Stars tour

Well, I know what I am doing for Valentine's Day. Yippee-ki-yay, Stars are on tour all throughout February, crisscrossing these great lands of ours, which is an excellent thing in my book. Stars was a top recommendation to me of 2005, "finely-crafted melodic indie pop" out of Canada (on the Arts & Crafts label), with intelligent, witty, and oft-scathing lyrics, great harmonies, and really rich instrumentation with a lot of strings.

If you haven't heard 'em yet, here are two sample tracks for you to enjoy:

"My Radio (AM Mix)"
from A Lot Of Little Lies For The Sake Of One Big Truth EP

"The First Five Times"
from Set Yourself on Fire

Also on Set Yourself On Fire, I especially enjoy the creepy stalker-esque feel of "One More Night," the clever lyrics of "Your Ex-Lover is Dead" (talking about an ex-fling, 'And all of the time you thought I was sad, I was trying to remember your name...'), and the simple & pure piano melody of "Calendar Girl." Do check them out if you haven't heard them, and it looks like they are playing some nice and intimate venues on this tour:

2/1/06 - Winnipeg, MB. Ramada Conference Center
2/2/06 - Saskatoon, SK. Louis Pub
2/3/06 - Regina, SK. The Distrikt
2/4/06 - Calgary, AB. MacEwan Hall
2/5/06 - Edmonton, AB. Dinwoodie Lounge
2/7/06 - Vancouver, BC. Croatian Cultural Centre
2/8/06 - Seattle, WA. The Showbox
2/9/06 - Portland, OR. Aladdin Theater
2/10/06 - San Francisco, CA. The Fillmore
2/11/06 - Los Angeles, CA. Avalon
2/12/06 - San Diego, CA. The Casbah (little bro, you better go!)
2/14/06 - Boulder, CO. The Fox Theatre
2/16/06 - St. Louis, MO. The Gargoyle
2/17/06 - Chicago, IL. Metro
2/18/06 - Ottawa, ON. Winterlude
2/22/06 - Boston, MA. Paradise Rock Club
2/23/06 - Philadelphia, PA. Beyond
2/24/06 - Washington, DC. Black Cat
2/25/06 - New York, NY. Webster Hall

Off for a beautiful day of skiing with the girls.