The Wednesday Four

Few tunes for Wednesday:

Okkervil River - "Lost Coastlines". 

New one from Okkervil River off The Stand Ins, their upcoming follow-up to TRS-certified The Stage Names.  Yeah, we kinda ripped their show at 9:30 Club last spring.  But this one's pretty good, they sort of channel a Motown (with nods to twee) thing while Will Sheff crams a few hundred words into his sprawling verses.

Cotton Jones Basket Ride - "Chewing Gum"

I thoroughly enjoyed Michael Nau's old project, Page France, finding it to fill the wacked-Christian-in-psychedelic-elementary-school-playground void ever since Neutral Milk Hotel went wherever they went.  Page France broke up, and I'm not sure why since it seemed like it was mainly Nau and Whitney's project anyhow and since the CJBR sound, umm, similar.  I missed them at Iota last week -- anybody catch the show?

Grandpaboy - "Eyes Like Sparks"

Paul Westerberg is Grandpaboy.  He just put out a solid new record, 49:00, which is getting buzz because you can pick it up for 49 cents (!), legally, on Amazon (the catch is that it comes as one continuous track.  Such a Rockist move).  It kinda plays like a radio station, Westie occasionally sliding in a few seconds of a tossed-off cover in between the actual songs.  This tune is actually from the Grandpaboy debut, Mono, which is a stellar, stellar album full of killer riff-heavy cuts of the Stones/Faces variety.  Here he gets pretty good mileage out of about 8 words and 2 minutes of the same riff.

Built to Spill - "The Plan" (live)

Again, not covering any new territory here, but on my lengthy summer road trip I had occasion to revisit BTS' Keep It Like A Secret on a brilliant sunny day Allegheny Mountains and to recall just how spectacular it is.  I think I might put it in my all time top ten albums, and, if not, then it certainly stands as one of the records that hooked me on this thing we call indie rock.  They may be touring a start-to-finish playing of Perfect From Now On (great too), but KILAS is the stronger of the two in my humble Rockist opinion.  Their latest jams may get a little tedious, but still, no one produces guitar sounds like Doug Martsch and company.