Blah blah blah, Sam Prekop. We GET it. You’re brilliant. You don’t need a day job like we do. You sing and write songs for The Sea and Cake. You paint. You “do” photography. You make solo albums. You fight. You fly. You crow. And I write about you during my 30-minute lunch break. Whatever, man. I’m cool with it.
Even as I sit here slurping shitty, weak coffee from a Styrofoam cup that I swear makes it taste worse somehow, you’ve got a new solo album coming out on September 7 from your longtime home of Thrill Jockey, called Old Punch Card. (That title seems like kind of a cruel dig at that fact that you don’t have to punch in to work every day like we do… but apparently your mind didn’t even GO there, because it refers to the old-school punch-card method that some of the first synths used. Hey, good for you. I wish I had a modular synth too.)
There’s no vocals, hardly any guitars, and no beats. I guess most of the sound material is generated by a modular synthesizer and takes inspiration from such sources as early musique concrète and electronic music, the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, Nuno Canavarro, Raymond Scott, David Behrman, and free improvisation; and it combines all of that into what your PR people are calling “a beautifully noisy, jagged, yet stately album of synthesizer music.” Hey, that all sounds awesome. I wish I had some PR people.
Oh, hey look at that: apparently you’ve also decided to tour your solo record by taking your well-known veteran band, The Sea and Cake, around the U.S. this fall with Broken Social Scene (on whose recent new album you also guested on). Man. I LOVE BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE. Damn it. I’ve got to get back to work. Get out of my face with your awesomeness, Sam Prekop.
Old Punch Card tracklisting:
01. Old Punch Card
02. Array Wicket
03. Knitting Needles
04. Brambles
05. Tell Work
06. November September
07. A Places
08. Lazy House
09. The Silhouettes
The Sea and Cake tourdates:
09.13.10 - Washington, DC - Warner Theatre *
09.14.10 - Philadelphia, PA - Theater of Living Arts *
09.17.10 - Boston, MA - House of Blues *
09.18.10 - New York, NY - Rumsey Playfield *
09.20.10 - New Haven, CT - Toads Place *
09.21.10 - Northampton, MA - Calvin Theatre *
09.22.10 - South Burlington, VT - Higher Ground *
09.24.10 - Ithaca, NY - Historic Ithaca State Theatre *
09.25.10 - Buffalo, NY - Town Ballroom *
10.02.10 - Chicago, IL - Riviera Theatre *
10.03.10 - Milwaukee, WI - Pabst Theatre *
10.04.10 - Minneapolis, MN - First Avenue *
10.06.10 - Winnipeg, MB - Burton Cummings Theatre *
10.07.10 - Saskatoon, SK - The Odeon Events Centre *
10.08.10 - Calgary, AB - Macewan Hall *
10.09.10 - Edmonton, AB - Winspear Centre *
10.10.10 - Kelowna, BC - Kelowna Community Theatre *
10.12.10 - Victoria, BC - Element Nightclub *
10.13.10 - Vancouver, BC - Commodore Ballroom *
10.14.10 - Vancouver, BC - Commodore Ballroom *
10.15.10 - Seattle, WA - Paramount Ballroom *
10.16.10 - Portland, OR - Crystal Ballroom *
10.17.10 - San Francisco, CA - Treasure Islands Music Festival
10.19.10 - Los Angeles, CA - Wiltern Theatre *
* Broken Social Scene
• Sam Prekop: http://www.myspace.com/samprekop
• The Sea and Cake: http://www.theseaandcake.com
• Thrill Jockey: http://www.thrilljockey.com
[Photo: wrestlingentropy]
