Blood Diamonds (feat. Grimes) – Phone Sex

Just came across this track and pardon my west coast slang but Grimes really does have one hella cool posse. Plus that Harajuku style art is rad enough to make Gwen Stefani jealous.

 

M83 – Reunion

Those creepy little telekinetic kiddies from the ‘Midnight City’ video are back with another instalment in their matter moving mind games, this time as a film clip for ‘Reunion’. Having escaped from what seemed to be some kind of top secret institution vaguely reminiscent of the X-Men, we find them up to their burning blue-eyed antics on the roof of a high-rise where the authorities pick up their scent and take up the chase once again. The kids have a more formidable foe this time in the form of an evil (because she has glowing red-eyes) little lady who looks a tad grumpy at having being left behind with the grown ups. The resulting showdown includes some pretty swish effects (It wouldn’t surprise me if they had a bigger budget than American Pie: Reunion) and leaves the saga open to the prospect of impossibly French sounding directors Fleur and Manu turning the story into a trilogy.

As a song, ‘Reunion’ drew the short-straw in getting asked to directly follow ‘Midnight City’ on last years masterpiece Hurry Up We’re Dreaming but ended up becoming a highlight itself by amazingly taking things up a gear when most of us thought it not possible. This clip manages to do like-wise and has the makings of being one of the best music video series since a couple of fellow Frenchmen in robot suits went all Manga on Discovery.

Azealia Banks – 1991 EP

I gotta admit I greeted the extreme hype surrounding Azealia when she exploded onto the scene last year with more than a little eyerolled scepticism. Given the flood of praise that was gushing her way on the back of very little output and having seen such blind love more often than not turn out to be a false alarm I wasn’t exactly in a rush to jump in and get swept along with the current. And while she’s still the name on everyone’s lips more than 6 months on, there’s now a little more context floating around to help get a handle on who we’re dealing with here.

While “212” is undoubtedly one of those dynamic bolts from the blue that captured the imagination of pretty much everyone and set itself down as a landmark it wasn’t until I heard “Jumanji” a couple of weeks ago that the wheels of admiration in my mind began to spin under heavy acceleration. Her words on that track just seem bubble and pop from her mouth, and that beat…it’s an irresistable force. It literally made me think “Okay I give in, we’ve got something here”.

 
Yesterday marked the release of Banks’ debut EP 1991 (her year of birth) arriving 2 days shy of her 21st birthday. It provides a home for “212” and the previously released “Liquorice”, also bringing 2 new cuts along for the ride. The first, a title track of house infused hip hop provides increasing layers of sampling so that Banks’ rapping slowly loses focus as if she’s dragging you away from the bar conversation towards the crowded club dancefloor. The second new track “Van Vogue” see Banks wrap her fast flowing verses around a sped up beat that propels with blistering forward momentum. This is contrasted though when her vocal flips to slo-mo giving her voice a freakily deep masculinity. Once the dog barking filled loops fade out we’re left with an unrecognisable Azealia ranting and laughing away in a studio tech disguised tone. It’s equal parts disturbing and amusing.

All four tracks here are excellent and more than confirm how good a rapper Banks is. The thing that really sets her apart from the pack though is the consistency in combining this natural ability with such fresh and exciting production. With a mixtape – titled Fantastic– due out shortly and a full length record touted for delivery later in the year we wont have to wait long to find out just how deep her bag of tricks is.

Chromatics – These Streets Will Never Look The Same

The Alberto Rossini series of Kill For Love videos continues with this 6th single from one of the best releases of 2012 so far. Shot in Mexico City, Las Vegas and Montreal it’s a fittingly dreamy visual accompaniment for album centrepiece “These Streets Will Never Look The Same”. Make sure you stay to the end for the Donna Summer tribute.

Savages – Husbands

 

By all reports there’s been some pretty serious chatter doing the rounds of London lately about a gang of post-punk playing ladies going by the name Savages. After one helluva debut performance in January (check out the first song of their first ever set below) the fearsome foursome of vocalist Jehnny Beth, guitarist Gemma Thompson, bassist Ayse Hassan and drummer Faye Milton admirably managed to grab the attention of the local scene without even recording a track. That was until a couple of days ago when the godfather of indie blogs, Pitchfork debuted and BNM’d their first single “Husbands”. And although having built their buzz exclusively through live shows meant there could be a letdown on the horizon, this inaugural recording does not disappoint one bit.

