DOWNLOAD: Sunset Rubdown - Idiot Heart (MP3)

'This is the best band retreat yet...'

"By no means am I a poet or a great lyricist, I just like to include some sort of beauty in the lyrics," [Sunset Rubdown's Spencer Krug] says. "Sometimes I'm trying to make them more straight-forward, but it's still in me to return to the metaphor and I'm not very good at it. My friend Dan [Bejar - aka Canadian solo artist Destroyer] is one of the few people who can pull off poetry and music at the same time. The imagery isn't anything complex. I'd like to get to the point where I could create something like that, without hiding behind metaphors. I'm my own worst critic, right?"

"[With the new record] it's turned very much into a collaborative band - they're not just hired guns," explains Krug with a hint of relief. "I'm still the principal songwriter. I bring my ideas to them and then they add their own colours and flavours to them and it becomes Sunset Rubdown. If I was to sit down and record with just a piano and a guitar it sounds all right but it makes me miss the band."
[Spins and Needles]

Spencer and Sunset Rubdown kick off a month-long tour of Europe on September 2nd. When they return, they'll be playing shows across North America through October. That tour comes to NYC for an October 16th show at Manhattan Center Grand Ballroom. Tickets go on sale Saturday, August 8th at noon. After missing the show at Studio B during the Northside Festival (which apparently was a disaster anyway), I can't wait for this one.

The group's great new record, Dragonslayer, came out on June 23rd on Jagjaguwar. "Idiot Heart" from that album is above.

Dan Bejar, Krug's Swan Lake collaborator shouted out above, just finished a short solo Destroyer tour. He played XX Merge in North Carolina, and a July 30th NYC show at Bowery Ballroom...

"Last night I had the privilege to see my favorite band/singer Destroyer at the Bowery Ballroom in NYC. I've been to countless shows over the past 18yrs or so and I've even seen Destroyer a number of times, but last night was special. He played material off of each of his EIGHT albums and even a song from a side project called Swan Lake, AND he did it all solo with an acoustic guitar. I've always been partial to a sripped down lo-fi sound anyway, so in my opinion, it was best like that. Not to take away from what the band contributes, but it really was amazing this way. So luckily I brought a pad to do a few quick drawings (in the dark) as I always think it would be great to reportage these events and then some how I never seem to. Glad I did last night." [Greg Betza]

Destroyer is releasing a new 12-inch vinyl EP, titled Bay of Pigs, on August 18th via Merge. Bejar will be back in the fall for a Wordless Music show at the Miller Theatre on September 12th, as well as an appearance at Pop Montreal. All tour dates below.

EP art, tracklist, the setlist from Destroyer's XX Merge show, and Sunset Rubdown live videos and tour dates, are below...

Continue reading "Sunset Rubdown announce 2009 tour (dates), Spencer's friend Destroyer releasing EP & played Bowery Ballroom"

DOWNLOAD: Swan Lake - Spanish Gold 2044 (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Swan Lake - A Hand At Dusk (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Swan Lake - Spider (MP3)

Three free tracks from the new Swan Lake album!
(Pre-orders and the download dissemination will begin tomorrow, February 24th, via SC Distribution)

To Whom it May Concern

A petition was put together recently in order to persuade Canadian super group Swan Lake into touring. Most of you have posted on your sites about their forthcoming second record, Enemy Mine, which is due out March 24th on Jagjaguwar. In regards to touring, Jagjaguwar posted that "Swan Lake does not currently have any tour plans but is easily swayed by gold doubloons and/or enthusiastic mobs". Upon reading this, we the fans have come together to prove to the band that they definitely need to tour to support their new record.

We are urging all of you to help us in our quest. If you would post a link to this petition along with any upcoming posts about Swan Lake, we'd greatly appreciate it. Once we hit our target goal of 1000 signatures, we'll send the petition to Swan Lake's booking agent at Billions who will present the petition to the band. After being overwhelmed by the shear number of signatures, we're sure the band will want to hit the road.

http://www.petitiononline.com/swanlake/petition.html

Thanks for all your help.

