One act that we have been especially looking forward to seeing at this year’s Newport Folk Festival is Portland’s Blind Pilot. We fell in love with We Are The Tide and the band has been making some major moves since we first featured them last year. In January they played Letterman, followed by a headlining tour, and bookings for the 2012 editions of Lollapalooza, Sasquatch, and Bonnaroo. We knew that it was only a matter of time before they were booked for Newport as their sound is comparable to various other Newport favorites such as The Head and the Heart and Fleet Foxes.

I would go on about how catchy and beautifully crafted each song from Blind Pilot is, but I think that Caroline summed it up perfectly in her review from last year-

“But while my infatuation for Blind Pilot’s pop-folk was fast to develop, a furious and fiery affair it’s not.  So let’s put it this way: if the Flaming Lips are that unpredictable hipster you could never tie down, and Eddie Vedder is the rugged and coarse adventurer, then Blind Pilot is kind of like your spouse 20 years into marriage.  Neither We are the Tide or their 2008 album Three Rounds and a Sound throw curveballs; it’s smooth sailing. But the band, with its album stacked with catchy tune after catchy tune, has proved to me that maybe reliability’s not such a bad thing after all.  So for better or for worse, settle in and give a listen to Blind Pilot’s We Are the Tide.”

Not to sound dramatic, but Wednesday May 16, 2012 will be a day that will go down in infamy. Why? It was the day that the last meaningful radio station in Boston sold its soul to the radio devil. Yesterday Phoenix Media/Communications Group announced the sale of the legendary station to radio conglomerate Clear Channel. When I read the news my heart sank into my shoes. How could this be happening? Was it not only 3 years ago when I listened to “Shine On You Crazy Diamond” followed by an eerily unsettling silence on WBCN? Now the last remaining hope in local alternative radio is gone. Rumors are Clear Channel has planned to move one of their AM talk stations in to the 101.7 slot, others have said the format will change to country or Spanish talk…

Being a lifelong fan of WFNX, and even lucky enough to be a part of the FNX family for a short time as an intern in college, to see the outpouring of support via social media is emotional to say the least. Sure there were times where FNX may have lost their way (Eminem and Panic! At the Disco in heavy rotation in the mid 2000s to name a couple instances), but over the past 4 or 5 years they have truly hit their stride. A great example of this would be last year’s Clambake lineup which featured Young the Giant, The Naked And Famous, and Foster the People all on the same stage. Look at what all three of those bands have done in the past year- Foster the People performed at the Grammys with the Beach Boys, The Naked And Famous are literally everywhere in television, commercials and video games, and Young the Giant sold out nearly every date on their headlining tour earlier this year. Who was there to break these bands and promote the shit out of them in the Boston market? WFNX was, and with Foster the People and Young the Giant especially, you can’t tell me that their FNX airplay and sold-out Boston shows are no coincidence.

Does this mean the end of indie music in Boston? I wouldn’t go that far, but I would say that it will be a hell of a lot more difficult for the next Foster the People or the next Young the Giant to sell out venues like The House of Blues without the support and airplay of WFNX. People need to realize that we are not just losing a radio station, but also the personalities and the artists that come along with it. Afternoon DJ Adam 12 was lucky enough to catch on with FNX after BCN went by the wayside, but now there are no other alternative stations for our favorite DJs to turn to in this market. WAAF? I’ll try not to laugh. Radio 92.9? I’m convinced that they have the MTV Buzz Bin records set on a permanent loop. WXRV? Not nearly edgy enough to call themselves alternative.

Not to mention the impact that WFNX has had in supporting local bands. I think that Boston’s Weekly Dig Music Editor, Hilary Hughes, put it best in her article yesterday–

WFNX also incorporates the music of local bands into it’s regular programming seamlessly, showcasing bands like Mean Creek and You Can Be A Wesley and Viva Viva alongside the Foster The Peoples and Funs and Joy Formidables that strangers to the Boston music scene may recognize.

To play a Bostonian underdog’s song before or after a major, recognizable single is a GOOD thing by association. It introduces the local band to listeners tuning into WFNX as one on par with the national hit-maker, and hey, maybe the local band will get a few more new listeners out to the show and cultivate more fans.

I couldn’t agree more whole-heartedly with this statement. WFNX has done so much to help promote local bands and as I already mentioned, without that support the local music scene will suffer. Personally I am still trying to digest the news of the sale and the end of WFNX, but I wanted to take this opportunity to formally thank everyone at WFNX for the incredible run, especially Julie, 12, Driscoll, Henry and Fletcher.

