Michael Hedges and Leo Kottke playing Kottke's "Theme from Doodles." One of the coolest little acoustic guitar tunes around.
My friend just released an album. If you like complex and crazy electro, give it a listen. http://foil.bandcamp.com/album/handsome-pixels
Their new album, Bye Bye Bayou, is throwing me around the room. A Swiss band singing Cajun songs in a garage-punk style, produced by Jon Spencer is driving me wild.
Presented without comment: Edit: OK, I lied about the no comments thing. If you can - if you DARE - see if you can make it to minute 16, when the drummer goes all "Wipeout" over Billy Joel's scale exercises and they start CHANTING.
God DAMN that is really good. Kirian give me albums or song titles, I need more. Have you listened to Balmorhea at all? You might like them. This kind of expansive, lush, thematic chamber-music sound reminds me of them.
That's Sharks Took The Rest. They're from Newcastle, they have a single called Rename the Planets, an EP called Grounds for Hearts to Swell (Spotify link) and they've released an LP this year called Too Late for Logic. The LP and EP have some cross-over, but the LP is almost impossible to find. I can't see it available for sale anywhere, and they self-published it so I'll have to try and see them live to get hold of it. That's the extent of my knowledge, I'm afraid. I'll give Balmorhea a listen, I haven't heard of them. That song's definitely got similarities to The Cinematic Orchestra or what I remember of them, at least.
http://youtu.be/t-PNeHq-Krs I've been listening to these guys. I have no idea what genre of electronic music it is, but I like it. (And for some reason I can't embed it.)
Kirian - thanks for the info, I'll definitely see if I can find that LP for purchase somehow. Probably because you're using a short YouTube link - BF likes long links but doesn't know what to do with the truncated ones, so if you mark the Long Link checkbox under the Share button on Youtube, you'll get the full URL.
Sorry to necromance this remark, but as someone who loved Justice, did anyone else sort of think that sound was going to be a bigger deal than it turned out to be? And it's odd to me that Dilemn never made that much of a mark.
I came across Supergrass recently and just picked up their 10 year album to try them out. I really like the range of what they did over their career.
How To Destroy Angels' new EP comes out tomorrow, and it's up on Soundcloud right now. If you're a fan of NIN/Reznor's later work (Ghosts I-IV especially, or The Social Network soundtrack) you should check it out. Of course if you're already a fan of NIN, Reznor, or HTDA you probably have already listened to it.
I've been a fan of NIN since something like 1990. I was disappointed to see them/him retire, but I was also enthused to see Trent teaming up with new talent (even if this new talent was a spouse) to put out new music. After everything I've heard from HTDA over the years, I can say without bias or resentment, they suck. The vocalist sucks. They should just stop. Anyway, in other news, I'm glad to hear that NIN is coming out of retirement and will be putting out more music some time in the future. Whether this new music will be in the form of an album or just movie & game soundtracks or something has yet to be seen. But, perhaps we'll get back to songs that deliver at least some sort of emotive expression.
Did you like any of NIN's later stuff, or just the earlier 90s stuff? Because musically the only difference between HTDA and Ghosts are the vocals.
I liked most of everything, with the exception of With Teeth. My favorites are undeniably the early stuff (meaning albums, remixes and soundtrack stuff from the PHM, Broken & The Downward Spiral eras), but I still listen to newer NIN stuff as well. And yea, as it's the vocals that I called out, I'll say that it's Maandig's vocals specifically that I have the hardest time coming to terms with. They're so leaden, sterile... and lacking of any personality whatsoever. For all intents and purposes she sounds as programmed as the synth, but this doesn't seem intentional given how little her delivery style adds to the music. As little as her vocal input does for me, I'd call her singing more unremarkable than outright distracting. The only reason they bother me at all is that I don't see the point of them even being there, as the songs seem as though they'd be just about the same without her (leaving the music feeling as dry as the Ghosts releases). But that doesn't mean the songs wouldn't sound better if they featured other vocal talent instead. As for the other vocals on their stuff (namely Trent), I don't mind Trent singing backup (or not singing at all) on a track, as is the case with HTDA, but it's always kind of odd when the backup outshines the lead. Some folks have it, some folks don't. I haven't yet heard anything from Maandig to help propel her out of the latter camp. P.S. If you're unfamiliar with the YT song I linked, that's an 80s song released by Rockwell (the son of a record label executive of some sort) which features background vocals performed by Michael Jackson (during his hey day). It was a big hit, but not because of anything in particular Rockwell brought to the table.
