Duck & Cover :: Indie rock music writing from Arcade Fire to the Zygotic Minci

It's Christmas time all over the world, and even here at Duck and Cover Headquarters... Even though Jamie is enjoying a gorgeous summer in the Southern Hemisphere while Dakin is oppressed by cloud cover in the Northwest (though soon to be supplanted by the biting cold and irksome provincialism of the American Midwest). To celebrate this glorious time of year, and the birth of the little baby jesus (as well as to good naturedly poke fun at our Jewish reader(s) [Hi, Katie!]), we present to you the first ever D&C holiday mix! Well, first ever, because this is Duck and Cover's first Christmas (collective "aaaah!"). We hope to have many more, and we shall, unless of course, Dakin and Jamie cannot get along, which, truth be told, is always a very distinct possibility. However, if we do end up doing several more holiday mixes, wtf will we play? I mean, we're kinda blowing our load here, so we hope that you appreciate it. Also, shame on Seeqpod for having NO versions...

...just...whoah... this isn't typically our schtick, but...whoah. (Please also note the bunnies holding/comforting each other... eeeeeew.) source: http://www.lvrj.com/columnists/normclarke ('cuz i'm all lazy with da html.)

Britain's Liberal Democrat party just hired Brian Eno as its youth advisor. The attempt, according to The Guardian , is to "engage more young people in politics." While well-intentioned, it may serve to engage more musos than youths. Roxy Music was going in the 70s, Eno was making (arguably) his best stuff then and in the 80s. And while it's true he's worked production for the likes of U2 and Coldplay, how many British "youths" read the liner notes? Altogether, however, it looks like a genuine attempt to bridge the age gap in politics. Yet Britain isn't the only country hearing the music. Bringing musicians into mainstream government is all the fad: Australia's new Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, has decided to try to answer the question, How can we dance while our beds are buring?" Answer: we don't dance on our beds. Duh. So way to jump on the big ship, Brian. Good luck, and all the best.

My first exposure to The B-52s was Love Shack, so for years I wrote them off as a one-hit blunder. That was until I heard their early, self-titled album. Rock Lobster became an instant favorite. Maybe I wrote them off too early, I thought. So when I stumbled upon this collection of B-52s videos from a gig in 1978, I was only further convinced that, once upon a time, The B-52s were very fucking cool. Unfortunately, embedding has been disabled on this one, so you just have to jump over to see it. Jump!

Some of you have written to say the mix tape (the playlist on the left. No, the left. Yeah, that one) isn't working properly. It seems that if you double click on a track, it won't play. However, if you click on a track and press "play," it will work fine. I've written to SeeqPod to see if they can fix this. In the mean time, sorry for being so analog. Enjoy!

Dem come turn-us to suffer head to Every once in awhile you come across an artist you wish you had found years ago. Fela Anikulapo Kuti is one of those artists. If only I had been more receptive to Nigerian jazz funk back in the early 70s . . . when I was embryonic. Oh, well. Lesson learned. Lucky for me, Fela was one prolific mutha. So there is plenty of choice. From his first recorded album in 1970, he continued making music right up until his death in 1992 to rack up a total of 40 unique albums--that is, not including EP singles or best-of collections. I'm sure awareness of his early work is necessary to fully understand his style, but I've only listened to Original Sufferhead, produced in 1981. So keep this in mind while you read the following prescription. My exposure to Fela is limited to four tracks. Here are a few scenarios which would benefit from a dose of Fela: You have invited a group of friends or colleagues to your home. On your table you have an eclectic spread i...

