The Post-Rockist holds the curious distinction of being the only Detroit and St. Louis-based music blog known to man. This isn’t something we brag about so much as it’s something that forces us to spend a lot of time awkwardly justifying our existence. We hope to avoid pandering to one audience too much at the risk of alienating the other, mostly by trying to remain true to our mission statement of writing passionately about the music we love (in other words, we pander to ourselves). But on the same token, we’re plainly cognizant that being a music fan anywhere is deeply impacted by your local surroundings, and we try to reflect that by talking about great shows that come through town, or releases by bands like Lightning Love of Detroit or the Blind Eyes of St. Louis — bands that we’d probably never hear if we lived anywhere else.

But, does it work? Do you wish we did more with local coverage? Do you find it interesting at all to read about what’s going on in another city, or could you not give two flying shits about what happens in either the 313 or 314 area codes? Do you wish I’d just shut up and start posting more podcasts by Andrew and Liz?

It’s an experiment, for sure, but it’s one that’s allowed me the opportunity to discover and write about Detroit bands like the High Strung or Champions of Breakfast when they come through St. Louis. Maybe someone else finds that useful? If you have any suggestions for how we can better cope with our bi-city-uality (or any thoughts on the site at all), please let us know in the comments.

Incidentally, this week marks the three-year anniversary of the Post-Rockist. Back when we started, we were based in Cincinnati and Washington, D.C. We’ve come a long way, babies, hope you’re enjoying the ride.

Thanks to Joe Crawford of the Beacon for the interview time and nice article.

While Scotter harbors his inexplicable blog-crush for the shrill Joanna Newsom, there’s still no band that gets me quite as hot and bothered as the inimitable Fiery Furnaces. I guess where he finds sustenance in the pomp and flutter of courtly Elizabethan balladry, my heart is tickled by winding Germanic meta-narratives filled with labrynthine plot twists and whimsical wordplay, but alas, to reduce this difference in taste to a matter of preference for poetic bloodlines is just the Deutsch in me overanalyzing things again.

So… why am I telling you this again? Right! I remember: the Fiery Furnaces are releasing a new album! Sure, they tend to release new albums like clockwork — this being their sixth new album since Gallowsbird’s Bark (the seventh if you count EP as an LP, which it basically was, the eighth if you count the double live album Remember, or the tenth, if you consider Matt’s double solo albums Winter Women and Holy Ghost Language School as part of the official discography — but who’s counting?), but that’s no reason not to get excited. Let’s cut straight to the facts:

Title: I’m Going Away
Label: Thrill Jockey
Release Date: July 1, 2009
Cover Art: See above
Tracklist:

01. “I’m Going Away”
02. “Drive To Dallas”
03. “The End Is Near”
04. “Charmaine Champagne”
05. “Cut The Cake”
06. “Even In The Rain”
07. “Staring At The Steeple”
08. “Ray Bouvier”
09. “Keep Me In Dark”
10. “Lost At Sea”
11. “Cups and Punches”
12. “Take Me Round Again”

Okay, wow, that was anticlimactic. Thankfully, the siblings Friedberger also decided to release two arcane “promo” videos that might give us a little something extra to sink our teeth into:

The Fiery Furnaces – promo video 1 from Thrill Jockey Records on Vimeo.

Jeez, Matt, take it easy on Eleanor, willya? Oh wait, I get it, you kids are just being your casual zany selves. You so did not get Boutros Boutros-Ghali to come out retirement and record your record, silly, it was Jason Loewenstein! Ha, cute. We do, however, get a very brief snippet of what track 9 “Keep Me in the Dark,” which apparently includes dueling pianos, which is always a nice thing. Also, they appear to be practicing in a personal library of sorts. Matthew is flanked by a volume of poetry by William Dunbar on the left and the philosophy of W.V. Quine on the right. Eleanor has a book by the English travel writer Eric Newby near her. What this all means I don’t quite know yet, but I’ll have to hit the stacks soon to find out. It continues:

The Fiery Furnaces – Promo video 2 from Thrill Jockey Records on Vimeo.

More dueling pianos. Is Matt doing a Dylan impression? No, I think he’s trying to sing the closing track “Take Me Round Again” but can’t remember the lyrics. There are no covers on this record, he claims, which contradicts the statement by Pitchfork that the title track is a traditional arrangement. Hmm, intrigue. I wonder if it follows the more folksy approach taken here by American blues singer Elizabeth Cotten:

Download audio file (ElizabethCotten-ImGoingAway.mp3)
Elizabeth Cotten – “I’m Going Away”
(from Shake Sugaree)

Or, maybe, since Matt is describing the album like “TV show theme songs to your life” it will capture the spirit of this Burl Ives version?

