The New Pornographers

Found another Canadian pop band worth checking out (brings the total up to three, I think). Anyway, I read about these guys a while back in Rolling Stone, and meant to check them out, but I could never remember to. Enter Steve Jones on Indie 103.1. "The Sire of Wilshire" spun a song by them on his show the other day (it's so great to be able to say that a DJ turned me onto this-just like radio used to be!), and it was catchy as a cold in December. Their sound is inspired by equal parts Beatles, T Rex, David Bowie, and Todd Rundgren. At the same time, it is forged with the same sensibilities that make the power pop bands of the last 15 years so wonderful (in their case, bits reminiscient of The Posies and fellow Canadians Sloan going on here). Dig 'em today!

IPO Update

The lineup for the Los Angeles edition of the International Pop Overthrow has been announced. Unfortunately, there is no big name act this year that stood out like Owsley did last year. The biggest name was Orange County's own Scarlet Crush, who had a song put in decent rotation on the old 95.9 FM a few years ago before the station went Spanish. But I know a few of us have already seen them (they opened for Sloan at the Coach House four years ago), and they play on a Wednesday night. So I'll pass. The "controversial" Maple Mars plays on the first Friday of the fesitval (so you know where Dan's going to be), and that's about it. (There is a group called Giant that plays the final Friday, but I'm thinking it's a safe bet to say it's not the same Giant that we all know from the 80's and 90's). I'm not even sure what band Robbie Rist is going to be in this year. Of course, I'll still keep my eyes open for any last minute additions, but it doesn't look too good, with the gigs starting a month ago.

However, Manowar clones Hammerfall is playing in L.A. on August 30th. Who wants to go? :)

Sloan Greatest Hits Package & DVD

I'm not a big fan of greatest hits compilations. My long-standing theory about those kinds of albums is that if you like each song on that album, there's an excellent chance that you'd enjoy the songs in their proper context, plus you'd probably discover a song or two that you'd like even more.

That said, I gotta endorse this new greatest hits package by Canadian power-pop band Sloan, called "A Sides Win: Singles 1992-2005." Sure, there's a new track on it-no big deal in this day and age of downloadable music. However, the accompanying DVD is what draws me to this compilation. The DVD has a documentary of the history of the band, plus their music videos on it. So I'll probably be getting it.

For those of you who aren't all that familiar with Sloan, and yet enjoy the power pop, you should check into getting this album for yourself. These guys are moderately successful in their native country, but they just have not been able to scratch the mainstream surface stateside (although they just played at Coachella this year and toured with Jet last summer, so they are not as obscure as they used to be). To me, it's a big ol' mystery. For the last decade, these guys have been putting out some great Beatlesque pop infused with some good ol' butt kicking rock 'n roll (Plus they are tremendous fun live). There's no reason that they shouldn't have had at least one of their tunes trickle down to the radio. But that hasn't happened, and now you have an opportunity to listen to what the wizards at Clear Channel don't want you to hear. Although there are a couple of killer songs left off the compilation (probably because they weren't singles), there's plenty of great songs on there that will give you an idea of how cool this band really is.