20140331

Paste Magazine (Print edition, 2002-2010)

I love magazines. I mean, real, physical, printed, in-your-hand magazines. Online/digital magazines are fun, but I cannot get into them. Hopefully, maybe, someday I will.

One of the best magazines ever produced about independent music was Paste. It is still around, in digital form, but I haven't read it in years. Not because of lack of content (from afar seems to still be excellent), but because of the format. It is a sad reality.

Paste was (is) so-well designed, so visually interesting, that even if the content was not completely appealing to me (Paste is/was always a little too Americana/folky for my tastes) I still read it from cover-to-cover. It had great typography, clean lay-out, and even the paper was heavy-weight and just felt right.


And each magazine came with a sampler CD that contained around 20 songs. I discovered so many great bands this way. Paste Magazine put "Falling Slowly" by the Frames on one of its samplers years before that song got famous from the movie "Once"! Also, 9 of their first 20-or-so issues also contained free DVDs with all sorts of fun content.

When the print version of Paste died, I didn't know what to do. What I did do was hold on to all 63 print issues. Until now. I am moving to Germany in August. Very excited, but I can take very little with me. My vinyl collection is going to be cared for a friend who also loves the format. My CD's will probably go in storage. But my Paste Magazines? I have to sell them.

So I put them on eBay last night. I am not sure exactly how to sell them yet, but we'll see what happens. I feel like they are VERY valuable, but does anyone else see the value in magazine back issues? Paste sure still does, and is selling new copies of its back issues for $10-$25 a piece here. Even if you don't want to buy, that link is worth looking at because of the details it gives about each issue. If anything, maybe someone is interested in the 63 CD's. 1200 songs!




20140306

New Sunny Day Real Estate song to be released on Record Store Day 7"

I am probably the last blogger to mention this, but I haven't stopped thinking about it since I heard the news days ago, so I have to mention it as well. Sunny Day Real Estate will release their first song in 14 years on April 19, 2014. Pitchfork broke the news that it will be on a split 7" record with Circa Survive (interestingly a band I have never even heard). You can read some terrific details about how the record came to be following that link.


This is giving everyone hope (including me) that this will lead to more Sunny Day, but based on comments from the members of the band, that unfortunately is highly doubtful. Apparently they recorded almost an album's worth of material following their reunion tour in 2009, but were unable to finish the songs and have since gone their separate ways.

Anyway, I'll just celebrate the one song. And I can't help but wonder if "Lipton Witch" is the untitled track (also called "10" by some) they performed during that reunion tour. Anyway, you can hear it below, and it is good, but I am hoping the song on the 7" is not it but something none of us have ever heard before.



I'd love to say I'll be lining up at Grimey's or Wax'n'Facts on Record Store Day to get my hands on one of the 7"s, but instead I'll have to order it online. Three little kids and long lines don't mix.