by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

When it comes to rock shows, these indeed are the holiday/winter doldrums, especially this year. No holiday reunion shows. No big national indie shows to speak of, and very few for the foreseeable future. The only national indie shows I’m looking forward to are Har Mar Superstar Dec. 30; Craig Finn Feb. 3, Tennis Feb. 22, and Cursive March 3. That’s it. Yeah, I know Lemonheads are coming, but I’ve always thought they sucked.

A Lazy-i reader recently e-mailed asking if I thought there was an unnatural downturn in national shows coming through Omaha.  He pointed out that Cults, Magnetic Fields, Zola Jesus, M83 and Neon Indian are all coming through the area but routing past Omaha. I told him I didn’t know, but that I doubted it. We always experience a lull in touring indie shows during the winter months. A glance at touring indie shows I went to last year at this time: Cursive played Domestica last January, followed by Interpol, Best Coast/Wavves, Pete Yorn and Smith Westerns all last February. Not much else.

We get spoiled in the warmer months with fantastic national touring shows almost every weekend. So spoiled, in fact, that some of the best ones go virtually unattended. I went to a number of shows this past fall that had terrible attendance despite the quality of bands (Future Islands and Milegras come  to mind). I’ll say what I said back then: If you want to continue getting cutting-edge indie bands at our clubs, you need to go to the shows, and when possible, buy tickets in advance. As things warm up, hopefully we’ll begin to see more bands coming through. In the meantime, continue to support our local heroes, who continue to work throughout the winter months…

A few other news and notes on this boring Wednesday…

Bright Eyes, The People's Key (2011, Saddle Creek)

Pitchfork posted its annual list of the top-50 albums last week.The one band missing is also missing from a lot of other year-end lists: Bright Eyes. The People’s Key didn’t make the Pitchfork top 50.  Or the Rolling Stone top 50  or the SPIN top 50  or the Filter Top 20  or even the Paste top 50.

In fact, the only lists I’ve found that included The People’s Key are Magnet‘s top 20 (where it was No. 7),  American Songwriter‘s top 50 (No. 22),  BBC‘s top 25 (No. 25)  and Drowned in Sound‘s top 50 (No. 8). Disappointing? Probably, though I doubt Conor and Co. give a shit. Is the lack of inclusion a reflection of Bright Eyes’ waning popularity or was The People’s Key a misfire? The only thing that matters is how well the album sold and if Bright Eyes continues to draw crowds to concerts. So did The People’s Key make it on the Lazy-i Best of 2011 list? You’ll just have to wait and see.

By the way, you can find almost all of the year-end lists at the fantastic Album of the Year website.

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Tomorrow: Predictions Pt. 1: Looking back at last year’s predictions. Yikes.

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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 © 2011 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Saddle Creek Records reports that first-week sales for Bright Eyes’ The People’s Key were 41,185, good enough to come in at No. 13 on the Billboard charts, behind a ton of Grammy releases (including two Bieber albums). 41k is an impressive number. Remember, Cassadaga sold 58k its first week way back in ’07 at the beginning of the decline of the record industry. According to Mike Fratt, who runs Homer’s Music, 17,796 copies sold were digital — a whopping 43 percent of total sales. You can thank that $3.99 Amazon deal for a big share of those numbers.

Pitchfork didn’t exactly go out of its way to help the album’s sales, continuing the website’s tradition of hatin’ on The Creek. Critic David Bevan loved “Ladder Song,” the most depressing tune on the album.  As for the rest of the record, he was not so kind… “But with the plain exception of ‘Ladder Song,’ the slick sonics here make the rest of the pack all the more cavernous and impersonal, a long ways from where the whole story began. Every line is laid with the rich sense of rhythm and texture that he’s mastered over the years, but it still adds up to very little: a wildly spiritual record without any spirit,” he concluded, rating the album a measly 5.0. Read the entire review here.

