Here are the best of our January posts together with a few tasty new tracks. All in all nearly forty great tunes compiled and neatly presented in one lovely mix. As always, don't forget to check out all our previous monthly mixes listed in the sidebar on the left. Download Night Genes – Soaring Through The Chromosomes mp3 (from Like The Blood) Infectiously catchy, military folk stomp. A real gem. Download Cheyenne Marie Mize – Wishing Well mp3 (from We Don't Need EP) A mix of r&b tinged staccato vocals [...]
As is often their wont, Mojo magazine have produced another fine cover disc this month, with a tribute to Leonard Cohen's masterpiece of a debut The Songs Of Leonard Cohen plus a 'bonus' of five extra classic tracks from his back catalogue. The array of artists is mightily impressive from acclaimed new soul artist Michael Kiwanuka to Cass McCombs, Field Music and J Tillman recording under the name Father John Misty . The bonus tracks include Dan Michaelson, Diagrams and My Brightest [...]
The Chieftains , the legendary Irish folk group, have hit their active 50th anniversary. Let that sink in. The Chieftains are now 50 years old. And while the band members continually changed over time, which isn't that strange given the circumstances, sticking together in any form for that long is a certain testament to resilience. To celebrate the achievement, the group is planning to release Voice of Ages ; a compilation effort which includes help from Bon Iver 's Justin Vernon, The Decemberists , The Low Anthem , and more. Listen to [...]
Filed under: Video of the Day Artist: Firehorse Video: 'Charlie Darwin (The Low Anthem Cover)' Highlight: "Having done work with charities that aid Africa before, I was drawn to and deeply touched by what the Voice Project does," singer-songwriter Leah Siegel tells Spinner. "'Charlie Darwin' is an incredibly emotive and expressive song but also has a simple melody. I felt I could give my own personal take on it while keeping those important elements intact." [...]
Firehorse frontwoman Leah Siegel somehow gets even more delicate than The Low Anthem with her somber take on their song 'Charlie Darwin.'
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So, as the New Year approaches, here are our favourite albums of 2011 for your consideration. Feel free to dispute, argue, or otherwise put us right because, if nothing else, music is as about as subjective topic as it is possible to get. Some of these may not be the "best" albums of the year as far as the critics are concerned, but that matters not, as they were the ones we enjoyed listening to most - give them a try, you might feel the same. 50 Jessica Lea Mayfield [...]
01.Easter - Somethin' American This might be the first time such an unknown song by such an unknown band has ever been given top spot on any of my end of year lists, but they were absolutely brilliant live when they played up here in September, and this song is just fantastic, as are the other two songs on their Soundcloud page. It's less lo-fi than a lot of the DIY stuff I've listened to this year, and the squalling solos which tease Easter's songs to an end evoke loads of old school US indie music. This gives quite [...]
20. Hey Rosetta! – Seeds Lush strings, crunchy guitars and anthemic crescendos propel this ambitious and addictive collection of songs from underrated Canadian indie-popsters. Hey Rosetta - Yer Spring [...]
11. William Elliot Whitmore-Field Songs : Songs about working and struggling and grasping to the only piece of fucking dirt that yours and some SOB trying to cheat you out of it. Thanks WEW. I'm taking bullshit handyman work over the winter just so I can afford to eat Burger King and drink a couple of Miller High Lifes every once in a while, so I'm a disciple of these songs. I wonder what the farmers in Iowa do in the wintertime to survive. Is the suicide rate higher then? He's singing about [...]
Here's the first installment of the Song, by Toad Festive Fifty for 2011 - a collection of the fifty songs I have been enjoying the most this year. The fifty themselves and the precise order can hardly be described as definitive of course, because you know how fluid things like 'favourite' songs can be, but roughly speaking this is the stuff I have been enjoying the most in 2011. Just as a note, in order to make it a broader representation of the bands I've liked the most, I have made it harder and harder for bands to [...]
