote," but we highly recommend going to the Last.FM pages linked supra and downloading everything you can.

Nosferatu D2 -- "2 People 0 Superpowers" -- Nosferatu D2
Nosferatu D2 -- "A Footnote" -- Nosferatu D2
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Nosferatu D2: Interweb | MySpace | YouTube | Flickr

Perhaps Everyone DID Have It In For Eddyfink...

[PHOTO CREDIT: Stew Ruffles] We've been doing a lot of separating the performance from the songwriting lately, particularly as we revisit songs we remember enjoying on radio and mixtapes during our childhood ("Perfect Strangers" by Deep Purple, anyone? Actually, bad example -- that song is awesome). Additionally, we've come across some bands recently that have written great material who aren't presenting it exactly as we'd like. Sure, to a certain extent every band is an acquired taste, and we should just be able to give them all several ample fair shakes. But the truth of the matter is we aren't 11 years old anymore, with scads of time to spend in our rooms staring at the speakers.

Point is, while we have been significantly jazzed by certain songs of bristling British indie rock quartet Eddyfink, an act we discovered one day in July, only to read -- the same day -- that the band had just broken up, we also have some reservations. What's our beef with Eddyfink besides the fact that we didn't get a chance to follow their career at all while it was happening? Well, we think it is the vocal delivery of singer Andrew Pisanu. More use of falsetto than we care for, and occasionally a bit emotional for our tastes. Balancing that out for us, however, are some great songs.

The band's MySpace proclaims it trades in "anthems for the underdog," but we think their best material is deeper and darker than that. The video clip for the track "Do I" opens with a cartoon drawing of a shipwreck and features castaways bleeding blue blood from their mouths. And then there's the excellently titled "Will I Get Through Today Without Being Kicked In The Knickers?" [read our post about that here]. We loved the persecuted paranoia of that song, opening as it does with the ominous line "It's happening again..." before pleading "I can't take this anymore, is there a number I can call, someone to help me through it all?"

Well, imagine our surprise to hear the same white-knuckled urban agoraphobia expressed as brilliantly in a tune the now defunct Eddyfink posted to its MySpace garage more recently called "In For Me." Again, we're a little put off by the vocal delivery. More importantly the song has an absolutely bulletproof lyrical shtick. In the choruses Pisanu lists off the names of ENTIRE TOWNS that have it in for him: "...Nottingham, you know they've got it, Canterbury, they've all got it, Coventry, you know they've got it in... they've all got it in for me..." Pisanu lists TWELVE cities in the UK, and they all have it in for him. Like we said, brilliant. It's pop mixed with urban psychosis, cities as monsters with people for teeth. Incidentally, there is a video for the clip here at YouTube, but it works the funny like an old Men At Work video and kinds of turns us off; however, there are nice shots of the band performing the track spliced in as well. At their best, during its six-year-career Eddyfink was a songwriting force. We're sad to have missed the whole thing, but we're hopeful more recordings will make it to the band's MySpace. For now, here's an MP3 of "In For Me."

Eddyfink -- "In For Me" -- MySpace download
[right click and save as]
[buy Eddyfink songs from ITunes here]

Frightened Rabbit Releases Sings The Greys In US Oct. 2

It's been a while since we've talked about brilliant Glaswegian indie trio Frightened Rabbit, but here's some news. The long-awaited US version of the band's 2006 debut Sings The Greys, which has been remastered by Mr. Indie Mastering Guy Alan Douches, will finally be released Oct. 2 on new label Fat Cat. As we reported here in June, Frightened Rabbit is expected to issue a single prior to the re-release of Sings The Greys for the track "Be Less Rude." So that should be out sometime in the next six weeks, in our estimation.