More notable to those who follow consistent criticism is Stephen Thomas Erlewine’s review at allmusic.com. Erlewine, who is the website’s senior editor, went against the grain dissing Digital Ash (2 stars) and Wide Awake (2 stars) back in ’05.  He was more complementary this time ’round: “Disregarding the lyrics — something that is not easy or necessarily optimal with Oberst, who is continuing to whittle away his overwritten excesses — The People’s Key is Bright Eyes’ poppiest record by some measure, trading anthems with the weight of America on their shoulders for sculptured miniatures.” Erlewine gave the album 3.5 stars. The full review is here.

Conor and Co. will try to get a “Letterman bump” when they appear on Late Night w/David Letterman tomorrow night with Sen. Rand Paul (Will there be fisticuffs? I think Conor could take him).

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There was some chatter at last Saturday night’s Pete Yorn show that Harrah’s was about to announce a huge, exciting show for their summer Stir Concert Cove series. Well, they announced the show yesterday: The Black Keys *thud*. The $37 (I’m not kidding) show is July 5 with opener Cage the Elephants *yawn*. If you’re doing the math, that’s $4 more than last year’s all-day MAHA Festival. And if you’re thinking to yourself, “Weren’t the Black Keys just here?” you’re not mistaken. They played at The Anchor Inn last August.

Is it me or does the Omaha area seem to get a lot of the same bands over and over? Are we part of some sort of déjà vu circuit? Deerhoof, who played at TWR last weekend, was just here in June. Mogwai, who plays here in April, just played Slowdown last summer. Heartless Bastards, who perform at Slowdown this Sunday night, were in Omaha last July. The Nadas, who were just here in December, are coming back in May; and Of Montreal, who plays at Slowdown in May, was at Sokol in October. Will we be hearing an announcement about an upcoming She & Him show in the near future?

Meanwhile, there’s an army of acts that have either never stepped foot in Nebraska or been here in many years. Everyone has their own list of bands they’d love to see that seem to avoid Omaha. Mine includes Belle and Sebastian, PJ Harvey, Sun Kil Moon, Arcade Fire, Sufjan Stevens, The xx, Aimee Mann, Beck, Teenage Fanclub, R.E.M., (the late) LCD Soundsystem, Iron & Wine, Ted Leo & The Pharmacists, Glasvegas, Dirtbombs, Justice, Tyvek, The Magnetic Fields, Nick Cave, Radiohead, the list goes on and on… I’m sure there’s a very logical, straightforward reason why these bands avoid Omaha while other acts continue to hit Nebraska over and over…

That said, we don’t have room to complain. Just look who’s playing tonight at The Waiting Room. The Smith Westerns just snagged a massive 8.4 rating at Pitchfork for their new album, Dye It Blonde, as well as the website’s coveted “best new music” designation. And the credit is well deserved. Opening is psych rock band Unknown Mortal Orchestra (check out some tracks here). $10, 9 p.m.

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Tomorrow: Noah’s Ark Was a Spaceship

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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 © 2011 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

Pete Yorn

Pete Yorn: Let’s Get Lost

Indie rock’s golden child returns to the Heartland.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

It’s late in the day; the sun barely blinks over the horizon. The familiar bleached light bounces off the pavement and through the dirty windshied while white stripes flicker below like a busy signal on the highway. The man behind the wheel is lost.

That man is Pete Yorn, his trademark Prince Valiant mane tossing in the wind blowing through an open window. He wears the same T-shirt and jeans he wore earlier that day in ARC Studios, where he stood behind a microphone, “cans” on head, singing, while producer Mike Mogis listened and twisted the dials atop the massive control board, glancing up occasionally to watch Yorn through the window.

It was 2008 when Yorn found himself in Nebraska only a few weeks after finishing recording sessions with producer and living legend Frank Black of Pixies fame for Yorn’s self-titled rock record, which has become known by some as “the Black album.” Between those Frank Black sessions and the release of the “Black album” in September 2010, Yorn released the Mogis-produced Back and Fourth (in June 2009), along with a collection of duets with Scarlett Johansson called Break Up, recorded two years earlier but released in September 2009.

It is only now that Yorn has had a chance to really perform the songs on the “Black album.”

“Ever since I recorded those songs I’ve been excited about the opportunity to play them live,” he said from his home in Santa Monica, California. “I haven’t been out touring in a bus in a year. I’m ready to play some good rock shows again.”

