[ download ] [tweetmeme] After many repeated listens, it all boils down to this: the problem with Devon Williams ' "Your Sympathy" is that when ends after three and a half minutes, you're just going to want to listen to it again. However, further spins only amplify the issue, making you more inclined to want to hear it once more. It's a powerful feedback loop-this song is a mesmerizing enchantress. "Your Sympathy" was first released as the A-side of a single back in late June [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] If Pink Floyd hadn't insisted on applying the phrase "the delicate sound of thunder" to their own music when they came up with it, they could have loaned it out to Los Angeles sextet RACES . On "Big Broom," RACES more than live up to the description by mixing rafter-shaking atmospheric rumbling with ethereal wispiness like a thunderstorm raging in Fairyland. The song kicks off with a brooding bass line and sketchy guitar part that for the first section of "Big Broom" places [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] In his day job as a political writer (for the libertarian publication Reason ), Virginia's Meredith Bragg sees the unpleasantness of the current state of American affairs up close. That perspective seems to color "Birds of North America," the lovely but troubling first single from Bragg's third album, Nest . On "Birds of North America," Bragg paints a portrait of a nation where to be a public figure is to be [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] Euro-style dramatics have always been a hard sell to American pop music audiences, at least since rock music took over the charts from the crooners for good back in the 1960s. Us Yanks will gobble up melodrama if it's a working class anthem from Mellencamp or Springsteen, or if it's a goofy horror movie theatrics like Alice Cooper or Kiss. But give us a dude with an Edith Piaf jones lamenting over strings and piano and we're likely to run screaming for the hills. We [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] For the better part of a decade and a half, Gordon Zacharias has been releasing records as Fan Modine , packing his songs with melancholy sentiments and lovingly orchestrated indie-pop compositions. Zacharias had gone quiet for six years prior to the release of his new LP, Gratitude for the Shipper , but the time off seems to have served him quite well. Fan Modine's melodies have never sounded as fully formed and enchanting as they do on the latest record, [...]
Remember when Aloe Blacc delivered that ridiculously ill cover of " Billie Jean " with a string section? Yeah, we do, too. The best, right? Well, his time with the folks at MADE - they apparently put the whole thing together - wasn't done there. He also got none other than Erykah Badu to take part in the live music series and, sweet heavens, it is great. At about the 6:40 minute mark, she takes the stage with Miki's String Quintet to perform "On & On" and "The Healer". Yeah, it's like that, y'all. [...]
This is probably one of the greatest renditions to Michael Jackson "Billie Jean," with a beautiful string section. This just made our night. Love it! Filed under: Beats , Clip , Yankee Panky Tagged: album , albumn , aloe , blacc , download , jackson , michael , new
[ download ] [tweetmeme] After yesterday's feature on Radical Dads and today's spotlighted track by Bird of Youth , you could be forgiven for thinking there is a wave of nostalgia sweeping through your ragtag bunch of writers here at OTM. As with Radical Dads, Bird of Youth is a female-fronted Brooklyn trio who drink from the reservoir of mid-1990s college rock radio. However, where Radical Dads prefer the canons of acts like Pavement and Sonic Youth, this Bird of Youth track finds kindred [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] Grayson Sanders, leader of Brooklyn's Snowmine , has a background in classical music and it shows. "Beast in Air, Beast in Water," a track from Snowmine's debut Laminate Pet Animal , betrays a classical musician's ear for structure, orchestration, and drama. The first movement of "Beast in Air, Beast in Water" begins with languid guitars over percussion before hushed vocals enter the picture. More voices enter in harmony when the song bursts into its bright chorus. [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] Long before the term "twee" lost its subcultural cachet and Zooey Deschanel had her own sitcom on Fox, Lupe Núñez-Fernández was helping reshape the twee aesthetic as half of the shamefully overlooked indie-pop act Pipas . Alongside Londoner Mark Powell, the native Spaniard Fernández whipped up songs in fleeting bursts which were precious (though never cloyingly so). Pipas built a modest yet exceptionally ardent fan base by taking a relaxed approach to their performances-one I caught a decade ago was dappled with apologies for missed chords or botched lyrics-but [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] The first thing you should know about René