Remember the moment before now? It was good and all…but pardon us if we don’t fall down and propose marriage to it. If you haven’t already heard, welcome to our aphorism: here at Drag City, it’s either about now or what’s next. And as of press time, today is a new release day! So let’s talk about that first.

The summer that was is wrapping up with a flurry of releases from all corners, which in this case, number four: The Howling Hex’s brave new Border Sound Earth Junk, David Grubbs' heart-cheering An Optimist Notes the Dusk, Sean O’Hagan & Jean Pierre Muller’s The Musical Paintings, Vol 1 and Michael Tully’s documentary Silver Jew featuring…well, we wouldn’t be talking about it unless The Silver Jews made at least a token appearance in it!

You want more? Okay, try this:

The Howling Hex have rewired their New Border Sound to meet 2008 specs (at the least! Probably more like 2028…) on the new LP/CD, Earth Junk. A lot of hardware went out the window for this one, leaving nothing but an organ, some five-string guitar obbligatos and voices. The phrase “strangely compelling” has been frequently associated with The Howling Hex over the years, but at this point, mere innocent bystanders are remarking on the compulsion factor of Earth Junk without even mentioning the strange! We can only attribute this to the persistence of The Howling Hex’s Border Sound methodology — innoculating the ears of the country with their caustic fusions until eventually those once Out sounds form the perfect building blocks of a new In sound. It was always the plan. If you don’t stand alone, it just means you have to stand around with the rest of the fucks. In other words, Earth Junk’s a fantastic rock album. No drums or bass — but plenty of groove. And that’s what matters…

David Grubbs casts his vote for the man inside on his new album of songs and singing, An Optimist Notes the Dusk. It’s funny, like The Howling Hex (but occupying space exactly on the other side of the solar system from the Hex’s Earth-2), David’s rocking with fewer pieces than his last go round — which was 2004’s A Guess at the Riddle. For David, this little piece of forever was well spent. Fewer songs too — six total make up the record, which justifies placing Grubbs next to Gentle Giant in the album bin in more ways than one. The songs themselves delve inward in a fashion shared by few other songwriters, resulting in confessional/autobiographical material that asks questions: “What else do you do with your time?” “Could you let yourself go?” and “Cutting through what?” among them. In other words, definitively Grubbsian singer-songwriter material of the delicate balance struck by David since the days of Gastr del Sol. An album-oriented journey to center of the man, An Optimist Notes the Dusk, as the title implies, traverses dark territory with an eye on what light remains, which makes the low tone undulation of “The Not-So Distant” a rumbling climax, with no words needed. If the dark truly is rising, we’ll need songsmiths like David Grubbs in the world that’s coming — so check into An Optmist Notes the Dusk for a bit of the other kind of news — e.g., not all bad!

Meanwhile, on DVD, the ever-expanding universe of David Berman is captured in a visit to mother Israel on part of the Tour That Almost Never Began. It’s an unlikely homecoming: Jews meet Silver Jews in the streets of Jerusalem, at the western wall in the old city and yes, onstage at a couple of shows. Today, the Silver Jews are rolling around America for their second-ever national tour — but back in 2006, this was a coming out party for the once-reluctant showman. Thus the cameras roll in a curtain-parting exercise, to get us beyond the footlights and into the tender mind and soul of D.C. Berman. As reclusive a live performer as he is, David’s never met an interview he didn’t like — and so there’s plenty of answers, even when there aren’t any questions. As we mentioned, some Silver Jews concert appearances in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem are contained, but mostly this documentary focuses on the head Jew, the main man, David Berman.

Have we got a coffee table book-plus-CD for you! For the past five years, Sean O’Hagan’s been collaborating with Jean Pierre Muller on a gallery installation concept called “The Musical Painting.” Having done two such shows (the second one’s called “The Musical Wheel”), they’ve collected the sounds and visions together into a book called The Musical Paintings - over 100 pages of graphics to thumb through while listening to quintessential sounds from O’Hagan. Sean seems to have designed his pieces to be dissembled, so the full-bodied pieces break into component parts on occasion — though never in a less than musical way. In fact, Sean’s music here seems to realize the direction he’s been heading in for years — a soundtrack vibe of immaculate and deceptive simplicity. The book and the CD together make for a nice little afternoon or evening at home. Not quite the same as being there — but nothing ever is, so there.

Summer’s gone – and all that’s left to us is the eighty-degree temperatures of early fall. Standing in the relative chill, we wonder how much life we’ve got left in these fatty old bones. Mortality – what a bitch. And commerce – a never-ending tit-suck that’s got us feeling kinda dry inside. What of 2009? What the hell is Drag City gonna do next year?

At times like these, there’s nothing to do but focus on the task at hand – and that’s the hot slate of new releases coming to you next month. So fuck you, Mister Anxiety.

