(Almost) Free Download : Paul Westerberg 49:00

When I stumbled into this during my daily diet of music blog cruising I went out and immediately purchased Paul Westerberg’s new recording 49:00 from Amazon for $0.49!!!

As one track clocking in at a confusing 44 minutes, it is apparently the “tip of a really large creative iceberg.” The songs were recorded  The recording is a cut-and-pastishe of new songs, older songs and samples of classic rock songs. It’s lo-fi sensibility and Westerberg’s signature vocals gives it a feel that reminds me of the early Replacements. The jarring editing of the recording has songs sliding in and out sometimes edging the previous song out of the speakers from the left or right which might be why they are suggesting that you don’t listen to this while driving (LOL). The snippets of songs reminds me of Lolita Nation’s little soundscape. The Classic Rock mix at 40:00 or so is pretty great– especially since he would likely have recorded full versions of these songs to create this.

I stopped following Westerberg– who at one point was kind of a personal hero of mine– some time after his second album Eventually in 1996 completely missing his Grandpaboy catalog (BTW: Eventually is available used from Amazon on CD for $0.37!!!!)

Anyway, Paul is a genius and this is an amazing gift to his fans and would-be fans. For $0.49 what are you waiting for?
Download the whole damn thing from Amazon

Update: Likely due to the cover songs included, this has been unceremoniously yanked! He has provided an addendum track called “5:05” at TuneCore that gives us the missing minutes and kind of an explanation.