The Runaways

I'm sorry, what the hell is going on with this?



Kristen Stewart as Joan Jett? DAKOTA FANNING AS CHERIE CURRIE?

What.has.the.world.come.to?!?!?!?!?!

The Zinnias, the complete discography

Well, that's kind of a joke, because they now exist in the form of at least two members of The Magnetic Fields. So they never really went away, though these albums are recordings of Stephin and Claudia when they were children, which is both an exciting and terrifying (in a good way, though) prospect.

But thanks to Michael at Aging Spinsters for the link to The Mythic Signifier's posting about the Zinnias, complete with links to download the albums.

I toss you the keys and say I trust you with my life

I'll post a proper review once I get the album in the mail, but I would like to draw your attention, dear readers, to this fellow who opened for Laura Veirs named Eric and his band, Cataldo. It isn't fair to say that most openers are categorically less pleasant to listen to than this, but we all know it's true. So when I was in the Elvis-shrine vault thing at the venue, waiting for the show to start, and heard Eric's slightly-less-raspy-than-John K. Samson-voice, I was not only pleasantly surprised, but also felt an incredible degree of clarity towards what I was hearing--the kind of expression of identity that most artists wish to convey but that often fails for lack of anything substantive to express. I've blogged many times about the earnestness I hear in this particular genre, but when you add the banjo and a very tall, red-bearded nerdy looking dude from Seattle, it's pretty much a deadly combination. So much so, that I remembered to buy the album this morning when I woke up.

1996

Michael over at Aging Spinsters has a few youtube videos up of The Magnetic Fields in 1996. Stephin is young and handsome and looks exactly as I remember him when I first discovered the band a year later, in 1997. I'm guessing that these videos are from the Get Lost tour, but, regardless, they pretty much epitomize why I have loved Stephin Merritt's work all of these years and why I think those first few albums were the most magical sounds of the last century.

laura veirs is still nerdy and adorable but now she's preggers and surrounded by lots of bearded men from the pnw.

that is all.

Evelyn Evelyn

In semi-music related news, it appears that Amanda Palmer and Jason Webley are performing together as conjoined twins. I haven't heard any of their work, but Annaham at the feminist disability blog, FWD, has a good post on the cultural work of using the conjoined twin as a figure of intrigue. Read it here.

you can't talk to the dude

jonathan richman looked like a fratboy in 1978. did they even have jeans like that back then?



come see what he looks like now this friday in L5P.

Joanna Newsom is apparently terrifying without her harp

Check out some new stuff over at Drag City.

Seriously, what is going on here? Is that even her?

around the interwebs

My friend, Charles, who keeps the blog Heartache With Hard Work has just put together a list of his Top 50 Songs of the Decade complete with mp3s. As he points out, these things are kind of an impossible task because inevitably something important gets left off. At the same time, lists like this provide the opportunity for intimate reflections on what is (musically) important to a given person. Given all of that, this list is pretty impressive. Be sure to check it out.

Also, if you haven't clicked on the link in my blogroll already, check out the Stephin Merritt blog, Aging Spinsters, which is maintained by my new friend, Michael. He's done a really great job of keeping up with all of the interviews and reviews of Realism, as well as general trivia and media appearances. Yay for fellow fans of The Magnetic Fields!

the man, the myth, the legend

The trailer for the Stephin Merritt documentary, Strange Powers, is out. All I want to do is to watch this film by myself in the dark while hugging an acoustic guitar.



Official film website

Note that if you make a donation, you'll be the first to get the DVD when it is released.

Stephin Merritt covers Peter Gabriel

Check out SM's "Not One of Us" cover here.