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

jen4

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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Monday, February 21, 2011

The Luyas

 
ARTIST / BAND: The Luyas
ALBUM: Too Beautiful to Work
FILE UNDER: Experimental / Indie
LABEL: Dead Oceans / Idée Fixe
INFO: The Luyas are four musicians named Jessie Stein, Mathieu Charbonneau, Pietro Amatro and Stefan Scheider. They made a record called Too Beautiful to Work at 6 Nassau in Toronto, Ontario, and call Montreal, Quebec home. r
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Sunday, February 20, 2011

Glorie

ARTIST / BAND: Glorie

MP3: "Highrise"

ALBUM: Glorie

FILE UNDER: Experimental / Rock

LABEL: Makeshift Music

INFO: Instrumental band Glorie was formed in Memphis, TN in the spring of 2009 by Jason Paxton, former frontman of The Satyrs, after an eight-year hiatus from playing music.

Jason was joined by Jonathan Kirkscey (cellist with the Memphis Symphony Orchestra who has composed arrangements for and performed live with Jay Reatard, Cat Power, and Al Green) Andy Saunders, Jeff Hulett (member of Makeshift Music label-mates Snowglobe and Jeffrey James & the Haul) and Rob Brimhall.

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Saturday, February 19, 2011

Adebisi Shank

 

ARTIST / BAND: Adebisi Shank

FILE UNDER: dance instrumental punk rock

LABEL: Sargent House

INFO: Imagine it's 1985 and you're making a movie that takes place in 2011. You picture myriad technological devices that simplify our lives -- every mundane activity can be accomplished with the push of a button -- freeing us to travel the globe, living a life of total awesomeness. The anthemic optimism of your era, you assume, will eventually enrich the entire world and create a global new form of music. This Is the Second Album From A Band Called Adebisi Shank is just the type of futuristic-utopian sound of a parallel 2011 universe breaking through the time-space continuum to guide us all to perfection.

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Friday, February 18, 2011

Storms

ARTIST / BAND: Storms

MP3: Wolves and Bells

ALBUM: Lay Your Sea Coat Aside

FILE UNDER: Experimental / Folk

LABEL: Plancha

INFO: Lori Scacco and Eva Puyuelo first met through mutual friend and collaborator Guillermo Scott Herren when Lori was asked to tour as part of the Savath & Savalas live band. Years later as Lori was writing new solo material and Eva was in New York recording with Savath & Savalas, she invited Eva to join her on one song for her new record which, at the time, was intended to be mostly instrumental. They soon discovered that they had a deep-rooted creative connection and a shared love of 70’s psych-folk one-offs, so they made a plan to bring Eva back to the states in the coming months to begin work on a full-length. Lay Your Sea Coat Aside is the result of 5 weeks spent sequestered in New York City, immersed in a wholly collaborative exchange. Inspired by Linda Perhacs, Extradition, Nico, and Elis Regina’s most stripped down collaborations with Milton Nascimento, they poured over a number of guitar pieces Lori had amassed throughout the initial writing stages and developed an explorative practice

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Thursday, February 17, 2011

Moving Units

ARTIST / BAND: Moving Units

MP3: Until She Says

ALBUM: Tension War EP

FILE UNDER: post punk, inide dance

LABEL: Post Modern Records

INFO: Hailed for pioneering post-punk, indie–dance music – a sound often reflected by today's contemporaries, Los Angeles' Moving Units, now ten years into their career, are set to release their EP, Tension War.Tension War references the existential personal struggles we experience when we attempt to harmonize the dualities in everyday life. From the push and pull that ensues during an unspoken attraction, to the dynamic of living in Los Angeles - a city full of symbolism and paraphernalia of glamour versus the desperation and disillusionment of the people who aspire to such entrapments...tension is everywhere.

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Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Le Butcherettes

 

ARTIST / BAND: Le Butcherettes

MP3: "Henry Don't Got Love" / "New York"

ALBUM: Sin Sin Sin

FILE UNDER: garage punk

LABEL: Rodriguez Lopez Productions

INFO: The garage-punk trio Le Butcherettes are like the brilliant offspring of surrealist Luis Bunuel and intrepid rock icon PJ Harvey. Led by 21-year-old vocalist/guitarist/pianist Teri Gender Bender (a recent transplant to L.A. from Guadalajara, Mexico) Le Butcherettes bring a brazen intensity and playful, hook-laden simplicity that hacks to pieces all forms of pretension and excess.

