DIY icons Mac McCaughan and Laura Ballance of Superchunk dropped by New York City's Housing Works Bookstore Friday for a reading from Our Noise: The Story of Merge Records, the Indie Label that Got Big and Stayed Small, a new oral history about their revered 20-year-old label.

There's no doubt about it: Technology has sapped much of the mystery out of seeing live rock'n'roll. A venue's website posts the set times, so you can skip the opening bands. Your friends will text you when the headliner is setting up. Hell, the band might even Tweet their setlist from backstage.

Superchunk members Mac McCaughan and Laura Ballance's North Carolina label Merge Records is celebrating 20 years of kicking out the jams with a five-day bash in their home state -- and they've invited some of their best artists to join the party, including Spoon, M. Ward, and Conor Oberst.

Superchunk frontman Mac McCaughan has written about lots of things in his 20 years in music. But new song "Misfits & Mistakes" marks a first: He wrote the tune from the point of view of Meatwad, a character in Cartoon Network series Aqua Teen Hunger Force!

Mac McCaughan may be best recognized as the leader of indie pioneer Superchuck (watch live video!), but with his solo project Portastatic, the Chapel Hill, NC, native and Merge Records founder explores territory outside the fuzzy, loose jangle most have come to know from that band.

The sad truth: Not all youngsters gallivanting under Seattle's Space Needle Monday turned out to heed SPIN deputy editor Steve Kandell's advice and catch indie rock luminaries Superchunk's rare live set in Memorial Stadium.