While Valentine's Day is a celebration of love for many worldwide, it is also a chance to reminisce about love lost. No one does it better than Dan Andriano, via this acoustic track off Alkaline Trio's first album Goddamnit, on Asian Man Records:
Alkaline Trio - Enjoy Your Day
For more info on Alkaline Trio, go to AlkalineTrio.com.
Earlier this week, Cloak And Dagger Media posted a wonderful feature on Bob Nanna, frontman of Hey Mercedes. In it, Bob discusses the meanings behind not only Hey Mercedes and City On Film [his solo project] songs, but also three of my most favorite Braid songs ever. I present those songs for you to download, courtesy of the fine folks at Cloak And Dagger Media:
Braid - (Strawberry Ann) Switzerland Braid - What A Wonderful Puddle Braid - Forever Got Shorter
For more info on Braid, click here, and to buy Movie Music, Volume One, the singles collection these three songs are taken from, click here.
Scott: So after all the insanity [and all the bad electronic music], Tom of Against Me! finally made it to his acoustic performance on WKDU. Sadly, most of us didn't get to hear it, but the awesome people at PunkUnited.com were able to record it and they passed it onto me. Now it's not the best quality [if anyone has a better recording, get in touch ASAP so I can post it!], but it's still a pretty cool 4-song set, including a brand new, as-yet-untitled song. You can download the whole set here. Enjoy!
UPDATE: We got a better set of MP3s from the show, thanks to users entrancedwedance and Greg Chaisson. If you've already downloaded, do it again, and if you haven't - what are you waiting for?!?
Adam: New to my list of "rad bands that have been around for years that I've been completely oblivious to": The BellRays. Musically inspired by MC5 styled garage punk coupled with the soulful vocals of Lisa Kekaula, the most amusing description I've found is "like a bus full of Motown recording artists being steamrolled by Black Flag." Last year the band released a singles collection titled Raw Collection on Uppercut Records. In the UK they've just put out an album titled Red, White & Black which as far as I can tell has not yet been released domestically. Here's a track from 2001's Grand Fury:
The BellRays - Fire On The Moon
Adam: They were in the top 3 on my Best of 2003 list yet I neglected to ever feature them as our MP3 of the Week. Here's a pair of demos from our tragically departed Exploding Hearts. The full length these ended up on was titled Guitar Romantic and was released last March by Dirtnap Records. RIP.
The Exploding Hearts - Rumours In Town (Demo) The Exploding Hearts - Throwaway Style (Demo)
And the mistakes continue. When deciding upon what EPs would make my Top 5 EPs of 2003 list [viewable here], I forgot to include what was one of the best of the year. Chicago's Colossal put out a stunning debut EP last January. The first two MP3s below are taken from that EP [reviewed here], and the last is taken from the Mailorder For The Masses comp, both on Asian Man Records:
Colossal - Embers Only Colossal - Brave The Elements Colossal - Table Settings
We all make mistakes. This time around, mine was not acknowledging the Rx Bandits' incredible new album, The Resignation, on my Top 20 of 2003 list at all. It was an enormous error on my part, and one which I hope to correct now. MP3s of "Sell You Beautiful" and "Falling Down The Mountain" have already been made available here and here, but instead of using those, I bring you my personal favorite track off the record:
Rx Bandits - Never Slept So Soundly
For more info on Rx Bandits, go to RxBandits.com.
Last week, I brought you a treasure trove of Christmas and holiday-themed punk rock songs. This week I have tried to duplicate the idea, by compiling as many New Years-related songs as I can possibly find.
There are not nearly as many.
But I still got a good baker's dozen or so, including tracks from Dismemberment Plan, The Lawrence Arms, Thursday, Death Cab For Cutie, Further Seems Forever, Cursive, The Casket Lottery, Waxwing, The Arrivals, and more! Download all of them for a primo New Years party mix at this link right here. And Happy New Year, from everyone at Punknews.org!
NOTE: If I'm missing any songs, please post them below and I'll do my best to find them and upload them. Posting more all the time, so keep checking it out!
Okay, here's the deal: For your Christmas/Chanukah/Kwanzaa/Festivus/whatever present, I am giving to you, my Punknews.org brethren, the largest single collection of punk Christmas songs in one place. Available for download are songs from Jimmy Eat World, Weezer, Atom & His Package, Brand New, The Vandals, Less Than Jake, Thrice, Flaming Lips, The Ataris, Goldfinger, Bad Religion, Josh and Eli Caterer [of Smoking Popes/Duvall], Dashboard Confessional, Gatsbys American Dream, Blink-182, and dozens more [including your new favorite holiday song, "Santa's Dead" by Gestalt]. To access these songs, simply click here and download to your heart's content. All the songs are uploading as we speak, but I didn't want to wait until the last one finished, so you can begin checking them out now. Keep checking back for more throughout the day!
NOTE: While a lot of these songs are random one-off compilation tracks and/or out of print, there are some full albums up here. I didn't make these available to screw over any artist's sales, so please, if you like what you hear, go out with your holiday gift cards you're accumulating or your Christmas bonus and pick up an album or two by the artist to keep supporting them.
NOTE 2: I didn't post all these MP3s up here to anger bands or labels, either - I'm simply trying to spread some cheer. If you are in or represent a band whose song I've made available for download and you object to it being there, please email me and I will remove it ASAP.
NOTE 3: Lastly, I must graciously thank Brad at Musatcha.com for the copious amounts of free webspace and Punknews.org user Scott for supplying me with the majority of these tracks. Please check out their websites and support them in whatever way you can, as well.
Sliced Bread is unfortunate in that they have a terrible band name, but fortunate in that they are making some really cool, dark, and original indie rock. Here are two songs culled from their self-released demo EP - they're rough production-wise, but plenty good in the talent department:
Sliced Bread - New Idea/Year Sliced Bread - You're Not A Tool
For more info on Sliced Bread, go to LoavesOfFun.com.
Aubin: It's weird really. I'm not a fan of Bright Eyes, but I did very much enjoy Connor Oberst's collaboration with Denver Dally (among others) in Desaparecidos [review]. Their Pinkerton-era Weezer inspired rock'n'roll was an wonderful mess of loud, energetic music. Soon, Jade Tree will be releasing Denver's full length release, Leave Your Name under the name Statistics. Electronic sounds, thick, driving guitars and catchy hooks a-plenty, it will be a definite highlight for next year.
Statistics - A Number, Not a Name Aubin: Since Scott is away today, here's another, completely different track for you guys to check out. People are calling this one of the best heavy releases since Calculating Infinity [review] and they might just be right. Taking pages from both Dillinger Escape Plan and Botch and yet sounding completely different, Burn By the Sun's The Perfect is the Enemy of the Good will impress all but the most jaded.
Burnt By the Sun - Forlani Adam: We just published our review of the Chunksaah's Sticks and Stones retrospective The Strife and Times here. Here's one of the tracks that the two CD set revisits. "The Lot" was from 1993's Theme Song For Nothing LP on Skene Records. This band was hugely influential in the early 90s New Jersey scene that included bands like Vision, Lifetime and The Bouncing Souls.
Sticks and Stones - The Lot