Almost Ready has released the eighth volume its The World Is Lousy With Ideas vinyl compilations, this time featuring Times New Viking, Intelligence, Vivian Girls and Blank Dogs, among others, and some fairly titillating potential album art.

While you check out the track listing below feel free to stream the Vivian Girls and Intelligence tracks here, and keep checking back with Almost Ready for ordering information. Oh, and don’t forget to have a looksie at the test pressing art work — especially for Richie Kroneiss of Terminal Boredom.

The World’s Lousy With Ideas Vol. 8 track listing
A
Vivian Girls – “Lake House”
Blank Dogs – “Ages Ago”
Times New Viking – “A Lot of Paintings”
Intelligence – “The Beetles”
Guinea Worms – “Soiled Sender”

B
Sic Alps – “STREPIX”
Thee Oh Sees – “Schwag Rifles”
Tyvek – “Flowers”
Pink Reason – “Going Home”

Vivian Girls opened.

[Vivian Girls]

It has been a productive period for Ariel Pink, who has been releasing new material steadily through blogs and his MySpace over the past few months. Now with a new cleaned-up sound and a full, solid touring band, his current outing is his most ambitious. Indeed, in a MySpace blog, he wrote: “HAUNTED GRAFFITI IS FULLY COOKED and DRESSED UP FOR OUR BIGGEST and BUSIEST TOUR.”

I’ve seen him in the past and the shows were wonderfully disastrous tragicomedies, pissing off many but ultimately adding to his legend. This time, however, I feel like the band should have been called Ariel Pink and the Haunted Graffiti, as the full band added a new dynamic. Yes, he’s toured with multiple helping hands in the past (most notably a tour where he invited different amateurs from town to town), but the difference here was the tightness. For the first time, the consensus seems to be that Pink & Co killed it. He said in an interview that he “likes to be a good singer and like to be backed up by good sounds” and that definitely showed here — but another thing he said was that there’s minimal preparation involved. Maybe on his part (still stoned, still awkward), but especially in the epic and largely instrumental “Trepanated Earth”, it showed that the band had definitely been doing some prepping.

The thing about his discography is that there are so many good tunes, and typically, he (rightfully) divides his setlists between standards and gems. While I could write a long wishlist of tunes I wish they’d play, over the course of the long set the band did bring out highlights such as “Among Dreams,” “Trepanated Earth,” “For Kate I Wait,” “Interesting Results,” new single “Can’t Hear My Eyes”, and a surprise “The Bottom”. This also marks the first time I’ve seen people inspired to dance at an Ariel Pink show.

It’s been a productive period for Pink and as a long time devotee to the Pink cult I’m glad to see the end of a long struggle of finding a solid backing band, as well as new, honed and slightly polished musical beginnings. Definitely hoping his next focus is a new full-length full of new of haunted gems that never were. In the meantime, you can follow the band on their blog, Earth Foot.

[Ariel Pink]

Is it too much of a pun to say we’re getting bored of “So Bored”? To be fair to Nathan Williams — aka Wavves — he wrote it and it is one hell of a catchy tune, but we heard it a lot at SxSW, only to find out at subsequent non-Wavves shows that the Vivian Girls were also covering and playing it live. But then we heard our 8-bit heroes Anamanaguchi’s version of it, taking it out of the garage rock murk and giving it new life. Now we’re pumped on it again.

Before listening to the song below, we strongly suggest checking out our profile on Anamanaguchi for a few original tracks and you can watch Wavves playing “So Bored” live in Austin, TX here.

Anamanaguchi – “So Bored” (Wavves Cover)

Ironically, not reported first by Pitchfork, but instead by respected Chicago Sun Times music critic Jim DeRogatis [via The Daily Swarm], the 2009 Pitchfork Music Festival will be dropping their “Don’t Look Back” classic-album theme, and instead will allow fans the chance to come up with the set lists as part of a new series called “Write The Night: Set Lists By Request.”

According to DeRogatis’ posts, the acts announced so far for Friday, July 17, are Built to Spill, reunited Chicago noise-rock legends the Jesus Lizard playing their first show in Chicago in 11 years, as well as respected classics Tortoise and Yo La Tengo. Acts announced for Saturday, July 18, include the National, Pharoahe Monch and the Pains of Being Pure at Heart. And the performers unveiled for Sunday, July 19, are Grizzly Bear, The Walkmen and the Vivian Girls.

Voting for the set lists begins when tickets go on sale on March 13 and ends on June 12.

Many musicians try different sounds, vibes and configurations before hitting on one that seems to ring true. Josh Thomas had been through a couple of different bands prior to landing on the post-shoe gaze freak-out that is Kansas City’s High Diving Ponies.

There was Bodisartha, the Nirvana/Mudhoney alterna-grunge band that released two albums. Then came The Spidermums, a band the released a few EPs and got a mention in Pitchfork for their cover of The Amps’ “Bragging Party” that appeared on a compilation with Deerhunter. “Pitchfork is always looking for a reason to write about Deerhunter so I guess that’s how I wound up on there.”

But with High Diving Ponies, Josh says he wants to go in a entirely different direction. That’s one of the reasons his previous band is no more. “Bodisartha was too heavily associated with the Nirvana and the music I was making wasn’t fitting into that mold anymore. I just wanted to do something different.” Hence, High Diving Ponies.

