Monday, March 28, 2011

Country Mice

ARTIST / BAND: Country Mice

Download: Festival

ALBUM: Twister

FILE UNDER: Garage / Psychedelic

LABEL: Wao Wao Records

INFO:

What does Country Mice front-man Jason Rueger have in common with less than 300 people in the US?  Growing up in Beattie, that’s ruralest of rural Kansas. On a farm of course, that was passed down through three generations of his family and old enough to be on the Pony Express route. “Family, friends, and working the land gave us a good wholesome life”.

Walking dirt road paths, working and living off the land, squinting his eyes at the sun, but with headphones on, it is not the bucolic atmosphere but music that most inspires him.  At an early age, Rueger sets his sights for something different than the surrounding dirt and milo that stung his eyes and cut his hands.

Breaking away from the close-knit ties of friends and family, Rueger moves east, not to Nashville, where you might expect a country boy to venture, but to Brooklyn.  It doesn’t take long to hook up with fellow Midwest transplants Ben Bullington (guitar) and Kurt Kuehn (drums) as they all quickly band together, finding comfort in their shared sense of displacement.  Eventually, as the trio becomes more assimilated to their new surroundings, they recruit upstate New Yorker Mike Feldman (bass). 

As Country Mice, they rally together to craft apocalyptic ballads through amplifier hazes that thicken into funnel clouds, drums that stomp-clap sedately before the storm peaks, and bass tones that thicken the bloodstream. Rueger draws on his small town rearing with sophistication beyond the ordinarily romantic and reductive Americana troubadour, and his songwriting is anything but dime a dozen.

Strong traces of Neil Young and Wilco are mixed into modern experimental guitar sounds that any fan of mid-90’sSonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr. will love. Living and gigging in Brooklyn, Country Mice begin to fully develop their sound, which becomes by influenced the other hardworking bands of Brooklyn's fast-paced scene. With the release of two 7” singles and a limited edition cassette on Brooklyn-based indie labels, Country Mice embarked on several national US tours, recorded and recently released a Daytrotter Session, played CMJ and is heading to and touring around SXSW.  

For the spring, they will unleash a new single “Festival” on March 28 and their debut album Twister on June 7th, a record that sonically chisels through the calloused shell of glossy rock & roll to find the dissonant live wire beneath and play it for all its worth. It tells a tale of strained memory: the hardships, joys, and love of growing up in a small town in the Midwest, with the hopes and dreams of traveling the world – a record for every kid seeing the big world from his small bedroom window.

Monday, March 21, 2011

Communipaw

ARTIST / BAND: Communipaw

MP3: "Twinkle" / "Plastic"

ALBUM: Big Blue

FILE UNDER: Acoustic / Folk Rock

LABEL: s/r

INFO: Born and bred in the Hub City’s infamous basement scene, Communipaw formed after singer/songwriter Brian Bond and drummer Keith Carne played an impromptu performance in 2007. Since then, with the additions of bassist David Esterman and guitarist Justin Gaynor, Communipaw has developed a reputation for scene-defying originality in their old hometown. By mixing a classic songwriting sensibility and a bit of alt-country with their love of soaring, anthemic indie rock, Communipaw has crafted a dynamic brand of insightful rock’n’roll.

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Monday, March 14, 2011

Omar Rodriguez-Lopez

ARTIST / BAND: Omar Rodriguez-Lopez

SONGS (MP3): Locomocion Capillar (Solar Gambling) / Shake is for 8th Graders (Cryptomnesia)

ALBUM: Telesterion

FILE UNDER: Experimental / Psychedelic /

LABEL: Rodriguez Lopez Productions

INFO: Immensely prolific Grammy Award winning recording artist Omar Rodriguez Lopez (The Mars Volta, At The Drive-In) announces the spring 2011 release of a quadruple LP / double CD collection culled from his multiple solo and collaborative albums. In celebration of this, Rodriguez Lopez's eponymous band will perform at this year's Coachella Festival and SXSW Music Festival (Sargent House/Rodriguez Lopez Productions showcase). Headlining tour dates are also in the works for late spring.

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Sunday, March 13, 2011

Sister Crayon

ARTIST / BAND: Sister Crayon

MP3: "Anti-Psalm"

"Anti-Psalm (Dam Mantle Remix)"

ALBUM: Bellow

FILE UNDER: Soul / Trip Hop / Visual

LABEL: Manimal Vinyl.

