9.1.10
I have a real soft spot in my heart for Eels, mostly due to Electro-Shock Blues, the follow-up to their breakthrough album Beautiful Freak, which contains the two songs they're still best known for, "Novocaine for the Soul" and "My Beloved Monster" (the first was a genuine radio/MTV hit, while the second was made popular after its use in the first Shrek movie). (And yes, I know Eels are really just one guy, Mark Oliver Everett, or E, but I'm still going to say "they" when referring to Eels.)

But when they released End Times, a morose, depressing effort that came only six months after the mostly mediocre Hombre Loco, I was pretty sure this would be the first new Eels release since Electro-Shock Blues that I wouldn't be buying, and I was right. I listened to some clips from the record just to be sure, but I had zero interest in adding it to my collection, especially when there are already so many middling albums on my shelf by Eels (Souljacker, Shootenanny, and Hombre Loco are virtually indistinguishable to me, because I couldn't really tell you what's on any of them).

So when I saw that they had another new release, Tomorrow Morning (which means there have been three full albums in just over a year, usually not a good sign from an established artist who hasn't produced a solid record in years——the last really noteworthy release from Eels was 2005's Blinking Lights and Other Revelations, and even that was a double album that probably could have stood some editing), I was pretty sure I wouldn't be picking it up either.

But then I listened to clips from the record, and it sounded warmer and more optimistic than anything since Daisies of the Galaxy, and I decided to give it a shot. I'd really love another record from them that I could love as much as Electro-Shock Blues, and while I think that's probably too much to hope for from this release, it would be nice to have another album that could sit comfortably in my rotation for a few weeks.

9.2.10
I've tried and tried and tried, but I just can't get into Broken Bells, the James Mercer (Shins) and Danger Mouse collaboration. The record is the most solid three star record I've ever heard: every song on it is a three star song (on a five star scale), which in my ranking system means that the songs aren't bad per se, but they're not good/memorable enough for me to want to hear them in my random shuffle playlists. They just sit there; I can't find anything interesting or distinctive enough about them to love them or hate them.

9.3.10
There's a lot of stuff to dislike about the just-released iTunes 10. The new icon is the first and easiest change to hate, and the grey icons on a grey background in the UI aren't far behind. And for some reason, they reduced the size of the album artwork in the main window, and there doesn't seem to be a setting that lets you make it larger.

They also created a new list view which is the only view where you can display album cover art now; the old list view, which has all of your desired columns, etc., for a given playlist, doesn't have the option of displaying album artwork like it used to, and the new artwork list view has the default settings for every playlist, so you have to go back and customize all of your columns for each playlist again.

Most of these are minor quibbles that don't interfere with functionality, but still, given the attention to detail that Apple usually pays to interface and design issues, these changes are surprising. Maybe there are some backend improvements that also came along with this update, but as far as the surface changes, I see nothing new that is worth keeping.

9.7.10
I follow an eclectic set of folks on Twitter——the local burrito truck, the woman who owns the bookstore I buy art toys at, and a couple of Baltimore bloggers, along with some bands I like. While Kristin Hersh (Throwing Muses, 50 Foot Wave) is the most consistently entertaining of the musical bunch, Kevin Barnes from of Montreal occasionally posts some great stuff. This sequence from the weekend was one of his best:

First tweet:
I think the palmetto bug I just killed managed to stick some sort of invisible I.D. tracking device into my right ring finger

One minute later:
I don't mind cockroach big brother monitoring me, it makes me feel less alone

30 seconds after that:
But I don't like them fucking with my cells

9.8.10
Personal Life, the latest album from the Thermals, arrived from Amazon yesterday, and while I mostly like it, I like it less than Now We Can See, which I liked less than The Body, The Blood, The Machine. The production is a little too clean, the pace is approaching midtempo on a few too many songs, and generally there's just less energy. It's possible it could still win me over, but with of Montreal's False Priest less than a week away, it's got a very limited window in which to do so.

9.9.10
NPR is currently offering a stream of of Montreal's upcoming release, False Priest. I briefly considered not listening to it so I could save the surprise for when the album is officially released next week, but given that I'm seeing them live both the night before the album's release and on release day, I really want to know as many of the new songs as possible. So I gave in pretty quickly and started listening to the stream.

