The Shabazz Palaces-affiliated outfit THEESatisfaction, made up of Seattle's Stasia Irons and Catherine Harris-White, is set to release their new album awE naturalE in March. For the price of an e-mail address, you can download that LP's first single, the chirping, thumping "QueenS." Hit the widget below. Read More...
Mirel Wagner, a singer-songwriter born in Ethiopia and raised in Finland, is 23 years old. When she wrote "To The Bone," the opening track from her shivery self-titled album, she was 16. But her songs sound old as dirt. With an appropriate amount of crackle and hiss, you could easily pass them off as ancient, undiscovered acoustic-blues 78s. That's partly because of Wagner's voice, a still and spectral quaver that emphasizes every word just so and carries a hint of Billie Holiday's soft intensity. And it's partly because of the way she recorded the LP: Alone on an acoustic guitar, [...]
A while back , when we asked Drake about how his personal life had changed since Thank Me Later came out, and he said: It's crazy man. Here's the thing: I haven't been able to write any love songs because I haven't been in a relationship in like three years. When I hear, even going back to [Frank] Ocean, like girls are so endearing and charming … I'm like, damn I can't write like that right now! My songs are like, I'm the man, bitch, I made it. I made you who you [...]
In November, Salem covered Alice Deejay's most famous trance jam for their latest EP, and today we have Alec Empire's (Atari Teenage Riot) take on the churning track. In Empire's version, he sucks most of Salem's sinister tones from the mix and comes up with something fresh and vibrant. Grab the download below. Read More...
Coldplay's video for the Mylo Xyloto track "Charlie Brown" stars an adorable young couple who do parkour and steal a car, all in an effort to watch the band playing in an absurdly glittery and crowded club. Kids these days! Mat Whitecross directs, and someone who apparently comes from the BBC show Misfits stars. Watch it below. Read More...
Last night, Jimmy Fallon's Late Night show, in Indianapolis for the Super Bowl, played host to rap legend Nas, who performed his blistering comeback single " Nasty " with the Roots backing him up. In the right context, Nas is an absolutely electrifying live performer, and this is pretty much exactly the right context. Watch him kill shit below. Read More...
The creative forces at Adult Swim roped in Flying Lotus's guy Lifuchs to direct a video for Era Extraña' s sumptuous '80s-gaze cinema fare "Fallout," and since it is Adult Swim, we are in the realm of the cartoon. The folks there peg the video as an "homage to 802s toons and sexy commercials," which basically means Pole Position with cleavage which, now that you mention it, I probably would have loved if it actually existed on Saturday mornings growing up, and now I feel cheated by my youth [...]
At this late date, you shouldn't need anyone to explain why the arrival of a Wal-Mart in your town is pretty bad news for the well-being of said town. And as Billboard reports , a group of musicians in Athens, Georgia is doing whatever it can to stop the construction of a massive local development anchored by a Wal-Mart. The Downtown 13 collective is led by Patterson Hood, frontman of the Southern-rock-revivalist institution Drive-By Truckers, and it also includes members of R.E.M., Widespread Panic, the Futurebirds, and plenty of others. In their efforts, they've written and recorded [...]
The Hairs' Kevin Alvir has a great feel for those warm-sounding, catchy indie pop songs that recall the era of cassette singles and the type of fare that would get heavy rotation'd at college radio stations of yore. Former SGum staffer Brandon Stosuy called the outfit "a twee Wavves, a less punked-up/still snotty Cloud Nothings, an extremely polite Happy Flowers," which is a pretty good jump-off. They've got a single coming out later this month on WeePOP!, and today we have that release's A-side "I've Been Working Out," a fun jangle of a song with a nice pop [...]
Madonna's forthcoming album, bearing the frankly awesome title MDNA, will feature two collaborations with M.I.A. This forthcoming weekend, Madonna and M.I.A. and Nicki Minaj will perform at the Super Bowl Halftime Show. This morning, we posted up this amazing M.I.A. video for "Bad Girls." So if you could add up all those words the sum total would be just about this: Madonna's own cadre of bad girls, including M.I.A. (and Nicki Minaj), in a football-themed video, on the eve of the Super Bowl. Here it is! "Give Me All Your Luvin'" is the track ("in [...]
