MP3: 1939 Ensemble - "Sabotage" Somewhere between post-punk, '60s lounge pop, and jazz sits 1939 Ensemble, the instrumental Portland-based duo of Jose Medeles (The Breeders) and David Coniglio. With nothing more than a drum kit, vibraphone, and some noise, this ensemble crafts music that's immediate and spacey. It's bold without pretense, sounding organic and experimental. "Sabotage" is the first single from the group's debut album, Howl & Bite , out April 16th on Jealous Butcher Recordings. 1939 Ensemble Official [...]
Oakland producer/musician Glenn Jackson has made a name for himself in the house/dance scene over the past few years with James & Evander, Benefits, and Hoodcats. But now the co-founder of the West in Dust label is stepping out on his own with the release of his solo debut, the Morning Swim EP (Ceremony). The 3-song extended player was released yesterday and highlights Jackson's ability to invoke a sweeping range of moods and imagery through a varied, but unified, sample-meets-synth heavy mix. It fits somewhere between the ethereal and the earthly. [...]
Back at the start of 2011, a 62 year-old soul singer by the name of Charles Bradley (aka "The Screaming Eagle of Soul") released his debut album. And while that sounds like a dream for one man, it was more of a blessing for the rest of the world. Bradley wasn't just another singer with the hope of making it in music, he debuted as an overlooked, under-appreciated legend of classic soul and R&B. The praise and success that followed that release was most definitely deserved, and it proved Charles Bradley was a classic long before the world [...]
Photo by James Thomas Marsh Local electronic duo Matmos (Drew Daniel and M.C. Schmidt) will release their first new full length in five years, The Marriage of True Minds , on February 19th through Thrill Jockey. Like most things in life, Matmos have been right under my nose for a while, but I am just now discovering their work. It's almost fair to say missing Matmos was like being completely unaware of Old Bay or Berger Cookies , something that shouldn't be possible if you live in the state of [...]
Photo by Emily Denton MP3: Pony Time - "What If You Caught Me" MP3: Pony Time - "Because I Care" Lately, jadedness seems to smother everything. Nothing is stimulating, everything has started to feel rather monotonous. It's not that life has become predictable, but it feels like it's dominated by a sense of complacency. It all just seems so stagnant. Only a wrecking ball of epic proportions could crack this all apart. [...]
A great many bands in the '60s flirted with the loose, experimental freedom of psychedelia, which more often than not sounded like a lens for their sound rather than a deeply rooted influence. For those band's of the era that skirted the periphery of psych, the music ended up having a sort of understated freedom without drifting too far off into the ether. Take for example a band like Tucson's The Resonars, who possess the aforementioned feel, but wrap it all in the tight, charming pep of power pop -- somewhere between Big Star and 13th Floor Elevators. Though, it [...]
Yeah Yeah Yeahs return April 16th with Mosquito , the follow-up to their excellent 2009 full-length It's Blitz . If you're wondering what the album cover is, it's what you see above. How cool is that? How weirdly awesome is that? But man, April's pretty far away. So, thankfully we have this trippy '90s-esque album trailer to bite us. Get it? Because the album's called Mosquito ? Eh? Eh? Yeah, I'm not impressing me either.
Lapalux, aka 25 year old London-based electronic/IDM musician Stuart Howard, will release his debut album, Nostalchic , on March 26th via Brainfeeder. For a look into Howard's trippy, hip hop-leaning work, check out Nostalchic 's "Guuurl" below. An almost psychedelic R&B type of sound that's both seductive and eerie all at once, which only seems to amplify its mysterious collage of elements. Nostalchic Tracklist IAMSYS (Tape Intro) Guuurl Kelly Brook One Thing (ft. Jenna Andrews) Flower Swallowing [...]
For the first post of 2013, it seems only fitting that I start the year talking about an overlooked record from 2012. Enter Bogota, Colombia quartet Bomba Estéreo and their infectious single "Pure Love." The song comes from their third full length, the excellent Elegancia Tropical , which saw worldwide release just two months ago in November. It feels like a pretty good snapshot of their self-described "electro tropical" sound with its addictive rhythm, unrelenting energy, and mix of electro pop and cumbia. Bomba Estéreo is another strong example of the great dance music that's rising out of South [...]
Well, the world didn't end, so I guess I need to get my year-end list up. Like in previous years, I aim to make this list a mix of what I enjoyed and spun the most as well as what also was good, technically-speaking, in my opinion. I think people often put far too much weight behind what a year-end list contains, as if what's listed at #5 or #1 is the God's honest truth. If you thought Carly Rae Jepsen's album was the best album of the year, right on. For as much as music writers critique the year's [...]