Spin is also offering a download of "Sex Karma", one of the songs they played on Jimmy Fallon a few weeks ago. It's more in the style of recent of Montreal releases than the first single, "Coquet Coquette", and from what I've heard on my first listen, "Sex Karma" is much more representative of False Priest, too.

9.10.10
I got Kristin Hersh's new record, Crooked, from Amazon today. Actually, it didn't come as a CD or a record or one of the physical objects traditionally associated with music releases. Instead, it came in the form of a book called Crooked: An Album. The book itself is a collection of essays about and lyrics to each track on the record, accompanied by photographs taken by a friend of hers, but it also includes the information you need to download the digital files of the songs, including two bonus EPs of material recorded at the same time as the album proper.

A couple of her Throwing Muses records still rank among my favorites of all time, and while her solo stuff is always hit or miss for me, I also really like her more recent work with 50 Foot Wave. But the price I paid for this book is worth at least a year of her tweets and blog entries, which give a real glimpse into her everyday life. I don't know when I'll get a chance to really listen to Crooked, but at this point, it doesn't matter much to me how much I like it, I'm going to continue to buy her stuff because I want to support her as an artist and as a person; I just like the fact that she's out in the world, doing what she does.

9.13.10
First of Montreal show down in DC tonight. I'm going after work, and I'm expecting to be pretty tired, but hopefully it will be worth it. Otherwise it's going to take a lot of effort to get excited about the second night.

9.14.10
The show last night was not what I was hoping for, but I'll give more details later. I'm going back tonight for the second show with the hopes that they will correct some of the issues from last night, especially because NPR will be webcasting tonight's show.

9.15.10
So let's start with the good from the of Montreal show on Monday night: Janelle Monáe, the opening act. It was clear that not many people in the audience were familiar with her material, but by sticking to the most danceable tracks from her most recent release, The ArchAndroid, she won the crowd by the third or fourth song, so that even when she paused for a mostly a capella number with only a jazzy guitar for accompaniment, everyone was really into it.

Given Kevin Barnes' recent statements about how the stage show for this tour was going to work——"We're going to marry the two shows together, in a way. It doesn't feel like you go see a band, and there's a pause, and there's another pause, and then it's over."——I was kind of suprised when he didn't join Monáe onstage to sing the song he contributed to her record. But I was even more surprised (although maybe I shouldn't have been) when her set ended and it became the standard pause while they broke down all the equipment for the opening act and then a little later the main act came out onstage. There was nothing that seemed to link the two shows together in any way.

But Monáe had a nice set with enough concept to make it interesting without distracting too much from the actual music. Her friends in of Montreal could have learned something from her...

9.16.10
Before I launch into a fairly scathing review of the of Montreal portion of the show, let me remind you how much I love this band. I bought tickets for both of their DC shows, determined to attend whether anyone was going with me or not, I loved seeing them in January at the 9:30, and I've been obsessed with their albums for the past couple of years. And it's clear that DC loves them, too——their shows always sell out (even when they play multiple dates), and when we got there at 7:00 on Monday just as the doors were opening, the line was around the block, the longest I've ever seen. My point to keep in mind for the rest of this review: the crowd was very much like me. We were already hardcore fans and superexcited to see the band.

One of the big problems that would be difficult for any band to overcome was the sound. It was just really, really loud, so loud that if felt like Kevin Barnes was yelling more than singing and his voice was still buried. Dottie Alexander's keyboard parts were mixed so badly that when she played, all you really heard was high-pitched static at the top of the mix, and the bass was pulled way back, sometimes to the point where you couldn't really hear it (this was especially noticeable after Janelle Monáe's show, which was very bass-heavy). The best word to describe the overall effect was piercing, and I know that's not typical for either the club or the band, because I saw them in this same venue back in January and had no issues with the sound.

They also played mostly tracks from the new album, False Priest, and since the crowd didn't really know the songs (the album wasn't released until the day after this show, although NPR streamed the entire record the week before the official release), they had a harder time getting into it, especially the less dance-y ones. It was at least six or seven songs into their set (and maybe more) before the band played an older song that the audience recognized, and the crowd reacted with more energy than all of the previous songs combined. So maybe six months from now this same setlist will get a different reaction, because the crowd will know all the songs and will be able to get into it more.

