SEVEN NOISES

Food Pyramid, a trio with guests from Minneapolis, have produced a trilogy of tapes called I, II and III that Moon Glyph has proudly made available mainly through their website. If you didn't get I and II yet it's already too late as they are sold out but you still have the chance of graping the third volume with your dirty hands. Food Pyramid's music is retro-futuristic, they can sometimes sound close to Kraftwerk and other closer to Neu! but they always put emphasis in rhythm, science fiction sounds, space and experimentation. The three tapes, although produced in only a year they sound more varied than what you can expect from the beginning, some songs containing more dance elements than others, some others even flirting with some free jazz elements. A compilation on vinyl with some of the best songs from the tapes would be more than welcome. Dixit.

On these days when everything seems to be done, invented and everything that appears in our lives seems an upgrade or a v0.2 of something done before is not strange that the mix-match of genres you could never think working together was an option, they suddenly appear to melt in a more than convincing way. Both Grimes and D'Eon explore and flirt with genres commonly attached to the mainstream, things like 80s RnB or proto-house but never seeing them as fixed unmovable styles and stranging them as brecht used to strange his characters (distorting the initial image in order to get a different product that may work both as a tribute and a parody of the imitated thing). While Grimes approach the dance and electronic elements icing them with a voice that sounds mysterious and helium treated, dark and warm and too high pitch for general taste, D'Eon sounds more soulful and when they doesn't hide the songs behind a cascade of uncontroled beats or interference noises they are able to create songs (transparency) that could have surfaced the mainstream 25 years ago.

Although the results of this long split EP is different and both sides are defined by a certain sound, the approach of both bands is a similar construction / decunstruction that works very well together and brings them closer than they have ever been before. It's obvious to see that, although the EP was performed individually it was concived together.
Out now on Hippos In Tanks

D'EON - TRANSPARENCY


GRIMES - VANESSA

Sometimes, the combination of a concrete kind of sounds can, surprisingly, result into something you didn't expect. Holy Other sounds warmer than what you could think, not only because of its name or the record covers, but also because mixing dark ambient, cold beats and haunted voices should always result into something dark and spooky but Holy Other is more the light at the end of the tunnel.

Don't misunderstand me: the record mixes strangeness and sadness, darkness and obscurity but also a seductive and sensual warmness which makes the whole think very enjoyable in any situation. Although it's mainly electronic and it has beats all around is more floaty and enjoyable in the intimacy of a room than expected to be danced or listened to in bigger spaces. It's music to move slowly to, music to listen with all your body rather than with just one sense. It's inspiring and it definitely doesn't come from a dark place but from its exit. And, of course, it's out on Tri Angle Records

I introduced you to Boy Friend some months ago, just after some weeks of formation when they released a digital download only 4 track EP you can still get in here. From the ashes of the former Sleep Over as a trio (now is just one of the original members with some outside help) Christa and Sarah left to form Boy Friend a similar sounding project that, although it's just months in the working, they already released their first physical single this week, the haunting and delicate Lovedropper on Hell, Yes!, accompanied on the B side by a re-working of the first EP song D'Arrest. For the A side of the single they've prepared a day-glo video that is meant to be seen vertical. I mean, instead of the normal horizontal landscape view, Boy Friend asked Amanda Joy to make a video and they decided vertical was the way to go, taking into consideration the video would only be seen on-line, where anything is possible as TV screens are no longer the place to watch music videos anymore and the web is a more free way of exploring new possibilities and formats for what is already a quite old form of art.

And as I mentioned Austra on my previous post and they're putting a new single out next week, I think it's fair to refer to it as well. Katie's newest project is getting more popular after the media attention her previous single, Beat and the Pulse, got on-line and the fact she's releasing through Domino could have helped as well. But she kept the most dance-oriented and killer track from the album to be the second single, the one coming immediately (one week) before the long debut release. If this song doesn't get played all around we'll just get another proof the world is unfair, as it's destined for mass transmission.

The video, a massive work of surrealism and symbolism, mixes playing cards, fights and fake tan in a way Katie uses to (check her other videos). It probably won't be shown much on MTV but, anyway, MTV doesn't play videos anymore.

Well, that's the second try I do resuscitating the blog after a very busy period of time, holidays and other stuff that, taking into account this is a one person job and I have to do it during my every time less and less free time, I cannot promise it's going to be more regular from now on or, if I find impossible to carry it on, it may disappear between all the blogs that passed away during our modern and disposable times.

Terror Bird was a Vancouver trio according to their last Fm profile but, when I saw them live a couple or so months ago they were already a duo and that's what they've been when releasing their first proper LP Human Culture, out two months ago on vinyl only thanks to Night People. And is through another Night label, this time Night School which I happened to mention on my last post two months ago thanks to the fact they were the people putting out the Golden Grrrls single, that they release their latest single Outside / When I Woke Up. These two songs are on the key of what we've heard before, dark synth based pop with beautiful and haunting vocals that may remind you another Canadian band, Austra, and hope it makes you go to listen to their album if you haven't yet.

Although Golden Grrrls have existed for a while it's not been until this month they actually published their first non-tape and non- extremely lo-fi release. In the form of a beautifully presented 7 inch single, Beaches / Date It clarifies what was quite obvious in their previous recordings but was mainly hidden under a mountain of fuzz and reverb: they have good songs and good melodies for the lovers of C-86 bands and its current revival. They put them in a bunch of new bands from Glasgow, a city that has always been very musical but has not had many new bands breaking through since the beginning of the noughties, together with Divorce, Plaaydoh or We Are Wolves. You can get their first release from the new label Night School directly here. It's a limited to 300 Silk Screened record and they are starting to have a consistent group of followers so you better hurry up before is too late.