Pete Yorn, self titled (Vagrant 2010)

Yorn recalled the contrast between Frank Black’s recording style and working with Mike Mogis. “They’re both guys who I really respect a lot and enjoy working with,” he said. “Mike is more detailed, more layering and I knew that going in. I also knew with Frank that I’d only have five days (in the studio) to capture something fast and not be too fussy about it. It was the antithesis of what we did in Omaha. That said, it’s all rock and roll, and both have different energies.”

The final products also couldn’t be more different. Yorn’s eponymous album, which will be the center point of Saturday night’s concert at the Whiskey Roadhouse, is barebones and abrasive, a rough ride that, on songs like “Velcro Shoes” and “Badman,” sideswipes garage rock without losing any of Yorn’s songwriting depth. Black’s influence saturates every track, from the chugging guitars to Yorn’s gravelly vocals.

In comparison, Back and Fourth is downright ornate; a soulful, personal album with the subtle touches that Yorn — and Mogis — are known for. Instead of five days, Yorn spent two and a half months in Omaha working on Back and Fourth. Over that time, he became immersed in the Omaha scene, hanging out at a wine bar in Dundee, eating at a Middle Eastern restaurant downtown, becoming involved in the spiritual center of Omaha, and going to rock shows. Maybe you were at one of the clubs on a night when someone leaned over, pointed and whispered: “Pssst… Look. Pete Yorn’s here tonight.”

“I never go out when I’m home; it’s very rare that I go to bars,” Yorn said. “But when I was there, I wanted to take it all in. I went to a number of shows at Slowdown. I remember going to see The Notwist after a group of kids told me about the show. I’d never even heard of them. That night I ran into the guys in Cursive and a bunch of other people I’d met. I started to realize that there was a cool group of really creative people that made up the scene, a tightly knit scene, and from an outsider’s perspective, it was refreshing to see.”

But just as memorable about his months in Nebraska were the times Yorn spent exploring the highways alone. “After we laid down tracks, there was a lot of down time,” Yorn said. “I like to go on drives. I had a car and drove around for hours, exploring the area.

“One time I was driving in the middle of the day and heading south. I was on my cell phone talking to someone in New York and became distracted. I looked around and thought ‘Where the hell am I?’ I was surrounded by cornfields. I love getting lost in cornfields.”

Yorn said for Saturday night’s show, expect to hear not only songs off the “Black album,” but from his full catalogue, including his landmark first album, musicforthemorning after. “When I go see a band and they play 20 songs I’ve never heard before, I think, ‘What the fuck is this?’ I’m not interested in doing that. It’ll be a balanced show. I’m excited to see what the catalyst in every room will be. There are always different people yelling different shit. I love it when people yell at me.”

Pete Yorn plays with Ben Kweller & The Wellspring, Saturday, Feb. 19, at Whiskey Roadhouse at The Horseshoe Casino, 2701 23rd Avenue, Council Bluffs. Showtime is 8 p.m. Tickets are $25. For more information, visit horseshoecouncilbluffs.com.

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Some extra copy that didn’t make it into the Pete Yorn feature:

Just the night before our interview, Yorn stood alone on stage at Carnegie Hall in Manhattan playing a solo acoustic version of “Rockin’ in the Free World” at a Neil Young tribute concert that also featured, among others, J Mascis, Glen Hansard, Jakob Dylan, Shawn Colvin and Patti Smith.

“Evan Dando and Juliana Hatfield did ‘Cinnamon Girl,'” Yorn said. “Both played Gibson SG electric guitars, it was really cool.”

What made Yorn’s performance particularly special was the song choice. “(Rockin’ in the Free World) was the first song I ever really sang in front of a band,” he said, adding that prior to that he sat behind a drum kit. “They coaxed me out front to sing. I was 15 years old in a talent show in New Jersey where I grew up. So it was coming full circle.”

Yorn also talked about what he’s been doing since finishing his last record: “I’ve been working on something loose over at a buddy’s house, a covers record,” he said. “It’s a palette cleanser for me to explore other songs and reinterpret them. We got 10 songs worked out. I don’t know what I’m going to do with it, but it’s fun.”