Download audio file (BurlIves-ImGoingAway.mp3)
Burl Ives – “I’m Going Away”
(from Tellin’ Stories)

The band continues to unwrap this “theme music” theme with their Thrill Jockey press release:

All rock music is a sort of dramatic music. And since the times are tough, it makes sense to have that “drama” be something more like a version of Taxi than something like a version of Titanic. We like Taxi better than Titanic anyway. So we hope that some of the songs on this record can be used as theme songs to folk’s own personal versions of Taxi. Because—ideally—the dramatic setting of the music isn’t provided by the story or image of the given act or band. It’s provided by the lives of the people who use—listen to—the music. That is pop music’s promise and problem, or danger. So be careful and don’t get canceled.

The band is very optimistic—despite or because of it all—and will continue its “Democ-Rock” efforts by releasing a fully-fledged Derocmacy in America limited edition vinyl box-set. It might be called something like Your Cashier Today was ACM CASHIER 96. Matthew and Eleanor are also working on the Fiery Furnaces “Silent Record:” a non-record record, in book form, with notation and instructions. Both will be released by Thrill Jockey records later this year.

This is shaping up to be a good year for Fiery Furnace fanatics: The audience-inspired “Democ-Rock” coming out in limited edition vinyl formats, a possible “Silent Record” that’s actually a book, and, according to the P4K news piece linked earlier but which is mysteriously absent from Thrill Jockey’s news, another record called Stories from the Old Testament by the Fiery Furnaces is also in the works. Hosanna! Huzzah!

Yikes, that’s way too much geeky excitement for one post. Now back to your regularly scheduled internet.

UPDATE: I wrote a “deaf description” of I’m Going Away over here. Czech it!

“Happiness Will Be My Revenge” was written, recorded, and mixed by Jens, and can be found on The Sweptaways Show, from Sweden’s The Sweptaways. The album consists of artists taking the vocal lead while The Sweptaways accompany with full female chorus. The album can be purchased on The Sweptaways KlickTrack page, which includes a short description of The Sweptaways as “thirty women in coordinated costumes who sing choir-arranged versions of pop tunes.”

Intriguing.

The track includes all of the classic Lekmanian elements we so dearly know and love: lovelorn confusion, the glorification of the kiss, a reluctance to get too emotional while simultaneously bursting with emotion, name-dropping himself, and a rhythm composed of several small percussion instruments. Added to the mix is a bit of Morrissey-like indignation: “And I hope that it hurts when you see me / like it hurts inside me right now, I guess / I’ve chosen not to love less.”

It’s a fantastic song, and I’m dying to listen to the B side of the 45 spinning on the turntable featured in this great still-shot video.

For a better look at The Sweptaways, check out this video for “They Don’t Know About Us” with Moneybrother.

Golly, why is so much good music coming out of Sweden these days!? John Darnielle, you should’ve given Sweden more of a benefit of the doubt when you wrote all those nasty things about it in the liner notes of your Sweden album.

I’m no economist by any means, but when I can’t even squeeze over to the used bin without artfully dodging a slow-moving herd of cash-flush consumers, I’m guessing business is doing fairly well. Record Store Day in St. Louis was, by my entirely non-scientific analysis, a resounding success. Every single record store I went to was overflowing with people, and because I apparently have nothing better to do with my time, I hit up all three independent shops this city has to offer.

First stop was Euclid Records. When I got there, Grace Basement was finishing their set and a Sly Stone documentary was being screened in the back above the vinyl. The whole store seemed to have been organized by a consumer psychologist with me in mind: a large display was set up near the entrance with Numero Group/Eccentric Soul comps (I picked up the Titan It’s All Pop! comp thanks to reader and writer recommendations); the used bin was recently stocked with a surplus of old Morrissey records (I grabbed Vauxhall and I because some guy told me so); and as I was standing in line to check out, the Fiery Furnaces’ double live album Remember jumped out at me (what can I say? Impulse buy. Besides, I was at risk of losing my superfan club membership if I didn’t purchase it eventually).

I drove up to Vintage Vinyl next. Zimbabwe Nkenya was playing outside in the rain and Papa Ray the Soul Selector was spinning a fine selection of soul and rock & roll in the interior. I found the free PBR booth with no problem, but everything else on my list came up dry (the Randy Newman section at VV is criminally understocked, and, as it turns out, not a single record store in the city of St. Louis has a single copy of The Thermals’ The Body, The Blood, The Machine — what gives?). My final destination was Apop, where the drink of choice was Stag. As is usual at Apop, some weird German shit I’ve never heard of was piping through the sound system, which, weirdly, wasn’t half bad. I stayed for a few songs from the motorik noise punk trio Bikini Acid before leaving with an old copy of Lindstrom’s It’s a Feedelity Affair.