Have we ever mentioned that we love Brother JT? He’s been making records we dig for a long time, but no records that we dig more than the ones he makes with his power-trio, the Brother JT3. Those guys have rocked and rolled us with such titles as Way To Go, Spirituals and Hang In There, Baby. Now, we have a new rhythm oil to rub into the limbs of our troubled times — it’s called Jelly Roll Gospel! Rough to the touch, the JT3s latest will sink into your souls, purifying them by breathing in the bad and exhaling out the good. JT’s songs use blues and r’n’b templates, executed with sweaty, wide-eyed energy — and this time, he’s added a couple of colors to his rainbow that are blowing our minds, those of dub reggae and ska, which squeeze next to their northern brethren with excellent tightness. You’ll be left breathless after a nonet of new songs, all of which address the modern dilemma of identity and faith. Who do you turn to, where do you turn? The good Brother bids us turn inward, to find the strength to turn out again and live in this ever-expanding world. This time, you’re gonna do it, and you’re gonna look good doing it. And look for Jelly Roll Gospel on fabulous LP only on October 21, 2008.

Believe it or not, that sentence actually makes sense — and no, not just in the rock-addled mind of Jennifer Herrema, leader of the runaway rock entity known as RTX. Check it: the anxiously awaited new RTX album is called just that: J.J. Got Live RaTX. No, it’s not a live record, but it’s live as hell. The guitars rage, crunch and squeal; the drums and bass thump with raw power, distorting our ears. The production is massive, and gleaming through the center is Jennifer herself, calling and responding to an outpouring from those who desire the new sound of luxury metal. RTX have responded. And with the album thus titled, we urge you to get one, either on LP or CD. Sure you can download it, but then you won’t have the zebra-striped image of the JJGLRaTX artwork zinging through your brain. J.J. Got Live RaTX comes at you from all sides on October 21, 2008.

is Red Favorite! Now before you call your local Committee on Un-American Activities, maybe we should explain that Red Favorite is the chosen name of the newest Streamline artist — and on surface, one of the most unlikely signings of the century! The last Streamline release, you might recall, was Jim O’Rourke’s long night — a two-CD, two-and-a-half hour epic with nary a voice or even a beat gracing the proceedings. That’s the sound everyday down at Streamline headquarters, where the silence of midnight reigns supreme: most of the dozen releases we’ve worked with them on are as much space as they are music, and none save Little Annie have traipsed anywhere near the fields of pop. Which is fine with us — we dig a head trip now and then and we love a headphone trip even more. Our close relationship to what Streamline’s slinging has given us pause to pay extra attention to the low-fi renderings of Red Favorite…and it’s given us the insight to say, we know what it is that makes Red Favorite an awesome new Streamline album. RF's guitar-and-voice songs are their own animal, constructed with their own unique sensibility and plenty of room inside them to catch a glimpse of the void, which is the axis of all Streamline releases. The songs are compelling too, which make Red Favorite our new favorite. Those who know have sought this album out in it's original CD-R incarnation — but the rich, cloudy atmosphere of the recordings is remarkably enhanced on Streamline's LP pressing. Get it? You will — on LP only, October 21, 2008.

This just in — two new languages have just been discovered! Languages of Stone, we mean. Ah-ha, ha ha — shit! You fell hard for that one, kids. Yeah, it’s hard to imagine a world without Language of Stone threading their underground sounds beneath the surface — but it was just one year ago this month that we were collectivly introduced to their hairy, dairy-free world. Since then, the names Mountain Home, Orion Rigel Domisse, Ex Reverie, Lights, Ilya Monosov, Festival, Silver Summit and Noa Babayov have become household names…in at least a few squats around the free world! Well in at least partial commemoration of that now-distant beginning, let’s all clap hands and — buy into the new Language of Stone titles! This time out, the raw rock of electric guitars cuts through the haze, as the sounds of Heavy Hands and Mythical Beast take center stage at the LoS co-op.

It’s not true: everyone isn’t on the road. But those who are are fighting through time and waterlogged space (shout-out to all southern brothers and sisters!) to put on the best damn show you could possibly see today. Silver Jews, Monotonix, RTX, Alasdair Roberts, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, Six Organs of Admittance: the night is yours. Thank you for sharing it with the rest of us. You fucking cock-sucker whores! Shit fuck! Shit fire! God Fuck!

Sooner or later, the year has to end. For us it ends with a trio of new releases – J.T. IV Cosmic Lightning, Nimrod Workman I Want to Go Where Things Are Beautiful and Harmony Korine's The Collected Fanzines. Unheard sounds and sights from the past is the theme for this release date! J.T. IV is a true obscurity from the 80s, a lost soul out of time (and back again). His LP-only release is an exquisite rendering of his only legacy — ten songs, a few press clippings and a short DVD of performance footage. Nimrod Workman is a name known to some on the folk and traditional scenes (not to mention fans of Coal Miner’s Daughter), but the recordings here (from 1982) were never released until now. And Harmony Korine’s ‘zines are reissued from their mid-to-late-90s original printings of a hundred or so – and done in a way to empty the pockets of all his righteous fans!

Christmas presents all! Now get out there and start buying the ones you can buy today. And we’ll be back on your face before Halloween.

Forward, ever forward —

Rian Murphy
September 2008