CATEGORY: MP3

Stereo owners beware! On Tuesday, May 22nd rebellious rockstars The National plan to take over your car & home music players with their brooding, goth-Americana stylings. Even computer headphone listeners are at risk of extreme joy & preference for the band’s signature late night songs.

Local police and social service agents are standing by at all Sam Goody and Wherehouse music stores in Vermont and New Mexico after reports that the New York band’s fourth studio album, Boxer, is “so damn good you’ll hand over your baby to the music store clerk for $12.99 store credit”.

To help the public transition from life before Boxer and life after, authorities have asked Invisible Limb to post a revised b-side from the record along with it’s original counterpart.

The tracks in question are Blank Slate, a b-side from the single Mistaken For Strangers (released this Tuesday), and Keep It Upstairs, which is taken from 2005’s Abel single.

This cd (Boxer) is brilliant! No joke!

[mp3] The National - Blank Slate
[mp3] The National - Keep It Upstairs

CATEGORY: Editor's Pick - Music Reviews

Before he became known as the less familiar half of the Postal Service, electronic songwriter Jimmy Tamborello was arranging his bleeps and clicks under the name Dntel.

His first album, 2001’s Life is Full of Possibilities, featured Tamborello’s electronic glitch-pop layered underneath several guest vocals from artists such as Mia Doi Todd, Strictly Ballroom guitarist Chris Gunst, and the more familiar half of the Postal Service, Ben Gibbard. This collaborative element added an interesting variety to his textured landscapes and is featured once again on his latest album, Dumb Luck.

Almost six years in the making, Dumb Luck is filled to the top with indie rock’s brightest young stars: Rilo Kiley’s Jenny Lewis, Bright Eyes’ Conor Oberst, Grizzly Bear’s Edward Drost. Even Mia Doi Todd returns for another go round. Add to that appearances from Fog’s Andrew Broder, Lali Puna’s Valerie Trebeljahr and Markus Acher, Arthur & You’s Grant Olsen and Sonya Westcott, and Mystic Chords of Memory’s Christopher and Jennifer Gunst, and you have a record that works simultaneously as an electronic pop album, a killer who’s who compilation, and a reminder that before ‘Such Great Heights’ Jimmy Tamborello was very much alive and making some great music.

The immediate stand out tracks are Jenny Lewis’ ‘Roll On’ and Conor Oberst’s ‘Breakfast in Bed’, however this may vary according to the listener’s familiarity with each vocalist. In the end Dumb Luck’s strong suit lies in its ability to draw all the different vocals into one cohesive whole. The bleeps and glitches float beautifully behind Jenny Lewis’ country drawl, Conor Oberst’s wavering and fragile storytelling, and Edward Drost’s airy voice.

The marraige between Tamborello and his friends works so well you may start confusing your favorite vocalist as ‘the singer for Dntel’.

MP3
Dntel - Dumb Luck

CATEGORY: MP3

[mp3] Magnolia Electric Co. - Lonesome Valley (from the record Fading Trails out now on Secretly Canadian Records)

Jason Molina and crew are forever waltzing along that dry desert highway, spreading their Neil Young-inspired country rock one lonely story at a time. Their second full length Fading Trails may not have been as strong as their debut What Comes After the Blues, but it features a few strong tracks such as the attached ‘Lonesome Valley’.

[mp3] Stephen Merritt - The Meaning of Lice (from the compilation Plague Songs out now on 4AD records)

Biblical disaster serves as the inspiration behind 4AD’s recent compilation Plague Songs. Featuring exclusive tracks from artists such as Imogen Heap, Brian Eno, Rufus Wainwright, and the attached Stephen Merritt (The Magnetic Fields), Plague Songs takes a hauntingly beautiful look at each of the ten plagues as interpreted by eahc artist. The attached track, ‘The Meaning of Lice’, is an upbeat pop song dedicated to the little known lice plague.

CATEGORY: Contests

You read the title. Invisible Limb is giving away a copy of the critically acclaimed Drums and Guns, the newest record by America’s favorite slow rockers Low. All you have to do to enter this once in a lifetime giveaway is send an e-mail to richard@invisiblelimb.net with your name and favorite pizza topping. Open to US residents only! Winners will be chosen on Friday, April 6th!

Here is an mp3 of ‘Breaker’ from Drums and Guns.

[mp3] Low - Breaker

CATEGORY: MP3

The National’s new record Boxer comes out May 22nd on Beggar’s Banquet but, of course, you already knew that. You’ve been checking their official website and Myspace everyday looking for updates and any trace of information concerning the status of their new record. You’ve been reading over the official tracklisting over and over again hoping that one day soon they would feed your obsession and finally post a song from the record. We know you too well.

