Omar S – High School Graffiti

Possibly one of my favourite moments of this year was at the Animal Collective-curated ATP festival back in May. The first two days seemed to sweep past in a maelstrom of bright lights, penetrative noise, intense consumption and repeatedly losing everyone I was with – basically a bit of a heady blur. But then near the end of the second night something cleared; the fog lifted, the waves parted and the way ahead was revealed to me in all its glittering glory. The stunning simplicity of Omar S’ particular brand of Detroit House came as an absolutely perfect mini-antidote to the excesses of what had gone before, and the hour spent dancing with all my mates in a room with sticky carpets, usually dedicated to Chesney Hawkes and Bon Jovi, was a particularly fine moment indeed. I also got to meet Liz Harris, aka Grouper, which was great (love you Liz!).

Now, thanks to the lovely chaps at Scion Audio, you can partake in some of my remembered merriment too. All for the modest sum of zero pounds and zero pence. That’s right, it’s free!

DOWNLOAD HERE

Image is a sculptural installation by John Isaacs. JFGH.

Zorch

Struggling quite what to say about these guys. I’d like to say that they’re kind of somewhere between Dan Deacon, Animal Collective and Lightning Bolt, but I think maybe a better way of putting it is just to say that they are fucking awesome. Somehow their 4 track demo, released back in 2009, totally failed to register but thankfully they’ve just uploaded two new tracks to Soundcloud that have not only caught our attention but have absolutely blown us away. However, while their recorded material may be good, we’re pretty sure that these guys put on incredible live shows, so we’re keeping eyes, ears, mouths and noses peeled for a UK tour announcement. You will be informed.

If you like what you see nip over to their website to check out even more material.

Image is by David Richardson, courtesy of Sweet & Sound.

Zomby – Dedication

We recently went to see Zomby at the Animal Collective-curated ATP. However, after nothing had happened on stage half an hour into his scheduled set-time an announcer informed the audience that he wouldn’t be playing, ‘unless anyone’s seen him around the festival site and can point him in our direction’. As irritating a let-down as this was, we’re not really ones to hold grudges, especially when the record said irritator releases is as solid as this one. So all is forgiven. Although we still reckon he probably owes us about a tenner each.

Stream it (almost) in full from German label HHV here. If you like it we’d suggest you consider buying it, unless you were at ATP as well, in which case ring him up and ask for a free copy as an apology.

Image is by Paul Graham, who’s currently exhibiting at the Whitechapel Gallery.

Entropy

ATP have recently put together a youtube playlist of videos by all the bands that are playing at the Animal Collective curated festival at Minehead this May. It’s a pretty great line-up and there are a lot of really nice videos on there, not to mention this one, by Finnish electronic experimenter, Vladislav Delay:

This reminded me of a series of films currently on exhibit at the the fantastic online film gallery, Animate Projects, entitled Lapse. As well as being a set of mysterious and mesmerising films, the project comes at a symbolic moment in time, as the cleaver of Conservative cuts has recently fallen onto Animate Projects’ digital neck, leaving them to soon lapse into obscurity. And so it seems, unlike the manipulated reality of Vladislav’s reforming ice cubes, we are all doomed to entropy…

Image is by our old fave Walker Evans.

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NEW RELEASES TO GET EXCITED ABOUT

Bit of a break from our normal output here, but there have been a few announcements in recent weeks that have made us sit up, take notice and salivate profusely. It may only be February, but thoughts are starting to turn to summer releases and festivals (damn those tricky record companies and their impeccably timed schedules) and in honour of this, here’s a bit of news about some people that we like whose new albums are imminent.

First, tUnE-yArDs is back! Merril Garbus and her trusty looping pedal have been in the studio and will release the follow up to the simply outstanding, BiRd BrAiNs on April 19th. The first single off her new album, w h o k i l l, premiered on Radio One a few days ago and is featured below. Apologies for Zane Lowe’s hyperbolic ramblings over the start and finish…

Next, Julian Lynch yesterday announced the release of  Terra, which will arrive via Underwater Peoples (not literally you hope) some time in the spring. Check out a live version of some tracks from the album over at the Free Music Archive or simply take in the languid, Just Enough, from last year’s LP, Mare, here:

Meanwhile, 4AD’s Gang Gang Dance have annnounced the follow up to 2008′s St. Dymphna. Apparently it’s called Eye Contact and is set to be released in the UK on May 9th. Exactly one month earlier they’re due play at Village Underground for a Dazed and Confused party, though no ticket news has emerged for the show as of yet. Still, keep your eyes peeled for that one and, in the meantime, have a listen to First Communion and imagine jumping around to it in a body-strewn sweatbox.

And finally. As if the thought of  seeing Gang Gang on the 9th wasn’t enough, the 8th of April sees an AV favourite land on these shores for what promises to be a very special performance. Pantha du Prince this week announced the release of an album’s worth of remixes from last year’s jaw-dropping, Black Noise. To go with this, he’s doing a set at Queen Elizabeth Hall on the Southbank alongside Apparat, who’ll be spinning cuts from last year’s excellent DJ Kicks. Here’s Animal Collective’s take on Welt Am Draht:

Deradoorian – High Road (Tanlines Remix)

Not content with being in a wildly successful, genre-defying, chamber pop sextet, Dirty Projectors’ Angel Deradoorian has decided that she’d like to have a go at being a solo artist too. The results haven’t always hit the heights of her collaborative endeavours, but the recent re-release of her 2009 EP, Mind Raft, has seen a couple of remixes added to the five tracks that received a roundly muted response upon their original release last May.

One of these remixes has thrown up an absolute gem; Tanlines taking the soaring vocals and close harmonising, that have become a hallmark of Deradoorian’s work with the DPs, and giving it an 80s R&B rework, complete with haunting synths and a razor sharp analogue drum machine line.

The result is a masterful example of a slow burning pop song, more emotive and driving than its original and hopefully a combination we’ll be treated to again.

Klein

Also, just another quickie, cos it’s Friday, and the weekend’s here, and we’re all happy, and this has just come out, and it’s real pretty, and it’s a lovely song, and it’s nice to see beautiful visuals paired with such lovely sounds, and I’m good to you, and Gorilla vs Bear always have the best stuff.

Holden

Animal Collective got pretty big last year. Perhaps not so in a truly commercial sense, but culturally their influence has been phenomenal. It’s been quite astounding how many bands sounding incredibly similar have sprung up recently (and how many of them are pretty lame) and how many well-established groups have put out songs chock full of heavily reverbed vocals, layered effects and distorted guitar lines, despite not being primarily known for these kind of tunes (Caribou and Baths, probably most notably).

Young Man fall take almost all their cues from the Baltimore boys’ output, and you could level criticisms at them for being derivative, reductive and unoriginal – which would probably be fair – but you also need to take into account a major difference: song-writing. Animal Collective, whilst being forward-thinking and fairly groundbreaking in sound and style, have never really been known for their compositional abilities. On the other hand, Colin Caulfield – Young Man’s songwriter and frontman – seems to have started out writing simple and sweet yet achingly melancholic, blissfully dolorous pop-folk songs (almost akin to a Bradford Cox project) that he’s then treated with the AC soundstyle guide. It’s nothing particularly spectacular, but it’s very, very nice.

Unfortunately he’s not got any videos out and about just yet, other than this one for an Ariel Pink cover:

And follow this link to check out his own tracks on Myspace (Home Alone’s my personal fave):

http://www.myspace.com/colincaulfield