Maria Carullo
http://wolfparade.nonstuff.com

DOWNLOAD: Handsome Furs - What We Had (old MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Handsome Furs - Cannot Get, Started (old MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Swan Lake - All Fires (old MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Swan Lake - The Freedom (old MP3)

FACE CONTROL is the second album by Montreal's Handsome Furs, 2007's Plague Park was their first. Alexei Perry and Dan Boeckner wrote the songs on FACE CONTROL together. The album was recorded and mixed by Arlen Thompson at Mount Zoomer. It was mastered by Harris Newman at Hotel2Tango. It will be released on March 10th, 2009 [by Sub Pop].

That makes two-upcoming Wolf Parade-related albums in March....

The release of SWAN LAKE's new album is imminent! It is called "Enemy Mine", to be released on Jagjaguwar on March 24th, 2009 (March 23rd in the UK).

For those unfamiliar, SWAN LAKE is the musical group featuring celebrated songwriter-mystics Daniel Bejar (of Destroyer and New Pornographers), Spencer Krug (of Sunset Rubdown and Wolf Parade) and Carey Mercer (of Frog Eyes and Blackout Beach).

Together they recorded Enemy Mine, their nine-song second album, in Victoria, British Columbia, in early 2008, a little more than a year after the release of their well-received debut collaboration, "Beast Moans", also on Jagjaguwar.

While their debut album was a beautifully-weaved mash-up of their disparate song-writing styles, often with layer upon layer of various melodies and stylistics thrown into a collaborative cauldron to magical, and at times discordant effect, their second album "Enemy Mine" reflects a more stripped-down, more deliberate approach to collaboration. It's as if they really tried to just make nice songs together. To quote Krug, "There's architecture here." Not that the lyric is about collaboration--it fits nicely though.

It is the band's contention that this is the first known use of a "court painting" as a record cover used in popular music. As a result of this enthusiasm, the band had planned on calling the album "Before the Law", a beloved Kafka parable and a reference to this court painting. However, the band is tired of being tagged as "literary", so they dubbed the record "Enemy Mine", a beloved movie from Bejar's youth, and a good metaphor for collaboration.

Both new album tracklistings, and Handsome Furs tour dates (including SXSW), below...

Continue reading "new Handsome Furs & Swan Lake albums, MP3 & tour dates"

by BrooklynVegan Mike

DOWNLOAD: Hello, Blue Roses - Shadow Falls (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Hello, Blue Roses - Sunny Skies (MP3)

The love child of two multi-talented, multi-tasking eclectics, Hello, Blue Roses pairs visual artist/vocalist/flautist Sydney Vermont with her scraggly-haired sweetheart, artsy singer/songwriter Dan Bejar (Destroyer, New Pornographers, Swan Lake), to make up this charming duo. Their intimacy beget a distinctive and engrossing debut album, complete with the awww-inspiring title, The Portrait Is Finished And I Have Failed to Capture Your Beauty... due out Jan. 22 via the Locust label. [SPIN]

Mike: Hello
Dan: Hi Michael
Sydney: Nice to meet you!

Mike: How/When was the decision made between you guys to make a proper album? I read that your first performance as a duo was in 2001.

Sydney: 2001...oh that was an impromptu performance at our goodbye Montreal "Snowball". Our friend Gordon B Isnor had turned everyone on to Judee Sill that summer when he found a record of hers at a garage sale. Him and Goody played an evening of her songs with Shary Boyle performing Sharyoke in Halifax, and their beautiful poster was hanging on our Montreal walls. So I pretty much copied them by singing a Judee Sill song and a Kate Bush number with Dan on guitar and our friend Terry on cardboard box drums. It lasted thee minutes or so. I guess that was our first performance.

We didn't think about an album until 2006. We had started to play just the two of us when my other band, Bonaparte, went on hiatus. I guess we had about five songs at one point and our friends asked us to play a Valentine's Day show. So we had to write a few more. By the time we got to Spain, we had eleven or twelve songs and just decided we would record them there and see what happened. Those turned out to be demos, as maybe Dan's vision for arrangement outgrew our equipment and engineering capabilities. So then to JC/DC studios in Vancouver in the Spring.

Was there ever an idea or a concept that you guys wanted to approach musically or did the sound just come about organically? There is a weightlessness to the album, but not in a contemporary sense.