Lightly though you drop, you are still falling This particular mix tape, compiled by yours truly, is a bit like being lowered into a mine shaft. From the upbeat pacings of Foals and The Constantines, you slowly descend into Lighting Dust, Yo La Tengo's darker side, and Cat Power's bleak meander through the rigor of surviving winter. However, please don't quit after The Colors and the Kids --see it through. I would never let you fall so far you couldn't return. You will find redemption in the form of Architecture in Helsinki and Neutral Milk Hotel's Ghost . That, I promise. Mix tape on the left, as always

Oh, the sun is shining! Birds are chirp chirping! And Okkervil river is giving away free mp3s! Oh, happy day, happy day! The Golden Opportunities Mixtape is a collection of cover songs the band has performed live over the past few months. They cover such greats as Serge Gainsbourg, John Cale, and Joni Mitchell. Speaking of Joni Mitchell, if you're hanging around Dakin's house, happen to be on his computer, and see a folder titled "Joni Mitchell," don't open it. Because what's inside has nothing to do with Joni Mitchell. It's full of . . . something else entirely. The Okkervil River tracks, on the other hand, are full of excellent music. You can download them from the Okkervil River website here , or in .zip form here (zip file courtesy of Pitchfork)

'Ol Mr. Cent has some wise words While not one of the favorites here at Duck & Cover, 50 Cent has some poignant words on file sharing and the recording industry. In short, P2P file sharing is not the devil, and the major labels of the RIAA need to suck it up and adapt. Personally, I've always thought the term "illegal" in reference to downloading music was ridiculous. Or should I say wack. And now I got fiddy to back me up. Don't front, kid. From TorrentFreak: “What is important for the music industry to understand is that this really doesn’t hurt the artists.” Thats quite a statement. Organizations like the RIAA are always talking about how the artists get hurt by file-sharing but 50 Cent clearly doesn’t agree. In fact, he appears to appreciate the value of a good fan, whether he buys or file-shares his music, as he explains: “A young fan may be just as devout and dedicated no matter if he bought it or stole it.” The rest of fiddy's wise words after the b...

Enjoy the latest Duck & Cover mix take, a generous helping of uber cool tunes arranged in a most pleasing manner. Tell your friends! And if you don't have friends, tell that guy behind you! He looks nice. Maybe you two should go out for a coffee. There's a great place down on 13th street. You two could discuss how well the Duck & Cover mix tape transitioned from The Black Heart Procession to Man Man. Look to the left for the latest playlist. It's the one with all the buttons.

Nothing is good if other people like it. Oh, how true. How very true. Remember when They Might Be Giants were awesome? Then suddenly they were on Tiny Toons and everyone knew the words to Particle Man. And Remember when you saw The Shins at that basement VFW in Norman, Oklahoma? And there were 25 people there? Yeah, before the McDonald's ad. Actually, remember when all the bands you liked were cool? Before everybody else found out about them. Because once other people have heard of your bands, they're suddenly not as cool as they were. And now you have to fill your playlists with music so ungodly awful that it makes people in vegetated states actually come out of their coma to pull the plug on themselves. I mean come on--there's only so much free form jazz the human psyche can handle. If you feel this way, then you are probably 22, male, and suffer from low self esteem . . . did I mention that we identify with this t-shirt? All except for the 22 part--but we were there once...

Music in a format worth paying for We at D&C love our free music. In fact, we don't even care where it comes from: KEXP , SeeqPod , imeem , that girl the sushi bar who looks like Satomi from Deerhoof; Blanket Man . You know, where ever. But every once in awhile, we have to part with our hard earned blogging cash (which is nonexistent, so it becomes our hard-earned blackmail cash) on music in a non-digital format. When we do, we like to make it count. So when Pitchfork announced that Constantines were going to release their first limited edition 7" we collected all our incriminating pictures of Prince and hit the black market. Hopefully, by 15 January when the single is out, we'll have enough cheese to buy the vinyl. And if we don't have the money, then maybe we'll just keep the pics of Prince oiling his beer belly . . . considering all offers, kids.

oh-em-gee. . . My Bloody Valentine. Is releasing. A. New. Record! The first since a little release called Loveless that you may or may not have heard of. No, really, it’s a classic! Loveless ? Does the word 'shoegazer' ring a bell? Blissful pop songs buried under layers of gorgeous feedback? Yes, that one! Anyway the purveyors of polyphony are back. I mean, seriously, they’ve had, what, SIXTEEN years to come up with something even more astounding than Loveless ... which, as we’ve said, was pretty close to perfect. And while My Bloody Valentine didn't start the shoegazer scene, they arguably defined it with Loveless . None of the others (Slowdive, Ride, Curve, Cocteau Twins) could approach the album for sheer density, and so the scene slowly drifted into the background like so much feedback. The record that made My Bloody Valentine was also their undoing. And then, all of a sudden, as if from the ashes, there appears Kevin Shields: he shuffles off the brittle coils of a lif...