One of my favorite song lyrics of all-time comes from Ted Leo’s “The Lost Brigade” where he repeats over and over– “Every little memory has a song.” For this reason and for many others WFNX will never die or completely fade away into obscurity, at least not while I’m around. Every time we hear “Pumped Up Kicks” or Pearl Jam’s “Alive” for an older generation, we will remember the first time that we heard it on WFNX. There are so many memories that I have of WFNX whether it was last year’s Clambake, the ’07 Best Music Poll or going into the office two times a week to produce and schedule commercials, I plan on reliving all of them over the next few months.

Thank you for the memories WFNX, Boston will never be the same without you.

If your regularly scheduled Wednesday night programming isn’t cutting it anymore, let me suggest getting your butt down to Great Scott in Allston tonight to check out The Shape opening for headliner Psychic Paramount, joined also by A Troop of Echoes and Cropduster. My first exposure to The Shape came back in March when I saw them open for My Best Fiend at O’Briens. They gave an inspired performance to a lackluster crowd, but they found at least one new follower when they hooked a brother up with a fabulous bootleg of their psych-infused rock, which has found its way into regular rotation on my car stereo.

So if nothing else, show up to Great Scott early to check out a solid live act with promising new tunes on the horizon, but a jam-packed bill of 3 other bands promises to be a great night overall. And if you’re into Pitchfork-endorsed bands, Psychic Paramount received a sneaky 8.2 on their 2011 release, II.

Facebook Event

The Shape

Special thanks to our Canadian correspondent, Megan, for exposing us to these great bands.

Canada. To those who don’t know, it is the country to the north; also called America’s Hat. Canada is not just a frozen land of hockey players and igloos, but actually quite a lively scene for good indie music. This frozen land is also home to music fans that take their music very serious. The long winters and copious amounts of overpriced, yet delicious bevies allows for the Canadian talent-juice to pump all winter long and make some succulent musical sounds. Canada has music scenes from the smallest farm town in Saskatchewan to the large hubs of Toronto (T-dot), Montreal and Vancouver (Van or Vancity).

Quick facts, the indie fans in Canada, also called R3ers (they typically can be picked out at any show by the stage, holding an album of the band with a CBC Radio 3 ‘toque’ or winter hat on); constantly listen to CBC Radio 3 which only plays Canadian indie bands, all, day, long, everyday. As much as I poke fun at the R3ers (since I am kind of a closest R3 case myself), it is a good thing for indie music in Canada, and a great thing for American fans that get the spill-over into the States. For quick information, streaming programs 24-7 and free channels of every indie band in Canada (all 29,000+ of them and growing); check out http://music.cbc.ca/#/radio3/

The Rural Alberta Advantage (Toronto)- M&T featured The RAA a few months back right here before they released their second LP Departing. This album is an instant classic featuring the distinctive vocal stylings of Nils Edenloff and the keyboard sounds of the ever-so-beautiful Amy Cole. Of course, you can’t mention The RAA without talking about the intense tom-tom rhythms of percussionist Paul Banwatt which tie the group’s sound together and give them that distinctive and fresh vibe we love. Check out this acoustic version of “Tornado 87,” it gives me the chills, so amazing.

Said The Whale (Vancouver)- Said The Whale started back in 2007 when they released their debut EP Taking Abalonia. Touring the U.S. West Coast in the spring of 2011, they made a splash at SXSW, enough to get them invited back again for this year’s festival. Their new album Little Mountains, a mixture of indie rock and geography lessons, is a tour-de-force led by the first single “Heavy Ceiling.” The album is a more mature, faster paced version of previous records and contains similar themes like the topography of Vancouver area, the outdoors, and places they have traveled to. Check out their classic track “Emerald Lake, AB” for an up-beat summertime love-story indie-pop song and then “Curses of the Current” for a furlong song about loosing your love in the Georgia Strait.

Supercassette (Vancouver)- They aren’t even signed folks. Supercassette brings you back to the ’90s when Alternative and Punk were in a loving marriage with plenty of sex. Check out their great sound with the song “Good Company.”

The Provincial Archive (Edmonton)- Folky and fun, The Provincial Archive have a great live presence and sound. With two albums under their belt, they are done touring for the time being while they work on their next effort. Check out their song “Art Museums and Tourist Traps” below.

Yukon Blonde (Vancouver)- Their self-titled album with swooning voices and flaring guitars reminds you of the days of old. Check out their song “Wind Blows.” Will not disappoint. Their latest release Tiger Talk features the sweepingly powerful “Stairway” that will knock you off your feet.

Library Voices (Regina)- The great, upbeat indie-pop sound of Library Voices will make any sad day into a happy one. Their album Summer of Lust is solid from start to finish, with “Generation Handclap” by-far being the cherry on top. It will be on my summer playlists, and probably yours after a listen.

