It's Showtime for Illinois

Although I try to stay on top of new bands as much as possible, I admit that I tend to shy away from bands that all of the other blogs jump on. My tastes tend to differ from a lot of the blogs - I really don't like either dance-oriented music or bearded-freak-folk. (Hence, you don't see a whole lot of LCD Soundsystem, Daft Punk, Grizzly Bear, Devendra Banhart or the like on this blog.) As a result, I tend to be pretty hesitant about a lot of the bands that you see getting a major push on the blogs.

One of the bands that's gotten a ton of coverage over the last few months, and one of the bands that I kept putting off listening to, is Illinois. As time went on, though, I kept hearing more and more good things about the band and its debut EP, What The Hell Do I Know? As a result, I came this close to heading out to McCarren Pool a few weeks ago to catch them, but got scared off by the lengthy commute.

So when I got an email from the band's publicist yesterday about the inclusion of the song "Nosebleed" on this week's episode of Showtime's Weeds, I figured it was time to finally check out the band. Here's the song:
Illinois, "Nosebleed" (from What The Hell Do I Know?) [BUY]

Honestly, it doesn't do a whole lot for me. The way the vocals are recorded is pretty annoying, and I'm really not a fan of the banjo in anything other than country or bluegrass.
Slightly better is the song "Alone Again", which you can hear over at the Ace Fu Records site. It's better, though still not anything particularly groundbreaking. It actually makes me think of Midlake, but a little louder and less pretty.

If you like what you hear, be sure to catch the band on tour throughout October with Menomena. And be sure to watch this Monday's episode of Weeds. Theoretically I'll have Showtime again after I move next week, so maybe I'll end up seeing it someday too.