Tuesday, April 28, 2009

John Vanderslice - Fetal Horses


John Vanderslice is the latest artist to offer up a unique incentive for those looking to purchase his album (Not -quite- as involved as of Montreal's last album, but hey). If you're one of the first 100 to pre-order his upcoming release, Romanian Names, included with your order will be a portion of analog tape from the cutting room floor from the album's sessions. Once its yours, you then own it and can go all Girl Talk with it and turn it into a mashup with a Three 6 Mafia song or whatever. Details here, first Romanian Names single below.

Mp3: John Vanderslice - Fetal Horses (via JohnVanderslice.com)

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Black Lips - Short Fuse


I couldn't completely get into Black Lips until finally seeing them live a few weeks back. Their music is pretty much unabashed Garage Rock (with some elements of Punk), with continuous hooks throughout. Give it a listen below, that's really the best introduction. This'll probably be one of my favorite tracks of the year.

Mp3: Black Lips - Short Fuse

Monday, April 13, 2009

Outside Lands Festival Announcement

Just caught this excellent promo video for San Francisco's Outside Lands Festival. Creative, funny, and a pretty gigantic lineup:

Tuesday, April 07, 2009

Dead Man's Bones - Name In Stone

It's not too often that an actor or actress can successfully transition from working in films to making interesting music. If you're thinking Bruce Willis or Jennifer Love Hewitt bucked the trend, you should stop reading, because you're not going to like this. Ryan Gosling, however, who is probably best known for starring in "Lars and the Real Girl" and "The Notebook," is apparently a pretty good musician. His new project, Dead Man's Bones, is most noticeably reminiscent of Arcade Fire, if for nothing else than that press photo above. Seriously, though, check out the two live singles the band has released below. You'll probably like them both.

Friday, April 03, 2009

Neko Case - This Tornado Loves You


After the large undertaking of working on the Sasquatch! 2009 mixes, I had some trouble deciding what artist/track to feature next up here. Just as I had resigned myself to waiting for the next one to strike me, the weather went crazy in Tallahassee, with tornado/flood/hail warnings all over (including a jarring siren & "Seek Shelter!, Seek Shelter!" speaker announcement on campus yesterday evening). This led me to have a pretty vivid dream that I was at home in NY and looked out the window to see a giant Tornado spinning overhead. When combined with seeing the poster above (for sale here) in Austin, and reading a great article about Neko Case (who incorporates the weather/nature as a theme throughout her latest album) in this month's Paste (abbreviated version here), I decided to take the sum of events as a sign. Neko has probably my favorite voice of any female vocalist today, and she has made a number of great records already. Her latest, Middle Cyclone, takes yet another step forward, pairing her vocal range with songwriting that builds upon past efforts. Check out album standout "This Tornado Loves You" below.

Stream: Neko Case - This Tornado Loves You

Video: Middle Cyclone Album Preview
Buy: Neko Case - Middle Cyclone