More Phil Elvrum

My earlier post Phil Elvrum Rules! is probably a plain give away as to my bias about this neo-hippy troubadour's music, but I'm the first to admit that he has a tendency towards flakiness and kind of annoying 'deepness'. But, despite my hesitations, he seems to consistently put out albums that I think are great. While I don't yet own the new album 'No Flashlight', these two MP3s posted by Japanese label '7 E.P ' indicate a healthy dose of awesomeness on the new album. The song "I hold nothing" is reminiscent of the pleasant ambient-folk, semi-spoken word type of songs that are found on the wonderful (and freely downloadable) Seven New Songs of Mount Eerie. The song "The Universe is Shown", however, is a kind of circus-march drum-explosion that more accurately captures the Mount Eerie live show, which is often filled with audience participation and crazy percussion (which, I hate to admit, sometimes even includes steel drum solos; but we'll forgive Elvrum for that one transgression, especially because I once saw a show that included large-scale audience basketball dribbling in the place of drums, which was awesome).

Mount Eerie - The Universe is Shown

Mount Eerie - I hold Nothing

Despite the semi-derogatory pre-review of the new album from Tiny Mixed Tapes, I'm looking forward to it. (And, I have to say, I think its pretty indie snob to diss an album because the artist put some creative effort into the packaging of it even though they'll probably end up losing money on the venture. Is TMT becoming the new Pitchfork? Their jerkiness filled/bitter Black Mountain review seems to say so.)