Well, it's not really so much a tape as it is a playlist, but we grew up with cassette tapes. And since it's our blog, we can call it whatever we want. So while you're poring over our posts--as we know you do--you can listen to some of the songs we like. We'll try to update the mix tape, er "playlist", every week. However, we tend to spend a lot of time in bars, so cut us a little slack. So yeah. Duck and Cover Mix Tape: second door on the left.

It's difficult to find the right music for staring off into space. Dub and reggae sometimes work, but only because the stuff is so mind-numbingly boring that it might as well not play at all. In fact, pop into your local coffee shop (as long as it isn't Starbucks for god's sake), ask them to put on some reggae, and then read a book. I guarantee you'll devour the text with more fervor than ever before because your brain, upon sensing sound devoid of meaning, looks for something--anything--else on which to focus. Discovering music that enhances the staring off into space experience, on the other hand, is rare. Echolocation , the 2001 release by Fruit Bats, is just such an album. If Jack Johnson makes you want to put ice picks in your ears, Fruit Bats will stay your hand. Multi-instrumental, poetic, and layered with lush harmonies, Echolocation is not so much mellow as it is introspective. You won't want to smoke a doobie and ponder on the existence of extraterrestri...

Dakin is going to hate me for this. He's hunkered down to endure the dark and cold of a Northwest winter with Califone and The Dirty Three, but I can't help it. It's almost summertime here (New Zealand), which means upbeat music. The kind of fun time pop tunes that are like crack cocaine to my ears: The Shins, Vampire Weekend, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah--Oh man, that's the good stuff. And then I happen upon this video while perusing one my favourite design blogs ( swissmiss ). I don't know if Noah and the Whale is a band, or if it is just the name of a song. While I understand it would take me all of two minutes to Google them and find out, I'm happier not knowing right now. Because it's summertime, you see, and I don't have time for facts. For god's sake there's a woman outside my window in a bikini--truth and details can wait! A few years ago I would have been embarrassed at my ignorance of such a fun band, but this is 2007, and--let's face i...

Sometimes it’s not enough to survive winter. Sometimes you want winter to cut you just so that you can enjoy the warmth of your own blood, however fleeting the pleasure. Sometimes you want to traverse dark roads bundled in shadow and avoiding the eyes of passing strangers. Sometimes you wish to visit a place inside yourself that is far less civilized, a place that, though you’ve been many times before, still requires a map to locate. This map can take many forms, and has, for centuries, done so for many people. Some wish to find these roads through drink or pills or violence; others, the more sane, the more austere prefer music. Not anything will do of course, it must be, preferably non vocal, with no real importance placed on the composition’s simplicity or complication. it must, however, possess a certain quality that is impossible to define or explain until it is experienced. The Dirty Three certainly has such quality, and can be retained for use as such a map, and easily so. Person...

"The night starts here . . ." Just don't let it go any further. Romanticism (as a philosophy rather than a literary period) is often misinterpreted, and too much emphasis placed on traditional Hollywood versions of "romance": candle-lit dinners, rose petals on the bed, cliched situations involving rings and champagne. A true romantic wouldn't have time for such laziness, such hackneyed devices, because a true romantic would not have time to plan a dinner, let alone light anything that isn't going to explode. You see, a romantic is a revolutionary; an anarchist. True romanticism is thoughtless, kinetic energy: all hope, no logic. Romantics want something to happen--anything. They yearn for the chaos; want buildings to crumble around them, to dodge the rubble, and to, somehow, come out okay. The latest release by Canadian pop group Stars sets out to be a romantic's anthem. The first song builds into the second one--big chords, driving bass drum--mimick...

