February 2010
70 posts
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The High Wire: The Sleep Tape
Words: Gareth O’Malley
If ever there was a case of the production saving an album from being one hell of a letdown, this would be it. The major problem with London group The High Wire’s 2008 debut was that there was simply not enough substance behind the hazy guitars and lush arrangements. The band worked better as a live proposition than they did on record, which is why we...
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Freelance Whales: Generator 2nd Floor
Words: Emmy Droege
Why does it seem that so many musical groups these days christen their band by including the name of a mammal? Arctic Monkeys, Animal Collective, Modest Mouse, Animal Kingdom, Band of Horses, Wolf Parade, and the list goes on. Okay, so some of these bands aren’t exactly that new to the scene, and there is no reason for this irrelevant fact other than pointing out that another...
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UK Music Releases: March 2010
March 1st
Frightened Rabbit - The Winter of Mixed Drinks [Audiovisuals: Nothing Like You] Blood Red Shoes - Fire Like This [mp3: Colours Fade] Errors - Come Down With Me [Audiovisuals: A Rumour In Africa] Two Door Cinema Club - Tourist History [Audiovisuals: Undercover Martyn] Joanna Newsom - Have One On Me Sambassadeur - European Ellie Goulding - Lights [Audiovisuals: Starry Eyed] Groove...
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Blood Red Shoes: Fire Like This
Words: Gareth O’Malley
Some would say that less is more. We’re sure that Blood Red Shoes, a duo, consisting of Laura-Mary Carter and Steven Ansell, would agree. They make a hell of a lot of noise for a two-piece, though - that’s something we can all agree upon.
The group probably also subscribe to the ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ school of...
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We Are Scientists: Rules Don't Stop
Words: Gareth O’Malley
Brace yourselves, everyone. We Are Scientists (once again a trio, with former Razorlight drummer Andy Burrows along for the ride) are back; some would say, in more ways than one.
The group gave broadening their horizons a try with 2008’s ‘Brain Thrust Mastery’. The album itself was, and still is, very good, but it’s safe to say that a lot of...
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Josiah Wolf - Jet Lag
words: Jamie Milton originally scribed for MusicOMH
Multi-instrumentalist and integral component of alternative hip-hop darlings Why?, Josiah Wolf, has taken a step aside from his customary project and all of a sudden, has committed an album of his own. Jet Lag is produced by brother and Why? frontman Yoni Wolf, but its parts are constructed solely by Josiah, who will surprise many with his...
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February, In Reviews
9.3 - Yeasayer - Odd Blood 9.1 - Screaming Maldini - Screaming Maldini and the Kookaburra 8.7 - Marina and the Diamonds - The Family Jewels 8.5 - Shearwater - The Golden Archipelago 8.5 - So Many Dynamos - The Loud Wars 8.3 - Los Campesinos! - Romance Is Boring 8.3 - Midlake - The Courage of Others 8.2 - Pilotlight - The Post War Musical 8.1 - Errors - Come Down With Me 8.0 - Fionn Regan - The...
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WatchAudiovisuals
Four Tet - Angel Echoes
Taken from the stunning ‘There Is Love In You’
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Xiu Xiu - Gray Death
Taken from ‘Dear God, I Hate Myself’
mp3 [via Stereogum]
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Liars - Scissor
Breathtaking lead single from ‘Sisterworld’ now has an equally breathtaking video.
mp3
Via Pitchfork
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Lightspeed Champion - Life Is Sweet! Nice To Meet...
words: Jamie Milton
Whatever one says about Test Icicles, they were unarguably, in a completely different zone to every other indie band of the time. They were a joke, yes. Diabolical at times also. A sham. But they were pretty different. The consensus around former third of the band Dev Hynes - now Lightspeed Champion or alter ego Blood Orange - is that he’s a complete world apart from...
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The Middle East: The Recordings of the Middle East
Words: Emmy Droege
Gentle. That’s just one adjective, out of the many, to describe The Middle East, a not-so-new band from Australia. To start off with, the vocal fragility on the opening track, The Darkest Side, may cause Belle and Sebastian fans to wonder if Stuart Murdoch has abandoned his Scottish homeland to sing in a balmier climate down under for this band’s debut EP, “The Recordings of...
