J's Indie/Rock Mayhem - 26th August 2009

[Welcome to another edition of J's Indie/Rock Mayhem. Great interview tonight with most of the band Decoration Ghost. They'll be playing tomorrow night as part of the Dotmatrix Project series down at the Green Burro on Elm Street downtown. They're playing along with Sin Tax and Joshua West. The show is free, gets started at 8pm and is a guaranteed great time, just like all the Dotmatrix shows are. Make sure you get there.

A head's up: If you live in Greensboro, or pay attention to the occasional PSAs I read, you might be familiar with First Fridays downtown. The first Friday of every month usually involves a lot of the art galleries staying open later with some awesome exhibitions and so forth. Well, now you can add the First Fridays Indie Market to the list of things to do downtown those nights. In addition to great local indie retailers hawking their wares, each hour will present a different live entertainment. Yours truly will be down there performing my original guitar music, most likely in the 5 PM hour. So, Friday, September 4th, come on downtown, say howdy to me and catch me playing. Why not?

Now, before I get too depressed about Jon Beason's injury, onward.]

J's Indie/Rock Podcast: 26th August 2009 Show

Theme Song - Peaches - "Rock Show"
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the Clean - "Tensile" [from the forthcoming mr. pop. great new zealand pop. what can i say? they still sound amazing years later.]
the Mountain Goats - "This Year" [from the sunset tree. this is, truly, the song that turned me around on really loving the mountain goats. i had enjoyed all hail west texas and some of his lo-fi earlier material, but i really, really loved this song the moment i heard it.]
Citified - "Pencil Me In" [from absence. one of my absolute favorite north carolina releases of this year - and seriously, that is not faint praise.]
Brendan Benson - "Eyes on the Horizon" [from my old, familiar friend. my interview with brendan is up over at aquarium drunkard so go check it out. pretty good stuff. his music, too.]

[So this is where Decoration Ghost came into the studio. They're playing tomorrow night, Thursday, August 27th, as part of the ongoing Dotmatrix Project series at the Green Burro downtown. It's a free show, so all the more reason to come. 3/4ths of the band were able to make it - Tim LaFollete, Devender Sellars and Scott Hicks. They played some live stuff for us, in addition to some new demos, and were great sports for a lot of interesting questions and a word-association game that kind of fell flat. My fault, not theirs. Enjoy the interview on the podcast.]

Decoration Ghost - "Camera Bag and a Backpack" (live) [i love the interplay of the guitars and the rock harmonies that these guys are able to put together. click here to download.]
Decoration Ghost - "The Haze of Wine and Age" (live) [literally, this song got stuck in my head for several days after hearing them play it live back in july. great stuff. click here to download.]
Decoration Ghost - "Horizon" [one of the demos recorded with snuzz. more awesome stuff.]
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Decoration Ghost - "Thick Tan Rope" [another of the demos recorded with snuzz. can't wait to hear a full release of this stuff.]
Langhorne Slim - "Say Yes" [from his forthcoming be set free. i saw him open for the avett brothers about 4 years ago and it's been fun to watch his star build. i'm really excited about his new record and his last was fantastic.]
Polvo - "The Pedlar" [from in prism. seriously. do you want one of the best indie records you've heard in a long time? get your hands on this when it comes out. honestly.]
Son Volt - "No Turning Back" [from american central dust. jay farrar and company will be at the cat's cradle in carborro on sunday, september 13th. get excited.]
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Vic Chesnutt - "Flirted With You All My Life" [from the forthcoming at the cut which is astounding. my interview with vic will be up on aquarium drunkard next monday - it's a really interesting talk, so make sure you check in.]
PJ Harvey - "Missed" [from rid of me. i only grabbed one of pj's two earliest records about a month ago and i've been floored by how much i love this album. i'd honestly not spent that much time with her earlier music, but that's going to need to change.]
St. Vincent - "Save Me From What I Want" [from actor. probably top ten bound on the j's indie/rock best of 2009. get ready for it.]
Lou Barlow - "Gravitate" [from goodnight unknown. merge is putting out some seriously amazing music this year. this, the clean, the new polvo, the new wye oak. geez, merge. spoil us already.]
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Wye Oak - "I Want for Nothing" [from the knot. this could be top 25 bound. and i never would've assumed that from their last record. i enjoyed it a lot, but didn't see them blowing my mind like they have this time.]
the Damnwells - "55 Pictures" [from one last century. the damnwells documentary, golden days, is finally being released on DVD. excitement? yes, 'cause i want to actually see it. they're such a great band.]
A.A. Bondy - "On the Moon" [from the forthcoming when the devil's loose. i did an interview with bondy that will be up on aquarium drunkard later next week also. a great week for interviews, obviously.]
the Ronettes - "Be My Baby" [this song's co-author, ellie greenwich died today. she, along with songwriting partner jeff barry, co-wrote, without a doubt, some of the greatest songs of the 60s. "then he kissed me," "da doo ron ron," "chapel of love," "river deep, mountain high" and "leader of the pack," just to name a few. so this is in her memory - an obviously incredibly gifted pop songwriter. rest in peace.]
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Roadside Graves - "Take a Train" [from my son's home. i have seen nothing but tweet after tweet on twitter talking about how great their live show is. i concur. they're marvelous.]
Portishead - "Plastic" [from third, last year's j's indie/rock mayhem # 1 album of the year. and for very good reason. amazing.]
Echo and the Bunnymen - "The Killing Moon" [from ocean rain. i was listening last night to one of the best mixes anyone has ever made for me and it contained the nouvelle vague cover of this song. so i thought i'd throw the original up as a way to say thank you. happy anniversary, lauren.]

That'll do it for this week. See you at Dotmatrix tomorrow night and back here next week for more great music. Until then, Go Panthers!, and take care.