GANG GANG DANCE - Listen First!

Ever check out NPR to stream a new album before it is out? Of course you do! We do it too, but now we're THRILLED to offer y'all the chance to stream a new album right here from our website! Bring it on All Songs Considered! We've got the new album from Gang Gang Dance right here for you to listen to from front to back. The CD and LP are out on May 10 and will be on sale at Slowtrain! Now get listening...

RSD LEFTOVERS

Did you miss out on some Record Store Day exclusives yesterday? Fear not, we've got some leftovers still for sale. If you see something you'd like stop by and pick it up - these are all for sale at regular retail prices. We're not trying to make a quick buck at your expense, after all. We'll even ship to you (at a small extra charge) if you're not in SLC...just give us a call and pay over the phone.

We still aren't doing holds on these items just yet. So if you want something, act now.

Here's what's left!

LP/12"
sold out Akron/Family
Bad Brains
sold out Bear In Heaven
Black Twig Pickers
Eric Clapton
Clouds
David's Town
sold out Dio
sold out Esben & the Witch
sold out Flaming Box
Fleetwood Mac (1LP)
Flying Lotus
Follow Me Down
John Hammond
Jimi Hendrix
Kill Rock Stars Comp
Mastodon Live
Midlake
sold out Mississippi John Hurt
sold out MMJ- Evil Urges
sold out MMJ- Z
sold out MMJ- It Still Moves
Nickel Creek- s/t
Oval
Rough Guide: Desert Blues
Rough Guide: African Guitar Legends
Sacred Bones Comp
sold out Sonic Youth
Submarines
Superchunk
Therapies Son 10"
sold out Hank III- Risin Outlaw
sold out Hank III- Rebel Within
Omar Rodriguez Lopez Box

7"
AC/DC
sold out Built to Spill
sold out Civil Wars
Duran/Duran
Jimi Hendrix
High Llamas
Michael Jackson
sold out Freddy King
sold out John Mayall
sold out Nada Surf
Ozzy Osbourne
sold out Prurient
Nathaniel Rateliff
sold out REM
Raphael Saadiq
Skysaw
sold out Superchunk
sold out Twin Sister
Urge Overkill

CD/Other
Bloodshot Comp
Roky Erickson DVD
Frustrators
Omar Rodriguez Lopez
Save the Music Comp
Superchunk

RECORD STORE DAY IN-STOCK AT SLOWTRAIN

Okay fellow music-lovers. I'm caving. I'm going to list here all of the exclusives we've received for Record Store Day tomorrow. What I will not disclose is how many of each we received...you'll have to get here yourself tomorrow to find out. The earlier the better if your DESPERATE for one or ten of these.

And, in full disclosure, I may have accidentally missed a title or two on this list as we've been rushing to get everything ready and I don't have time to double and triple check my work. So, well, godspeed.

Here ya go!

ANTONY & THE JOHNSONS 10"

ARCHITECTURE IN HELSINKI PLACES LIKE THIS

BAD BRAINS PAY TO CUM

BLACK ANGELS ANOTHER NICE PAIR

BUSDRIVER ATM

KATE BUSH HOUNDS OF LOVE

CARIBOU SWIM REMIXES

ERIC CLAPTON UNPLUGGED

DAMIEN JURADO LIVE AT LANDLOCKED

DEERHOOF FRIEND OPPORTUNITY

DEERHOOF/XIU XIU SPLIT

DENNIS COFFEY 7"