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Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Jookabox

ARTIST / BAND: Jookabox

MP3: "Drops"

ALBUM: The Eyes Of The Fly

FILE UNDER: Indie

LABEL: Asthmatic Kitty

INFO: A band whose imagery echoes ghosts, zombies, decay, and the afterlife, inspired by life in the post-industrial land of white flight, now writes its own epitaph, carves its own headstone, and sings its swan song. May the funky frenetic compositions of Jookabox rest in chaos as beautiful as that which they created.

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Monday, February 14, 2011

Discodeine

ARTIST / BAND: Discodeine

MP3: 'Synchronize' Feat. Jarvis Cocker

ALBUM: Discodeine

FILE UNDER: dance, electronic, pop

LABEL: DFA Records

INFO: DISCODEINE is a french duo born in 2007 from the sick minds of Pilooski and Pentile. They have separatedly released some acclaimed records in the last past years (Pentile was involved in Octet and France Copland, Pilooski has remixed LCD Sound System, Mystery Jets and the infamous Frankie Valli) before finding a mutual ground around their love for sci fi movies, weird club music and south western french cooking style. Discodeine is signed on french imprint DIRTY, home label of the well known "Dirty edits" (a collaborative project between Pilooski and Dirty Sound System) and some other cool and weird compilations projects.

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Sunday, February 13, 2011

Jail Weddings

ARTIST / BAND: Jail Weddings

MP3: I Thought You Were Someone I Knew

ALBUM: Love Is Lawless

FILE UNDER: Melodramatic Popular Song / Pop / Soul

LABEL: play white noise

INFO: Love Is Lawless the new album from Jail Weddings that the LA Weekly calls “a big, fine mess of weepy, quavering, hiccupy hurtin’ hurt, plowed through with a way-tough punk-rock theatricality and welcome good humor” is out today! Get it on-sale for only $7.69 (until 11/1) from Insound, with every order receiving a bonus CD containing songs from Jail Weddings first two out-of-print 7″ singles as well as a live cover of The Cramps’ “Beautiful Gardens”.

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Friday, February 11, 2011

La Resistance

ARTIST / BAND: La Resistance

MP3: Understanding / Isolation

ALBUM: Philosophy

FILE UNDER: Rock, Indie, Pop

LABEL: Superphonic Records

INFO: La Resistance is the brainchild of Greg Summerlin, who after releasing several solo albums on Superphonic Records formed the new Birmingham, Alabama band with three friends that have played with him over the past several years. The band's debut album, "Philosophy", will be released through Superphonic Records this February and recalls various musical influences from the last three decades. Greg is joined by Wil Drake on drums (formerly of Moses Mayfield - Columbia Records), Jake Blount on bass and Erin Tumlin on keys and vocals.

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Thursday, February 10, 2011

RYAT

ARTIST / BAND: RYAT

MP3: "Superficial Friction"

ALBUM: Avant Gold

FILE UNDER: Indie / Live Electronics

LABEL: Obvious Bandits

INFO: Ryat is a cutting-edge producer, multi-instrumentalist, singer, who transfers her compositions into an improvisation based live looping project featuring guitarist/composer Tim Conley.  Compared to artist like Panda Bear and Bjork, Ryat's multidimensional musical approach is an array of effects processed raw organic pop.

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Wednesday, February 09, 2011

The Caribbean

ARTIST / BAND: The Caribbean

MP3: Mr. Let's Find Out / Outskirts

ALBUM: Discontinued Perfume

FILE UNDER: Indie

LABEL: Hometapes

INFO: Quite possibly the best demo we will ever receive came in the mail from our nation's capital thanks to The Caribbean. Originally in D.C. area bands Townies and Smart Went Crazy, the boys followed up their astounding album on Tomlab and Endearing (History's First Know-It-All) by coming to Hometapes and recording the William of Orange EP with studio collaborator Chad Clark (Beauty Pill / Silver Sonya Studios). After a few brief tours on America's coasts they have returned with Plastic Explosives, again recorded with Chad Clark and at their own home studio. They consistently amaze us with their musical knowledge, witty charm, epic email threads, and skill at navigating the murky waters where pop and not-pop collide. They make lovely house guests and would love to play your local venue at the nearest convenience.

