Plenty of musical goodies to tickle your ear fancies this week! We kick off the MIXTAPE post with the much blogged about tracks from Burial, Thom Yorke, and Four Tet before moving onto some very cool bands still flying under the radar like Bass Drum of Death, Love Inks, Dirty Beaches, Moon Duo, Peaking Lights and much more! Many of the bands in this post are taking full, creative advantage of home recording and we love it! Stream the tracks below and grab the MIXTAPE podcast from these sources…iTunes, Podcast.com, and Podcast Alley. CONTINUE READING
BURIAL/THOM YORKE/FOUR TET: Now that it has happened, the collaboration between Burial, Thom Yorke, and Four Tet on their “Ego/Mirror” 12″ seems as though it should have been inevitable. Thom Yorke and Four Tet have collaborated in the past, Four Tet having provided the remix of Radiohead’s “Scatterbrain”, which appeared as the B-side to the Raidohead single “2+2=5″ in 2003, as well as opening for the band on their European tour that same year. While Four Tet’s many remixes of pop artists such as Bloc Party, The xx, and Battles, as well as ground breaking work in the electronic and folktronic genres, have earned him a crossover reputation amongst indie and altenative rock fans here in the US, Burial’s important work in dub-step is less known state-side. The real tenor of the tracks on this 12” are Burial’s low throbbing, sub-sonic bass, broken typewriter-like beats, eery synth atmospheres and strange vocal track manipulations… those key style-elements of dub-step. As a progression of the 2-step Garage scene in South East London, and Drum and Bass in general, dub step as a genre has yet to break into the general consciousness of indie rock fans in the US, but I’m willing to bet Burial’s collaboration with Mr. Yorke will change all that!
MP3: Burial/Thom Yorke/Four Tet “Ego” (Text)
MP3: Burial/Thom Yorke/Four Tet “Mirror” (Text)
BASS DRUM OF DEATH: Kick-ass, home recorded garage rock outta Mississippi from the two cats that are Bass Drum of Death on this up-coming Fat Possum release, GB City. With just a guitar, drum and production settings at 11, John Barrett recorded these songs in a series of basement apartments, and he serves up an endless supply of most tasty, southern fried, scuzz hooks. On the track “Get Found”, Barrett’s guitar makes so much noise you’d mistake it for a full band, organ included, as his vocals rip right through the noisy mix with snot and swagger. But, what are the songs about? “The songs are about drugs, trying to make it with religious girls, panic attacks, stealing stuff, mild to severe depression, Elvis appearing in your dreams and giving you advice, gravity bongs and the devil living inside your brain.” That’s nice!
MP3: Bass Drum of Death “Get Found” (Inflated Records)
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MP3: Bass Drum of Death “Heart Attack Kid” (Inflated Records)
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LOVE INKS: The folks in Love Inks didn’t have to travel far to wow the people at SXSW this year. They’re from Austin! On their debut, E.S.P., due out on May 2nd via European label Hell, Yes!, the band adhered to a simple, focused sonic pallet of guitar, bass, old drum machine, and the occasional Moog Satellite…all recorded naked and unadorned so that the song’s principal instrument, Sherry LeBlanc’s vocals, can seduce with their warm, late-night light. “Skeleton Key” delivers musical restraint and understated beauty as LeBlanc’s voice sommersaults around an amber moon. If you’re a fan of The xx or Young Marble Giants meet your new friends, Love Inks! I’m thinking May 2nd will be too long to wait to get a hold of their debut, so March 28th the band will put out the 7″ “Skeleton Key” with an unreleased song on the B-side!
MP3: Love Inks “Skeleton Key” (Hell Yes!)
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MP3: Love Inks “Blackeye” (Hell Yes!)
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MOON DUO: Wooden Shjips guitarist Ripley Johnson started Moon Duo in 2009 with fellow San Francisco musician Sanae Yamada. Initially inspired by the most righteous of jazz duos, John Coltrane and Rashied Ali, as well as awesome rock duos such as Royal Truxx, Suicide, and Silver Apples, it seems the band would have mighty huge shoes to fill. No problem! Key board and guitar soak these blazed out psych drones that roll on motorik rythms for extended jams of dark acid bliss. So many crepuscular corners to get lost in here! Cope this lysegically distilled goodness March 28th on the bands newest release Mazes coming out on Sacred Bones, and keep your eyes peeled, the bands on tour, and these ghost riders might just be coming your way!
MP3: Moon Duo “Mazes” Sacred Bones Records
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PEAKING LIGHTS: Peaking Lights is dubbed out deliciousness coming deep outta the rural woodiness of Wisconsin. The band is Aaron Coyes and Indra Dunis who also played in Rah Dunes and Numbers, but have now relocated from Cali to the midwest. Using dubbed out electronic pulses via tape loops, organ, synth, and guitar, as well as vocals that cascade in washes of birds and water, these spaced-out jams will definitely tickle the fancy of the entropically inclined. The band’s newest LP is called 936, and it’s out on Not Not Fun Records. Perfect for a technicolor bike ride through your head!
