Lately there have been so many vintage pop bands appearing in a magical burst of shiny melodies, but they often fade away just as quickly. Free Energy's new tune “Dream City” will hook you with the handclaps, the na-na-na's, but most of all, the singer with the rockabilly punk voice that's uncharacteristically calm and smooth. They've just caught the eye of DFA Records and they're working on their debut album, so let's hope they stick around awhile.
Before the weekend I showed you the retro musical-styled video for Martin Solveig's hot new single, “Boys & Girls”, featuring Dragonette and filmed in the Paris mansion of fashion designer Jean Paul Gaultier for his latest scent, Ma Dame.
As I hinted in Friday's article, I've just received the official MP3 of “Boys & Girls”. This is not the YouTube rip posted recently on other blogs, and it's a bit different from the video version.
Last February, O. Children played a stunning showcase attended by Deadly People, who signed them the next day. Their upcoming single “Dead Disco Dancer” is a haunting, resonant song laden with acidic guitars and deep, heavy vocals.
O. Children's sound is dominated by their singer, who is gifted with an incomparable baritone voice. The instrumentation is dark, murky and post-psychedelic. The band takes their name from a Nick Cave song, but even a comparison to the legendary musician can scarcely depict the transcendant sound of O. Children.
The single releases in July on Deadly People. Here is the music video, but click the link below to see it in HD.
Ma Dame is the latest addition to Jean-Paul Gaultier's famous line of perfumes. The French fashion designer is promoting his new fragrance with a music video, shot in his own home—a brand new track by Martin Solveig and Dragonette.
We don't know whether this song will ever be made available for sale, but it may be available for free in the future. We'll keep you updated. In the meantime, here's the video and some great remixes of Martin Solveig's and Dragonette's most recent singles.
He was the King of Pop, one of the greatest and most influential entertainers to set foot on our Earth. His god-like status was smashed to pieces in the last decade over his personal issues, but that doesn't change the impression he left on the world of music. Many superstars have had the limelight scorch them over their personal problems and shortcomings but I don't believe that it can undermine the immortality of their accomplishments.
Rest in peace, Michael Jackson. Popular music will never be the same, since you've come and gone.
Here's my favourite Michael Jackson remix, released by Hi_Tack in 2005.
La Roux's debut hits stores this Monday the 29th, marking the second breakthrough female-fronted electro album of the summer. This weekend they take the stage at Glastonbury, then comes a tour of festivals and venues throughout North America and Europe for the rest of the summer.
They've had a few big singles already, but the album isn't tapped out yet. The next single will likely be “Tigerlily”, which somehow sounds like their previous single “In for the Kill”, but flipped with a massive drum track and the kind of beat that can summon the power of dance to take over anyone within aural proximity.
Creepy and entrancing, Sarahjane Swan's new single “Ghost” features her abrasive, blustery vocals over gothic guitars and industrial synths and percussion. Her peculiar blend of gothic music with pop is not easy to describe—perhaps try to imagine an early 90s Siouxsie Sioux/Trent Reznor collaboration. The single is out now on Shark Batter Records.
UK twee-folk band Slow Club releases their new single It Doesn't Have to Be Beautiful today on Moshi Moshi Records. It's a cute duet, with fast drums and twangly guitar, that will get stuck in your ear like a tickly bug. The album Yeah So releases July 6.
Five years after The Temptations released “I Wish It Would Rain”, a then and now unknown female soul group, The Cougars, released their own rendition. Trading the sad but unsuitable piano for a dreary organ and guitar, a reluctantly gloomy brass section and vocals considerably more passionate than the original Temptations song.
Disco punk, the psychotic subgenre that hardly resembles disco or punk, is still awaiting its chance to dominate the galaxy. High Voltage Humans, Germany's answer to Russia's Cheese People, are another step in the cosmic escalator of electrochrome and symphonic lasers that adorn the path to the top of the world, where electro lounges in a golden armchair.
The explosive duo sparks a supersonic collision in “Laser Symphony (Catastrophe)”, a lightspeed joyride of bass-crunching, guitar-grinding discomania.
Excepting a few incidental collaborations, this daily blog has never featured the same artist twice, but this song is just too good to pass on the chance to show it to you. After their introductory mixtape last winter, Radioclit and Esau Mwamwaya, aka The Very Best, have tentatively scheduled their full-length debut Warm Heart of Africa to release in autumn.
The title track, “Warm Heart of Africa” features Mwamwaya and Vampire Weekend's Ezra Koenig in a sunbaked, sand-dancing track that feels like sweltering sunshine, captured and gently shoved into my ears. This is the first taste of what is sure to be a monumental album of African pop music.