Winter in the Northwest comes upon you hard and fast. Fall’s flirtation is brushed aside, and with the fervor of an angry drunk Winter barrels into the room. One moment you shed your coat after a trek uphill, stopping to rest and wiping sweat from your brow, the next a gale wind is driving you back inside, back to comfort. Suddenly your light jacket is no longer sufficient armament against winter’s chill, and you must arm yourself with tweeds and a scarf, and where did you put your gloves? You take comfort in soups (Matzoh ball! Lentil and chard!), a good wine, the company of good friends, and of course, proper music. The music of winter does not fight off the chill, it does not transport you to days of sunshine and garden parties. The music of winter embraces the cold and the darkness, but nonetheless comforts you with it’s own ambient warmth. Today the winter wind is blowing hard, the waters of Seattle’s Puget Sound are an angry gunmetal; passing boats rock up and down, fighting the ...

All this talk of bands breaking up (well, of one band breaking up), makes one muse on the cycle of musical groups. Some acts depart from the scene after a short-lived stint, only to reconfigure under different names. Other bands never make it that far. And still others stick around long after their relevance has expired. For instance, think of your favourite band(s). Are they still playing? Are they new-ish? Are they dead and gone, but so entrenched a part of your personal narrative that you simply cannot let them go? Furthermore, think about those acts who come and go before you even knew they were there, leaving you with that dull ache that accompanies missing out. Is the ache greater than experiencing a band in full, seeing them live, then watching as they fade and depart exactly as they started--their music a reminder of what we can't regain? I was walking down Roches street in Limerick, Ireland. It must have been late Summer, or maybe early Autumn. The air was crisp and smelle...

As per Electrelane's website, and following the genius of 2007's No Shouts No Calls , Electrelane is calling it quits for the time being, or, rather, "the foreseeable future". Well, we all know what that means. That means no more Electrelane, forever. Why is it that good bands call it quits all the time, yet Aerosmith, The Rolling Stones*, and The Eagles will always be around? Help me out here, 'cause I need to know. *Not to discount amazing records such as Sticky Fingers , Beggar's Banquet , Exile On Main Street and Let it Bleed , but, c'mon people, when was the last time they put out something like that? Seriously. It's like going to see Flock of Seagulls on tour. Play "I Ran", and let me get on with my evening. If you don't have/haven't heard No Shouts No Calls , buy it now! And if you had a chance to catch the band opening for The Arcade Fire last summer, count yourself among the fortunate.

It's entirely possible that "Hey Ya!" by Outkast is one of the best dance songs ever (evah!), if not one of the best songs ever written by humans. Granted, it's likely that this may be doing some sort of disservice to other worthy contenders, but... right now... at this moment... well, "Hey Ya!" just made one of it's rare appearances on shuffle, and it's impossible for me not to jump up in my empty apartment and scream "Brilliant!" Which I am doing right now, on the internets. There was a time when I feared that I would grow tired of "Hey Ya!". It was 2003, I had gotten my first iPod a year before, and was more than happy to have the genius (again, brilliant!) double opus of Speakerboxx/The Love Below as a constant player in the car, on the bus, walking through the city... But then, well, it was everywhere . Over Christmas we listened to it ("Hey Ya!") repeatedly while myself and my friend Angela snorted No-Doz with a N...

I'm lucky to have some stunning pieces of art by Canadian artist Sarah Kernohan in my house. I say "lucky" because I have said pieces on loan from a friend who suddenly got the urge to travel the world. He asked me to look after three drawings on canvas, unframed, and I happily agreed. So when I heard through the e-grapevine that Ms. Kernohan is showing a piece of her collection in Connecticut, I felt compelled to share the news with the blogosphere, of which you are unwittingly a member. The three works I get to enjoy every day depict close up cross sections of bone, overlayed with architectural sketches. Precise staircase angles try in futility to impose artificial order over the shaft of a femur, while seemingly ignorant to the smooth, natural slope that underpins it. Well, that's my take, anyway. Although she explains it with a bit more eloquence: My drawings are a way of sharing the space that I see within these objects. The experience that I am aiming to build w...