I’ve got a few low-quality photos of Apop above and below the jump, but you should definitely scope out Annie Zaleski’s photos of Euclid and Vintage Vinyl to get a better feel of the hustle and bustle of the day.

I closed the day with tacos off Cherokee Street and the free So Many Dynamos gig at the Billiken. The Dynamos were celebrating the release of the “New Bones” 7″, the first single off their upcoming Chris Walla-produced record The Loud Wars. The new track, if you haven’t heard it yet, is undeniably great. It’s less like the spastic prog-emo stuff they’ve done in the past to engender Dismemberment Plan comparisons; instead, it’s much more measured, linear, and mechanical electro pop. A repetitive synth riff opens the track, which sounds like Gary Numan covering “Icky Thump,” but they continue to build up the tension with a series of increasingly complex cross-phasing loops that link serrated-point guitar buzz with soft focus keyboard warbles. If you haven’t been a fan before, this may change your opinion.

Download audio file (SMD-NewBones.mp3)
So Many Dynamos – “New Bones”
(from The Loud Wars)

So what did you buy this Record Store Day?

After a day of vigorous teabagging, who among us couldn’t take a breather to submit to the beck and call of shiny black vinyl and an array of rare, hot seven inches? That’s right, Record Store Day is back upon us like Woody on Soon-Yi. This Saturday, independent shops all across U.S. of A. are banking on the idea that true music fans will, for one hopeful day, pull themselves up off their collective asses and drop however much coin they can afford in order to support the endangered local record shop. Consumers are being lured with live bands, DJs, limited edition 7″s on a broad spectrum of fetishized colors, film screenings, the promise of titillating conversation with friendly store clerks and knowledgeable neighbors, and, in some instances, free booze to make said conversations bearable. Seriously, if you don’t make it out to scrummage through at least one dollar bin, you are one sad, sorry slubberdegullion.

For Detroit, our swell friends Laura Witkowski and Elle Sawa put together a nice little article on Record Store Day at Detour spotlighting Flat, Black, and Circular, Record Time, Stormy Records, and Underground Sounds, so (phew!) part of our work is already done for us. Particularly awesome is the fact that Flat, Black, and Circular will have Ra Ra Riot in store.

If you’re in old Saint Lou, there’s also plenty to do. You could follow these links to get an idea of who’s doing what, but you really can’t go wrong no matter where you go. Vintage Vinyl’s giving away free PBR and making all purchases tax exempt; Euclid is serving up BBQ from Highway 61 Roadhouse and screening Wilco’s Ashes of American Flags at night; while Apop is promoting “special deals” on turntables, so you have the necessary equipment to play all the limited edition vinyl you buy throughout the day. Plus, there are free performances galore. I cobbled together a schedule as best I could from each store’s respective website (after the ‘jump’):

Apop Records:

2:00 PM Medical Tourists
3:00 PM Bikini Acid
4:00 PM Maximum Effort
5:00 PM Lonely Procession
6:00 PM Uranium Heist
7:00 PM Pink Sock

Euclid Records:

11:00 AM Farshid Etniko
12:00 PM Bob Reuter’s Alley Ghost
1:00 PM Trip Daddys
2:00 PM Grace Basement
3:00 PM Bent
4:00 PM Troubadour Dali
5:00 PM Jason Ringenberg
6:00 PM The Bottle Rockets

Vintage Vinyl:*

1:00 PM Bob Reuter’s Alley Ghost
2:00 PM May Day Orchestra & Robert Sarazin Blake
3:00 PM Zimbabwe Nkenya
4:00 PM DJs Needles, Alejan, Legend & more
*In addition to the bands playing outdoors, assorted “celebrity” DJs will be spinning inside all day for your browsing pleasure.

Apparently, Bob Reuter is in high demand this weekend, being booked at Euclid at noon and Vintage Vinyl at 1:00. Either he’s playing the shortest set imaginable at Euclid in the morning, or he’s a much more reckless driver than I am. Or, like last year, everything’s going to run a little bit behind schedule.

And finally, after all that shopping leaves you feeling broke and guilty, you might as well pull yourself together and head out to the Billiken Club later that night for the release party of So Many Dynamo’s new 7″, “New Bones,” which you can stream now on their MySpace page. And, because it’s the Billiken, admission is free.