The Wailing Wall's “Sister, I”, from their brand new debut, is a graceful folk ballad that sounds like it leapt straight out of an ancient sylvan storybook. Multi-instrumentalist and singer Jesse Rifkin takes the position of vocalist and virtuoso, over twinkling keys, steady strumming and the gentle wind of accordion and bells. The season of folk music is fast approaching and this is miles beyond any other folk songs I've heard this year.
The album, Hospital Blossoms, is out now on JDub Records, who are offering it exclusively as a free download.
Das Racist. The name just begs for weird looks and the occasional misunderstanding. Oddly, the music does too.
Imagine a rap song where the emcees rap about being at Pizza Hut and Taco Bell and the lyrics barely extend beyond the song title. Now imagine that the song is actually good, maybe even brilliant—you can't, right? Well, you'll just have to trust me and listen to it.
The duo raps over a grimey drum track that sounds like classic L.A. Symphony, while the Wallpaper remix gives them a club beat with horns, guitars and electro synths. I can't decide which version I love more—can you?
Props to The Burning Ear for turning me on to this crazy song.
UPDATE Das Racist's full-length debut drops in August!
Victoria Hesketh, aka Little Boots, floated casually across the radar of many music fans and critics during the past year, usually mentioned among the ranks of rising British popstars like La Roux, Marina & the Diamonds and Florence & the Machine. Little Boots is the first among them to release her full-length, and it seems that she's swiftly surpassing the reputations of the others.
When I first heard Little Boots, I loved “Meddle”, but her other single at the time, “Stuck on Repeat”, sounded like a Madonna/Timbaland reject and her more recent “New in Town” was mediocre at best. Truthfully, I was far more excited for the upcoming albums by Marina, Florence and the lovely French girl with the gingerswoop. Low expectations aren't always bad.
From start to finish, Hands sounds smoother than its preceding singles and EPs. The tone of “New in Town” is warmer and, although the structure of the song is the same, it's gone from mildly unpleasant to well-deserving of it's track 1 placement.
The reworked “Stuck on Repeat” is shortened by half and no longer sounds like it's...stuck on repeat. The song that hooked me the first time I heard Little Boots, “Meddle”, is mostly unchanged, with a few tweaks that give it a more polished sound.
After going over the songs I already knew and finding shocking improvements, I listened to the rest of the album. It turns out, Little Boots not only renewed the singles that led up to her album, but has even more single potential. The electro hip-hop beat of “Remedy” is sure to bring her comparisons to Madonna's last album, but really, most of that album was shallow and pale next to the inspired wonder of Little Boots.
My new favourite, “Symmetry” is a spacey synthpop duet that matches Little Boots with Philip Oakey of The Human League. At four and a half minutes, it's the longest song on the album, fitting for an dark, glimmering dancefloor track that has many years of club potential.
Overall, the album plays like Ladyhawke's debut—there are a few radio-friendly songs that will catch your ear, but this is an album to listen to as a whole. Many of the songs are exceptional on their own, but together, the album is phenomenal.
French Horn Rebellion collaborates with Database and Hey Champ on “Beaches and Friends”, a warm summer groove that flawlessly replicates the classic disco funk sound of Gibson Brothers or Kool and the Gang. Polish your platforms and flaunt your flares. The dancefloor is waxed and ready for slow-motion moves.
I only write about songs that I love and my tastes reach far beyond popular blog fodder, so I often feature songs that are superlatives of fringe genres or are just exceptionally unique. So, instead of a warm summer tune for this Sunday afternoon, I have a song for you that utterly exemplifies a genre I have never covered.
It's not easy to bridge the gap between a regular, average music listener and an extreme genre like neoclassical symphonic metal. Saviour Machine's “A World Alone” is a dramatic composition that, despite the deviant genre, breaks down to a magnificently orchestrated tale of a present-day apocalypse. The elements of the song are minimal but you won't notice it behind the blinding intensity and the immense voice foretelling an epic tragedy.
Saviour Machine - A World Alone Download MP3(YSI) or Watch the concert clip below
Spirits from the underground ruins of Egypt, Rainbow Arabia take up arms and ravage a grocery store in their newest video for “Omar K”. Violent and seductive, this is one of the most astonishing music videos ever filmed.
Here are the song and its remix by Max Justus, both free downloads, and the stunning video. Rainbow Arabia's The Basta EP is out now on Manimal Vinyl Records.
Funky-fresh producer from Brooklyn, Nickodemus draws his inspiration from the big fireball in the sky and dancing people around the world. The first free taste he's given us of his sophomore album is “Sun Children”, a jazzy boom-bap hip-hop track with a guest list of rappers that remind me of Chali 2na and Gift of Gab.
