Hellooo. It's my birthday today, so I'm 'dropping' a mixtape in celebration of surviving another year. It's just a general splurge of stuff I've listened to in the past twelve months, in a logical order. Happy 17th September everyone! Click the image to download the entire thing (149MB) Tracklist: [...]
It's funny how our music tastes change. Not just with age, which is the obvious one, but even within a space of time as short as a couple of weeks - or even literally overnight. Don't worry, dear reader, I'll get round to recommending some music in a few paragraphs' time. For now this blog post is going to be a little more personal than usual - but hey, blogs are meant to be personal, right? I first downloaded 'Oblivion' by Grimes back in, I think, October, and thought it was a pretty good song. [...]
Muse. It's been a while. Three years, in fact, since The Resistance split their fanbase down the middle, managing the impressive task of seeing the band becoming even more a parody of themselves whilst simultaneously taking another step towards being successors of Queen (if Queen ever wrote musical versions of 2001: A Space Odyssey and Nineteen Eighty-Four, that is). Many fans turned away. Easy to see why, really, given the sheer flamboyance on display from the band who once gave us the certainly dramatic but utterly camp-free 'Muscle Museum', 'Bliss' and countless others. The hard edge was replaced [...]
A roaring crowd. A distorted guitar chord. “New Orleans!”, screams Alexis. “What the fuck’s up?” So begins the second aural assault from Brooklyn’s distortion-drenched duo Sleigh Bells. With a name like Reign Of Terror , it comes as no surprise that opener ‘True Shred Guitar’ arrives with the subtlety of a sack of sledgehammers, all chugging riffs and yells of “Enemies! On your knees! Suffer please!” Any concerns that Sleigh Bells’ appeal might have been limited to the raucous charms of debut Treats are dispelled in approximately [...]
Visions is the first album of 2012 - maybe even of the last twelve months - to make me want to shout about it (or indeed blog about it). It's an album that throws out (most of) the clichés of electronic music and takes stunning risks - not in an overblown, prog rock fashion, but entirely unpretentiously. There's plenty of lo-fi electronic music about at the moment (mostly of the Washed Out variety), and you could be forgiven for mistaking Grimes for another one of these acts. But thought it may also sound as like it's [...]
It sounds like such a backhanded compliment when you say it at first. It's not the most obvious way to praise an album - usually you'd go for, 'the tunes are amazing', or 'it's lyrically brilliant', or something along those lines. To praise something seemingly superfluous to a record itself could come across as derogatory. But it's true - the best thing about Childish Gambino's label debut Camp is the way it's sequenced. Sequencing is a funny thing. In some ways, the better the track sequencing on an album is, the less you notice it. It's [...]
"I'm in love with a tropical world, I'm in love with a tropical world..." Whenever I sit down and think about Fixers, I find myself somewhat conflicted. The reason for this is very simple - for the most part, I think they're a great band who're doing something both fun and interesting with indie pop music. It's just, while they have a load of great songs, some of them are a bit... well, we'll get to that later. First with the good stuff. It is obligatory to mention that Fixers hail from [...]
Comparing two songs which are pretty much only similar in name, and differ practically everywhere else. Within a couple of days of one another, two highly anticipated new tracks made their way onto the intorweb-blogospherez - first up, the new single from that 'Video Games' woman Lana Del Rey (I must be the only person on said intorweb-blogosphere who still hasn't heard that song), and the glorious return of the downright awesome Sleigh Bells. One track is called 'Born To Die'. The other is called 'Born To Lose'. Which is better? [...]
So, Maxïmo Park have been away for a little while, and whilst their third album didn't do huge business, their first two records still stand up as a perfect example of how great some of the indie rock in the mid-'00s actually was. A few weeks ago, myself and the wonderful Chris Scott had the chance to catch up with frontman Paul Smith (the bowler hat guy, not the stripey Nottingham designer), who opened up about the Newcastle music scene, the difficult second album and what the band have been up to following Smith's solo album. [...]
With Christmas day just a few excitable days away, 'tis the season for loads of bands to try and get your attention by giving away free festive mp3s. Here are a couple of pretty good ones that have caught the eagle-eyes of Quiff Pro 'Fro. Caitlin Rose and Keegan DeWitt - 'You Never Come Home For Christmas' The best original Christmas song I've heard in a long time. Caitlin Rose's voice is beautiful, and this really shows off her talent for writing stunning melancholic contemporary country music. Yeah, it's pretty miserable when you focus [...]