DIO KILLING THE DRAGON

JUSTIN TOWNES EARLE MOVE OVER MAMA

FELA KUTI MONDAY

FLAMING LIPS HEADY NUGGS

FLEETWOOD MAC RUMORS

FLEETWOOD MAC RUMORS

FRANZ FERDINAND S/T

GHOST OF SABER TOOTH (SEAN LENNON) LA CARETTE

GLASSJAW WARSHIP AND TRIBUTE

GRINDERMAN PLACES OF MONT

GRINDERMAN EVIL

JIMI HENDRIX SOUTH SATURN DELTA

IGGY & THE STOOGES RAW POWER LIVE

INTERNATIONAL SUBMARINE (GRAM PARSONS) SAFE HOME

JOAN OF ARC PRESENTS DON'T MIND CONTROL

JOAN JETT I LOVE ROCK N' ROLL

KILLS SATELLITE

FREDDY KING WASHOUT

RAY LOMONTAGNE LIVE FALL

LUYAS / TWIN SISTER SPLIT

MATES OF STATE TEAM BOO

JOHN MAYALL / ERIC CLAPTON SPLIT

My Morning Jacket EVIL URGES

My Morning Jacket IT STILL MOVES

My Morning Jacket Z

MUMFORD & SONS DHAROHAR

NO ONE GOT HURT V/A

OF MONTREAL PAST IS GROTESQUE

OPETH THROAT OF

OWEN O, EVELYN

POLVO CELEBRATE

RED KRAYOLA HURRICANE FIGHTER

RUSSIAN RECORDINGS V/A

SACRED BONES VOL 1

SAVE THE MUSIC V/A

TY SEGALL TY REX

SOMEONE STILL LOVES YOU BROOM

SUPERCHUNK HERE'S WHERE THE STRINGS

SUPERCHUNK HERE'S WHERE THE STRINGS

13TH FLOOR ELEVATORS WAIT FOR MY LOVE

VELVET UNDERGROUND FOGGY NOTION

Charlotte Gainsbourg / VILLAGERS MEMOIR

VIVIAN GIRLS I HEARD YOU SAY

WILD FLAG FUTURE CRIMES

YARDBIRDS GOODNIGHT SWEET

YEASAYER END BLOD

FLEET FOXES HELPLESNESS BLUES

BLITZEN TRAPPER MAYBE BABY

LOWER DENS DEER KNIVES

THE HEAD & THE HEART S/T

THE HEAD & THE HEART s/t

VARIOUS ARTISTS SAVE THE MUSIC

VARIOUS ARTISTS NO ONE GOT HURT

Flying Lotus Cosmogramma Alt Takes

Bibio/Clark Willenhall/Baskerville Grinch - Split 12 inch

Oval/Liturgy Split LP

Black Twig Pickers/Glenn Jones Split LP

Omar Rodriguez Lopez Telesterion

Omar Rodriguez Lopez Telesterion

John Doe & Jill Sobule A Day at the Pass

Urge Overkill Effigy b/w The Kids Are Alright

Daedelus Tailor-Made

Os Mutantes Everything is Possible: World Psychedelic Classics 1

Javelin Coleridge/Colleagues

Javelin Canyon Candy

Midlake Am I Going Insane

Prurient Many Jewels Surround The Crown

Clouds B Chuggas May Be Logging

Neurosis Sovereign LP

Various Artists Kill Rock Stars

Nada Surf The Moon Is Calling

Kode9 & The Spaceape Otherman / Love Is The Drug (ft Cha Cha)

Various Artists Follow Me Down

John Hammond So Many Roads

Skip James Today

Mississippi John Hurt Immortal

John Fahey Requia

Nickel Creek Nickel Creek

Nickel Creek This SIde

Nickel Creek Why SHould

Machine Head Black

Gorillaz Fall

Syd Barrett Introduction to

James Blake James Blake

Sonic Youth Whore's Moaning

Lady Gaga Born This Way

Foo FIghters Medium Rare

Decemberists Live at Bull Moose

Nathaniel Rateliff Shroud

Queen Keep Yourself Alive

Mastodon Just Got Paid

Derek & Dominos Got To Get

Rolling Stones Brown Sugar

Duran Duran Girl Panic

Skysaw No One Can Tell

Jimi Hendrix Fire

Pearl Jam Immoratality

Ozzy Osbourne Flyin High

Roy Orbison Only the Lonely

Raphael Saddiq Radio

AC/DC Shoot To Thrill

Manchester Orchestra Simple Math

Cults Abducted

Michael Jackson Hollywood

Daft Punk Tron

Beach Boys Good Vibrations

Kings of Leon Holy Roller

Adele Rolling in the Deep

Bruce Springsteen Gotta Get

Jimi Hendrix Fire

Roky Erickson Night of the

Local Customs: Pressed At Boddie (Numero) LP

Local Customs: Pressed At Boddie (Numero) CD

Local Customs: Pressed At Boddie (Numero) Cass

High Llamas 7"

Various Artists (QOTSA & others) A Rekords Rekords Record

Mike Gordon Inside In

Various Artists Rhymesayers Vinyl Picture Disc

The Submarines Love Notes / Letter Bombs

William Fitzsimmons Gold In The Shadow

Various Artists Rough Guide to Desert Blues

Various Artists Rough Guide to African Guitar

Brett Dennen B Side to the D Side

Frustrators Griller

The Kills Satellite

Polvo

Mike Gordon Moss Remixes

Phish 2 soundchecks

Grateful Dead s/t

Television Live at the Old Waldorf

Hank Williams III Risin Outlaw / Rebel Within / Lovesick / Straight to Hell / Damn Right

