Blog: Tuneage

Fences - "My Girl The Horse" (Featuring Sara Quin) I love a song that begins with a fade-in every now and then. Not only does this track feature Sara Quin (one half of Tegan & Sara), but she also co-produced the band's self-titled debut that was released this past September. Fences is Chris Mansfield, a Seattle native who sings his experiences through slightly mellow yet melodic indie folk. This album puts me strangely at east. The track "Girls With Accents" is another favorite. You can watch the video here . [...]

Jeanne Moreau - "Le Tourbillon (de la Vie)" This song is from 1962 and was featured in François Truffaut's new wave film Jules et Jim . It's a lovely, acoustic ballad but I'm not quite sure how it holds up without the film clip. "Le Tourbillion" (The Whirlwind of Life) is a song which is very iconic in French culture but mostly because of the seminal film it was featured in. It's not that catchy and I'm sure my affinity for the lyrics come from the context of the song [...]

Oh Land - " White Nights " Meet Oh Land. Also known as Nanna Øland Fabricius, this former Danish ballerina (yum?) traded in her tutu for a chance to make fun, dreamy, electro-pop music that may even find the most amateur of dancers moving their bodies to. I was pleasantly surprised when I saw her perform a few nights ago, and immediately after I was on the hunt for her self-titled EP that came out this past October on Epic Records. "White Nights" features thick layered vocals interjected with a delicate [...]

Cloud Nothings - " Leave You Forever " At the beginning of the summer I wrote a post telling you to watch out because the Cloud Nothings were coming for you. I hope you heeded the warning because they are back and they ditched the tape recorder for a real recording studio. Don't worry, they kept the hooks. You can expect their self titled "debut" to come out in January on Carpark Records but until then, check out the Didn't You single and Leave You [...]

Wolf Parade - " Grounds for Divorce " With the way the music press tends to work, it's easy to forget that truly excellent albums were released just a few years and are now probably collecting dust in the back of your iTunes catalogue. As luck would have it, while wasting time clicking around reddit the other night, I read a comment that reminded me of one of my favorite forgotten albums: Wolf Parade's 2005 stunner Apologies to the Queen Mary . Since then, [...]

Flight of the Conchords - " Carol Brown " Sometimes I think we take our music too seriously here at Tuneage, but good songs are good songs no matter how silly they are. With that in mind, take a listen to New Zealand's fourth most popular folk parody duo, Flight of the Conchords. They've done it all from TV shows, to comedy specials, to films. They've also released two albums that have topped music charts around the world. So if you're funny bone needs a tickling, now you know [...]

WWTB Been a quiet few weeks, and it's likely it'll stay that way until the start of the new year… Cee-Lo Green - The Lady Killer ( buy the CD / buy the MP3s )

Aloe Blacc - " I Need a Dollar " You know what's great for this colder weather? Soul music. And these days, when I need a soul fix, I reach more and more for Aloe Blacc. You'll find Blacc on the same label ( Stones Throw ) as Mayer Hawthorne , and while the two are similar, Blacc is more Soul while Hawthorne is more Motown. You can't go wrong with either, honestly, but if you want something better suited to the season, I'll be pushing Aloe Blacc's latest, [...]

Blu ft. U-God - "KeepItGoin" Blu (one of my top 3 MC's today) and U-God (Wu-Tang) with Flying Lotus on the beat? I'll have some of that. We're finally starting to get some information and sounds from a new Blu album. Since signing a major-label deal (and since I posted an early Blu freestyle on Tuneage), he's been relatively quiet, with some laying the blame on major label politricks. But he's starting to divulge info on the new project, No York and it's making me giddy just thinking about it. Producers [...]

It's getting close to Halloween, and you think your only musical option is "Monster Mash", right? Wrong. There's a surprising amount of good music out there that fits the Halloween vibe perfectly (in feel, if not in theme) without being cheesy, but too many people overlook it. Well now's your chance to rectify your lack of quality Halloweeny tuneage; just pick from the list below, hit play, and you're all set… Shaboi - Curse Walk : I assumed all Halloween music had to be kitschy crap until [...]