The band pieced together with members of KC bluescore band The Factory Workers (Justin Brooks on drums and Al Amador on bass) along with friends Steve Williams on cello and Kyle Pugh on guitar. Although Thomas said he had the songs written before putting together the band, High Diving Ponies is not a one-man band. “We’ve come up with a lot just fucking around at practice. These guys bring out things I would have never thought of. The next record will be a totally collaborative effort.”

Thomas sights My Bloody Valentine, The Flaming Lips, Vivian Girls, Boo and Boo Too and The Beatles as music favorites that lead to the creation of HDP and a sound he affectionately calls “danger pop.” It is a swirling dream of effects, acoustic/electric guitars and vocals that sound like they were recorded in a room a thousand years wide. Traditional song craft, melody and structure stand hand in hand with anarchy and chaos. The three songs on the band’s MySpace page (“Muppets”, “Meatheads” and “I Smell Like Smoke”) are a step in the right, unsettling direction.

An album is in the works but Josh is taking his time with the release. “Hopefully it will be out this summer,” he said. “We’re almost done recording it but I want to sit on it a month and then go back and listen to it and make sure we still think it sounds right. There’s no rush to release it.” When it is released it will be on Circle View/Chomp Womp. And he will go the old school route: it will be DIY cds with spray painted covers — and if they can get the plates done cheap enough, Josh says he’d like to do vinyl, a limited run of about 300.

Though he considers him part of the “Chomp Womp Family”, a collective made up of Kansas City/ Lawrence, Kansas bands Baby Birds Don’t Drink Milk (previously featured in Notes From Middle America), Rooftop Vigilantes and many others, he stops short at calling himself part of the KC music community. “It’s not really a good scene,” he said. “There are no good radio stations, no good zines but there are some good venues. Maybe it is a good scene. I don’t know, I’m not part of it. I’m doing my own thing.”

If doing his own thing consists of surrounding himself with great musicians making strange, dreamy, at times violent and always thought-provoking music, it’s ok if he’s not part of a conventional scene. He knows what he wants to do, he’s good at it and that’s scene enough.

High Diving Ponies – “Muppets”

When we interviewed the Vivian Girls back in August of last year, we knew they were aspiring to great heights. But never in our wildest dreams did we think the three girls we saw playing house parties to small-but-appreciative crowds in early 2008 would be the forebearers for an entire scene of lo-fi pop slackers.

This new upbeat and — of course — lo-fi single “Lake House” is the Girls’ contribution to the eight installments of Almost Ready’s The World’s Lousy With Ideas 7″ series.

Vivian Girls – “Lake House”

In honor of last night’s BRIT awards, we’ve gone all U.K., all the time with this week’s New Music Thursday picks. Up now is a sloppy little garage-pop trio from London we’ve been following called Let’s Wrestle who might just be headed to a town (or an Austin music festival) near you soon.

Let’s Wrestle has this casual sound that sort of mimics that dressed-down style where you’re trying to say to the world, hey. I didn’t really try or anything, but I look good in a kind of disheveled way, don’t I? Singer Wesley Patrick Gonzalez has this slow, relaxed, almost apathetic vocal style that pairs well with the scratchy, imperfect, U.K. version of the currently popular U.S. garage rock sound, a la Vivian Girls, Blank Dogs, Wavves, etc.

They released a three-song EP Song for Abba Tribute Record in 2007 and a six-song disc called In Loving Memory Of… in 2008 and now they’re heading to the states soon to play with — appropriately anough — the Black Lips and The Pains of Being Pure at Heart before heading down to SXSW. Check out “I’m OK, You’re OK” here.

Let’s Wrestle – “I’m OK, You’re OK”

Let’s Wrestle on tour
03.10.09 – Brooklyn, NY (Music Hall of Williamsburg) w/ Black Lips, Gentleman Jesse & His Men
03.11.09 – Hoboken, NJ (Maxwell’s)
03.12.09 – Brooklyn, NY (Monster Island Basement) w/ Cause Co-Motion
03.13.09 – Brooklyn, NY (The Bellhouse) w/ The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
03.14.09 – Baltimore, MD (The Talking Head Club at Sonar) w/ The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
03.15.09 – Chapel Hill, NC (Local 506) w/ The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
03.16.09 – Atlanta, GA (The Earl) w/ The Pains of Being Pure at Heart

So on one of our regular searches around the world wide interweb looking for new music, we have a few regulars we like to scout from. Problem is, then you feel guilty taking the credit for it. Such is the case with the next teen sensation, Fungi Girls.

In case you missed the hint, we found these guys via Impose — who ironically is responsible for Brooklyn teen noisemakers Fiasco’s most recent record — because they are currently hosting a link to download Fungi Girls’ Psilo demo.

Maybe the fact that they are only 14 and 15 years old will help you want to dig out from under their lo-fi murky garage rock and the obvious Vivian Girls and Wavves comparisons. Or maybe it will make you realize how novice bands like those are at such “advanced” ages. Or because that at such a young age, Fungi Girls’ list of references ranging from Suicide and Pavement seem that much more impressive. Whatever the case, the beyond-their-years song writing of Fungi Girls has paid off in the way of two soon to be released split tapes. One with Natural Numbers on North Carolina’s Neon Aztec Records and one with Philadelphia’s Reading Rainbow on California’s Not Not Fun. Not bad for “three Texas teenagers who make noise pop.” The track below, “Crystal Roads”, is on their Psilo demo.

Fungi Girls – “Crystal Roads”