And he talked about his flight from Omaha after the Mogis sessions ended. “I drove cross country back home on  Halloween,” Yorn said. “I listened to The Shining book all the way through Colorado. I was driving through the mountains listening to The Shining.” It doesn’t get much spookier than that.

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Everything points to strong opening-week numbers for Bright Eyes’ The People’s Key. Mike Fratt, who runs Homer’s Music, said his stores sold a total of 76 copies of the recording yesterday — 45 CDs and 31 LPs. Fratt also said the The People’s Key was the No. 1 seller at indie retailers yesterday. A glance at the iTunes Store shows The People’s Key charting at No. 7 on its albums list. And yesterday Amazon began offering an mp3 download of the album for just $3.99 — a price point that helped catapult Arcade Fire’s The Suburbs to the No. 1 spot on the Billboard charts for its first week of sales.

Hurting Bright Eyes’ quest for the top Billboard spot, however, are strong sales by artists who performed on Sunday night’s Grammy broadcast. “The grammy spike is REAL big this year,” Fratt said. In fact five of the six spots above The People’s Key on the iTunes top-sellers list are all Grammy performers (Mumford and Sons currently sits at the top).

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Tomorrow: Tennis

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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 © 2011 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

Column 309: Here it comes, that heavy love…

CD Review: Bright Eyes, The People’s Key

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Bright Eyes, The People's Key (Saddle Creek, 2011)

Bright Eyes’ new album, The People’s Key, comes out Feb. 15 on Saddle Creek Records. Conor Oberst’s publicist tells me that the band, which had just started rehearsals, has put all press inquiries on hold for the time being. Maybe when Bright Eyes gets ready for his June 4 show at WestFair we’ll get Conor’s perspective on the album, but until then, you’ll have to settle for mine in this review.

NPR.org, who has been streaming the album in its entirety for the past few weeks, came right out of the gate declaring it the “best record Bright Eyes has ever made. In fact, it’s the best record the band’s frontman, Conor Oberst, has ever been a part of.” Only time will prove if NPR is right, though I don’t know how you could declare any album as being an artist’s “best.” It might be your favorite, but “best”? Come on…

I will say this: I like The People’s Key much more than Oberst’s last solo album and his Monsters of Folk material, and that’s somewhat concerning to me as I’ve always said that all this talk about this being “Bright Eyes final album,” was pure silliness since Bright Eyes at its core is Oberst. However, there’s no denying that Oberst is a different man when it comes to Bright Eyes. From both a musical and lyrical standpoint, Bright Eyes records just hold together better, like reading a great novel as compared to a collection of short stories. The thematic essence of Bright Eyes albums is more consistent and, well, satisfying than what he’s produced under his solo banner.

The album keeps with the Bright Eyes tradition of starting with a spoken-word audio clip. For Cassadaga, Bright Eyes’ last album, it featured a (presumably) big-haired southern woman talking about spiritual centers that attract “believers,” like the Florida town the album was named after. This time it’s “Shamanic” vocalist Denny Brewer of the band Refried Icecream doing an L. Ron Hubbard-esque spiel about spaceships and lizard men at the beginning of the world. Brewer occasionally sticks his head in between songs, sounding like Will Ferrell imitating Harry Caray. For long-time fans, this eccentric touch is part of what you come to a Bright Eyes album for, though later on you’ll find yourself figuring out ways to cut out those opening two and a half minutes so you can get right to the first song.

In this case, that song is “Firewall,” a simple melody draped in dread built upon a sinister, circular electric guitar line. Oberst spits out his vision of talking ravens and artificial theme parks before getting to his own artificial reality and his escape from it via jump ropes and slit wrists. Breaching the “firewall” opens the melody to the glorious heavens, before it comes back down.

If there’s a theme that ties the album together its Oberst’s dwelling on the inevitability of death. Every song has an allusion to death or dying, a theme approached now with resignation, though it’s something (based on earlier Bright Eyes material) that Oberst figured out long ago.

