For this podcast I am joined by Ian, who is now a member of the Song, by Toad Records team, to go through a bit of a run-down of what’s going to be happening on the label this year.

We’ve got a couple of our more recent releases, like Rob St. John and Lil Daggers, as well as some of our confirmed and ready new albums for next year, by the likes of The Leg, Jesus H. Foxx and Yusuf Azak.

I’ve also got a couple of tracks from bands we’ll be releasing on a split 12″ in the Spring.  We’ll be recording that stuff in our house next week, so the songs we chose to represent those bands are for obvious reasons not the final ones we’ll be releasing, just tracks by the bands so you can get a bit of a flavour of what we’re up to.

With Ian on board and based on the good press we managed last year I am hoping we can really kick on with the label this year and make a decent impression.  Obviously the third Meursault album will  help, what with them being our most established band, but we have a good spread of stuff, from bands like Dolfinz with only a few demos to their name, to the likes of Yusuf Azak and The Leg who people know already and then the Foxx album, which has been ‘much anticipated’ for a while now.

So all in all it should be an exciting year, I reckon.  Enjoy!

Direct download: Toadcast #208 – Song, by Toad Records 2012

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01. Mongrels – I’m Gonna Murder Justin Bieber (00.21)
02. King Post Kitsch – The Make the Same Faces Whether Fuck or Fight (02.46)
03. Meursault – Flittin’ (locationmusic.tv Piano Version) (08.49)
04. Rob St. John – The Acid Test (17.59)
05. Lil Daggers – Dead Golden Girls (22.05)
06. Paws – Bloodline (Toad Session) (31.52)
07. Jesus H. Foxx – This is Not a Rental Car (40.31)
08. The Leg – Twitching Stick (43.00)
09. Sex Hands – Jinglebitch (51.56)
10. Dolfinz – Blowhole (55.36)
11. Yusuf Azak – Lay Me Down (63.12)

The Party’s Over, the debut album by King Post Kitsch, was released this week and can now be bought from our website, Avalanche Records on the Grassmarket and (as of the weekend) LoveMusic and Mono in Glasgow.

As is our habit with this sort of thing we are giving away another free song to mark the occasion: in this case the splendid Fante’s Last Stand, which has been played on Gideon Coe’s show on 6Music a couple of times this week.  Marc Riley also seems to be a fan, and the blogosphere in general has been incredibly generous, with the latest splendid reviews coming from Incendiary Mag in Holland, as well as Tidal Wave of Indifference and Peenko somewhat closer to home.

I hope you enjoy.  I promise we’ll get him out and about playing live just as soon as we can.

Direct download: King Post Kitsch – Fante’s Last Stand

King Post Kitsch – Fante’s Last Stand by Song, by Toad

The new King Post Kitsch album The Party’s Over comes out on the 13th of June, and as a little pre-release present we are giving away a couple of free mp3s, the first of which is the impossibly catchy Walking on Eggshells.

We’ve already seen some cracking reviews for the album already, in The Skinny, The List and Musos Guide, as well as some really good writeups of the Don’t You Touch my Fucking Honeytone single on too many blogs to individually mention, but to whom I am hugely grateful.

Marc Riley turns out to rather like it as well, which is nice.  He’s played songs from the album on his last two 6Music shows, which can be listened to on the iPlayer here and here.

Enjoy!

Direct download: King Post Kitsch – Walking on Eggshells

King Post Kitsch – Walking on Eggshells by Song, by Toad

Well it’s been a while since we announced an actual, real new release on Song, by Toad Records but here is one for you: the debut single from King Post Kitsch, called Don’t You Touch my Fucking Honeytone.

The song comes out on Monday on a rather special,  limited edition four-song white 7″, with a free download code, and I will be posting pre-orders tomorrow. The title actually has nothing to do with the song itself, but the guitar on his debut album The Party’s Over, which this single is from, was all recorded on a tiny wee Danelectro Honeytone, so I suppose there’s sort of a connection, tenuous as it might be.

And erm, also… er, just buy one.  Please. You can do that here.

King Post Kitsch – Don’t You Touch My Fucking Honeytone by Song, by Toad

Sweeping the Nation turns six round about, well, now actually.  For a music blog to last that long is highly unusual; most get to about the two year mark and then posting becomes less and less frequent, and eventually the only updates are rather uncomfortable ‘sorry I haven’t posted in ages’ missives spaced an increasing number of months apart until… silence.

