LA art-rock trio, The Happy Hollows, released their debut album, Spells, last month and have just unleashed their awesome new video, Death To Vivek Kemp. We’re giving away a Happy Hollows prize pack featuring a copy of Spells, a t-shirt, 7″ vinyl, magnet and two autographed stills from the video. To enter, just leave the name of the city you live in below this post.

Directed by Benjamin Hoste, the stop motion animation clip is accentuated by a barrage of random shapes, a matted water color palate and the occasional splatter of paint.  ‘Cause no one said that creativity was a clean sport, check out their canvas ready music video. Spells is available now courtesy of Autumn Tone Records.

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Following on from Michael Lavine’s seminal portrait of Kurt and Courtney for the cover of Sassy! [pssst, he also took the photo for the Nevermind album cover], we got the inside word from British music journalist, and infamous Nirvana bedfellow (in the least literal sense of the word), Everett True on Kurt, Courtney, and those damn persistent rumors: ‘No, I don’t believe he was murdered. I don’t particularly go into this in my most recent Nirvana book — partly through lack of time, partly through lack of interest — but let’s view it this way. Examine any event that has happened in the past, however trivial, and discrepancies will appear. 9/11. John F Kennedy. The death of Princess Diana. The fact my cat had to be put down at the age of sixteen. Why I forgot to take my iPod to London this morning. All of these could be contested, violently and with real — and valid — opinion. That’s because history does not exist except in books. Suicide is particularly ripe for innuendo: after all, the only person who can tell you what really happened is — er — dead. Still. I have nothing against conspiracy theories, especially if they’re fun’.

‘That moment in the Nick Broomfield film Kurt And Courtney where Il Duce is talking about how Courtney offered him 20,000 bucks to knock off Kurt – genius! In a weird twist of fate, Krist Novoselic and Kurt Cobain actually fronted a mid-Eighties Aberdeen tribute band to Il Duce’s former sex-fuck group, The Mentors.

‘Still. What do I know? I have only information and hazy recollection and paranoia on my side, and they rarely are decent bed companions. You believe what you believe and I’ll believe my version — isn’t that what history is all about? Here’s another ironic slant: for a decade, I refused point blank to speak to people wanting to speak to me about Kurt Cobain, sometimes quite rudely. ‘How’s the bloody money going?’ I pointedly enquired of one professional biographer. Who’d want to be Johnny Rotten for thirty years, continually retracing the same three months of your life for an ever-dwindling circle of admirers?’

I can say with an unwavering amount of conviction that kaleidoscopes are the greatest things ever invented. Well, one of them at least. Brisbane band, The John Steel Singers, take that statement and turn it into a super cool video for their song, Rainbow Kraut. I think Oliver Sacks would agree: phantom hands should always play keyboards.

We have an awesome Oasis Limited Edition Box Set to give away to a randomly selected new subscriber to the Lost At E Minor weekly publication. To be in with a chance of winning, sign up to receive the newsletter, then leave a comment under this post with the name of your favourite Oasis track.

This Deluxe Limited Edition Box Set imported from the UK features the following, all in a beautiful shoulder box:

* Dig Out Your Soul CD
* Dig Out Your Soul Bonus CD with 9 extra tracks
* Dig Out Your Soul DVD (NTSC/region 0) – includes footage of the Making Of Dig Out Your Soul, The * Making Of ‘The Shock Of The Lightning’ Video and ‘The Shock Of The Lightning’ Video
4 x heavyweight LP Set (180 gram vinyl) of Dig Out Your Soul and Dig Out Your Soul extra tracks
* A hardback 24 page book featuring exclusive artwork
* Digital download of the album

Last week when the 2008 ARIA nominations were released, I was so happy to see the recognition of Melbourne’s Eddy Current Suppression Ring. Their album Primary Colours is pure, unadulterated Aussie rock, standing out from the numerous electro releases we’ve had this year. The band manages to capture that wonderful pub-vibe without any pretension or tragic nostalgia. Primary Colours speaks to people who still seek an existence that is all about wearing ripped jeans, loitering and punching people in the face … not in a violent way, but because your fist flailed in that direction while you were thrashing around front of stage.

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After relentless touring, performances on Saturday Night Live, and appearing on the cover of Spin and Paste Magazines, Death Cab for Cutie brings us Narrow Stairs. Following up their DVD collection, Directions, and their platinum selling album, Plans, was no easy task but Narrow Stairs has already been praised by MTV as the band’s most daring and adventurous effort to date. Also be sure to check out the Death Cab For Cutie Open Windows On Current TV. Open Windows is a Current TV exclusive documentary about the recording of Death Cab for Cutie’s new album. It also follows the band on their final days at home in Seattle for the band before they begin their 2008 tour. The half-hour documentary features interviews and performances from the band.

There’s an ethereal feeling about the music of London-based, Aussie exports Howling Bells. It washes over you in waves of pure melody, always tinged by the faintest whisper of longing. We checked in recently with frontwoman Juanita Stein.

What’s been the highlight of 2007? ‘It has been a year of touring the legs off our debut record! We played many, many towns, cities, countries. In all, it’s a pretty incredible way to see the world. And especially cool is connecting with people who would never ordinarily hear your music’.

Are you a compulsive writer – do songs burst forth or more kind of trickle out? ‘Well, it’s funny you ask. For the first record, it was more a case of being love struck and expressing the those sentiments over a short period of time. For this next record, it’s thus far been a much more collaborative process. Recently we’ve been writing a song a day, its insane. We just got the bug. I suspect there’ll be two albums ready to go by the time recording come around!’

Is there a place that feels like home now? ‘Sydney is our sentimental home — it’s where we grew up, had our first kiss, first cigarette, first band … However, London feels like our musical birthplace. It inspires art in a way no other city has’.

Has work started towards the second album? ‘Yeah, I feel that it’s taking form rather beautifully. Sometimes the music will dictate a direction for you. Where the first album was sonically very sparse and brooding, this one feels a little more brash and bold, but still quite moody. It just ain’t as slow. It’s important to us that we grow and extend ourselves as a band. We wanted to try a slightly different avenue. And it feels good!’

Listen to the Howling Bells song, Bones.