The Current Music Blog: October 2, 2006 Archive

The Buffering Stream: Day of Atonement Edition

Posted at 6:50 AM on October 2, 2006 by Hans Eisenbeis

We're away from the news desk today, but we still took wind directions and barometric readings on the music scene, just to keep you informed.

Minnesota Music Awards: Tapes 'N Tapes finally feels the love. Critics feel chastened in time for Yom Kippur. [Strib]

Pitchfork finally reviews "Boys and Girls in America," calls Craig Finn "an American Jarvis Cocker." Run! Run for the hills! [Pitchfork]

Coldplay takes a big break; world is ready for it.[Gigwise]

Paul Westerberg continues new love affair with the press, regrets swearing so much. [AOL]

Notes From the Box Office

Posted at 7:08 AM on October 2, 2006 by Hans Eisenbeis

"Open Season," the animated children's film, was the weekend's biggest movie. We're absolutely certain it was because of the soundtrack, which was written (and largely performed) by Paul Westerberg. That, and it gave Tommy Stinson something to do other than answer the constant question: Why? For the love of god, why?

Earlier: Paul Westerberg: the New Phil Collins?

The Hold Steady: Pulling Even With The Shark?

Posted at 7:18 AM on October 2, 2006 by Hans Eisenbeis (1 Comments)

It's official: the Hold Steady have arrived in the national limelight. The best Minneapolis band that lives in Brooklyn got their close-up in the New York Times yesterday, where Kalefa Sanneh avers that Craig Finn and his colleagues are America's bar band, an important post long since abandoned by Bruce Springsteen. While we have our doubts about the accompanying photographs (uh, we've been to WInnepeg and there aren't any snow-capped mountains in all of Manitoba; we doubt there's even a hill), the piece concludes on a beautiful note that conjurs the ghost of Jack Kerouac:

The album ends with “Southtown Girls,” a tribute both to Cheap Trick’s “Southern Girls” and to a Twin Cities species slightly less exotic than its name: “Southtown Girls” are the type one might find at the Southtown Shopping Center in Bloomington, Minn.; it is, Mr. Finn is proud to note, “a really lame mall.” Yet the song has a great, swaggering guitar riff, and a refrain that balances sweetness and sarcasm: “Southtown girls won’t blow you away/But you know that they’ll stay.” So maybe the song is also about how even the most mundane place can seem exciting, if you sing about it right. After the first chorus Mr. Finn reels off some whimsical directions. “Take Lyndale to the horizon,” he sings. “Take Nicollet out to the ocean.” And that’s the Hold Steady’s hometown: a singular city that goes on forever.

OK. So when will Craig sing about Southdale girls?

Earlier: Idolator accuses Pitchfork of loving the Hold Steady too much.

Even earlier, funnier: Separated at Birth--Craig Finn and Peter Sellers?

Photo MPR

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Everyone's A Critic, And They All Agree

Posted at 8:39 AM on October 2, 2006 by Hans Eisenbeis (1 Comments)

Tapes 'N Tapes, Atmosphere, POS--no big surprises at last night's Minnesota Music Awards, other than this:

The Alarmists capped off what may be the band's best week ever. They topped City Pages' annual Picked to Click, played Summit's Big Brew on Saturday, picked up two nods for best new group of the year — one from the public and one from the critics

Which proves that the general public is finally seeing things our way. Nice work, rock critics of Minnesota!

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