We’ve got a raging atomic (for peace) hangover, but were revived upon seeing The National performing one our personal (literally) favorites off of Trouble Will Find Me, I Should Live In Salt unplugged for Gibson, Austin.  Check it out below.  Once again the Dessners showed up on appropriately-branded guitars.

Singer Matt Berninger had this to say about the song’s meaning  when interviewed by NPR in June:

“Tell us a little bit about the lyrics to “I Should Live in Salt.” 

“I write all the lyrics, and this one was sort of inspired — very much inspired — by my younger brother, Tom, who’s nine years younger than I am. And he was on my mind a lot while we were making this record because he was living with my wife and I at the time. Still — actually still does. So he was on my mind and in my house….We’re very different brothers. Whereas I might be kind of buttoned-up and ambitious, he’s more lax in his approach to the universe, I guess. We love each other a great deal, but there’s often a lot of conflict between the two of us.”

And there’s some fun imagery in one of the verses: “Can you turn the TV down? You should know me better than that.”

“The lyrics to that are like a bunch of little fragments of thoughts about him. And, truthfully, it’s about us actually getting to know each other as adults, because I went off to college when he was a little kid. He was 9 when I was 18 and went off to college, and then I moved to New York after that. And he kind of went his own — a different path.

“I felt a lot of guilt, because I think [he] needed an older brother the most when you start hitting your teens, and that’s when I sort of took off and disappeared on him a little bit. I mean, we’ve been close our whole lives. But then, when he came and joined us on the tour as a roadie, it was the first time we were spending a lot of time together as adults. And it was a big shift in our relationship and trying to figure out how to love each other and respect each other as adults — not just this much older-younger brother sibling dynamic. So the song kind of is a reflection on all of that.”

And you said you felt a little guilt, but the chorus is, “I should live in salt for leaving you behind.”

“Honestly, that was just kind of an abstract image or something in my head and I don’t know. I think Lot’s wife turned to salt when she looked back at the city. I think they used to pack bodies in salt. So there’s not specifically any meaning into it directly, but it seemed like a bad thing to have to live in salt. A lot of my lyrics are approximate meaning without me knowing why they sound right.”

Reminds us of some siblings we know.  Take good care of one another.

By the time you are reading this we will be ensconced in the pit at the majestic Santa Barbara Bowl to take in Atoms For Peace’s show in the smallest venue of their entire tour (and certainly the North American leg).  It’s also one of only 28 shows of their entire worldwide tour.  Expectations are running high given their last visit to our Bowl, which was our favorite concert of 2010 against seriously stiff competition.  We can’t wait to be newly impressed.

In case you aren’t fortunate enough to be in the Santa Barbara Bowl tonight, Atoms For Peace have given you a good option below.  You can watch their entire Austin City Limits Special Show this past Sunday at the Moody Theater in Austin (due to the ACLF rain-out).  Enjoy!

Here are the song times within the video below:  0:00:46 (Before Your Very Eyes) 0:08:03 (Default) 0:13:15 (The Clock) 0:18:08 (Ingenue) 0:24:34 (Unless) 0:30:36 (And It Rained All Night) 0:35:12 (Harrowdown Hill) 0:40:42 (Dropped) 0:46:13 (Cymbal Rush) 0:54:35 (Feeling Pulled Apart By Horses) 1:01:30 (Rabbit In Your Headlights) 1:07:00 (Paperbag Writer) 1:11:33 (Amok) 1:22:40 (Atoms For Peace) 1:28:00 (Black Swan).

Top photo by Johnny Thundercloud

We caught Arctic Monkeys at a sold out show in May at the comparatively tiny Ventura Theater before they later headlined at Glastonbury and took the world by storm with their new album AM.  They put on a ragingly rockin’ show in Ventura, and we were wowed not only by the band’s muscular music, but also by the ardor of their multiracial/multicultural fans. Who knows how these things happen, but we were heartened by the whole event.  We might selfishly prefer more Riot Van in the setlist and sound-mix, but the band has added a metal/hard-rock element that is obviously registering worldwide.  Last night the band showed up on the Jimmy Kimmel Live and played single Do I Wanna Know? and, available only online, another new album track R U Mine?  Watch both below as the audience eats it up.

Earlier this year, Brits Stornoway delivered their tour de force album Tales From Terra Firma, which is bound to be on our Best Albums of 2013 list.  In May the band toured around North America in support of the album, and their show at The Bootleg Theater was one of the highlights of the concert year thus far.

Stornoway has just announced the release of a new “mini-album” entitled You Don’t Know Anything.  You can listen to the new recording and order it below.  The band is obviously expanding upon its sound palette, and we like what we hear.

Afterwards, check out the band’s recently-released video for Farewell Appalachia, one of our favorite tracks from Tales From Terra Firma, and get out of your house and onto the trails.