As our Twitter followers ( become one of them! ) might have recently ascertained, 'Fro and myself have recently decided upon our list of the top 10 albums of 2011. Already we're anticipating the frenzied response of "OMFG U MIST MY FAVE ALBUM YU NOBS", so to disappoint you all in advance I present a very brief look at the most critically acclaimed albums of the year that I either couldn't be bothered to listen to, or have just simply passed me by, and hence will NOT be appearing on the list. [...]
Whilst on their last tour, after the success of excellent third album A Different Kind of Fix , I was given the chance to sit down and chat to bassist Ed Nash and drummer Suren De Saram. Obviously this was a really great opportunity to ask about the new album and tour, but I decided to just ask lots of silly things instead: see below. You’re given the chance to follow any living band or artist on tour – who would you tour with? Ed: Weezer would be [...]
Back in 2007, French duo Gaspard Augé and Xavier de Rosnay unleashed their debut album † , giving freshers week a new anthem with 'D.A.N.C.E' , making dancefloors tremble under the colossal buzzing bassline of 'Waters of Nazareth' and providing the perfect soundtrack should a zombie apocalypse ever arise with 'Stress' . What's the logical progression for album two then? '70s prog-rock and '80s hair-metal, of course! Indeed, Audio, Video, Disco compounds Justice's predilection for distorted disco with the classic rock of yore, and it's not necessarily a bad thing. [...]
Peter Liddle of up-and-coming folk band Dry the River has come a long way to get where he is today. And I don't just mean in terms of his career. "I never knew how far away Newcastle is… but it's fucking far away," he says, sitting in the band's tour van. The group have driven up all the way from Brighton today to support Bombay Bicycle Club at the O2 arena this evening. He gives me the 'grand tour' of the van: covered in clothes, books and crumbs. "Those three seats at the back are [...]
Fresh off the back of their third and best album to date, A Different Kind Of Fix , Bombay Bicycle Club ventured on their biggest UK tour so far to showcase the newfound maturity of their latest tunes. The notably adolescent crowd gathered for opening act Dog Is Dead, the brightest hope of the rapidly exploding Nottingham music scene. Best known for their appearance in the latest series of Skins, they played a fantastic set taking in fan favourites and material from their forthcoming album. ‘Young’ was brilliant as ever with crisp, powerful harmonies, new [...]
Hello everyone! Thought I'd share a couple of choice tracks that have been languishing in our inbox for a while. First up is some fuzzy west coast girl rock, courtesy of SNEAKPEEK. Being given away on their bandcamp page is a live version of 'Walk All Over Me', a slow and grungey treat. It may not be complex or particularly original, but its simplicity lends it an irresistible lo-fi charm. [mp3] 'Walk All Over Me' - SNEAKPEEK [...]
If you can cast your memory all the way back to 2008, you may remember a brief time when, following in the footsteps of Radiohead's In Rainbows , bands were desperately handing away their music for nothing. Forest Fire were one of these bands, giving away their debut album Survival for the low, low price of zero pounds - but with a refreshingly sleepy pace, it stood out among the crowd as a gem of a record. Three years on, normality has been restored and most bands are charging for their music again. [...]
If you can cast your memory all the way back to 2008, you may remember a brief time when, following in the footsteps of Radiohead's In Rainbows , bands were desperately handing away their music for nothing. Forest Fire were one of these bands, giving away their debut album Survival for the low, low price of zero pounds - but with a refreshingly sleepy pace, it stood out among the crowd as a gem of a record. Three years on, normality has been restored and most bands are charging for their music again. [...]
Everyone loves a good rant, don't they? A chance to vent, get all your frustrations out. Especially on the internet, where you can shout 'screw you!' at anything or anyone into the overcrowded din before it disappears into the world wide void forever. In fact, while we're here, I might take the chance to do a few myself: Screw you David Guetta for releasing the same shit song hundreds of times without anyone noticing and making tonnes of cash! Screw you [...]
Hello everyone! It's my birthday today, and I thought I'd share the birthday cheer by putting together a little mixtape for you all. It's an eclectic mix of some of my tracks I've been enjoying listening to recently - with a silly intro if you download the whole package. Make sure to listen in order, and hope you enjoy! Click on the image to download the entire mixtape as a [...]
Quiff Pro 'Fro
The Weeknd - Kiss Land
Franz Ferdinand - Right Thoughts, Right Words, Right Action - Album Trailer
She & Him- I Could've Been Your Girl
Action Bronson - "Strictly 4 My Jeeps" (Official Video)
Kanye West - New Slaves
Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros – Better Days
Listen The Lonely Island and Solange together on “Semicolon”
