Nobody knows what to say in times like this. Mark Kozelek probably put this best.

This is not the most popular example of this sample, but it sounds a bit like a summertime Saturday night. Enjoy, and be sure to tune in tomorrow night for our second show.

Sorry for missing the soup of the day yesterday. To make up for it, we put together a little three-song stretch. I want to say that Stephen Malkmus is telling the truth, but I don’t think he believes it of himself. Let us know what you think.

Thanks everyone for listening last night, it was a great first show. We’re still working out the kinks with the website, but we’re going to start posting album reviews, music news, op-eds, Radiohead bootlegs, and other fun stuff. Stay tuned

Hey! Our first show as Soup Phase is tonight from 10-12 on WCWM. Listen in!

Last Friday Phil Elverum played a show at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in D.C.. It was one of the strangest and most beautiful experiences I’ve ever had. The show sold out quickly as the church probably only held around one hundred people, but we all approached the nave with a kind of calm solidarity. When Phil approached the stage, soft spoken, warbling, and sincere as he has always been, he addressed the crowd with a simply apology, “I’m sorry for what you’re all about to hear.. but I think you knew what you were getting yourself in to… okay one-two-three-go ‘Death is real…'”

He went through about half of A Crow Looked At Me before he kind of reset for a minute before sharing a few new songs. They felt like the natural successors to Crow’s devastated, dejected guided stories. The songs still weave disconnected stories of his life and experiences with random observations of nature and kind, but these newer stories feel another year removed from Geneviève’s passing. Their daughter is a kid now, not a baby, and Phil revels in her voice and thoughts as a piece of Geneviève’s. The songs are devastating and beautiful, and probably work as evidence that his “conceptual Emptiness was fun to sing about”/heady black metal phase has passed.

I strongly disagree with music outlets picking Crow up as “one of the best albums of the year,” and if anyone has put out an entirely honest and non-commercial body of work over a legendary (of itself a coded, list-derived moniker) career it’s been Phil Elverum. Still, these new songs are some of his most distinct and disarming songwriting. This is one of those new songs, about the beginning of his relationship with Geneviève Castrée.

We’re going to start things off with a new/old/current song. Sometimes we struggle with that. Until we can work out the kinks of what articles to use, how royally to refer to ourselves, and whether to reveal our identity, enjoy this song. Thanks for listening.