by SHANE SINNOTT

Some recent online fumbling led me to the Daytrotter site (www.daytrotter.com), an interesting variant on the usual music blog collection of well travelled MP3s. The Web site is run by Sean Moeller, who has a studio in Rock Island, Illinois, a small town that serves as a stop point for bands touring the Midwest. The idea is to get touring bands to take a short break as they’re passing through, to record a few songs in an afternoon. It’s a great idea, and certainly sets the site apart. As Moeller explains on the site, “What Daytrotter is attempting to do is to not kid around with you and tell you that we found something that you never knew existed. We are going to contribute to the musical landscape, not just toss it around like a used book or a stolen pick-up line. We’re going to give you something that you truly have never heard.” The result: a ton of great bands recording four-song sessions that are posted as free MP3 downloads. Recent acts this year include ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead, Enon, the Thermals, John Vanderslice, Architecture in Helsinki and others. There’s a shitload of stuff to explore, but here’s “Parade” by Vanderslice (tinyurl.com/3eyu9m) and “Gimme Gimme Gimme” by the Dirty Projectors (tinyurl.com/ywxy94).

R.E.M.’s 14th album, called Accelerate, has recently been leaked, and the rumbling online is that it is a return to form (after a, um, 10-year absence from form). You can get the title track here at tinyurl.com/2c3pzj, though to be honest it’s pretty balls, but there’s also “I’m Gonna DJ,” which is a little better, or at least a little different: tinyurl.com/26c3rt. Neither track sounds like there’s any surplus of effort being given, songwriting-wise, but a band like R.E.M. casts a big enough shadow over our generation’s music that you can be sure that commentary on this album will be requisite amongst the plaid button-down set, so get listening.