Despite its return to an indie label (Original Signal) after a two-album stint with RCA, New York City’s Longwave continues to record some of the finest mellow and atmospheric alt-rock around. (Read our review of last year’s Secrets Are Sinister.) Currently supporting Bloc Party on its North American tour, the band is releasing a video for infectious [...]
Leave it to a musicologist to assemble this year’s stylistic Frankenstein: The Decemberists’ bookish leader Colin Meloy has long pledged his fealty to the ‘60s British folk revival, having recorded a tour-only EP consisting of nothing but Shirley Collins obscurities; a few previous releases (2006’s rock opera The Crane Wife; 2004’s The Tain EP, a [...]
Most SXSW festivalgoers fled Austin on Sunday. MAGNET’s Mitch Myers stuck around an extra day to survey the wreckage and try to remember what happened over the weekend. Well, I’ve finally wrapped up my 10 days of SXSW action, and boy, are my feet tired. Thank goodness MAGNET scribe Corey duBrowa did most of the [...]
Josie Cotton may have stolen the prom scene in a cult-classic film (1983′s Valley Girl, singing new-wave hit “Johnny, Are You Queer?”), but she never committed such cinematic high-camp crimes as found in vintage b-movies. Each day this week, Cotton surveys one of her favorite films and offers a song from her latest album, Invasion Of The B-Girls. [...]
They’re nobody’s buzz bands anymore. But since 1993, MAGNET has discovered and documented more great music than memory will allow. The groups may have broken up or the albums may be out of print, but this time, history is written by the losers. Here are some of the finest albums that time forgot but we [...]
Ever wonder what will happen during the last five minutes of late-night TV talk shows? They let musicians onstage! Here are tonight’s notable performers: The Tonight Show With Jay Leno (NBC): PJ Harvey & John Parish The Daily Show With Jon Stewart (Comedy Central): Bruce Springsteen Last Call With Carson Daly (NBC): Chris Cornell What’s [...]
We have a little secret for you, but you can’t tell anyone: MAGNET really likes Robert Pollard. You might even call us big fans, if that means compulsively collecting all of the 12,000 records the man has put out over the course of the last 22 years—on every format they were released on. (Yes, we [...]
MAGNET’s friend Roob (you’d know him if you saw him) was a Yes man until he took a trip to Chronic Town in 1982. He’s left the city limits since then, but now he’s back to inform you of the five most overrated and five most underrated R.E.M. songs. I was 23 years old when [...]
Let’s just say that things got a little lonely last week for music journalists who weren’t in Austin for the South By Southwest festival. The phones stopped ringing. The mail crate was lighter than usual. Emails trickled in from PR interns. So when senior editor Matthew Fritch began receiving emails from ex-American Analog Set frontman [...]
Josie Cotton may have stolen the prom scene in a cult-classic film (1983′s Valley Girl, singing new-wave hit “Johnny, Are You Queer?”), but she never committed such cinematic high-camp crimes as found in vintage b-movies. Each day this week, Cotton surveys one of her favorite films and offers a song from her latest album, Invasion [...]