“Husbands” is a delightfully unsettling ride propelled by a heart-racing bassline that’s urgently calling for action to a restless late night realisation that all is not what it seems. Like a child’s imagination running wild in a pitch black room our protagonist finds the everyday turned into a familiar but skin-crawlingly dangerous imitation of itself. Breathy chants of “husbands” graduate along a scale of piercing tone eventually reaching a shrill violence that screeches for acknowledgement from a crowded, troubled mind. The resulting snapping point comes between verses as the paranoia turns guitars into chainsaw fueled carnage as suddenly and shockingly as if it’s sawn through the door to the room you’re standing in. It’s the zombie film-like horror of good turning evil as opposed to simply good versus evil that cloaks the song in a compelling “ill at ease” that somehow simultaneously repulses and excites.

 

M83 – Outro

M83’s grand orchestral finale to Hurry Up We’re Dreaming now has an unofficial but worthily Gonzalez endorsed video. Watch it below.

The Tallest Man On Earth – 1904

 


 
WikiAnswers tells me Swedish singer songwriter Kristian Matsson is 5’7″ meaning either WikiAnswers is broken or The Tallest Man On Earth stage name he goes by is meant to be an ironic reference to his modest stature. Let’s go with the latter.

As The Tallest Man On Earth, Matsson recently put the finishing touches on his latest LP There’s No Leaving Now which has an official release marked for June 8th in Australia. Lead single ‘1904’ picks up with his familiar folk-rooted strumming and that Dylan-esque croak of a voice which is especially reminiscent of the great man in some of the nasaly stretched out vowels found here. There’s a hopeful warmth in the uptempo guitar work on show which compliments the echo-tinged vocals that have been turned up high and take focus. Any specific meaning in the lyrics themselves though is difficult to unravel, seeming to exist more as a form of mildly interpretive poetry.

Matsson recently told Rolling Stone “I wanted to build something that didn’t sound like a rock band, but wasn’t super minimalistic” and this idea is played out in ‘1904’s’ added layer of twinkling electric guitar picking that helps to flesh out it’s texture and depth. The balance between stripped back and overcrowded is beautifully met and makes for a richly satisfying listen. Great signs for what’s to come.

Prince @ Rod Laver Arena 14/05/12

I’m a bit of a late-comer to the whole “Prince is a god” party but blimey am I glad I showed up because last night in Melbourne he taught us a lesson on how to do an arena show. He may be midget-like in stature but his ego needed every inch of space available in Rod Laver Arena. Confessing mid ‘Cream’ that “I wrote this song looking in the mirror” and shouting “He’s got too many hits!” during a medley that included ‘When Doves Cry’, ‘I Would Die 4 U’ and ‘Raspberry Beret’, this is a bloke that sure as hell ain’t lacking in the confidence department. And we love him for it, because while these sort of declarations from anyone else would probably come across as embarrassingly egotistical, coming from the man who practically owns the colour purple, you can’t help but chuckle and agree.

Despite plonking for the cheap ($99) nosebleeds, the projective abilities of the Prince production, which included his band the NPG (New Power Generation) and a legion of dancers such as the Australian “Twinz”, meant that there wasn’t a dud seat in the house. His enormous stage designed in the shape of his signature symbol occupied a large portion of the floor and was a sight in itself, constantly changing colour to suit the song he was currently playing or acting as a canvas for the amazing light show. His tricked-out piano, which looked like it had received a visit from Xzibit, was perched at the end of one of the stage junctures and had an electronic screen built into the sides which also displayed various themes throughout the performance.

The Prince stage.

Most of the music events I attend these days are of a far more intimate variety, so the novelty of the no-expense spared spectacle put on here wasn’t lost on me. The most impressive part though is that it was combined with a level of musicianship that’s miles removed from the usual pop fad acts that sell out this venue on a regular basis (yes I’m talking about you One Direction). Prince plays a guitar like a 13 year old kid plays Halo…he’s pretty much fucking unbeatable. I wouldn’t be able to keep up with his fingers on my air guitar. The riff at the end of ‘Let’s Go Crazy’ was probably my highlight of the night but there was barely a hit (and as he said there’s “too many”) that wasn’t touched on in some way or another, whether it be via one of his marvel inducing medley’s or an expectedly epic 15 minute rendition of Purple Rain. He also managed to pull off a “Princified” cover of fellow “King of Pop” nominee MJ’s ‘Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough’. Respect.