Okkervil River has been overflowing the banks of our listening time, and their new album The Silver Gymnasium is the primary force majeure causing this quagmire (the three-song sequence of Down Down the Deep River, Pink-Slips and Lido Pier Suicide Car is the best of any album in recent memory).  While out on tour in support of the new album, the band was captured unplugged, performing three songs off of the new album by NPR.  Check it out below.  There will be comic-geeking and Petty-talk by leader Will Sheff.   And muted trumpets.  And brilliant lyricism and goodwill all around.  They play LA and SF on October 20th and 22nd, respectively.

Volcano Choir recently let us view an entire set of live music (via NPR) from their tour in support of new album Repave.   Now comes the band (via Pitchfork) performing song Comrade in an old tannery in their home state’s Milwaukee.  Watch below as the band gathers volume, eventually bleating and bellowing the song superbly.  As we’ve said repeatedly, we prefer the vocals of humans to machines.  But here, Justin Vernon (Bon Iver) applies heavy effects (vocoder), and the song still surmounts.  The song’s lyrics (your guess is as good as ours as to the meaning–sung to a drug-addled conservative friend/ex-friend?) follow the performance.

“Like i didn’t know it
choking on the pulp of it
Semper fi
you kept me on your long line
tugging in the whole time
keep shining on

and that silent head grip…
can’t do it no more

the honey bin
the bunny’s in
is telling you there’s a countdown
oh, damn your eyes

had that one a long time

sorting out the long pipe
hoping that the copper fits
make sure you stay oblivious

said that we could go back
said that we could go find
terra forming!
said that you were coke blind
drinking in dramnesic
tore out at the comrade

that’s a comrade, making a comrade offer

that Ticonderoga’s shit
made my mind and my heart all split up over
the floor of the jackpot
there’s a floor to the jackpot
where’do you rise???

you don’t even lie to me no more

‘ey say you ain’t a comrade
still, i’d know you’d come back
for a folly-ridden Romeo, you break down a fortress NOW
standing out in public
stained with your conscience

i know that you love me
you are just lawless, son

give it another fortnight
eye to eye the culprit
just rid the fucking pulpit
i ain’t giving you another full ride
underneath the combine
said it didn’t bump you right
habitual falling right?”

OK, so we’re the late show on this one.  We blame the season, long bike rides, playoff baseball (NOT football–please make it stop), dinners, shows, Top 10 all-time songwriter disputes with old friends, and the inability to stop listening to Chuck Prophet’s all-time stave-off-the-Fall song, Summertime Thing on repeat. And then there’s Okkervil River, and the evil that band’s albums (and especially the new Silver Gymnasium) has visited upon our leisure time.

Phew. Where were we? Oh yeah, Phosphorescent’s Matthew Houck knows a thing or two about covers, and picks them impeccably well. Late last week Phosphorescent’s label Dead Oceans released Phosphorescent’s cover on KCSN of Vampire Weekend’s Ya Hey, which Yahweh himself had to have had a hand in.  Listen below as Houck’s world-weary vocals mesh perfectly with delicate piano and subtle and pure female harmony to do the song justice, plus-one.

And then what the heck: kiss Fall off with Prophet’s Summertime Thing, which is top of our best-songs-capturing-summer’s-joys list (and has to be heard live to be fully appreciated). Jump into the river!

Anna Calvi annihilated us when we first heard her lofty musical aspirations.  Now comes Calvi and her new, critically-acclaimed album One Breath, released mere days ago.  Judging by the new musical breaths we’ve heard,  Calvi still has her sights set on higher planes.  To coincide with the new album, Calvi has released the official video for one of the show-stealers, Sing to Me, off One Breath. Check it out below. Fusing celestial strings with Calvi’s dramatic vocals, this song captures her perfectly. We are willing to give her at least two breaths. Maybe three.

Below the new video, watch/listen to two other songs off of One Breath.  Go buy the album now at the Calvi’s site linked above.  Calvi will embark in November on a short tour that will include UCLA’s Royce Hall and San Francisco’s Independent.  You can see all the dates HERE.

Anna Calvi – Sing To Me (Official Video) by domino

Top photo by Roger Deckker

We caught The Waterboys’ leader Mike Scott and violinist Steve Wickham at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass a week ago, and it was one of the highlights of HSB.  Once again we were reminded how much Mike Scott’s delivery always connects, and especially when enhanced by Wickham’s playing.  At HSB they played some of the band’s greats (Fisherman Blues, Raggle Taggle Gypsy, etc.), and left us wanting more.  After HSB, the band continued on their tour of North America and Europe, alighting in Portland after San Francisco.  While in Portland, they performed at KINK Radio.  For a good feel (and sample of Wickham’s playing), check out their performance of Mad As The Mist and Snow below.  If you want more of the KINK session, go HERE.

As we’ve written before, Kentucky’s Cage The Elephant has been wowing audiences for a while now, but especially since the release of their last album 2011’s Thank You, Happy Birthday.   Now comes the release of their new album, Melophobia.  To coincide, the band appeared last night on the Letterman Show and wowed Letterman (and us) with new flagship song Come a Little Closer.  Watch below as lead singer Matt Shultz get’s his Jagger on and the band gathers steam throughout.  And then watch Letterman deliver his uncaged praise.  And deservedly so.