We Met in a Chat Room

I've been shamefully delinquent with the postings. It got so bad that I was mocked from Hong Kong today. Of course, the mockery was unnecessary. It's embarrassing enough to see that I went through all of February without writing a damn thing. And the two entries since then consist of a placeholder and an article pilfered from the AP. Good thing shame has a way of getting you off your ass.

There's quite a backlog of things to write about. But, for the moment, the backlog will have to remain undisturbed, because I just read a rather strange story about Mew that deserves to jump the queue. (They're playing Irving Plaza in a couple of weeks. Woohoo!)

The journey started on Myspace, as I curiously hopped from one band site to another to see the people each band features as friends. Robin Guthrie has Rachel Goswell, who has Saint Etienne, who has Annie, and so on and so forth. You could probably get a pretty good game of "Six Degrees of David Bowie" going. Anyhow ... I eventually worked my way over to Mew's site and was reminded that Frengers finally became available stateside a few weeks ago. (Hokey, yet catchy. Not quite friends, not quite strangers. Frengers.) Because I'd been on Pitchfork earlier in the day to get a glimpse of what they had to say about The Arcade Fire's new album (out tomorrow -- woohoo!), I figured I'd stop by to see their take on Frengers. (Not that it matters, because I bought Frengers as an import long ago, and who really cares what Pitchfork says anyway. Yeah, I do see the non sequitir.) No review of Frengers, but there was this interesting blurb about the female vocals on "Symmetry."

Basically, the female vocals were provided by a 13-year-old American girl whom Jonas met online when she was all of 11. As she tells it (read the Biography and the interview), she met Jonas in a chat room while looking for others interested in Hanson. Jonas said he wasn't interested (phew!) but asked her what else she liked listening to. One thing led to another, and eventually the little girl was flying off to Copenhagen with her mom to record "Symmetry."

A bit creepy, yet kinda sweet. Let that be a lesson to ya. There's no shame in meeting a girl online, or in professing your love for Hanson.