2008 First Tier
Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds ~ Dig!!! Lazarus, Dig!!!
The Raconteurs ~ Consolers of the Lonely (SS)
King Khan and the Shrines ~ The Supreme Genius of… (SS)
Black Francis ~ Svn Fngrs (SS)
Erykah Badu ~ New Amerykah Part One
The Black Keys ~ Attack & Release (SS)
Howlin’ Rain ~ Magnificent Fiend
Fleet Foxes ~ Fleet Foxes (SS)
Al Green ~ Lay It Down (SS)
Trampled Under Foot ~ May I Be Excused (SS)

2008 Second Tier
Dr. Dog ~ Fate
The Heavy ~ Great Vengence and Furious Fire (SS)
TV on the Radio ~ Dear Science (SS)
Devotchka ~ A Mad and Faithful Telling (SS) (SS)
Bob Mould ~ District Line (SS)
Toadies ~ No Deliverance (SS)
The Breeders ~ Mountain Battles (SS)
Bodies of Water ~ A Certain Feeling
Wolf Parade ~ At Mount Zoomer (SS)
Okkervil River ~ The Stand Ins (SS)

2008 Third Tier
Bon Iver ~ For Emma, Forever Ago (SS)
My Morning Jacket ~ Evil Urges
Grand Ole Party ~ Humanimals (SS)
Tobacco ~ Singles
R.E.M. ~ Accelerate (SS)
No Age ~ Eraser (SS)
Dirt Bombs ~ We Have You Surrounded
The Dodos ~ Visitor
Mates of State ~ Re-Arrange Us
Beck ~ Modern Guilt (SS)
Kings of Leon ~ Only by the Night (SS)
Shearwater ~ Rook
The Hold Steady ~ Stay Positive
The Whigs ~ Mission Control

Bands overlooked by Stella Splice in late 2007
Yeasayer – All Hour Cymbals
Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings – 100 Days, 100 Nights
[See Stella Splice's Best-of-2007 list here.]

August 23 ~ San Francisco ~ Fillmore
August 26 ~ Seattle, WA – WaMu Theater *
August 27 ~ Vancouver, BC – General Motors Place *
August 29 ~ Edmonton, AB – Rexall Place *
August 30 ~ Calgary, AB – Pengrowth Saddledome *
September 1 ~ Winnipeg, MB – MTS Center *
September 4 ~ Ottawa, ON – Scotiabank Palace *
September 5 ~ Montreal, QC – Bell Centre *
September 7 ~ Boston, MA – Bank of America Pavilion
September 9 ~ London, ONT – John LaBatt Center *
September 25 ~ Schenectady, NY – Proctor’s Theater
September 26 ~ Syracuse, NY – Landmark Theater
September 27 ~ Rochester, NY – Auditorium Theater
September 29 ~ Columbus, OH – Palace Theater
September 30 ~ Cleveland, OH – Palace Theater
October 2 ~ Indianapolis, IN – Murat Theatre
October 3 ~ St. Louis, MO – Fox Theater
October 5 ~ Madison, WI – Overture Hall

Think of the Kings of Leon sound, only maybe if they were making a theme song for Escape from LA and maybe if it were produced by Trent Reznor. Or something. On pills and booze.

If you don’t have the brothers’ (+ one cousin) older albums, gear up by buying them here. Because of the Times is very different from their even earlier stuff, so buy that disc and one older to cover your bases. Sounds like this new one will be a shocker even compared to that broad range.

Jack wrote the song and will also play drums; see here for his other appearances on soundtracks. The soundtrack will be out October 28th, featuring the duet plus the score by David Arnold.

In the trailer, double-oh-Craig appears to be exploring the darker, more troubled, and more vengeful Bond as featured in the Ian Flemming novels. I hope the complexities of the character in this era of the movie franchise are compelling enough to trump the glossy characature of previous years/actors.

This album, The Supreme Genius Of King Khan & The Shrines, is certainly going to be on my year-end best-of list. Go! Be sure to listen to a couple, because their sound varies, but def wait around for Torture and Took My Lady Out to Dinner.

Download these songs: the sweet little ditty Welfare Bread, Burnin Inside, and I Wanna Be A Girl.

I remember my local record store clerk telling me she was way into the The King Khan & BBQ Show disc, but I stupidly ignored her. Boy am I sorry now. Also, it makes me want to check out these dudes’ former band The Spaceshits.

Blind Pilot

Russian Circles

Elephone

Girls in a Coma

The Celebrated Workingman

The Still City

Candle Music

I bought it because I downloaded the song Sun Lips, which quickly became a staple for all sorts of mixes. I like to pair it with the Air remix of the Beck cover of the Air song Heaven Hammer (Missing).

MOKB alerts me that BMSR is coming out with a new EP in August/September: Dippers (preorder). You can listen to one track, Happy Melted City, here at their MySpace or download the thing from YANP. Download some other tunes, including some old stuff of theirs, from their site.

Also! I have uploaded the tracks the band has released as a promo for Dippers, which they are calling Bonus dippers. The band has all the files zipped for download here, or you can download them individually through the miracle of ones and zeroes from my mp3 page. I recommend Slide 9, Day On a Bike, and Unfinished Sketch 3.

If you’re way into it, check this out. They played SXSW with their buddies The Octopus Project; together the two bands released a disc called The House of Apples and Eyeballs.

To download, click on the link, and on the resultant page scroll down just a bit until you can click on the orange Download Now button. Scroll down on that next page until you see “Your download should begin shortly. If it does not, try Download file now.” It never begins without me clicking on that link. Have fun!