Boxer The Horse (Prince Edward Island)- Boxer The Horse put out their second LP French Residency earlier this year and are touring Canada with the aforementioned Said The Whale. Boxer The Horse are the darlings of CBC Radio 3 winning the Best New Band of 2010 and recording with former Two Hours Traffic member Alec O’Hanley.

Also if you want a quick and easy way to keep your finger on the pulse of Canadian indie, you can either tune in or download the podcast of the weekly R3-30 of the Week every Sunday on CBC Radio 3.

The Cribs have made a name for themselves by constantly releasing new albums and touring heavily for the past decade. Yet how did they go under my radar for so long? Luckily the well timed release of their most recent album In the Belly of the Brazen Bull coincided with my recent fascination with everything British. This release has almost everything I am looking for in an album. The loud start provided by the lead track “Glitters Like Gold” then diving right into my favorite single off the album “Come On, Be a No One” gets the tempo up and the blood flowing. “Glitters like Gold” deserves praise in the sense that it gives you a nice layout of what to expect from the album, catchy melodies that are not too fine tuned, loud guitars with feedback and a little rawness that might turn some off, but anyone who can appreciate early Weezer will find something in this album for them. Track 6 “Uptight” might be the best comparison for this.

What really strikes me about this album is how bold the band seems to be moving from one theme to another. As I mentioned, the opening couple of tracks have college pool hall anthem written all over them and at the halfway point of the album we hit the climax with “Chi-Town,” a song that is also bound to be released as another single and to gain a certain level of celebrity in Chicago for obvious reasons. Moving past this point we enter the second half of the record which seems to be the heart and soul of the album’s message. Songs like “Back to the Bolthole”  and “I Should Have Helped” utilize a lo-fi sound to provide overtones of ’80′s mix tape heartbreak.

The last four tracks are strung together using a reoccurring military snare march, an explosive sendoff that sounds as big as you would hope it to be played live. Starting with the chaotic “Stalagmites” we move quickly through the short “Like a Gift Giver” which sets up for the catchy upbeat “Butterflies” bound to be the most underrated track on this album. The album finishes with “Arena Rock Encore with Full Cast” which uses soaring gang vocals and heavy rock riffs to counter the airy track of “Butterflies” and leaving you with a still bobbing head.

Caged Animals Links: Bandcamp, Tumblr, Facebook

The cycle of days known as the “week” is winding down once again and we’ve got the perfect auditory pairing for you. As your musical sommelier, I’d like to present to you a uniquely blended offering of Down Easterly pungent psychedelics, ripe with plucky strings and far-out whirrs and beeps. Jeff Beam (bassist for The Milkman’s Union) recently released his latest solo effort Be Your Own Mirror, a delightful album which spans a range of moods and draws from a noticeably varied pool of influences. Check out the tripped-out video for the premier single “Now” below, and head over to Jeff’s bandcamp to listen to the entire release.

I was given the wonderful opportunity to feature the Alabama Shakes in our NFF spotlight series. Led by frontwoman, Brittany Howard, the Shakes have exploded onto the music scene over the last year, doing multiple appearances on late night TV, being named one of MTV’s 11 bands to watch in 2012, along with releasing their first full length album, Boys & Girls.  So, if this is the first you’re hearing of the Alabama Shakes it means two things to me: 1. You’ve been living under a rock this last year and 2. You don’t subscribe to Maimed & Tamed’s monthly Spotify playlist…In all seriousness, Alabama Shakes is the perfect blend of Americana, blues rock, and soul that will make your parents forget the last 4 decades of music ever happened (except the ’80s, no matter how hard you try, you can never forget the ’80s).  Before, and while they were working on their original material, they were known to play Led Zeppelin, James Brown, and Otis Redding cover songs, which explains the vintage sound they created for themselves.

I’m extremely anxious to see Alabama Shakes at The Fort this summer for multiple reasons. One of them being their album, Boys & Girls, which seems like it will translate very well live (I think Eric can attest to that in his SXSW review). It has a great mixture of songs where they can go from nearly rocking you to sleep to all of a sudden exploding into a frenzy that will have you singing and clapping along. Another reason is the crowd that they should draw. Their sound is just so accessible that I’m expecting people of all ages rocking out to them, including babies and Nanas. It’s going to be awesome.

Here are some videos to hold you over for the next couple of months.  I would have put “Hold On” as one of them because that would have been clever, but even my Mom knows that one (she thinks the band name is The Alabama Slammers).

Man am I glad that our friends over at Visible Voice turned us on to The Wooden Sky. Not only has the Toronto based quartet produced one of our favorite albums of 2012 with Every Child a Daughter, Every Moon a Sun, but they also put on one of the best shows we have seen this year at Radio in Somerville last night. It was my first trip to the new venue and my first time seeing the band, so needless to say I was quite excited upon pulling back the curtain at the venue entrance and stepping in to what would become a night of soaring crescendos and passionate harmonies.