Breton is that it's a band and not an individual. René Breton is the Nashville duo of Ryan Hurtgen and Tobin Sio, and their name is a nod to French poet and author of the Surrealist Manifesto , André Breton. Indeed, the band claims their new record, Asleep in Green , is "a modern, surrealist journey, which represents the subconscious mind during sleep." I, for one, welcome such highfalutin [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] Although "Bugs" begins with a folksy veneer, it soon reveals itself to be much more than a wispy strum-along. Eschewing the alternative acoustics of acts like Fleet Foxes, O'Death instead opt to craft songs which make respectful nods toward the stringed music of Appalachia but whose wingspan lifts them to far loftier heights. Through a whirl of fiddle, banjo, and ukulele (in addition to more traditional rock'n'roll accompaniment), the New York City quintet showcases intricately interwoven melodies against singer Greg Jamie's feathery vocals. [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] I don't smoke, but after listening to "Yer Spring" I feel like I need a cigarette. The opening track from Newfoundland, Canada six-piece Hey Rosetta! 's new LP, Seeds , is the kind of song that takes a lot out of a listener, an epic in miniature whose intensity escalates to greater and greater levels like a fireworks display ramping up to the finale. Bandleader Tim Baker has said "this is a song about that looking for a spring, [...]
Check out Aloe Blacc perform a few tracks off of his Good Things album with String Section in Berlin. Videos like this are the reason I love music. Each artist brought their sound and it mesh incredibly well in the video above. Take a quick 15 minute break from work today and check this out.
Although the headline of this post refers to Aloe Blacc's performance in Berlin with a string section, there's actually a lot more going on here. The above short film from MADE , Moments , also features the work of musician Mihalj Kekenj and artist Jaybo. In particular, you get to watch as the latter puts together a gorgeous piece based on Blacc's " I Need a Dollar ." As for Kekenj, he leads the string section in their interpreting tracks from the singer's 2010 album, Good Things , such as "Loving [...]
three weeks ago i got to see my first concert of 2011. i was really excited that nite because it was an opportunity to spend time with a sexy lady that really gets my blood flowing. i took my wife to see Esperanza Spalding. i was especially delighted because i really love her and have written before about how much ( click here ) . i'm talking about Esperanza not my wife. oh wait, i love her too! it was also a "date nite" for us. and we don't have many of those. [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] Although his name will be new to many, Rusty Willoughby 's recording career stretches back twenty-five years to his first release with Pure Joy . Following his work with that band, Willoughby led Flop through a series of records for the Sony and Frontier labels before releasing the first of two solo LPs in 1999. His third effort under his own name, Cobirds Unite , is a fitting testimonial to a quarter-century spent writing [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] Loch Lomond 's "Elephants & Little Girls" is built upon a base of maudlin strings, acoustic guitar, and dew-dropped glockenspiel. It's an exposition for a strange tale where vocalist Ritchie Young suggests a ride on an elephant (respectfully exotic) and subsequently on a little girl (outright strange). The lyrics "We'll go somewhere warmer / We'll go somewhere new" offer an escapist promise, yet even as the chant "Now we're having fun / now we're living life" begins, the mood doesn't exactly lift. The song never promises [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] As 2010 begins to wind down, music writers begin to turn their collective attention to year end lists and best of features, trying to make sense of twelve months' worth of new music and take stock of the cream of the crop. One record which deserves to be on everyone's "Best Albums" rankings-but which will likely get overlooked more often than not-is The 1900s Return of the Century , the latest (and greatest) collection of the Chicago band's winsome, 1970s inspired indie-pop released by Parasol Records . [...]
[ download ] [tweetmeme] Though hardly intended to be a seasonal touch, Mariage Blanc 's "Whatever You Say I Am" actually kicks off with a few seconds of sleigh bells before launching into a full-fledged melodic onslaught. But like the true spirit of the holidays, Mariage Blanc favor largesse. Picture the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania five-piece in the studio wanting to give their fans "more of everything!" No less than four distinct melodies (guitar, vibraphone, vocals, horns) intertwine during the first verse before the vocals stretch out at the chorus to fill the wide [...]
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