To Have & To Hold – Taster Tape from Jony Lyle on Vimeo.

I never knew that Saint Etienne’s “He’s on the Phone” was a cover. I am a horrible fan.
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Corinne Tucker, my favorite voice from Sleater-Kinney, is set to release her solo debut this October, which she has unfortunately described as “a middle-aged mom record.” Yikes. Not a good way to get the momentum going. Conversely, she has employed Unwound’s Sara Lund on drums, which definitely perks my ears back up. Fleshing out the line-up is Seth Lorinczi of Golden Bears, whose studio, Little Golden Books, Tucker used to record the album up in Portland, Oregon. Tucker cites The Slits, The Raincoats, The English Beat, and Sinead O’Connor as influences for her first-ever solo effort. Tucker has also reaffirmed that Sleater-Kinney is merely on hiatus, not broken up, as guitarist Carrie Brownstein concurred with recently in an interview at IFC. [via Spinner]

The Wedding Present’s David Gedge is the Guest Editor over at Magnet Magazine to coincide with the launch of the band’s latest tour, which celebrates the 20th anniversary of its legendary Bizarro album. I made the trek to Atlanta this past Wednesday night to see the album performed in its entirety. Gedge always makes a point of not playing encores, so the band played a pre-set of material ranging from tracks off its latest El Rey to George Best-era classics like “Everyone Thinks He Looks Daft” and even on to “Corduroy” off my personal favorite Wedding Present album, Sea Monsters. Gedge apologized for also playing two new songs, but they were nothing to scoff at, ably holding their own alongside such classics. The band sounded outstanding with its legendary lightspeed strumming in full force, which could have been helped along by a mix of my excitement and nostalgia, but the current line-up rivals any I’ve seen, even the one I had to watch through a window when I was 17 because I wasn’t old enough to enter the club (the name of which escapes me now). My friend Robert and I were turned away at the door for ageism that night in 1991, despite the fact that literally no one was there. Nashville wasn’t quite the hip metropolis it is now.

Some wise technophile had the wherewithal to record “Granadaland” at The Earl on Wednesday night, so you can bear witness to a small dose of what was a glorious evening of music:

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