Maps and Atlas - Old and Gray
I like Maps and Atlases but their new album doesn’t quite do it for me. Maybe it’ll grow on me… If i let it, that is.
This song I really like though. It sorta gets boring half way through but if you’re a bit patient, there’s a refreshing change of tempo 4.30 mins in, so bear with it… Or not, whatever.
The Shins - The Rifle’s Spiral
Cool animation music video directed by Jamie Caliri, featuring three sinister gentlemen, a magician and a giant rabbit.
Andre Wyatt - It Won’t Let You Go
Michael Cragg via the Guardian:
“Isn’t there more to life than world tours, indie cred and empty pockets?” So pondered a press statement released on behalf of all the members of Ingrid, a new record label set up by Miike Snow, Lykke Li, Peter Bjorn & John and Teddybears. “Couldn’t we be creating straight from the heart right to the people without any middle hands?” it continued. Well, yes, and it looks like they’re doing just that with the announcement of a new compilation, Ingrid Volume 1, released in conjunction with Record Store Day on 21 April.
Opening with Come Near, a brand new track by Lykke Li, and featuring all the artists and band members associated with the label, the compilation has been teased not only by a two-minute mix (which you can listen to here) but also two full tracks: John from Peter Bjorn & John’s side project Hortlax Cobra’s “Berlin” and “It Won’t Let You Go” by Miike Snow’s Andrew Wyatt. The latter verges on schmaltz, with sweeping strings, dancing flute filigrees and big gusts of brass, but it has a loping quality that makes it sound like a drunken waltz. In a good way.
Bright Moments - Milwaukee Protocol
Bright Moments = Kelly Pratt, a multi-instrumentalist who’s worked with Arcade Fire, Beirut, St. Vincent, and David Byrne. “Milwaukee” is from his debut album Natives. Another track I dig is “Tourists”, the rest of the album doesn’t particularly rock my world. Both “Tourists” and ” Milwaukee” sound a bit too much like Beirut but that’s probably why I find them so catchy.
Dont’ be afraid, it’s only water
Listen to “Tourists” => HERE
OK Go - Skyscrapers
New video. Though it’s a lot simpler than some of their other videos, this is still beautiful. Hell, even the mouseover on the video link is interesting.
A toss up between a like and a reblog
Santigold - Disparate Youth
Howl at the Moon - Squalls
Katie Scott has an old soul; and every song from Howl At The Moon’s sophomore release Squalls carries that lovely weariness to it. Squalls was composed over many years, beginning in Scott’s hometown. Maori culture and all its spectres played a big role in her formative songwriting years. Track one ‘Caught By The Sun’; a moody, sexy tumble into Scott’s wonderful vocal work and the excellent gritty guitar of Matthew Storey, tells the legend of Mauao. A nameless hill fell in love with another. Her heart already belonged to a mountain. The nameless one, behest with sorrow, had his bulk thrown into the ocean where it gouged out the walls of a valley. And so Scott’s hometown was born, from the rubble of preternatural heartbreak.
PJ Harvey comparisons are bound to be rife here in lieu of the similarly wrought and wonderful vocal talent of Scott, but there are echoes of stronger influences throughout Squalls. Track three ‘The Hostage’ has a doo-wop feel carried in spangly guitars that gives way to a glorious crescendo of a chorus- sixties pop cavorting with late nineties, Radiohead-esque indie rock. ‘Black coffee’ is exactly what the day after the night before feels like: the sheets of someone else’s bed, the throb of a heavy head, and the animal that overcomes you when you’re the near the limbs of someone you’re besotted with. This song reminds of Cat Power’s unkempt sexiness circa Moon Pix. Blackhearted Charlie is could almost be a Grinderman song; it revels in the narrative and showcases Mark Renall’s bass talents- his riffs drive the guts of many songs here.
The crescendo of Squalls is the wonderful ‘Let The Mainsheets Down My Love’, where all HATM’s members create a cacaphonic, tempo-shifting anthem, giving way to the whole band proclaiming in sync- ‘We are done with it’. It’s row your boat into a dark ocean alone kind of stuff. My very favourite track, one that I’ve played on repeat, drenching myself in its beauty, is the closer ‘I Just Want To Hold Your Hand’. The melody of this track is just wonderful- it’s Yorke-ishly captivating and has all the gut-wrenching drive of the late great Elliot Smith. This song slays me- it is what lonely nights wanting after someone feels like.
Behind the music and with every measured drum beat there’s a twinge threatening to spill through; a latent pain haunting the background. There’s wonderful build and space to this album without taking from the excellent grit of Howl at the Moon- producer and engineer Myles Mumford has done an excellent job of creating balance and exposing the intricacies of Squalls.
Howl At The Moon are one of the most determined and talented bands around; and I hope Squalls throws them into the spotlight they deserve. Squalls will stay with you- it is a compelling, honest and often crushing compendium of Scott’s experiences- every wrought and lovely moment. We’ve been real lucky in Melbourne of late- strong, talented women are making rad music and carrying bands as well as the men are. Climb into the boat HATM have built for you and let this wind take you to a dark place, where lovelorn hills sacrifice themselves to the ocean to the wash of mesmeric, haunting melodies.
Dirty Projectors - Gun Has No Trigger
New album this year… I’ll defo try to catch them live next time they come through town.
Sigur Rós - Ekki Múkk
The first taste of their follow up to 2008’s hugely successful Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust, this time forgivingly titled Valtari. It’s basically 7 odd minutes of me thinking to myself; “Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cr-I MUST FILL THE WORLD WITH MY TEARS”.
Azealia Banks - Fuck Up The Fun
I usually hate smack talk/bravado in rap songs but she makes it so much fun.
Sigur Ros announce new album
Valtari is due May 28 and the name translates as “steamroll.” Wonderful news for a Monday morning.
Tracklist
Ég Anda
Ekki Múkk
Varúð
Rembihnútur
Dauðalogn
Varðeldur
ValtariVia TwentyFourBit
Plan B - iLL Manors
Visceral.
Ben Drew sounds like a good guy who has something to say => ref to his interview on BBC Radio 1Xtra => HERE
CHAV = Council-Housed And Violent
[feature-length film to be released in May]
Grilled Lamb Heart, grilled treviso, fava bean hummus, ramp vinaigrette. (Taken with Instagram at American Grocery Restaurant)
