When I was a young lad I got this groovy cassette deck. Kids, that was what dinosaurs listened to before CDs. My birthday was coming up, and all I had to play on my new piece of equipment were blank TDKs that I used to tape obscene phone calls with. One time, we called all the guys named John Rambo at 3AM, and made sounds of explosions and gunshots. Yeah, we were a scream. Pissed ourselves laughing.

But I digress. I needed some tunes, so I asked my buds to get me ‘em for my bday and the first one I opened was The Kinks, Misfits. I was so disappointed it wasn’t LowBudget. But it soon became my favorite album ever. Put that on the shelf with Give The People What They Want, Arthur, Low Budget, Lola vs. The Powerman, To The Bone, Schoolboys in Disgrace, Village Green . . . You’ve got yourself the perfect record collection.

And now you’ve got yourself the perfect indie covers collection . . . And somewhere, lurking in the alphabet, is the zip file. I’m forcing you to at least skim my post. Ha!

A is for Act Nice And Gentle with Me-The Black Keys.

B is for Bouncing Souls-Better Things.

C is for Counting Crows-Better Things.

D is for Dar Williams-Better Things. One of my all-time fave songs, ever.

E is for Elliot Smith-Set Me Free (live). There’s a ton of Elliot Kinks covers floating around.

F is for Feist-Nothing in the World Can Stop Me Worryin’ About That Girl. A bluesy tune, covered again later.

G is for Guster-Days (direct link).

H is for HBO, because if it wasn’t for the soundtrack to Six Feet Under, I might never have understood how brilliant Sia is. Check out her contribution to the A to Z: I Go To Sleep-Sia. Voice like an angel.

I is for Islands-Waterloo Sunset. This is such a pure, simple cover, but it works well. Maybe it’s because The Kinks made such pure, simple music themselves.

J is for Johnny Thunder-Counting Crows.  A twofer from Duritz and co.!

K is for The Kooks-Victoria. I’m not a huge fan of this band–they seem kinda bland–and this song selection is a little bland, too, but hey, it’s a “K”. And it doesn’t suck.

L is for Mark Lanegan-Nothing in the World Can Stop Me Worryin’ About That Girl.

M is for Montreal’s namesake, Of Montreal, who cover Days and Tired of Waiting.

N is for never heard of these guys before, but I was poking around and found this: Pi Theory-Sunny Afternoon (direct download). A very manly acoustic cover. Nice job.

O is for Old 97s-She’s Got Everything. I love this cover.

P is for pseudonym. This Is Where I Belong-The Condo Fucks. From the great “Fuckbook” album, released earlier this year, featuring member of . . . Aw, I’m not going to spoil the surprise. Read down to “Y.”

Q is for Queens of the Stone Age-Everybody’s Gonna Be Happy.

R is for Robyn Hitchcock-Waterloo Sunset (direct download).

S is for Ron Sexsmith-This Is Where I Belong. Today’s best indie nerd covering one of the most talented rocker nerds in history. Perfect!

T is for Trappers Cabin-Shangri-La. Very faithful rendition.

U is for utensil.  Spoon-Situation Vacant (direct link). Spoon obviously owes a great debt to the kind of simple, catchy rock pioneered by The Kinks. Wish they’d release a trib album.

V is for Village Green Preservation Society-Kate Rusby.

W is for Oklahoma, U.S.A.-Wilco. A somewhat sad acoustic cover.

X marks the spot of the zipfile!

Y is for Yo La Tengo-Act Nice and Gentle. This is a clean, well constructed cover. Unlike their version of “This Is Where I Belong,” which Tengo did as The Condo Fucks. (see “P” above.)

Z is for Zwan-All Day and All of the Night

What’s better than a new Spoon album? Well, nothing. But what’s almost just as good? The new White Rabbit album. It’s Frightening is produced by Britt Daniels, and the album sounds like a constant tug-of-war.  White Rabbits’ debut was terrific, but at spots it was a bit inaccessible.  Here, Daniels injects his beat-beat-beat driven style into White Rabbits’s more adventurous, experimental, and spacey musical instincts, resulting in incredible combinations like the James Bond bassline, played on piano, on “Lionesse,” creeping under stellar vocals and fantastic guitar work.  You simply will not find a better indie rock album this year.  It gets my highest praise, my strongest recommendation, and has already gotten five straight-through listens from me.  In my busy, music-laden universe, that’s the highest possible praise.  From TBD Records, the folks behind Radiohead’s “In Rainbows.”