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Tuesday, February 08, 2011

ALSO

ARTIST / BAND: ALSO

MP3: True

ALBUM: Music Belongs In The Background

FILE UNDER: Alternative / Indie / Rock

LABEL: s/r

INFO: Los Angeles natives, ALSO, will release their third full-length Music Belongs In the Background on February 22, 2011.

In many ways, the guys from ALSO are an anti-rock band. Drew Conrad, Scotland Stephenson, and Mark Zelen are all self-proclaimed neat freaks with families and day jobs. They don’t have tattoos. They don’t do drugs. They take naps.

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Monday, February 07, 2011

Snowblink

ARTIST / BAND: Snowblink

MP3: Ambergris

ALBUM: Long Live

FILE UNDER: folk, pop

LABEL: Fire Records

INFO: Recently back from a six-week US tour opening for Owen Pallett, Snowblink‘s debut album Long Live, is now available on Fire Records, in conjunction with a European tour centered around The Sounds Quixotic festival in Vevey Switzerland.

Currently a Toronto-based duo comprised of Daniela Gesundheit (Bruce Peninsula) and Dan Goldman, the line-up of Snowblink past has been known to expand to include other extended-community members — MGMT, Nat Baldwin (Dirty Projectors), Frank Lyon (Keepaway), Caley Monahon-Ward (Extra Life), and fellow Fire artist Ryan Driver among them.

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Sunday, February 06, 2011

SISTER CRAYON

ARTIST / BAND: SISTER CRAYON

MP3: I'm Still The Same Person / I'm Still The Same Person (Free The Robots remix)

ALBUM: Bellow

FILE UNDER: Indie

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), Nicholas Suhr (Drums and Percussion) and Jeffrey LaTour  (Keyboards, Synths, Guitars, etc.),  Sister Crayon has emerged as a four-piece whose emotional live performances along with their styles of ambience, hip-hop, and “hysteria” have created a stir with their EP release, “Enter Into Holy (or)ders”. With their debut LP entitled “Bellow” set to be released February 28th, 2011, Sister Crayon spreading the word of their music any and every way possible.

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Saturday, February 05, 2011

Loch Lomond

ARTIST / BAND: Loch Lomond

MP3: "Blue Lead Fences" , "Elephants & Little Girls "

ALBUM: Little Me Will Start A Storm

FILE UNDER: Experimental / Folk / Pop

LABEL: Tender Loving Empire

INFO: After a string of head-turning, critically acclaimed releases on Hush Records, Portland's Loch Lomond is bringing their unique brand of raw symphonic chamber pop to the growing Portland label/media arts collective/store/gallery, Tender Loving Empire. Responsible for recent releases from the likes of Y La Bamba, Typhoon, Jared Mees & The Grown Children and more, Loch Lomond has slated their much anticipated second full length 'Little Me Will Start A Storm' for release on Tuesday, February 22nd. The album was mixed by Adam Selzer (who has recorded all of M Ward's records), Tucker Martine (Laura Veirs, The Decemberists), and Kevin Robinson (of Viva Voce). The stunning track

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Friday, February 04, 2011

Thursday, February 03, 2011

Torpedo

torpedo

ARTIST / BAND: Torpedo

MP3: Waiting For The Fall [Single Version]

ALBUM: WE

FILE UNDER: krautpop, alternative, electronic

Waiting For The Fall [Single Version] by flagstone

INFO: Torpedo play kraut influenced electronic alternative rock/pop. The band call it Krautpop. A Swedish music blog recently described Torpedo as a mix between Miike Snow and The Knife which could be a good description. Torpedo just finished their second album "We", produced by Christoffer Berg, first single "Waiting For The Fall" is released February 14th and album April 29th.

25 years of Giant Sand

ARTIST / BAND: Giant Sand

MP3s: "Graveyard"(from Ballad Of A Thin Line Man)

            "Uneven Light Of Day"(from Storm)

            "Valley Of Rain"(from Valley of Rain) 

ALBUM: Giant Sand back catalog

FILE UNDER: IAlternative / Americana / Indie

LABEL: fire records

INFO: 2010 marked the 25th anniversary of Valley Of Rain - the debut album by Giant Sand, the ever-shifting alternative rock band overseen by "the Godfather of Alt. Country" Howe Gelb. With that in mind, the band will spend the next year celebrating in the only way they know how: with a flurry of great music! There is a special one-off show at the City Winery in New York City tomorrow, February 1st!  The newest Giant Sand album,Blurry Blue Mountain, will be released on vinyl tomorrow, as well.

