Blood From A Stone

More Specs for the Fam

Glasses Part Deux

My New Specs

This is for you, fam...

More Leigh Art

I'm nobody, who are you? Are you nobody, too? Shhh. Don't tell them. There's a pair of us... ~Emily Dickinson

Gracie Mae

What a world this would be without Boxers!!!

Art For Your Head

Yves Tanguy... Ahhh...

The Eraser

I got Thom Yorke's new album last week, and I've been listening to it quite a bit. I find it very interesting, which I think in this day and age is one of the better compliments one can make about a musical work of art in this age of homogeneous, intellectually insulting drivel.

Music for Your Head

Arctic Monkeys
Ben Kweller
Cat Power
Cursive
Damien Rice
Death Cab for Cutie
Eagles of Death Metal
Editors
Elefant
Elliot Smith
The Flaming Lips
Fugazi
Iggy Pop
Iron & Wine
Interpol
Kaiser Chiefs
The Mars Volta
Modest Mouse
The New Pornographers
The Notwist
Nouvelle Vague
Pavement
Queens of the Stone Age
Thom Yorke
Radiohead
Spoon
Sufjan Stevens
Sun Kil Moon
Tool

Cursive

After a steady diet of near-constant touring across three continents, including a stint opening for The Cure on the 2004 Curiosa tour, Cursive was a quintet on the precipice. Their then-most recent record The Ugly Organ had racked up considerable accolades--named one of 2003's best records by Blender, called "the best album of (the band's) career" by The New York Times and given a 4-star rating by Rolling Stone--but the band, ragged and road-weary, opted for an ambiguous hiatus rather than forge onward to the daunting task of Follow-Up to Hit Record. All was quiet in Camp Cursive for more than a year... And then, slowly at first, after much decompression and contemplation, they began to discuss and then assemble a new record as a freshly reconstituted four-piece--the longtime core of Tim Kasher (vocals, guitar), Matt Maginn (bass), Clint Schnase (drums) and Ted Stevens (guitar, vocals). The band's reemergence finds them self-assured and assertive as ever. Rather than retread familiar artistic ground, Cursive has unfurled their most adventurous and accomplished work to date, Happy Hollow. Happy Hollow is an expansion of Cursive's trademark discordant swell: dissonant yet distinctively melodic guitar sounds and frontman Kasher's ever-cathartic yowl now mesh and clash with horns, piano, accordion and other various instrumentation. The new songs are marked by a new bounce, a buoyant strut and a recognition that hey... this is fun.Still informed by a sharp lyrical pathos and a wise, road-tested sense of dynamic interplay, the songs groove and dart with brash swagger, interspersed with hints of gospel and skewed blues. The rhythm section, heavier, tighter, and more propulsive than ever, drives the songs forward while horns careen over dueling vocals and interweaving guitars. Never repeating themselves, always pushing forward artistically and never settling, Cursive returns to raise the bar with yet another groundbreaking new album, Another Hit Record as Follow-Up to Hit Record. Happy Hollow's first single "Dorothy at Forty" is another typically atypical Cursive romp, catapulted by incisive guitars, punctuated by horns and jerking to a stop before mightily spiraling away into the song's rousing coda. To be released July 11, "Dorothy at Forty" is backed with non-album tracks "The Bitter End" and "The Censor."

Sufjan Stevens

After the death of Elliot Smith a couple of years ago, I wasn't sure if I would ever find a singer/songwriter with whom I connected. I've been searching the vast musical expanse, and in the process, I came across some interesting cats like M. Ward, Damien Rice (who is truly amazing), and Donovan Frankenreiter. These guys to some pretty interesting things, both harmonically and lyrically, and Damien Rice is the one who affects me the most emotionally.

Lately, however, I've been listening to every Sufjan Stevens album on which I can get greedy little hands. Sufjan Stevens is an American musician, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist from Detroit, Michigan. He is known for his lyrically focused and instrumentally rich songs that often relate to faith and family. He has enjoyed wide critical success in the United States. He is considered part of the folk revival in indie pop, but his influences are very broad, including electronica, the jazz of Vince Guaraldi, and the academic minimalism of Reich and Glass. Stevens has announced plans to make an album for each of the 50 U.S. states, beginning the series with the albums Michigan (2003) and Illinois (2005).

Many of Stevens's songs have religious and spiritual allusions, but his album Seven Swans has the most direct religious references. Stevens has expressed that he is Christian, but does not overtly advertise this aspect of himself in his music. Stevens has also stated that he does not try to make music "with a message," or music for the sake of preaching. "I don't think music media is the real forum for theological discussions," says Stevens. "I think I've said things and sung about things that probably weren't appropriate for this kind of forum. And I just feel like it's not my work or my place to be making claims and statements, because I often think it's misunderstood."