INFO: Something small and quiet at first, Sister Crayon began with vocalist Terra Lopez playing classical guitar and pre-programmed beats on a loop pedal to attentive house crowds. With the addition of members Dani Fernandez (MPC 1000 and Microkorg), Genaro Ulloa (Keyboards and Synths) and Nicholas Suhr (Drums and Percussion), Sister Crayon has emerged as a four-piece whose emotional live performances along with their styles of ambience, hip-hop, and “hysterical” have created a stir with their upcoming EP release, “Enter Into Holy (or)ders”. Inspired by the late French writer Jean Genet, “Holy (or)ders” is a sexual lament and sigh to the popular criminal.

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Saturday, March 12, 2011

New Jared Mees & the Grown Children

photo by tyler kohlhoff

ARTIST / BAND: New Jared Mees & the Grown Children

MP3:"Hungry Like a Tiger "Limber Hearts"

ALBUM: ONLY GOOD THOUGHTS CAN STAY

FILE UNDER: folk rock, indie, soul

LABEL: Tender Loving Empire

INFO: Despite its title, Only Good Thoughts Can Stay is not an anthem for blind faith in simple pleasures. Pairing sometimes dark lyrical matter with uptempo major-chord progressions, the newest album from Portland, Oregon’s Jared Mees and the Grown Children examines the give-and-take inherent in struggles for self-fulfillment while walking a tightrope between naive exuberance and cynical skepticism. This balancing act results in a sound that is joyful yet introspective; a rollicking Americana tale of modern life, be it hellish or heavenly.

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Friday, March 11, 2011

Jeniferever

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ARTIST / BAND: Jeniferever

MP3:

Waifs And Strays (MP3)
The Beat Of Our Own Blood (MP3)
Dover (MP3)

ALBUM: Silesia

FILE UNDER: Alternative / Gothic / Atmospheric

LABEL: Monotreme Records

INFO: Monotreme Records is very proud to be releasing ‘Spring Tides’, the second full-length album by Jeniferever.
Jeniferever is a 4-piece band from Uppsala, Sweden. They have previously released 4 eps and one album since 2002, and have played over 250 live shows across Europe. Over the years, they have gained an ever-growing band of admirers, who have bestowed descriptions such as ‘lush’, ‘melodic’, ‘swooping’, ‘glacial’, ‘beautiful’, ‘shimmering’, ‘sublime’, ‘electrifying’ and ‘atmospheric’ on their music.
Some have compared their sound to the physical beauty of their native country, with its aural landscapes of slow-paced melodies which build to orchestral-like climaxes.

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Thursday, March 10, 2011

Wednesday, March 09, 2011

Monday, March 07, 2011

Little Tybee

ARTIST / BAND: Little Tybee

MP3:

ALBUM: Humorous To Bees

FILE UNDER: Folk Rock / Indie

LABEL: Paper Garden Records

INFO: “Little Tybee is something of a mini orchestra with its ever-evolving five to ten members all engaged in intricate musicianship. Their name comes from a tiny island off the coast of their native Georgia, where legend has it, an undetonated atomic bomb from the 1950s lies missing. They jokingly attribute the quirkiness of their debut album Building a Bomb to the long-term effects of eating radiation-drenched seafood, but it’s more likely they were just born that way” -Lavinia Jones Wright, ASCAP

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Sunday, March 06, 2011

Gypsy Treasures

Gypsy Treasures: "Stray Dogs of Wroclaw"

ARTIST / BAND: Gypsy Treasures

MP3: "Stray Dogs of Wroclaw"

ALBUM: Buried Goods

FILE UNDER: electronic, alternative, exotic

LABEL: Not Not Fun

INFO: Gypsy Treasures is a project from Aria Jalali (aka Railcars), his release on Not Not Fun "Buried Goods" is the sole document of his mid-2000s basement raga project in which blown-out faux-modal guitar lines snake and coil under a cavernous reverb chamber while bizarre bunker electronics whirr and oscillate in an opiated haze on a bed of zoned tambo & hand percussion. "Buried Goods" sounds like a lost Sublime Frequencies demo as played by a bunch of So-Cal teens obsessed with German Oak.  Completely awesome and wholly apart from whatever else is/was going on, scene-wise when it was recorded.

