This Two Will Change Your Life

According to Pitchfork, the little indie-pop band that could has the #2 album on the Billboard charts, with 118,000 units sold on its first week of release. Even if they might not be your thing, someone like the Shins selling that many albums (and iTunes downloads) out of the box can't be anything but good news for fans of all kinds of good music.

And now I feel like I'm a part of something! I picked up Wincing The Night Away last Tuesday at Best Buy. It was just an $8.99 impulse buy, but I can't remember the last time I bought an album at the store on the day of release.

I've listened to Wincing a handful of times, and the jury's still out on my final views. I like the first "side" (everything through "Phantom Limb") a lot more than the second. It starts out with four or five great songs in a row. Then it drags a little on the second half. Not anything I'm tempted to skip or turn off, but the songs all blend together. This seems a lot more "dense" than their first two albums. The best songs on Oh Inverted World and Chutes Too Narrow were the stripped down and bare ones, but everything on this one has layers of stuff going on under the surface. I still haven't decided if that's a good thing or a bad thing.

And not to get all older-school-than-thou, but my first exposure to the Shins was in March 2001 at the SF Noise Pop Festival, sandwiched between the Orange Peels and the Aislers Set at the Bottom of the Hill. That was six months before Oh Inverted World came out. Most of the BOTH crowd loved them, but I thought the singer was trying to channel Robert Smith or Ian McCullough a little too obviously. Plus they're kinda boring live.

But #2 on the album charts on the first week is nothing to scoff at! (Pitchfork). Hooray for our side!