That theme is most obvious on the album’s ultimate downer number, “Ladder Song,” with its subtle opening lines:

No one knows where the ladder goes

You’re gonna lose what you love the most

You’re not alone in anything

You’re not unique in dying

Mournful piano and Conor at his most quivering. In the old days, this would have been a song about a broken heart or a strung-out night spent in Manhattan. My how things change as you get older. And unlike, say, Prince’s song about a ladder, there’s no salvation or hope at the end of this one. About to turn 31, Conor seems too young to be dwelling on death, but then again, there were those who wondered if he’d even live to see 30.

The People’s Key might be Bright Eyes’ most consistent album from a songcraft perspective. There is a straightforward quality here that is undeniable; everything seems self-contained, pulled together and kept from going on tangents. The end product is an even line from beginning to end. Predictable, and for a lot of music-goers, that can be very satisfying.

But there is something missing. On every other Bright Eyes album, there was one perfect moment that jumped off the disc, unique and demanding a rewind, the perfect song for the mix tape. From I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning it was “Lua.” From Cassadaga it was “I Must Belong Somewhere.” From Lifted, it was “Nothing Gets Crossed Out” and “Lover I Don’t Have to Love” and “Bowl of Oranges” and  “You. Will. You. Will? You. Will? You. Will?” and “Waste of Paint” — a song that you can’t turn off or skip over after it’s begun.

I’ve been listening to this album for a couple weeks and that song hasn’t jumped up and waved its arms at me yet. Maybe it will later, I don’t know. Maybe it’s more than I should expect.

That’s the thing about Bright Eyes albums. Those of us who have followed the band since the days when Conor wore glasses expect every release to be a masterpiece. And maybe that’s what separates Oberst’s solo work from his Bright Eyes efforts — that he and cohorts Mike Mogis and Nate Walcott also approach each album as if it were something more than just a collection of songs.

Time will tell if The People’s Key was a just a collection of songs or a “masterpiece” or a “best” or just a favorite. Right now it’s just a good album.

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So my rating for The People’s Key is a firm “Yes.” Let me echo Omaha World Herald music guy King Kevin Coffey and ask, “Will it top the Billboard charts when it’s released next week?” I don’t see much standing it its way. There are new ones coming out by Sonic Youth (Hey, MAHA, now there’s a band to consider), P.J. Harvey, Mogwai and Drive-By Truckers, none of which are a threat to Conor and Co.

It doesn’t take much anymore to top the charts. Decemberist’s awesome The King Is Dead was a Billboard No. 1 only needing to move 94,000 copies during its debut week to mount the summit. It helps when the mp3 download is only $7.99 at Amazon (or in Arcade Fire’s case, as low as $3.99 during its release week). How low will The People’s Key be offered on Amazon (or iTunes)? If it’s a $3.99 download, look out.

But what do I know about the music business? When it comes to these sorts of discussions, I always turn to Mike Fratt, who runs Homer’s Records. Mike is more skeptical. He doesn’t think The People’s Key will top the charts. “Because the Soundscan week includes the Valentine’s weekend (historically a good week for music sales) and the week post-Grammys (2/13) I don’t think Bright Eyes will hit No. 1,” Fratt said. “I do think it will achieve top 5, but at a lower number than 2007’s Cassadega.”

He thinks Arcade Fire, Mumford & Sons, Eminem, Taylor Swift and Katy Perry all will chart higher than People’s Key, helped along by Grammy performances. “Looking at this week’s Soundscan, Conor & Co. may have to generate at least 30 to 35(000) to make top 5,” Fratt said. “I’d be surprised if they make that, although the album sounds good.”

Cassadaga logged in at No. 4 on the Billboard charts with first-week sales at just slightly north of 58,000. And 11,000 of those sales were digital downloads — around 19 percent. If Amazon offers The People’s Key at $3.99, you could see downloads grab a bigger percentage this time ’round.

Fratt predicts total first-week sales to be around 27,000, and he hopes a ton of those are bought at Homer’s, where they’re guaranteeing the album will be in stock through Feb. 27. “We bought a lot, but if we run out (Saddle Creek) will drop some off vs. us having to reorder through ADA or a one stop.  CD = $9.99  LP = $19.99! through 2/27.” Get your ass to Homer’s, people.

