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Free Song Download of "Short Fuse," from Black Lips fifth studio album, 200 Million Thousand, out Tuesday, February 24, on Vice Records. These self-described "flower punks" are packing in a little more melody in their sloppy garage rock, but don't worry, they aren't going soft on us -- hell, they just got chased out of India. You know what they say, "Once a scumbag, always a scumbag." And we mean that in the best possible way. This Week's Featured Downloads
Medio Mutante's Inestable is the first contemporary/non-reissue release on Minimal Wave sub-label Cititrax(!) and are a three-piece, female-led synthwave band with two of the members based in LA and one member living in NYC. It took a couple listens to feel what was really going on here. Expectations of vintage, hyper-"true" coldwave distracted us from what was really at hand: sultry, percolating, bedroom disco-esque synthwave with female Spanish vocals and an infectious bubbling synth-rhythm running throughout, embedded in Mudd Club underground murk. I hear from the label that they are as into freestyle (i.e. Debbie Deb, Lisa Torres, Book of Love, Noel etc.) as much as they are into Cabaret Voltaire or Malaria, but the sound they create manages to satisfy the craving for Glass Candy and Nite Jewel as much as a craving for Chris and Cosey. There's that sense of pop embedded deep in its dubbed out new wave/Liquid Sky atmosphere that just works. Totally recommended! -Scott Mou
Now expanded to a quintet, Canadian band Faunts offer up more Postal Service-flavored electroid indie goodness on this confident sophomore missive. It could be hard right now to make too much of a mark in a genre overflowing with young artists, but by injecting their chirpy songs with an 80s charm (something like Ben Gibbard fronting Alphaville) they offer something slightly different from their peers. Added to this the production is all rather smart, rather than the weak attempts at electronic music most bands attempt (lo-fi is no excuse guys); Faunts offer up intelligent arrangements backed by sparse, open electronics giving the sense that they really know what they're doing. This allows their particular brand of pop to shine through, stopping it from being too easily dropped into a specific place or time. Just head to the album's title track "Feel.Love.Thinking.Of" and it's hard not to be won over by the band's jaunty charm. Oddly enough however, I get the feeling they are most at home (and most successful) when tackling slower, less bombastic tracks such as the gorgeous 'I Think I'll Start A Fire'. Maybe this is simply because these tracks sound even more like Alphaville, but the harmonies are just too hard for me to resist. Lovely. -John Twells
Joe Simon was a southern soul singer who had a fair amount of success throughout the '70s with his signature country/soul fusion. These two albums are some of my favorites from this underrated vocalist, 1974's Simon Country being one of the best examples of this sound. Simon's butter-smooth baritone voice and restrained gospel phrasing was able to convey a myriad of conflicting emotions, but he wasn't a shouter as much as a storyteller. Simon had amazing diction and leaves you hanging on every word. Tracks such as "Georgia Blue," "Your Turn to Cry," and his rendition of "Help Me Make It Though the Night" are great tear-in-your-beer soul ballads, and are some of the finest examples of the genre.
By 1977, the landscape in popular music had changed and Simon, adjusting to the times, tweaked his formula and put out this pair of albums that drew heavily from the disco and quiet storm R&B. The results are surprisingly successful for the most part. Tracks like "I Gotta Jones for You Baby" and "Before the Night Is Over" are great spacey lover man ballads -- the latter being the sampling source for Outkast's hit "So Fresh and So Clean" -- while "Easy to Love" and "Can't Live Without Your Love" are great underrated disco-funk tunes. -Duane Harriott
Yasuaki Shimizu is an omnipresent character in Japanese music, having lent his saxophone tones to hundreds of records in the last couple of decades. Notably he has been a go-to guy for sometime pop prankster Towa Tei, but Shimizu also has a great sideline in avant-garde squeaks and squeals. Here he is joined by the Flying Lizards' David Cunningham, who contributes shimmering guitar drones to Shimizu's effected horn playing. The constructions they create in the live environment are more interesting than they are original, taking cues from the looping structures Steve Reich pioneered, albeit doing it with very different instrumentation. One Hundred moves through an hour's worth of material, exploring atonal ambience, hiccupping loops, decaying delays and Eastern-scented near-ragas. It's certainly a record for the more dedicated explorers among you... -John Twells
Deluxe re-issue of Mikey Dread's (Michael Campbell) groundbreaking dub masterpiece African Anthem Dubwise, it comes loaded with bonus tracks. This one has long since entered the canon and is an absolutely essential listen. In many ways this album is an amazing synthesis of the towering influence provided by those twin giants of dub, Lee Perry and King Tubby. Mikey Dread was an electronics wiz as a youth and a serious scholar of reggae music's early history. He had tracked down and interviewed countless legends while in high school, then put his prodigious knowledge and connections to good use by starting a 24-hour-a day, all reggae radio show. The late-night-night shift provided him with ample opportunity to experiment and put his electronics skills to good use, he had an endless capacity to create inventive jingles and outlandish segues that would later serve as the kaleidoscopic background for his own productions. African Anthem Dubwise was recorded at King Tubby's studio (who'd lent Mikey all of his studio production manuals) and mixed by Prince Jammy. The post-production was handled by Mikey himself, and you could certainly say he favoured a kitchen sink approach to his craft. The roots rhythms are almost overloaded with sound effects, making a blissful cacophony that takes many, many listens to unravel. Mikey Dread was absolutely intent on slapping his listeners out of easy complacency, constantly stunning them with surprise after surprise, and here at least he succeeded in creating one of the most outrageously joyful and good-humored albums you could hope to ever hear. -Michael Klausman
