I sure wish I had gone to see Elf Power/The Silos/Minus 5 at the Georgia Theater in Athens this past Saturday. I guess REM, including retired member Bill Berry, took the stage during the Minus 5 set and played “Country Feedback.” Peter Buck is of course a member of both bands and lead Minus 5-er Scott McCaughey (pronounced McCoy- I didn’t know that before) has long been a touring guitarist for REM. And through the magic of the Internets, we can all see what happened! Check the YouTube link from this post over at The Day Jobs blog.

Speaking of cool blogs, I recently came across this great Elephant Six one called Optical Atlas. I love that whole scene and have enjoyed reading what’s going on with the many, many artists associated with the collective. I didn’t know, for example, that The Circulatory System not only had been working on a second album but are now finished recording it. I’m not sure of the blogger’s name (Jeff?) but he’s been posting or pointing the way to a lot of rarities, including an EP for a Japanese singer on which Olivia Tremor Control is the backing band and a Velvet Underground tribute album with songs by OTC and Of Montreal among others.

Since no post would be complete without an Emusic reference, I’ll mention what I grabbed today on new release Tuesday. First up was the new Irving album, Death in the Garden, Blood on the Flowers. I’m not familiar with their stuff but have read a lot about them recently and took a chance. I also downloaded a new Soul Asylum anthology, Closer to the Stars: Best of the Twin/Tone Years. Yes, I was one of those late comers to the band that didn’t listen to them until they hit it big with Let Your Dim Light Shine back in the day. I have some of that Twin/Tone stuff but thought I’d trust Rykodisc to put together a nice overview of those earlier years.