[12.7.05] Its that time again! The time of year when all of our favorite websites compile lists of the 'Top 10 Records of the Year' and we get to learn about records we may have slept on thus far. RiYL will be putting together a Top 10 of 2005 soon, so get ready! Maybe we'll even have our bands/acts compile their Top 10's? That'd be cool. Bands/acts? Wanna do this? One of our most favoritest websites in the UK, trakMARX, has compiled its 'Top 10 of 2005' already and have bestowed our very own Pathways with the honor of having the eighth best record of 2005 (Boat of Confidence, of course). Take that, Arcade Fire (#9)! We couldn't be happier. Thanks trakMARX! Stay tuned for more... 'Tis the season to be merry! [12.5.05] Rebecca Schiffman was featured in an article on artinfo.com last week. You can check it out here "Emerging Artists: Fair Game.". As you'll learn, this coming January, Rebecca will have her first solo art show in Miami at the Hernan Bas-Naomi Fisher space (opening January 12th). How totally cool. In other Rebecca-related news, she's still hard at work on her second record (her first for RiYL) titled "To Be Good For A Day". We're hoping it'll be out sometime in Spring 2006. Stay tuned. Oh, and Rebecca's also just finished putting together a new zine which we'll have up in the distro section as soon as we get a few copies. [12.4.05] On December 5th, the "One World" programme on BBC Radio 1 will be broadcasting a special show in which various bands cover songs from the Beatles' White Album. The Pathways were asked to contribute a song and they chose George Harrison's "Savoy Truffle." To listen, go to the BBC website at the appointed hour and then click LISTEN LIVE near the top of the screen. The show airs at 1:00 am London time. For those of you in the Eastern time zone, that's 8:00 pm on Sunday, December 4th. [11.08.05] Yo, word?! The Fugue (who made a brief appearance on Pitchfork today) have been added to the roster of the illustrious Free Agency Booking (you may remember them from our shared CMJ party...). The Fugue join the ranks of other well regarded acts such as Wooden Wand and the Vanishing Voice, BARR, Slim Moon and What Army, The Punks, Princess and New England Roses. Flippin' sweet. The Fugue'll also be playing some dates with AIDS Wolf in December and then touring the West Coast with Night Wounds this February / March. Email John Chavez at the Free Agency if you wanna help with these dates: Friday Feb 24 - San Diego Saturday Feb 25 - Los Angeles Sunday Feb 26 - Oakland Monday Feb 27 - Reed Tuesday Feb 28 - Seattle Wednesday Mar 1 - Portland Thursday Mar 2 - San Francisco Friday Mar 3 - Visalia Saturday Mar 4 - Los Angeles That's it for now. Peace out. [10.31.05] The wait is over. The Pathways' Boat of Confidence full-length is now available in the CAPITALISM section! Happy Halloween. [10.7.05] We have a lot of favorite shows on college radio (shout outs to "Things Get Dusty Sometimes" and "The James Joyce of Radio" on WVKR!!) but the one show that consistently astonishes us is PHONING IT IN" on WBSR in Providence, RI. We first found out about the show in early 2005 and we've been fans ever since. The premise: A band or artist calls into their show and plays live over the phone. Hence the lovely twist on the phrase, "phoning it in". They even went so far as to have The WoWz play "on" their show in early August. You can listen to that HERE. Some of our other favorite Phoning It In episodes: The WoWz (August 8, 2005) David-Ivar Herman Dune (July 22, 2005) The Wave Pictures (July 15, 2005) The Solvents (June 24, 2005) BARR (June 23, 2005) Thomas Patrick Maguire (June 10, 2005) Little Wings (May 26, 2005) Woelv (May 13, 2005) Bridget Martin (May 12, 2005) Jad Fair (April 27, 2005) Daniel Johnston (April 20, 2005) Thanksgiving (March 16, 2005) Mount Eerie (February 9, 2005) I mean. C'mon. This is brilliance. Speaking of which, Boat of Confidence, which has been getting spins on BBC 1 in the UK, adds to college radio this Tuesday, October 11th. Call yr favorite station and request it... [9.26.05] Boys and girls: Once again our lovely and talented friend