na: department of eagles

While not worthy of a download all, the Department of Eagles EP that came in today, A Johnny Glaze Christmas, provides primo cherry-picking opportunities. One of the two Department of Eagles dudes is in Grizzly Bear (not Big Ed tho), and this EP is a weird hodgepodge of stuff from their two-year-old album called The Cold Nose, which finally gets an official US release next week (we will have it). There’s quite a bit of scrap here, but “Sailing By Night,” the A-side, as it were, is as lovely and gorgeous as could be, sounding like Kid A Radiohead (that muffled melancholy) with a bit of Randy Newman (?!?!) as well. Maybe even better than the album version is the live take that closes the EP (despite a hokey spoken-word bit) that’s loose and breezy. So great. Also, “Day School/Rooster,” despite sounding nothing like anything else on the EP, is really great, spooky electronic stuff (think RJD2, Shadow, etc). Definitely snag a track or two. The end.

PS: “No One Does It Like You,” a new DoE song that the band leaked to blogs earlier this year, is even better. You can download it free from the band’s site here.