Well, look at this: Maya has her swagger back. The video for her new single " Bad Girls " is an early contender for video of the year; it sends up all sorts of rap-video clichés by transposing them to a Middle Eastern desert party. So we get drivers doing car-tricks that go way beyond any old whip-ghostriding and M.I.A. leading hordes of revelers through the streets. That shot where she's reclining on a car window, calmly filing her nails while the thing is driving up on two wheels, is easily the most badass thing you will see today. Romain [...]
Apparatjik is a European rock supergroup that boasts members of Coldplay, A-Ha, and Mew and which sounds way more twinkly and electronic than that list of names might lead you to think. They'll release their second album Square Peg In A Round Hole later this month, and it features a team-up with superstar rap producer Pharrell Williams. That collaboration is called "Do It Myself," and you can download it (yourself) below. Read More...
The 11th annual Sasquatch! Music Festival returns to The Gorge in George, WA this Memorial Day Weekend (5/25-5/28) with a lineup featuring headliners Jack White, Beck, and Bon Iver. Also on board: the Shins, Girl Talk, Portlandia Live, Feist, St. Vincent, the Walkmen, Spiritualized, Shabazz Palaces, and dozens more. Check out the full list of performers below: Read More...
It's been a compelling week of television on CBS's Late Show . On Tuesday, K-Pop's Girls' Generation made their American TV debut to the delight of all of us, and especially guest Bill Murray. Wednesday marked David Letterman's 30th year in late night, over which Howard Stern got all nostalgic, telling the host, "Back then, the fact that you asked me to be on a national television show was mind-blowing." And Thursday saw Lana Del Rey - perhaps you've heard of her - improve upon her much critiqued SNL bow [...]
A while back, we labeled sister-act electro pop outfit Zambri a Band To Watch and posted the band's first single from their forthcoming debut LP House Of Baasa , " ICBYS ." Now that clip has a dark (literally), frenetic video. Context from the group: we broke into the vacant apartment next door to me and kept the lights out! johnny woods (who directed our "on call" video and who does all of neon indian's amazing live visuals) is the guy we train to fight throughout the vid. we drank [...]
Norwegian space-disco king Hans-Peter Lindstrøm has a new album called Six Cups Of Rebel coming next week; we've already posted his track " De Javu ." And in something of a coup, he's recruited a very special remixer to come in and rework the album track "Quiet Place To Live": '70s studio-rock master Todd Rundgren. Talking to Rolling Stone , Lindstrøm says, "I'm not aware of any other remixes he's done before, in which case this feels really special as Todd Rundgren's music has been inspiring me a lot over the years." Listen to Rundgren's dizzy, [...]
The Magnetic Fields' latest single " Andrew In Drag " has been praised as a return to the form of the vintage Magnetic Fields through it's more acoustic, synth-heavy arrangements (but don't worry, too much. Stephin's still doing the oddball stuff !). And now that track - which contains the opening couplet "A pity she does not exist, a shame he's not a fag / The only girl I ever loved was Andrew in drag" - has a video, where two people transform into two other people, cosmetically speaking. Watch it below. Read More...
On the latest episode of The Donaghy Files , a 30 Rock spinoff of animated webisodes, Alec Baldwin's character finds himself tasked with throwing together a Super Bowl halftime show but unable to pay any clearance fees. This somehow leads to him bringing in a bunch of musicians to sing theme songs to old NBC shows. One of those guests is Ryan Adams, guesting as himself, who does a perfectly lovely acoustic version of the Passions theme and somehow makes it sound exactly like a Ryan Adams song. We also get Michael McDonald [...]
We first brought up Kazu Makino's (Blonde Redhead) benefit compilation We Are The Works In Progress as we discussed Four Tet's contribution, " Moma ," and today a brand new instrumental Deerhunter track from that release hit the web. Stream the song, "Curve," after the jump. Read More...
Though Beach Fossils members like Cole Smith and John Peña have taken time to do their own thing lately (with their bands Dive and Heavenly Beat , respectively), the Dustin Payseur-led Beach Fossils outfit is still an outfit of high function. As they prepare their second LP, the band will put out the single "Shallow" next month, which logically follows the What A Pleasure EP in mood and texture. Download below. Read More...
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