Following on from our previous post, let part two of the run down commence. 6. Finnebassen - If You Only Knew The appearance of Aaliyah in any form is usually a reasonable cause for celebration, something that Norwegian producer Finnebassen was evidently aware of when sampling her on the stellar 'If You Only Knew'. Lifting a vocal hook from the chorus of 19962s sublimely sexy 'If Your Girl Only Knew' (Jesus was that really 16 years ago), Finn [...]
We've had so much music invade our iTunes library recently that absorbing it alone has been a considerable challenge. Whilst you can expect some more detailed posts in the coming week on our choice picks from the influx, we thought we'd do a quick(ish) run down on a handful of tracks we've had on repeat. We'd suggest you press play on the following: 1. Bullion - It's All In Sound Having established himself via the 'Pet Sounds: In The Key Of Dee' mixtape which put The Beach Boys ' seminal LP head to [...]
Ruby Goe 's been making ripples for quite some time now, in fact we first remember reading about her in late 2010 when The Guardian featured her debut single 'Beat Breaking Boy' . This was perhaps the inception of a genre we're going to call 'moombahpop' - all honking sirens, stacatto percussion and wobbly bass with a distinctive R&B vocal holding everything together. In terms of marking a place on the musical landscape, it asserted Goe as an exciting, forward-thinking pop troubador, unafraid to embrace unconventional ideas. Since then momentum has been building gradually, but steadily. We've [...]
We never need much of an excuse to post about Björk but we're delighted that we can finally showcase a song we first heard seven months ago at Hudson Mohawke 's headline show at XOYO. When he opened his set with what was obviously his own remix of 'Virus', by far our favourite track from Björk's latest and named as our third favourite song of 2011 , we nearly exploded. What made it even more exciting was that it had seemingly been unheard anywhere else and subsequent Google searches around that time suggested that even its mere existence was unknown apart from [...]
Groove Armada have always been a pretty good cultural barometer regarding dance music trends, par exemple: chillout tunes perfect for compilations with a Buddha figurine on the front circa cover 1997 / dancehall-infused party bangers ideal for drowning in mud to at Glastonbury circa 2001 / face-scratching- Sugababe -featuring crossover electropop circa 2007 / Bryan Ferry- reviving retro synth disco circa 2010. So accordingly, their most recent output has been firmly rooted in the house revival of which we've spoken about at length in previous posts. Hypercolour , a label that recently has been releasing the [...]
Just under a month ago we were lucky enough to attend Feist 's show at the grand ol' Albert Hall, a majestic venue to host such beautiful concert. Being nearly a month later, we won't be doing a full review but felt that we had to share this stunning live rendition of 'Intuition'. Feist achieved quite a feat making such an imposing venue seem so intimate and at no point during the set was this more apparent than during the solo version of the track that served as the show's finale. [...]
Ready for the biggest dosage of SWAG you've experienced at the very least during the month of April? Look no further than everyone's favourite pretty motherfucker A$AP Rocky , who yesterday unleashed onto the interwebs his first official single 'Goldie'. Rocky's 'LiveLoveA$AP' was widely cited as last year's best mixtape and this latest cut keeps the quality control tightly in check. Production is handled by 'Niggas In Paris' beatsmith Hit-Boy and whilst calmer in tone than the Jay-Z / Kanye joint, it's still constructed of similarly mechanical sounding components that tip their hat strongly [...]
Today should be considered an exciting one for all music enthusiasts as ten months after we first encountered a preview , we've finally been allowed to hear Major Lazer 's sweet reggae lilt 'Get Free' in full, uniting the crossover dancehall dons with the luscious vocals of Dirty Projectors' Amber Coffman . Seemingly casting a niche for herself as indie chanteuse for hire by the Mad Decent roster (Check Rusko 's album highlight 'Hold On' here ), Coffman brings some much needed elegance, class and sultriness to Diplo and Switch's jubilant instrumental. After the relative hard-style misstep that [...]
It's been a couple of weeks since Whitney Houston left us, and we're still pretty sad. Yes, she lived a checkered life, but that's not to detract from the fact that she was clearly one of the greatest talents of the last 30 years and that is very much what we would to prefer to focus on. In the wake of her death, various reworks, remixes and tributes have flooded the interwebs and we've sifted through them to present our personal favourites. Deep&Disco have given 'How Will I Know' a sublime makeover, naming their effort the [...]
A meeting of four exquisite minds here, specifically Bloodshy , Avant and Andrew Wyatt (who collectively make up Miike Snow ) and a true god of electronic music, Stuart Price , under his recently re-emerged Jacques Lu Cont alias. Price has given Miike Snow's forthcoming single "Paddling Out" a reworking of some magnitude, being one of the few individuals who can comfortably get away with releasing material that is ostensibly an electro bosh-o-thon circa 2007 and still make it sound essential. That said, a significant contingent of the remix utilises lush, extended and atmospheric synth [...]
