I'm starting (and possibly ending) a new concept for AndygoesdowntoChinatown.
Album of the Week is here. Welcome Album of the Week.
It was a hard decision, but in the end it was between The Black Keys' awesome new soul-tinged blues-rock album 'Brothers' and Micah P. Hinson's new orchestral Americana masterpiece 'And The Pioneer Saboteurs'
The winner of the prestigious title is Micah P. Hinson. I've decided that The Black Keys album was last weeks Album Of The Week winner. But as there was no such title to be had last week, they'll just have to scamper off in defeat.
Hinson could've won just with his album cover, which I think depicts Lady Gaga once she's gone just a teeny bit more off the rails. But no. In fact IT IS the music that does it. Micah P. Hinson has been compared to the legendary Ennio Morricone. Famed for his movie scores, who could forget the classic harmonica theme from Once Upon A Time In The West?
Hinson's arrangements share the same intensity as Morricone's pieces. However there seems to be no urgency here whatsover. The whole album just rolls over you leaving you feeling as though you should definitely give up any plans of what you were supposed to do later and listen to it all again just to see if you missed something hidden in its depths.
I've never been a lyrics man. I'm just the type who like sounds that are put together and sound kind of pretty. So I never actually listen to lyrics in any song. Of course I still appreciate vocals in songs. I might appreciate them more if I wasn't so damn busy concentrating on what's going on in the background. Micah P. Hinson's lyrics could be genius. I don't rightly know. The sound of his voice however does complement the music incredibly. It does however make everything kind of sound like a downer. Even on the more playful tracks ie. 'My God, My God' he still sounds way depressed.
Album closer 'The Returning' is a near 12-minute beast of distortion and feedback until its crecendo. After which a most wonderful string arrangement kicks in, making you wish your mum had bought you a violin as a kid. Damn you mum.
Videos anyone? Videos?
And of course you can listen to it on Spotify too!
After hearing the glory of what is 'Shine On You Crazy White Cap' I was hooked.
I guess it's lucky then that he's releasing his Four More Years EP on Arcade Sounds Ltd very soon. Hopefully it'll be out on some other format as well as casette, because I can't for the life of me remember where I misplaced all my casette decks.
I'm not "punk". I never was "punk". I probably never will be "punk". I fear all the things I associate with punk: Piercings, mostly shit tattoos, poignant hair and loud noises.
But I kind of remember my kid sister buying like the entire Sex Pistols discography when she was about 2, and since then I've been on a gradual journey towards being a wide-eyed, open-minded individual. Sometimes I'm even in cohorts with the "hardcore" punkers. Blimey am I terrified of those times though.
Browsing through Resident's shelves the other week Sauna Youth's 7" Youth came highly recommended. Being easily influenced I just lapped it up and stuck it in my bag without further questions. In my bag, or thereabouts it lay until just yesterday I spun that tiny vinyl like no other vinyl has been spun before.
It's a cracking little gem. People should just recommend more stuff to me without my asking questions. It's raw, it's rough. The lyrics are at best indecipherable. Energy is one thing it doesn't lack. Even if I'm not "down with" the punk ethos, can I at least be down with the musiqué. Is that allowed?
There's been a lot of hipster-bashing going on around the place recently, and one thing these bashers always bash is the dancing. Ha, oh the dancing. I wish I could dance. I wish I could be like Patrick Swayze in Dirty Dancing. Unfortunately it looks a lot more like this:
None of which I'd seen before and two of which I'd heard of before.
Melodica, Melody & Me are a young little twee sextet. They all looked kinda nervy on stage, but once they started playing their melodica (surprise) centered songs, they shook off all notions of nervousness.
You can download their great cover of Paul Simon's 'Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes' from here. Download the song fool
Next was Erland & The Carnival. Oddly there were no goats, goatmasks or goatees to be seen anywhere. I don't think I've ever seen anything to do with E&theC without there being some kind of goat theme to it.
The band seemed to be well indulged in their set, but I'm guessing something went awry, as Erland the singer chucked his microphone on the floor and stormed off at the end of the last song. Awesome stuff. I was half expecting something more. Catfight/goatfight/fight in general. But no. Turns out it was just a sulk.
It was Esben & the Witch to end the night. After lots of intensive listening, I'd prioritised this as the artist to see. They're from Brighton, they're dark and they're shit hot.
