Similarly to the phenomenon experienced by The Police with their hit “Every Breath You Take”, frontman Stephin Merritt doesn’t get why people use The Magnetic Fields‘ “The Book of Love” for weddings. But while Sting and company experience a sense of dread for people promising their lives to one another based on a song about stalking, Merritt feels that his band simply has better songs to choose from. “When people use ‘The Book of Love’ as a wedding song, I want to scream, ‘But I have a better one!’” The song in question is “Forever And A Day”, off the aptly-titled Obscurities collection Merritt has coming out August 23rd.

The 14-song collection features exactly what you’d expect: a slew of “hard to find” tracks by Merritt taken from circa 1994′s The Charm of the Highway Strip to 1999′s 69 Love Songs. Of the tracks, five are taken from Merge-imprinted Magnetic Fields 7″s, with another three taken from The Song from Venus, the unfinished sci-fi musical Merritt wrote with Daniel Handler (of Lemony Snickett fame). The rest are from random releases, including a track from the audiobook for Neil Gaiman’s Coraline, a K Records cassette-only release, and more. “Forever And A Day”, available for streaming below courtesy of Stereogum, may very well be a much more apropos song to get hitched to.

In yet another instance of digging back into the MF archives, Strange Powers: Stephin Merritt and the Magnetic Fields, the documentary about the band that debuted last fall, is now coming to DVD. Along with commentary by Merritt and long-time collaborator Claudia Gonson, the release features two Gonson directed videos, one for “Strange Powers” and another for “Born on a Train”, and five deleted scenes. Enjoy the film’s trailer below.

Strange Powers: Stephin Merritt and the Magnetic Fields is available beginning today. Obscurities hits stores August 23rd via Merge Records.

Check Out:
“Forever And A Day”

Obscurities Tracklist:
01. Forever And A Day
02. Rats in the Garbage of the Western World
03. I Don’t Believe You
04. Plant White Roses
05. Rot in the Sun
06. The Sun and the Sea and the Sky
07. Yet Another Girl
08. Scream (‘Till You Make the Scene)
09. The Song From Venus
10. Beach-a-Boop-Boop
11. When I’m Not Looking, You’re Not There
12. Take Ecstasy With Me
13. When You’re Young and in Love
14. You are not my Mother and I Want to go Home