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Pitchfork reported yesterday that Titus Andronicus has been added to a few Bright Eyes dates, which should make for an entertaining evening considering how Titus frontman Patrick Stickles’s vocals are forever being compared to Conor Oberst’s vocals. Here’s what Stickles told me last September when I asked him about the Oberst comprisons:

“I’ll tell you because you rep the Omaha readership,” Stickles said. “I think it’s a little short-sighted. The constant comparisons to anyone gets old, even if it’s Jesus Christ. Doesn’t everyone want to be themselves? Don’t we all want to blaze our own trail, though I know this is rock and roll, and there’s not too much under the sun? But it seems kind of like, uh, cheapening slightly to say that if you’ve heard one guy you can pretty much guess what this guy is going to sound like. After awhile it feels like a feedback loop, a house of mirrors, like sometimes (reviewers) get these things to sound so similar that I’m reading reviews of other reviews. But maybe that’s me being a self-righteous, entitled type. Even if it were true, is it helpful? Who’s to say? It’s not in my control. As I put my art out into the world, it’s out of my hands. History will judge.”

It will indeed.

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It’s going to be cold outside but oh so hot inside The Slowdown tonight for Interpol. Opening is School of Seven Bells, who came through The Waiting Room last September. Here’s the review from that show:

The best moments came when guitarist Benjamin Curtis was allowed to run wild run free. His tone was amazing; it reminded me of every great soaring guitar solo of ’80s post-New Wave/dream rock era. The Deheza sisters sounded like what you’d imagine Azure Ray would sound like fronting a dance band. Unfortunately, too often the vocals were buried in the mix and sounded limp, like an afterthought. As with the opener, the sound would have benefited from more bottom end (no bass again). The 70 or 80 people on hand spent the night huddled by the stage, but few if any danced, except for one girl who spent the evening with her arms in the air. Maybe that’s why they didn’t come out for an encore after their 45 minute set concluded. A pity. I could have listened to them for another hour.

Get there early and get out of the cold. See you at the show…

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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 © 2011 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

Interpol's Sam Fogarino

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Here’s some extra credit that didn’t make it into last week’s Interpol feature.

So where exactly was Interpol drummer Sam Fogarino when I spoke to him a few weeks ago over the phone?

“I’m in my studio in Athens, Georgia. I’ve been working with a band called Twin Tigers that hails from Athens as well. We took them on tour with us this past summer, and I’ve been helping them track and mix their new EP.”

Twin Tigers started in 2007 when Matthew Rain and Aimee Morris were working at Grit, Michael Stipe’s restaurant in Athens. Athens must be a small, small town because everyone there seems to have run into Stipe at some point in their lives (Six Degrees of Michael Stipe?). Anyway, the band has released its previous material on Old Flame Records; and I remember seeing them at SXSW last year at the temporary tent club known as Emo’s Annex (across from Emo’s, of course). The four-piece all wore white T shirts and sounded like soaring indie rock, with an undercurrent of shoegaze and an extra helping of Jesus and Mary Chain.

“Twin Tigers were friends first,” Fogarino said of their relationship. “My wife discovered them on Myspace and turned me onto them.” It was only a matter of time before Fogarino ran into the band. “Athens is the size of a dime. I met them just before we decided to take them on the road (with Interpol). Matthew (Rain) approached me outside of a record store. He had a copy of The Cars’ Candy-O under his arm that he was buying for a friend.”

After the tour, Twin Tigers were invited into Fogarino’s private studio that he shares with a business partner. “The challenge is to capture their live essence on recording when there’s really nothing live about about the recording process,” Fogarino said. “I thought I could tap into that energy and abandon, and bring a sense of empathy to the process.”

Plus he wanted to help out the starving artists. “They’re a young band and they don’t have a budget to record,” Fogarino said. “They’re friends and we have respect on a musical level. So the proverbial clock isn’t ticking during these sessions; they don’t have to worry because they only have an hour left.”

But that said, Fogarino doesn’t want to turn the sessions into a “My Bloody Valentine-type thing. It’s a four-song EP. We’ll get back from touring at the same time and spend a week together and get it done.”