and Fugue drummer, Ben Grnbrg, has unfurled his generous talent on a new "cover" track, this time a version of Deerhoof's "Milk Man" (from the album of the same name). The song is featured on a downloadable album called The Covers, which is available directly from Deerhoofs website. Ben's track can be downloaded HERE. WARNING: It is amazing. In addition to Ben, the album features contributions from people like Nels Cline (Wilco, Mike Watt, a whole lotta others) and Vice Cooler (of the ineffable Hawnay Troof). For more information, read today's Pitchfork news story on the album. In other splendid news, our friends across the sea at BBC Radio 1 have apparently taken notice of The Pathways' Boat of Confidence album and will be giving it a spin on one of Hermeet Chadha's shows. We couldn't be more flattered. If you're in the UK, feel free to request the Pathways and let us know if you hear 'em on the radio! Last and least, we're apparently still having problems with our email server, both on the sending and receiving end. We're going to create an interum gmail account to serve as our main contact email until we get this all figured out. If you've tried contacting us but received an error message or no reply from us, either try us again or wait until the gmail account is active (we'll post it here). We're not ignoring you, we promise!! [9.23.05] RiYL / FREE AGENCY CMJ show was rad. Thanks, of course, to John Chavez for being awesome and for running things with us. Thanks to all the people and bands who played and all the people who came and stayed. Totally fun. Things are a little slow around here because we're hard at work behind-the-scenes on our new website. We're hoping to unveil it around the time Boat of Confidence comes out. Keep your eyes peeled. Also: Yet another label has been birthed in Poughkeepsie. This time our dear friends Chris and Jacob have started a label called BloodShake Records. They'll be releasing stuff from Sonya Cotton, The Bland Allisons and The National Lights. The website is pretty easy on the eye and features some wonderful photos by Ryan Muir. Welcome to the game, guys! [9.6.05] OMG/CMJ. Yo: 169 Bar offered us their place on Saturday, September 17th, to throw a RiYL Records CMJ Party. It'll take place from 1pm to 6pm and we may split the time with some friends of ours. More details soon. [8.28.05] Woah. Its been a while since we've updated the news section. Sorry about that. We hope this update will make the wait worthwhile... Things are buzzing here at RiYL Central since we've finally received our copies of The Pathways' Boat of Confidence CD. You can pick it up at this week's SUMMER SLAM 2 blowout concert at 169 Bar. Unfortunately, Rebecca Schiffman got stuck out of town and so she will no longer be playing. Nor will The Fugue, who were asked to open for Chinese Stars and Rye Coalition at the Knitting Factory. Ok, ok. Good excuses. Here's the new lineup: KID WAVE THE PATHWAYS THE WOWZ CHRIS MAHER & CRIMINAL BONES SECRET SALAMANDER (and maybe a surprise Huggabroomstik show?) COLIN KINDLEY The show takes place at 169 Bar (169 East Broadway - take the F train to East Broadway) on Thursday, September 1st. Doors at 8pm, 21+, $7. Come get a taste of RiYL's present and future. You won't be disappointed. See you in four days! [8.2.05] Dudes! We've added a studio version MP3 of BEN GRNBRG's cover of the Wolf Eyes song "Stabbed in the Face". You may remember Pitchfork giving Ben a whopping 5-star rating for an earlier recording of this cover (under the name "Jazzed in the Face"). Get the new and improved version over in the SOCIALISM section! (Oh, and we've also added 3 songs from The WoWz thus-far-unreleased new album, Cool Dump, which we may or may not have some hand in releasing in the future! The new songs are AWESOME.) Also, our email problems should be resolved. Phew! [8.1.05] A new month and new items in the RiYL Records Online Store!! Chris Maher's first chapbook, "What Was Magnetic", is now available for only $3 ppd. It features 12 poems and nearly as many drawings. Also available is the new DIE FUGUE USA Combo Pack. Get the Mysterious Animals