HIYA // Pedro Say hello to our latest Artist of the Month: Pedro Garcia ! A menswear designer by trade, Pedro is our very first Sydney based artist. Besides being menswear design assistant at one of Australia's most notorious labels, he is also a freelance textile designer/illustrator designing prints for several high profile Australian fashion labels. A graduate of Australia's foremost fashion school, East Sydney Tech, Pedro was always destined for the world of fashion from a very young age. One of my oldest and dearest friends, [...]
This is beautiful. Just beautiful! One of our most favourite, most dearly beloved bands of all time, of Montreal have joined with Norwegian electro poppets Casiokids to release a split 7" (with the artwork above made by Nina Barnes ) for Record Store Day via Oslo-based indie label Splendour . It's a rare occasion to see two bands deliver two tracks that sit side by side as comfortably and perfectly as these do; in spirit and even a little in melody, but still be very different in their execution. Hats off to [...]
Win Win 's melodramatic second single, 'Interleave' features the sweetly pleading vocal of Hot Chip 's Alexis Taylor laid over Daft Punk -circa- Tron -style droning synths. We liked it well enough; but felt it just didn't have hit written all over it. Though we hoped for more from the XXXchange remix , he delivered an interpretation that swerved from this side of right into almost wrong territory, despite being an addictive remix. Enter our boy Kingdom , who gets it more right than either. Kingdom has a [...]
Wicked cover art for 'Control' from which 'Pleasure Principle' was taken Janet Jackson will forever be Queen of the Dance Break for me. No one does a dance break quite like Janet. She generally keeps her private life private, and doesn't really cause too much scandal aside from her often fluctuating weight; so in this age of hyperactivity we often forget how important Janet has been and is to pop/women in pop/black/women/in pop/black music, since she comes from a ridiculously legendary family (each member for different [...]
Liz, Brian and Josh of Gang Gang Dance were in London when I met them a few years back. The trio and I slumped together a little miserably in the windowless basement of Vice's offices. Somehow though, we shot way over the fifteen to twenty minutes allocated and ended up having this awesome kind of meta-interview which included all three of them giving me life advice, as well as an intense, in depth (and awesome, if I do say so myself) exchange for the interview I was writing. Anyway, that was just after the [...]
Say hello to Sienna Freeman . I stumbled across her work in my online trawls and found myself immediately drawn to every single one of her surreal, but rather warm and immediate creations. Freeman works with photographs and other found images that she manipulates and then collages together to create these expressions of life, death, and the contemporary living experience. She says of her work: "I am interested in territories between the intellect and senses, places where the logical mind and the [...]
WHAT UP // Toddla (and HIYA Shola on a shirt which I obviously need) Toddla T is back and dropping a new single next month! I was a fan of his debut, so I'll be very interested to hear what he's got come the release of his sophomore album (expected out in August this year via Ninja Tune ) entitled Watch Me Dance . Especially since his upcoming single 'Take It Back' features one Shola Ama !(!!) In 'Take It Back', Toddla deploys [...]
Tackling the rather dark but appropriately hipster theme of 'suicide', our friends from The Golden Filter have turned out this stellar mixtape from the super cool kids at Oki-Ni. It's a hazily contemplative tracklist; pensive and oddly carefree. The kind of playlist I imagine could be played in that eternal moment when a character decides to let it all go and gracefully dives off into a dizzying waterfall or into the darkness of a bottomless abyss or something. Here's a bit of tumblrism so you get what I mean: image by [...]
Opening with their version of a line appropriated from Bloodhound Gang 's 'Fire Water Burn', is Yacht 's latest offering from their fifth album (the second one of which has been released via DFA on June 27th) Shangri-La , is this first single entitled 'Dystopia'. It's a warning, a prophesy, a harkening for doomsday, a true story; it seems that the Yacht duo of Jona Bechtolt and Claire L. Evans have been getting more and more seriou s as they've gone along . 'Dystopia' seems [...]
"He was very buzzworthy. And he's been called the Mexican Morrissey. The Bangladeshi Bowie. The Domenican Daryl Hall..." I often think that behind the scenes sort of material can be really immaterial to whatever is being released. But whether this is really a behind-the-scenes-commentary video or the real bonafide deal (and I really hope that this is the official vid), it's one of those very rare occasions where every extra word, extra shot, extra effect and subtitle is absolutely necessary. One of the funniest commentaries I've ever had the pleasure to [...]
