Blog Note: This used to be housed on my non-Collegian blog, but like migratory birds, spring brings change. And so, the Venues:Music blog will now be the home of Twofer Tuesday, a weekly series in which I direct you all to two songs I'm digging right now.

JOSH RITTER

For a non-superfan, Josh Ritter's Saturday night show at the State Theatre was a bit of a letdown. I only knew three songs - "Angels on Her Shoulders," "Snow is Gone," and "Kathleen" - and just one was played. Hyped up on ... something, Ritter was kind of a smiley mess, too reliant on lame sight-gag jokes. I'm glad I loved his opener -- Samantha Crain and the Midnight Shivers -- so much, because otherwise it would have been a wasted $23. All that being said, though, I fell head over heels in love with Ritter's "Harrisburg," a lovely, mellow song off one of his earliest albums. It's got an old sort of quaintness to it, like you're just discovering some antique classic for the very first time. Check it out for yourself:

PAULINE

I love songs sung in foreign languages. I'm a sucker for terrible French pop, Israeli reggae, Italian techno, freakin' weird Scandinavian folk ditties. Parisian-born chanteuse Pauline falls into that first category; she's like a totally sweet, charming French version of Colbie Caillat or Sara Bareilles. "Allo Le Monde" is pleasant folk-pop, but it also packs a protest punch, shaming the world for basically ignoring scores of natural disasters that take place in countries other than our own. I first heard this song in Israel last summer, and it's stuck with me rather tremendously. What do you lot think of it?

See you next week. :)

- Alex Weisler

Kudos to HypeLG.com for posting this great video that shows just how
out of touch the McDonalds staff in Paris are when it comes to
Pharrell's hunger for McDonalds. Apparently, Pharrell wanted a Quarter
Pounder so bad, he resorted to singing and dancing in hopes that the
Mickey D's would open up a bit early for the man with the mad beats.

For all you angst-lovers out there, the hype around New Found Glory's new release called Not Without a Fight is that it returns to the band's former punk rock glory and shies away from the softer side of previous releases like Catalyst and Coming Home. This album supposedly shows that they are "back to their roots" after a long hiatus from which fans were not quite sure they would ever come back. So I'm reading all of these reviews and I'm thinking about how there must be something wrong with me because I actually liked Coming Home. I mean, does everyone think if Jordan's not screaming and spitting into the microphone (for all of you who don't know, this is definitely what he does live), that it's not the real NFG? Can't punk rockers show their sensitive side at times too? No one had a problem with Blink's "I Miss You."

I mean sure I love the old stuff from Self-Titled and Sticks and Stones, but when you listen to a song like "Boulders" off of Coming Home, with its slow, steady guitar lines and choir vocal breakdown, how can you not give them credit for doing something different? When you think about hearing an album for the first time, songs like that are the ones that are going to stick out right away. For me, nothing really sticks out yet on Not Without a Fight. I'm not saying I like it or dislike it, it's just I usually appreciate an album with more depth over one with more drum-beating and more lyrics that make you want to start a riot or break up with your girlfriend (or boyfriend).

-- Beth Ann

There's something that's been bothering me about some of the reviews of Neko Case's recent album, Middle Cyclone (also reviewed in today's Collegian). The album's last track, "Marais La Nuit," is 32 minutes of a field recording Case made on her property. It's a cacophony of summer peepers - swamp frogs - singing uninterrupted for a good half hour. The problem is that I've read at least three different reviews of the album that refer to sounds of the track as "the chirping of crickets." Those ain't crickets. That the review on PopMatters makes this mistake annoys me the most, because it also gave the album (which is very good) a 5/10. Please, reviewers, get your facts straight.

- Andy

Jack White has unveiled yet another "side project" band. Already a member of musical heavyweights The White Stripes and The Raconteurs, White's new band is named The Dead Weather. The announcement of the band accompanied the grand opening of White's Third Man Records in Nashville.

The Dead Weather is a supergroup of sorts, featuring members from other bands: Alison Mosshart (The Kills) sings, Dean Fertita (Queens of the Stone Age) plays guitar, and Jack Lawrence (most recently The Raconteurs) plays bass. Perhaps most interesting is White's role in the band: he plays the drums. "Tonight was the first time I played drums on stage since I was a teenager," White told The New York Times.
-Andy

Apparently, Miley Cyrus is a Radiohead fan.

The "Hannah Montana" star had a dressing room near Thom Yorke and company at the Grammys. When she tried to use her own star power to set up a meeting, Radiohead declined. Cyrus threw a temper tantrum and vowed to "ruin" the band. The day a corporate creation like Miley Cyrus can ruin Radiohead is the day the American music officially dies.

- Andy

If you're bored over the break and trolling iTunes sounds like a better alternative to watching daytime television, be sure to check out the newest installment of the Punk Goes series, which drops on March 10th. Punk Goes Pop 2 is the latest release on this series by Fearless Records, which also includes such compilations as Punk Goes Crunk, Punk Goes '80s and Punk Goes Acoustic. Punk Goes Pop 2 features such popular rock, punk, and screamo bands as Silverstein covering "Apologize" by One Republic and Mayday Parade putting their own unique spin on "When I Grow Up" by Pussycat Dolls. Even if you're not into punk, these variations of popular radio hits provide, if nothing else, an unparalleled form of musical entertainment. The album allows listeners to bask in the irony of the long-haired members of Attack Attack!, some of whom could be mistaken for girls, singing "I Kissed A Girl," as well as listeners getting a laugh out of hearing any self-respecting punk band singing a Miley Cyrus song. Check out the album's Myspace for links to where you can listen to the entire album streaming, or pre-order the album and have the opportunity to receive and free copy of Punk Goes Pop 1.

-- Beth Ann