Unamplified sing-along from last night; I was photographing for Brooklyn Vegan. They’re super young sisters from Sweden, and like all Swedes, they love Bright Eyes. When they first got noticed by doing you tube covers of Fleet Foxes, they were 18 and 15 respectively.

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So far as it can inferred from the sound of “Dancing Behind My Eyelids”, which you can trade for your email address on the band’s website, and “They Made Frogs Smoke Til They Exploded”, which now has an animated video, the new Mum is sounding cheerful. This, considering the album they gave us last, Summer Make Good, was not quite a summer album (if one were to make a quick, misguided guess from the title). Instead, it stretched with mournful longings, drawing pictures of dark clouds, icy water and a harsh, winter landscape. And as if the album’s dreary weather wasn’t obvious, song titles such as “Small Deaths are the Saddest” and “Weeping Rock, Rock” served as reassurances. But for now, from the upcoming Go Go Smear the Poison Ivy that comes out on September 24, something far brighter.

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Mum is playing two Wordless Music Series dates in New York, on Nov 9 and 10th.

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Engine Room Recordings hosted a contest to mark the upcoming release of a compilation featuring “15 acclaimed underground artists covering their favorite guilty pleasure pop tunes”. They are now showing winning videos and other entries at YouTube, film student Andy Cahill emerging victorious with his stop-motion piece for Devendra Banhart’s rendition of “Don’t Look Back In Anger” by Oasis. This and other two other songs revealed by way of the videos – Petra Haden’s cover of Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin” and Will Oldham‘s cover of Mariah Carey‘s “Can‘t Take That Away” – surely hint at Guilt by Association being an interesting take on guilty pleasure pop tunes. Launch parties will be hosted in various cities, including two in New York: August 21 at Pianos and September 7th, “the big launch” following September 4 release, at Joe’s Pub.
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Photo: Delgoff

Many Beirut shows have closed with a cover of Kocani Orkestar’s “Siki Siki Baba”. Here frontman Zach Condon performs a truly “ramshackle” version with the Orkestar itself. I was reminded of my favorite version – from Kocani’s album Alone at My Wedding – during a second viewing of Borat.

More from La Blogotheque

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After playing Irving Plaza summer dates, Australia’s Architecture in Helsinki will be “returning” to New York for two fall dates: October 11 at The Gramercy Theatre and October 12 at Studio B (most members seem to have settled down as Brooklyn residents anyway). La Blogotheque recently teamed up with the band for another accidental occupation of apartments in Paris, this time even borrowing electricity from one kitchen. On a previous occasion it was members of Holland’s Alamo Race Track performing from small balconies of a Parisian building. They, too, will be playing New York: this Thursday, August 2nd, as part of the showcase series hosted by NME at the Annex.

Download “Northern Territory” (from Black Cat John Brown)

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Practice it for this event:
08.09 – Daft Punk, The Rapture, Sebastian, Kavinsky / Keyspan Park (tix)

It’s taken me some time to get to Mirrored, the much talked-about album from Battles on Warp Records. Thankfully, I’ve also been oblivious to much of the hype (hate the hype, not the band, I say). The foursome will be playing Studio B on July 20, but I might miss that for Bishop Allen over at Seaport Music Festival, where Battles will be playing an August 31 date. Animal Collective, Danielson and XXX Change from Spank Rock are kicking the fest, which happens to be one of my favorites this summer, off today.

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Bowerbirds was a treat to watch at Bowery Ballroom, when they opened for Ladybug Transistor and The Rosebuds last night. The sound that is captured in their recordings is even more elegant live, and the performance reaffirmed the fine quality of Phil Moore’s and Beth Tacular’s voices. It was a soothing set faithful to the recordings, rarely interrupted by any talking. “In Our Talons,” with its energetic chorus, was beautifully rendered. Friend Mark Paulson was also present, switching between bass drum and violin (Beth switched between bass drum and accordian). For the last song they played “Dark Horse,” and two members of the Rosebuds came out to sing the exiting refrain. Almost half the space had filled up through their early set, but it shouldn’t be long till Bowerbirds plays to a devoted audience.

Alex Delivery video and other curious incidents after the jump.

“Reform the Countryside”

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The talkative Carey Mercer may be a goofball in between songs, saying “the woman wants more of my vocals” when drummer Melanie Campbell, his wife, asked for it on her monitor. But when he performs, it’s as if he’s possessed: singing like his voice was a fireball spit out of his mouth, and convulsing when he’s on the guitar. She, on the other hand, drummed without the slightest change on her face.

Union Hall’s performance area is on the small side, and the conversations amongst the attendants are usually audible during song breaks. Somewhere in the second half of the set, we all heard a woman’s urgent voice, “Are you kidding me?” I thought, “that’s rude,” but apparently a drunk person had accidentally thrown up on his neighbor, who had, in response, punched the puking drunkard in the face. Carey Mercer asked for updates from the stage- someone reported there was a knife fight. “I consider this a disruption,” he said, and waited to be told the troublemakers had been escorted out. “New York is getting tough again,” he observed, and continued: “Hey, there’s a knife fight going on there, but we’re going to play another song… too-doo-doo too-doo-doo…”

When Frog Eyes announced they had come to their last song, there was a chorus of “Nooo”. Carey suggested, “If you guys leave this room and pay again to get in, we’ll play another… Do you know how expensive putting together this show was?” To this a woman in the audience sincerely said, “Oh, fuck off. Are you kidding me?” The bassist had a joke to make: pointing to the ancient carpet on the stage, he said: “This magic carpet here didn’t get us to New York City.” Then Carey conceded with a chuckle, “Yes, we are kidding.”

The songs were mostly from the newest album Tears of the Valedictorian, including “Idle Wild,” “Stockades,” “Evil Energy the Ill Twin of,” “Reform the Countryside” and “Bushels” (the real last song they included for free). “One in Six Children Will Flee in Boats” was one of the older ones, though there were also a couple even newer than Valedictorian.

Part-time Frog Eyes member Spencer Krug of Wolf Parade was absent. I missed Chris Garneau, but caught the last two songs from Alex Delivery’s set. Some photos later.

Alex Delivery

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“Fractured Skies”

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(My audio setting was a little off, ignore the distortion)