WNYC video and upcoming Sirius appearance

A video of TMBG's recent appearance on The Leonard Lopate Show on WNYC has been posted to YouTube. The short segment of the interview shows the Johns talking about their children fans. You can still listen to the entire interview online.

Via Orbitcast, having just appeared on XM Radio, They Might Be Giants are now making an appearance on Sirius Satellite Radio's Kids Stuff to promote Here Come the 123s. The show will take place on Monday, February 4, the day before 123s is released, at 8 o'clock am on channel 116. If you happen to miss this airing of the show, it will be rebroadcast once a day at varying times for the rest of the week.

The They Might Be Giants song tournament taking place over at the TMBG LJ group is coming to a close. The two remaining songs are "Birdhouse in Your Soul" versus "Don't Let's Start" in the finals. Who could have guessed this kind of outcome?

TMBG Radio Takeover on Y-Rock

Via TMBW, tonight at 9 o'clock They Might Be Giants will be taking over Y-Rock on XPN. Flansburgh and Linnell will be guest jockeying and will play some of their favorite songs as well as a few from the studio recorded live. You can listen to the show online on the station's website. In case you miss the guest spot it seems it will be archived for streaming at some point.

They Might Be Giants have also announced in their latest MySpace bulletin that they are performing a show for kids and families at the Variety Playhouse in Atlanta, GA on March 15. I have a feeling I already know one song they'll play.

TMBG Podcast 31A and newsletter

The first new podcast of the year is upon us with 31A. Recently, the "I Never Go to Work" episode from the Family Podcast was entered into the feed--perhaps to give podcast listeners a heads up on their activities--but this is the first in their regular, adult series. The songs include the most recent Free Tunes, some songs from Here Come the 123s, and "a song from some one night thing," says the accompanying TMBG newsletter.

The newsletter includes an entry from the Flansblog 9000 wherein Flans gives his reaction to "No!" being played on American Idol and the possibility of Paula Abdul having heard their music. He also sends a heads up to the people going or considering going to the upcoming show at the Beacon Theatre. Apparently, they've never played "Hey, Mr. DJ, I Thought You Said We Had a Deal" before and this show will be its first time live. They are also appearing on Surface Noise this week on XM 44, the Fred channel, where you can hear them play the XM songs featured in the podcast. If you don't already get the newsletter, sign up today and get free MP3s.

Interviews and 123s speculation

A Flansburgh interview with the NY Daily News appeared over the weekend. The article discusses Here Come the 123s and compares it and its audience to The Else and its, noting that many fans enjoy both. Additionally, the They Might Be Giants MySpace Blog points us to an older interview with Gearlog. This is a great interview from a couple of months ago that really focuses on the technologies used by the band. Examining Dial-A-Song, wax cylinders, and the Internet, Flans talks about how using technology is a means to an end and shouldn't distract listeners from the final product. Make sure to read part two of the interview as well.

The blog over at theymightbegiants.com updated and contains an image promoting Here Come the 123s. In it we see several characters from the included music videos. One of which is the boy in a spaceship from the "Planets" video. It's still unknown how this will appear in the 123s package as none of the promotional material or track listings mention a song of that name. It's possible that the song is not called "Planets" at all and is actually titled something different. In this case, my guess goes to "One Two Three Four" for which a video is included in the Amazon package. This is a shallow guess, but it is the only song that hasn't been heard yet and I doubt that "Planets" is one of the songs available for previewing.

Now that that's out of the way, let me also mention the panda bear puppet on the left. Hine Mizushima, creator of TMBG Puppets Shoot "Ana Ng" and the video for "With the Dark," points out the animal to us, suggesting this is one of her creations. This would be for her contribution to Here Come the 123s: the music video for "The Secret Life of Six."

"813 Mile Car Trip" hits the Family Podcast

"Eight Hundred and Thirteen Mile Car Trip" is the most recent entry in the They Might Be Giants Friday Night Family Podcast promoting Here Come the 123s. The concept of incredibly long car trips and counting the things you see outside is a familiar one to many, children and adult alike, but most don't share the same enthusiasm that those in the video display. If the video seems familiar to you, perhaps it is because it seems to be animated by Pascal Campion, the same person who animated the video for the "Pittsburgh" venue song. The video shares some resemblance to the one for the Mr. Small's and you can see another similar animation on his site.

The Flansburgh and Linnell puppets introduce the video wearing a mustache and goggles, respectively. They sing a song about riding in motorcars and wearing a mustache and goggles that made me laugh quite a lot. I don't think the puppet segments will get stale any time soon. The other video included in the podcast is "D is for Drums" from Here Come the ABCs. Exiting the podcast is the goodbye song again with the Johns still dressed up in their car-riding garb.

The Leonard Lopate Show and American Idol

John Flansburgh and John Linnell stopped by WNYC to appear on The Leonard Lopate Show today. The interview includes discussion on their children material, working with Dunkin' Donuts and McSweeney's, and having songs appear on Tiny Toons and The Simpsons.

Speaking of television shows licensing TMBG's music, last night's episode of American Idol featured a segment of rejections backed by They Might Be Giants' "No" from their album of the same name. You can view the clip online via the recently updated They Might Be Giants Mulitmedia page.

Linnell interviewed, "I'm Impressed" explained

A new interview with John Linnell has been posted on the Gothamist website and pointed out by TMBG's MySpace blog. Linnell speaks on fans, playing the same songs again and again, and nearly hitting a famous poet with a van. The rarely interviewed John gives an interesting read and a wide range of topics are covered. One bit that stuck out to me was a side note on what they are thinking about working on next.

"We’ve sort of cooked up a rough idea for the Disney DVD that will follow this one and at this point we’re thinking it will just generally be about science for kids."

A science oriented DVD is an intriguing idea. I would like to see how John and John handle concepts more difficult than those of letters and numbers. What other ideas for kids projects might they work on? Mathematics, geography, and history are the first that come to my mind.

Also posted today is an insider's look into the creation of a They Might Be Giants music video. An anonymous editor on This Might Be a Wiki has posted his or her insight into the creation of the video for "I'm Impressed" and on the meaning behind it. The insider, who had interned at Bent Image Lab, tells why everything is made of paper, what political undertones the video carries, and what instructions were received from the band: "There must [be] a leader, and he must get killed." Read the entire piece over at TMBW.