Bishop Allen - "Rain (2005 demo)". Bishop Allen's second album, Bishop Allen and The Broken String, will be released on July 24. The album will include new versions of songs from last year's twelve EPs, as well as some other things. "Rain" is one of the other things, a heretofore unreleased song, and at You Ain't No Picasso you can hear the version that will be released this summer.

But the demo of "Rain" is better, much better, and it's that which I share with you.

It's a pop song about desperate unhappiness. A joyous, kinetic, catchy, beautiful song about desperate unhappiness. "Now it's really pouring / it's crawling up the shore / and I walked and never heard / and umbrella does no good / and I guess it's in my blood / and I couldn't stop the flood." Justin Rice's voice is morning-muddled, cracking like it's the first time he's used it. I see a man on his fire-escape, glum, wiped, soaked to the skin. And then he stands and stamps so hard that the fire-escape collapses around him, with him, falling with the sound of cymbals. "Rain" isn't even a song about surmounting unhappiness: it's a song about sorrow's necessity, the need to taste tears so that you can later taste sweetness. "Oh!! Let the rain fall down! And wash this world away! Oh, let the sky be grey." Those Ohs, those lovely, brave, boisterous ohs. A sound that flies from the heart through a wide-open throat, the blues sung fast and jubilant into a glittering silver mike.

I climbed mountains to this song.

("Rain 2.0" thumps harder, but it's clean, too clean, the lyrics' fog already long-cleared. The electric guitar's up front, dopily cheerful. All desperation's evaporated, like vanished puddles on sunny streets. Singing about a melancholy long after that melancholy has passed.)

[MySpace / website]

Scout Niblett - "Just What I Needed". With perfect patience, Scout Niblett sings two sides of a relationship. The lying in bed and hating, hair bent under her head, talking to the ceiling & sneering. Her partner saying nothing. And then the both of them on either side of a doorway, smiles shining, "i don't want you coming here" transformed into "yeah! yeah! woo hoo hoo hoo hoo!" Strange how the fiercest feelings can appear at the wrongest times. Strange how you can ache when there's no reason to, none at all. Strange how loving can turn to loathing, and back, as you stand under the same incandescent bulb.

Post-script 4:35pm: Turns out my interpretation of the song is entirely misguided! Ivan emailed to tell me that it's a cover of a track by The Cars, and more than that the lyric I quote is actually "I don't mind you coming here". And he's right. So this isn't a song of ambiguity, of two sides: it's a song of love, the confusion of love, of playing a little hard to get when you're sick with how much you long for the person you're with. Thanks again Ivan.

[Scout tours Europe in May and early June. The Just Do It/Dinosaur Egg EP is released May 21, with a full-length to follow later this year.]

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You Ain't No Picasso also has a new, unrestrainable Final Fantasy track.

Heaven and Here is a thoughtful, copious blog on the subject of The Wire, the third television series I can say I love.

The biggest highlights of last weekend's All Tomorrows Parties festival were Felix Lajko, Einstürzende Neubauten, and Low. Low's European tour is ongoing, and I'd really so-strongly recommend attending.

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Said the Gramophone notes:

1) The image above is cropped from a photo by Steph.
2) We still haven't identified the "mystery song" from Tuesday.
3) The unplayable mp3 from Jordan's Wednesday post has been fixed.
4) So long, Europe, and thanks for everything. xxox