EP and the Four Corner Races 7-inch together for only $10 ppd! What a deal. In other news, we've apparently been having trouble with our email server. Several folks have said that they've had trouble when trying to reply to emails we've sent to them. If you've received an error message that reads: "The user does not accept email in non-Western (non-Latin) character sets.", chances are, we haven't gotten your response. For whatever reason, the problem can be remedied (in the short term) by sending us a non-reply email. So, if you've tried emailing us in the last few months and haven't heard back or have received this error message, please try writing us again and telling us about the problem at info [at] riylrecords [dot] com. Thanks and sorry for the inconvenience! Hopefully the problem will be fixed soon. Oh, and dudes: DIE FUGUE have new recordings on their MySpace page. "Blow Yr Chrome", which will be featured on an upcoming split with AIDS Wolf on Blood of the Drash, and "Panthor", which will be on a split with Night Wounds on Filco Productions. These songs own. [7.30.05] The WoWz' "My Baby Loves Me" was the download of the day at Salon.com. See for yourself: The WoWZ at Salon.com! Go WoWz! (To get yr copy of "Long Grain Rights" for only $10ppd, visit the RiYL Records Online Store!!) [7.27.05] We've received an urgent message from Joe Somar about an upcoming fundraising event! "Conrad is BROKE! Save Conrad ! Lemonade Stand. THIS WEEKEND!!! We need $450 to save Conrad! This weekend Sat & Sun in Mccarren Park, Brooklyn NY- we will be having a lemonade stand to raise money to save my best friend. Please come out and help by drinking delicious ice cold lemonade. Lemonade will be $2 for a GIANT glass and $1 for a small cup. You can donated more if you have it in yr pocket. You will be helping a very good cause and increasing yr karma as well. We need to sell 225 cups! Come to McCarren Park and buy a cup or two!" Dudes, help save Conrad. Lemonade rulez. [7.12.05] Mysterious Animals by The Fugue is now officially available. BUY IT TODAY!! [7.4.05] Happy 4th of July! Brief updates: The Pathways' Boat of Confidence is finally off to the pressing plant this week. It'll be out "officially" in September, but you'll be able to get a crack at it way before that. The Pathways will be playing a few shows at the end of July and the first half of August, so be on the lookout for those. This Friday, The Fugue's Mysterious Animals EP will be sent to 100 stations thanks to the wonderful people at AAM. The EP "adds" to radio on July 19th, so request yourself silly on or after that date. Rebecca Schiffman's paintings will be featured in the Guild & Greyshkul 2nd Annual Watercolor Exhibition. The exhibit runs from July 5th to July 30th. John Finneran, who's responsible for the cover of the "Productivity" single, will also have paintings on display. More info HERE! Next week, Chris Maher leaves for a month on the West Coast. Keep an eye out for shows in Seattle, Portland, Olympia and a few other places in July, then possible California dates in August with Throw Me The Statue (and maybe one in LA with Kid Wave and "Chris Glover"). The WoWz are gearing up for the release of their next full-length, Cool Dump, on Luv-A-Lot Records. We'll let you know when its available. [6.29.05] Our lovely friend Ian Crowther has started working on a new RiYL Records site. It'll be more functional and packed to the brim with content. If you have specific ideas or requests for this redesign, please get in touch: info[at]riylrecords[dot]com. Chris Maher will be doing a brief, five-date tour in the Northwest with Jeffrey and Jack Lewis City and Eastern Songs, Kimya Dawson, The Pharmacy and The Solvents. (!!!The Seattle date is with Mount Eerie!!!) Check out the dates in the SHOWS section (more complete info coming soon). For those of you in NYC, catch him play his last two East Coast dates until late-August: First, with his band Criminal Bones, at The Cake Shop this Saturday, July 2nd at 9:30pm; then a solo-set at Sidewalk on July 8th, also at 9:30pm. Many have been getting hip to The Fugue's Mysterious Animals