The other big issue was that Kevin seemed much more focused on what I'm disparagingly calling the puppet show than he was on making sure that the music sounded good and that he and the rest of the band were connecting with the audience. It was a very theatrical show, with multiple costume changes for Kevin and an assortment of actors donning various costumes and peforming skits for all of the new songs, and while that had some entertainment value, it seemed like it distracted from the music, when the music should be at the forefront and the mini-plays should serve as enhancement. But because of the space needed for the performances, most of the band (except for Dottie, a second keyboardist, and of course Kevin) was pushed against the back of the stage, ensconced in their station of instruments (since everyone except the drummer plays multiple instruments during the show) and cut off from any kind of interaction with the audience.

The lighting added to this sense of disconnection and alienation as well——much of the time, there was only a small rectangle of light in the center of the stage, which Kevin would wander in and out of, at times becoming almost invisible when he went into the shadows. When the full stage was lit, it was typically because there was a large prop or group of costumed figures, and these, of course, kept the audience from seeing the band.

I came away from this show very, very disappointed. I had tickets for the second show, but I seriously considered not going after that first one. But I was meeting a friend, and besides wanting to see him, I was hoping that the fact that NPR was doing a live webcast of the Tuesday performance would elevate the band's game a bit.

9.17.10
Despite the utter travesty of the first show (at least of Montreal's portion of it), I'm glad I went back for the second night. Not only was the sound much better, but I was able to grab a spot in the balcony right above the stage and get a much better view of the stage.

The setlists for both bands were pretty much identical to the first night——even the order was mostly the same. Janelle Monáe had another stellar performance, and she added a couple of new tricks to her repertoire. On the first night, she opened the show by standing in a hooded cloak with her back to the audience alongside two other cloaked, hooded figures, so that for the first minute or so of the song, you couldn't tell which of the performers was actually Monáe. On the second night, she instead sent the other two out onto the stage while she stayed hidden in a balcony for the first part of the song, revealing herself with a spotlight at the same point in the song where she'd thrown her cloak off the night before.

Later in the show, Monáe also got off the stage and, escorted by a couple of security guards and her two actors, made her way into the center of the club floor to dance with the crowd. She had them eating out of the palm of her hand by then anyway, but that just added to her connection with the crowd, and I guarantee she made a ton of new fans. Monáe's music and her personality are way too big for a club stage, and her and her band's love of music (not just their music, but all music) is obvious. There's still a bit too much filler on her album, but she wisely stuck to the strongest tracks for her live set, and I definitely appreciate her music more now for having seen her perform it live.

9.20.10
of Montreal's second night set was almost the same as their first, too. I couldn't find a setlist for the first night, but because the second night was streamed and archived at NPR, it was pretty easy to find the setlist for that one:

Black Lion Massacre
Coquet Coquette
Our Riotous Defects
Godly Intersex
Sex Karma
Girl Named Hello
Like a Tourist
Enemy Gene
Hydra Fancies
She's a Rejecter
Tonight
Casualty of You
Around the Way
The Past Is a Grotesque Animal
A Sentence of Sorts in Kongsvinger
You Do Mutilate?

Encore
For Our Elegant Caste
Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse
Michael Jackson Medley

"Black Lion Massacre" isn't a real track, but that's apparently the name that the band has given to the spoken word piece that precedes Kevin Barnes taking the stage with the first wave of puppets. The only differences between Monday and Tuesday that I can recall were the addition of "The Past Is a Grotesque Animal" in the main set and "Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse" in the encore. The order of the songs in the main set changed a little bit, although it was pretty close, especially the first half dozen or so songs.

The pageantry was also the same, but with better sound and a crowd that seemed a bit more familiar with/into the newer material, it didn't distract nearly as much. There was also more interplay between of Montreal and Janelle Monáe ; while Kevin Barnes didn't join her for her set to sing "Make the Bus", Monáe did come onstage to sing her part in of Montreal's "Enemy Gene", and the entire entourage came out to help with the Michael Jackson medley ("Thriller", "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'", and "P.Y.T.").

I still have a mixed opinion about this trio of covers as the closer for the show, which it was both nights. In January, they closed their shows with a Jackson 5 cover, "I Want You Back", and I thought that was brilliant. But covering Michael Jackson again transformed it from a genius, unexpected surprise into a we've-run-out-of-new-tricks kind of thing, especially when it stretched out into three songs.

But the second show was well worth making another trip to DC for, and although I won't forget the issues with the first show, the Tuesday performance has made we want to make sure I see the band the next time they're in town. But if they play two nights again, maybe next time I only buy a ticket for the second one.

