As expected, Pitchfork posted a video of the Colbert bit in case you can't catch it tonight. Nothing is more awesome than Stephen Colbert saying "hyper-literate prog rock."

Brad K alerted me to this total freakish awesomeness: Stephen Colbert takes on the Decemberists. Should be rerun tonight at 7:30!

Here's a funny interview with the Daily Show's Dmitri Martin from the Onion. Check out the badass palindrome at the end.

DJBV alerted me to this article from Slate.com. I love when music critics criticize other critics. Clicking on all the links was fun, too.

I was sad to miss Andrew Bird's Thanksgiving shows this past weekend, but it looks like I've got another chance to see him at the Hideout on January 13. I'm excited to hear new material, as his new album, Armchair Apocrypha, drops March 20. Huzzah!

Decemberists are on Letterman tonight, and Tom Waits is on Jon Stewart in case you're interested.

ABC News picks up on the Malachai Ritscher story like, a month late. Martyr or mentally ill? I'm not hip enough in the experimental music scene to have known who he was before this story came out, and I'm still not sure what I think about the whole thing myself.

Only two shows left after this morning before I take a break for the holidays. I'll find out next week what my time slot will be next semester- we'll see if I stick with Tuesday mornings or get to move on up to the evening. Meanwhile, this morning's show will hopefully record correctly this time and be up tonight.

I thought this was Cat Power!

How not very sad: Liz Armstrong of the Reader's infamous Chicago Antisocial is moving to Vegas.

Happy Turkey Day!

So I make this big deal about all the great new music on the show this morning, and then I get home to discover . . . it didn't record properly. Darnit!!!!! Well, you'll have to trust me and tune in next week instead.

This morning's show has a lot of great new music going on- I was very excited to walk in this morning and see the new Swan Lake, White Magic, Mirah remixes, Andrew Bird's latest Fingerlings, El Perro Del Mar, and more . . .. Some brief notes: the Andrew Bird track, "Dark Matter," is going to be on Armchair Apocrypha, which comes out this spring, so that should give you a little taste of what's to come. Meanwhile, since Swan Lake has three potential vocalists in Spencer Krug, Carey Mercer and Dan Bejar, I picked a track randomly and got . . . Carey Mercer! With spazzy backing vocals by Spencer and Dan! It was really awesome, by the way. I think that album is just going to be all over the place (and I believe it comes out tomorrow, so we'll see for sure then. My copy is in the mail). Also, lots of really great songs by women featured on today's show- glad to see so much new indie music is coming from the ladies!

Oh good God, according to Gapers Block, Thax Douglas has a band, and they're playing at Beat Kitchen tonight. Yikes.

Edit: upon further bored-at-work myspace research, Thax is back in Chicago because New York was too expensive. But he made sure to let us all know how much better New York is in every way.

I saw the movie Stranger Than Fiction last night, and I liked it a lot. It's very odd seeing a movie where the entire score is made up of songs by one of your favorite bands- it was almost entirely instrumental versions of existing Spoon songs! Very cool.

The DIY Trunk Show is happening tomorrow at the Pulaski Park Fieldhouse from 10am-4pm, and I'll be staffing the WLUW table from 2pm-4pm. So while you're checking out all the handmade arts and crafts, stop by and say hello!

The other day I caught an old episode of Friends where they're all in Bermuda and Joey and Rachel get together for the first time. I've seen it before, but most definitely did not remember the fact that as Joey runs down the hotel hallway to kiss Rachel, Interpol's "Untitled" was playing. It was so, so wrong.

Radio Free Chicago is promoting another edition of Bandwidth this coming Friday at Subterranean. If you're lucky, I may play a few songs over the speakers in between bands again. More on the bands and what else to expect here.

Totally forgot to mention how I saw Hot Chip this past Friday at the Metro. Don't have too much to say on the show since I forgot my camera and was a bit tipsy on wine, but it was a fun dance party, though I wish the sound had been a bit sharper- their music has a crispness to it that shouldn't be muddied. The singer does, however, suffer from what I'll call the "Junior Boys Syndrome"- i.e. an incredibly sexy voice that turns out to belong to a not-so-sexy man. Hot Chip's front man looks like a dorkier version of Rivers Cuomo, and he was wearing think neon green glasses and some sort of odd multi-colored outfit.

Notes from this morning's show:
-I had the weirdest set of calls ever this morning, and if anyone can decipher them for me, feel free. Right at 6AM some guy called asking if I could do a traffic report on the air for the block of Damen between Augusta and Thomas. He wanted to know if it was clear and specifically wanted a "helicopter report." I was like, ok that's a block long and I have no idea what you're talking about, but whatever, I humored him and that was that. 5 minutes later a different guy called and said he wanted to submit a traffic report, and that the block between Augusta and Thomas on Damen was "all clear." WTF?!??!?! Was I supposed to be giving out secret code over the air or something, like Holly Golightly's weather reports to Sally Tomato?

-The new Joanna Newsom was in rotation, so you can hear the song I raved about from her show in the first hour- it's about 10 minutes long and gorgeous. I'll be stopping by Reckless to pick it up tonight after work.

With yet another band having their equipment stolen and even cancelling their tour as a result, the nerdy, practical accountant in me wonders: considering bands are driving around with tens of thousands of dollars of equipment in crappy old vans, why aren't they insuring their equipment? Personal property insurance is the cheapest insurance out there- a band could buy one less case beer a month and have it covered.

