CD Giveaway: Midlake’s “The Courage Of Others”
Posted on February 7, 2010 at 3:16 pm | No Comments
After a wait of nearly four years since their breakthrough full-length, “The Trials of Van Occupanther”, Midlake returned with last Tuesday’s arrival of their third album, “The Courage of Others”
Though I was immediately impressed upon Van Occupanther’s release, it did take awhile for its magic to truly charm me, so I’m hesitant to judge this new one too quickly. It has the disadvantage of increased expectations, and if you come looking for the catchier, more upbeat side of the band (a la signature song, “Roscoe“), you’ll have to look elsewhere. The hooks here are subtler, more drawn out… sometimes hard to find at all. “The Courage Of Others” is a drastically moodier affair – the band takes a fair amount of risk within the sonic box they’ve placed themselves in.
During the long wait for the album I wondered, given that every review of their previous one mentioned the same 70’s touchstones (Fleetwood Mac, Fairport Convention, etc), if the band took so long in an over-thought effort to reinvent themselves. Well, the answer is very simply no, but they’ve definitely gone darker and deeper, and are taking hits for it. For every band that tries too hard to change up their formula and fails hard, there are those that work within what they know (and what many love them for) to craft a worthy follow-up. I think that’s where Midlake is at, coming up with a collection of songs that is just different enough from its predecessor to avoid redundancy, yet still rub a few followers the wrong way.
Thanks to the folks at Filter, I’ve got a couple copies of Midlake’s “The Courage of Others” on CD to hand out to ‘Nac readers. If you reside in the continental U.S., drop an email to giveaways [at] bradleysalmanac [dot] com entitled “MIDLAKE” before this coming Friday, February 12th at 9am. I’ll fire up the randomizer and pick two winners that day, then get in touch for mailing addresses.
As the ceaseless (and increasingly rapid) consume/judge/move-on cycle that is today’s internet-music-review-machine chews new albums up and spits ’em out, I look forward to spending the rest of the winter letting this one sink in, and to Midlake’s April 9th stop in Boston near the end up their upcoming U.S. tour. I remember very distinctly their visit to TT the Bears back in 2006, playing first of three bands, and how enamored I was of their live set. They headlined both the Middle East Upstairs and then the Paradise the following year, but haven’t been back since. (and thanks to Kevin in the comments for setting me straight on those headlining gigs, both of which I missed. The ‘Nac intern responsible for fact-checking has been sacked)
Stream “The Courage Of Others” over at NPR, and if you’re in the Boston area, stop by Newbury Comics, where I picked up the CD for a measly $7.99 (with a sticker on the front that ironically included previous praise from P4K). A nice surprise? Finding an insert inside with a download code for bonus track “Rose Of Dawn” (which easily measures up to the rest of the album) and a hi-res quicktime file of the Jason-Lee-directed teaser film above. Which could be looked at as an attempt to culturally balance out his work in the Chipmunk films.
Future Faves? Upcoming 2010 album releases…
Posted on January 27, 2010 at 12:25 pm | No Comments
As far as my ears are concerned, yesterday was the first major multi-album new music release day of 2010, so it’s past time for my annual list of what I’m looking forward to in the months ahead. I’ve included albums with solid dates, some with ballpark estimates, a few that are mere whispers on the wind. Oh, and a couple of pure fantasies. A boy can dream, can’t he?
Keep in mind, this is not even close to a comprehensive rundown of what’s supposed to be coming out – just the stuff I have high hopes for. If it’s not on here, I’m either apathetic at best or totally unaware. That said, go ahead and let me know what you’re looking forward to this year, and any guesses you have at surprises that might show up down the road…
(note: Labels and release dates are U.S.-centric. And when available, label name links will send you to pre-order info for each album. So, y’know, go ahead and do that. I’ve also made all the MP3s linked here available in one handy .zip file, linked at the bottom.)
JANUARY 2010
[MP3] “The Space You Know“
[Stream] the entire album at Drowned In Sound
[MP3] “Hide It Away“
[Stream] the entire album
[MP3] “Blame Love“
[MP3] “Norway“
[MP3] “Romance Is Boring“
FEBRUARY 2010
[MP3] “Rulers, Ruling All Things“
[Stream] The album at NPR
[Watch] album teaser trailer
[MP3] “Falling From The Sun“
[Feb. 9th on Moon Jaw Records]
[Feb. 16th on Kelp Records]
[MP3] “Two Twenty Twos“
[Feb. 23rd on How is Annie Records/Norway]
[MP3] “To Sit Down Or To Follow, So I Follow“
[MP3] “Measure“
[MP3] “Repulsion“
[MP3] “The Motion Makes Me Laugh“
[MP3] “Black Eyes“
[Stream] the album at Merge
MARCH 2010
[March 1st on Fat Cat Records]
[Video] “Nothing Like You“
[MP3] “Good Morning“
[download code available at 3/6 Great Scott show / possibly vinyl later]
[MP3] “You Ruined My Election
[Video] For title track “Age Of Denial“
[Stream] New songs on MySpace
[MP3] “Even Heroes Have To Die“
[March 9th on Columbia/Sony]
[Video] “The High Road
[MP3] “Promises“
[March 16th on Bar/None]
[MP3] “Fifteen
[Download] a free Christmas song @ SPC
[MP3] “Kungen“
[Video] “Deny All“
[Stream ] “Boy Lilikoi” on his site
[MP3] “Horse Warriors“
[MP3] “Ayisa Abyss“
The V3 are Peter Buck, Scott McCaughey, & Bill Reiflin, and album guests include
Johnny Marr, Nick Lowe, Egyptian/Soft Boy Morris Windsor & John Paul Jones
[MP3] “We Are the Men You’ll Grow to Love Soon“
[Video] “We Are the Men You’ll Grow to Love Soon“
[Available on March 25th at shows]
[Stream] “Enjoy The Silence” (Depeche Mode/home demo)
[March 30th on Cooking Vinyl]
[In March? on their own PeMa label]
[Watch] “When I Still Have Thee” (new song, live acoustic)
[Watch] live videos of three other new ones
APRIL 2010
(vinyl resissues/remastered) [April 6th on Kill Rock Stars]
[April 6th on Sargent House]
[Video] album teaser
[MP3] “King of Spain“
[April 16 on Bombora/MGM]
[Stream] “Cylinders” on their site
[Download] New song “Odessa” in exchange for your email addy
[MP3] “Heaven’s On Fire“
MAY 2010
[May 4th on Arts & Crafts, I assume]
[May 18th on Casa Nuevo]
[Download] free MP3 with email addy and code ‘paris’
Elsewhen in twenty-ten…
[June on Own Records]
[MP3] Download a demo
[“Early 2010” on Killer Pimp / 7″ available now]
[MP3] “But It’s So
[“Early 2010” on Killer Pimp / 7″ available now]
[MP3] “Someday
[Stream] full album with a Strange Angels membership
[MP3s] Download demos at CASH Music
[Spring on Rock Action Records]
[Watch] “Burning” teaser trailer
[Download] “2 Wrongs Make 1 Right“ live MP3 w/email address
[Stream] rough mix of new song “Neither Nor” on Myspace
[June 7th on Odd Box Records/UK]
“Bass Ackwards” and “Great Speeches From A Dying World”
[Download] new song “Greyhounds in the Slips” in exchange for your email addy
Optimistically on the way…
And in my dreams…
(hey, we got Liz Fraser‘s return recently, so why not?)
[DOWNLOAD]: A 135MB .zip file of all the MP3s linked above.
Ok, so sound off in the comments with what I missed, what you care about, and what you’re hoping for in 2010…