Tokyo Police Club, White Rabbits

Today I offer two of my favorite bands at various times of last year, one of which [finally!] has an album coming out. Tokyo Police Club's Elephant Shell comes out April 22.

This White Rabbits track is hot off the press. I just this morning received the latest issue of Paste and it's their "Paste presents" bonus track, recorded live in the Paste copyroom-slash-music studio. Apparently. I picture them jamming out next to a water cooler between the advertising section and the break room. Stream the track here or download below.

I'm totally stoked for the new Rabbits record already, and to see them live in Madison hopefully soon enough. I specifically remember hearing this Untitled song at one of their two stellar High Noon performances this past year. Killer track.

Tokyo Police Club, from forthcoming Elephant Shell:
In a Cave [direct MP3 link]
Listen to the Math
Tessellate
And a sublime but largely unknown downtempo rendition/remix of last year's [or 2006's?] Citizens of Tomorrow [space version]

The White Rabbits - Untitled

Preorder TPC's Elephant Shell from Insound.
Purchase White Rabbits music from Strictly Discs.

Bonus: peep the Rabbit's "The Plot" as they performed it on Letterman last summer.



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OMG! My Robot Friend

So this video and song are both dated. Like.... so 2007. But they're both really good. I don't watch many videos-- any videos, really. I just don't get the point. But then I see something like this, and it rocks my world, blows my mind, etc etc. I also think it fits in nicely with my new motif here.



MyRobotFriendSpace.

This was originally gonna be another OMG! / WTF? post about my fave cutie Vanessa Carlton, as I just heard a cover of the Stones' "Paint it Black". But I don't like it. Go listen [mp3] for yourself if you like to blatantly disregard my high musical expertise/authority and perfect taste. It's just a little too twangy for me. And sucky. A little too sucky.

And speaking of cuties, though.. howabout the new Death Cab? Haven't heard it yet? Well, the leaked/promoted/whatever'd track that's making the rounds is "I Will Possess Your Heart" and is a barnburner. Almost nine minutes of DC4C wonder, since half of that is building intro, it reminds of "Transatlanticism". Go find it on someone else's blog via the Hype Machine.

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The Kills

1st note: it's not the Whites. 2nd note: this is only two people.

London's The Kills haven't put out an album in three years. No Wow was pretty good. I remember getting more and more into The White Stripes at about that same time, and there used to be obvious similarities there. Or at least I thought there were. One girl, one guy, rocking some sound that few others do. Now, though.. jeez, I don't know what to liken their new album, Midnight Boom, to. It's like a.. BOOM.. at.. at night!

Srsly, though.. it's pretty moving. Danceable, that is. I totally wanna play it out at a club. If that sounds good to you, listen first to "Getting Down". But then check out the others, too. They rock. If you're looking for something a little different, or maybe more like the old Kills you may know, steer yourself to "Tape Song" first, which sounds like vocalist VV listened to a bunch of YYYs/Karen O before recording.

Good or bad: the entire album clocks in at just over half an hour; the longest track is still under four minutes, and two are under two minutes each.

The Kills, from their new album Midnight Boom:
U.R.A Fever
Tape Song
Getting Down
M.E.X.I.C.O

And a couple earlier tracks:
Pull a U - one of my favorites from their 2003 album, Keep On Your Mean Side
No Wow [MSTRKRFT rmx] [right-click, save-as] - everyone's favorite, remixed by everyone's favorite [although I think it's most everyone's opinion the original didn't need a remix and is still far better]

Buy the album from Amazon or iTunes [only $7.99 and you get bonus tracks!].

Madisonites: The Kills will be at The Annex on May 10.

I'm going down the coast to M E X I C O, see you.

Oh yeah, and OHWNT needed a new look. Melikes. Youlikes?

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Portishead, DJ Andy Smith

Fans of old genres lost, reunite. Trip hop, or some new media-empowered tag that equates it, is back. More accurately, the queen of the scene, nee Beth Gibbons, and her partner in crime, beat extraordinaire of trippy and headnoddish fodder, Geoff Barrows. What's that you say? Massive Attack is the reigning king of trip hop? I'll allow you that opinion. But in my world, Portishead rules the rainy days.

In any event, this is hardly the trip hop of the 90s. This album walks a path which sometimes crosses the one which leads back to their classic first album Dummy, and it walks near the path which goes to their second, Portishead. But it's winding and there are more hills which lead us up, up, up, ["We Carry On", "Machine Gun"] before the comedown, down, down. We eventually meet up with the Dummy path once again, and stop and walk in the grass before lying down on our backs and finishing it by injecting ourselves with the old Portishead we know ["Threads"].

I offer my immediate favorite, the opening track. A perfect opener, "Silence" climaxes at its abrupt ending when it surprises us with.. silence. "We Carry On" is strong, driven by a bleepy, Detroity beat and frenetic drumming, it gaining energy all the way through. "The Rip" is simply nice. Starts acoustic, picks up in the middle with some organ fun.

Third comes out 29 April. It'll also be available as box set with other goodies, says Pitchfork. Hear parts of it here and now, as I get my gloom and depress on when it's finally sunny outside here in Madison.

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If we're lucky, P-head will come here and if I'm lucky, they'll have their tour DJ Andy Smith in tow. Smith is one of my all-time favorite DJs; a master of all things with a beat, whether funk, reggae, jazz, hip hop or otherwise. He is in my mind one of the first mash-up artists, and has the best series of mix CDs going [although they haven't been going for a few years]. It all started with this:

I played this 45-minute masterpiece of mixology non-stop in my car and everywhere else for a couple years straight. And then it resurfaced again a couple years ago and I couldn't stop listening to it. The man fuses and blends The Jungle Brothers, Jeru the Damaja, The Meters, James Gang, Barry White, Marvin Gaye, Tom Jones, Grandmaster Flash and more into one symphony of funk, and it all sounds perfectly natural, perfectly normal, and perfectly sublime. Check out and stream or download some of his other mixes here and here. Purchase from Amazon.