pre-order (some orders have even shipped already!). Download the podcast/blog-safe MP3 of "Gun Wolf" and check out a picture of the rad, all-chrome bonus Fugue cassette, Chrome The Sleep, that you get if you pre-order (courtesy of Death Tapes / Sex Threats): Here are some pics from the Mysterious Animals release show at Lit: Mysterious Animals hits radio on July 19th, so get those dialing hands ready! [6.7.05] The MYSTERIOUS ANIMALS Pre-Order starts today!! The first 100 people to pre-order the EP will receive a free Fugue cassette from Joe and Conrad's Death Tapes / Sex Threats label. The cassette is called "Chrome the Sleep" and features exclusive, new live material from The Fugue. Side one is called "Chrome #1", side two is called "Sleep #1". Its gonna be totally awesome. All pre-orders will ship on or before July 5th, so you'll get the EP at least a couple of days before the July 12th street date. Fukin' cool!!! Now GO ORDER yrself a copy... [5.28.05] Cool news! The WoWz will be opening up select dates for The Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players down South. For all of their upcoming dates, click HERE. And, thanks to all who came out to the RiYL Records 1st Birthday Bash! It was a great night from start to finish! Stay tuned for news on RiYL SUMMER SLAM 2, coming this August to a venue near you (if you live in New York). [5.15.05] Dudes: Today, The Fugue came over to the RiYL War Room to plot the future. The pre-order for Mysterious Animals will begin on the old release-date, June 7th. Those who order before the July 12th street-date will get a bonus Fugue cassette from Death Tapes/Sex Threats (Joe and Conrad's label) that'll feature exclusive material. It's gonna own you. Check the SHOWS section for their 19-date June tour. Finally, the Mysterious Animals Record Release Show will be taking place at Lit on June 25th. More details as they're available. [5.10.05] Hey! Here's the confirmed line-up for our 1st Birthday Bash at Sidewalk on Saturday, May 21st: 11:00 THE WOWZ 10:00 DREAM BITCHES 09:30 REBECCA SCHIFFMAN 09:00 SECRET SALAMANDER 08:30 CHRIS MAHER 08:00 JACK LEWIS 07:30 LISA LI LUND Mark it down in yr calendars. Be there or be square. [5.1.05] Dudes! Long time, no update. Sorry. New distro item: DIBS' "More Unsent Letters" on Luv-A-Lot Records. Totally rad. Check the CAPITALISM seciton. Other updates: New shows in the shows section, including a RiYL & Friends Night at Sidewalk Cafe on May 21st w/ The Wowz, Dream Bitches, Secret Salamander, Jack Lewis, Chris Maher and hopefully Rebecca Schiffman. More news on that soon. The "official" release date of The Fugue's Mysterious Animals EP may be pushed back a bit, but we'll have copies for you here beforehand with a special pre-release companion tape from Death Tapes/Sex Threats. The Fugue leave for their tour in just about a month, but they have at least three shows in Brooklyn in May. Chris Maher will be out on the West Coast for all of July, and will likely play some shows in the first half of the month before embarking on a two-week West Coast tour with Jeffrey and Jack Lewis City and Eastern Songs and two acts from Baskerville Hill, Black Bear and Throw Me The Statue. Hopefully some recording will take place with Criminal Bones before he leaves. The artwork for the long-delayed Pathways record, "Boat of Confidence", and for Secret Salamander's "Beebles" are both coming along. More news on those (and sneak peaks) soon... [4.10.05] NEW DISTRO ITEMS! Sweet! Two awesome records from two awesome people have been added to the RiYL RECORDS ONLINE STORE. The first is Baltimore Trees, the debut release from Sonya Cotton. It has eight beautiful songs recorded by Chris Kiehne in Poughkeepsie, NY and Baltimore, MD. The second is the first EP from Portland, Oregon's David Knowles. Its a 4-song cassette with handmade packaging from Poughkeepsie's brand-new label, Stovetop Records. Totally awesome. In other news, Ben Greenberg of The Fugue got 5-stars from Pitchfork for his "jazz" cover of the Wolf Eyes song "Stabbed In The Face" (aka "Jazzed in the Face"). Read the review HERE. We might post the song in