Japanther
Seripop, 2005

Blamma Blamma – “Collide Sparks”

The Independent lists the ten best rock biographies.

Mixtape.me is an online streaming mixtape sharing site.

Lullabyes has started posting mp3s of 2009 SXSW shows, including sets by the Whispertown 2000 and Hockey.

Nyctaper shares mp3s from last weekend's Women performance in NYC.

NPR's Morning Edition profiles singer-songwriter Elvis Perkins.

Shontelle - “T-Shirt (Crazy Cousinz Extended Mix)” The original mix of Shontelle’s single “T-Shirt” is pleasant but generic, basically the kind of song that provides either a functional sort of pleasure, or a neutral non-response when heard in passing. This largely comes down to the way it seems designed to sound like a half-dozen overly familiar pop hits from the past few years, resulting in something that comes off, at best, as being a severely watered-down version of Beyoncé’s “Irreplaceable.” Crazy Cousinz’ mix salvages the best elements from the original, and changes the mood, tempo, and arrangement significantly by flipping the ho-hum melancholy of the source material into a rather celebratory Latin-tinged dance number. Their arrangement is a funky, dynamic piece of music that evokes a powerful feeling of joy while at the same time feeling slick, cool, and relaxed. This is a wonderful example of the remix as aesthetic surgery — one can imagine the original song limping and wheezing its way into the OR, and just hours later prancing around cheerfully to its new and improved beat.

Buy it from Amazon UK.

Catsup Plate is set to release a 3xLP set of Animal Collective rarities, in a vinyl limited edition of 1000. All of the material was recorded live to MiniDisc at various locations, spanning the first three years of the band.

It is to be released “within the next 4-6 weeks,” though you can currently buy a test-pressing of it on Ebay, with all proceeds going to Doctors Without Borders.

Full details “after the jump…”

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Andrew Wyeth via Everyday Marvels

Red River - “Something Good” Our mysterious friends in Red River have released another album, something partly handpainted and called Grassblades. Bill Roberts stands on a small stage, wearing a sheet like a cape. He stands with friends in t-shirts and jeans and baseball-caps and skirts, friends whose violin cases have stickers for Chiquita Banana and Page France. They play. "Something Good" is a song whose creation can be easily understood; whose singing can be easily imagined. The lyrics are plain, loving, pious. But the "love" Roberts sings of, the "good" - these are not the stuff of chapels and rosaries. They are the stuff of tides, night rides, bare feet, grassblades, Chiquita Banana. This is a song to keep in a flask in your pocket, something to sip on the bridge.

Red River play Clancy's, in Long Beach, tonight. And Hollywood's Knitting Factory on March 30. Buy their albums, which are cheap as sand. And Mike Turner's short tour film, Riverbeds, is as modest as a memory passed.

Casiotone for the Painfully Alone - “Natural Light” In this song of just 2min24, Casiotone doesn't give us enough time to fall in love with the keyboard riff. Wait, wait, wait - yes he does. Yes, I'm already in love with it. Just because he doesn't give me enough time to realise I'm in love, not 'til after the song's over, doesn't mean it didn't happen. Because that's the way with so many of the best things. You don't realise until after how good they were; or how deserved. [buy]