FREE MUSIC: So there's quite a bit of hype building around Yeasayer, a band who've found the midpoint between Arcade Fire and Fleetwood Mac, Danielson and Midlake. It's proving far more popular than that sort of juxtaposition and unhip referencing would suggest. 2080 is the expansive single from album All Hour Cymbals.
HEY YOU GET OFFA MYSPACE: We're slightly late to the punch, as these released an album in January and have had a couple of EPs out since, but it's high time we got fuzzy again, and that's a role The Manhattan Love Suicides fulfil splendidly. The Leeds outfit, who evolved from the great lost band of 1999 Pop Threat (we still have the Fierce Panda EP they featured on), know their way around Sonic Youth and the Jesus & Mary Chain, know their way around C86 and girl groups (doesn't everyone?) and follow the pure, well, pop threat lineage of the Shop Assistants, Primitives, Heavenly, Duke Spirit and A Sunny Day In Glasgow.
VISUAL REPRESENTATION: This week Elvis Costello declared both that he's not interested in making any more albums and that, after a tetchy encounter with the 2005 Glastonbury crowd, he's not going to play live in Britain any more. On recent Costello form this can only mean he'll be announcing a full spring tour within the week, but in the meantime we can dine out on his TV debut performing Alison, Oliver's Army on Kenny Everett's show, his helping Fiona Apple cover I Want You helping Diana Krall and Willie Nelson do Crazy and the song he wrote for Dave Edmunds, Girls Talk.
VIRAL MARKETING: And so to 2008, and first out of the preview blocks are the Mystery Jets, who've just been on a belated US tour and try out their new songs on a small tour starting on the 25th ahead of release (March, whispers say). In the meantime they've made us all a lovely illustrative clip including one of the new songs, very much bearing producer Erol Alkan's fingerprints. As well as sounding a bit like GoodBooks.
FALLING OFF A BLOG: Everyone's Got Nothing To Say has, oh, the usual interesting stuff. (Not to denigrate their work in any way, but recommending blogs every week and having to write something about them too out of fairness... well, it gets a bit limiting eventually.)
EVERYBODY GET RANDOM: Here's something that's come out of nowhere, and even the obsessives we passed it on to knew nothing about it - a new Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band album! The first for 35 years, all living original members are on plus Fry, Edmondson and Jupitus adding vocals to an immense number of new tracks, although we can't say our excitement on the news hasn't been compromised by the press release including the 'promise' of "a hilarious new take on the Kaiser Chiefs' I Predict A Riot".
IN OTHER NEWS: As you may have read, Christmas is approaching, and Sufjan Stevens is overly full of the festive spirit. Not only are Asthmatic Kitty streaming all five discs' worth of his Christmas box set, but they've set up a competition for one lucky entrant to write a Xmas song to give to Sufjan. He will buy up the rights to said song... and give you the rights back to one of his new songs in return. That's all explained better on that same link.
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