Continue reading "an interview with Hello, Blue Roses (Dan Bejar & Sydney Vermont)"

Swan Lake is the new project of Dan Bejar, Carey Mercer, and Spencer Krug. Back in June Carey told us they were finished recording an album. Well, the album is coming out on Jagjaguwar (home of Oneida, Ladyhawk, Wilderness & Okkervil River), and that's who just sent out this first much-anticipated MP3......

DOWNLOAD: All Fires (MP3)

"I don’t like Spencer." [Martin from Think About Life]

Press release (track list included) below....

Continue reading "Swan Lake (Destroyer+Frog Eyes+Wolf Parade) to release CD on Jagjaguwar | MP3"

Swan Lake is the new project of Dan Bejar (Destroyer), Carey Mercer (Frog Eyes), and Spencer Krug (Wolf Parade, Sunset Rubdown).

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Dan Bejar (Destroyer): Well, Spencer and Carey have a long history of working together-- they also both played in Destroyer when we toured Europe last year. Musically, they're pretty in tune with each other, and I think go for a lot of the same kind of sounds and arrangements. I just brought some songs to the table, played a little bit of functional guitar on them, and [did] a bit of singing on their songs in spots they guided me to. I totally trust and am a fan of their instincts, and they both have way more experience with recording than I do, so to relinquish "control" over my songs was an easy and enjoyable and necessary thing to do. The fact that I have no real idea what this record sounds like is a testament to who the alpha males are in the project, if you're gonna look at it that way. [the whole interview at Pitchfork]

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Carey Mercer ( Frog Eyes): The few people who have heard it say that it is really…weird. That it was trippier than they thought it would be. It sounds like we are pushing ourselves to have it not sound like a happy medium. Like, on some of the songs you can tell who wrote them, you know? I don't really know what to say about it, to tell you the truth, except that it was really cool to make it. A lot of fun. If people don't think they will like it then they shouldn't buy it. [the whole interview one post down]

Help me welcome interviewer Mike Chadwick to BrooklynVegan. Mike was supposed to get together with Carey Mercer of Frog Eyes at their May 20, 2006 date in Montreal, but that show never happened so they met up at the rescheduled show a week later....

CAREY MERCER, FROG EYES @ MERCURY LOUNGE, NYC (more)


Carey: Sorry about the Montreal thing.

Mike: It's not your fault. What was that about anyway?

Carey: For this tour, we were kinda jumping back and forth between the border. When we tried to get back in, we found out the visas we had that we thought were good for a year were actually only good for six days. To get another one would have cost us three thousand dollars. So, we kind of had to make a choice. It was a really tough decision to cancel the Toronto show. We rescheduled the Montreal show, though.

Mike: I saw some pictures from a last minute show you put together and there was no one there?

Carey: Cleveland? Yeah [laugh]. That was a pretty good show, too. It was fun, but I hope something like that never happens again.

Continue reading "An Interview with Carey Mercer of Frog Eyes"

DOWNLOAD: The Oscillator's Hum by Frog Eyes (MP3)

I've been privately wondering why the combination of Sunset Rubdown and Frog Eyes didn't sell out Mercury Lounge yet. I thought maybe it had to do with tickets going on sale three months before the show date, but it was still hard to believe that even a Pitchfork buzzed Wolf Parade side project on a bill with former champions wasn't enough to move an estimated 200 tickets, and that news of a collaboration between the vocalists of both bands and Destroyer didn't help either. I also thought their schedule wouldn't allow the chance for a second show to be added. I was wrong, and I guess the first show (May 24) is almost sold out because now there's a second one(May 22).

--
"...The brain child of one-time Frog Eye/current Wolf Parader Spencer Krug, Sunset Rubdown is a more lo-fi, more fragile project than what he as otherwise been used to. Whereas his participation with Frog Eyes came across as music for circus freaks, and his work with Wolf Parade was an attempt to make this circus more ‘indie friendly,’ here Krug focuses more on writing an opus for the insane. The results are both intriguing and exciting...." [Stylus]
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Updated SR/FE tour dates below....

Continue reading "Sunset Rubdown & Frog Eyes | 2nd NYC date, tickets"

Thunder Cloud taken, new name Swan Lake