Can you believe it’s been almost five months since the last episode of The Office? Thankfully, the series returned last night with plenty of hilarity, brutally awkward moments, and - oh, yes! - a soundtrack of cringe-inducing coffee-shop tunes courtesy of Jan’s former assistant Hunter! Last night’s ep (”Dinner Party”) revealed that Hunter’s band (The Hunted) released a CD featuring a song (”That One Night”) that seems to imply cougar Jan took her assistant’s virginity. Another fun fact: the music for “That One Night” was written by Todd Fancy of The New Pornographers!

If you’re interested in winning an exclusive copy of “The Hunted” CD (that you could share with Hypeful, of course!), Dunder Mifflin Infinity has released a forty-five second clip of the song and are asking fans to create a music video! If you want Jan’s Serenity Candles, however, you’re going to have to pay to smell Merlot Morning…

MP3:
The Hunted - “That One Night”

Take note fans of electro-pop and indie foot fetishists! Hotly-tipped French dance band The Shoes have been taking pictures of their famous friends’ shoes, and are giving an autographed polaroid of a different star’s feet away free with each copy of their new 7″ single “Knock Out”. There are some 300 unique polaroids in all to collect and trade with your friends, featuring such artists as Band of Horses, Bloc Party, the Cribs, Does It Offend You, Yeah?, MGMT, and “Barry-Gwen Stefani’s maintenance man.” (Don’t be surprised to see Barry at SXSW next year…) I wonder if polaroid-enthusiast Jason Schwartzman/Coconut Records makes an appearance…

MP3:
The Shoes - “Baby I’m 4 Real”

Financial Times reports that Apple is currently in discussions with the big music companies to allow customers unlimited access to the entire iTunes music library in exchange for paying a premium for its iPod and iPhone devices (presumably for the life of the device). This “all you can eat listen” plan recalls Universal’s Total Music plan with Nokia, in which the cost of music is embedded into the music player itself. Negotiations have allegedly stalled due to disagreements in pricing - Apple wants to keep the charge as low as $20, while the labels presumably want something closer to the $80 Nokia deal. Other possibilities may include a subscription based service for iPhone users ($7-8/month, for example) with the capability to keep up to 40-50 tracks/year even after the subscription lapses.

This month marks the 10th anniversary of the world’s first MP3 player - the MPMan F10 (pictured above). The tragically named MPMan F10 was a landmark invention that laid the groundwork for modern gadgetry (and serves as an excellent reminder of just how super-sexy and amazing today’s iPods are…). Manufactured by Korea’s Saehan Information Systems, the device was launched in March of 1998 at CeBIT, and went on sale in the Summer for $250. The player featured 32MB of flash memory (which could be upgraded to 64MB via mail-in scheme), connected to PCs via parallel port, and had a miniscule LCD for playback info.

MP3:
Add - “We Have the Technology”

Two iPhones and a Ninendo DS comprise the instruments in the world’s first iPhone band calling themselves (what else?) - iBand. The band is hoping to replace the DS with an iPhone through fan donations, but the results of their first jam session are pretty ace with the DS as a rhythm instrument. If you’re inspired to put together your own pocket band, iBand’s first jam session used the DS game Electroplankton and the iPhone applications iAno and Pocket Guitar.

MP3:
iBand - “Jam Session #1″

VIDEO: