[UPDATED] Pavement Reunion Show Sells Out in Two Minutes, Second Four Shows Added

By David Nadelle on 09-18-2009

Don't you love it when the man least likely becomes a hero? Few would have bet on Stephen Pastel (né McRobbie) to influence legions of spotty-faced followers when he started playing music as The Pastels back in the early 1980s but, as any scamdicapper will tell you as he pockets the deed to your house, betting is a suckers game. Copycatting being the sincerest form of flattery and all that aside, The Pastels gave up the ghost of the embarrassingly clique-y C86 scene shortly after 1986 and have released a string of idiosyncratically brilliant, frustratingly infrequent albums that have managed to simultaneously rub the brain muscle and tug the love muscle since. Recovering indie gamblers will fight the urge to jump back in the fray with news that the original high-rolling exploration team of Pastel and Katrina Mitchell will return with a new album not in the murky "near future" but in the eyeball-singeing "near now." Next week, in fact!

For their latest record Pastel and Mitchell have recorded with their Japanese spiritual muso-twins, Saya and Takashi Ueno, a.k.a. Tenniscoats, and frequent doppelgangers like Norman Blake and Gerard Love (Teenage Fanclub), Bill Wells, and Tom Crossley (International Airport). Two Sunsets will be available on September 22 in North America via the Pastels-navigated arm of Domino Records, Geographic, and is a, not the, follow up to their most recent album, a soundtrack to The Last Great Wilderness (issued in 2003). This inspired Tenniscoats/Pastels collaboration is already out in the U.K., as is the first single, "Vivid Youth," which features the double duos' heart-touched version of The Jesus and Mary Chain’s "About You" on the B-side.

As far as a new exclusively Pastels record is concerned, there is no firm news on that front as yet besides the fact that there is indeed one in the works. Patience, patience... good always wins out and comes to those who wait. When it does come you can bet the farm on it wiping the floor with the current crop of overhyped crap shooters.

Two Suns tracklisting:

1. Tokyo Glasgow
2. Two Sunsets
3. Song for a Friend
4. Vivid Youth
5. Yomigaeru
6. Modesty Piece
7. About You
8. Boats
9. Hikoki
10. Sodane
11. Mou Mou Rainbow
12. Start Slowly So We Sound Like a Loch

One is the loneliest number of upcoming Pastels shows:
11.27.09 - Glasgow, Scotland - King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut

By Matt Lundy on 09-17-2009

Chad VanGaalen is like a younger, Canadian version of Robert Pollard. Behind a relentless work ethic, all the guy needs is some shitty recording equipment to pump out his falsetto-laced brand of folk-pop. When I spoke to Chad back in March, he said that he didn’t start actively listening to music until his late high school days, and that his time was wrapped up in drawing and animation. Then, of course, he bought a four-track recorder and started writing a boatload of catchy songs. Fresh off the debut album of his instrumental/electronic side project Black Mold, Chad has reached back into the Soft Airplane (TMT Review) vault to offer up a free digital EP of B-sides from that recording time.

You can download the EP at the Soft Airplane website. Better yet, you can catch Chad VanGaalen in the coming weeks when he does a primarily West Coast tour of Canada.

Tourdates:
09.19.09 - Toronto, ON - The Church of the Redeemer
10.08.09 - Regina, SK - The Exchange
10.09.09 - Winnipeg, MB - The Park Theatre
10.10.09 - Saskatoon, SK - Broadway Theatre
10.14.09 - Victoria, BC - Alix Goolden Performance Hall
10.15.09 - Vancouver, BC - The Rio
10.16.09 - Kelowna, BC - Habitat
10.18.09 - Edmonton, AB - Myer Horowitz Theatre