In honor of Halloween, I'm guiding your attention to sound scape creation artist, SEHT. A good Halloween vibe (at least for me) relies heavily on atmosphere. From the abundance of haunt-related decoration to the increasingly chilly weather, it isn't Halloween if it doesn't feel spooky. When I was a boy, I paid $4 at Osco Drug in Wichita for a cassette tape called "Spooky Sounds of the Dark." On October nights, I would play it to help me get into the Halloween spirit and generally scare the shit out of myself (I was 9). The tape was 90 minutes of low-budget chain jangling, cat shrieking, howling, and a few dead moments when there was little more than a creaky gate and leaves rustling on a footpath. But it was these hollow scenes that truly made my ears tingle. Natural sounds layered in an unnatural way, grouped to create a mood, can bring to the listener the audio equivalent of metaphor. One might approach SEHT in a similar way as I did to the four-dollar cassette...

From my office in Wellington I look out over the bus station, commuters busily weaving between each other to find the right bus; getting on, climbing off. Just past the bus station is the train station where there happens more of the same: surges of bodies entering and leaving, choosing a footpath, following its way into the city. And beyond that? The harbour, quiet today and bluer than then cloudless sky overhead. Beyond? The Tararua ranges: a green wall on the horizon, their dramatic rise from the water covered in pine and giant fern. Between here and the hills--my world, my scenic world--are a thousand ideas, a thousand conversations; a thousand quick glances from the girl in the Saturday blouse; a thousand shouts, a thousand moments leaning against the window waiting for someone to wander by. Jacket in hand, I quickly grab the iPod and sunglasses and head for the door, and before the sun hits me, I choose the song for the rest of the afternoon. Band :: Beirut Song :: Scenic World

All right, 2007 has been a great year for new releases, and I have to admit that we have been remarkably remiss by covering barely 1/8th of them. For the record (the not so timely record) we heard, enjoyed, and had big opinions about The Shins, St. Vincent, Spoon, Okkervil River, the National, New Pornographers, Electrelane.... A veritable laundry list of what I have come to think of as my generation's adult contemporary. We just never got around to sharing those opinions; and, to be fair, there has been SO MUCH new music that we barely got around to thinking that the new Okkervil River was one of the best things ever before we had to take some time to wonder who St Vincent reminded us of. In any event, my iTunes has been flooded lately with an influx of new music, so much that I can barely take time to give it all the attention that it needs... and writing a full review? No thanks, and especially not five or more. So as a compromise, I have composed the following Haiku poems for s...

Good news for us living in the Southern Hemisphere: Bjork is paying us a visit! Hot off the Pitchfork press is Bjork's list of tour dates down under . If you don't feel like clicking, I'll summarise the itinerary: blah blah blah blah, Brazil, blah blah 18 JANUARY, AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND blah, blah, Australia, blah blah I may have to recount my "I'm never going to another outdoor festival as long as I live" testimony, and just suffer the heat, rain, bad food, hippies, and lack of shade for what will be my first Bjork experience.

DivShare , the media storage and streaming service we use here at Duck & Cover, has just upgraded its service. Once only a place to store files, DivShare now stores AND streams video while also hosting live versions of documents and slide shows, too. The best part is, most of DivShare's service is free. We like to think we got in during the beta days--you know, semi-clunky interface, frustrating failed uploads, and an embed link I had to hack to ensure I wasn't unwittingly offering free downloads without artists' permission. Ah, good times, good times. However, their product has just kept getting better. From the article at TechCrunch : The whole service is now providing a one-stop solution that will save users the download process, whatever the format of the file is. They offer free unlimited hosting and convert to flash nearly every file type (audio, video, office documents,..) instantly upon uploading with embedding capabilities. This is different from a company l...

