It’s entirely possible you don’t check Stereogum as often as we do, so drag your mouse to this link and click to download our tribute to Björk’s Post. It’s essentially a list of our favorite bands right now — Liars, Dirty Projectors, No Age, High Places, Atlas Sound, El Guincho, Final Fantasy & Ed Droste, Evangelicals, Xiu Xiu, Pattern Is Movement, Bell, White Hinterland — and it’s free. We’ll abstain from telling you how we think it turned out because that would be unseemly. But we’ve been noticing some good feedback in the comments, and some interesting mentions around the web (thanks for your mentions, everybody). None of said reviews are better than this one from LiveJournaler Richaod, though, so we’re reprinting the whole thing.

Richaod Presents… I Miss Björk – A Review of Stereogum’s Tribute to Post

I really wanted to like this cover album. I really did. And even though it fails miserably, I can probably find more redeeming qualities than most in the songs by Liars, Bell and Final Fantasy. I’ve yet to hear the previous tributes to OK Computer (I want a download, not a stream!) and Automatic for the People, so I can’t make comparisons to those.

Post is the only Björk album I physically own, and admittedly the only one I’ve listened to at length, though I’m not incredibly familiar with it. I think I quite like Björk where I should love her. The more you love Björk’s idiosyncrasies, the more you’ll likely hate these covers.

I’ve tried to be descriptive here, so I can say “I told you so” when you download the album so you can complain about me being discouraging.

Next: the track-by-track analysis…

Read More...

Stereogum’s complete 12-track Enjoyed comp is live and ready to be downloaded (for free). Yep, 12. Because No Age cooked up an excellent alternate take on “It’s Oh So Quiet,” which we wanted to keep a surprise until … now. In addition to Dean and Randy’s Björk, you’ll hear, in order of appearance, the previously announced covers by Liars, Dirty Projectors, High Places, Bell, Pattern Is Movement, Evangelicals, Xiu Xiu, Final Fantasy & Ed Droste, White Hinterland, El Guincho, and Atlas Sound. Each artist gave us their thoughts on Post, their Enjoyed take, and/or Björk’s work in general (additionally, we’ve included video interviews with High Places, Pattern Is Movement, and El Guincho). We also offer a contextual “essay” and, finally, we caught-up with Björk and asked her for her thoughts, 13 years later, on her 1995 follow-up to Debut. Enjoy!

Evangelicals On “You’ve Been Flirting Again”
“This is a mysterious song, I think. It’s unclear who the ‘you’ in the title is and and the string arrangements hint that lyrics like ‘How you reacted was good’ aren’t quite what they seem. Is this Björk talking to an ex-boyfriend, saying ‘hey, it’s good to see ya gettin out there and playing the field again’? Maybe she’s trying to tell a dude putting the moves on her to be patient ’cause ya know, she’s Björk.

I’m not sure of her intentions but on the particular night our version was recorded I imagined what if, despite how beautiful the song is, she was really seething at seeing an ex flirt with someone she knows at a party in Iceland. In Björk’s version she controls her raging jealousy at witnessing such a a situation, but in our version the narrator (Björk or whoever really) slowly comes unglued and ends up freaking out and going on a murderous rampage at the party. We tried illustrating this with string stabs and creepy ‘witch’ voices swirling around towards the end.”
- Josh Jones

SXSW is way over, and we have no intention of posting about it anymore. Except for oh yeah this last splurge of live videos that never made it onto these pages last week. The final crumbs from our SXSW ’08 archives include deep cuts from a trifecta of bands that we’ve been talking up a lot of late, along with a brand new song for fans of High Places. We’ll start it with with the raucous, sprawling psych-pop of Oklahoma’s Evangelicals. Here’s the dark and ebullient, narrated tale of “Party Crashin,’” live from the Mohawk Patio:

Evangelicals – “Party Crashin’”

Following fellow guitar-free BTW Fuck Buttons on Saturday, Brooklyn BTW High Places’ singular kitchen-sink Beat Happening calypso felt perfect for an early, sunny afternoon. There are just two folks on stage — Rob, clad in his purple Mika Miko tee, smashing sticks against triggers, Mary singing, often with her back to the audience, in a patterned shirt that seems to echo the tropical elements they toss into the mix — but they remain completely engrossing. For starters, as much as we study Rob’s noisemaker, we still can’t quite figure out how all the triggers work. Which is sad, because we even had him explain it. That, and it’s amazing how Mary at times seems to barely open her mouth when she sings, but somehow a crystalline voice emerges. Her stories come across clearer in a live setting — unlike a lot of folks’ lyrics, they’re worth listening to, following along.

We have footage of a new song, an oldie, and one of our favorites. First is the avian and shaker fragment, “Freaked Flight,” one of the first few songs the band wrote.

Read More...