The Company I Keep

BONUS SPOONFULS!

(Spoon covers, with direct links)

A Good Flying Bird (Guided By Voices cover)

Lowdown (Wire cover)

Panic (Smiths cover)

Ketch Harbour Wolves are so confident you’ll dig their new album that they’re giving it away for the price of an e-mail addy on their website. It’s definitely worth your time to go check it out there. Think The National and Interpol, but not quite as depressing, and with more vocal range.

I know what you’re thinking: There’s too many bands doing this kind of slow indie rock with a deep voice and heavy lyrics. Well, you’re right. But there’s room for Ketch Harbour Wolves — they’re very good at this. Maybe it’s because they’re from Canada? I dunno. But they get a thumbs up from me.

Animals

Midnight Dark Water

The Game is Gay-Joell Ortiz

Gay Bar-Electric Six

Los Angeles foursome Foreign Born deliver Person to Person this month, on what is fast becoming one of my favorite independent labels, Secretly Canadian.  The album is remarkable not because it breaks ground or changes rock and roll as you know it, but because it does so well what you already know so well.

Like so many bands today, Foreign Born borrow heavily from the classic rock canon.  There are shades of David Bowie on “See Us Home,” for example.  (No, those swells and crashes aren’t like Arcade Fire or The Talking Heads.  Know your history!)  “It Grew On You” recalls 1950s psychedelia, improved by technical proficiency and incredible production.  And if “Winter Games” doesn’t borrow the main riff from “Last Train to Clarksville,” I’ll eat my hat.

In the past, the word “anthemic” has been used with frequency to describe this band.  The word is not inappropriate, but it fails to convey the detail in their work.  The Killers make anthems: Big riffs, big vocals, and a thick sound.  Those items are Foreign Born’s shopping basket too, to be sure, but there’s so much else going on here, too.  Like the bubbling notes that introduce “Vacationing People,” the skillfully placed vocal overdubs, and the intricate drumwork on every single cut.  Powerful lyrics sung with staggering skill, incredible musicianship, and songs that move from the sweet to the killer, from toe tappers to heart warmers, make this one of the best albums of the second half of 2009.

Vacationing People

Early Warnings

BONUS COVERS RELATED TO BANDS MENTIONED IN THIS POST!

My Body is a Cage (Arcade Fire)-Sara Lov

Rock N Roll Suicide (David Bowie)-Rilo Kiley

According to Comic Book Resources, J. Michael Straczynski (nominated for an Eisner) is leaving Thor because he refused to allow Thor to be involved in an unnamed Marvel “Big Event” crossover.  I applaud him.  In fact, I’m standing and clapping right now.  Civil War changed the Marvel Universe for the worse, and it was difficult to follow the action without reading all the crossovers.  Skrull Invasion and Dark Reign have been even worse, mucking up even books whose continuity was otherwise pretty much self-contained (like Spider-Man Brand New Day).  The X-books are virtually unreadable for the same reason—you have to buy like three or four books a month (at $4 a pop) just to follow the characters.  For the fan of individual characters, or for the cost-conscious, these “Big Events” are huge turnoffs and make me less likely, as well, to experiment by buying a couple issues of a book I don’t normally read (such as New Avengers or Wolverine).  D.C. is no better (in fact, it’s worse).  I know adults read comics, but most of the fans are still relatively young and on fixed budgets.  Moreover, few if any of these crossovers are actually any good for the character, and many force the books to change to fit the universe so that creative authors with their own visions are crowded out of  the book.

So I applaud Mr. Straczynski’s stand.

Batman Theme-Link Wray

The hills are alive with the sounds of Michael Jackson.  I was gonna post something on the dude because no matter what his faults were, he made some good music, but . . . For many reasons, I just don’t feel comfortable paying tribute to him.  I’ll send you here though.  And here (ooh!  stars are sad!).  Of course, here is a tribute to another talented musician who died.

And if you dig mashups, here’s the ultimate MJ Mash post.