For Simon to keep StN going for six years might just be testament to his mentalism, but I prefer to recognise someone with a familiarly psychotic need to constantly tell people what they should be listening to, and can only admire his endurance.

I don’t know what earns respect for music blogs.  Do you end just respecting the ones whose taste you agree with the most, the ones who are firstest and fastest to absolutely everything (twats), the ones who write interesting, in-depth features, or simply the ones who stick it out the longest?  I really have no idea, but I do know that Sweeping the Nation has always had an aura of respect about it, both from bands and other bloggers, and I would like to congratulate Simon on the work he’s done over the last six years.

To mark the event StN are releasing a charity compilation to benefit Macmillan’s Cancer Support.  It can be downloaded from Bandcamp here, for a minimum of £3 and a maximum of whatever you chose to give, and Simon has written a full run-down of the tracks he chose here. There are a couple of Song, by Toad Records band in there as well – it’s nice to be able to support someone who has given our label so much encouragement over the last few years – as well as donations from the excellent Alcopop and Popty Ping labels.  Please give generously.

No, no, don’t worry this isn’t some sort of chillout special (although we did actually do one of those once upon a time).  The only reason this is called the Chillcast is because on what was a beautifully sunny day for the rest of Scotland, Edinburgh performed its age old trick of drawing a freezing sea mist off the North Sea – the haar, as it’s called – and turning a lovely Spring day into a damp, chilly sulk.  Bastard.

I realised a while back that I don’t actually cover all that much Scottish music, despite the location of this blog being quite a prominent feature of the thing. This week, though, we have something like five Scottish (or Scottish-based) bands on this, and all of them relatively under the radar ones as well.

Anyhow, I am off to play nicely with Mrs. Toad’s colleagues for the rest of the day, in some sort of horrific bonding exercise.  Ah well, it pays the bills I suppose, and it’s not like she doesn’t have to spend an awful lot of time hanging out with my ‘colleagues’.

Direct download: Toadcast #171 – The Chillcast

01. The Sandwitches – Summer of Love (00.11)
02. The Japanese War Effort – Pool Attendant (7.41)
03. King Post Kitsch – Don’t You Touch My Fucking Honeytone (10.42)
04. PAWS – Summer Wipeout (16.22)
05. Marcy Playground – Wave Motion Gun (25.05)
06. The Low Anthem – Boeing 737 (33.40)
07. Horsecollar – Christopher (39.12)
08. Morris Major – In Amongst My Ideas (47.11)
09. Plastic Animals – It Fell Apart (Demo) (50.34)
10. Earth Girl Helen Brown – Girls of My Dreams (59.06)

Apparently no-one visits websites anymore, because it’s all about the social media and so on and so forth, so I suppose most of you have already seen this.

In case you haven’t, however, I have uploaded a free Song, by Toad Records sampler to Bandcamp, with songs from some of our more recent releases, as well as a healthy dose of new material from the releases we have planned for the rest of the year.

Our release schedule is slowly filling up, as well.  Before a brief break for the Edinburgh Festival we have four-song 7″ releases by King Post Kitsch and Lil Daggers, we have Surrender to Summer by The Japanese War Effort on 10″ vinyl, and we have albums by Lach and King Post Kitsch.  It is going to be very fucking busy indeed.

So, before all that excitement starts I figured I might as well give away some free sweeties to get people excited.  And here it is, downloadable for free from Bandcamp.  Enjoy!

After shaking the music industry to its very foundations by announcing the release of his debut album on Song, by Toad Records (cough cough), Charlie from King Post Kitsch has decided that waiting around and giving himself a pat on the back is not for him: he has decided to release a free EP called Some Call it Hell, but it’s Home (download here).

These are all acoustic demos he recorded to help himself get a feel for the songs and figure out how to record them properly. As can happen, however, the improved versions apparently never really felt all that improved, and so he decided to quit foostering about with them and just leave them be, with the result being this EP.

The tracks are lovely, with the title track reminding me of some of the woozier stuff on the first EPs he released, and the closer Rebecca more of a kind with the upbeat, catchy pop tunes we’ve heard from Charlie in the past.  As he’s on the label I won’t say too much more, as you know I am biased in this instance, but please take the chance to pop over to his Bandcamp page and help yourself.

King Post Kitsch – Rebecca

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It seems like a very long time since I have given you anything like a news update on Song, by Toad Records, and that’s because I usually keep these things restricted to times when I have something to give away, like an mp3 or a new video or something like that.

