oddly monikered brilliance

as spring approaches and little green things start popping out of the ground and from the tips of trees, i begin to feel quirky. it’s a great time of year, and often a lot of cool new music sprouts up, too. over the last year i encountered a few bands with such quirky names i normally would have ignored them. thankfully, life helped me intersect with their brilliance and i discovered how incomplete my collection was without them.

some may have heard DeVotchKa behind the film Little Miss Sunshine. LMS was a fun film, but it was not the first appearance of DeVotchKa supporting a film. i first heard them on Everything is Illuminated, a stunning film that benefits bountifully from DeVotchKa’s presence. in my opinion, the music is a much better fit for this film, too. How it Ends, the main work behind both of these films, is utter genius. their new album, A Mad and Faithful Telling (released March 18, 2008), is clearly DeVotchKa, but feels forced. like they’re trying to be DeVotchKa and not simply making the music that made them.

last spring i was in Portland, OR, and stumbled upon Menomena (think Muppets “muh-NAH-muh-nuh”). wow, is this creative. worthy of spring. three guys playing all the parts and often swapping instruments. i haven’t stopped listening to this one. i really hope they release a new album soon.

Elbow recently released The Seldom Seen Kid in the UK; you can listen to it in the UK store of iTunes. i eagerly await it release in the States (April 22, 2008). for now, we’ll simply need to be satisfied with Leaders of the Free World, an album that joyfully denies the need for anything common in modern music.

enjoy, my friends.