For those who think punk is dead, dying, or just derivative, please consider bands like Refused, Blood Brothers, and--wading into the mix--Die! Die! Die! While Swedish rockers Refused attempted the equivalent of punk reform with their 1998 swan song The Shape of Punk to Come (which unfortunately alienated more fans than it attracted new ones), Blood Brothers, who serenade you one moment and scream in your ear the next--in a good way--were some of the freshest I'd heard in a long time. And finally, there is Die! Die! Die!; specifically their latest release, Promises, Promises . Not groundbreaking, but far from derivative, Promises is a solid, well-produced album that sacrifices none of punk's inherent rottenness. Die! Die! Die! pounded into the New Zealand punk scene (which is also the alt/hardcore scene, which is also the indie scene, which is also the prog scene, which pairs occasionally with the dub/reggae scene--hey, it's a small country) in 2003, released their first ...

As many of you know, Radiohead's latest release becomes available for download (from their site) today. However, some of you may not know that they are leaving the pricing up to you. That is, you pay what you think the download is worth. Don't believe me? Go to Radiohead's website and try to download the new album, In Rainbows . When you come to the pricing page you are faced with blank boxes. Click the little red question mark for an explanation and a very short, very uplifting message. Is this the future of the music business? I doubt it, but a boy can dream. In the meantime, let's tell the industry what we think a fair price is.

Tonight, well, last night if we’re to be totally honest, I was to start packing. As has been expressed in a previous post, I am in the middle of Tremendous Life Change. I am moving as much as I can afford of my current life in Hawaii back to what could be said to be my old life, but is really my new life, in Seattle. Yesterday, I turned thirty two. Thirty was spent in the middle of a hectic move to Hawaii, a move that was even more hectic because I allowed my then partner to shoulder all of the responsibility in getting us here. Sure, I helped, but not as much as I could or should have. Part of it was that I was resistant to change, and, even at the cusp of thirty, acting the part of a spoiled child. This time is different. This time I only have myself to answer to (because who wants to be in a relationship with a spoiled child? Exactly.), and must handle things differently. Jamie suggested that I take some time out of the packing to do a post about Music for Packing, which, really, t...

I have been told that I have a shoe fetish, but I continue to refute this. I have, simply, a healthy appreciation for footwear. That said, when I saw the new range of boots from D.A.T.E, I almost allowed myself to succumb to the status of fetishist. Put simply, these shoes are hot. The initials stand for the first names of those involved in creating the shoe company. Four individuals from differing backgrounds (business admin, fashion design, graphic design, etc.) formed D.A.T.E in Britain, but quickly established that the sneakers needed to be made elsewhere. Yet don't get your backs up about another shoe company that outsources production to sweatshop-infested countries like Vietnam (Nike), Indonesia (Adidas), and China (everyone else). D.A.T.E shoes are made in Italy, where most good shoes are made (unless they're made in Spain). Italian-made shoes carry a quality standard that should cover both design and build. In fact, the phrase "Made in Italy" is almost a bran...

Guest post by Drew Zackary It doesn't take a pipe-smoking Frenchman writing novels about a godless universe to make me terrified of my own moral freedoms. James Johnson's chanting voice is enough. Baltimore-based Wilderness's 2006 EP Living Through should be played loud, ( as all Wilderness songs should be). The title track begins silent, the soft patter of rain the only sound for nearly a minute until the reverb-dripping guitar comes forward towards the listener. The bass and drums crash suddenly into a tight unexpected groove. Then it happens. That terrible voice of the Id muscles in. He chants, So here is to you and your situation / well hello to these trying times. But the tension is in the delivery. You truly have to hear it to feel it. Wilderness are a guitar player's wet dream. It's one of those bands that we hear and immediately wish we were in. With 2 previous full lengths, a self-titled, and Vessel States . This single is a good introduction to the b...