The title "Buried Goods" refers to the accidental rediscovery of these tracks by Jalali on a recent Railcars tour in Europe. When pressed for more material to play for various encores, he found forgotten 6-7 year loops on his boss pedal which they improvised upon. Realizing that these 'jams' were worth revisiting, it inspired the collection to be re-recorded and mastered.  All four tracks were 4-tracked (the exception being “Four Horsemen,” which was recorded live) with various guest personnel and inner-chemical agendas. Being lifelong fans of contextless cassette curveballs, "Buried Goods" appealed to Not Not Fun instantly who have now released it a limited pro-dubbed tapes in cases with pitch-shifted regal furniture art/design by video-maker du jour, Megazord.

Friday, March 04, 2011

Easter Island

ARTIST / BAND: Easter Island

MP3: "Better Things" / "Proud"

ALBUM: Better Things

FILE UNDER: lo fi, indie pop

LABEL: s/r

INFO: Easter Island‘s progressive sound is one of the leading revivalists re-forging the yuppie angst pop that defined the mid 90s and early 00s. This impressive group, of classically trained guys hail from Athens, GA and have been playing together in a carousel of revolving bands since 2005, when vocalist Ethan Payne met lead guitarist Nathan Thompson. Payne (formerly of The Cubs, Union & Corduroy Road) has worked in the film industry for the past three years as a freelance shooter/editor/boom operator. Recently, he produced the Soundie: a series of lo-fi music videos featuring mostly local musicians and bands inspired by Vincent Moon’s takeaway shows.

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Kreidler

ARTIST / BAND: Kreidler

MP3: Kremlin rules

Kreidler - Kremlin rules by Tapete Records

ALBUM: TANK

FILE UNDER: Electronica

LABEL: Bureau B

INFO:

- Kreidler were formed in Düsseldorf/Germany in 1994.
- They have been asked to remix artists such as Einstuerzende Neubauten, Depeche Mode and Faust among 20 others and cooperated with artists like Klaus Dinger (NEU!), Add (N) to X, Young Gods, Theo Altenberg, Momus, Leo Garcia, Pyrolator and Chicks on Speed.
- Their music has been used for high profile fashion shows (Chanel, Lacoste, Giles Deacon), films, theatre and dance performances.

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Wednesday, March 02, 2011

Matthew Friedberger

ARTIST / BAND: Matthew Friedberger

MP3: Meet Me in Miramas

ALBUM: Solos

FILE UNDER: experimental, electro, pop

LABEL: Thrill Jockey

INFO: Matthew Friedberger is a Rock-N-Roll Goings-On Person-From-Chicago.

Born many years ago now, his interests--his "likes" as we say--include the following. Mediterranean Matters; Old Phone Books; "that beautiful place where the White Sox play baseball" (Dominic Pacyga); Jean Paul; James Brown; the IBM building; Chicagoism in General; Rhetorical Capitalization; the SNCF jingle that plays immediately before any announcement; Old Blind Writers from London; the Sidney Siblings and their Friends; what's written on some The Fall album covers; the Brontë Brother, Branwell; Lonely Trailer; I Love You, Big Dummy; Johnny Hodges; Jaki Byard; The Who in 1972; John Culshaw; The City of Bridges; magasin général; Music Written Down in Old Books from Old Shops in the Lands of Yesteryears; So Forth; and so on.

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Tuesday, March 01, 2011

Warm Ghost

ARTIST / BAND: Warm Ghost

MP3: Let My Angst Unfold In The Water Like A Hounds Tongue

ALBUM: Uncut Diamond

FILE UNDER: Experimental / Pop

LABEL: Partisan

INFO: A band and multi media duo based in Brooklyn, NY - Paul Duncan and Oliver Chapoy.

Paul Duncan is currently recording and performing under the moniker Warm Ghost. It finds him taking a step beyond traditional instrumentation and one toward that of electronics, synthesizers, drum machines and processed field recordings.

Warm Ghost has now evolved into a band in collaboration with Oliver Chapoy, where the sound is an intricately arranged shimmering sonic world of twisting words and melodies inside dense environments where there are elements of 80′s new wave, cold wave and synth pop from Solid Space to OMD to Depeche Mode, late 70′s disco, synth programming sharing ground with Autechre and AFX, and experimental textures reminiscent of Fennesz. The payoff is beautifully executed, lush pop songs that beg for repeat listening.

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