Be sure to check the Record Store Day official website to see other participating stores in your area.

And for a little extra glimpse into why vinyl is still around and going strong in this poor economy (compared to other manufactured wares, at least), czech out this little article on the Re-Arrival of Vinyl by some guy.

Most if not all of my music-loving pals can’t stand Joanna Newsom. Seriously, I can’t even mention the name to some of them without getting a reaction of either immediate chagrin or nausea. I just don’t understand. I mean, I can see exactly why I’m such a huge fan: the wordiness of her lyrics, I love weird voices, she plays an unusual and demanding instrument (the harp, in case you didn’t know). But I think her songs are all generally spectacular on any level, so it’s weird to have to defend her more vigorously and with more exhaustion than even the many Bob Dylan arguments I’ve allowed myself to fall into over the years.

So I’ve given up trying to convince others. I enjoy her music way too much to care.

So it’s with near panicking excitement to find out that a new Joanna Newsom album is on the make.

Apparently Joanna played a very secretive show consisting of mainly new material in somewhere called Big Sur in California, as reported by Naturalismo (who write a very good blog, btw). No word yet as to when an album will be released, but this is a very good sign that I’ll soon be eliciting groans and rolled eyes from my distinguished collection of friends when I freak out about how good this album will surely be.

Still with me, people? Then you get to watch this. As reported by Pitchfork, turns out that Joanna Newsom has sold 14 seconds of “Sprout and the Bean” to Victoria’s Secret.

When we started this blog nearly 3 years ago, I never would’ve thought that we’d post a Victoria’s Secret commercial.

Which means we finally made it!

More Joanna news(om) t/k.

Sprout and the Bean from The Milk-Eyed Mender
Download audio file (Sprout.mp3)

More Joanna Newsom:
A new article in Paper Magazine (ironically, available online) titled “The Woodnymph, The Harp, and the Wardrobe”

I haven’t read it yet, but I’m assuming it’s great.

Okay, uhm, that’s all the lead-in I have prepared. I basically just wanted an excuse to post that video. Tour dates are after the jump, courtesy the bv:

Flight of the Conchords – 2009 Tour Dates
4/06 – Tampa, FL – Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center #
4/07 – Coral Gables, FL – University of Miami BankUnited Center *#
4/08 – Orlando, FL – UCF Arena *#
4/10 – Nashville, TN – Ryman Auditorium *#
4/11 – Atlanta, GA – Fox Theatre *#
4/13 – Washington, D.C. – Constitution Hall *#
4/14 – New York, NY – Radio City Music Hall *#
4/17 – Boston, MA – Agganis Arena *#
4/18 – Philadelphia, PA – Tower Theatre (2 shows) #
4/19 – Kent, OH – Kent State University *#
4/21 – Toronto, ON – Massey Hall *^
4/22 – Toronto, ON – Massey Hall *^
4/24 – Detroit, MI – Fox Theatre *^
4/25 – Bloomington, IN – IU Auditorium *^
4/26 – Madison, WI – Overture Center for the Arts ^
4/28 – Chicago, IL – Aerie Crown *^
4/30 – St. Louis, MO – Fox Theatre ^
5/02 – Milwaukee, WI – Riverside Theatre (2 shows) ^
5/03 – Minneapolis, MN – Northrop Auditorium ^
5/05 – Dallas, TX – Nokia Theatre *^
5/06 – Houston, TX – Jones Hall *^
5/07 – Austin, TX – Bass Concert Hall ^
5/10 – Vancouver, BC – Center in Vancouver for the Performing Arts *%
5/11 – Seattle, WA – Paramount Theatre %
5/12 – Seattle, WA – Paramount Theatre %
5/14 – Portland, OR – Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall *%
5/16 – Denver, CO – Red Rocks Amphitheatre *%%
5/17 – Salt Lake City, UT – Abravanel, Hall %
5/19 – Phoenix, AZ – Dodge Theatre %
5/20 – San Diego, CA – RIMAC Arena *%
5/22 – Santa Barbara, CA – County Bowl *%
5/23 – Las Vegas, NV – The Joint *%
5/24 – Los Angeles, CA – Greek Theatre *%
5/25 – Berkeley, CA – Berkeley Community Theatre (2 shows) *%

# = w/ Kristen Schaal
^ = w/ Eugene Mirman
% = w/ Arj Barker
%% = w/ Iron & Wine AND Arj Barker

Well, I used to go to Desirable Discs in Dearborn, Michigan. Telegraph Road location. The year was 2002, and there was a guy there with thick-rimmed glasses years before they became standard to the hipster sartorial repertoire. With him, I could always count on two things: 5 o’clock shadow, and good music suggestions. At that time, I had collected every Belle & Sebastian album then in existence, played out Grandaddy’s Sumday, and replaced my lost copy of STP’s Tiny Music… (still one of my faves), and was looking for something new. I walked around, picking through the used stacks, walked around some more–spent a good 45 minutes in there, and finally realized that nothing was tempting me to part with the $15 in my wallet, and that perhaps I should pay a bill or buy some food or something instead.