Once Prince and his posse had descended back below stage on the elevator platorm built in the middle of it for suitably grand entrances and exits, (for what we all assumed was the last time) the house lights came up to send us home. But whether pre-planned or not the prolonged ovation from the crowd urging the great man to return for one last hurrah earned us another encore. The fake-out ending was so well executed that hundreds of people were already well on their way home by the time Prince, about 10 minutes later, was wheeled back out in his box, (yes that’s right a box, like some kind of goddamn magician) to churn out a couple more crowd pleasers. Of course in that time of absence he’d alternated outfits to an all white suit and joked on return that “I was already at the after party”. By the time he’d sent his guitar into the audience (in what I assume ensued a near all-in-brawl for it’s possession) and said his farewells once again near enough to 3 hours after first arriving on stage it’s probably understating it to say I felt I’d gotten my money’s worth.

TV Girl – The Wild, The Innocent, The TV Shuffle

TV Girl have made a few appearances on this blog since it’s fairly recent birth but in the band’s most exciting news to date they’ve finally dropped upon us their first full-length release. The bonus for us is that it’s absolutely free! Download The Wild, The Innocent, The TV Shuffle HERE courtesy of Greedhead and Stereogum.

The Wild, The Innocent, The TV Shuffle (here on known as TWTITTVS) arrives in the spirit of the sample heavy Beastie Boys classic Paul’s Boutique, weaving threads of pop music history into an alternate tapestry. Throughout the 15 mostly unbroken tracks (Grover will let you know when to flip the record) you’ll find yourself playing the game of mentally untangling the layers of tunes that now immaculately co-exist as strands of DNA within this new and unique creature. According to the band there are around 86 borrowed noises on this bad boy that have undergone cross-pollination and now await re-introduction to our eardrums. You gotta hand it to these fellas, the result is something pretty damn neat.

While band members Brad Petering and Trung Ngo describe the album as a “mixtape” it could be seen as a somewhat modest term since this is much more than your run-of-the-mill John Cusack-style compilation. TWTITTVS showcases the pair’s talent for integrating sounds, genres and pop culture references with a self-deprecating wit that is becoming an early hallmark of their work (see the activity book that comes with the download). Intro ‘Keep Me Distracted’ sets things up with Ngo singing “There aren’t enough television shows or songs on radio to keep me distracted” as various vocal snatches float in and out of earshot. It’s like walking between rooms in a house where all the TV’s and radios have been left on and catching snippets of audio from each of them but rather than arriving nonsensically they play out like a preview of the coming attraction. It harks back to the spoken-word storytelling of The Avalanches on Since I Left You as if made from the cut-out letters in a magazine that usually form a ransom note.

 
The gorgeous string-drenched ‘I Wonder Who She’s Kissing Now’ follows and reverts to a more traditional verse/chorus/verse song-structure propped up by some retro-tinged loops. Although both Petering and Ngo alternate on lead vocal duties it’s Ngo whose honey-glazed pipes prove to be a perfect foil for the vintage pop scores that so often form the bedrock for these tunes (sorry Brad). A doo-wop era trilogy is rounded out with ‘Misery’ and ‘It Evaporates’ whose fingerprints (at least for this generation) might bring to mind the 50’s soundtracked adventures of Back to the Future or Stand By Me before ‘Mirror Mirror’ flags the record’s transition towards heavier hip-hop sanctioned beats, lyrical delivery and vocal samples.

The overarching theme of the record seems to be a reaction to the sonic overload of the modern technological age that’s causing the sheer volume of noise we hear each day to blend into one large indiscernable mess. The irony of this certainly isn’t lost on the band who have effectively brought themselves to the foreground of the conversation with their particular penchant for jam-packed collage-like soundscapes. ‘Loud And Clear’ addresses the subject most directly with Petering singing “Have you noticed how it all just blows together and melts away”. The song’s looped Buffalo Springfield bite asking “What’s that sound?” sums up TWTITTVS in referencing both the listeners experience of the record itself and the “too much is never enough” attitude being fueled by having near endless catologues of tunes available at our fingertips and oh so little time to hear them. The trouble with engulfing ourselves in sound is that eventually it loses it’s context and just becomes background noise. In stamping out the silence in our everday lives it ends up being the sound of silence that we hear loudest.