MP3: Peaking Lights “Tiger Eyes (Laid Back)” Not Not Fun Records
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MP3: Peaking Lights “Key Sparrow” Not Not Fun Records
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CRAFT SPELLS: After releasing several 7″s, Craft Spells will be putting out their first full-length, Idle Labor on Captured Tracks this March 29th. And, with dates at SXSW earlier this month, the band has kicked off on a US tour with Beach Fossils. Super sweet 80’s synth pop, very dreamy and stripped down to bedroom simplicity on “The Fog Rose High”, with Justin Paul Vallesteros’ plaintive vocals piling on cloudy layers of longing and regret. The new romantics, same as the old romantics!
MP3: Craft Spells “The Fog Rose High” (Captured Tracks)
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MP3: Craft Spells “You Should Close the Door” (Captured Tracks)
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DIRTY BEACHES: Alex Zhang Hungtai’s project Dirty Beaches outstanding new release, Badlands, will be coming out March 29th via Insound. So many musical references are touched on in Hungtai’s work, but the prevailing vibe is lo-fi with riveting drum and guitar loops stretching out like hours of highway, while Hungtai’s molasses croon conjures up spectral road figures like Alan Vega’s Ghost Rider or the Stagger Lee of Nick Cave’s Murder Ballads. Hungtai, weaves his personal and family mythos throughout his work in interesting ways, referencing his Taiwanese father who was a musician and greaser in the 60’s, as well as his own nomadic journeys that have taken him from Taiwan to Montreal. On Badlands, open road down old highways and transgressions of the psyche abound!
MP3: Dirty Beaches “Golden Desert Sun” (Zoo Music)
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MP3: Dirty Beaches “Shang-ri-la” Zoo Records
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DIGNAN PORCH: Dignan Porch‘s tune “Yards” has been stuck on play this week. Sunny and kinda sad all at the same time, these lyrics come out of a fuzzy little can, “I watched you sunnin’ on my lawn/from a hundred yards, I’m still in love/I left the light on in my room/letting you know I’m waiting patiently//C’mon take a piece of my/C’mon get a piece of me/uh-huh, steal a piece of me/just leave me whole/c’mon get a piece of me.” Dignan Porch would also like you to know that they are functioning alcoholics, and in a world of losers that’s good to know.
MP3: Dignan Porch “Yards” (Captured Tracks)
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MP3: Dignan Porch “Surge” (Captured Tracks)
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WIDOWSPEAK: On “Burnout” Molly Hamilton’s vocals move between a boozy warble and Chan Marshall dreaminess as she stumbles out of sleep into the early morning. All kinds of delicious laziness as the singer purrs us back into repose, “it can wait/everything else can wait”. This Brooklyn, by way of Chicago/Tacoma three piece, with Molly Hamilton on vocals/guitar, Michael Stasiak on drums, and Rob Thomas on guitar, delivers dark tinged pop with nods to the 90’s via Mazzy Star, The Cranberries, and Cat Power. The band has a 7″, Harsh Realm out now on Captured Tracks, and is planning a full-length. Ah, remember those hot, long days, sleeping in late with your lover, no sheets. Now, weren’t those the days!
MP3: Widowspeak “Burn Out (Tape Final)” (Captured Tracks)
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BELONG: We sure did love the astral travel inducing album October Language from Belong, with it’s great song titles like “Who Told You This Room Exists?” and “The Door Opens the Other Way”. Well, it’s been five years since that one, and on his newest, Common Era, the artist adds drum machine and vocals to his hazy, reverb and echo drenched instrumentals. The result is that a far-out strand of consciousness actually emerges from the white fog of October Language, a ghost like voice crooning from some lost goth transmission, while the drum beats familiar, faded memories. Very beautiful and for floating around. Belong is a duo from New Orleans. Their newest is out on Kranky!
MP3: Belong “Never Came Close” (Kranky)
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BLOUSE: Super-sexy creep vibe on this little chill-wave number, “Into Black” by Blouse. Very well crafted stuff here from the Portland trio of Charlie Hinton, Jacob Portrait, and Patrick Adams on the “Into Black/Firestarter” 7″, out now on Captured Tracks. Hey, and while you’re at it, check out their way cool video for this track put together by Ben Razavi and Bernard Pantoja of Wooden Lens using snippets of footage from Léos Carax’s 1991 film Les Amants du Pont-Neuf.
MP3: Blouse “Into Black” (Captured Tracks)
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MP3: Blouse “Firestarter” (Captured Tracks)
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MUSHY: Fit for ritualized forays deep into the sub-conscious, Mushy‘s full-length Faded Heart is unrepentently noir in it’s 80’s dark-wave adorations. Mushy is Valentina F., a Rome based artist, who uses heavily effected vocals, analog synth and found objects like a four string flea market guitar to conjure murder mysteries of the soul. Home recorded, the album was later mixed and processed at Mannequin Studio by Alessandro Adriani with a full analog setup. Think very dark Cocteau Twins or Hope Sandoval. Of her music she says,”You can consider it as my personal second reading of blues music”. Black and blues!
MP3: Mushy “Losing Days” (Mannequin)
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MP3: Mushy “Burn Me” (Mannequin)
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