The band opened their set with “Child of the Valley,” the first track on Every Child and from there meandered their way through a set that was heavy on more material from their latest release. For fans who have followed the band for much longer than we have, there were songs like “My Old Ghosts” and “Something Hiding For Us In The Night” from the band’s 2009 release If I Don’t Come Home, You’ll Know I’m Gone, but for the most part the focus was on Every Child. Highlights included the ethereal “It Gets Old To Be Alone,” the tropical feel of “Malibu Rum” and our personal favorite from the new record “Bald, Naked & Red.”

The band ended their set by ditching the PA, coming in to the crowd, and playing three songs without any amplification. The band chose “The Wooden Sky,” “Oslo,” and “Oh My God (It Still Means a Lot to Me)” to close out their set, the latter of which brought in a full-on sing-along during the chorus.

After leaving the venue I was still blown away by how fulfilling and memorable the show was, between the vibrant set and the unplugged encore it was safe to say that I had a pretty incredible Tuesday night.

If you don’t know The Wooden Sky check out a few of their tracks below and make sure to head on over to their webpage and pick yourself up a few CDs.

The morning after our showcase at O’Brien’s Pub, we woke up bright and early in preparation to host the wonderful group of Danes that is Alcoholic Faith Mission. The Scandinavian band first caught our attention with their knack for writing ridiculously catchy songs beginning with 2006′s Misery Loves Company all the way through their most recent release Ask Me This, the latter of which has been on constant repeat for a couple weeks now. When we found out that they would be playing TT The Bear’s Place in Cambridge (review of that show here) as part of their North American tour, we had to reach out and invite them over for the afternoon.

After recruiting our good friend and sound engineer Andy to help us out, we headed over to Caroline’s Somerville apartment to prepare for what we had dubbed a “porch session.” Upon arrival we greeted the band with tall boys of PBR and Narragansett (naturally) and waited eagerly as they prepared for the mini-session. What resulted was an inspiring performance from the band on two new tracks– “Running With Insanity” and “We Need Fear.” Each time I listen to the recordings I get goosebumps, maybe because it was our first foray into recording live sessions, or most likely because AFM’s songwriting will do that to you. We are very thankful that AFM made the whole process so easy and took care of the most important part by providing us with two beautiful songs.

Take a look at both videos below and read on for an interview that we did AFM members Thorben Seierø Jensen (lead vocals, guitar), Kristine Permild (vocals, percussion) and Morten Hyldahl (drums) after their performance on our porch.

Maimed & Tamed: What is it like taking the new songs from Ask Me This on to the stage? Have you found them to be evolving or changing over the course of the tour?

Kristine Permild: There is a huge difference between the recorded versions and the live versions because I think already when we had to transform our album Let This Be The Last Night We Care we knew that we weren’t able to translate the same sound. Our recorded songs are very layered, tons and tons of layers on top of each other, and we decided that we’re not able to produce the same sound on stage.

Thorben Seierø Jensen: We work on how to create a cool live ambience and atmosphere within the songs. Like Kristine said, we have tons of layers on the recordings, but we try to peel it down and weed out the stuff that is needed for the audio experience, but not necessarily the visual experience.

M&T: What do you find is the biggest difficulty when you’re trying to figure out how to take each song and turn it into something that can be performed live?

KP: I think that the toughest thing is that sometimes in a song there’s something, like in “Got Love? Got Shellfish!”[Eric's note: check out our review of AFM's performance at TT's for a video of this song], where it’s so driven and it was really difficult to reproduce that song. You’ve got to kill your darlings and explore new good things in the songs, because sometimes the things that you really love about a song are impossible to reproduce live.

M&T: What is your favorite song from the new record to play live?

TSJ: My favorite is “I’m Not Evil,” I love to play that song live.

KP: I like “Alaska” and I like “We Need Fear,” that’s a fun song to play.

Morten Hyldahl: We don’t play it that often, but “Throw Us To The Wolves,” I love playing that one a lot.

M&T: One of our favorite things about Alcoholic Faith Mission is the music videos that you have made for a lot of your songs. Could you tell us a little bit about the process behind creating all of those videos over the years?

TSJ: We work with a guy named Matthew Thompson, as well as a German director named Bryn Chainey and then we work with a Danish director named Kristian Foldager. They have an idea for one of the songs, they have the imagery in their head and want to follow up on that idea. We give them carte blanche to do whatever they want because we’d like to focus on doing the music and not be all over the place. We like to let other people do what they do best and hopefully we can do what we do best.

KP: We’ve been very lucky, the people that have contacted us have actually made videos that are very picturesque and with beautiful cinematography. I hope this is because our music speaks to the images, because that is why we like making music videos.