I saw NiN in 2008? It was pretty disappointing, but I only really listened to their 89-early 90s era (though it was before my time). I think what really broke the live experience for me was when some dude next to me freaked out that NiN using an upright acoustic base (in the vain of "o what an artisite" and yeah, I'm totally an objective rememberer of this and not some judgmental fuck) at a fucking (semi)indie music festival in which half the bands were using all acoustic instruments. O yeah, This has been my jam lately.
Fair enough, I respect your opinion even though I disagree with it. I listen to very few female vocalists and she's one of the few I like. (Also: Neko Case.) There are people who don't know this song? Heh! I remember as a kid the video freaked me out. Didn't want to close my eyes when I washed my hair in the shower after that.
Awesome song and super cute video. Hopefully I'll get to see Kid Koala live before he succumbs to carpal tunnel syndrome. Just wait for the fat, fat bassline. Even a huge dork like me's got rhythm when listening to this.
Picked up what will almost certainly be the first of a long, long line of Sonic Youth releases mining their ridiculous vault of unreleased stuff they've accumulated over a thirty-year career: Smart Bar Chicago 1985. A phenomenal live recording of Bad Moon Rising era Sonic Youth, with the EVOL highlight "Expressway To Your Skull" tacked on for good measure. In classic live rock record terms, this is their Velvet Underground's Live At Max's Kansas City, if you dig me. More importantly, the record will teach you a couple of things: 1) Sonic Youth went through a lot of drummers before nabbing a then-young Steve Shelley, who was the drummer from EVOL on. I adore Steve Shelley, and I think he was the secret ingredient that really helped focus the strengths of the band post-Bad Moon Rising. That said, the guy he replaced, Bob Burt, brings a pretty ferocious energy to this recording that pleasantly surprised me. 2) The douchebags at every concert who feel compelled to WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! during any semi-quiet moment do not make any exceptions for "Expressway To Your Skull". Fuck you, anonymous hipster fuckstick from thirty years ago.
That's good stuff! Was it really hard to find decent hip-hop? Have you listened to anything by The Roots, Tribe Called Quest, Talib Kweli, De La Soul, Substance Abuse, Pharcyde, Common, etc? You might like them too.
To be honest, I haven't looked for hip hop. The stuff in the charts seemed so repugnant that I just didn't have an interest in looking further. I've become acclimatised to it though from having a fair amount of trip hop (which I like) show up in my last.fm with the occasional bit of hip hop, but that song really made me sit up and pay attention.
Why hello there new Mindless Self Indulgence... Also related kickstarter: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1268472090/brand-new-mindless-self-indulgence-record
I am sorry you discovered the flaming lips. Have some 70s dreampop about Yuri Gagarin, from a group who you can't not dance to:
Youtube video embeds don't seem to want to take so my late-90s nostalgia has to go through Vimeo and some guy's video of clouds.
What did you discover? Because I am That Guy, here are their albums in descending order of magnificence: The Soft Bulletin Clouds Taste Metallic Transmissions from the Satellite Heart Embryonic Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots In a Priest Driven Ambulance At War with the Mystics Hit to Death in the Future Head Telepathic Surgery Oh My Gawd Hear It Is The top 6 are all brilliant; the bottom three are not really worth listening to. Zaireeka is not ranked, because I do not have, and have never had, four CD players.
I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that there is at least a couple of people here who like Jonathan Coulton. Jonathan Coulton has a new record with John Roderick (of The Long Winters, who are responsible for the song at the top of MBMBaM, and he's also the other guy on Nemeses). It's a Christmas record. I only recognized one of the songs in this video from a previous Coulton release (he's had a couple of Christmas songs): The record is for sale at www.OneChristmasAtATime.com if you are interested. I've also been enjoying They Might Be Giants recently. Specifically, a record that I probably ought not to, on account of it is for babies: Is it wrong that I like this? I feel like it's wrong that I like this. Maybe not like I should have to tell people that I live in their neighborhood, but, you know, it's in the vicinity. I also kind of wonder why they haven't done Here Comes History, since you could practically assemble something along those lines from their back catalog at this point (they are apparently cooking a new album "for grown ups" right now, if you're curious as to what they're doing).
