Pitchfork

For those who find Ben Folds' humorous piano-pop a skosh too much like school in the summer time (no class!), his latest release should serve as a resounding "Hey, hey, hey!" reminding you that one's redneck past doesn't necessarily preclude one from occasionally bringing the swank. And what says "swanksta" better than an 83-piece symphony orchestra?

The bespectacled "Brick"-layer does just that with Ben Folds & WASO - Live in Perth, to be released by Epic Records on December 6. Culled from a two-night stint this past March at Kings Park in Perth, Australia, the DVD documents Folds "in a way never heard or seen before." Sorry, not smell-o-vision, but we do get the angry dwarf performing with the solemn faces of the West Australian Symphony Orchestra, most of whom, if memory of high school band kids serves, you wouldn't want to smell anyway. Carrying those tubas is sweaty business!

For those of y'all who wear fanny packs, here's the tracklist:

01 Zak and Sara
02 Smoke
03 Fred Jones part 2
04 Steven's Last Night in Town
05 Boxing
06 Annie Waits
07 Brick
08 Evaporated
09 Not the Same
10 The Ascent of Stan
11 Lullabye
12 Narcolepsy
13 Rock This Bitch
14 The Luckiest

No need to fret if you can't stand to wait until the 10th day of Advent for your fix of live key pounding, as Folds is currently touring in support of his latest album, Songs for Silverman.

Rock these bitches:

11-18 Houston, TX - Warehouse Live *
11-19 Grand Prairie, TX - Nokia Theatre *
11-20 Austin, TX - University of TX at Austin - Bass Hall *
11-29 Hempstead, NY - JC Adams Playhouse #
12-12 Birmingham, England - NIA Academy
12-13 London, England - Brixton Academy
12-15 Manchester, England - Manchester Apollo

* with the Fray
# with Corn Mo