Denim label Lee have given Yeah Yeah Yeahs ' guitarist and budding photographer, Nick Zinner his first ever commercial assignment (Zinner has previously published two critically acclaimed books, I Hope You Are All Happy Now and Please Take Me Off The Guest List as well as exhited solo shows all over the world), in capturing their Winter 2011 campaign entitled Swagger and Jetts . Shot in the East Village of Manhattan, it's all a bit scrappy, all a bit random and [...]
Hooray for Little Dragon ! The emotional and musical fireworks that this band manage to convey in such a light handed way never fails to surprise and delight me. I had the pleasure of meeting the band in London back in 2007; not long after the release of their self titled, critically acclaimed debut Little Dragon . Now in 2011, we're already excited for the release of their third LP, Ritual Union not yet due out until July later this year, the band have thankfully dropped a little teaser in 'Nightlight'! [...]
Adele is so hot right now. She is not only everywhere, but girl is also loved by everyone; from Britney Spears to Lady Gaga. The last to reference the singer was John Legend , as he took his Twitter account to post a soulful interpretation of 'Rolling in the Deep' simply because he "loves this Adele song". Doesn't everyone? In his cover, John strips the instrumental down and uses only his voice with some gospel choir backing vocals. This heavenly acapella is sufficient to bring up the best of feelings in people, but [...]
After a bunch of remixes released for their single 'Take Me Over', it's time to start it all again with Cut Copy 's latest, 'Need You Now'. The first version unleashed is from the Aussie band Architecture in Helsinki , which in their remix "imagined the tune as a classic Roy Orbison". So forget all about the club ready electro synthpop that impregnates their music and enjoy this track as a 60's crystalline pop song. Cut Copy - Need You Now (Architecture in Helsinki Version) [mp3] 'Need [...]
In their latest video, Parisian duo Jupiter created a perfect hangover inducing game: the Saké dance show. As with most drinking games, you eventually will have to do something stupid, but in this case I haven't decided if it's more stupid to mix beer and saké or to actually do the Saké dance. Either way, that seems like a fun game that I'd like to be trying pretty soon and, hopefully, after watching the video below, my friends will want to join me too. But what about the song? 'Saké' has that 80s synthpop [...]
No need to tell you that the combination of Tame Impala and Daft Punk is something to be looking forward to. The unexpected remix of the Australian psychedelic boys for the French duo is only going to be released on the Australian version of Tron: Legacy R3CONFIGUR3D , which, for the rest of the world, is a total shame. In the remix, the boys jam around the synth of 'End of Line' and totally own it. The rhythmic drum becomes the new center of the song, but the space synthesizers travelling [...]
There's nothing better than to find out that one of your favorite new bands are also awesome at other things. Edwin Congreave , the Foals ' keyboardist, took the band's Facebook page to announce that he had uploaded some DJ mixes he has done in the past. And they are GREAT. At least if the latest one, Foals Mix #2 recorded this month, is anything to judge by. Modern classics like LCD Soundsystem' s 'Get Innocuous', The xx's 'VCR', Hercules and Love Affair's 'My House' and Azari & III's 'Into [...]
We all have tasteless friends. The ones that close their eyes and shout "This is my jam!" when the DJ plays 'I Gotta Feeling'. It's fine, friendships shouldn't be based purely on musical taste, but that doesn't mean you can't help those to become better people. And you know who's going to help you with that mission? Animal Collective. Yes, that Baltimore based indie-psych band. That's because the band has put together a mixtape with most of the artists that are going to play in their curated edition of All Tomorrow's Parties. Beach House, Gang Gang [...]
Cults still owe us a decent video for 'Go Outside' , but I suppose a new track will do the trick, especially one as good as 'You Know What I Mean'. This new song is like a combination of Lykke Li and melodic 60s pop; with snapping fingers and that classic chord progression included, in a newly crystalline production compared to their 7" demos. But before you start blaming their recently signed contract with a major, you better know that it doesn't interfere in any form with the heartbreaking effect of this adorable little [...]
HIYA // Suzy Miss A (short for Miss Asian) is in my top 3 contemporary kpop girl bands – yes, we do have this list. They are like colorful pop fun with a bit of third world attitude. If Rihanna were Korean, 'Breath', this delicious synthetic reggaeton number, would be the video she'd record. Miss A - Breath From all the four girls, Suzy (or Bae Su ji [...]
I M // U R
Avicii – Two Million
Scissor Sisters’ “Baby Come Home” Video: Watch The Band Get Animated
Yellow Magic Orchestra edit from Chrome Canyon
Beck – I Just Started Hating Some People Today
