Last year Rolling Stone's senior music editor, David Fricke, named The Octopus Project one of five bands to watch out of thousands that performed at the 2006 SXSW music festival. That was pretty cool. But it still came as quite a surprise when the recent November 29th issue hit stands with another glowing review, this time praising the band's new full-length release, Hello, Avalanche. In the lead review in the editor's column "Fricke's Picks," Mr. Fricke described the band as, "smart pop scientists and total party animals, like Stereolab with happy feet," and went on to say the album was "tightly composed bundles of synthesized whoop and circus-calliope cheer." That was pretty cool, too. www.theoctopusproject.com www.myspace.com/theoctopusproject