I felt really let down after the gig. It was ruined by sound/technical problems throughout. Ha, the funniest bit was probably the guitarist struggling to get any sound out of his guitar until the soundguy pointed out that he should turn his amp on. Does the trick. They were loud, odd and reclusive. Fine combo. They didn't manage to wake up the two asian girls next to me though, who apparently didn't really "dig" Erland and the Carnival.
Thanks Great Escape! It was mighty fine, see ya next year then!
I need to quicken these posts up, or else I'll be writing these forever. Ok so it's Saturday morning, and as my other half hasn't really seen Brighton yet, we decide to walk around town, around the lanes and just, you know, see what it's like. Walking around the lanes we felt they were alive with the sound of music. They weren't. What was alive/live was Frontier Ruckus playing a street gig at a random spot in front of a kebab shop.
Frontier Ruckus were a familiar name, but like with some people you meet on the street who's face you recognise but can't quite pinpoint where from or why, their music didn't sound too familiar. This meant I could listen to them with a new sense of open-mindedness. Whilst also eating with a new sense of open-mindedness. My burger from the kebab shop seemed to be filled with crusty snot instead the usual cheese and beef. That's right. I had no arrogant, pretentious comments on "ooh how that tambourine is so totally mixed to the wrong volume in comparison to that saw." Yeah, they played the saw! The saw! I urge you to check out the above photo to see how happy the saw player looks to be playing the saw. Saw + banjo + makeshift drums + harmonica = a very good performance and hey they got a new fan out of me.
On to the actual Great Escape gigs then. Saturday's plan was to stay in one venue to see The Rural Alberta Advantage (again), La Shark and Is Tropical and then mosey on down to the next place to catch Erland and the Carnival and Esben and the Witch. This all went exactly as I had masterminded it. Brilliant.
RAA were yet again amazing. Quickly growing to list high on my favourite live performances ever. For their last song they just waded into the crowd and played it there stood in the midst of everyone.
La Shark hit the stage. If you haven't yet listened to them, then I suggest you do so. If for no other reason, then just to say that you have and you didn't/did like them.
Described as "Late of the Pier-esque quirkyness", these guys definitely looked the part. Their live show was mega energetic, with their flamboyant lead singer often just jumping off stage and dancing with various audience members whilst swigging on some cheap whiskey. Then the switcheroony. Various audience members jumping on the stage and dancing with the flamboyant singer whilst drinking cheap whiskey.
The last band to play at the Price Albert was Is Tropical. I was really looking forward to these guys and they didn't disappoint. By the time they started playing though, the tiny little room the bands were playing in was roasting hot. Everyone started huddling under the tiny fan at the back of the room. Is Tropical bursted onto the stage with a barrage of pounding beats, thumping basslines and facemasks.
No photos here but just the assurance that Is Tropical are a force to be reckoned with.
The (hopefully) final part of this report will be done soon. My apologies for dragging this on for so long.
Yesterday I left you "hanging" as to what happened after the cheesy lyrics/singing/hand gestures of Bang Bang Club.
As I told yous before, the plan was to see Wild Beasts at 23.30 at the Royal Pavillion. As it was still over an hour till the gig started we thought we were spoilt for time. Basically we should have been laughing. The band before WB was Fiery Furnaces. Who in their right mind wants to see The Fiery Furnaces? That of course was sarcasm. Everyone wants to see The Fiery Furnaces. In fact more people than everyone wanted to see them. The queue to get in extended to 'ooh about Rottingdean' (that's like a total exaggeration, but the queue was very lengthy). As to not spoil our entire night waiting for something that was not to be, a lovely nice little lady who apparently worked at the Pavillion Theatre told that we basically were never going to get in. Bummer. Well thanks for the info nice little lady. We thus jumped out of the queue and headed straight round the corner for the Corn Exchange where Everything Everything and Delphic were about to start soon.
Delphic of course are a band that play gigs at local pubs, but only because they're mates with the DJ and Everything Everything are a band with no hype whatsoever that usually play at children's birthday parties slotted between Bumbo the clown and Ally the Alligator. This meant there was no queue to get in. None at all. Brilliant, we just walked in, got beer and walked(not pushed) our way to the front.
Everything Everything took the stage and they took it well. Yes indeed. Causing me to sing 'Sufragette Sufragette's' chorus wrong for the rest of the week.
I don't think they should be singing -Who's gonna sit on your face when I'm gone. Who'sa gonna sit on your face when I'm not there? and I don't think I should be singing that on a packed train. Seems a bit rude.
Not the best pic I know but.. Well I haven't got any excuses. Sorry.
