If you're not yet hip to them, the Features are the Nashville-based rock quartet who made a splash scene back in 2006 with their killer debut, Exhibit A. That year they went on tour with fellow Tennesseans the Kings of Leon, and played gigs with  the Raconteurs and the Walkmen. 

The Features are back with their second LP, Some Kind of Salvation. The record will be released on May 26th, and features production work by KOL and Tom Waits producer Jacquire King.

Check out the Salvation track "Lions," below and head over to their website for more. 

The Features - "Lions"

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Sure, we didn't put up any new posts yesterday, but we have a damn good excuse.

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The S.S. just received word that in May Conor Oberst and the Mystic Valley Band will release a brand new album, Outer South. The disc features sixteen new tracks from the band, including "Nikorette," which the boys performed on  Conan last year. 

Oh, and you can catch Conor and the Mystic Valley Band on the road this spring. Click the jump for the dates.

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The speculation has finally been put to rest. After fans tried to unravel the Nine Inch Nails/Jane's Addiction puzzle Trent Reznor presented to them in the form of pictures on the NIN website and cryptic Twitter messages, the game is over.

As we predicted, Reznor is producing a new Jane's album (the first since 2003's Strays). And the bands will tour together later this year!

The rub is that Reznor has decided that this will be the last NIN tour for some time. In a post on the NIN forum, he writes: "2009 marks the 20th anniversary of our first releases. I've been thinking for some time now it's time to make NIN disappear for a while." 

Just how long "a while" means is hard to tell, but the last time NIN went on hiatus it took six years for a new album to emerge!

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Pearl Jam fans, here ya go. 

For the first time anywhere, check out two tracks from the upcoming reissue of Pearl Jam's epic 1991 debut, Ten. Check out a leaner, grittier, nastier mix of "Porch," and then dig "Brother," a Ten outtake.

On March 24th, Pearl Jam will reissue Ten. Longtime producer Brendan O'Brien has remixed the original tracks -- which, we can attest, sound better than the original versions -- and a slew of B-sides and rarities will be included. The reissued album will come in four different special editions, each containing a remastered copy of the original album, plus the O'Brien remixed version.

Dig it.

"Porch"

"Brother"

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While the Smoking Section is in no position to confirm or deny the existence of a spankin' new studio album by Bob Dylan, we thought we should tell you about some of the news we've read on hardcore Dylan fan sites.

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Because there's just not enough retarded sexuality and bad poetry out there, Spinal Tap have reunited. Derek Smalls, Nigel Tufnel and David St. Hubbins have confirmed to BBC 5 Live that they plan to hit the studio to record new material!  

Bassist Derek Smalls said the album will be available "for download and coventional media later this year."

As for what will be included on the new album, Smalls added, "We'll do a song called 'Gimme Some More Money,' probably with some dubious results." 

There are also plans to record the song "Warmer Than Hell," which they performed at the Live Earth gig a couple years back, in London.

Since then, due to the economic woes, Tufnel's haberdashery has gone out of business.

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What the hell is Marilyn Manson up to, you ask?

"My new record is done, man," he tells the S.S. "It's called The High End of Low - it's a self-described state of being that I'm in. You're going to be fucking freaked. It's the shit."

Manson is currently in the mixing process - no word yet on a release date - and this month he'll shoot the album's first video, for the tune "I Want to Kill You Like They Do in the Movies." "It's nine minutes long," he says. "Severely sadist. Basically, it's murder, sex, death, the end."

While we're in Los Angeles for the Grammy's, we'll drop by Manson's pad and get the full scoop. 

The Jerk, The Man With Two Brains, All of Me, Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid, Three Amigos, Little Shop of Horrors, Roxanne, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Parenthood, L.A. Story, The Spanish Prisoner, Bowfinger... These are but a few of the reasons why we worship Steve Martin.

So it was pretty wild and crazy to pick up the phone and hear Mr. Martin's voice on the other end of the line.

The occasion? Today marks the release of his very first album solely dedicated to music, The Crow: New Songs for the Five-String Banjo.      

Of course, throughout his stand-up career in the Seventies, when he was playing arenas, the banjo was always a stage prop for Martin. His 1981 comedy album, The Steve Martin Brothers, even included some of his own compositions on banjo. But around that time Martin quit doing stand-up, and his banjo skills started to suffer.

"I just played it at home," he says. "In the mid-Eighties I played a song called 'Clawhammer Medley' in a movie called Simple Twist of Fate, which was not a hit. So I was still up to speed." Then his banjoes began collecting dust, until Bluegrass legend Earl Scruggs asked Martin to play on his 2002 album, Earl Scruggs and Friends. "I told him, 'I'm not sure, I'm a little rusty,'" says Martin. "At that point I got into it  again." And Martin would join a handful of pickers on the Scruggs tune, "Foggy Mountain Breakdown," which would go on to win a Grammy for Best Country Instrumental Performance. 

"I sit there and look at that Grammy and I'm going, 'This is a fluke,'" says Martin. "The Grammy actually says, 'Best Country Instrumentalist.' I like to have it out when musicians come over."

Finally, with the encouragement and participation of banjo legends like Scruggs, Tony Trishcka, John McEuen and Pete Wernick, Martin has compiled an album of his own compositions, some of which date back to the late Sixties. (Vince Gill, Dolly Parton and the great Tim O'Brien contribute some vocals, as well.) "It was because of a lack of formal instruction that I started writing my own songs," he says. "The others were written in the last four or five years."

Martin will host SNL this weekend, where he'll perform "Late For School," the only track on The Crow that features his very own vocals. "I'm going to sing," he says. "First time since 'King Tut!'"

Enjoy our favorite cut from the album, "Freddie's Lilt," below.

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Photo: WireImage

The Killers are working a covers album for their next release, the band announced in an interview with Q Magazine.

Drummer Ronnie Vannucci has picked up some new, portable recording equipment so the band can capture covers while touring. Each band member will pick three songs to cover for the album, with Vannucci already pining for Genesis, Tom Waits and Rod Stewart's "Young Turks." 

What do ya think they should cover?