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Portishead music, from upcoming album, Third.
"Silence"
"We Carry On"
"The Rip"
"Threads"
Go get the first single, "Machine Gun" from any of the other hundreds of blogs offering it.

Thanks for reading.

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edited: I simply cannot stop listening to "Threads" and it's 60 seconds of foghorn zounds at the end. I almost didn't post this track. Very glad I did. Simply. Fucking. Marvelous. Get it now.

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Teardrop

Howdy y'all.

Well it's spring break here in Madison and I've employed it nicely, I do believe. I've finally completed a huge music project I've been working on off and on for the past few months. I mentioned it here a couple weeks ago, where I gave a little five-minute snippet to listen to.

Anyway, stay tuned to see the entire 80-minute mix and all of its 200 [!!] sampled songs here soon enough. In the meantime, I have another offering.

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In the meantime..

The latest Teiam Player song I have to offer is a bit different than most. First, it's not very dancey. Second, there are no hip hop // rap vocals. So.. if you typically steer clear of my TP crap because you don't like mash-ups or you don't like my mash-ups, or you just don't like me, at least give this one a chance first.

Here it is, a brilliant duo of Nellee Hooper and Jose Gonzalez, two beautiful voices coming together in Jose's cover of the Massive Attack original, with the original itself. I dig it. Bonus points, as always, for the third song sampled; it's an easy one.

Teiam Player: Massive Attack feat Jose Gonzalez - "Teardrop"

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Milkshake!

**SPOILER ALERT**

If you have not seen There Will Be Blood, then don't watch this video. Corey & Laura, I think you're the only two out there who've not. And I wouldn't want to be the cause of another great thing spoiled for y'all.

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If you have, then perhaps you'll find this as funny as I did. I've watched it like four times in a row and I'm still cracking up. Funniest YouTubery I've seen in quite some time. It's less than a minute, so go ahead and watch it, dammit.




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Eek! New Animal Collective!

This has got to be the most bad-ass picture of these boys.

If you just want the music and not my blathering, all MP3 links are at the end.

The band behind one of my top three favorite albums of last year has a new EP. It will be awesome. Water Curses is out in May. I had no idea it was really in the making. I guess I shoulda known because every live performance they do, they play some new unreleased track. Just go search the YouTube. But thanks to fellow Madison blogster Remove Your Teeth, who I just recently discovered and should probably get to know, I was made aware. A taste is below. I'll perhaps post more when I have a chance to attentively listen to the rest.

Also, Australia's Gameboy/Gamegirl recently nabbed my attention via a recent iheartcomix promo mixtape. I'm not going to try and tell you what they sound like. Just listen to "Fruit Salad".

Why?'s album Alopecia hits the stores soon as well. I'm not totally convinced that it's a masterpiece, or that anything matches last year's "The Hollows", but the opening track "The Vowels Pt 2" is a pretty good start. The rest of the album finds lead man Yoni Wolf sounding like Buck 65 half the time and one of the They Might Be Giants guys the other half. Ok, I should mention that Wolf does in fact normally sound like that. Still.. a weird mix on one album, especially considering Why?'s diverse sound, somewhere between the quirky/weird hip hop of Busdriver or Subtle and.. something else entirely.

Tell me the Islands track below doesn't remind you of OHWNT fave and Madison local Pale Young Gentlemen.

Bon Iver still dominates the airwaves wherever I am. If you missed the tracks I posted last week, go get them. If you want more, one follows below. Again, Madisonites have a chance to see him in the flesh at the Orpheum Stage Door in April.

And last.. I recently went looking for songs with the phrase "team player" in it, for what should be obvious reasons, and it turns out that the ol' bandaid bandit from East St Louis once spat it in a tune. And I can't stop listening to it, either.

Animal Collective "Street Flash"
Gameboy/Gamegirl "Fruit Salad"
Why? "The Vowels Pt 2"
Islands "The Arm" [right-click]
Bon Iver "re: stacks"
Nelly "Another One"

Purchase released material at InSound or through iTunes.

It's 44' and sunny here in Madison, so I'm going outside because here after a long winter 44 is almost t-shirt and shorts weather.

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Bon Iver

Holy crap, I'm horrible. It's 11.11pm on a Saturday, I have a midnight deadline for a paper, I haven't posted anything here of any substance in over a week, and I choose now to do so?

Whatev. This guy from the Dairyland totally rocks. I can't stop playing this album from front to back, and then I start it all over and do it again.

Comparisons to Iron & Wine, Horse Feathers, Great Lakes Swimmers, Will Oldham, Phosphorescent aren't too far off. But this guy's from Eau Claire. Eau Claire, fer fack's sake! [that link, should you be too lazy to click it, is a link to the City of Eau Claire's official website; a page which, at least at this very moment, highlights as their top story Potholes - The "Hole" Story, and, not but a few lines beneath it, Adopt a Fire Hydrant; from this city, comes this man-- how'd they do it?!]

"Skinny Love"
"The Wolves [Act I and II]"
"Creature Fear"

All tunes from his album For Emma, Forever Ago. It is beautiful.

BonSpace
Buy the album at InSound

Madisonites: Bon Iver will be playing at the Orpheum Stage Door on 11 April. I suggest you highly consider going to the show. For one, you will see me there. And better than that, you will hear Bon Iver.

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Screw you, Texas, Ohio and Rhode Island

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