Other Voices

Okay, enough downer posts from me. In the meantime...

• Maybe all you really want is a critical discussion of No Age, which seems to be the topic of the week. Start with Fluxblog, then Status Ain't Hood and Kiss Out the Jams, and finish up with Clap Clap. In that order.

• Tim Burrows gives a good primer on Jonathan Richman over at the Quietus.

• New blog the Adios Lounge gives a pretty thorough rundown of African-American soul artists who dabbled in country.

• The Guardian identifies a trend in music they'd like to call "Neu Kraut" (please don't!), writing up new bands like Holy Fuck and Fugiya & Miyaga while identifying the influences of Can, Neu!, and Harmonia, among others. I hadn't realized this was a new trend. Bands have been influenced by krautrock for a while. [via Largehearted Boy]

• A little debate has started up over at Idolator, in response to a post from Ryan Catbird about new business models for indie rock... I commented that I think this debate has officially crossed the line into a lot of noise about something far less complex than it's made out to be. If I have the energy and time I'll try to elaborate next week.

• And finally, I've been having a great time over at Star Maker Machine this week. The theme is "2:42," based on the post from the Morning News a couple weeks back about the ideal song length for a pop song. All of the SMM contributors have been mining gold this week, so check it out if you haven't already.