In the era of Bandcamp, Garageband and Myspace there's not only many possibilities of showing your music to the world but also of creating music without any music skills. Sometimes, and punk said it load and clear, music skills are not necessary at all but we shouldn't confuse music skills with music talent, aptitude or something to say with originality. In the modern era when everybody can pretend to be a musician or an artist and show it immediately to the world is also very difficult to be able to find something worth online while just browsing with no help from a trustful source. Many of these bedroom projects shouldn't cross the bedroom frontiers but, from time to time, there's one that takes advantage of the new technologies to create something special that is worth to be listened to and should be more spread out. Mutual Benefit is one of these projects and, although his previous EPs like Drifting were already good enough to separate him from the rest, his last EP posted online this month, I Saw The Sea, should definitely put him in the map of artists to pay attention to. The attention to detail, the melodies and the recording exceeds even his previous compositions getting a distinctive sound that is not easy to point out with comparisons.

Powerdove is the project of Annie Lewandowski although she frequently performs with Jason Hoopes and Alex Vittum according to her label's website. Although originally from the U.S they are now settled in the UK and I happened to see them live last week without knowing anything about them. In that occasion, they were just two on stage: She was playing a small guitar while the other guy, who I think it was Alex, was making background noises, ambient sounds and beautifully crafted percussions with a strange tool connected to a laptop. Although it was the first band out of three (everybody was there to see Former Ghosts) and we know the attention that guest bands receive in general, the audience remained quiet for the whole set, hypnotized by the haunting voice and the delicate melodies coming out from the stage. Then, after the show I found out they already have a self-titled EP and their first album, recorded by Deerhoof's John Dieterich, has just been released on the same label, the Portland based Circle Into Square. Both records are a delicate collection of folk-pop songs, most of the times as slow as Low's first records used to be, and as delicate as Picastro or Piano Magic's ballads. But,although the recording is really good, I really recommend to see them live to get the whole idea of their current sound as the recording of the album is a year old and more organic and I think that, thanks to that weird machine that captivated me, they're slightly evolving and mutating the songs with loops and other electronic details not as evident in the album as they are live, or that's just maybe because as they just were two, they tried to fill the songs with what had available. We'll have to wait to anther recording to find out.

John Maus, who you might know for his own work or his collaborations with Ariel Pink or Panda Bear at some point, is finally dropping out some new material after a silence period. Next Summer will see the release of his new album We Must Become The Pitiless Censors Of Ourselves on always interesting Upset the Rhythm (in the UK) but we can already enjoy the lead single Quantum Leap which has been offered as a free download in some blogs but will sadly probably not see a physical release. The bass and synth based song is loyal to his sound but is probably his most catchy tune yet. The rhythm is contagious and would probably be a favorite tune for fans of Gary War (whose sound is pretty close but his vocals more conventional) or Blank Dogs.

And yes we are already reviewing the first of the coming releases prepared for Record Store Day 2011, and even that it's become one of the most important days of the year (music related speaking) in just three editions (this year's, on April 16th, will be the forth). And the first release I'll talk about is actually a reissue of one of the most stupidly forgotten and overlooked bands that really should need more recognition. The Scottish band The Wake who started by the edge of post-punk meets new pop could be put under the same entourage as The Associates, Orange Juice or Josef K and other Postcard bands (or later The Pastels) because of sharing, not only a Geographic but also a sound in common (if we obvious the highly Joy Division influenced first Factory LP), but also commonly compared to New Order through their mid 80s records. And Captured Tracks are proud to announced they will re-release their first single (and only pre-Factory release) and their last 80's single (and also their first post-Factory record, which was actually released on the also mythical Sarah Records label and helped to design and define what would be the very recognizable sound of the label.

But that's not the only good news coming from Captured Tracks regarding their Record Store Day releases. To celebrate these two records, they'll also put out a single with two of their most emblematic bands, Wild Nothing and Beach Fossils, covering two tracks from The Wake, called Gruesome Flowers (as they will cover Plastic Flowers and Gruesome Castle, both from the 1987 Something That No One Else Could Bring EP).

I can't be more excited about these news.

Last year I posted about Computer's Magic first digital single, the melancholic and beautiful On VHS. Since then, she's released three free to download EPS (still available for download on her website) I couldn't recommend enough. So it was just a question of time a recognized label, this time White Iris (formerly known as Black Iris and guilty of putting out Best Coast's When I'm with You 7 inch), paid attention to her music and gave her the opportunity of having a proper physical release. The tracks on this first 12' are selected songs that previously formed part of those homemade EPs that have been re-recorded more professionally for the occasion. The 12" record has been announced for the 15th of March and no final tracklist has been named yet. If I had to choose between all the tracks I would like to be there, the list would be so long it had to be an LP.

Here you have the final version of Found Out, which originally appeared on her first EP Hiding From Our Time, and will close the 12'.

A couple of months ago, with the release of Boy Friend's first EP containing two members out of the three from Sleep ∞ Over, we thought that meant the end of the band. We just were slightly sad as there were not many differences in sound between the original project and it's son and, actually, the four songs in that E.P were amongst its best. This week though, our suspects were dis-confirmed as a new release from the now one girl band, the remaining original founding member Stefanie Franciotti, has been announced for next month Hippos in Tanks followed by the release of a whole album on the same label in Summer with the help from Christine Aprile among others. Meanwhile we can enjoy the A side of the single, Casual Diamond, that will have a remix of the same track by Laurel Halo as the B side. The funny thing of the whole story is that, while Boy Friend, the two thirds that left the band, followed from close the same sound of the band they quited, the remaining member has slightly mutated Sleep ∞ Over into something that, although as mysterious as before, is less atmospheric and full of light.

Sometimes, if the results of a split can divide talents into two having then double good results, we welcome the splits with joy.