For the last five months, Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield has served as the commander of Expedition 35 aboard the International Space Station. And while in space, he’s made some fun and surprisingly educational videos: You may have seen him making a sandwich or wringing out water from a wet towel.
Hadfield’s latest video is perhaps his [...]

I have mixed feelings about Christmas songs. I don’t celebrate the holiday, so I don’t have any sentimental or spiritual reasons for listening to these songs. And it’s easy to get inundated with holiday music playing at every place you turn from basically October until New Years. But despite all that, I do tend to [...]

It’s difficult to truly calculate how many songs have been recorded by indie veterans Guided By Voices and its frontman Robert Pollard. Certainly hundreds. Maybe thousands? But it’s safe to say that with such a giant output over the years, it’s hard for fans to know where to start, what records to listen to, [...]

Chromatics are getting ready to put out their first album in five years. To tease a little, they’ve released this reworked cover of Neil Young’s “Hey Hey My MY,” titled “Into The Black.” It’s nice and moody. Also dig this retro, split screen video.

Sometimes there are bands that I’ve heard of, and read things about, but never actually heard much of. This is the case with The Pop Group, a late 70s, early 80s post punk band that falls in the same wheelhouse as bands I already love like Joy Division, Gang of Four and Talking Heads. I [...]

Earlier today, my friend and co-worker Lars tweeted:
“Accidentally typed “Punk Moon” instead of “Pink Moon.” Oh, Nick Drake, the world would have been so different.”
Which got me to reply:
How hasn’t there been a punk tribute to Nick Drake yet? We got the title right there! How do we make this happen?
Thanks to another friend, and [...]

Recently Washed Out performed for Sirius XMU Sessions, during which they performed a short but well-realized cover of Chris Isaak’s lovely 1989 slow jam ballad “Wicked Game,” from his record Heart Shaped World. It’s a great reminder to how amazing the original is.

Check out Isaak’s performance on Late Night with David Letterman (back when he [...]

Whoa, how did I manage to miss this one for at least a few years? Awhile back you might recall that Radiohead released “stems” for their song “Reckoner” from In Rainbows. These stems basically are individual tracks from the song, not quite the raw multi-track recordings, but rather they were grouped into different pieces like [...]

(parts 988 and 989 in a 1001 part series)
Really loving this video for “Tiny Head” by The Luyas:

I just really dig how simple and clean it is, but still manages to be artful. Based around the singer Jessie Stein, The Luyas are another Montreal-based band with ties to Arcade Fire — former multi-instrumentalist, Pietro Amato, [...]

(part 956 in a 1001 part series)
I sure love a well executed cover song. Case in point: Holly Miranda’s haunting rendition of Sparklehorse’s “Hundreds Of Sparrows.” Miranda, a member of the Detroit band Jealous Girlfriends, has been playing the song recently in her solo set. But on New Year’s Day, the singer-songwriter gave away a [...]