After EE it was time for Delphic. I missed these boys a couple of years ago, when they supported Bloc Party in Helsinki. Missing them was completely unintentional and I blame it on the complicated public transportation system in Helsinki. This time I WOULD NOT MISS THEM. Well now that I was there anyway.
Delphic played most of the awesome Acolyte not stopping for a moment. In fact the most impressive thing about their live set was the bit inbetween the songs where all the band memebers just jammed and "messed about" with their instruments to create almighty transitions between songs. I have a feeling that seeing Delphic a couple of years ago wouldn't have been as fulfilling, as I reckon that sort of musicianship only comes from years of playing together. Anyway, what they created was gobsmacking.
Delphic was the last gig of the night. Off we traipsed to our (long story cut short) 7 star hotel on the seafront.
Hello! This is me making my spectacular return to blog-writing after over 1 whole week!
Oh I do envy you few lucky readers who shall witness the resurrection of AndygoesdowntoChinatown. It shall be grand, it shall be amazing, it shall just basically be me doing more of the same as I used to do before this hiatus, ie. write about interesting bands in an uninteresting kind of way.
So where to start the renaissance? Me thinks a breakdown of my Great Escape experience could be the appropriate way. Me tooks a few pictures while I was there, but had some technical difficulties with memory cards and computers and shit. Thankfully I've got a warm and loving flatmate (K) who generously allowed me to use his computer system to make things workygood.
I'ma gonna have to write this in parts as to not flood everyones brains with too many words in one go. So here goes part I.
Aight so we landed at Gatwick airport on a lovely (warm?) Thursday night. Whilst we were busy landing and getting our bags, the Great Escape had already started and was probably already going full steam ahead. Of course we missed the entire first day of the festival as flights were roughly a thousand pounds dearer if one were to fly on any other day of the year than that specific Thursday. Of well, my biggest loss was perhaps Surfer Blood. They are however playing at Flow Festival so shit ain't all bad.
I'm not going into other details about the trip other than the musiqué, so no talks of how cool the family seeing stuff was. (It was.) So it's Friday and me and the missus are itching to see some bands. After rigorous scheduling I decided (not her) what to see. So the plan was: 19.45 Best Coast and 23.00 Wild Beasts. Not much of a plan, but everything inbetween would just play out on its own.
So 19.45 on the Palace Pier in Horatio's (chavvy says my old man) it was time for Best Coast. Good. Ace. Brilliant. Front row? Most def. This is what it looked like from a lens that was relatively close to my actual eyes.
Best Coast have an great sound on their recordings which also shone through their live performance. This was a great way to start the weekend. One thing I had to note was that they are an odd looking bunch though. Lead guitarist was definitely looking more J-thrash. Also we noted a certain Darwin Deez watching the same gig right behind us. It's no lie, the guy must be about 3 metres tall. Darwin was set to play his own gig right after Best Coast at a different venue (Digital). The missus wanted to see him, and I felt like I had no say in the matter, even though the awesome Warpaint were supposed to take the stage right after Best Coast, right in Horatio's. So we left for Digital.
Rookie mistake.
The queue was a proper f**k off queue resulting in us not actually getting in to see Darwin. And also in us not seeing Warpaint either. Not to fret. Let's go somewhere else then. "Ooh, the Morning Benders are playing at Hector's House soon, how about we go there?" We went there.
One thing about the Great Escape that annoyed me was the delegate ticket system. If you pay extra you get a delegate pass, which acts as a VIP "skip the queue" ticket. As the delegates got entrance priority, we ended up feeling stranded. At Hectors House the delegate's queue was about 20 people strong. Us two were the only people in the "normal people" queue. Because of the popularity of most places they had a 1-out 1-in policy. By all logic we should have never got in, but thankfully the bouncers were nice guys and took us in. Much appreciated. Got to see most of the Rural Alberta Advantage's (who were playing before Morning Benders) set which was an added bonus!
RRA were amazing. So good in fact that we saw them again the next day.
Next up were the Morning Benders. "No wait! who are these two pretenders?"
"Oh, Morning Benders cancelled and replaced by London electro-pop duo The Bang Bang Club." BBC start up their set by pressing play on the laptop and fair enough they do have a good sound to them. And holymoly if this duo wasn't the best looking duo of men to ever grace any stage. If I'd have been wearing women's knickers, I'd have thrown them on that stage. Alas. T'was not to be. All was good until the Justin Bieber-esque "fist pounding my heart, to say how much I love you" and "arms reaching out to grab thin air, to say how much I love you" actions kicked in. Hmm, they made me giggle. So did the last song they played: 'Chemistry'.