In this case I don’t have any such thing, but there has been a lot going on so I thought I should probably give you a wee update anyway, because somewhat amazingly, we have no less than five new signings to announce (I hate that word, but you know what I mean).   So, in order of their forthcoming releases:

King Post Kitsch

I have been a fan of Charlie’s for some time, since Lloyd from Peenko very kindly introduced me to his music a year or so ago. He’s just moved up to Glasgow from London and is putting together a new band, if you’re interested and can drum or play guitar.  On the 16th May we’ll be releasing a four-song single Don’t You Touch My Fucking Honeytone on 7″ vinyl, and then his debut album The Party’s Over comes out on the 13th June.

The Japanese War Effort

I hesitate to use words like ‘signed’ with Jamie, because he’s such a creative wee bastard that he’ll probably turn up on things released on half a dozen different labels over the next few years.  Anyhow, he has agreed to let us release the absolutely blinding Surrender to Summer EP on 10″ vinyl, and although we don’t have a date set just yet, I am thinking that the tail end of June makes sense – it is called Surrender to Summer, after all.

Lach

Yes, for some reason the gentleman who invented the New York anti-folk movement which, as well as kind of defining an entire genre of music, nurtured the early careers of the likes of Jeffrey Lewis, Kimya Dawson, The Moldy Peaches, Beck and Regina Spektor, has decided he wants to release his next album on Song, by Toad Records. Ramshackle Heart is coming out on the 18th July, and Lach will be reprising his stellar turn at the Edinburgh Festival again, both as a one-man show as well as bringing back the Anti-hoot.

Rob St. John

Having recorded his album in just two and a half days in February, Rob is going to have to wait until the Autumn to see it released.  I am not sure of the title yet, but we have a release date of 26th September and a plan to put it out as a gorgeous gatefold vinyl 12″, with Rob’s own photography forming the bulk of the album artwork.

Lil Daggers

This one isn’t quite what you would describe as a done deal, although it is agreed in principle, in the sense that we’ve asked if they’d like us to release their stuff over here (the band themselves are actually from Florida) and they said yes.  So that’s about as done a deal as we usually have, here at Song, by Toad Records.  Anyhow, we’ll be putting out their 7″ King Corpse EP over here sometime in July, followed by their self-titled debut album, probably sometime in October or November depending on what we all decide together when they get back form their current tour.

Crucially, King Post Kitsch and Lil Daggers are ‘Approved By Mrs. Toad’, a phrase you can expect to hear a little more of from time to time around these parts.  Basically, it means that she likes them because they make a racket.  And here, because I had to give you at least something to download for free, is the promotional track their US label Livid Records is using to promote the US release of Lil Daggers: Slave Exchange.

Lil Daggers – Slave Exchange

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I am Ruthless for this week’s show on Fresh Air Radio, so it will just be me prattling on by myself instead.  I have a John Darnielle tribute to the assault on organised labour in Wisconsion, I have the original version of that song, and I have some Withered Hand, in honour of his SXSW visa troubles.

Other than that, I am pretty worn out from a night of epic drinking in Stockton (which is not even Middlesbrough) last night after the excellent seminar thingy hosted by The Generator at which I (inevitably) drank and talked far too much.  There is a certain inevitability to these things, isn’t there.

Live from 8pm UK time – click here to listen.

As per usual the playlist will appear below as I play things, and feel free to swing by the comments and have your say.

1. Lil Daggers – Give Me the Pill
2. King Post Kitsch – Don’t You Touch My Fucking Honeytone
3. Meursault – And Butter Would Not Melt (from Jonnie Common’s Deskjob)
4. Withered Hand – No Cigarettes
5. Tom Waits – Anywhere I Lay My Head
6. John Darnielle – There is Power in a Union
7. The Louche FC – Only in a Dream
8. Irk the River – Mind That Child
9. The Son(s) – Radar
10. REM – It Happened Today
11. Billy Bragg – There is Power in a Union
12. Elbow – Jesus is a Rochdale Girl
13. David Thomas Broughton – Ain’t Got no Sole
14. Clem Snide – Pale Blue Eyes
15. Warm Ghost – Open the Wormhole in Your Heart
16. Dam Mantle – Grey
17. Dolfish – Your Love is Bummin’ Me Out
18. The Honey Pies – Hair of the Dog