SOUND BITES

If there's a reason why women became much more prominent in the 90's rock scene than most had hoped or dreamed for, a strong case can be made that Liz Phair's Exile In Guyville is that reason. Released on up-and-coming independent label Matador (who just released the amazing new Queens Of The Stone Age album if you need an illustration of just how far the label has come) this day in 1993, Exile In Guyville wasn't met with fans buying it up in droves. But, the album did have powerful (at the time) allies in the press; critics devoted valuable space in their publications heaping praise on it in a time when the only way you discovered new artists was by watching music video channels or reading these publications. MTV followed suit by spinning the video for Never Said . It took a while to really catch on but the album eventually became somewhat of a minor hit; it certainly didn't hurt when Spin magazine crowned it as the best album of 1993. It was (at the time) Ma...

Somewhere along the way, record labels figured out what most businesses already knew: there were good and bad times to sell your wares. The Christmas shopping season was a given; there were also benefits to selling in spring (with Easter, Mother's Day, Father's Day, graduation etc.) and early fall (as kids went back to school and parents started thinking about St. Nick). So, record labels developed a strong tendency to release what they considered their best shots at hit records during these peak selling weeks. If you look at a full year's worth of releases, you'll probably notice a glut in April, May, September and October. Which makes my collecting habit a somewhat boring proposition eight months of the year.

You know how a lot of bands take months and months to carefully tease and promote an album? Of course you do; we talked about it last week . Well, Trent Reznor seems to have developed a very simple method of promotion that works quite well. Two days ago, as Nine Inch Nails was preparing for their return to the stage, Reznor confirmed via social media that not only was Nine Inch Nails going to do another album but that it was, in fact, finished and coming out later this year. Today (well, late last night), we get not only an album title and release date, but also a full high quality stream of the album's first single. It's called Came Back Haunted , and it's got the goods. Check it out: Came Back Haunted does away with (most of) the laptop noise that influenced the last three NIN records and focuses on its tight groove and a pretty straightforward dance beat, rather than disorienting listeners with the experimental sonic blasts and disjointed beats that populated ...