In the words of Morissey: "Stop me, oh stop me if you think you've heard this one before"
Yeah well this was part I of I don't know how many. Thanks for reading. Great to be back
Today'll be my last post for about a week. The reason for this being that I'm heading to Brighton for the Great Escape festival. With it's fantastic line-up in a about a million different venues located throughout the city, it's said to be like Europe's equivalent of SXSW. Hopefully!
Never been to a festival outside of Finland. Feeling kind of nervous. What if I can't handle the mean streets? What if the queues are so long I don't get to see anyone I want to. What if I have to settle for my kid brother playing the pots and pans in the kitchen? And mainly what if the missus drags me to see someone poo, when I just want to see the awesome Wild Beasts?
Just post a few videos here of stuff I'd like to see. All these questions permitting. See ya in a week or so for my unexpansive festival report. Laterzz
So here we go again. More of this dreamwave coolness I'm getting in my ears from everywhere. There's just so many awesome sounds going around, that I do honestly feel overwhelmed sometimes. This time Ears in the Wall has given me a really hard time getting out and doing real people stuff. Going out and such might be an easier task if one were to have one of those portable music devices, but, alas, as a poor student, I'm restricted to listening to all the ace-ness in a dark dark room.
Ears in the Wall is the brainchild of SannyFrannyCali man Josh Woods and it basically sounds like an underwater slow-rave.
EitW has two EP's out and they're both available to listen and download on his bandcamp site.
I pumped this delightful tune into my speakers this morning and thought you lot should hear it too. That is if you haven't already.
A Chelsea fan (*spits on the ground*) Jai Paul has some bangers on his Myspace (often featuring Ron from Harry Potter) including a tidy remix of Emiliana Torrini's Jungle Drums.
The highlight is BTSTU, which he's giving away on his myspace. It's all falsetto harmonies singing "Don't fuck with me" until the beat and bass kick in. And oh my do they kick in, making this a quirky little grimy gem.
Mum'll probably hate BRONZE but who cares about their mother's musical opinion? Obviously what matters the most is that BRONZE are rocking my socks off with their 5-song s/t EP. With beats very much in the same category of goodness with Delphic, BRONZE do kind of remind me of a "rockier" "guitar-ier" (Now I've started to describe bands with made-up words. Great)version of said Mancs.
Give it a go. Hopefully you're not like my mum, and you like these guys. Because then it makes us like so totally alike. We could even be super compatible on last.fm and shit.
If listening to that brought about good moments, then I'd suggest downloading the EP for 0€.
Remixes aside I wanted to write about new stuff I'd been listening to. So that's what I'll do.
With a name as magnificent as Mickey Mickey Rourke, your music wouldn't even really matter. However upon listening to it, the music matters a whole lot more.
MMR is the solo project of that shady character know cryptically as MLR. The letters could have some totally other-wordly meaning, but now judging by his e-mails, they could just be letters from his name. By solo project I'm guessing he's taking time off from Neon Navajo (where he's also a bit cryptic/mysterious, opting to wear a green mask whilst performing).
N//N are a very glitchy dance punk outfit and it seems that upon embarking on the solo journey, MLR has just wanted to peace the fuck out. Because peaced the fuck out these tunes are indeed. Dreamy and ethereal, his album Festival Bummer (great name) is the complete opposite of "a banger". So the next time you're stressing your nuts off about life and shit. Just put the kettle on, sit down and get down with some of Mickey Mickey Rourke's finest.
Yesterday I read about those french electronic pop musicians Phoenix remixing a song of Grizzly Bear's. Not in your conventional style of remixing though where you just add a few bleeps here and there and watch those dancers shake their thangs like me after a light pear cider. No, the Frenchies did the double youtube clip being played simultaneously thing. But try it out it sounds superb.
So good in fact that I thought I'd attempt my own remix(es). Obviously the backing track aka the Brian Eno Track should be an instrumental as to not fook with the voice of ED.
What you do is start one video and then at any time start the next one. Then adjust the volumes to sound good/inaudible
Here's my first one: Going for a blind spanish composer Ed Droste here.
---------------------------------------
With this next one I wanted to capture the essence of an improvising bebop Ed Droste.
So press play on the Grizzly Bear video and start up this next one too. Shit it's like that time I walked into a hazy smoke-filled New York joint called The Wolf Shack back in the 40's and a band was playing, in the darkest corner of the room, a kind of rough sounding style of jazz I ain't never heard before.