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Tuesday, February 01, 2011

Mathew Sawyer And The Ghosts

ARTIST / BAND: Mathew Sawyer And The Ghosts

MP3: "Myna Birds Call"

ALBUM: How Snakes Eat

FILE UNDER: Indie, Pop

LABEL: Fire Records

INFO: If you were to make maps of the human voice, Mathew Sawyer is someone you'd balk at starting with. A vocal cartographer would have an easier ride with an X-Factor pop vocalist. The resultant sketch would be of somewhere abstract, featureless and dull. A moneybound R&B diva might lead to an Ordinance Survey Map of a smooth and well functioning future city with symmetrical civic parks and equidistant train stations. The growl of a death metal bellower would reveal itself in a landscape of Tolkienesque volcanoes, castles and dragons lairs.

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Sunday, January 30, 2011

Sun Wizard

ARTIST / BAND: Sun Wizard

MP3: World's Got A Handle

ALBUM: Positively 4th Avenue

FILE UNDER: Alternative / Grunge / Powerpop

LABEL: Light Organ

INFO: Sun Wizard are your favorite band from when you were in high school, back when the whole world was a little bigger and everything you touched was a bit more golden. You knew all the words to their songs, you bought every last one of their records, and rushed out to the record store every time their new single came on the radio. They were the soundtrack to that endless summer, and they colored your adolescent fever with the helpless optimism that everything was going to be just fine.

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Saturday, January 29, 2011

ZOEY VAN GOEY

ARTIST / BAND: ZOEY VAN GOEY

MP3: The Cake And Eating It

ALBUM: PROPELLER VERSUS WINGS

FILE UNDER: Experimental / Other / Pop

LABEL: CHEMIKAL UNDERGROUND

INFO: Zoey Van Goey are an indie pop band from Glasgow, Scotland, made up of Matt Brennan, Michael John McCarthy, Kim Moore and Adam Scott. Brennan, McCarthy and Moore, hailing from Canada, Ireland and England respectively, formed the initial trio in Glasgow in 2006, with Scott becoming a fully-fledged member in 2010.

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Friday, January 28, 2011

Jeniferever

ARTIST / BAND: Jeniferever

MP3: Waifs And Strays

ALBUM: Silesia

FILE UNDER: Alternative / Gothic

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.

read more from the source...

Jeniferever 'Waifs & Strays' by Monotreme Records

Saturday, January 22, 2011

Nightlands Drops

ARTIST / BAND:  Nightlands Drops

MP3s: "Suzerain (A Letter to the Judge)" / "300 Clouds"

ALBUM: Forget The Mantra

FILE UNDER: Indie

LABEL: secretly canadian

INFO: Nightlands is the recording project of Philadelphia-based multi-instrumentalist Dave Hartley. The music he creates in his bedroom is itself a bed of delicate, chiming strings and bubbling synths beneath a blanket of choral vocal arrangements. It's dreamy in the literal sense -- the seeds for the album were sown when Hartley began archiving musical ideas that occurred in his sleep with a simple bedside tape recorder. As a result his debut album Forget the Mantra is, in essence, a field recording of Hartley's dreams -- a travel journal through pop music and a collection of psych-hymns from the first human lunar colony. The songs sound both huge and intimate, breathy and cavernous like massive echoes of a faraway concert. It's the big, shadow music from just across the lake.

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Friday, January 21, 2011

All Tiny Creatures

ARTIST / BAND: All Tiny Creatures

MP3: An Iris

ALBUM: Harbors

FILE UNDER: Electroacoustic / Minimalist / Rock

LABEL: Hometapes

INFO: Stacked melodies, distorted organs, stretched chords, reimagined vocals: Collections of Colonies of Bees/ Volcano Choir multi-instrumentalist Thomas Wincek drops his Emotional Joystick handle for the glorious themes of All Tiny Creatures. ATC's debut release is Segni, a vinyl-only document of four engrossing instrumentals that kindle the fire of something-like-Krautrock through the lens of both rigid methodolgy and a wholehearted embrace of rhythm and its unpredictable results.

