Preston School of Industry

Five Songs took a little break there. Had to recharge our batteries. It’s a grind getting out here and writing nothing of consequence about music nobody has heard or cares about! Well, we’re back!

A programming note: I’m really tired of doing the “previously"s. I think they’re charming, but they’re also a hassle to put together manually. I’m going to use the tagging on this platform instead. It’ll take a while to convert all the old entries, but this will make it easier for me going forward.

Today!

Preston School of Industry, “Blu Son”

This is some straight-up They Might Be Giants shit right here.

The Fiery Furnaces, “Guns Under the Counter”

Indie duo the Fiery Furnaces were a sister/brother act, dedicated to playing singular art rock. Employing a wide range of instrumentation, often within the same song, and rife with literate, obtuse storytelling, the Fiery Furnaces could be equal parts fascinating and exasperating. This comes from one of their more challenging albums, Rehearsing My Choir, which is their collaboration with their grandmother. Centered around her memories of growing up in Chicago, it’s a meandering look into one family that can be interesting if you’re paying attention but isn’t something that you can just kind of throw on in the background.

New Melvins album! It’s a double album, a first for them. Word is that the first album is good, the second is ambient nonsense. I guess I’ll find out. Meanwhile, here are your tunes for today.

Also, I totally had this entry ready to go, and forgot to post over the weekend. Broke my streak!

Preston School of Industry, “Monkey Heart and the Horses’ Leg”

There are times when you can really hear the Pavement in Preston School of Industry. This is one of those times.

Yesterday, I actually briefly had six songs in the post. I only discovered it when I was going to put the entries in the index. I have one job! I only need one hand to count! Anywhere, here’s today’s random count of songs (hopefully five!).

Preston School of Industry, “History of the River”

When Pavement broke up, Stephen Malkmus went solo (later adding a backing band called The Jicks), and Scott “Spiral Stairs” Kannberg founded Preston School of Industry. He put out two records under that name, neither reaching anywhere near the heights of Pavement (but, to be fair, neither has Malkmus). They’re both decent records, but they’re missing the spark that really elevated Pavement.