Now It's Overhead Tour, Cover Magnetic Fields
Magnetic Fields covering themselves just fine, really

Some people pin it on Radiohead. Maybe you could drag Neutral Milk Hotel or Godspeed You Black Emperor into it, too. We don't know. But somewhere in the past few years, someone made music safe for yearning. It may seem strange to think about now, but in 1998, you didn't hear a lot of straining toward the ineffable on college radio, unless a Celine Dion record got played in all its glorious, awesome irony.

This is all very good news for Athens pop band Now It's Overhead, who might otherwise have been lost to the dark, pining netherworld. Instead, the murky, multi-faceted 80s revivalists are touring-- for the second time-- in support of their second album, Fall Back Open (out last March), and boldly covering one of the Magnetic Fields' most deceptively simple songs while they're at it. The first single from Fall Back Open, "Wait in a Line", was released late July, and contains a cover of "Book of Love", from the Fields' 69 Love Songs, as well as a Faint remix of the title track.

What with that remix by The Faint and half of Now It's Overhead being Azure Ray, you can see that their lack of Omaha roots hasn't stopped Now It's Overhead from engaging in some standard-issue Saddle Creek cross-pollination. We remain impressed, however, at just how many Saddle Creek-affiliated bands they'll be playing with on this tour: five! Six, if Rjd2 suddenly defects from Def Jux. Check it out:

08-10 London, UK - Underworld (w/The Good Life, Beep Beep, Broken Spindles)
08-11 Oxford, UK - Wheatsheaf
08-12 Nottingham, UK - Rescue Rooms (w/Beep Beep, Broken Spindles)
08-13 Rennes, France - La Route Du Rock Festival (w/Beta Band, LCD Soundsystem, Rjd2)
08-15 Dublin, Ireland - Whelan's
08-16 Cork, Ireland - An Cruisin Lan
09-23 San Francisco, CA - Bimbo's 265 Club *
09-24 Portland, OR - Nocturnal *
09-25 Seattle, WA - Neumo's *
09-28 Minneapolis, MN - Ascot Room *
09-29 Omaha, NE - Sokol Underground *
09-30 Chicago, IL - Abbey *
10-01 Cleveland, OH - Grog Shop *
10-02 Ann Arbor, MI - Blind Pig *
10-03 Toronto, Canada - TBA *
10-04 Montreal, Canada - TBA *
10-05 Cambridge, MA - Middle East Downstairs *
10-07 New York, NY - Bowery Ballroom *
10-08 New York, NY - Bowery Ballroom *
10-09 Philadelphia, PA - Starlight Ballroom *
10-10 Washington, DC - The Black Cat *
10-11 Carrboro, NC - Cat's Cradle (w/The Good Life, Neva Dinova) *
10-12 Atlanta, GA - The Earl (2 shows) *
10-13 Athens, GA - TBA *
10-15 TBA *
10-16 Orlando, FL - The Social *
10-17 Miami, FL - TBA *
10-18 Tallahassee, FL - Florida State University *
10-20 New Orleans, LA - Howlin Wolf *
10-21 Houston, TX - Mary Jane's *
10-22 Austin, TX - Emo's (w/Fiery Furnaces) *
10-23 Denton, TX - Hailey's *
10-26 Tucson, AZ - Solar Culture *
10-27 Phoenix, AZ - TBA *
10-29 San Diego, CA - Epi Center *
10-30 Pomona, CA - Glass House *
10-31 Los Angeles, CA - TBA *

* with Rilo Kiley, Tilly & The Wall