With his annual Thanksgiving Eve gig just around the corner, Ike Reilly has prepared a feast for his Twin Cities contingent and anyone else who wants to get in on the party. The Irish-eyed workingman's indie-rocker and his Libertyville, Ill.-based band the Ike Reilly Assassination have cooked up an 18-song collection and made it available as a free download today.
Titled "Am I Still the One for You?," the bulky set features four new songs off the IRA's overdue follow-up to 2009's "Hard Luck Stories." The other 14 tracks hail from their prior records, including an alternate version of "Hip-Hop Thighs #17" off the group's classic 2001 effort for Universal's Republic Records, "Salesmen & Racists" (newly dubbed "Hip-Hop Thighs #16" for the 2010 outtakes set "Poison the Hit Parade").
"The four new songs will hopefully tide fans over who've been waiting for them, and the rest will maybe attract new fans," Reilly explained by phone from Libertyville last week. Among his other going-ons of late, Reilly performed at a rally for striking teachers in nearby Waukegan and played a gig with a new trio, Cops and Clergy.
However, his priority has been finishing off the new IRA album, "Born on Fire," which is due out on vinyl in April and digitally in May. "We worked hard on it, and obviously I think it's very good," he said. The record features Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine shredding on one song, "Paradise Lane," and the IRA's Twin Cities-based women back-up singers, the Assassinettes, are heard throughout.
Among the new songs heard on the free set available today is the vaguely ominous, organ-infused "Hangin' Around," a video for which debuted last year with footage from the Turf Club's Clown Lounge. The other three free new tunes include the sly, slide-guitar-laden rocker "Upper Mississippi River Girl," the moodier "Good Looking Boy" (full lyric: "It's a hard time to be a good looking boy") and the opening title track "Am I Still the One for You?"
Reilly and Co. return for their 12th straight holiday warm-up/blow-out Wednesday at First Avenue with local openers American Scarecrows and Sam Cassidy (8:30 p.m. Wed., $15, tickets here).