The Like - "Wishing He Was Dead" It's cute, it's so retrofab it hurts: one of these sinister upbeat songs. You're bopping your head to the sound (the darling harmonies, tamborine) until you realize she's singing when I am through with him, he will be wishing he was dead . Teaming up with Mark Ronson and Alex Greenwald (Phantom Planet) - the Like takes on a distinctly 1960s, girl group sound in their second studio album, Release Me . Despite the throwback feeling of this record - I [...]

Huey Lewis and the News - "The Power Of Love" On October 25th, 1985, Marty McFly went back in time. Dun Dun Duuuun. Now we're going to go back in time by listening to this classic Huey Lewis track which was written for the movie. Great Scott!

The Rural Alberta Advantage - "Don't Haunt This Place" The Rural Alberta Advantage is a name that I would associate more with an insurance company than with an indie group- but I guess that's the way it goes with most band names these days. The song has already been featured on Pitchfork over a year ago but I've just fallen in love with it in the last few months. Last July, we featured another song by this band but in honor of them finishing their second album (it's following up their 2009 Hometowns ). I [...]

Elvis Perkins In Dearland - " I Heard Your Voice In Dresden " What do you get when you cross Norman Bates with some insane musical talent, and a bit of melancholy? Well, Elvis Perkins, of course. On his debut album, Ash Wednesday, Perkins dealt with some heavy issues, including the death of his mother on 9/11 and his father's death from AIDS only a decade earlier. His second album, Elvis Perkins In Dearland , is much lighter on the content but still comes hard with the folk. [...]

Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin - " Everlyn " Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin's first two albums had enough hooks to drive any fish (or music lover) insane and their third release, Let It Sway is no different. What has changed is their delivery. With both Broom and Pershing , they managed to create an certain ambiance that would almost have you believing that they were playing in your living room. That is gone on Let [...]

Antony & the Johnsons - Swanlights Badly Drawn Boy - Photographing... Belle and Sebastian - Write About... Idlewild - Post Electric Blues Joshua Radin - The Rock and the Tide The Klaxons - Surfing the Void Styrofoam - Disco Synthesizers... Sufjan Stevens - The Age of Adz [...]

Jeremy Messersmith - A Girl, a Boy, a Graveyard Through Tumblr, I discover new musicians all the time but very few of them I immediately take a liking to. Someone I follow posted a Youtube video of Jeremy Messersmith a few days ago and his 2010 album, The Reluctant Graveyard , is now in heavy rotation in my iTunes. Some critics have made the argument that Messersmith's three first albums are a sort of trilogy; which is particularly apt considering he is a huge Star Wars fan. [...]

Brian Bonz - "Owl Prowls Elm Village" I'm very excited to see that Brian Bonz will be releasing his new album, Triborough Odyssey , later this month. He has definitely grown and matured on this record and I can wholeheartedly say I love the direction he has gone in. The music reminds me of Andrew Bird but the vocals are uniquely Brian. This could quite possibly be the album that garners the attention this talented musician deserves. One common thread between this song, and of songs past , is the slow build [...]

Elliott Smith - Miss Misery When I was in 9th grade, my crush gave me a CD he had burned. While not all the songs were memorable, he had chosen five Elliott Smith tracks. And this was my introduction to one of my favorite artists of all time. His music is melancholy, often more depressing than it is uplifting. His voice is eerie but slightly imperfect in range. His sound is immediately recognizable - His last full album, Figure 8 , was released in 2000 and Smith took his own [...]

Deerhunter - Halcyon Digest No Age - Everything in Between WWTB A light week for the releases, but they're big ones… Deerhunter - Halcyon Digest ( buy the CD / buy the MP3s ) No Age - Everything in Between ( buy the CD / buy the MP3s )