Check out the premiere of the video “Laredo,” the first official single from Band of Horses’ third album Infinite Arms. I’m not sure what all the blogger backlash is about, their third album isn’t bad compared to Cease To Begin. Sure Ben Bridwell’s vocals come off a little pretentious with the 70′s gold sounding doubled vocals, just a little different than what we’re use to.
Writing about these guys sure brings back memories of seeing them play in the studio.
Apologies for the lack of content, with the proliferation of music blogs since we started this site 6 years ago it was hard keeping traction with day jobs. We’ll keep at it.
London’s O.Children might be like nothing you have ever heard or seen before. Their frontman Tobi towers at 6 foot 8, but what stands out most is his booming Adams Family Lurch-esque vocals. O.Children’s heavy sound can be categorized as a post-punkish, psychedelic shoegaze that will make your insides feel like they’re being grinded to pieces inside out. You’ll hear serious nods to the likes of Bauhaus, Sisters Of Mercy, Joy Division and of course Nick Cave (who wrote the song the band took as their name). I’ve been listening to their demo CD for the past year and wonder how a little clean studio time will effect their sound. I hope not much.
Their self-titled debut full length ‘O.Children’ will be available digitally on July 12th on iTunes and physical copies here.
Vice’s Motherboard has a cool video of synth pop legend Vince Clarke. His digital and analogue synthesizer studio in the woods of Maine will make you go ‘whoa’. Who knew the founder of Depeche Mode, Yazoo and Erasure ended up in America.
In other news if you are wondering; his musical partner Andy Bell from Erasure will release his second solo album, Non Stop, on May 25 via Mute Records.
Virtual music crock potters Gorillaz takeover the UK’s Guardian as only the likes of U2′s marketing team could have conjured up. Their new album Plastic Beach, one of 2010 most anticipated albums, is streaming now in its entirety on the site. Former Blur frontman and Britpop king Damon Albarn as well as comic-book artist Jamie Hewlett continue their own bizarre journey into hip-hop, electronic/traditional orchestration and dub, all categorized as alternative rock since their first Gorillaz release in 2001.
What first stands out is the diverse ‘featuring’ collaborations with the likes of Mos Def, Lou Reed, Mark E. Smith, De La Soul and The Lebanese National Orchestra for Oriental Arabic Music. Their knack seems to be that there’s something here for everyone. Bobby Womack standouts on ‘Stylo’ and ‘Cloud of Unknowing’, how great would it have been to have Snoop Dogg on these tracks, but this would have been too easy for Gorillaz. The synthy chill-wavesque ‘On Melancholy Hill’ might as well be the breezy hit of the summer. Our only complaint is that Lou Reed falls flat and seems like an out of touch grandfather on ‘Some Kind of Nature’, which would have been better served with the likes of Lee Renaldo. We’re curious as to how they bring it all together live as this year’s headliner at Coachella. One thing is for sure, Snoop Dogg will be there as a collaborator on ‘Welcome to the World of the Plastic Beach’.
On first listen this is the sort of album you would play at your own party after all the pesky party crashers have left and only the cool kids are left. Time to get the party started by busting out the top shelf stuff you’ve been hiding and wait for the sun to rise.
Get Hype!!! FRICTION is back from a break with a night at new performance and art space littlefield in Brooklyn. Headlining this month’s post mid-summer classic are NYC’s The Forms with Special Guests. On the bill are Boston’s Pretty & Nice who bring their form of frenetic and danceable form of pop and punk. Just added are Fugitive Souls with their dark, guitar-based angst mixed with electronic flourishes. All the way from Long Beach, melodic post-punkers The Valley Arena open up this as usual exciting night.
Advanced tickets are available at littlefield website. Doors open at 8 PM, flyer, mp3’s, and more below.
…Pretty & Nice re-imagine the playfully manic, barbed-wire sounds of Devo, XTC, and This Year’s Model-era Elvis Costello. Their approach is so guileless and giddy, you’ll get drunk on that spazzy, sneering sound all over again. Though the rousing, delightfully messy songs on their sophomore album are neither pretty nor nice, they do show off some masterfully economical riffs and herky-jerky (if not outright dance-y) rhythms. …swells with energy and amphetamine-addled pop hooks, making it hard to ignore and near impossible not to like. [Pitchfork] [MP3]:Pretty & Nice “Tora Tora Tora”
Brooklyn’s Fugitive Souls are here to serenade you with the dark, romantic melodies on this week’s free download, “Hang On”, off their debut EP, Strangers. Singer, Mark Allen, formerly of the The Shapes, delivers an intimate, yet powerful performance akin to Muse’s Matt Bellamy. Beautiful piano chords punctuate Allen’s vocals while disco rhythms beat across the drummer’s hi-hat…[Our Stage] [MP3]:Fugitive Souls “A Secret Weighs A Ton”
Long Beach’s Valley Arena deliver a dynamic, well-crafted modern rock album—I guess you could say that their sound has evolved and grown up, but they bring enough of their old building blocks to the studio to have assemble something mostly new, yet hazily familiar. They’re able to strike that delicate balance of their noisier/more frenetic elements with newly focused song structure that lends itself well to their individual playing styles. The real brilliance on this record is found in the guitar/bass tones… [L.A. Record] [MP3]:The Valley Arena “Grayscale”
FRICTION NYC and FUCK YEAH FEST bring a little bit of the right coast, left coast, and in between to the Cake Shop for this CMJ Afterparty TONIGHT! Austin, Texas’ BEST FWENDS, along with Long Beach, California’s CRYSTAL ANTLERS, and Brooklyn’s very own NINJASONIK get hype for CMJ. Best Fwends gets shit moving at 1AM. No RSVP bullshit — just show up and GET HYPE! Free PBR while it lasts!
I didn’t even write any of this people, I put in something else earlier. Justin changed my shit up, another case of not being able to delegate and being controllingly anal. -Nghia
“BEST FWENDS’ music is a big attention-deficit-disordered smash-up of punk, early Beastie Boys and unrefined 8-bit sounds. It’s a kindred sound to those of British bands like Gay Against You and Applicants: frantic, but rooted in pop and/or rock. It’s trashy, cheap, headachy noise, but noise that a lot of love has clearly been put into.” [MP3]:“Orange Marker”
“Existing at the cross-section of so many styles, CRYSTAL ANTLERS debut EP (Touch & Go) finds the band at a more important nexus of potential and realization. In person, Crystal Antlers look like outcasts from six different bands, and at various points on this record, they sound like it, too: Merging psych, garage, lo-fi, prog, and countless other influences, the group easily maintains consistency despite a complete inability to be pinned to any specific movement or trend.” [Pitchfork, Best New Music] [MP3]:“A Thousand Eyes”
“Looking for a good time? You might want to call NINJASONIK. These Brooklyn art-hop pranksters combine spiky beats with rhymes about grabbing asses and the skinny jeans they wear…Mostly, though, people have been talking about these foul mouthed Ninjas for their debauchery fueled live shows, which has seen plenty of crowd diving and drunken punk rock antics…Whoa! Don’t say we didn’t warn you.” [Brooklyn Radio] [MP3]:“Tight Pants”
