Sup, tardlings?

Hey, sorry I haven't posted in a while, everybody. I'm sure that not hearing about my awesome, fast-paced lifestyle was tearing you apart inside and all, but hey. I walk my own road, fuckfaces. And that road is called "Destiny."

So what's been going on... just finished my first week as Vue's Managing Editor; turns out it's a fuck of a lot more difficult and thankless than I had hoped, and it's making me yearn for the days when I was merely a news editor, working three days a week and having all the time in the world. But now I get paid more, and as much as I think this job is going to make me go crazy, I've got debt to pay down and shit to save up for. So hey, whaddaya going to do? Well, I've been thinking about that a lot lately: what am I going to do when Vue finally succeeds to driving my nuts? Or what's Vue going to do, even? So I think about that for a while, then I shrug my shoulders and go back to sitting around like a goon waiting for whichever asshole deliquent Vue contributor has decided they feel like getting their story in two days late. You know, because all they want is our money, and they could care less whether or not they're totally fucking up our schedule.

But I'm not getting into that. On the bright side of things, I'll have a few stories in other publications come August; I wrote a Tower of London travel piece for Dave's horror mag, Rue Morgue, so you should all check that shit out--I'm really proud of it, actually. And I'll also have a couple of prominently featured reviews in the August issue of Exclaim!--one of The Fever show that was at New City back at the end of June, and one of the new Whitey Houston record that also includes a little three-part Q&A with Lyle. So yeah, pretty hot--and they seem to be liking my stuff so far, as James the Editor-in-Chief just asked me to become a more regular music reviewer for them. They don't pay for straight-up CD reviews, sadly, but it's a good foot in the door, I'm thinking. And I should be doing a few more gig reviews in September as well. Yay! I'm movin' on up, in a very lateral sort of way!

Also cool, I think I've figured out how to post some tunes on this thing; I have to route things through Yahoo Briefcase for hosting purposes, but it looks like I can link songs straight from here, which is neat. I'm going to try and post some music more regularly, as I keep spewing about bands to people without ever trying to give anyone any evidence to support my claims. So if you guys could let me know if this system is letting you access these songs (and if there's a better way, I'm all ears), that'd be great. Also, it'd be cool to hear what you folks think of each of these tracks.

So here we go! First up we've got "Won't Make It Easier" by the Ladies and Gentlemen, the lead track off his debut disc, Small Sins, which'll be out next month. I've been jizzing all over the place to anyone who will listen about this group (actually, the whole album was recorded by one guy, Toronto-based artist Thomas D'Arcy, although they're now a full-fledged band). Hopefully this track--with its soft, cantering pace, bloopy keyboards and D'Arcy's breathy, emotional vocals--explains why. D'Arcy told me in a interview I did with him that he set out to make an album you could dance to or fall asleep to. I think he nailed it.

Next up is another lead track by another totally hot Canadian group, this one called "You Are a Runner and I Am My Father's Son" by Montreal's Wolf Parade. This is off Apologies to the Queen Mary, which is due out in late September) and was produced by Modest Mouse's Isaac Brock--which you could have probably guessed on your own after hearing it. I haven't heard a lot from this band before, but this track's blend of Run Chico Run twitchiness, Modest Mouse cadence and David Bowie-esque otherworldly vocal delivery is totally haunting me. Check it.

Finally, just to prove I'm not a total musical homo, here's a fucking awesome rock 'n' roll track from a British group names Dead Fly Buchowski, called "Russian Doll." It was funny--when this disc came into the office, everyone was listening to it, but thanks to its clear Soundgarden influence and unabashed straight-ahead rockiness, none of us wanted to own up to the fact that we liked it. We've since given up the pretense, however, and the album, called Land of the Rough (no release in North America yet, but a "Russian Doll" single was released in Canada this past April), now stands as incontrovertible proof that if the Smalls had started doing what they did ten years later, they would have been as famous as they deserved to be.

Anyhow, let me know what you think, and I'll throw up some more stuff in a day or two.