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The Exhibition: Demo EP
Words: Gareth O’Malley
Wearing your influences on your sleeve isn’t exactly a bad thing. You have to be a radically forward-thinking band to be truly original these days. Yorkshire quartet The Exhibition certainly aren’t, but they can be forgiven that, for, as demos go, this is thoroughly decent.
The four-track EP sees them having a go at sounding like their favourite bands....
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Sambassadeur: European
Words: Gareth O’Malley
The three words ‘Swedish pop group’: What, or more appropriately who, do they make you think of? Yes, we’re guilty of the same thing; it’s a certain palindromically-monikered Europop quartet, right? We thought so.
Depending on where you stand with said quartet, you will either be pleased or disappointed to hear that Sambassadeur sound...
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Quick Fix: Field Music - S/T (Measure)
Released with Memphis Industries
words: Jamie Milton
20 tracks to cover. One paragraph to fit it into. A “quick fix” review might not do Field Music’s lengthy and progressive record justice. But here’s all you need to know: A great deal of records, when steering themselves over the hour-long mark, face a torrid time in winning over listeners/critics/you name it. It takes...
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Marina and the Diamonds: The Family Jewels
Words: Emmy Droege
La Roux. Lady Gaga. Florence and the Machine. All of these female vocalists that seemed pretty much omnipresent in 2009 will again win plenty of nods this year. Not so much because of their achievements, however, but for the comparisons to Marina and the Diamonds: eccentric singer Marina Diamandis. But fear not, Marina’s idiosyncratic lyrics, coupled with a distinctive...
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WatchAUDIOVISUALS: Liars - Scissor —— Review of ‘Sisterworld’ coming soon.
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Screaming Maldini - Screaming Maldini and the...
Words: Gareth O’Malley
Fans of the sadly-departed Situationists, rejoice! The band may have folded a long time ago (nine months ago to be precise, but it feels longer), but Screaming Maldini have risen phoenix-like from the ashes. They are a sextet, led by ex-Situationist Nick Maldini, feature five (count ‘em) vocalists, and use some brass instruments like trumpets and horns.
...
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Before I Explode: Minor Arcana
Words: Gareth O’Malley
Before I Explode are Sophie Wilkie and Jak Stephens, and they are clearly aiming for big things. The duo specialise in dream-pop, and they have struck gold with their new single. Fans of Bloc Party’s more ethereal side (say, ‘Silent Alarm”s ‘So Here We Are’) will find much to like here. ‘Minor Arcana’ is as immediate as the...
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Pilotlight: The Post War Musical
Words: Gareth O’Malley
If you’re a new band and you hail from the U.K., you keep plugging away and if you’re half-decent, you eventually get noticed. If you’re a new band from Ireland however, the sad truth is that if you want to be exposed to larger audiences, you are screwed unless you have something special going on. It’s notoriously hard to break out here, and...
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Quick Fix: Xiu Xiu - Dear God, I Hate Myself
released on Kill Rock Stars
Now officially alone, with former musical partner Caralee McElroy wandering off to Cold Cave, and sporting a title like ‘Dear God, I Hate Myself’, you’d expect Jamie Stewart to be hitting his paranoia-gone-dangerous peak. And certainly, ‘Grey Death’ hints that this could very well be the case. “Beat, beat me to death. I said...
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Quick Fix: Excepter – Presidence
Released on Paw Tracks
words: Steven Serrao Gutierrez
‘This is the sound of the band leaving Earth behind’. ‘Teleportation: KAL’ is presented as an abstruse electronic energy, KAL being one part of a six song suite of improvised live recording. Throughout this double-album from this Brooklyn six-piece, as a listener you are are placed in an immersive vocal glitch...
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Quick Fix: Pantha Du Prince - Black Noise
Released on Rough Trade words: Jamie Milton From 2007’s naturally-inclined ‘The Bliss’, Hendrick Weber aka. Pantha Du Prince has taken very little, choosing to evolve but perhaps allowing himself to stand out to a lesser extent than he did only three years ago. ‘Black Noise’ still showcases rich, human sounds in plentiful supply, although the rhythms and the...
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Shearwater - The Golden Archipelago
words: Emmy Droege
Hands down, the first organic album of 2010 goes to Shearwater. And I don’t mean in the generic rock ‘n’ roll terms either. There are plenty of magnificent soundscapes throughout The Golden Archipelago. This is the kind of organic that could stop global warming in its tracks. Okay, that’s a little too hippy-dippy. But listeners just might gain a deeper appreciation of mother...