Math Rock Doesn't Die; It Simplifies To me, some bands can be compared to olives, in that it took me quite a few attempts before I could eat an olive without making a sour face. It may have something to do with the fact that my first olive was a giant, Spanish black olive (avec pip) that had been soaking in brine for, oh, probably five years. I ate it sitting on an airplane next to a girl, MB, who I'd had a crush on for about the same amount of time as the olive had been marinating. It was during a school-organized trip to Europe, and I was 18 (yes, I was 18 before I had an olive. You might think this odd until you remember that I grew up in Kansas). We had just been served our in-flight meals, and MB opened her sealed-in-plastic salad. She turned to me slowly, holding the salad out in offering, and asked, "Do you want my olive?" For a split second I hoped it was some odd metaphor for jumping her bones in the airplane toilet, but I quickly realised that, indeed, she d...

Dakin is in the middle of planning a trans-pacific move, from the blue water and flawless days of Hawaii to the cloud cover and drizzle of Seattle. Moving is always a difficult task, even if your move only takes you across town. When you cross oceans and time zones, a certain melancholy can take hold as you say "fare thee well" to a handful of new friends, while (in this case) falling back into the open arms of those that you had previously left behind. There is always an intrinsic feeling of being cheated that is imparted by the people you must doff your proverbial hat to, always accusations of some sort of abandonment... and why do they never understand that this is not an easy task? Perhaps things are different with each parting, as you leave your family in the midwest and follow dreams to the nw, then follow bigger (yet simpler) dreams to an island in a sea of blue, then, yet again, you chase even bigger dreams (is such a thing possible?) back to the fog and chill of t...

If you go to the official Flight of the Conchords website , you will see that it was about the time they started work on their HBO special that they stopped updating. However, you will also read that they don’t mind too much. In fact, they are very quick to point to other fan sites that are doing a much better job. This self deprecating humour is part of what makes the duo so endearing. For those who have not yet seen the programme, Bret McKenzie ( formerly of Wellington dub band The Black Seeds) plays the naïve Bret, who is a vertible emotional rollercoaster when compared to the dour-faced Jermaine (Jermaine Clement. See him in Eagle vs. Shark ). Together they look for gigs and . . . well that’s pretty much it: they look for gigs. But it’s enough. Just because the show’s premise isn’t robust, doesn’t mean the show falls flat. Hell, remember Seinfeld? That was a show supposedly about ‘nothing,’ and look how well it did. FOTC is at least about one thing, so it’s got that much more ...

All right then. First of all, apologies to all of our readers (yes, we do still enjoy the conceit that we have an "audience") for the lack of posts. Though, rather, what I really mean to say is "apologies for the lack of posts from myself, Dakin, as Jamie has been toiling away bringing you the news that counts -- such as Posh and Becks; as well as reviews of must-have records and whimsical insight into, while not necessarily the mind of the real Craig Finn, certainly the mind of someone who has known some pretty desperate characters ." Or something to that affect. In any event, Dakin and Jamie are Up To Something, and we hope to be telling you all about it soon. Very soon. We also promise that we, in fact, won't shut up about this Something, and we'll natter on at you until your eyes bleed and you delete us from your favorites. So anyway, big news soon. Very soon. Today's post is, admittedly, dialing it in a bit. So much so that I didn't even come ac...

Recently, the Beckhams, Victoria (aka Posh) and David, descended upon Los Angeles like--they must have thought--winged angels from on high, here to enlighten the American masses in the ways of soccer and pop music. "How grateful they'll be," Posh no doubt whispered to her reflection, "when I show them my spectacular pout." And it is true, she can pout. In fact, I don't think I've seen a lip droop like that since the day my father heard Knight Rider was cancelled. But it takes more than a pretty pout to win American audiences, as Calista Flockhart could tell you. In a country where the media ogles over the likes of Paris and Britney (I would mention the president, but that dead horse has been beaten to glue), it is difficult being the new celeb on the block. But there is, in my opinion, just one reason Posh and Becks will fail to woo the American media: they are just not dumb enough. The Victoria Beckham Marketing Machine counted on turning their first ye...