Mastodon Live at the Aragon

Deftones Covers

Jimmy Eat World Bleed American

Opeth The Throat of Winter

My Chemical Romance Na Na Na

Rush Caravan

Death Cab for Cutie In Living Stereo

Built to Spill Ripple

Green Day / Husker Du Don't want to know if you're lonely

Bad Brains God of Love

Jenny and Johnny / Gram Parsons Love Hurts

Mastodon / ZZ Top Just got paid

REM First Three Singles

Regina Spektor Four From Far

The Doors Riders on the Storm

Akron Family

Beady Eye

Bear in Heaven / Lindstrom

Between the Buried and Me

The Civil Wars

Frightened Rabbit / Twilight Sad

Matt & Kim

Skysaw

Superchunk / Coloseium

Guided by Voices tribute CD/LP

Arthur Russell - LP -
New Pornographers - 7"
Esben & The Witch - 12"
Fucked Up - LP
Deerhunter - 7"

Ryan Adams 7"

ANNA'S RECORD STORE DAY PEP-TALK

Some of you may have already read this from our newsletter...but if not, you should read it now.

It is here. Record Store Day is just, literally, around the corner. We are in fully stress/work-like-crazy-people mode here at Slowtrain HQ as we finalize all of the little details. We're printing t-shirts, confirming bands, organizing the beer, preparing for crafters, pricing RSD exclusives, and trying to keep the shop running day-to-day.

So as we work on all of these items, I want to just take a moment and share my Record Store Day thoughts with you. For some folks and record stores this day is all about the exclusive releases. It is about having everything on the shelf and collecting each piece, especially the most rare ones. And that is fine. The exclusives are certainly bad-ass and we ordered practically EVERYTHING we could for y'all. But I think all a person really has to do is look at what Slowtrain has planned for the day and see that, to us, Record Store Day (and record stores specifically) is about community.

We are using our biggest sales day of the year to help out 3 amazing local non-profit organizations. You can buy beer and support the Salt Lake City Film Festival. You can buy food and support Breathe Utah. And we'll have Local First Utah on site to share the local business love. SLUG Magazine will be with us showcasing some incredible crafters from Craft Lake City. Breathe Utah is providing food from local restaurant Rusted Sun Pizzeria. SLCFF will be slinging brews from the locally owned Bohemian Brewery. Our special edition t-shirts we're printing (designed by Owen Ashworth and Pete Klockau) will benefit Spy Hop Productions.

At Slowtrain, this day isn't about who has the best vinyl selection in town, who has the most RSD exclusives, who has the biggest sale, who has the hippest staff, who has the best location...At Slowtrain, Record Store Day, and every day, is about this great community that we all share. We want to continue to build it up and support it the best way we know how, by throwing a killer party and inviting all of you to join us.

We hope to see you Saturday...

Love,
Anna

FREE GIFTS!

We're suuuper honored today to offer you some incredible bonus gifts with your purchases at Slowtrain. If you pick up the new Mountain Goats CD or LP we'll give you a free cassette tape of demos that have been hand-colored by John Darnielle himself! These are ridiculously limited, so hurry in to get yours. If you can't drop everything to be at the store at 11am, we'll be raffling off 1 of these tapes next Monday. To enter the raffle you MUST purchase the CD or LP from us in this coming week, no exceptions - you must enter when you make your purchase. Ask to enter at the register.

We've also got some beeee-yooo-tiful lithograph prints to give away when you purchase the new Radiohead and the new Pains of Being Pure at Heart.

AND if you buy the new CD or LP from the Obits, which rules, you get a free band patch to put on your jeans or your jacket or your backpack or something. It's a patch! And it's red! And it's free as a gift from us to you when you buy their rad album!

Still not satisfied? How's about you buy the new Moon Duo CD or LP, which is also incredible, and then you get a bonus remix CD. The free shit is out of control!

HAVE I MENTIONED THAT ALL OF THESE TITLES ARE ON SALE TOO! Woot! Don't get much better than that! You're getting a deal on pricing PLUS free gifts.

These are all first come, first served, so get your booty to Slowtrain stat!

** a commenter wants an address on the main page. not totally sure what page or what address but here's what i've got.

web address: www.slowtrainmusic.com

physical addrss: 221 E Broadway

i'm guessing this is the page he's referring to...

RECORD STORE DAY ENTERTAINMENT pt 3

Screw it. Now that I've got all of our RSD bands confirmed I'm finding it hard to get motivated to write a blog about each one...there's a lot. So let's just dive right in and share the good news! We're gonna have some kick ass music on Saturday, April 16. Woo-hoo!