Well, my friends, the day you are waiting for has finally arrived. As of Friday, March 23rd the first song from the highly anticipated follow up to 2005’s critically acclaimed Alligator was made available both for streaming on the band’s Myspace and download on their website.

Hellz yes.

The name of the song in question is ‘Fake Empire’, a softly sweeping piano ballad that shows off an exciting new side of the band. Color me much impressed! The three minute track reminds me of the subtle intensity and lyrical emotion of ‘About Today’ (Cherry Tree EP) combined with the clean interweaving guitars featured on Alligator. Much like the men featured on the record’s cover, this is a classy National dressed up in a black fitted suit and tie. By the time the climactic flurry of horns hits, I am already itching for the replay button.

Now all we need is John Vanderslice to follow suit and show us what he’s been working on all these months.

[mp3] The National - Fake Empire

CATEGORY: Editor's Pick - Music Reviews

With their debut album Devestator, the Chicago rock band Star have written and recorded what appears to be an alternate soundtrack to the 2003 indie flick Lost in Translation.

The record’s twelve pop songs are so rich with atmosphere and mood that images of Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson laying in a hotel bed staring sadly at the ceiling might invade your imagination. This emphasis on texture & mood also turns one of the band’s potential weaknesses into a strength- singer Shannon Roberts’ reverb-drenched, indecipherable vocals fit right in here, avoiding the trap of becoming distracting. Behind Roberts’ light bursts of air, her bandmates Theodore Beck (bass/beats) and Scott Cortez (guitar) let their instruments echo and fuzz until they have formed a giant, slow moving wall of sound. This simple formula is the band’s successful foundation and they stick to it faithfully throughout the album.

In the end, if a few of the songs on Devestator sound a little similar it is because they are. However, people shouldn’t criticize Star for lack of variety; the mood and textures of their great walls of sound are what make Devestator a worthwhile trip. If the album had been released in 2002 perhaps Mrs. Sophia Coppola might have been tempted to steal it for her own exercise in mood & isolation.

http://www.myspace.com/lovelyrebelrecords

MP3s
Switchblade Heart
Pure Gold Reason

CATEGORY: Music Videos

CATEGORY: While You Wait

Surprisingly I have been receiving a lot of really excellent releases in the mail (won’t tell you who yet tho).  Once I get them uploaded and the mp3s squared away I will have some great new music for you to download and absorb.  Prepare.

Until then here is a video that leaves me conflicted inside.

CATEGORY: Music Reviews

Independent music is a jungle, my friends, and the search for good tunes is a safari. Luckily for you, I am a barely qualified tour guide with the grandest of machetes I like to call a blog. Using this dangerous instrument I cut through the brush and unecessary underhang that blocks our journey, however sometimes I will come across a patch of vines and tree trunk that is seemingly too tough to pass through. This is when I, your leader, stop posting for a month and re-focus my sights on the music that is actually speaking to me.

Here is all I’ve been listening to the past few weeks. Here are the records I think are truly deserving of your hard earned money. Here is music you can enjoy without being friends with the band who wrote it. Here is the stuff that legends are made from. Here is what happens when you forget to lock your car door.

Here is now!

Low - Breaker (from their up coming SubPop album Drums & Guns due out March 20th)

Their last full length, The Great Destroyer, was the perfect balance of slow-core and accessible melodies. Their newest Drums & Guns slips back into a more glacier like pace but it still contains enough of Low’s smart songwriting to be worth listening to again and again. Purchase the record when it drops March 20th.

The Arcade Fire - Neon Bible (from the Merge album Neon Bible, out now)

Neon Bible is the best record I’ve heard so far this year and ‘Neon Bible’ is my favorite song from that record. Beautifully understated & whispered, it draws me in with its delicate guitar work and quiet layers of strings and drums. The Arcade Fire have proved themselves to be the real deal.

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah! - Love Song No. 7  (from the self released album Some Loud Thunder, out now)

Life has a funny way of working.  When Clap Your Hands Say Yeah released their debut album to critical acclaim, I found the record to be a bit…undeserving.  For the quirky, raw style they were going for the production seemed pretty flat and conventional.  To me the songs were boring.  Fast forward to a year and a half later and now things are pretty much the opposite.  Their new album Some Loud Thunder is being panned by critics and I am somehow loving the shits out of it.  People say the bad production is pretentious, but I think it adds a great deal of personality to this already eclectic and experimental batch of songs.  Along with Neon Bible, this is the only thing I’ve been able to listen to the past few weeks.  Whenever I put another cd in I am immediately presented with the need to remove it and replace it with Some Loud Thunder.

CATEGORY: While You Wait