Take note music promoters: I like mail. It’s 2006, folks, and we don’t need a stamp to reach out and touch someone (although in some cases a phone line is necessary). Whether it’s in my inbox or the mailbox by the front door, I love hearing new music, especially on Tuesdays. Can Joann made me happy today with some new tracks in my inbox. They’re from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and are releasing their debut full length, Hurt People Hurt People. They’ll be playing at the Durham Music Festival alongside The Mountain Goats, The Rosebuds, and Portastatic, and are well worth checking out if you’re in the area. Bluesy-garage rock? Emo-pop? Who cares; I’m tired of trying to pigeon-hole all this music. If I thought it was crap, I wouldn’t post about it. I’m especially fond of [MP3] “Lady Luck” from their Aiden Grace EP (2004).

From Hurt People Hurt People (2006):

[MP3] Can Joann “Indecision’s way”

[MP3] Can Joann “After the Seizure is Gone”

Can Joann: A little blue in the face.

[Can Joann's official site & Myspace]
[Find more mp3s at the Hype Machine!]

If you checked out the sidebar in the last few days, you’d know that I’ve joined forces with a few other excellent bloggers in an new experiment: Our Last Quarterstance: The Blog Tribunal.

Please check out the blogs of my fellow contributors by clicking the links in the sidebar. Special thanks goes out to mastermind Matt of Still Kisses With Saliva for being the brains behind this operation.

[MP3] Pavement “Here” (from Slanted & Enchanted, 1992)

[Get artist's album title here]
[Find more mp3s at the Hype Machine!]

Justin Rice of Bishop Allen is featured in a new movie by Andrew Bujalski called Mutual Appreciation. The story of the film center’s around Rice’s character, a musician who arrives in New York City without a band. He’s looking for a drummer to play a gig he’s already booked, and with the help of a radio DJ and a couple of old friends, he tries to make his way the only way he knows how. Based on the movie trailer alone, this is going to be one whip-smart, black-and=white comedy featuring some very colourful characters, brilliant writing and a superb attention to the subtleties of relationships. The official site has some great information, including future screenings of the movie. Worth checking out.

[MP3] Bishop Allen “Quarter To Three” (from Charm School, 2003)

The first time I ever saw Sloan perform was in 1992, a few weeks before Smeared, their debut full length album was released. I was a student at the University Of Waterloo at the time, and the band was playing on a weeknight at The Bombshelter, the very cramped and very intimate campus pub beloved of Waterloo Warriors the world over. I went with my friend Michael, the only other person in my dorm who was even remotely curious about all the hubbabaloo these Haligonians were generating. I don’t think there were two more clean cut, straight-laced guys in the place that night then me and Michael: this was the height of Grunge, remember. To say we stood out like sore thumbs would be an understatement. To add to our conspicuousness, we were sitting quietly at our table with a couple drinks, enjoying the show while the rest of the bar was up and dancing and grooving. So it really shouldn’t have come as a surprise that a young woman who had quite obviously been overcome by the music (and the drink) started shouting at Michael and I: “What’s wrong with you guys? Don’t you like it? Why don’t you get up and dance??!! Come on, dance!!” When we told her we were happy sitting and listening, she responded with a shrug and said, “Fuck, man, you gotta dance.”

Now, fourteen years later, I wonder what ever happened to that girl from the bar. I never saw her on campus again; for all I know she wasn’t even a student at the school. I wonder if she’s stuck with Sloan all these years, through that first feedback laced album to the melodic pop and rockstar posing that came with One Chord To Another and Action Pact respectively. I wonder what she’s making of Never Hear The End Of It, the band’s new 30 song epic. But most of all, I wonder what she would make of the herky-jerky dance I privately do around the house when I play “Who Taught You To Live Like That?” from said album. Would she dance like that with me now? Does she hear the subtle reprise of Navy Blue’s “Chester The Molester” mid-way through “Fading Into Obscurity” like I do, and does it make her feel warm and fuzzy, like she’s cuddling with an old friend? Does she ever think of me like I think of Sloan? Bombshelter grunge girl, where are you now?

[MP3] Sloan “Who Taught You To Live Like That?” (from Never Hear The End Of It, 2006)

[MP3] Sloan “Fading Into Obscurity” (from Never Hear The End Of It, 2006)

[BONUS:MP3] Sloan “Chester The Molester” (from Navy Blues, 1998)

[Sloan's official site]
[Find more mp3s at the Hype Machine!]

Do you remember the first record you ever bought? Not some cheesy compilation record you bought because it had your favourite song at the time on it, but the first honest-and-truly record by a band . Do you remember how it felt when you listened to it for the first time? When you heard all the tracks in succession, the singles you knew and the album tracks that were fresh to your ears, and you suddenly looked at the artist in a whole new light, in a way that you never got from the songs on the radio alone–remember that?

One listen to Today Is Tonight, the debut album from Chicago’s The Changes, and you’ll remember that feeling, that rush. The Changes have crafted a song cycle best described as a journey through a day in the life of happiness and sadness, love and longing, misery and miracles, epiphanies and epitaphs. Opening track “When I Wake” bounces you up out of bed and into the melodic and intoxicating of this quartet’s polished and dynamic sound. 12 tracks later, as “When I Sleep” closes out the day’s journey, you’ve experienced a band whose not tied to a style or sound, but rather allow each track to grow and develop in the way it needs to.

The band themselves say that their sound is the result of all members working “like scientists” where “everyone’s idea counts” when it comes to interpreting Dave Rothblatt’s songwriting (he also plays guitar and sings). The results of our intrepid scientists’ experiments are like beakers and test tubes frothing over with jangly guitars driving home sing-along melodies, propelled by keyboards (contributed by all members) that bounce, skip and soar. The Changes are pure classic pop, yet each track reveals a little something else about their personalities and influences. You hear the Morrissey and Marr influences almost instantly, but around the next corner is some white-bred reggae that could come from either the Clash or The Police. You’ll be convinced you’re back in the 80s at the height of alternative New Wave pop.

They are not the new wave of New Wave, though–The Changes are the real deal. They sound as if they are a part of the genre that inspired and influenced today’s New Wave artists, rather than one of the current crop of New Wave pretenders. As the only unsigned act asked to play at Lollapalooza ‘05, they’ve had to deal with the pressures of expectation, and have delivered an album worthy of the accolades being given them. It will be the first of many Changes albums you will buy, because Today Is Tonight is, quite simply, exceptional.

The Changes are: Darren Spitzer, Dave Rothblatt, Rob Kallick and Jonny Basofin.

[MP3] The Changes “When I Wake” (from Today Is Tonight, 2006)

[MP3] The Changes “On A String” (from Today Is Tonight, 2006)

[MP3] The Changes “In The Dark” (from Today Is Tonight, 2006)

[Pre-order The Changes' Today Is Tonight here]
[Find more mp3s at the Hype Machine!]