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HOT OFF THE PRESS – Enemy Mine by Swan Lake
It’s Wednesday, and that means it’s time for Nick Courtright’s weekly first glance at just-discovered music, whether it be just-released, just-leaked, or some long-lost gem that has remained under the radar. Click here for other recent editions of Hot Off the Press, featuring acts such as Animal Collective, Deerhunter, TV on the Radio, M. Ward, White Denim, and Grizzly Bear.
to be released March 24 on Jagjaguwar
Report Card: B+
There’s something inherently obnoxious about the whole “supergroup” moniker, and music history is dotted with thankfully aborted attempts to make something of the name’s lofty claim. Despite that, it’s surely intriguing when that star-crossed label becomes affixed to three guys who just a decade ago would have found it nearly impossible to develop a following in the first place, let alone such independent fan bases that when they get together to screw off in the studio it elicits all sorts of anticipatory glee-shouts. Yet in these internet times, musicians such as Spencer Krug, Carey Mercer, and Dan Bejar do have a niche in which to survivably produce some of the most intricate and conceptually demanding albums of the last few years, and even afford themselves the spare time to work on the Swan Lake project, a project best described as what happens when three mad scientists meet at a mad scientist convention and decide to be mad scientists together.