American Music Club ~ All Lost Souls Welcome You to San Francisco
Band of Horses ~ No One’s Gonna Love You
Basia Bulat ~ In the Night
Benji Hughes ~ So Well
Benji Hughes ~ You Stood Me Up
Benji Hughes ~ Why Do These Parties Always End Up the Same Way?
Benji Hughes ~ The Mummy
Benji Hughes ~ I Went with Some Friends to See the Flaming Lips
Bodies of Water ~ I Guess I’ll Forget The Sound, I Guess, I Guess
Bowerbirds ~ In Our Talons
Brazos ~ Mary Jo
Dirty on Purpose ~ Mind Blindness
Dr. Dog ~ The Ark
Dr. Dog ~ The Old Days
Fleet Foxes ~ White Water Hymnal
Howlin’ Rain ~ Dancers at the End of Time
Iron & Wine ~ Innocent Bones
James Hunter ~ Jacqueline
Jens Lekman ~ The Opposite Of Hallelujah
Jens Lekman ~ Friday Night At The Drive-In Bingo
Jim White ~ Crash into the Sun
Kaki King ~ Two O’Clock
Ladytron ~ Black Cat
Lykke Li ~ Dance Dance Dance
Man Man ~ Top Drawer
Mates of State ~ My Only Offer
Mike Doughty ~ 27 Jennifers
Mike Doughty ~ I Just Want the Girl in the Blue Dress
Morning Benders ~ Crosseyed
Mudhoney ~ I’m Now
Mudhoney ~ In ‘n’ Out of Grace
My Brightest Diamond ~ Inside a Boy
My Morning Jacket ~ Evil Urges
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds ~ Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!
Nina Simone ~ Revolution
No Age ~ Eraser
Oxford Collapse ~ The Birthday Wars
Port O’Brien ~ I Woke Up Today
Ra Ra Riot ~ Dying Is Fine
Saul Williams ~ Sunday Bloody Sunday
Saul Williams ~ World on Wheels
Science for Girls ~ Northern Lights
She & Him ~ Why Do You Let Me Stay Here?
Shearwater ~ Leviathan, Bound
Shearwater ~ Rooks
Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin ~ Think I Wanna Die
Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks ~ Baltimore
The Acorn ~ Crooked Legs
The Acorn ~ The Flood, Pt 1
The Breeders ~ Bang On
The Dandy Warhols ~ The World The People Together (Come On)
The Dodos ~ Fools
The Dodos ~ Jodi
The Dutchess & the Duke ~ Reservoir Park
The Mountain Goats ~ Sax Rohmer #1
The Republic Tigers ~ Buildings and Mountains
The Whigs ~ Right Hand on my Heart
Tilly and the Wall ~ The Freest Man
Tilly and the Wall ~ Cacophony
Tokyo Police Club ~ In A Cave
What Made Milwaukee Famous ~ Resistance Street
White Hinterland ~ Dreaming of the Plum Trees
Wolf Parade ~ Call It a Ritual
Wolf Parade ~ Language City

If you own a copyright and would like your mistakenly posted song to be removed, or if one of the links is not working, please contact Stella Splice.

August 1 ~ Boston ~ Opera House
August 2 ~ Boston ~ Opera House
August 4 ~ New York ~ United Palace Theatre
August 5 ~ New York ~ United Palace Theatre
August 7 ~ Newark ~ Performing Arts Center
August 9 ~ Montreal ~ Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier
August 10 ~ Montreal ~ Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier
August 12 ~ Toronto ~ Massey Hall
August 13 ~ Toronto ~ Massey Hall
August 16 ~ Washington, D.C. ~ Warner Theatre
August 17 ~ Washington, D.C. ~ Warner Theatre
August 19 ~ Milwaukee ~ Riverside Theatre
August 21 ~ Chicago ~ Auditorium Theatre
August 22 ~ Chicago ~ Auditorium Theatre

Harmonies, rounds, and soaring strings (including a violin bow on a guitar) embedded in the roots of rock makes them sound quintessentially American. I know that trite perspective on this Seattle band is overdone, but it’s as hard to avoid such analysis as it is to find fault in their execution. Here’s what the buzz has been saying:

“studiously rural aesthetic”

“mingling the Celtic and pastoral with Beach Boys harmonies and crashing Americana into moments of real darkness and disarming pop bliss” [the pastoral vibe is emphasized by their self-titled's cover art, a painting by Pieter Bruegel]

“it was as close to perfect as a band could get in writing a song”

“It is easy to sneer at young men fetishising old music, but Fleet Foxes handle their antecedents with panache … All this musical experience comes couched in a breezy innocence which never becomes cloying.”

–

To take a closer look at Fleet Foxes, watch the stop-motion video for White Winter Hymnal here. Download He Doesn’t Know Why. Watch their Black Cab Session. Listen to their concert at The Black Cat in DC, courtesy of NPR. Check out their Daytrotter session that features downloads of the songs drops in the River and Sun Giant from the Sun Giant EP, and Sun It Rises and White Winter Hymnal from their self-titled CD.

I think it’s wise to listen closely to the album, and to apply what band member Robin Pecknold told Drowned In Sound regarding the painting gracing the cover of their 2008 release:

“When you first see that painting it’s very bucolic, but when you look closer there’s all this really strange stuff going on, like dudes defecating coins into the river and people on fire, people carving a live sheep, this weird dude who looks like a tree root sitting around with a dog. There’s all this really weird stuff going on. I liked that the first impression is that it’s just pretty, but then you realise that the scene is this weird chaos. I like that you can’t really take it for what it is, that you’re first impression of it is wrong.”