This just in from Mr. Colin Clary: Not one, but two, VT bands made indie music blog PopMatters Best Indie Pop of 2008 Top 10 List! And they are — drum roll, please! — The Smittens and The Capstan Shafts. Weird that this came in as I was working on my own top 10 . . .

Anyway, if I could borrow a phrase, “Yow!” Congrats to both bands.

In other news, Higher Ground just announced that Andrew Bird is coming back to town on April 5. It’s a Christmas miracle!

Dan Bolles is a culture coeditor at Seven Days. He joined the paper in 2007 as its music editor, covering Vermont's robust music, comedy and nightlife scenes for a decade before deciding he was too old to be going to the Monkey House on weeknights to...