the SOCIALISM section, so stay tuned. Oh, and look what we got in the mail: Happy sunday! [4.6.05] Like Tourz? Here's the list of places The Fugue'll be hitting on their JUNE TOUR in support of MYSTERIOUS ANIMALS: 6/1 - Vermont 6/2 - New Hampshire 6/3 - Allston, MA (w/ Apse) 6/4 - Providence, RI (w/ Apse) 6/5 - New Haven, CT (w/ Apse) 6/6 - Philadelphia, PA (w/ Apse) 6/7 - Baltimore, MD (w/ Apse) 6/8 - Virginia Beach, VA (w/ Apse) 6/9 - Washington D.C. (w/ Apse) 6/10 - Columbus, OH 6/11 - Bloomington, Indiana 6/12 - Chicag, IL 6/13 - St. Louis, MO 6/14 - Birmingham, AL 6/15 - Athens, GA 6/16 - Columbia, SC 6/17 - Greensboro, NC 6/18 - Wilkes-Barre, PA (w/ Apse) 6/19 - NYC (w/ Apse) Mark 'em down in yr calendars. An update with venues will follow when they're all confirmed. And: News on your opportunity to pre-order Mysterious Animals very, very soon. [4.4.05] RiYL PROMOTION sent out all four RiYL releases to over 40 stations nationwide. For a list of stations that have received copies of our records, click here: RiYL RADIO. The Pathways' "Productivity" and The WoWz Long Grain Rights go for adds today and tomorrow, so feel free to start requesting them in the next few days! "Four Corner Races" and The Morningsides' Debut 7-inch go for adds next Monday/Tuesday. In other news, Erasing Clouds gave Long Grain Rights another great review! Check it out HERE. Over and out. [3.30.05] DUDES! Its all available at Insound now. So while you're there buying Guero or The Getty Address (which, by the way, is seriously the greatest album of all time), pick up a copy of The Pathways' "Productivity" or The Fugue's "Four Corner Races" or The Morningsides' Debut or The WoWz's Long Grain Rights. Ok!??!?! Ok. Now, back to work, you!!! [3.28.05] "Four Corner Races" is now available at Insound! CHECK IT OUT!! Presumably, the other three RiYL releases will be available there shortly. Keep yr eyes peeled! [3.27.05] Happy Easter(!) if you're into that sort of thing. Go eat some eggs and chocolate. Or, if you like The Fugue, go buy their "Four Corner Races" from STICKFIGURE DISTRO in Atlanta, GA (if you don't trust buying from us or something). In their words: "New York City's The Fugue [play] catchy guitar driven spazz rock which will appeal to fans of the Red Scare and Orchid". Oh, and while while we're on the subject, it seems that The Fugue are altering their name to Die Fugue USA. More on that when we have the full scoop. [3.26.05] The Pathways played an excellent show at Bar 169 last night. Thanks to all those who came to the show and all of those who bought a copy of the "Productivity" 7-inch! And, a slightly belated thanks to our new friends in Norway, Taiwan and Italy who bought "Productivity" and some other RiYL stuff! We're proud to be officially international. The Pathways will be playing in Boston with Pants Yell! on April 8th and then again at Tommy's Tavern on TAXXX DAY. [3.24.05] The debut CD from Dream Bitches is available as a distro item in the RiYL RECORDS ONLINE STORE. Cool!! ALSO: RiYL Records is seeking someone in the NYC area who loves talking to strangers on the phone and enjoys writing and reading emails to help develop the RiYL PROMOTION arm of the label. It won't be a paid position, but you'll get lots of experience, a few free records and you'll feel like a better, more complete person. All interested parties should write to info [at] riylrecords [dot] com and tell us why you think you should be our new, special friend. [3.23.05] Watch out, it's here: RiYL PROMOTION. The promotion arm of RiYL Records will be servicing its own releases to radio, as well as certain releases from Luv-A-Lot Records and Olive Juice Music. [3.22.05] RiYL FUN FACT: Did you know that PPD stands not only for "Postage Paid" but also for "postpartum depression" and "Poughkeepsie Police Department". We shit you not. More items coming to the RiYL Records Online Store soon! [3.20.05] So there's a new MYSTERIOUS ANIMALS ad floating around the internet. Have you seen it? Check the RiYL MySPACE if you haven't. Oh, and The Fugue, The Morningsides and The Pathways have received nice nods from Smother.net. Check