It's been six long years since the release of Cassie 's self-titled debut and despite fans in some very influential places we've been lucky if we've been gifted with one official single every 18 months, with even those limited nuggets varying in quality ("Official Girl" / "Is It You" good, "Let's Get Crazy" much less so, for example). If rumours are to be believed, this year should eventually see the appearance of the long lost sophomore record and things are looking up with new single "King Of Hearts" hitting YouTube a couple of [...]
We're absolutely delighted to be able to bring you some new material from the absurdly talented Jacques Greene , a man responsible for not only some of last year's most accomplished productions, but also our favourite track of the year in the form of "Another Girl" . Greene's "Concealer" EP plays host to four tracks, all excellent in their own way. "Clark" casts an ear back to some of his earlier productions - dubby acid, skittering beats, drawn out synth tones and a beefy kick drum all get things slinking along nicely. "These Days" begins with lush cascading [...]
We're absolutely delighted to be able to bring you some new material from the absurdly talented Jacques Greene , a man responsible for not only some of last year's most accomplished productions, but also our favourite track of the year in the form of "Another Girl" . Greene's "Concealer" EP plays host to four tracks, all excellent in their own way. "Clark" casts an ear back to some of his earlier productions - dubby acid, skittering beats, drawn out synth tones and a beefy kick drum all get things slinking along nicely. "These Days" begins with lush cascading [...]
If you've ever witnessed a Chemical Brothers live show it's probably coincided without about 40 units of alcohol, half a foot of mud and a few other 'components'. As much as we love swampily swaying to some of the finest dance music of the last twenty years, we (like most CB's audience members) have always been left thinking "That was amazing but I'm afraid I'm unable to recount any details other than at one point I was chanting HEY BOY HEY GIRL for what seemed like half an hour". Probably in direct response to this eternal conundrum Tom, [...]
A quick post before we head home from work, but a highly necessary one. If you, like millions of others, have been sitting around twiddling your thumbs getting extremely bored of waiting for Santigold to drop some new material, then praise be, for SOME IS HERE. Although we were blessed with the Karen O- featuring 'Go' almost a year ago, that'll barely prepare you for the earth shattering bombast that is 'Big Mouth'. No one does globally influenced raggacumindiecumweirdbasslaced pop quite like Santi and this new track has stepped things up several notches. Having witnessed her show [...]
Having highlighted the emergence of all things house as the overriding trend in electronic music in 2011, prepare your ears for one of the first essential remixes of this brand new year. A remix which, if we're honest, has slightly surprised us. Excluding the excellent "How Deep Is Your Love", The Rapture 's third album was a slightly disappointing listen - not only did it mark the departure of Mattie Safer, but was also rather light on the indiedisco bangers we have come to expect from the scene-defining group. One of the few songs to stand out [...]
5. The Death Set - I Miss You Beau Velasco If you're thinking that our list this year has been noticeably lacking in a particular instrument, you'd be correct. 2011 hasn't been a great year for guitars and little of the music we've listened to has centered around them. One album however which had face-melting frettery very much at it's core was The Death Set 's 'Michel Poiccard'. Our favourite song from the record was 'I Miss You Beau Velasco', a fitting tribute to former bandmate Beau who sadly died from an overdose in 2009. We all know [...]
15. Azealia Banks - 212 Anyone who thought that female fronted electro-rap had run it's course was forced to eat their metaphorical hat this year when Azealia Banks ' '2122 swiftly went viral. Like a showreel, the record demonstrated a multitude of talents - from tough as nails and filthy as hell Harlem rap, to an impressive R&B croon to a pretty aggressive battlecry. And all of this whilst delivering one of the biggest party bangers in recent memory. We're hyped to see what Azealia's Paul Epworth -produced album will sound like and with [...]
WE'RE BACK! And remembering 2011. Initially we felt that this perhaps hadn't been the most sonically astounding year, but having had to refine 12 months' worth of music down to a mere 25 highlights has been a troublesome task indeed. This year has also been an odd one in terms of strong artists producing strong albums, but not individual tracks that will make the list below (Expect Best Albums and Honorable Mentions imminently). So, let's get to it.... 25. Metronomy - The Bay ( Erol Alkan 's Extended Rework) [...]
Spank Rock 's new album "Everything Is Boring and Everyone Is a Fucking Liar" is incredible. But we wouldn't have expected anything less from the person responsible for one of our favourite ever records ("YoYoYoYoYo"), nor from an album that was in large part helmed by Boys Noize , alongside some other very talented collaborators and producers including Leif , XXXChange , Mark Ronson , Santigold and New Orleans bounce Kingpin (Should that be Queenpin?) Big Freedia . Having already posted once today we'll keep this short but draw your attention to what are in our opinion [...]
Beats And Pieces 2.0
Azealia Banks - '1991' [Listen]
Metric Debuts Album via Synthetica Hide+Seek, Tickets On Sale Now For Fall Tour
THE MASTERSONS — BIRDS FLY SOUTH