Dinner time in Austin, time to munch tacos and figure the night sched. As the picture suggests, tonight’s the night for Jens Lekman fans: y’all have two chances to catch the Swedish troubadour (Emo’s at 8PM, Mohawk at midnight). For those looking for relatively veteran greats, the only choice is Yo La Tengo and My Morning Jacket (sure to be showing off their Evil Urges) at Austin Music Hall. If your legs are already hurting, you can one-stop shop at the Mohawk Patio, where the Secretly Canadian/Jagjaguwar/Dead Oceans crew bring the night’s most stacked lineup (culminating in a sure to be stonerific Black Mountain set at 1AM). Us, we’re going to see the Lou Reed tribute and then off to check the newly black-clad Islands crew work through the great forthcoming LP The Arm’s Way. Or there’s Mark Kozelek in a church, or the awesome El Guincho at 1AM, or Vice’s Dark Meat covering Stooges songs or … actually, just jump.

Read More...

When we gave our gushing preview of Evangelicals great new record and mentioned a childhood diet that surely included Scooby Doo reruns, “Midnight Vignette” was sort of what we had in mind, which sounds just like a cheeky take on the soundtrack to a chase scene for a b-movie horror flick. (As the band’s said themselves, there’s a dash of Rocky Horror to this show.) Rather awesomely, Josh Jones’s sprawling psych-pop crew take those tones and splash them all over the video for “Vignette,” which is essentially a drive-in slasher flick in four-minute form. You just need twenty seconds to get the feel for the full clip, but the song is what we’re really tripping over.

Read More...

There was a night back in ’06 where we swung into Bowery to take in a headlining set from the always great Serena-Maneesh, and wound up having our heads shredded by the the cackling, shape-shifting psych-pop of Evangelicals. The mini romance begun at the Ballroom (and furthered by their debut So Gone) just blossomed into some full-on need-to-be-with-you/can’t-stop-leaving-messages crazy-in-love shit this past Friday night, though, when we finally heard the band’s follow-up The Evening Descends. Over and over again, all weekend.

This is a great album, a big, sprawling, mess of a trip through the band’s unhinged and unruly musical vocabulary. It’s a strain of pop, no mistake there; but as made by kids from Oklahoma weaned on the Lips and Scooby Doo re-runs, on 8-bit pastimes and ’80s bands (U2, the Smiths, even the Cure circa “Just Like Heaven” come through virtuosic singer-guitarist Josh Jones’s home blend). Now take that mess of modifiers and run it through a kaleidoscope, and you’ve got the mighty first cut:

Evangelicals – “Skeleton Man” (MP3)

Please listen to the entire record, streaming at MySpace — though if you’re picking and choosing, go “Midnight Vignette,” “Paperback Suicide,” and “Party Crashin’” to start. Love. It.

The Evening Descends is out 1/22 in the US, 2/4 in the UK via Dead Oceans.

Read More...

/img/album_covers/evangelicals-the_evening_descends.jpg

Read More...

Thank you, Jim Noir. Over the past few weeks, more and more bands have come to the holiday table with new, seasonally appropriate songs to help get festive. As would be expected, it’s definitely a mixed bag (stocking?), but there are a surprising amount of goodies as opposed to lumps of coal. We decided to gather some of these in one place so you could have a one-stop soundtrack for Holidays ’07, for your tree trimming and eggnog slurping. We’ll start off with our favorite of the bunch, Stereofave Evangelicals’ “The Last Christmas On Earth.” Actually, it could be our favorite song we’ve heard from these guys, bar none.

Evangelicals – “The Last Christmas On Earth” (MP3)

Spending the apocalypse beneath the mistletoe is beautiful. (Note the creepy ID3 tags — theirs, not ours.) A whole sack of joy after the jump. But it’s not as dirty as that sounded.

Read More...

There’s a middle aged dude who works security at Bowery Ballroom; he usually sits on a stool at the stage-access door near the front of the room, and he uses the density of his torso (and of his scraggle of hair) to ensure that no party crashers make their way backstage. We should know this man’s name, as we often engage in conversation (here, “conversation” includes discussions on placement of beer cups and use of camera flash). The guy sees a lot of shows but, despite his apparent love for live music and those drawn to see it, we’ve never seen him cut loose like he did for the Oklahoma trio Evangelicals.

By now you know we love Serena-Maneesh, so we hit Bowery on Friday night in fanboy-mode to catch up with ‘em, take in their headlining set, and snap some backstage pics. We didn’t expect to pay attention to the early opener, but our friendly, Bowery security man’s unexpected enthusiasm was a lure. The next draw was the goofy interplay (and botanical garden!) that had taken over the stage. When our ears finally opened, we even enjoyed what we heard.

Evangelicals’ brand of unhinged psych-pop lives somewhere between state-mates Flaming Lips and Broken Social Scene, with shifting tempos, soaring background vocals, and a demented, sunny disposition. You’ll also hear some fleeting surf-rock basslines from the ’50s, a period that seems to have shaped moments of their trebly, bright guitars, served up with a dollop of reverb for taste.

Evangelicals – “Another Day (And You’re Still Knocked Out)” (MP3)
Evangelicals – “Diving” (MP3)

After the jump, a look at the headlining, Norwegian rockers in their natural, backstage habitat.

Read More...