The complexity of emotion is rather humbling but also quite confounding at times. It's a beautiful thing, but it's also something that can be terribly overwhelming; trying to make sense of one feeling while battling another just seems to make more of a mess. You can't appreciate the beauty, or learn from the experience, unless you can peel each emotional layer away to see how everything unites to make you who you are. Making sense of your emotional being isn't the easiest thing, but it's a rather rewarding journey; understanding how you feel is the biggest step towards learning who [...]
One of the biggest names in the French electro scene is Kavinsky, but you may know him best as the creator behind "Nightcall," the opening track off the Drive soundtrack. That's about to change with the forthcoming release of Kavinsky's highly-anticipated debut album, Outrun , on February 26, 2013 via Casablanca Records. The album comes on the heels of three well-received EPs: 2006's Teddy Boy , 2007's 1986 , and 2008's Blazer . Outrun may not be out until next year, but you can hear a [...]
Guitarist/songwriter extraordinaire Marnie Stern is known for her dizzying guitar work and intricately composed instrumentation, for songs that sound like chaos harmonized. But for her fourth album, Stern wanted to continue evolving even further. She says, "I always gravitate towards interweaving and a more abrasive sound. I was working with Nicholas Vernhes from Rare Book Room Recording in Brooklyn, and he was the producer. He wanted my voice clearer and fewer guitar parts. I tried it because I wanted to try something different." The end result is the excellently titled The Chronicles of Marnia , out March 19th of [...]
I had an evening flight back home that departed just as dusk was setting. As the plane ascended, the sun began its descent behind the horizon. And even though the light was fading, the sun seemed inexplicably radiant as if it was radioactive, about to bleed its brilliant shades of red and orange across the sky. There are moments in life that cannot in any way be honestly, or accurately, described with words. These are the types of moments that need to be seen in order to be truly expressed. This sunset was one of those moments. It was one [...]
Social Studies was always a subject that excited and intrigued me, learning about the decades that help build the one I was currently sitting in. It felt like a grandly evocative experience for the soul while also being something rather humbling with its scope and endless lessons on life. And while it was all so factual, set it stone and undeniable, it was rather inspiring, as well, for how it lent itself to illustrating the human potential for amazing, unexpected things. It was real while providing space for the imagination to run wild. In [...]
2013 will mark 7 years since the birth of Mixtape Muse. In that time, I've made it a point to never cross my own creative endeavors with the work I do here on Mixtape Muse. So, please allow me a moment to step of character. I figured based on the post below, it only seemed fitting. For what it's worth, I hate talking about myself. I recently had the chance to use a Canon C300 at work, which, for those outside the film world, is a very high-end video camera -- one [...]
While we were all still trying to recover from the Thanksgiving holiday, Chromatics dropped the video for new single "Cherry." Directed by frequent collaborator Alberto Rossini, the video features the trademark Rossini/Chromatics colorful, hazy film aesthetic, one that centers around the vivid, almost hypnotic pink and blue hues. It conveys an almost surreal setting, skimming the line between fantasy and a dark reality. The song comes from the as-of-yet released After Dark 2 compilation album. See and hear/download "Cherry" below. [...]
One of my favorite releases of 2012. Great for pre-dawn/dawn drives and rainy days.
Back in January, I wrote about Gambling On the Richter Scale , a three year old record by a San Francisco sludge/noise rock band called Kowloon Walled City. They took their name from a legendary walled city , one that originally served as a military fortress for the Chinese back in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Sounds pretty heavy, huh? Well, Kowloon Walled City no longer stands, but Kowloon Walled City (the band) sounds like an army with a bunch of bottled up aggression -- you know, living inside a city that's [...]
Bravestation - Giants & Dreamers If you've spent a year on this fine planet of ours, you've undoubtedly observed the changing of the seasons – or even the daily exchange of sun for moon and moon for sun. There's something inexplicably beautiful about the subtleties that characterize these transitions: the way the leaves begin to turn color at the introduction of cold or the way the sun sets not [...]
Mixtape Muse
Tanning Mom Releases The Worst Dance Music Video Of 2013
[Watch] Kanye West Debuts "Black Skinhead" and "New Slaves" on SNL
One Direction in concerto a Verona oggi 19 maggio 2013: la scaletta delle esibizioni (video)
[News] Kanye West to Release New Album 'Yeezus' on June 18th
Stone Temple Pilots - Out Of Time (Free Download)