Birthquake
Trappers
Paul Jacobsen
American Shakes
Ryan Tanner
Plastic Furs
Jay William Henderson
Desert Noises
Joshua James

Let's not forget other cool shit we've got going on...

• Morning coffee from Nobrow for those of you early risers that will be waiting in line for first dibs on exclusives.
• Children's entertainment for you families out there from 10am to noon. Magic! Balloons! Face paint!
  
• Food sold by Breathe Utah as a fundraiser for their important non-profit.
• Craft booths from some of your favorite Craft Lake City crafters.
• Fun interactive booths from SLUG Magazine and Local First Utah.
  
• And, of course, we'll have Bohemian Beer inside from the Salt Lake City Film Festival.
  

Can we just fast forward to April 16 already???

RECORD STORE DAY ENTERTAINMENT pt 2

Are you chomping at the bit to find out who else is playing at our RSD festivities this year? Of course you are!

Well we're happy to tell you all that the wonderful AMERICAN SHAKES will be bringing their brand of reverb-soaked, 70s-esque, rock to our party. This is where the Band of Annual's Brent Dreiling steps out from behind the pedal steel to share his stellar songwriting and leading-man skills.

American Shakes had their CD release here at Slowtrain so we speak as experts when we say, this band is stellar. You can get their album on vinyl (VINYL!) here at the shop now, that way you'll know all the songs by heart on April 16 ad you can sing along and swoon.

RECORD STORE DAY ENTERTAINMENT pt 1

One of the questions we've been getting the most of lately is "Who is playing at our RSD2011 party?" - and while we're not ready to unveil our full line-up just yet, we're going to feature some of our musical guests here on the blog this week. Kind of a sneak peek for those of you paying attention.

For this first feature we'd like to highlight the incredible BIRTHQUAKE!

We are super excited to have this band playing our big event. This band of brothers loves record stores and music and parties as much all of us here at Slowtrain. Which means we're pretty much a match made in heaven.

Check out what Ryan Hall and our good friends at Tome To The Weather Machine have to say about Birthquake.

Rejoice The Noise (Kilby Records, 12.09)

If there is one album that has consistently been the most enjoyable experience in backtracking (still much more to come) it has been Rejoice The Noise by SLC locals the Brothers Whittaker. Every virtuosic move is expertly calculated to simultaneously put a smile on your face and flip your lid (if flip your lid translates to the physical act of being totally impressed). To bring you up to speed Birthquake is comprised of three brothers who play blistering math-tinged post-rock in the vein of The F’ing Champs, Hella and A Minor Forest but with occasional woodwind accompaniment by Mark Herrera. Living in a day where huge emotional payoffs are manufactured by the most inorganic methods thinkable it is truly refreshing to be blown away by something as primitive as drums, bass, and a killer guitar solo. The excesses of a finger-tapped guitar solo, precision timed hand-claps, whistles, hell-on-wheels time changes all point to one end, celebration. Or revelry. Or rejoicing. This trifecta of fraternal familiarity is underwritten in the very fabric of the sound, as if each members internal clock is inherently understood by the other; this awareness provides for an album with nary a wasted moment. I can’t believe I have gotten this far without mentioning Mark Herrera’s incredible woodwind contributions. His tenor sax on “Farewell, Fare Thee Well, Well “ shreds like the Eighties never happened. Absolutely top-notch stuff.

Ryan H.

SLUG localized set.

RECORD STORE DAY IS COMING

Have you marked your calendar yet? Record Store Day 2011 is on the books for Saturday, April 16, and you will not want to miss Slowtrain's celebration.

We are still finalizing all of our plans, but you can follow our progress on our special RSD web-page here. We *should* have delicious Bohemian beer from the Salt Lake City Film Festival, we'll have crafters from Craft Lake City, food provided by (and supporting) Breathe Utah, and our EXCLUSIVE RELEASES. That's what it's all about, right?

Well, not really, I like to think RSD is more about the celebration. Yeah, the exclusives are cool and we want you to buy lots of them...but we just like existing and RSD is a way to celebrate us and all of you who help keep us around. So thanks for your support.

Who am I kidding, I can't just glide past the releases like that, can I? Haha.

Check out the as-official-as-it-gets lists here on our website.