With the world awash with 'wonky' it's nice to see Anticon still pedaling away doing what they do best. Many might have thought the Oakland dudes had given up on beats altogether in their pursuit of all things indie-rock, but Odd Nosdam's back and his SP1200 is fired up to give any kid with Fruityloops and a sidechained compressor a run for his money. Written to accompany This Is My Element (a documentary about skaters), Nosdam takes his sound suitably back to the oldschool to lend an authentic backbone to the movie. That's not to say it doesn't stand on its own two feet though -- it has been some time since Anticon have birthed a release so unashamedly rearward facing and this reminds me favorably of their glory days. With beats crunchier than a toasted cockroach and decaying synthesizers buzzing away somewhere in the distance, it's easy to remember what we loved about Anticon back in the day. Indeed, there's even a hint of occasional collaborators Boards of Canada in the tracks here, but thankfully free of any of the New Age noodling their more recent work dripped with. Good solid beatwork from Nosdam -- give it a look. -John Twells
Excellent collection of trashy, vibrant and life affirming '70s pub and early punk rock singles from the first truly "indie" label. Based outta London, Chiswick was formed in '75 and was only in existence for eight years, but the quality of music from their roster was quite astonishing. They also put out early records from young snotty rock-n-roll upstarts who would soon become icons. Chiswick released the first and only single from Joe Strummer's 101er's -- "Keys to Your Heart" is a rough-n-tumble driver, which was apparently the first song that the future Clash-man ever wrote. The collection also includes "Saints and Sinners," a fun, thrashy, three-chord romp from the short-lived Scottish band Johnny and the Self Abusers, the group's sole release before breaking up and reforming as Simple Minds. Dublin's Radiators were another young, scrappy amp-fueled pub band but would soon implode after releasing the frenetic "Television Screen." (Incidentally, their lead singer, Phil Cherron, would go on to form the Pogues.) There's also the eponymous first single from Motorhead, early tunes from the Damned, and classic punk rock from Johnny Moped, which featured a young Chrissie Hynde in their lineup. You get the picture. All fans of rock-n-roll who aren't familiar, not to mention followers of the Saints, Undertones, the Perfect Unpop comps, and the like...you need to get this. -Duane Harriott
Mostly focused on highlife, Afro-beat, and Afro-rock, this great compilation of Ghanaian music traces the lineage and trajectory of the Bokoor Band and subsequently, the Bokoor studio. Formed by John Collins, a white man who came to Ghana to attend school and never left, the Bokoor Band's beginnings go back to the early seventies when they started as a highlife dance ensemble, whose repertoire mostly consisted of covers of contemporary American funk and rock bands, especially James Brown. (Bokoor, incidentally, means "coolness.") Dozens of musicians would come and go during the group's existence until they disbanded in 1979, which is when Collins founded the Bokoor studio and label. Kind of an Alan Lomax type, he would go on to record over 200 local bands, from traditional drumming and chants to Afro-beat, highlife, gospel, and various combinations of genres like Afro-reggae and Afro-Cuban. Collins, a trained guitarist and harmonica player, is featured prominently in these songs and his Bokoor Band is credited with eight of the 12 tracks. His group sounds like a mixture of Fela, Dr. John, and James Brown, with African poly-rhythms, accents, and textures. These recordings and compositions are unique in that they are definitely African, expansive and layered, yet they also possess an intimate quality that keeps the songs warm and bright; a great reflection of the music and performers' spirit is captured in sound. A nice selection from one of the foundations of modern contemporary African music. -Daniel Givens
Uwe Schmidt is one of those producers with whom it's worth taking a step back from, just to look in awe at his esteemed catalogue. Over a handful of years, the German producer has released countless albums under countless monikers -- Atom Heart, Dropshadow Disease, Dos Tracks, Midisport, Senor Coconut, LB, Erik Satin -- each showing yet another facet to his astounding talent. He makes electronic music, but this is electronic music with a whimsy and a cracked sense of musical form unlike anything you've heard before. There are links and comparisons to be made, but those links are eroded by Schmidt's genuinely unique palette of sounds, and there really aren't too many artists you could say that about. Trust Raster-Noton then to pick up this latest release and add it to their already shocking schedule. Over the last couple of years the German label has re-kindled our love for electronic music and repositioned themselves from purely experimental sound to something a little more accessible. It is fitting then that Liedgut is anything but staid or pretentious; Schmidt begins the record with a cascade of vocoder vocals which should instantly get Kanye fans on board. Eschewing the trend for everything autotuned though, Schmidt takes things back to the more organic Kraftwerk-era, giving a featured guest spot to Florian Schneider for good measure. Through the fractured history of German music, Schmidt reframes his electronic roots, infecting them with the shadows of waltz, techno and his beloved bossa nova. The cacophony is almost indescribable, but amongst the digital hiccups and binary belches there are songs -- melody, harmony and occasionally rhythm. Even the familiar sound of cell phone interference is thrown into the mix creating a throbbing dub wise rhythm before you've even got a handle on what you're listening to. He might not have been away for that long but it's great to have Uwe Schmidt back -- electronic music just isn't as much fun without him around. A fabulously wacky record and a huge recommendation. -John Twells
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