Our Australian’s a little better, and the nice folks at Duggup gave some cool props here. Cheers!

Our English is pretty top-notch if we can say so ourselves, and THE WORD had the following to say in their November 2008 issue:

Austerity be gone! The poppier end of the indie-folk canon

” If in doubt, opt for brevity. Canadian singer-songwriter Woodpigeon (earthly name Mark Hamilton) previously fronted the ludicrously named Woodpigeon Divided By Antelope Equals Squirrel before he saw the light and downsized both band and name. It was a wise move, ensuring there was no instant irritation from the listener that might detract attention from this delightful batch of tunes.

Hamilton is aware that he doesn’t have to submerge into Bon Iver-style maudlin to earn his indie-folk credentials, and these dozen songs float happily on the surface, bobbing around next to those of Sufjan Stevens, a clear kindred spirit.

Even Take The Hint Kid, a Dear John letter given a mandolin-and-xylophone accompaniment, isn’t without its lighter moments: “There’s 200 dollars if you go now / It’s interest-free”. And while Hamilton is still prone to the occasional, deliberate verbose moment (the album opens with Home As A Romanticised Concept Where Everyone Loves You Always And Forever, on this month’s Word CD), this is a mean critisism for a record so poetic and effortlessly gorgeous. “
 — Nige Tassell

Shucks.

On the other end of the spectrum, however, our Swedish is pretty much non-existent, but the 8 shiny discs at the top of the review over at Dagens Skiva looks pretty hot, and our Stockholm friends assure us it’s all good.

And speaking of Stockholm friends, Mark sang some cooing backing vocals on The Second Band’s gorgeous new single No Song, available for free download here. Hampus Noren’s one of our favourite songwriters, so listening back to No Song is a bit like the collision between two worlds of amazing. Man, Stockholm in the Spring is at least one heaven on Earth that’s not at risk of disappearing any time soon.

Check out the cover art, and get listening:

 — 
We’re taking a short break from playing live, getting a batch of new tunes in order. There’s one called ‘The Saddest Music in the World’ that’s turning out rather nice, and ‘Emotorik’ went down a storm every time we played it in the UK.

But we’ll be back on-stage in early 2009, first performing some folked-up Bjork covers as part of the One Yellow Rabbit High Performance Rodeo at the Big Secret Theatre in Calgary, followed in February by our first full-band show in Vancouver since 2006 as part of the Cultural Olympiad at Performance Works on Granville Island. Then it’s back overseas for another go, another tour, another record … And we’ll tell you all about that soon! At some point in 2009, we’ll also raise the Woodpigeon flag from coast-to-coast here on our home shores of Canada. Stay tuned.
 — 

Here’s Peter at The End of the Road Festival at the Larmer Tree Gardens in Dorset, UK, lookin’ a bit like rock royalty somehow:

Mark misses this orange tie. He gave it to Martin from Calexico, thinking it’d be easy to find another one just like it. Alas, that wasn’t the case. You can almost see the longing in his eyes. The sadness.

And here’s Foon being the most photographic mandobird slinger in the history of the world ever:

Dang, that was fun.

Another thrill: Holding Songbook in our hands with its beautiful new artwork by Sing Statistics.

You can read some nice things about it at Subba-Cultcha, The Line of Best Fit, a cool profile from The Guardian, and BBC’s website. We can’t read Swedish, but our friends who can tell us there’s swell words here at Dagensskiva too.

Pick it up via Rough Trade!

As for that “other” record we’ve been hawking lately, well, you’ve read it here first: Treasury Library Canada is sold out, folks. All 1,000 hand-folded copies are gone, and we couldn’t be happier (in part to have the closet space back).

But worry not: it shall be back … (and speaking of backs, in case you haven’t seen it, here’s what it looked like!)

xox,
 W.P.