Here we are at the penultimate podcast of the year, and the one immediately preceding Christmas. I really don't like 99% of Christmas music so there's pretty close to none of it at all on here, although I have made a couple of exceptions as a lazy sort of nod to the season. Let's face it, if the druids can be arsed dancing about like idiots around Stonehenge and people can fall out over half-defrosted turkeys then I can probably make the effort to shove a couple of token musical nods onto a single podcast, can't I. I [...]
Scottish Kate is a great friend of this blog and has often offered her (sometimes pithy) opinions on the world of music - and very good taste she has too. She also runs the always excellent (sometimes pithy), and often provocative blog A Burdz Eye View for all things Scottish (of course), political and musical. Here are her aural selections for 2011. The Burd's Best Songs of 2011 Well it doesn't get any easier. Though given that all my old schticks are in here aplenty [...]
My friends over at The Voice Project sent over this beautiful new video of Firehorse covering The Low Anthem's, "Charlie Darwin" for an FWBA exclusive. Here's a blurb from Anna Gabriel (TVP Co-founder) about the experience: I tried to find the place in Williamsburg for ages as I had gotten the wrong address, which was actually a construction site, and by the third time I passed the builders were my new friends trying to point me in the right direction. I finally got to this amazing studio/office space where her [...]
A few days ago I wrote a post about a track called Boeing 737 by The Low Anthem. In the lyrics of that song The Low Anthem intertwines the tragedy of the World Trade Center terrorist attack with hanging out in a bar with Philippe Petit (the man who strung a high wire between the twin towers). In that track there is a certain beauty found in what is ultimately a melancholy and utterly tragic experience. It takes a unique talent to capture the bittersweet emotions of certain events and forge from that fire something beautiful and worthy. [...]
In korte tijd heeft The Low Anthem in ons land een flinke reputatie opgebouwd. Concerten van de band worden goedbezocht en de CD's kunnen rekenen op positieve aandacht. Dat doet de band uit Providence, Rhode Island goed. Een van de mensen die het geluid van The Low Anthem bepaalt is Jocie Adams . Jocie zingt en bespeelt een heel spectrum aan instrumenten. Eerder dit jaar bracht Jocie een soloalbum uit met de titel Bed of Notions. Elf sterke songs vormen een mooie showcase voor de prachtige vocalen van Jocie. Jocie zet een prachtig geluid neer met onder [...]
Over the past few weeks, in between listening to appropriate Christmas music*, I have been working my way through various Best of 2011 lists. One album that has popped up on a few lists has been the most recent work from The Low Anthem entitled Smart Flesh ( amazon ) ( itunes ). For various reasons I can't really recommend the entire album. It's too, well, slow for my taste. And it veers unnervingly close to pure country at times. Even though I couldn't bring myself to love the entire album there is one track that [...]
A far liste non sono capace ma più o meno ci siamo, 15 dischi + 1 dove i primi sono i migliori e gli altri solo belloni. Essendo io un emotivo è tutto molto soggettivo e ricco di doveri morali, poi sarei anche pieno di mancanze e i dischi migliori li ascolterò l'anno prossimo ma che importa, mica siamo qua a fare Pitchfork. (Se cliccate sulle immagini ci stanno le canzoni preferite) The Low Anthem | Smart Flesh Feist | The Metals [...]
In an age of the disposable pop star, and blog buzz bands that seem to fizzle out as quickly as they rise to prominence, The Chieftains are the rare model of both consistency and longevity. The traditional Irish folk act, who have been putting out albums since the early 1906s, will celebrate their 50th anniversary in 2012 with a new studio album and a lengthy world tour. On February 21, the band will release Voice Of Ages , which will see the legendary act collaborating with an impressive roster of musicians from the worlds of [...]
I've been trying to decide if I should review this album for months. I love it but I wasn't sure how it would mesh with some of the other stuff on Nine Bullets. Then I saw them live and decided I didn't give a damn if Smart Flesh was too artsy, experimental, or abstract. The Low Anthem has more talent than any band I've ever seen. The melodies on Smart Flesh and Ben's vocal delivery are so infectious and unique I have no idea who to compare it too. Then [...]
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American Idol Finalists: where are they now?
