In case you were refilling your cup during the Super Bowl when Denny's announced today is FREE GRAND SLAM DAY (6a-2p), get out there and claim your free breakfast platter!

But that's actually not the BEST thing about today. Out of the blue, I was just emailed a new Thermals song, "Canada" -- and it's brilliant and wonderful and makes me feel all Winter Olympics inside.

You can go hear it for free right now and then head to iTunes to purchase it.

Here's the full scoop behind today's highlight:

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I totally love Horse Feathers and can't wait for some new lumberjack love!

From buyolympia.com:

Horse Feathers' debut album on Kill Rock Stars, "House With No Home", garnered excellent press as expected, but also sold five times as much as their previous release. The band's constant touring to packed houses has created a quiet groundswell of support which buoyed the band up to its current position as one of KRS's breakthrough bands of 2008. This 7" is another delicious morsel to tide the fans over while the band finishes recording its follow-up to "House With No Home", due in April 2010.

No false advertising here. The Portland Cello Project is just what it says it is.

PCP is a collective of (mostly) classically-trained cello players who perform (mostly) covers of contemporary pop songs. I wish they contained a little less irony but they do have some interesting arrangements with those songs.

PCP has collaborated with such artists as The Builders and the Butchers, Thao (of the Get Down Stay Down), Mirah and The Dandy Warhols. They released an album called The Thao and Justin Power Sessions on Kill Rock Stars earlier this summer, with each Thao and Justin Power (a PDX musician) collaborating on four songs. For Bumbershoot, PCP will be joined by Portland musician Adam Shearer, who is the singer of a band called Weinland. When the collective covered George Michael song earlier this month in Portland, people in the audience were offering their womb immediately after. Take that for what it's worth.

Here's the Portland Cello Project playing with The Builders and the Butchers:

Portland Cello Project plays Bumbershoot on Monday, September 7 on the Northwest Court Stage at 6:45pm.

I just returned home from a friend's birthday party. (Happy Birthday, Flyn!) I hopped on my computer, so I could waste some time on the internet. The first thing I see when I checked my Facebook was an acquaintence's post about the incredibly untimely demise of one of my very favorite KRS artists, Jeff Hanson. From what I can gather via the few articles on the web, there is a possibility of some sort of apartment-related accident which then ended Hanson's life on June 5th. There are no words to describe how fucking saddened I am by this news.

Jeff, your 2005 self-titled release kind of saved me. Thank you.

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The Thermals: a power trio of pop punk (or post-punk-pop. or whatever posty way you want to label them) players that gives more bang for the buck with shorter songs and longer playlists than the average show--and all within the same time frame that everyone else draws out their 13-song set.

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The fourth full length from the Thermals starts out with a swaggering rocker (including the classic away from the microphone scream) about shedding your human self and becoming an invertibrate ("When I Died"). This sets the tone for an album that seems to be about pouring gasoline on your life and tossing a lit cigarette on the pile. Such is a feeling that shows up on many songs, such as "I Let It Go" ("I looked my fear in the eyes/I looked at the water below/I knew I could love or die/I let it go"). This is an album that feels like jumping off a cliff just to see what would happen - a pop album about renewal of the purest parts of oneself.

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The icy indie vibe is only there on the surface; a few repeated listens and you realize this band may resemble Seattle's bearded poets of depression in Beatles homages and Talking Heads jangle, but their hearts feel much warmer and more alive.

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The remarkable guitarist and songwriter answered my phone call to discuss her stunning new record, working with some of her favorite artists, and being part of the Kill Rock Stars roster, amongst other things.

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This video has a not-entirely-dissimilar aesthetic to "Sledgehammer" and "Money for Nothing."

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There has been no official announcement nor have the reasons been leaked as of yet. The birdie suspects that it might be because of a bad blood breakup between two of the three members.

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