Anyhoo, to celebrate the US issue of the full-length the lads will be returning to the US for a few weeks of dates beginning in mid-October [incidentally, some of the dates listed below are with Pinback, who will be supported in late September by another :: clicky clicky :: fave, The A-Sides -- check out the A-Sides dates here]. Sadly, right now there is no Boston date, but we're hopeful that the band might fill one of those empty nights in the first week of November with a show here in Cambridge, Mass. Maybe they could get an in-store at the Urban Outfitters like the one they had in Austin? Somebody make it happen. Have you heard Frightened Rabbit's live set from SXSW that they've been selling at EMusic for a goodly while now? It's a barnburner, especially the opener "Square 9." To get you back in the mood for Frightened Rabbitamania, here's a version of "Modern Leper" the band was giving away on its MySpace page for a while early this year.

Frightened Rabbit -- "Modern Leper" -- MySpace Download
[right click and save as]
[buy Frightened Rabbit music from EMusic here]

10/15 -- Empty Bottle -- Chicago, Illinois
10/16 -- Pabst Theatre -- Milwaukee, Wisconsin
10/17 -- Fineline Music Cafe -- Minneapolis, Minnesota
10/18 -- Slowdown -- Omaha, Nebraska
10/19 -- Gothic Theatre -- Englewood, Colorado
10/20 -- The Depot -- Salt Lake City, Utah
10/22 -- Showbox Showroom -- Seattle, Washington
10/23 -- Viking Union Multipurpose Room -- Bellingham, Washington
10/25 -- Bimbos 365 Club -- San Francisco, California
10/26 -- Bimbos 365 Club -- San Francisco, California
10/28 -- The Wiltern -- Los Angeles, California
10/30 -- Solar Culture Gallery -- Tucson, Arizona
11/01 -- Emo’s Jr. -- Austin, Texas
11/02 -- Dan’s Bar -- Denton, Texas
11/08 -- Theatre of Living Arts -- Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Previous Frightened Rabbit coverage:

Frightened Rabbit's First American Tour
Show Us Yours #5: Frightened Rabbit
Frightened Rabbit Signs To Fat Cat

Today's Hotness: Wannadies, Wicked Farleys, Tony Allen

>> We've been obsessed with our favorite Swedish act The Wannadies since we saw the video for their song "Hit" on MTV Europe a decade ago. Our obsession has been somewhat tempered by the fact that the quintet only had one US release, so virtually all of their records must be purchased from abroad via the Internets. Consequently, at this point we've just gotten the self-titled US release a several of the CD singles released in the UK. With today's exchange rates, we're obviously not buying a lot of their records right now, even though we have a goal of getting all the band's full lengths that use the sleeping people theme we talked about here. The reason we're mentioning all of this is that the band has put together a blog with YouTube links to all of their videos right here. So go there, watch the video for "Hit" -- seriously, this song should have been as big as "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and it pains us every time we watch the video that it was not -- and then check out other clips at your leisure. Some of the early stuff is really bizarre late '80s acoustic pop. Weird. We do love seeing those fashions again, however. Anyway, if you could go to Sweden and buy all the Wannadies records on vinyl you can find for us, we'd be grateful. So what's up with the band now? Well, they've been asking fans to submit tracks for inclusion on a compilation. Wannadies have also recorded new songs it intended to release as a single or EP, but its efforts at releasing the material are as usual being stymied by label stuff.

>> Resurgent blog Built On A Weak Spot has a very nice overview of erstwhile Boston indie rockers The Wicked Farleys. We think we saw the band play a reunion show in our pre-blog days with Logie, and via him we first discovered the band through their inclusion on Holiday Matinee's Pedal Faster, Bicycle Rider compilation from the turn of the century. Built On A Weak Spot has the track from the compilation (with a mix that sounds a little different, we'll have to compare), the excellent "Fitchburg, MA," available for download along with several tracks we've never heard before but about which we are very excited. "Dig The Ring" sounds like an early Lilys cut in places; "Opportune" has a Swirlies kind of edge to it. Anyway, dynamite post, go check it out.

>> If, like us, you didn't know Afro-beat legend Tony Allen from Tony Randall (well, okay, we knew he wasn't Tony Randall) before the renowned drummer joined Damon Albarn's superlative supergroup The Good, The Bad & The Queen, Aurgasm has a couple tunes here to get you caught up. The pair of bumping tracks are from drummer Allen's 2002 release Home Cookin'.