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Download: Wasting My Time

Taking a bumpy off-road off the Sparta highway, Jim Ward is exploring a previously untapped path with his new project, Sleepercar, a full-blown rootsy, twangy, rural rock offering. While Ward’s bread-and-butter, Sparta, is known for it’s melodic, post-hardcore sound which, itself, is just a few steps removed from Ward’s previous band, At The Drive-In, Sleepercar owes much more to the mid-America sounds of Gram Parsons, the Old 97s, and the tumbleweed landscape of Ward’s home state, Texas.

Sleepercar has a handful of Texas tour dates coming up (including an appearance at SXSW):

Mar 18 – Brownsvile – Galeria 407
Mar 19 – McAllen – Incubator
Mar 20 – Laredo – GW Roadhouse
Mar 21 – Corpus Christi – Brewster St
Mar 22 – College Station – venue tba
Mar 25 – Ft Worth – Lola’s
Mar 26 – Wichita Falls – 169
Mar 27 – Amarillo Golden – Light Cafe
Mar 28 – Abilene – Monks Cafe
Mar 29 – Lubbock – Jakes
Mar 30 – Marfa – Ray’s Bar

Sleepercar’s debut, ‘West Texas‘, drops in stores on April 22.

It’s interesting to note that there is another band with the same name out there, just displayed a tad bit different. Sleeper Car, from Chicago, not so surprisingly, also plays in the Americana sandbox and you should keep your eyes on these guys as well; their ‘Love and Anxiety’ EP is getting a lot of plays on my iPod lately.

The Wombats – “Kill the Director”
Guillemots – “Kriss Kross”
Mobius Band – “True Love will Find You in the End” (Daniel Johnston cover; download the Mobius Band’s FREE covers EP, ‘Love Will Reign Supreme’)
PWRFL Power – “It’s Okay”, “Alma Song”
Oren Lavie – “Her Morning Elegance” (featured in Chevy Malibu ad; influenced by Leonard Cohen, Nick Drake)
The Dollyrots – “Valentine’s Day” (MP3 contained in the .ZIP file)
Ghostland Observatory – “Dancin’ On My Grave” (Let There Be Vinyl Remix)
Caithlin De Marrais – “The Fire” (ex-Rainer Maria)
Thao Nguyen – “Beat, Life and Fire”, “Swimming Pools”
Model Photographer – “Gone”

And, check this out: Download Amplive’s Rainydayz Remixes, an 8-track collection featuring remixes of Radiohead’s historic seventh album, In Rainbows. The songs are available in a zip file and feature verses courtesy of Too $hort, MC Zumbi of Zion I, Chali2na of Jurassic 5, and Del the Funky Homosapien.

Jaymay – “Blue Skies” (NY singer/songwriter getting praise from the UK press)
The Whigs – “Right Hand on My Heart” (fresh off a Letterman appearance; indie rock from Georgia)
What Made Milwaukee Famous – “Resistance St.” (can’t wait for this upcoming Barsuk release)
American Music Club – “San Francisco” (LOTS of upcoming tour dates for Mark Eitzel and company)
Destroyer – “Foam Hands” (the latest from Dan Bejar)
She & Him – “Why Do You Let Me Stay Here?” (Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward)
Big Dipper – “She’s Fetching” (old-school college rock from the 3-CD anthology to be released in March)
Helvetia – “Old New Bicycle” (touring soon with Built to Spill/Meat Puppets)
The Charlatans – “You Cross My Path” (first single from the forthcoming FREE album)
Panther – “Violence, Diamonds”, “Puerto Rican Jukebox” (indie funk?)
Mark Pickerel and His Praying Hands – “Cody’s Dream”, “Cherokee Grove” (roots-pop from ex-Screaming Trees drummer)
Waco Brothers – “Cowboy in Flames”, “Do What I Say” (legendary country band on Bloodshot Records)
The Republic Tigers – “Buildings and Mountains” (hmm … electro-indie pop from Kansas; Death Cab + Postal Service + The Shins)

Just about the only non-music content you’re going to get on AtomicNed.com comes in the way of discussion about LOST. The new season starts this week and, if you’re like me, you might need just a quick refresher before season 4 kicks off.

This recap, produced by ABC, covers the first 3 seasons in rapid fire succession in 8 minutes and 15 seconds (815 … get it?)

[youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=QIuXZ37GQIs[/youtube]

While season 3 started off slowly – yes, I’ll admit that I thought maybe it had jumped the shark – the last half of the season was some of the best TV I’ve ever seen. If you remember, the last episode (“Through the Looking Glass”) introduced the concept of flash-forward and it totally caught people off guard.

It seems like the writer’s have thought long and hard about how season 3 was slow out of the gate and they’ll be picking up where that season dropped off which should make for a pretty intense first episode of season 4, titled “The Beginning of the End”.

Here’s a sneak preview of what’s in store for this season (at least for the first 8 episodes that were filmed before the writer’s strike).

[youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=0ou7cWOTXJs[/youtube]

There are, of course, a million fan sites out there dealing with LOST. If you’re a fan of the show, you’ve probably already found one or a few that you visit often and trust. My favorite is Lostcasts.com which hosts a weekly podcast recapping the previous week’s episode and offers some insight into what might be going on and also reveals some spoilers. If you’ve got time before the first episode, I’d recommend checking out Lostcasts most recent podcast, episode 59, “Theory Cast”. It’s a little more than an hour long.

DOWNLOAD: LOSTCasts 59: Theory Cast

And while you’re at it, if you missed Matthew Fox’s interview in Entertainment Weekly a few weeks ago, it’s post on the EW.com site. There may be some things that could be construed as “spoilers” but Fox doesn’t give too much away.

The Gutter Twins – “Idle Hands” (Dulli + Lanegan = Amazing)
Black Mountain – “Tyrants”  (Pink Rebel Sabbath Club)
Grand Archives – “Torn Blue Foam Couch” (ex-Band of Horses!!!!!)
Monade – “Regard” (featuring Laetitia Sadier of Stereolab)
The Helio Sequence – “Keep Your Eyes Ahead” (great song but not even the best on their new CD)
Say Hi – “Northwestern Girls”, “Toil and Trouble” (MySpace top 8 includes Nada Surf, Plus/Minus, Bishop Allen among others and for obvious reasons)
No Kids – “The Beaches Are All Closed” (Dancey indie-pop)
The Autumns – “Boys” (LA band = J.Buckley meets Brit shoegazer pop)
Kelley Stoltz – “Your Reverie” (’60s-style pop ala The Beatles, The Monkees)
The Heavy Circles – “Henri” (Edie Brickell + Harper Simon, son of her husband, Paul)
Why? – “Close to Me”(Cure cover), “The Hollows” (Any friend of Hood is a friend of mine)
Miguel Miggs – “Fire” (featuring Junior Reid (Faze Action Afrotronic Re-Rub))  
Imaad Wasif with Two Part Beast – “Oceanic” (folkie, J.Buckley-ish)
Faunts – “Memories of Places We’ve Never Been” , “M4 (Partt.1)” (synth-gazer)
Castaneda – “Pixels” (DCFC with balls)
The Ruby Suns – “Tane Mahuta” (Disney soundtrack meets Vampire Weekend-covering Paul Simon)
Excepter – “Kill People” (don’t worry, I don’t get it either)
The Epochs – “Opposite Sides” (sample-filled indie (trip)-pop with falsetto vocals)