Recently spotted on the web:

-- Drowned in Sound does a nice, long interview with Nik Zinner (a.k.a. Edward Sissorhands) of Yeah Yeah Yeahs (read it here), where Nik invents a new word. He's discussing the All Tomorrow's Parties festival, which the Yeahs were asked to curate a day, along with Devandra Banhart. The writer comments about the festival's performers. "DiS: What's ridiculous, really, is that any one of those bands could easily curate a day themselves, such is their level of recognition. Zinner: Yeah, absolutely. We have to leave on the Sunday, though, but I don't know that many people that he (Devandra Banhart) has selected. They're all beardos." Beardos!

-- Criteria get dissed roundly in this review in the MSU State News, with the headline Criteria Lags with Dark, Whiny Style. "To get right down to it: Criteria sounds like a bunch of suburban boys finding an alternative to working for 'The Man.'" Uh, isn't that the motivation for most bands these days? Notable for being one of the first outright negative review of the CD, which came out last year.

-- Speaking of Criteria, Aversion reports the boys had some van troubles (read it here). And they gave WWB 4 out of 5 stars (here).

-- Pop Matters has a super-long interview/profile with Two Gallants (read it here). Adam Stephens doesn't like his band compared to Dylan and The Beatles, which, of course, they sound nothing like in the first place. "Not only is it lazy journalism, I think it is uneducated journalism. Mentioning Bob Dylan or the Beatles in the context of modern music is redundant. Of course the influence is there. It's like pointing out Thomas Edison's influence on a well-lit room. The only reason people say it with us more often is because our songs might have a bit of content. But, we don't really like to describe our music with words either. Not like what we do is beyond description, but we just try to avoid the undertaking whenever possible. Whenever people describe bands, it's always a litany of other bands. Sometimes that works, and some might think it works with us. I don't. We just try to stay away from it altogether." Wonder what he thinks of my description: "...rousing ship-galley sea-shanty ballads on meth." Probably not much.

-- Personal writing hero/mentor/guru Robert Christgau has posted another in his series of Consumer Guide CD review round-ups (read it here). He likes the new Arctic Monkeys (They sound like not knowing the doorman, like moving on a girl you think isn't pretty enough, like missing the bus in a leather jacket that doesn't keep out the cold.), hates Editors (Someone should tell him about the Human League.). Editors, by the way, don't just rip off Interpol (who ripped off Joy Division) they mug them in broad daylight.

-- Finally, there's been enormous coverage of last week's 'Bring 'em Home Now' concert, and Bright Eyes is consistently singled out as one of the evening's highlights, including in this New York Times piece. "But as pure protest, a quintet version of Bright Eyes, the ever-changing band led by Conor Oberst, hit the hardest of the night." Strangely, the next day, NYT Creek cheerleader Kelefa Sannah filed this story, where he calls out Oberst: "...in one sense: Mr. Oberst's best political songs are full of ambivalence and confusion, not unshakable defiance." Make up your minds, dammit.

--Got comments? Post 'em here.--