They're no Puddlepoint

Like CMJ or Uncut or Appalachian Funeral Dirge Monthly, the free CDs that come with most music magazine are big crapshoots. The track listing usually goes like this:

1. Catchy Radiohead song
2. Bluesy Ryan Adams song
3. Somewhat talented female singer-songwriter like KT Tunstall
4. Inversely untalented female folk singer whose songs sound like day old kittens
5. Crap
6. Brighteyes
7. Somewhat catchy Canadian artist, probably Sloan
8. Crap
9. Crap
10. Surprisingly good song by a band that no one’s heard of and has no album or MySpace page
11. Crap
12. Crap
13. Crap
14. Crap
15. Live recording of Hold Steady's Stuck Between Stations at First Avenue, Minneapolis

In fact, that’s pretty much every Paste CD I’ve ever listened to. Until this month.

There was a very upsetting inclusion in this month’s issue.

Say you’re having a conversation about music with your mates and you want to recollect the youthful, more innocent yet brooding days of the late 90’s. There is only one band you need to bring up. Or say someone is arguing that Austin or Athens, GA is the center of college music in America but you think it’s actually Williamsburg, Va. If you bring up this band, the conversation will end and you will be awarded a medal from the Model UN for your debating techniques. Or say some guy is like, “Ian McKaye once tuned my guitar.” And you say, “Oh yeah? I know a guy who used to date the girl who’s now dating the leader singer of this band.” Again, you’re the winner.

This band should have been your answer to all references about washed up, Virginia bands from last decade. This band was Seven Mary Three.

But now this month’s Paste Magazine seems to imply that 7M3 has a new album coming out. And they put a song from that album on their free CD. This is probably good news for the William and Mary music scene. But this is awful news for me. They were my go-to band.

I’m going to start using Agents of Good Root again.