Slowtrain has set up a RSD Savings Account for customers...you can come by the store anytime and deposit money into your own account via cash or credit ($25 min) and we'll hold that money for you to spend at Slowtrain on Record Store Day. PLUS any deposits you make in March will earn you an extra 10% of spending and April deposits will earn you an extra 5%. Click here for more details, or just come on in and ask us about it.

So come on down, start setting funds aside, and get your lists ready for RSD 2011. It's gonna be wild!

2011 HITS

2011 has been flush with stellar new releases. Some hit below the radar, others are big topping charts and such. I thought it would be wise to take notes on a bunch of my favorites so far this year so that when November rolls around I can reference this list and remember some of these gems for my year end list.

Hopefully you'll find some treats of your own in my recap of the last 2 months.

The Decemberists - The King Is Dead
A nice Americana album from Meloy and crew. This album is full of well-crafted alt-country pop songs that will get stuck in your head for days, and that is a good thing. I love that The Decemberists can change their style and output from record to record. This may not be as risky as Hazards of Love or as quirky as Picaresque, but it is a fine album to add to any music collection.

Fergus & Geronimo - Unlearn
This little gem comes from a label that is full of 'em, Hardly Art. It is a nice poppy garage-rock album full of toe-tapping beats, perfectly distorted guitar, and retro-esque vocal stylings. If you haven't heard this yet, you probably should. It is that sort of underground album that will win you all sorts of cool points next time you play it at a party.

Esben and the Witch - Violet Cries
The songs on this album start quiet and slow and build into epic swells of dark matter. It is like post-rock Blonde Redhead with a dark side. The album is intense and beautiful, depressing and uplifting. Recommended on a turntable with the volume cranked.



Yuck - s/t
There is something oddly familiar about the songs on Yuck's debut release, yet it is a distant enough memory that the album doesn't feel like a rip off. Maybe in the same way that the Girls LP, Album, swelled their listeners full of nostalgia Yuck is doing the same...just in a slightly more subtle fashion. You'll want to keep an eye on this band, I think they are going to shoot up from here.

Bright Eyes - The People's Key
I've been getting a lot of questions about "how" the new Bright Eyes album is. And truth is, it's good. It isn't "classic" Oberst with strong political/personal/religious undertones and howling for change and revolt. But it is a step up from his last solo effort, in my opinion. I like to think of it as a better version of Cassadaga. If you're at all a Bright Eyes fan, this is definitely worth owning. If you are on the fence with Bright Eyes...I think this one is a good one to have in rotation between I'm Wide Awake It's Morning and Lifted.

Destroyer - Kaputt
Oh, Dan Bejar, how do I love thee? When we went to the Matador at 21 festival and snuck into the VIP box to watch Guided By Voices I was RIDICULOUSLY distracted because I was just feet away from Destroyer's Dan Bejar. I love him. That said, I wasn't a super fan of his last release. I own it, but have barely listened to it. So when Kaputt came out I wasn't sure what to expect. BUT I've been thrilled to fall in love with this album. I predict it will easily be in my top 10 of 2011. The songs, the sax, the voice...Buy this album, thank me later.

Akron/Family - S/T II: The Cosmic Birth and Journey of Shinju TNT
After the deep psychedelic trip on their last record, Akron/Family has mixed it up and come back strong with a less fuzzy and more beautiful album that is deserving of your ears.

La Sera - s/t
Retro pop songs with a soft modern vocal touch and the perfect amount of distorted guitar make this album a 2011 must-have. This is everything that the Best Coast album *should* have been. Smart, catchy, retro-pop. Buy now, save for summer.



Mogwai - Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will
I wouldn't really call myself a Mogwai "fan". I don't mind them, but I, prior to this record, have never found myself *wanting* to listen to a Mogwai album. But Hardcore Will Never Die changed everything. I think about it ALL THE TIME. I want to hear it when I read, when I shower, when I work, when I sleep. The drama is toned down to a subtle and powerful climax and the soundscape is just beautiful. Sigh...

Eat Sugar - ­Levantense!
A little punk rock, a little electro, a little distortion - this album will get you off of your ass and get you doing something because you just can't sit still while listening. I'm guessing that is where the album title came from...My only complaint is that Mush didn't put this fun album onto vinyl.



TITLES I LIKE BUT WANT TO SPEND MORE TIME WITH BEFORE I WRITE ABOUT THEM BUT YOU SHOULD STILL CHECK THEM OUT:

Telekinesis - 12 Desperate Straight Lines
Cave Singers - No Witch
Twilight Singers - Dynamite Steps
John Vanderslice - White Wilderness
The Luyas - Too Beautiful To Work

Now it is your turn. What am I missing!?