out the triple threat HERE. Finally, in family-related news, our good pal "Chris Glover" has a free download available at the iTunes music store this week. Get it: "STAND ON YR SEAT". We're sure you'll see his dreaming head all over the place soon... [3.19.05] Now available in the RiYL RECORDS ONLINE STORE: Dufus - Theis Freedumb 7-inch, Huggabroomstik / Wooden Ghost - Split 7-inch, and Thomas Patrick Maguire - PIssing Streams CD. Way cool! More soon... [3.15.05] Recommended If You Like Records will soon enter the distribution business with the addition of two Luv-A-Lot Records releases to our ONLINE STORE. These will be Dufus's Theis Freedumb 7-inch and the Huggabroomstik / Wooden Ghost split 7-inch. More distribution items to come, stay tuned. [3.14.05] The Pathways got an awesome review at Tangents in the UK, which called the "Productivity" 7-inch "geniuis" and pleaded, "if you've a heart that beats then you need this record." Check out the whole thing HERE. [3.9.05] A new review of The Morningsides 7-inch was posted over at the excellent website, Blue Mag: "On both tracks, the late 60's british pop influences (of both the cockney bad boy and sensitive lad varieties) are tastefully filtered through current lo fi aesthetics, amounting to a quality 7" for any era." Read the whole thing HERE. [3.8.05] The WoWz just got a glowing "Editor's Pick" review from Smother.net. The review concludes with this advice: "Pick up this CD now from your indie store - there's no excuse for not owning genius like this." We couldn't agree more. Buy it HERE or get it at Kim's or Insound (soon). Read the whole review HERE. Also, peep this NEW(?) PAGE devoted to The WoWz over at BrooklynRock.com. [3.7.05] BIG SUPER ULTRA AWESOME NEWS! We thrilled to announce that this summer RiYL will be putting out a record by the super-talented Rebecca Schiffman. Rebecca's first full-length, the excellent Upside Down Lacrimosa, was released by Some Records back in 2003. You should check out her website, rebeccaschiffman.com, as well as her page at Some Records, for more info. Rumor has it, Rebecca has plans to start working on new recordings with Peter Toh at Moon Rock Studios very soon. You can check out an untitled acoustic demo they recorded over in the SOCIALISM section, as well as a demo of another song called "Lewis Brothers, Farewell" (which is about two of RiYL's other favorite songwriters, Jack and Jeff Lewis). This project promises to be a wonderful amalgamation of RiYL's past and future, a totally rad confection of awesomeness. We can't wait to hear Rebecca's new recordings. In other news, we have new souvenirs for sale. Peep the brand-new RiYL Button Packs which are now available in limited quantities over in the RiYL Online Store: Each pack comes with 5 buttons, one each from The Fugue, The Pathways, The WoWz, Daggerhearts and us, RiYL Records. Buy it in the CAPITALISM section. And pick up a record or two while you're there!! [3.3.05] In case you kids don't like buying direct or using PayPal, pretty soon there will be an active one of these that'll let you buy RiYL releases with all yr other favorite records: Stay tuned here for news on when we're "in" at Insound. [2.28.05] The WoWz got a wonderful review in the brand new Punk Planet. It goes a little something like this: "Either good music is timeless, or these guys have figured out how to create Beatles-esque and Dylan-ish music without sounding like a tired nostalgia trip. They don't strictly sound like these artists, but with songs built on strong harmony and a stripped down musical approach, those are the two most obvious comparisons." Don't be a tool, be MySpace friends with them: The WoWz @ MySpace. In other news, there are RiYL Records popping up all over NYCity: Though they don't stock vinyl, The Wowz's Long Grain Rights is availble at Kim's Mediapolis up by Columbia and the first three RiYL Releases (that's Long Grain Rights, The Fugue 'FCR' 7-inch and The Morningsides 7-inch) are available at Kim's Video and Music downtown on 8th Street. The Pathways single should be available there soon, but if you can't wait or you live in