Kite in the Air is a new electro pop act featuring Emma Lucia (Jed and Lucia) and Mark Reveley (Wzrdz, Meterhead, Jed and Lucia). The band released their first single yesterday, Magic Marker , for free from their upcoming EP on Zero Brains Records . Their sound is "somewhere between Adult, Laika, Ladyhawke, Azure Ray, Mu, Gary Numan, The Pretty Things and Sebastian." Kite in the Air - Magic Marker You can download their debut [...]
Frank Schweikhardt is one of the many Bloomington artists I'm excited about. His debut full-length, Life But No More , is coming out on November 17th on Bloomington's Crossroads of America Records , and it's one of those albums that you feel intimately attached to after a few listens. Frank recorded the album with several seasoned Bloomington artists: Mike Adams ( husband&wife ), Tim Felton (husband&wife), and Zac Canale ( Morrow ). You'll find him on sporadic tours when he [...]
As I've settled in to my new home in Bloomington , Indiana, I've been getting to know who the local artists are, going to shows, and sitting down with people involved in the local music scene. According to Andy Goheen ( Sticky and the Bees , E.P. Hall ) who organizes shows for The Bishop , Bloomington has over 500 bands. Shortly after moving here Nicole O'Neal ( Hipster Spinster ) asked me to co-host a radio show with her. We decided to call it [...]
Shout Out Louds have completed their next album, Work . Their follow up to Our Ill Wills will land on February 23rd, 2010 on Merge Records . Phil Ek produced Work at Bear Creek Studio in Seattle. You might be familiar with Ek's work with Fleet Foxes, Band of Horses, The Shins, Built To Spill, and Modest Mouse. Is that any indication that Work should sound amazing? Adam Olenius , [...]
South Bend based indie rockers Native will be releasing their new album Wrestling Moves on October 30 in a small cramped basement of Chicago called Summer Camp , and this will be a show for the ages. On a first listen to Native’s newest record, I was immediately impressed at (firstly) the quality of the new record. After listening to We Delete ; Erase a few hundred times it was rather refreshing being able to hear lead [...]
The music industry is driven by the desire to make money . A decade ago, the most universal of the American music companies (including Universal itself) were controlled by the likes of Seagram . Today, the honor goes to Vivendi . Perhaps Monsanto will be in control tomorrow. “How does a music company become more profitable?” This is the question that those that have the pocket change ask themselves occasionally. The answer is usually somewhere along the lowest common denominator. What do people already like? [...]
Common Existence Tour pushes Thursday to a whole new level. Not many bands can perform after 12 years the same way they did at their first show. Thursday hit the New Jersey scene in 1997 and released 6 full length albums since, including their most recent album Common Existence . Although the album has been out since the band toured on the Taste of Chaos tour, any Thursday fan could agree that the Taste of Chaos tour didn’t feel like a Thursday show. Common Existence Tour [...]
Sleeping At Last has released a new music video for Green Screens , their first video for their latest album, Storyboards . The video was created by Javen Ivey , and is a tremendous mixture of animation and stop-motion photography, fitting perfectly with the song. The video can be viewed on Vimeo and Youtube .
Sufjan Stevens ' month of October could not be more impressive yet clandestine at the same time. While everyone is expecting Sufjan to continue his gimmick of writing an album for every state, he is instead releasing two instrumental albums in the month of October and a contributed heavily to a third instrumental album to be released in December. These releases come amidst Sufjan's first tour in over twelve months, though Stevens is not performing these songs during the tour. One of these albums will be released under his name, while the other two will not. [...]
Kicking off Say Hi 's tour with David Bazan is a fresh new video for the song, One, Two... One . The song is from his Barsuk release, Oohs & Aahs , released earlier this year. Directed by Drew Norton , in the video, "Eric is hunted by the obsessive, beautiful, and cruel goddess Diana." Say Hi - One, Two ... One [...]