 
The release of the mixtape, something that had been touted on Twitter for quite some time eventually came last Friday May 4th. In a cruel twist of fate this was also the day that MCA lost his cancer battle. @tvgirlz openly tweeted of the direct influence the Beastie Boys (and more specifically Paul’s Boutique) had on the mixtape, from it’s more is less sample mantra and format to the use of Yauch’s voice counting “4 and 3 and 2 and 1” on final track ‘All A Dream’. The flood of tributes that washed in upon the sad news breaking illustrated just how deep an imprint MCA had left on the world but the eerie timing of it coinciding with the unveiling of TWTITTVS is one of those bittersweet instances of life turning what should have been a celebration into the proverbial “kick in the nuts”. The consolation to be taken is that TV Girl have provided us with a worthy and “none more” timely homage.

Although becoming a more common practice in recent times it is still a little astounding that the band have offered this to us for the price of a mouse click however the costs and legal complexities that come with such blatantly heavy sampling seemingly forced this stance. While a little financial recognition will always come in handy it was probably the liberation of knowing from the outset that they could mine their record collections without reproach that makes TWTITTVS such a richly textured listening experience. Rather than getting bogged down in the politics of the industry they’ve shown what can be achieved without it’s restrictions. ‘The Artist’ (Brad’s mum’s fave) encapsulates this attitude by embracing the idea that a lack of financial security is simply part of the job description and one way or another, if they’re good enough at what they do they’ll get by. Finding your audience is half the battle and in order to get the masses listening they’ve given themselves complete creative freedom by not allowing money to dictate their ideas. I hope like hell it works because this thing deserves some serious recognition. And even if the validation they receive doesn’t quite cover the bills, there’s always the option of marrying an heiress, mum’s already given her blessing.

 

Lower Plenty – Hard Rubbish

 
It’s always pleasing to be able to spruik the wares of an act from my own backyard so today I’m happy to be sharing a band I stumbled across very recently who go by the moniker Lower Plenty. Now for those of you who exist in a place far removed from Melbourne and dare I say for a lot of people who’ve lived in Melbourne their entire lives, it may come as news to you that Lower Plenty is firstly but no longer foremostly the name of an outer northern suburb of our fine city. It’s a place I myself know nothing about, it’s existence only ever confirmed by the odd name-check during some story plugging the gaps in the 6 o’clock news. But now some of Melbourne’s finest musicians, none of whom reside in Lower Plenty or have any affinity with the place are putting it on the map.

Of it’s members, Sarah Heyward, Al Montfort and Jensen Thjung are slightly more familiar for their output with acts including but not limited to Total Control, Deaf Wish, UV Race and Dick Diver but in following up a well received initial outing as Lower Plenty they’ve returned with an LP titled Hard Rubbish. It’s a casual but moody alt-country type affair, dotted with haphazard harmonies and was reportedly recorded in a single take. It’s the kind of record that feels like it’s already been worn in for you like a pair of old boots, all you have to do is slip them on to immediately feel at home.

‘Strange Beast’ is my highlight here, a brooding anti-duet on loneliness, the hopeless pleas of “dance with me strange beast” from the self-pitying duo seemingly falling on deaf ears. ‘Dirty Flowers’ follows with a rare taste of the band losing their cool, frantic strumming and a foreboding undercurrent of feedback building an illogical panic as if channelled from a disturbing dream. With most of the tracks pulling up under three minutes there’s an excellent economy of words throughout. An inspired example of this comes when “Nullabor” is coupled with (surely its ultimate Australian rhyming partner) “Commodore” in detailing a woman’s four-wheeled escape to a fresh start across the desert.

The varied, makeshift sounding percussion used throughout the 9 songs sounds like it has been improvised from the bits and pieces that have accumulated in the backyard over the years (see the cover art above) awaiting the hard rubbish collection. But like the rather subdued thuds, clinks and swishes that pace the record there’s no real urgency in the matter since in it’s current inhabitants eyes the junk just adds to the character of the place.

Clocking in at a tick over 23 minutes, Hard Rubbish is a charmingly humble album that will both chime into your share house coffee conversation and keep you company while you’re washing up afterward. But by the time final track ‘Close Enough’ concludes you’re likely to have the urge to pop the kettle back on and do it again.