Brooklyn, you can get yr copy at Sound Fix or Eat Records. The Fugue 7-inch and The Morningsides 7-inch should be available at Rocks In Your Head on Prince St. unless they've sold out (The Pathways might pop up there soon, too). And last but not least, 'Four Corner Races' will soon be available in all its national glory from Stickfinger Distribution in Atlanta, Georgia. Rad? Rad. So if you work at a store or a distro and wanna stock any of our releases, don't be shy, email us: info[at]riylrecords[dot]com. And if yr favorite store doesn't carry our shite, ask 'em to. NOW GO BUY STUFF!!! (Cuz dudes, Kim's is having a 25% Off Sale 'til March 6th and that means you can get this shit for CHEAPPP!) [2.20.05] Downloadable mailorder forms are now available in the CAPITALISM section for those of you who, as Joe Somar so eloquently put it, choose not to use PayPal "out of spite or an irrational hatred of convenience." Download 'em, print 'em, fill 'em out, send 'em in, get some records in yr mailbox: [PDF] or [JPEG]. [2.13.05] RiYL Records in the Pazz & Jop countdown!? Its true. Critics (yes, two of them!) love us. Boat of Confidence was ranked as (one of) the 856th best album(s) of 2004 by the Village Voice before being officially released!! (Thank you, Daniel King - whoever your are - for your, uh, "vote" of confidence). At this rate, the just-released "Productivity" 7-inch is gonna be #1 on the 2005 Pazz & Jop singles chart. Oh, and The WoWz's Long Grain Rights landed at number 1570, a full 206 places ahead of our friends Automato! (Big "ups" to Jesse Jarnow's wonderful taste!) Isn't this reason enough to BUY LONG GRAIN RIGHTS already?! But for serious... Automato's totally rad self-titled debut did make the Top 40 of Robert Christgau's prestigious Dean's List ahead of the freakin' Arcade Fire and Modest Mouse (not to mention Madvillain, The Streets, The Roots, and The Beastie Boys). That's reason enough to buy it (as if having RiYL's Chris Maher thanked in the liner notes wasn't enough). So treat yourself to some RiYL-related Valentine's Day gifts in honor of Pazz & Jop. Fuck flowers and chocolate. We're the one you love. [2.4.05] Woah, cool! To celebrate the RELEASE of The Pathways' "Productivity" 7-inch, we've uploaded a new live video of "Helen's Housewarming" shot at yesterday's Lit show. We've also uploaded videos of The Fugue playing "Gun Wolf" and The Wowz playing "Drivin' To Hawaii" from RiYL Records Night at Galapagos this past summer. Download 'em, pass 'em around, play 'em for yr grandkids. Get IN. [2.2.05] At long last, The Pathways' Productivity 7-inch is available! It features three excellent tracks, all exclusive to this release (although a re-recorded version of the A-Side, "Productivity", will appear on the band's upcoming full-length, Boat of Confidence). The record was pressed on on super-cool "coke bottle clear" vinyl and is limited to a pressing of 500. It is available now in the CAPITALISM section and also at Sound Fix in Williamsburg. More retail stores should be carrying it soon. To celebrate the release, The Pathways have started a MySpace page and are also working on a slight facelift to their site (see a preview here). They're also playing two pseudo-release parties this week at Lit and the Bowery Poetry Club. Check the SHOWS section for more info on those... As Pop Culture Press said recently in an early review of BOC: "In the tradition of when Pavement was good, the Pathways have a way of creating cleverly weaving song structures that teeter nimbly on the verge of collapse; the ever so tight musicianship, keeping it all together. Have confidence; they know what they're doing." Everybody knows The Pathways are your new favorite band, so maybe you should start acting like it. [1.7.05] Happy New Year! The Pathways' 'Productivity' single is almost here... we swear. Stay tuned for a few site updates as well as some other fun stuff, but maybe not until the end of January. Right now, check out the upcoming SHOWS, including new Pathways dates and more Chris Maher / Phoebe Kreutz shows in Seattle and Olympia, WA... Do it! Now!!! Thanks. NEWS ARCHIVE - 2003/2004