The Subjects have released the first single (or should we say leaked on RCRD LBL ) from their new EP, New Soft Shoe . Winter Vacation isn't nearly as lo-fi as their debut album, is much more percussive, and overall the songwriting is stronger. The four tracker can be purchased for $3.49 on Think Indie . With an origin as unique as theirs, they'll forever be introduced as the band where two high school teachers formed [...]
The Weakerthans posted a new video yesterday for Sun In An Empty Room , from their Reunion Tour album, released in 2007 on ANTI . The concept video begins and ends with older adults sharing their experience living in the North End for 30-odd years. Their responses are a mixture of difficulties, of social perspectives, and fond memories... some wanting change and other preferring things the way they are. The music video follows the life of a middle-aged father [...]
David Bazan of Pedro the Lion and Headphones fame is going on tour with Say Hi (To Your Mom). During the tour Bazan will be joining up with TW Walsh 's band, The Soft Drugs , for a show in Cambridge, close to where Walsh lives and works as a mastering engineer and software developer. David Bazan's first full-length, Curse Your Branches , is his most concrete and well-produced album since he debuted with [...]
There's a band that I would have written about earlier this year if I had been on top of my game, but introducing you to The Rest is certainly not too late. The Rest recently signed to UK's Something In Construction and Everyone All At Once will be released on October 10th (in the UK). For their US release, look them up on Auteur Recordings ' website. Also, the band is releasing Walk On Water [...]
Tim Williams is releasing a new album, Careful Love , along with a video and single for the opening track, I Hit Another Wall . The album is tremendous, as you'll hear in this song. In May, 2008, Tim Williams had open-heart surgery and had to remain in bed for most of the year. The album art is reflective of this heart surgery, showing a boy holding up his heart to a bear. Careful Love marks a return [...]
While searching for new music sites I came across a site called thesixtyone (think Route 61). Mashable describes thesixtyone as "Mp3.com meets Digg." What do they mean with that comment? Digg is a voting-based site where popular stories filter to the front page. Mp3.com was the first music social site where artists could climb charts and distribute their music as people listened. Let's take a look to see if this description is correct. When you're creating a site you're asked [...]
What was a side project for Matt Pond PA , The Dark Leaves is now turning into a full-length album. The songs on the album were originally going to be released under Matt Pond PA's name, but they were scrapped and reworked as a side project, The Dark Leaves . Altitude Records is now releasing The Dark Leaves in February, 2010. As Puddlegum quoted Matt Pond in January, 2007, "We threw away songs — ended up with four. Four. [...]
Sweden is known for its innovative indie, and readers of Puddlegum know that we have a soft spot for music coming out of Scandinavia. El Perro Del Mar is one of the artists we enjoy in particular, and we're excited that they have a new album, Love Is Not Pop , coming out on October 20th. C hange of Heart is the first single from their third album, Love Is Not Pop , showing off El Perro Del [...]
Besides Google, no other website pushes more traffic to music blogs, and ultimately to independent artists, than Hype Machine . Developed by Anthony Volodkin , Hype Machine is a music blog aggregator . We'll take a look at what that means and the services Hype Machine offer to music fans. An aggregator gathers data from a bundle of RSS feeds, and then republishes the story, typically the opening line. So once a website publishes a story, it is immediately made available on the site's RSS feed, and is then gathered by the [...]
The Stockholm twins known as Taxi Taxi! have released their debut full-length, Still Standing at Your Back Door . In 2005 Johanna and Miriam Eriksson Berhan were only 15 when they released a song on Myspace, and grabbed attention worldwide. They released two EPs with Rumraket , the label operated by the Efterklang folk, Taxi Taxi! in 2007, and more recently, Step Out Into The Light [...]
Puddlegum
Download: Macklemore & Ryan Lewis – Can’t Hold Us (Major Lazer Remix)
Virginia Wing: Red Sails
Thee Oh Sees/ Sauna Youth
Washed Out Announce New Album ‘Paracosm’