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All Tiny Creatures - An Iris Mixtape SIDE A

All Tiny Creatures - An Iris Mixtape SIDE B

Thursday, January 20, 2011

Modern Skirts


ARTIST / BAND: Modern Skirts
SONG (MP3): "DUI" / Modern Skirts -- "Rebecca St. Claire" / "Happy 81" / "Bumper Car"
ALBUM: Happy 81
FILE UNDER: Alternative / Indie / Pop
LABEL: s/r
INFO: Modern SkirtsHappy 81 EP marks a stark contrast to their previous records. The band flexed its pop muscle on the debut record, Catalogue of Generous Men, and their sophomore effort, All Of Us In Our Night, found the band starting to push its own boundaries.  The Happy 81 EP and the forthcoming full length record (tentatively scheduled for a November 9th release date) both have their origins in singer Jay Gulley’s bedroom four track cassette recordings. Through the years, while Modern Skirts was touring and recording their studio albums, hundreds of cassette demos were being recorded in the off time. These songs were purely for enjoyment, never to be heard by anyone outside of the band. This is a rare treat.  A peak into the fetal stages of many of the songs that will see their finished versions on the soon to be released full length. read more from the source...

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Echo Lake

ARTIST / BAND: Echo Lake

MP3: "In Dreams" / "Young Silence"

ALBUM: Young Silence

FILE UNDER: Ambient / Pop / Psychedelic

LABEL: No Pain In Pop

INFO: In the summer of 2010, Thom Hill met Linda Jarvis while studying at Camberwell Art College in South London. The two instantly connected after discovering the ex-choir girl's voice perfectly complemented the tracks Thom had been crafting in his bedroom, and they decided to work on a new project together, which would come to be known as Echo Lake.

Matching driving rhythms with ethereal, gorgeous melodies, Echo Lake is an arresting take on the droney side of psychedelia's pop frontier. The band's demos were quickly discovered by indie label and blog No Pain In Pop, who signed the band and posted some of the songs on the blog. The tracks garnered critical praise almost immediately, and were featured on Pitchfork, Gorilla vs Bear and The Fader. 

The songwriting duo decided to take a bit of time off from school to record and put together a band with some friends from Thom's hometown of Birmingham. Keen to avoid the stigma often attached to bedroom projects' live performance, they shed the backing tracks the recordings were based on and replaced with a tight, loud set up for shows.

Echo Lake's debut EP, Young Silence, is set to be released via No Pain In Popon February 14 (UK) and February 15 (US). Recalling a pre-Sub Pop Beach House crossed with a more raw side of My Bloody Valentine, it's as bold and complete of a statement as you can expect from a band so young. 

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Monday, January 10, 2011

John Blaze

Sleeping In The Aviary

ARTIST / BAND: SLEEPING IN THE AVIARY

MP3: Sleeping In The Aviary -- "You Don't Have To Drive" / Sleeping In The Aviary - "Y.M.C.A. (No, Not That One)"

ALBUM: Great Vacation!

FILE UNDER: Rock / Classic Rock / Comedy

LABEL: Science Of Sound

INFO:

The lineup of Kozel, Phil Mahlstadt (bass), and Michael Sienkowski (drums) churned out their debut album, Oh, This Old Thing? in 2007. The disc's intense bursts of lo-fi pop-punk drew comparisons to The Thermals, Buzzcocks, Violent Femmes and Nirvana.  Then another side of the band’s musical personality was captured on SITA’s sophomore album from 2008.  Expensive Vomit in a Cheap Hotel was a move towards indie-folk heralded by the addition of fourth member, Celeste Heule, on accordion and musical saw.  Kozel switched from electric to acoustic guitar for many of the songs, and also found himself screaming just a little less, exposing more of a tender side. This album cued comparisons to artists such as Neutral Milk Hotel, Bright Eyes, Baptist Generals and even Bob Dylan.
For 2010, Great Vacation once again finds the band in fresh musical territory, and also with a newly-added fifth member; Kyle Sobczak on guitar.  Layers of backup vocals (including multiple tracks of gargling, which Kozel describes as “the new reverb”) and additional instruments such as harp, trumpet, banjo and mouth harp accompany stories of scuba diving, sinking on a ship, space-like love, an S&M session gone awry (or did it?) and the occurrence of irony the day before one dies.  The ten songs on the album were tracked and mixed by the band themselves in their Minneapolis attic.