WASN'T WAITING FOR NOTHING TO DO

Why you gonna pray and pray? You're gonna go to hell anyway!

Just got back from taking the dog for a walk. His name is Chuck. I'm pretty sure I've told you before about our friend Chuck, aka Chet, aka Chet Boom. Well, his girlfriend, who I told you about because she sort of randomly ended up working merch for Black Mountain, already has the same first name as Mrs. Des Noise. So confusion reigns.

We got the dog about three weeks ago now, and he's the first dog I've ever had, because I'm allergic, but he's a labradoodle (unfortunate name for a poodle-labrador mix), so he doesn't bother me. Contrary to popular belief, it's not that he doesn't shed-- oh man, he does-- but I guess it's true what they say about the dander or whatever, because so far I've been feeling fine. Mrs. Des Noise used to work at a kennel, and she had a co-worker who is now a dog trainer, and the dog trainer knew Chuck, and it turned out Chuck needed a home, which was a special case because it's hard to find hypoallergenic dogs in shelters or whatever, so we met Chuck's previous owners, they were looking for the right people to come along, we were waiting for the right dog to come along, and it just so happened Chuck was the right dog for us. I know this is supposed to be a music blog, so I'm sorry to go on and on about a dog, but that's really the main thing that I've been talking about/obsessing over lately.

WHEN YOU SMILE, I SMILE

The guy playing fiddle also shouts

into a megaphone or something 

and bludgeons a child's drum set.

While Justin Bieber was making his Des Moines arena debut, I was at a bar where there is no division between urinal and stall in the men's room. Not that I have anything particularly against the guy: He's a 16-year-old teen idol. They pretty much have the formula down by now. This latest is a guitar-strumming puppy lover whose 2009 debut album,  My World 2.0, expertly outfits 1950s teenybopper sweetness in up-to-last-year's-minute radio-killa synths. Swedish pop prankster Eric Berglund, whose ceo project just put out one of my favorite albums of the year, hasn't heard of him.

So instead, I went to see local instrumental-rock impresarios the Autumn Project, who create a sustained trance by never breaking between each epic build, nor skimping on smoke-machine showmanship; Denver, Colorado-based Woodsman, whose two-drummer psych-rock isn't totally instrumental, but often treats vocals as another fabric to warp; Statocyst, a Des Moines experimental duo who beat up a guitar, fiddle, voice-obscuring device of some kind, and the tiniest drum set you ever saw (I hadn't heard of them yet, but after I figured out it was their set and not the soundcheck, I was totally grinning and impressed); and Ames-based atmospheric minimalists Maid Marian (tonight just Trista Reis without brother Tre).

The Autumn Project work in the dark.

My camera doesn't.

It said in the Des Moines Register that Bieber "seemed unmoved." He was "singing and dancing the motions like any other night." This after bringing a "lucky young fan" to tears by presenting her with a floral bouquet. Enjoy the ride, kid; not everybody can be Justin Timberlake, but Usher's cosign still counts for something-- as it probably should, that divorce album notwithstanding.