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It's Magic
MP3 Blogs are Lovin' Spoon
Three new Best of 2005 (So Far) lists to mention - all loaded up with MP3s to steal - err - download (joking of course!). Both My Old Kentucky Blog and Kingblind give top honors to Spoon's Gimme Fiction while You Ain't No Picasso names the technically unreleased Sufjan Stevens album Illinois as its first pick. Also receiving praise on these lists: Low, Okkervil River (I really need to check this one out), The Hold Steady (good, but overrated IMO), Crooked Fingers, Eisley, The Decemberists and Tegan and Sara.
Also on the list tip: The Observer UK recommends their 10 House CDs to own. [via OutofRange]
Lost in the Bloc Party hubbub last week was a fine opening performance by Engineers. Free of unnecessary studio adornments, their songs showed unexpected muscle and bone. They reminded me how much I liked their Folly EP and how great music was lost under overproduction on the full length. If you haven't heard anything from Engineers yet, Insound has one of their best tracks, "Come In Out of the Rain" (MP3), available for download.
Thank god for Coldplay, System of a Down and Audioslave. They're saving rock! So says Rolling Stone.
Preview
I've been slacking and haven't picked up the new Kraftwerk live 2CD Minimum-Maximum yet, but it'll happen soon enough. Everyone who hears it seems to love it, and it's not even that expensive. (Too much new music these days!) I'll be just as excited for the Kraftwerk live DVD though. As you can tell from Jason's pictures, their June 1 show was as impressive visually as it was musically - it's impossible to separate the two in my mind. Though I never watch music DVD's much, this might be the one to buck the trend.
Alas there's no release date for the DVD yet. Astralwerks has three preview clips up on their site though. You can't match the quality of a DVD, but these samples are a nice taste:
"Numbers" - Real Audio: High / Low, Windows Media : High / Low
"The Robots" - Real Audio: High / Low, Windows Media : High / Low
"The Model" - Real Audio: High / Low, Windows Media : High / Low
You'd expect 30 second clips, but Astralwerks actually treated us well here with full songs - "Numbers" being the best of the three IMO. Now they just need to put out the rest!