So how does working on a project like Twin Tigers translate to Interpol? Fogarino, who has also played with Swervedriver frontman Adam Franklin in the band Magnetic Morning, said it’s impossible to not bring something back to the table. “There’s always a new recording technique or just an observation on how something is done,” he said. “It kind of makes going back home, let’s say, a lot more refreshing. You got a chance to stray for a little while and then return when you’re comfortable.”

With Twin Tigers “they don’t feel that I’m being this bigshot that’s telling them how it is,” Fogarino said, adding that his role as a sort of mentor involves passing along anecdotes about his early days with Interpol. “Interpol has a great sense of integrity in terms of how we handled our success, so to speak” he said. “But every now and again you find yourself bitching about superficial shit and I think back to Twin Tigers, working in a vegetarian restaurant and having to find someone to cover their shift. It provides an interesting sense of reality.”

I don’t need to tell you that Interpol’s show tomorrow night at The Slowdown has been sold out for weeks. It’s worth it to try to scrounge up some tickets if you have a chance. They’ll be bringing their arena show to one of the smallest venues they’ll be playing on this tour, and it’s bound to be spectacular.

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Bright Eyes announced that it’s playing at WestFair Amphitheater in Council Bluffs June 4 with Jenny and Johnny. The $25 tickets go on sale this Saturday. I thought for sure Bright Eyes was going to be the MAHA Music Festival headliner, but not anymore… Now what, MAHA?

Speaking of Bright Eyes, the new issue of Rolling Stone arrived at my doorstep today, and The People’s Key is the featured CD review. The 3-1/2 star review by Jon Dolan concludes with: “He manages to be everything at once: folkie and punk, old soul and eternal boy, high-plains drifter and hipster heartthrob. He’s busy being born again every time he strums a chord.” Read the whole thing online here.

So far the album has received a rating of “90” from review-site aggregator Album of the Year (here).

My review of The People’s Key goes online tomorrow.

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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 © 2011 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

It was only a matter of time before we got the first Bright Eyes song from the new album, The People’s Key, and here it is, “Shell Games.” In various interviews over the past few days, Conor Oberst has been saying that he’s walking away from the played out indie/Americana/folk sound of his past two solo albums for a new rock sound, and for the most part, that’s exactly what he’s done. You’d never mistake this song for Americana. But then again, it isn’t exactly a “rock song,” either. It does, however, sound distinctively Bright Eyes-like, and that’s a welcome sign of things to come. The song feels like something that could have come from Cassadaga, but with the heavy synths toward the end of the track, there are some overtones of Digital Ash in a Digital Urn (an album that got lost beneath the shadow of I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning and marketing that stressed its “modern sound.” But with songs like “Take It Easy (Love Nothing)” and “Gold Mine Gutted,” Digital Ash still holds up as one of Bright Eyes’ better albums). This Pitchfork link also includes the album art for The People’s Key, and unless my eyes deceive me, it’s the work of Zack Nipper, who took home a Grammy for the Cassadaga album sleeve. The paper cut-out-style design and color scheme is reminiscent of the gorgeous art Zack did for the Every Day and Every Night EP.

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Tonight at The Barley St., it’s a different kind of Space Oddity when Kyle Harvey hosts the First Annual Merry Christmas From Outer Space. Join Kyle and his fellow space aliens as they celebrate the release of his new holiday album. Songs include “Crop Circle Christmas,” “Happy Birthday Baby Jesus, Merry Christmas Alf,” and “Baby, It’s Cold In Space.” “Come dressed as spacemen, astronauts, aliens, men in black, Santa Claus, or any other galactic or holiday themed gear and receive free admission!” How can you beat that? Show starts at 9.

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Kudos to the fine folks at Silicon Prairie News for today’s shout out. No one in town covers Fast Company-style, next-generation entrepreneurial business quite like those guys. Keep it up, gentlemen. (And yes, Kurt Anderson would call this “logrolling in our times,” but at least it’s heartfelt).

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Tomorrow we take another trip down memory lane with a feature on Slowdown Virginia and Polecat, just in time for Thursday night’s big reunion show…

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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 © 2010 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.