Merge Records Readies 20-Year Festivities

Chapel Hill's Merge Records are in the midst of celebrating 20 years of existence. Whether it's their 20th birthday or 20th anniversary is a matter of semantic irrelevance, for what truly matters is that Merge —the label that gave the world The Magnetic Fields, Neutral Milk Hotel, and Arcade Fire, amongst many— are pulling out all the 20-year stops.

Late last year, Merge HQ announced the mammoth Score! box-set; a year-long series involving 17+ CDs, artwork, posters, and other assorted trinketry, all to be housed in a bonafide box. This literal box-set is a limited-edition, subscription-only service that's already sold out. But, for those who missed out on scoring Score!, Merge have made its crowning work commercially-available.

Score! 20 years of Merge Records: The Covers! finds an array of indie big-wigs —Death Cab, The Shins, Bright Eyes— covering cuts from the MRG back-catalogue (full track list below). 7,500 commercially-available copies have been unleashed as of April 7, so be swift!

Made for-sale as of April 8 are passes to XX Merge, a five-day long series of festivities held from July 22-26 in Chapel Hill and Carrboro. Though details are far from being finalized, Merge are promising both "mayhem" and "bedlam," as well as over 25 acts. Those thus far known include: Superchunk, Spoon, Conor Oberst, M. Ward, Destroyer, and one of my favorite overlooked members of the Merge catalogue, Guv'ner. Ticketing details available at the Merge website

Score! 20 years of Merge Records: The Covers!
1. Quasi, "Beautiful Things" (3Ds cover)
2. Les Savy Fav, "Precision Auto" (Superchunk cover)
3. The Shins, "Plenty Is Never Enough" (Tenement Halls cover)
4. St. Vincent and the National, "Sleep All Summer" (Crooked Fingers cover)
5. Broken Social Scene, "Complications" (The Clean cover)
6. Ryan Adams, "Like a Fool" (Superchunk cover)
7. Bright Eyes, "Papa Was a Rodeo" (The Magnetic Fields cover)
8. Lavender Diamond, "New Ways of Living" (Destroyer cover)
9. The Apples in Stereo, "King of Carrot Flowers Pt. 3" (Neutral Milk Hotel cover)
10. Laura Cantrell, "Cowboy on the Moon" (Lambchop cover)
11. Bill Callahan, "Santa Maria" (Versus cover)
12. Barbara Manning, "Through With People" (Portastatic cover)
13. The Mountain Goats, "Drug Life" (East River Pipe cover)
14. The New Pornographers, "Don't Destroy This Night" (The Rock*A*Teens cover)
15. Tracey Thorn and Jens Lekman, "Yeah! Oh, Yeah!" (The Magnetic Fields cover)
16. The Hive Dwellers, "My Noise" (Superchunk cover)
17. Ted Leo & the Pharmacists, "The Numbered Head" (Robert Pollard cover)
18. Okkervil River, "All You Little Suckers" (East River Pipe cover)
19. Death Cab for Cutie, "Kicked In" (Superchunk cover)
20. Times New Viking, "Neighborhood #1" (Arcade Fire cover)

• See Also: Top 10 Merge Albums