Brian F.

(Just kidding.)

I'm already in line!

Cousin debuts at No. 65 on the Billboard 200 this week. The Billboard 200 measures sales and streaming. In terms of pure sales, Cousin was No. 5 for the week. I do not know the precise sales total, but it was between 9,632 and 15,484. Triangulating it a little more precisely suggests that it sold about 12,000 units. In vinyl sales, Cousin comes in at No. 7. There are a lot of variables that make it hard to do comparisons across recent releases. Star Wars was made available as a free download. Cruel Country had a digital-only release, followed by a limited Record Store Day CD releas

This was an invitation-only gig for local public-radio station KCRW in Santa Monica. The 54-minute set was: Pittsburgh Infinite Surprise Handshake Drugs I Am My Mother Cruel Country Sunlight Ends Soldier Child Evicted Bird without a Tail/Base of My Skull Meant to Be The set was preceded by a hilariously awkward ten-minute conversation between Jeff and Anthony Valadez of KCRW. Anthony: "So I understand something particularly special happened in Dallas on September 27. Tell us about that." Jeff: Confused stare. Anthony leans ov

And now the question is: will they attempt to pull off "A Bowl and a Pudding" live? Fingers crossed (echoing: fingers crossed).

I don't know-- the Cruel Country songs have been out for a year-and-a-half and got the same reaction. I think this documentary clip captures the phenomenon well:

Infinite Surprise Levee (first time played) Handshake Drugs I Am My Mother Cruel Country I Am Trying to Break Your Heart Kamera Side with the Seeds Pittsburgh Bird Without a Tail/Base of My Skull Cousin Hummingbird Misunderstood Evicted Impossible Germany Meant to Be Jesus, etc. Theologians I'm the Man Who Loves You A Shot in the Arm ---------------------------------------------------------- California Stars Spiders (Kidsmoke) [Falling Apart (Right Now) was listed first in

Hell Is Chrome Infinite Surprise I Am My Mother Cruel Country Handshake Drugs Pittsburgh I Am Trying to Break Your Heart One Wing Sunlight Ends (first time played) Everyone Hides Hummingbird Cousin Random Name Generator Via Chicago --> Many Worlds Either Way Impossible Germany Evicted Dawned on Me Meant to Be A Shot in the Arm ------------------------------------------------- Jesus, etc. Falling Apart (Right Now) Monday Outtasite (Outta Mind) Set was played exa

The highlight of this show was definitely the Cousin tunes. All six that were performed translated beautifully live. "Misunderstood" (26 nothings) stood out among the classic tunes, as did "Box Full of Letters." I think back to when they would play A.M. tracks on the Being There and Summer Teeth tours and the audience would mostly shrug. Last night, there was a big roar from the crowd at the opening notes of "Box." I think it goes to show how, in 1997 or 1999, you pretty much had to buy an artist's older catalog to hear it, as compared to today where streaming makes an artist's whole catalog a

I fixed the above for you. Never underestimate my obliviousness...

The black vinyl didn't seem particularly thick, but I didn't really examine it. I just pulled it out of the sleeve and glanced at the label to see what it looked like. I haven't listened to it yet.

Yes, and that record was broken several times. Incredibly, the current record was set in relatively recent 2015 by Adele's 25, which sold a mind-boggling 3.38 million copies in its first week.

In its first week of wide release, Cruel Country sold 7,000 copies across all formats (LP, CD and downloads).* That would include direct sales by the band as well as sales by retailers set up for tracking by Luminate (which will exclude some independent record stores). That number is slightly lower than it would have been but for the "white label" CD release on Record Store Day. (There were a total of 8,000 copies of that release available.) In its first week of release, the Yankee Hotel Foxtrot box set sold 13,000 copies (8,000 vinyl, 4,500 CD and 500 digital downloads). That incl

I noticed something interesting on the packing slip that came with my Wilcoworld preorder. For the LP, it says: BATCH PRINT: 119, PREORDER: 1000, R03: 881 For the CD, it says: R03: 427 I wonder if these numbers are sequential as orders were filled. It's interesting that the LP numbers 119 and 881 add up to 1000, which is also shown. What numbers do other people's slips show? I'm wondering if we can read anything into this about how many preorders there were. It seems plausible to me that they would have ordered a batch of 1,000 LPs to satisfy

A "First Listen" of Cousin with Jeff providing commentary is airing right now (9 a.m. PDT) on indie88.com. It will reair at 5 p.m. PDT.

https://jefftweedy.substack.com/p/chit-chat-check-in-71-prince-ted

Big fan of "On and On and On" here. When they played it at Port Chester this year, it moved me so much as I thought about the loss of loved ones in 2017 and 2021 that I started sobbing right there on the rail. I was in tears well before the song got to the "go ahead and cry" part. Per Jeff on Starship Casual today, "Ten Dead" is being retired from the live set because it's "despondent and numb and unfeeling," which is pretty much the vibe that led me to say that nine of the ten Cousin tracks grabbed me right away, with the unstated part being that "Ten Dead" was the outlier. Each t

I'm really looking forward to standing throughout the seated shows at the Ace next week. I'm not postponing my happiness. My fingers are crossed for sets consisting of nothing but songs from Cousin and Cruel Country.

I retract all of my whining. The package arrived today. Tracking still shows it in Raleigh, but it's here. What an infinite surprise (h/t coldasgasoline).

One of the things that made Ode to Joy such a chore for me was its lack of melody, so we'll have to agree to disagree. When I said at least nine of ten tracks grabbed me right away, the one I wasn't sure about was "Ten Dead," so we'll have to agree to agree.

I just gave it two full listens, and I am very pleased with it. I was worried this was going to be in the vein of "Ode to Joy," but it is not. There are a lot of highlights on this album. At least nine of the ten tracks grabbed me right away.

Who plays clock on "Infinite Surprise"?

Well, my Cousin remains in "label created" limbo, so I don't think I'm going to have it by tomorrow. I might be lucky to have it by Wednesday. (You had one job, Wilcoworld.)

I certainly hope you're right that the Cousin floodgates are just waiting for the official release date to be opened. With six shows in my immediate future, I would be kind of let down if the set lists looked like this one. There are a lot of old standbys in this set-- too many for my preferences (though I'm sure they sounded great.)

Probably so but I don't have access to any of them and, even if I did, I can't listen to them on my stereo or in my car. I just got teased by an email that my order has been shipped, but when I clicked to track the shipment, it's only at the "a label has been created" stage.