The Clien­tele are per­fect for autumn, so it was with great for­tune that I dis­cov­ered this lit­tle gem in the used bins of New­bury Comics a few weeks ago. Released in 2000, just at the cusp of the Clientele’s golden era, A Fad­ing Sum­mer fea­tures four songs not seen on any sub­se­quent LP. There’s noth­ing espe­cially note­wor­thy here, but that’s kind of its charm – mod­est lit­tle pieces con­tent to reside on a used EP. “Sat­ur­day” is marked by a char­ac­ter­is­ti­cally irrel­e­vant dark open­ing pas­sage and gen­tly tum­bling verses, and “Dri­ving South” employs a “Dear Pru­dence” rip-off that’s so shame­less it can only be an homage.

Also of note are dis­cov­ered links to the Clientele’s blog, vocal­ist Alas­dair MacLean’s Flickr page, and an archived per­for­mance on KEXP, all c/o the Merge Records blog.