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Lesbian Afternoon's Michael Koenig seems to have some sort of checklist up on the wall in his studio that breaks down all of my favorite things about a song. I like reverb. I like messiness. I like it when the bass is a little louder than it should be. And in terms of evolutionary theory, I really like it when a song claws its way out of the primordial ooze and quickly develops the ability to play stringed instruments and clap in time. Easter Island seems like a scary place to be for the first few minutes you're there, but it gradually turns out to be quite pleasant.
More fabulous bedroom electro from Bremen, Germany's Kimono Kops, who tapped their Japan (the band) and Depeche Mode fancies for new tune "The Trade," a glib bit of dark new wave that sounds like it retained some sonic glitter through the trans-continental file transfer. The usual suspects are around: the juvie synths, the clap-heavy beats, some vogue-y m/f duetting; is nu-wave the nu-rave of '09? We're not hating.
"Breathe" is the new single from Ghanian-born, Brooklyn-based MC Blitz The Ambassador, a song crammed with big, braggy horns, and some seriously ill fret-burning in the background, like on a Battlestip if you listen carefully. The jam comes from his new album Stereotype, due for release soon in '09 and featuring guest spots from the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, J. Ivy, and longtime collaborator Optiks. It promises more of the hefty, confident stuff you're hearing in "Breathe," so this'll likely be one of the sleeper breakthroughs of the year, especially if (like us) you're tired of hearing about the same seven "rappers to watch in '09."
I always like it when remixers take the original track's intentions into account when fiddling with their own version. Take "First One" by Swedish producer Jens Loden, for example: an acidic wobbler at heart with a penchant for phased ticks and tucks, the track is carved into something more lithe and mobile by André Lodemann. Although its movements are more melodic and tech-house oriented, the burning darkness remains, just turned over and over by burbling delay. Two excellent sides to the same coin on Fine Art Recordings.
Sounds like: Matthew Dear, 909s and 303s making babies
Golden Boots is Dimitri Manos and Ryen Eggleston, two vagabonds from eastern PA that found themselves and one another under the heavy suns of Tuscon, Arizona. Specializing in tumbleweed pop that's been painstakingly filtered through miles and miles of American highway and tape, the two are preparing this month to release Winter of Our Discoteque, a forthcoming full-length celebration of their own weirdo Americana imaginings. "Love Is In The Air" is a real spicy meatball of a cut from that new album. Find it and hold it below.
How old is this video? Old enough that Skinner was still using the neighborhood photo lab to process his party pictures instead of Facebook. For someone with internet moves like him (most updated MySpace blog ever right here,) this video became dated pretty quick.
"It's all over now...Rock 'n' Roll is shit. It's dismal. Granddad danced to it. I'm not interested in it..I think music has reached an all-time low - except for The Raincoats."
That's one of the most blithely hyperbolic Johnny Rotten quotes, the kind that kept NME and Melody Maker all a-tingle for a good decade or so. While I'm not quite ready to sub London's Wetdog for the sublime Raincoats, I can definitely relate to Mr. Lydon's excitement at hearing the scraping and mewling of the new. "8 Days" has a simplicity and a lived-in newness that's both disarming and pleasantly off-putting, and I don't mind admitting that I'm a complete sucker for the British female voice. Their set was the centerpiece of one of my most enjoyable nights out in Albion, and I hope this song can do the same for you now.
Sounds Like: The Raincoats, Liliput, The Slits, The Fall
Alexandra Hope is a one of the brightest things to heat up the sub-zero New year....Minnesota-born but raised in Paris, she reminds me of a coy, guitar-totting Charlotte Gainsbourg infused with nonchalant sexy rock attitude. This song is a blissed-out folk ode to surviving the cold, luring us to huddle under the covers for another hour with the song on repeat as snow gracefully falls outside. She's cracking into the NY music scene with a debut album, Invisible Sunday, produced by David Muller (Fiery Furnaces) and released on Manimal (Rainbow Arabia, Hecuba, Bat For Lashes). Watch out!
Amidst some aqueous organ and a few prophetic lines from leadsingerDjangoHaskins (yes, dude's name is actually Django,) "Til My Voice Is Gone" begins like it's actually being played from the "seawall" Haskins sings about, a place where we imagine you can see orcas and sea lions and the water isn't overly salty. Then the drums kick in, and this tune turns into something like Whiskeytown on anti-depressants, super-optimistic Americana for the weekend warrior crowd. The Old Ceremony's third album Walk In Thin Air drops on February 9, so make sure to pick that up if this is your speed, it's solid.
Bergen resident Bård Aasen Lødemel - occupying RCRD LBL's interests here as Skatebård - makes the kind of music that only ever seems to emanate from Scandinavia; his dance, while betraying the influence of Chicagoan house, Detroiter techno and southern European disco, is breatharian clean, virginal in its glacial freshness and epic in its questing gaze. Pulled from recent album Cosmos, "Skatebård Loves You" is representative of that LP's frosted sex, jacking synths spurred on and ahead by tight, insistent bass and the coy vocal refrain whose promise of love melts ice, setting goo flooding into your ears, warming insides in time for the drugged Morse and euphoric breaks Njaal brings to his version of "Kosmos".
![The Twelves - Be My Crush [The Juan MacLean's B-LIVE Rio Mix]](/cms/rcrdlbl/albums/99c370a6215e50a7c6104999e04a6b1f_tiny.jpg)
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