9.21.10
I somehow missed posting about the 100 $5 MP3 album downloads from Amazon at the beginning of this month, so let's get to them quick before they're replaced with a new batch in October.

This month isn't as strong as some of the ones this summer, but it's still got some decent stuff like Sufjan Stevens' Illinois, the Danger Mouse/Jemini collaboration Ghetto Pop Life, Superchunk's Come Pick Me Up, and Janelle Monáe's The ArchAndroid.

Some middling releases that might be worth $5 but I wouldn't necessarily recommend as great albums include Gorillaz' Demon Days, Ted Leo and the Pharmacists' The Brutalist Bricks, and Beulah's Yoko.

Again, a smattering of decent stuff here, but let's hope for better next month.

9.22.10
As for of Montreal's new album, False Priest, I actually like it pretty well. It's not nearly as complicated or interesting as their last two (closer "You Do Mutilate?" is the only track that approaches the schizophrenic hopscotching brilliance of the three-tracks-in-one ethos that dominated Skeletal Lamping), and if it was the first thing I heard from them, I don't know that it would have won me over. But having won me over already, this is a perfectly acceptable addition to their catalog.

The songs are shorter, more direct, and more traditionally catchier than a lot of the stuff on the last couple of albums, and if singles mattered for a band like this, there would be several good candidates, and although there is only one five star track for me so far ("Hydra Fancies"), most everything else is four stars in my book.

9.23.10
A few preordered CDs arrived a couple of days ago: of Montreal's False Priest, of course, and also the Walkmen's Lisbon and Les Savy Fav's Root for Ruin. These follow on the heels of last week's Personal Life from the Thermals.

I really like the Walkmen, the Thermals, and Les Savy Fav——they are each represented in my top 50 singles of the last decade, and it's likely that most of them will end up in the top 50 albums list, too, whenever I get around to putting that together. And although I didn't dislike the albums from these three groups that immediately preceded these, they weren't the high points of any of these bands careers, so I'm hoping for somewhat of a comeback with their new releases.

I've already had enough time to absorb Personal Life, and it's definitely their weakest release so far, almost absent of the energy that is at the core of their best work. It's got a couple of decent tracks, but nothing that's as good as anything on their masterwork, The Body, The Blood, The Machine. The slower pace of many of the songs doesn't help, but there's something else, something more intangible, that's also gone missing.

My obsessive period with False Priest looks like it's winding down (a little sooner than expected, to be honest, even though I do really like the record), so hopefully I'll get to spend some time with Lisbon and Root for Ruin soon.

9.24.10
Does everyone else think that the Replacements' Let It Be is better than the Beatles'? Or is it just me?

9.27.10
It's possible that Lisbon could be the Walkmen's best album yet. It's certainly their best since my previous favorite, Bows and Arrows, and it may grow on me to take over the top spot. I'm still getting to know it, and I might not know for sure where it ranks until six months from now, but after the stumble of A Hundred Miles Off and the nice recovery on You & Me, it seems like they're back on the right track.

9.28.10
I've listened to Les Savy Fav's Root for Ruin a few times now, and it hasn't left much of an impression on me. I mean, I think it's a good album, and most of the songs certainly sound like classic Les Savy Fav, but nothing on it really grips my attention like their earlier stuff did (and does).

The one song I can't figure out is "Poltergeist", which is the best imitation of angry Joy Division or Bauhaus I've heard since LCD Soundsystem did a cover of "No Love Lost". I think it's going to turn out to be either my least or most favorite song on the record, but it's a puzzle that's going to take me a few more listens to solve. Given how little the rest of the album affected me, even the songs that I like, the fact that I'm struggling with deciphering this one isn't necessarily a bad thing.

9.29.10
False Priest isn't a bad album by any means, but it might be just enough of a step down from their last few that it will let me take a step back from my obsession with of Montreal that's going on two years now. It's not nearly as big a dip as Modest Mouse took with their last couple of records, and of Montreal will still likely be my answer if you ask me what my current favorite band is, but I've been able to process and step away from False Priest a lot more quickly than I did Skeletal Lamping or Hissing Fauna.

9.30.10
I'm constantly surprised at the indie songs that end up on commercials, but I swear, I never thought I'd hear Los Campesinos on a Budweiser ad. But I guess that's the universe we live in now.