for a friday

beck - The Information: Beck brought back the beats with guero, and brought back some more with guerolito, but there still seemed to be some resounding lyrical malcontent leftover from the depressing sea change sessions. Here we have a return to beck's more lyrically playful side, beats intact, even on the slower numbers. Apparently if you buy the cd in stores, it comes with accopanying michael gondry directed videos for every song, and you can create your own cover art with stickers. Neat-o.

the killers - Sam's Town: Supposedly named after a casino from their home town of vegas, we see the band alledgedly shift from their duran duran influences to that of bruce springsteen a la 'born to run'. A lot of the songs seem to be about the melancholic pain of getting older, but it has a tough time coming accross as legit since these guys are still in their early 20's. The japanese version has two bonus tracks that you will never listen to since it's hard enough as it is to get through the rest of the album.

portastatic - Be Still Please: With superchunk pretty much dead in the water, longtime fans have to settle for mac's now full-time side project, portastatic. Up 'til now the output has been fairly average, perhaps highlighted by the upbeat sunniness of last summer's release, bright ideas. Over the years mac's falling outs with love and romance have morphed from searing angst into bittersweet sentimentality, mostly stomachable because you knew that his heartbreak came at the hands of his old bass player, the lovely laura balance. Who knows what he's going on about these days as the agonizing 'i'm in love (with arthur doyle)' seques horiffically into the next track which may as well be about getting your nuts clipped.

weird al yankovic - Straight Outta Lynwood: You gotta love satire. The more popular the target, the greater the laugh, and what greater target than popular music? Now, I may be biased after assigning weird al to the ranks of genious after being absolutely railed by his performance at the tabernacle years back, but he proves me right yet again, even though some of the spoofs are lost on me because I am not familiar with the source material. The required polka number is great (it includes 'pon de replay' amongst other notable pop radio staples), but the standout is the 11 minute opus, 'trapped in the drive through', which chronicles al and his girlfriend trying to decide what to eat then ordering food at the drive through. Watch the video for 'white & nerdy'.

joe lally - From Here to There: Fugazi bassist going it alone with mostly just bass and voice. It really makes you miss the rest of fugazi.

mercury rev - Stillness Breathes: Two disc set, the first is the "greatest hits" portion, and the second is a not complete collection of b-sides. Really only interested in filling in the tiny gaps in my mercury rev collection, the second disc was helpful, but not really a cohesive listen. Many of these are b-sides for a reason. Mercury neophites will do well to grab the first disc as a nice place to start.