Super pumped about this: Amy Sedaris is swinging through Chicago on her latest book tour. She'll be at the Borders on Michigan Ave. Wednesday, November 29 @ 7PM.

Indie music in commercials watch: Heard the Go Team! in another Civic ad.

Meanwhile, I've been getting more and more into the new Thermals, especially as I pay closer attention to the lyrics. It's about the apocalypse, and they're just really interesting.

Also been getting into the Parenthetical Girls' Safe As Houses. If you've wanted to get into Xiu Xiu but think it's just a tad bit too weird, Parenthetical Girls is a good way to go. Still that bizarre, emotive singing with controversial subject matter, but overall easier to swallow.

Joanna Newsom

Joanna Newsom
Originally uploaded by Nicolemc99.

Limited pics up now. As you can see, I should have stood on the other side of the stage . . . so you get half of Joanna!

Last night's Joanna Newsom show was incredible. I'll be writing a longer review and posting what few pictures I got later (not only was Joanna blocked by her harp from where I was standing, but my camera ran out of batteries half-way through), but for now a few highlights: after coming out alone and playing a couple of Milk-Eyed Mender favorites, she informed us that her band would be coming out to play her new album in its entirety- from start to finish. Since her album isn't out until next week and I didn't want to download it early, that means I got a preview of a complete album performed LIVE. How fantastic is that? Ys is five songs long, and they proved to be all over the place and really amazing- when I get it next Tuesday, I'm really going to have to sit down and pay attention to everything that's going on in each song, as well as listen to the lyrics and learn more about the stories she's telling (Joanna's lyrics rivals the Decemberists in sheer imagination and bizarreness). Most notable was the third track, which left the band hanging while Joanna played it solo. The song was absolutely gorgeous and heartbreaking, and Joanna's harp-playing and expressive facial expressions were mesmerizing- she had this pained look on her face that really made you feel the longing she was singing about. As the last note faded, I swear the entire audience had been holding their breath and let out one big collective sigh. I think a girl behind me burst into tears.

I can't say enough great things about Joanna. I think she's one of the most interesting, talented and unique musicians on the scene. Judging by last night's audience response, I'm not the only one who thinks that either.

Alas I will be passing on K-Fed tonight to see an early Joanna Newsom show at Logan Square Auditorium, which I'm tres excited about. Her supposedly amazing, epic album doesn't come out next week, so I'll get a sneak preview of the material live, and I have high expectations that I'm not too worried about being fulfilled. Joanna rules.

If you want to participate in a true trainwreck of an event, apparently they are giving away tickets to K-Fed's Chicago House of Blues Show today since--shocker--no one is buying tickets. I'm sure Britney is amused by this.

If you tried to listen to the show today in your car and couldn't get the station, it's because there was some technical problems with our antenna. It should be fixed by this afternoon, but for now, the internet is the way to go. Of course, you can always download what you missed later tonight.

To the jerk last night at the Rapture who cut me off from my friends, obnoxiously and unapologetically invaded my personal space over and over again, called me a bitch and (almost) ruined my night:

You suck. First you and your pixie girlfriend squeezed right in front me halfway through the show and just stopped there. Then after I squeezed back through to stand with my friends again, you felt the need to "retaliate" by "dancing" (i.e. flailing about and swinging your girlfriend in my general direction), constantly knocking yourselves into me. You aren't entitled to a 4 ft x 4 ft space at a sold-out show, but instead of trying to provoke you, we just moved over a few feet to give you extra room so we could dance on our own. Of course, the 4x4 square became a 6x6 square, and eventually you started stepping on my feet. I couldn't ignore you any more and had to say, "please stop stepping on my feet. I moved over to give you more room." So you sort of head butted me in the face and said "I wasn't trying to step on your feet. Oh wait, just kidding, I was." So I switched places with my friend to get away from you. Then you told her I was a bitch. I'm sorry, but I'm way too old to be dealing with this shit when I'm just trying to have a good time. Thankfully, said friend told you off and you left (or security made you leave?), though later in the coat check line you seemed to find us again and hiss at us and threaten us some more. Seriously, GROW UP.

Also, you smelled really bad.


To the red-headed, bearded guy in the orange polo dancing in front of me during the Rapture show:

Dude, your moves were totally killer. Watching you shake your booty totally made up for having to deal with the aforementioned jerk.

New Year's eve shows are slowly trickling in, so far nothing really sounds appealing other than possibly Girl Talk at the Empty Bottle. Other options so far: The Redwalls at Schubas, Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings at Park West, Poi Dog Pondering at the Vic Theatre, The Raconteurs at the Riviera Theatre, Russian Circles at the Beat Kitchen, The Legendary Shack Shakers at the Subterranean, and Umphrey's McGee at the Aragon Ballroom. Only the Double Door left really.

Today I listened to Ugly Cassanova's Sharpen Your Teeth for the first time in a very long while (not having an iPod has forced me to grab random CDs every day- it's funny how I forget what music I have when all my albums are in an electronic list instead of on a rack). Never having paid too much attention to the members of the band other than Isaac Brock in the past, and having been listening to a ton of Califone lately, I was totally surprised to find Tim Rutilli's unmistakable voice on the second track! I had no idea he was a part of the project. Further research showed me that Pall Jenkins from Black Heart Procession was involved too. Crazy.

In other news, I was at the gym today when I heard a mash-up of the Doors "Riders on the Storm" with Blondie's "Rapture." So totally awful, though it sort of made sense.