Nickodemus' sophomore album Sun People releases June 16.
SOUNDS LIKE Jurassic 5, Blackalicious, Lateef the Truthspeaker, The Pharcyde
Y.A.S. is a groundbreaking new duo, fusing the French electro of Mirwais Ahmadzaï with the Arabic vocal stylings of Yasmine Hamdan. As is the case with any Arabic music, it sounds strange and exotic to my Anglo-ears, and I love it. Felix Da Housecat's remix of “Get It Right” simply builds on the original, adding more grinding electrosynths and giving it more of a club feel.
Y.A.S's debut full-length is out now, but Universal has excluded the world outside of France from purchasing it. For the rest of the world, piracy is the only convenient option Universal has left us. I won't provide any such links, though regional restrictions provoke me like nothing else.
Norwegian electronic band Flunk's new album This Is What You Get has no confines, mixing up downtempo, chillout, ambient and minimalist dubstep. The pop side of the album drifts all the way to acoustic folk with “Cigarette Burns”, an out of place but ear-lickingly delicious tune where singer Anja Øyen Vister's Nordic accent naturally turns to twee.
The album is out now on Beatservice Records. It also includes a superb cover of Radiohead's “Karma Police”.
Really, you could have guessed all that from their photo above. Enjoy the guilty pleasure of Weekend Warriors' “Take Me to LA” from their new self-titled album.
Indie dream rock band The Ropes have just released their second EP of new material since their debut full-length last year. The title track of Clubs in Europe Forever waxes faux-philosophical about their astral tunes playing in clubs for as long as there is war, youth, fear and terror. The soft synths and reverberating guitar riffs are just enough to dress up the slightly cheesy lyrics into a beautiful song.
Jeff Hanson, folk singer/songwriter and the first artist signed to prominent indie label Kill Rock Stars, died on Friday, victim of a tragic accident in his home. Before hearing the news, I had not heard his music but it caught my attention immediately. His incomparable style of twangly instrumentation with his peculiar soprano voice will continue to astonish fans and newcomers alike for the rest of his regrettably posthumous career.
Have a listen to “If I Only Knew”, a great song from his last album Madam Owl, released last autumn.
The Mummers are an orchestral pop band from Brighton who sound like the beautiful music of a classic animated film soundtrack. They're offering their fantastic song “Wonderland” as a free download in a persuasive ploy to sell their new album Tale to Tell to you.
George Michael meets Daft Punk. Two random well-known names assembled together is a popular and easy way for a band to describe itself, but in this case Seb's ambitious description is surprisingly accurate. As most people are aware, George and those French robot guys are universally considered awesome, so you'll want to check this one out.
Here's Seb's massive new single, its music video and a remix by Stockholm Syndrome. The News for You single releases June 15 on Ferocious Dance via Amazon MP3 and iTunes.
Golden Silvers, a sparkly new UK pop band, released their debut True Romance in April and have since been given well-deserved attention from Radio 1. “Arrows of Eros” is one of the best from the album, a tale-telling number with 60s-sounding backup singers and a glittering synth.
The Arrows of Eros single releases June 15 on XL, and the album is available now at the shops listed below. Here is The Shoes' remix of “Arrows of Eros”, psychotically delicious as usual, plus the music video for the original version.
Portland's dirty indie pop duo YACHT seem to have a fetish for mud and triangles. Jona Bechtolt and Claire L. Evans, paper bag prince and princess, have a gift for magical melodies and charming idiosyncrasy.
Here's their newest song, “Psychic City”, a fantastic reminiscence of their dreamlike past lives. Their new full-length See Mystery Lights releases July 28 on DFA.
BUY THE ALBUM YACHT's previous releases are available from most major and independent music stores, but See Mystery Lights is not available to pre-order yet.
Floating Action is a dub reggae band from the early 70s with a heavy Motown blues and soul influence. The only facts that make that statement questionable are the young white American male on lead vocals and the band's 2009 debut.
After two solo albums, Seth Kauffman formed Floating Action, whose self-titled debut released in April. The album is an island pleasure, with a vintage Caribbean sound. Kauffman doesn't try to imitate a 70s black singing voice, sticking with his authentic 00s singer-songwriter voice, but the band does their part perfectly, and somehow it works.
The self-titled debut is out now on Park the Van Records. A vinyl LP of the album and the first single are expected in July.
Detroit indie band The Silent Years have a distinct lo-fi melodic sound that chimes and sways with beautiful simplicity. The highlight of their new Let Go EP is the dreamy sound of “Madame Shocking”, a jangly ballad that rides smoothly like the last cresting wave before a calm coastal evening.
The Let Go EP is available for download now and releases physically July 14 on SideCho Records.
