by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

XO For the Holidays, Vol. 5 (2012)

Get a jump on your Christmas music with the XO for the Holidays Vol. 5 compilation. XO is a publicist whose stable includes Blue Skies for Black Hearts, Piney Gir and The Winter Sounds. They’ve been putting out Christmas music comps by their artists for five years, and the content has been consistently good. The best part — the download is absolutely free and available right here (along with downloads for vol. 1-4). Ho ho ho.

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An illustration from Beck’s Song Reader.

By now you’ve heard of Beck’s Song Reader project — instead of recording his latest batch of songs, he’s published them as sheet music. The Song Reader is available for presale now for $34, but Beck has made the first pages of sheet music available for free download for the tune “Old Shanghai” and is asking people to record their own version of the song, upload it to YouTube and link link it at Beck’s songreader.net website. A few contribution are already online, along with versions of Song Reader song “Do We? We Do.” Very savvy marketing gimmick. Here’s a chance for your band to get the attention of arguably one of the most innovative pop musicians in the past two decades.

“Do We? We Do” Bradley Dean Whyte

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There’s a new Q&A with Todd Fink at Oregon Music News. Among the topics, playing Media live (“For whatever reason, I just don’t ever want to play those songs.”). Wonder why. Read it here.

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Pere Ubu is back. Lady from Shanghai, their first release in three years, comes out Jan.7 on Fire Records. Check out the first song, “Free White,” via NPR here.

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Luaka Bop recording artist Delicate Steve is playing tonight at Slowdown Jr. This morning I listened to his latest album, Positive Force, on Spotify (That’s right, Steve, that 1/4 of 1 penny in your Spotify royalties check next month comes from me). There’s an ocean breeze that runs through this electronic, mostly instrumental music. Modern surf? Maybe, maybe. With Dana Buoy (Lefse Records), UUVVWWZ (Saddle Creek records) and Sun Settings. $13, 9 p.m.

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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2012 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.