The dark is rising

Once upon a time, my favorite band in the whole wide world was Sparklehorse. I saw them in early '96 when the opened for Cracker at the old Boathouse in Norfolk. I heard Mark Linkous sing "Homecoming Queen" and I was done, forever in love with that music. I have since seen Sparklehorse at least 5 more times, including opening for the Flaming Lips and even once at Shepherds Bush Empire. The music still inspires feelings and memories that are at once bittersweet, painful and comforting.

However, I was a bit bummed about the last album, Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain. As a fan and avid collector, it was a disappointment to find that 1/3 of the album contained previously released material. Nevertheless, it was lovely music, but not like the first 3 records. Of course, timing is everything and perhaps the timing was just a bit off for me.

I have not forgotten about my beloved Sparklehorse. In fact, I was very excited when the cover of "Jack's Obsession" was included on the Nightmare Revisited tribute album. Made me wonder what Mr. Linkous might be up to these days. I would have never imagined just what kind of mischief he's been up to.

On the last album, Linkous hooked up with Danger Mouse to work on a few tracks. They evidently hit it off and decided to work on a new record. They enlisted a bunch of their musician buddies including Grandaddy's Jason Lytle, The Cardigan's Nina Persson and many more. Best of all, Danger Mouse called up David Lynch.

David Lynch, perhaps the finest surrealist filmmaker of our time, created a book of images as well as music for the album. This may very well be my Dream Team.

Of course, record labels can be pissy bitches. EMI is having some dispute with the artists and the album might not ever see a proper release. In the meantime, the artists have made the entire album (and individual tracks) available for download here at NPR. It's glorious, it truly is stunning and it's classically Sparklehorse in many places. I rather wish that Linkous sang most of the tracks as I love his voice for some reason, but I'm happy nonetheless.

So you can't have a record, but you can buy the book. David Lynch's deluxe book of photos created for the project is still available through Amazon.com here. It was evidently limited to 5000 copies so snap yours up before it's too late.