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Stream: Lightspeed Champion - Life Is Sweet! Nice...
Another Soundcloud-related treat from Domino.
Quality follow-up to ‘Under the Lavender Bridge’ from Dev Hynes.
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WatchAUDIOVISUALS: The Antlers - Bear
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Taken from last year’s phenomenon, ‘Hospice’.
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Japandroids - Art Czars (mp3)
The first in a regular offering of 7” releases, to keep all of us happy whilst they work on a new album. Japandroids return from the age of ‘Post-Nothing’ with ‘Art Czars’.
It offers awkward rhythm and mid-tempo chants of “Here’s your money back, here’s your punk rock back”. It’s as intimate and raw as anything on the debut, but it...
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Baby Monster - She Comes Alive (mp3)
It’s nearly impossible to tell whether this song will wash over everybody or take the charts, the festivals, with a firm grip and total dominance. Are Baby Monster re-creating trends already past their time or are they refining popular sounds to make something that everybody will fall in love with?
‘She Comes Alive’, a desire-ridden, streamlined alternative rock song, displays...
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WatchAUDIOVISUALS: The Soft Pack - C’mon -
Stay tuned for a review of their self-titled debut album.
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Google vs. Music Bloggers - An Analysis:
words: Jamie Milton
“5 Years of work. Gone”.
Patrick Duffy will have had trouble accepting the complete disappearance of his music blog, the New York-based Pop Tarts Suck Toasted. Of course, he did however know exactly what had happened when reading the immortal words: “The blog you were looking for was not found.”
Turns out Duffy was among many to have their online...
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So Many Dynamos: The Loud Wars
Words: Gareth O’Malley
No band is un-pigeonhole-able. While that may be true for most bands, there are some that continue to push themselves outside the boundaries of genre: bands like These New Puritans, for instance, are sounding like no-one else but themselves. Animal Collective, too, have always managed to avoid being pinned down completely, even as their sound has taken on more...
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WatchAUDIOVISUALS: Another Pitchfork Premiere.
Another astounding song. Read our review of: Eluvium - The Motion Makes Me Last
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mp3 // alt
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Quick Fix: Phantogram - Eyelid Movies
Out now on Barsuk words: Jamie Milton
Phantogram don’t do things by halves. Their diverse debut album showcases gung-ho attempts at pop gone psychedelic, pop gone anthemic, pop gone hip-hop or pop gone ethereal. With each effort they pour in melody and atmosphere and whilst their songs are shaped with similar male-female vocals and delay-driven guitars to The xx, Phantogram show nothing...
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Quick Fix: M. Pyres & New Past Tense - S/T
Out now on Patient Sounds words: Jamie Milton You enter from one side of ‘M. Pyres & New Past Tense’ and you come out of a completely different end, into an unrecognisable landscape compared to the one you came from. Such is the contrast between opener and closer, both titled ‘Gravity Deluxe’ but with different, bracketed sub-titles to help differentiate the two. The...
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The MFM Blogroll:
Lost Lost Lost (Visit) Basement Fever (Visit) yvynyl (Visit) Hearing Gold (Visit) Real Horrorshow Tunes (Visit) No Fear Of Pop (Visit) NPIP (Visit) Dance Yrself Clean (Visit) Surfing On Steam (Visit) Unholy Rhythms (Visit) Disco Naivete (Visit) Gorilla Vs. Bear (Visit) Transparent (Visit) Sweeping The Nation (Visit) No Pain In Pop (Visit) Bitzl R (Visit) I Guess I’m Floating (Visit)...
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The Middle East - Beleriand (mp3)
top photograph: poveralice
Things are finally breaking through for a band who released their debut EP a good two years back. Now, it re-surfaces due to popular demand, and out steps one of the most exceptional Australian bands for some time: The Middle East.
And what proves this? ‘Beleriand’ does. It closes ‘The Recordings of The Middle East’ and when it first emerges,...
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WatchAUDIOVISUALS: Wild Beasts – We Still Got the Taste Dancin’ on Our Tongues
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From last year’s #2 album of the year, ‘Two Dancers’
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WatchAUDIOVISUALS: Jónsi - Go Do
—— Scroll below for our review. Or get clicking.