I wasn’t planning to blog today, since I expected Steve’s third report from Coachella to turn up here. But thanks to his fairly quixotic posting strategy, he appears to have turned up on Allan’s blog. He’s right, of course: I do like Grizzly Bear.
Anyway, a couple of things to point out today. First, LCD Soundsystem are releasing “All My Friends” as their next single, one of the best tracks from “Sound Of Silver”. Can I draw your attention to the b-sides? One is a version of the song by Franz Ferdinand, which plays up the ’80s, pre-disco New Order vibes of the original. It’s pretty impressive, and is playing at LCD’s Myspace.
Another version is on the DFA Myspace and is, marvellously enough, by John Cale. This one uncovers the classic New York DNA in the song, rescoring it with wiry guitars and the usual stentorian grandeur of his voice. Very fine.
As – and I would say this, of course – is the new Uncut CD. We’ve tried this month to bring a bit of a fresh perspective to what Americana means – ie not just a bunch of tumbleweed troubadours. Allan and I were talking about all this, and we figured that Americana wasn’t just a synonym for alt-country. We thought it could be expanded to take in artists like Lavender Diamond, Oakley Hall, PG Six, Richard Swift and Lightning Dust – a lot of people I’ve been writing about here, fairly naturally. Let me know what you think: it’s the issue with the Paul McCartney exclusive interview on the cover.
Oh, and one last thing. A couple of you have asked me to write about the new albums by Travis and The National but, to be honest, I’ve never liked either band, and I try to keep stuff as positive as possible here. There are too many records that excite me to waste my time and yours on ones that don’t, basically. I’ll keep my bitching for the pub.