What better way to start the new year than with a bit of LAMBCHOP news?

Lambchop surprised their fans at the end of 2009 with their second live album in as many years.

Filmed at the band's American record label Merge's 20th anniversary party and released as an MP3 download (with an optional SD or HD video download) or as a limited edition CD with a voucher for HD video download (it's a chunky 1gb file), it's a world away from the band's previous live release.

While 2007's 'No Such Silence' beautifully captured Lambchop, in front of a polite Belgian crowd, at their most restrained and delicate, 'Live at XX Merge' sees the band at their most euphoric, tearing through their more raucus moments ('Your Fucking Sunny Day', 'Hey Where's Your Girl', 'Up With People'...) with a rare zeal.

It's an awesome performance which concludes with an epic version of 'Give It' - the track that lead singer Kurt Wagner released in collaboration with dance act X-Press 2 - with a bit of Talking Heads chucked in for good measure. It's well worth checking out:

LAMBCHOP LIVE AT XX MERGE: GIVE IT / PROMO from Show Cobra Productions on Vimeo.

Bawley (Hearts) 2008: Bottom 5 album covers of the year

5. Santogold - Santogold

Santi White’s debut album may have blurred the lines between genres, unfortunately the cover art blurred the lines of good taste. Burp...

4. Razorlight – Slipway Fires

Who are the three guys hogging Johnny Borrell’s lime light

3. The Presets - Apocalypso

The album’s title came from the idea of the apocalypse and a calypso together. I think the art work came from a primary school diorama competition.

2. Empire of the sun – Walking On A Dream

Star Wars fans, much?

1. Lambchop – (Oh) Ohio

If a picture is worth a thousand words, I wish Lambchop had the decency to stop writing after the first paragraph.

Bawley (Hearts) 2008: Bawley crew albums of the year: Nick

5. MGMT 'Oracular Spectacular'

The latest in a long line of masterpieces bearing the signature of super-producer Dave Fridman (Flaming Lips, Mercury Rev, Delgados, Mogwai...). This album was everywhere in 2008: In every shop, every radio and TV station – but deserved to be.

4. British Sea Power 'Do You Like Rock Music?'

'Waving Flags' was the year's best pro-immigration song, 'No Lucifer' borrowed a slogan from notorious British wrestler Big Daddy and 'Canvey Island' drew a complex analogy between a bird flu virus and a devastating flood. Really, what more do you need from a rock record?

3. Lambchop '(OH) Ohio'

Approximately the 10^th (depending on how you count) album from The Best Band In The World That Nobody Has Heard Of. Not a radical departure, more an amalgamation of all the styles the band has toyed with over the last two decades. Wonderful, as ever.

2. TV On The Radio 'Dear Science'

Sharp, funny, angular, joyous, intense. Very, very nearly album of the year....

1. Elbow 'Seldom Seen Kid'

...But in the end it was the songs that won it for Elbow. Guy Garvey writes lyrics that you could write essays about, without a single word out of place, and they work brilliantly. Heartbreaking, life affirming, devastatingly beautiful and utterly essential.

Runners Up:

Bloc Party, 'Intimacy'; Delirious?, 'Kingdom Of Comfort'; Vampire Weekend, 'Vampire Weekend'; Dodos, 'Visiter'; My Morning Jacket, 'Evil Urges'; Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, 'Dig Lazarus Dig!!!', Half Man Half Biscuit; 'CSI Ambleside'

"You'll never guess who I had in the back of my cab last week"

From an innovation in gig review journalism (and a rubbish venue)to an innovation in live music recordings (and a weird venue)....

The Black Cab Sessions is a great idea: take one interesting musician (or two) and film them performing a song accoustically in the back of a cab as it travels around London.

As they say: "The sessions are all about great music and the venue strips this to its essence."

There are 68 sessions so far and the number is growing quickly. Among them are Bawley faves My Morning Jacket, The National, Fleet Foxes, The Futureheads (actually visible), Johnny Flynn, Death Cab For Cutie (of course) and (drumroll...) Lambchop. Their song choices often veer from the obvious 'hits', too - The National tackle a B-Side, Lambchop take on Bob Dylan, and also well worth checking out is Amanda Palmer's take on Radiohead's 'Creep'.

Talk Like A Pirate Day

Why spend the day Arggh-in’ and Ahoy-in’ t’ all ye pirate mates when you can celebrate Talk Like A Pirate Day in alt-country style by downloading the new Lambchop track National Talk Like a Pirate Day, taken from their album OH (Ohio) which is due for a October 7th release.

Unfortunately it is not a swash buckling novelty song, but more of a roots based rock song that tells the story of a ditsy house wife, her pyjamas and her troubles - that exist today (on National Pirate Day) just as they do every other day.

Li’ly libbered land lubbers can download the mp3 via stereogum.

More Lambchop loving here and here.

OH (Ohio) streaming now

At some point I may post at length about exactly how much I'm in love with Lambchop (I've mentioned it before). For now, suffice to say I can't think of another band who have released quite as many albums of such utter brilliance in a row as Lambchop have managed.

Earlier this year, their first concert DVD (and documentary), 'No Such Silence' had me mesmerised (well worth checking out the trailer and clips here, bizarrely it's only ever been available to order from Germany), and on first listen, their new album, 'OH (Ohio)' (by my reckoning their tenth) which is streaming here now, maintains their high, high standards. Sounds a little more spontaneous, and with a bit more humour than its dark predecessor, 'Damaged' (an album that dealt with a major health scare for singer Kurt Wagner), but no less beautiful. It's released on October 7th.

It baffles me that the band aren't better known.

Tasty fresh Lambchop coming soon

Lambchop have been quietly relasing brilliant albums since the early nineties. Their last album, Damaged was my favourite of 2006 and all its tracks still sit very near the top of my iTunes 'most played' list. I'm excited, then, that they've just announced details of their eleventh album, entitled 'OH (ohio)' which comes out on October 7th.

Dubious artwork aside (is that Noel Edmonds?), the taster track, 'Slipped, Dissolved And Loosed' which is streaming over on stereogum suggests the album's going to be another good 'un. Richer, warmer and a little rougher than the band's more recent work, it's still classic Lambchop: Utterly beguiling and perfectly constructed. The band head out on a tour of UK and Europe in September.