In case you haven’t noticed, this hot mess of html has been on hiatus for the summer. And how is this particular break different from my earlier, sometimes longer, yet unofficial hiatuses, you may ask? It’s not. I mean, sure, there are some new variables — spotty Internet connection, vacations, a Twin Peaks bender, etc., but you don’t want to hear about any of that, right? And I trust you all have been dealing with this break just fine and are enjoying the summer as I have, at fun outdoor concerts and swimming holes, rolling around in poison oak, and the like.

You Don’t Even Need to Take Your Paper Out
I heard about this thing called Spotify a couple days ago. It’s a European music service that’s planning to crawl up on our shore early next year (right now, it restricts access if you have a U.S. IP address). Maybe you’re familiar. According to this other guy’s blog, users can stream any of the service’s 6 million songs for free and even organize them into playlists, but they have to listen to an ad every half hour or so.

Six million sounds like a lot, but iTunes has 10 million, and in my experience, only has what I search for about 60 percent of the time. And eMusic, “iTune’s cheaper, cooler cousin” (according to a Rolling Stone quote on its site), has more than 6 million songs (not sure how many more), but only about 30 percent of what I want. I canceled my eMusic subscription after just a few months because I was clogging my hard drive with a bunch of stuff I only sort of wanted. Granted, when I buy music over the Internet, I’m typically looking for things I can’t easily find at record store, or random Neil Young songs that pop into my head that I decide I need that minute. Maybe my taste isn’t “cool.” And maybe I’m asking a lot, but it’s the Internet. The Internet is supposed to have everything I want. Instantly. However, if you’re looking for the new Wavves record and don’t like stealing, eMusic rules.

Spotify sounds different, more like Hulu, which also has a limited selection and ads, but is free. There are concerns — that people like owning things rather than streaming them and that the business model won’t be able to sustain the costs of royalties. I have other concerns, but I’m pretty sure they’re boring.

ee Music
Lately, I’ve been riding a rad wavve of Judee Sill and Julee Cruise music. There’s a Sill tribute coming out September 22 called Crayon Angel: A Tribute to the Music of Judee Sill. Frida Hyvonen takes on one of my favorites — “Jesus was a Cross Maker” (hear it at Stereogum). Daniel Rossen (Grizzly Bear, Department of Eagles) did “Waterfall” (it’s over at Pitchfork). Judee Sill put out two records (Judee Sill and Heart Food) of rapture/redemption-rich Laurel Canyon-style material in the early 1970s before dying of a drug overdose in ‘79. An additional album, composed of demos and rarities, came out in 2005 on a double-disc called Dreams Come True.

Here she is singing “The Lamb Ran Away with the Crown.”

According to a few only slightly questionable online sources, Julee Cruise (who plays a large role in the eerie hum of Twin Peaks) is working on a new album coming out this year. I think her last one came out about seven years ago. This is exciting news! Also, she’s married to the editor of Guideposts. Just throwing that out there. Fun fact! 

You’re going to love this:

Wait — when was the Grammy Awards process “representative of the current musical landscape”?

Polka Music is Eliminated as Grammy Award Category

This is too perfect.

It’s funny! And sad! And true!

“Snarky Farewell From Seattle PI Staffer“

About a month ago, I toiled for days over a piece I was going to post here about all the reasons why artists should move to Detroit. I decided to sit on it for awhile, mainly because I thought it might be better received if it were written by an artist … who lived in Detroit. Well. That happened. (As a side note, I’m starting a movement to ban the phrase “Recently, at a dinner party” from the NYT’s op-ed section.)

Maybe I’ll revisit that story tonight, since I don’t have any dinner party plans. … And maybe I should rename this blog “Empty Promises.”

I thought it sounded good when I was copy editing this review last weekend. But check out the trailer! And by that I mean check out the music in the trailer!

Lots more to come — soonish, promise — including my top 10 of 2008 and video clips of old episodes of The New Dance Show.

But for right now, I just have some sad news to share.

I love this new distribution strategy that pairs music in the vinyl format with a digital download coupon. Bon Iver is doing it for his new EP, Blood Bank, which is scheduled for a January 20 release.

Compact discs are clunky and ugly, and offer a subpar listening experience compared to records. And now I can buy my records and listen to my music on the subway, too. Yay! Everyone wins! Except for CD manufacturers and Chuck “I do not own a record player” Klosterman.

So the music industry is adapting. And journalism is redefining itself as a purveyor of information, rather than a newspaper hawker. When are the car companies going to adapt and start investing in public transit and energy-efficient travel? And are there ways in which we can enjoy our daily “coffee and a newspaper” and long, winding, solo road trips in a manner that’s efficient and less wasteful?

When I first heard Bon Iver’s For Emma, Forever Ago … one of my immediate thoughts was that I wished I still had a car. The record is akin to scraping your windshield and gunning it out of a snow bank. It’s like wiping those little visibility circles on your steamed-up windows so you can just get going on your way, blind spot be damned. I hear the new EP is still wintry, but it’s more of a celebration of those rare glimpses of sunshine that you sometimes get toward the end of January.

Justin Vernon (Bon Iver) played two of the new songs — “Blood Bank” and “Babys” — at Bowery Ballroom this past summer. And if they’re any indication of what the album will be like, it sounds like Blood Bank might be a lot more keyboardy and a little more rocking, possibly like Damien Jurado’s raucous I Break Chairs follow-up to the hushed contemplation of his Ghost of David.

By the way, Village Voice’s Sound of the City blog did a good job documenting what the Bowery show was like.

Here’s the upcoming EP’s track listing:
1. Blood Bank
2. Beach Baby
3. Babys
4. Woods

And here’s what it’s going to look like:

A couple people caught the new songs on video.

Here’s “Blood Bank”:

And here’s “Babys”:

Bon Iver is playing three sold-out (nuts!) shows in New York next month: December 10 and 11 at Town Hall and December 12 at Music Hall of Williamsburg.

At the risk of throwing away tens of thousands of dollars spent on my journalism education, which taught me how to be an objective observer of my surroundings, I have to say: I AM SO ABSURDLY EXCITED ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED LAST TUESDAY!!!!!

I smiled so hard that night I think I might have permanently contorted my face.

But as always, good news comes tempered with bad, and as the glow subsides, we’re reminded that things are still really, really messed up. Maybe I truly am fair and balanced. And maybe my expensive journalism degree was kind of hanging in the balance anyway.

Or maybe it’s just that some friends of friends have died recently, and times are hard, and all I feel like doing anymore is giving everyone I love — and everyone I don’t love and everyone walking by on the street — a sloppy-laughing-crying-contorted-face hug that expresses all the joy and sorrow and anxiety that consumes us at this hyper-atypical moment in time. This is the closest thing I can find digitally. Karen Dalton singing “It Hurts Me Too” to a car graveyard:

Nathaniel Mayer, RIP

And this is old news at this point, but I’m psyched that the Gories are reuniting for a couple shows next summer. Apologies for this roller-coaster of a post. But holy crap. The Gories!!!

The Muslims are exceeding my expectations at the moment.

They’re playing tonight at 8 p.m. at Bowery Ballroom. Thanks Matt B. for the hot tips. That’s two for two!