I walked to the door and motioned to my clerk with that meek, nearly shameful “thanks, but no thanks” gesture you give to clerks when you’ve spent over 45 minutes in their shop without buying a damn thing. He nodded back with that cool, record store clerk head nod, which signals wordlessly “Hey dude, it’s cool. This is freakin’ record store. Come back soon, buddy.” But just as I was opening the door, the oracle spoke, “Hey man, you bought Grandaddy last month, I think this kid’s better.”

He handed me Sha Sha.

“Plus, it comes with this toothbrush.”

Indeed it did. ATO Records sent a batch of red toothbrushes, similar to the one Ben uses on the album cover, as a little promotional tool for the album (I actually had that toothbrush in my toiletries bag for about five years before I was forced to use it when I realized at 2am one late evening that I had left my toothbrush in Grand Rapids after returning back from a trip earlier that day.).

So I walked out of the store with a purchase, popped the disc immediately into my player, and before the end of the first song (sha-doo!), I was hooked. I bought or burned a copy for everyone I knew at the time. Some friends received the album as a gift on multiple occasions. To this day, I still have 4-5 burned copied of the disc resting on DVR spools. I must have sung along to all of those songs 100,000 million times in my car. It was one of the few times that I could say with honesty “that CD hasn’t left my player in 3 months.” Seriously, it didn’t.

Every…single…song…is so damn good. I spent the entire drive from Detroit to Toledo singing along–just like the old days. I was neither wasted, nor ready, but I sure as hell sang “I am wasted but I’m ready!” at the top of my lungs. I thought about my brother when singing along to “Family Tree.” I thought about an existentialism class I took in college when singing “Nothing isn’t nothing, nothing’s something that’s important to me.” I thought about my younger, rabble-rousing years and parties at The Beech House when singing along to “Commerce, TX.” I thought about ex-girlfriends when singing “Made It Up,” “In Other Words,” “Walk On Me” (I’ve been in all of the situations narrated in these songs). I thought about the future when singing along to “Falling.”

But at the same time, I wasn’t thinking. I was just enjoying. And when I arrived in Toledo, I was kind of hoarse. I had just put on not one, but two concerts in my car, and without an intermission or a drink of water. And it felt like the songs were all written by me. And it felt like I put on one hell of a performance.

Will the new album be better than Sha Sha? I don’t know. Sometimes, a great album comes into your life at a time when you’re so ready for it, and you absorb it like food or sun, and it becomes part of you. And just like a good meal or a sunny day, you can enjoy it over and over again and it doesn’t get old. For me, Sha Sha was one of those albums, and I just can’t see myself ever growing out of it.

“Make It Up” from Sha Sha (buy)

P.S. Thanks a million, Desirable Discs records store clerk guy, whose name I’ve forgotten, for this and all the other suggestions. I hope you’re doing well.

Hoo-whee! Willya look at that? The 2008 Village Voice Pazz & Jop results are in! This is particularly exciting news for those of you out there thinking, “You know, reading hundreds of incredibly subjective yet predictably similar ‘Best Of’ lists throughout the entire month of December never grew the least bit tedious, but what I’m really looking for is a pseudo-scientific aggregate of hundreds of critic picks compiled with a vague point system that will settle the matter of the best music of 2008 once and for all.” Well, sir or madam, today is your lucky day! And, if you look closely among the 579 individual ballots cast, you’ll find my ballot buried in the mix. Hot shit on a stick, isn’t that somethin’? Looks like my #8 pick came in at #1 for overall albums, while my personal #1 only clocked in at a measly #66. Meanwhile, I was the only person to cast a vote for Pas/Cal’s “O Honey We’re Ridiculous” on a singles list dominated by a song that came out in 2007. Oh well, I tried.

There are also a few good essays dissecting the year that was at that link. Certainly worth your reading time if you’ve got nothing else doing at work today.

So I guess this means we can officially begin working on our “Best of 2009″ lists, right?

James Brown - “Funky President (People It’s Bad)”
(from Make It Funky – The Big Payback: 1971-1975)

Happy Inauguration Day, people.