THE NO DEPRESSION FEST

It was a bummer to see the magazine No Depression fold, although it lives on as a website. They're also going to put on thier first No Depression Festival with a cool lineup including Gillian Welch, Iron & Wine, Patterson Hood of Drive-By Truckers and Justin Townes Earle, among others. Learn more here.

TWILIGHT VS. THE CROW

Last week, the soundtrack to the film
Twilight was the #1 album in the country. I attribute this to (a) it's part of the Twilight craze: kids love the book and are eagerly anticipating the film. (b) It features two new songs by Paramore. I can't get into them: they're like a band fronted by Avril Lavigne. It just isn't my thing.

But the album does have some good stuff: Muse's "Supermassive Black Hole" (not new, but a cool tune) and a band I never heard of called The Black Ghosts, who I am now interested in hearing more from. There's also songs by Perry Farrell (it's OK), Iron & Wine and the film's co-star Robert Pattinson, who apparently likes Ray LaMontagne a lot.

For some reason, this album reminded me of the soundtrack to The Crow, another gothy highly anticipated soundtrack from an eagerly anticipated film back in 1994, which also hit #1. It featured some classic track from Nine Inch Nails (a cover of Joy Division's "Dead Souls"), Rage Against The Machine ("Darkness") and Helmet ("Milktoast"), plus cool covers from The Rollins Band (Suicide's "Ghost Rider") and Pantera (Poison Idea's "The Badge"). The big hit was Stone Temple Pilots' "Big Empty." At the time I was annoyed that a not credible band was soiling the soundtrack, but today I have to admit it's a pretty good song.

Anyway, for my money, The Crow soundtrack is way better than Twilight's. But if Twilight gets attention for Muse and The Black Ghosts, then great.