-----------------------------------------
My last remix is all about showing that Ed Droste and crew have a wild sort of Ibiza synth style going on too. Awesome, I could dance to this mix all night long.
Whereas a lot of my posts have been quite heavy on the "chillwave"/lo-fi vibes, these guys have a more universal sound to their tunes.
Sometimes reminding me a lot of one of my favourite bands Curly hair, Coma Cinema are a lovely jubbly bunch of twee-melody making musical types.
Be it airy synths, pianos, plucked guitars, distorted guitars, vocal harmonies or anything, they manage to ooze a certain gorgeousness. I wish I was John Cusack so I could make proper casette mixtapes. If I was John Cusack living in the now, I'd make sure Tall Grass was casette-ed. Then again if I was John Cusack, I'd also have been in 2012 and witnessed the world being destroyed so what's the point in music anyway.
I love legal mp3s so yet again imagine my joy upon noticing Coma Cinema giving away their Baby Prayers album on their website. Yay!
and here's a youtube video for Flower Pills. A lovely little piano driven mini-ballad (1:36min) found on Baby Prayers.
Their second album Stoned Alone is out 1st. June on Arcade Sound Ltd. Arcade sound have got some tiptop acts on their roster so keep your eyes peeled here there and everywhere for other releases.
Prowling about on Myspace, like some deranged stalker, I've discovered an intricate web of bands who are all saying they love each others music. This of course is understandable seeing as I'm quite fond of them too. Making my way through this web of praise, it seems the two main culprits are Kiss Kiss Fantastic and Bye Bye Blackbird
For the next few days all I'm going to do is share these artists with you lot.
There's something about using the word memory in your title that says: "Lets just relax, man. Everythings good." The ones that spring to mind are: Memory Tapes, Memoryhouse and now Memory Screen.
Memoryhouse is ambience to say the least. Conjuring up serenity in abundance and sounding like what I'd imagine life would sound like if spent playing Mahjong and drinking various aromatised green teas. I hate it when you go out partying/clubbing in bars and there are all these party games like Trivial Pursuit, Cluedo, Scrabble and Risk. Ou est le Mahjong?
Oooh and another great thing about Memory Screen is that you can download his album from here.
Just wanted to do the thing everyone seems to love doing and make a mini-mixtape for anyone to listen to. Previously some of these have been done on spotify, but never before have I attempted to do this s**t mp3-wise.
So here it is. The AndygoesdowntoChinatown mixtape of stuff that I'm liking, but can't be found on spotify. Yeah.
Fair Ohs - Hey Lizzy Hazey Jane - Tail Kiss Kiss Fantastic - Oh Carolina! TV Resistori - Voi ei, ei voi olla totta Laurel Halo - Embassy Bagheera - Skeleton Leaf Tiger! Shit! Tiger! Tiger! - Whispers Slow Animal - The FUNsun Bye Bye Blackbird - Happy High Girls Names - Graveyard The Pop Winds - Feel It Thee Oh Sees - Tidal Wave The CQ - Wait and See Ravenous - Saltwater Taffy (The Dock) Memoryhouse - Lately
The new Spotify update kicked in today. It looks a bit similar, but then again it's like effin different. The neatest feature is most def the fact you can import all your mp3s off your hard drive. Strewth!
Anyway, in order to celebrate this new update, I made a new playlist of stuff I like. Give it a listen if you care to.
Sometimes sounding like a funky Enya, sometimes sounding more like a modern Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, constantly sounding interesting. Laurel Halo is a quality mixture of dark and fresh. Her King Felix EP can be downloaded for free and I yet again heavily recommend doing so. Laurel Halo - King Felix EP
And because Youtube video uploads are the ongoing trend in the Finnish music blog scene, here are tunes Embassy and Metal Confection as Youtube videos.
One of my main regrets of last year, was missing Flying Lotus' set at Flow Festival. From what I've heard, it was something quite astonishing. Like his 2008 record Los Angeles is also something quite astonishing.
Now the man has been working on his "space-opera" called Cosmogramma. Cosmogramma is released on tuesday, but as it leaked, he has been streaming the whole album on his myspace.
Flying Lotus' new offering is as eclectic and genre-spanning as Howard Moon in his prime, with the only certainty being phenomenal beats. There are notes here of free jazz, p-funk, dramatic orchestrations and even Thom Yorke. If that wasn't enough to have my ear. Lotus-man also used a sampled ping-pong ball's sound as a rythm track on Table Tennis. This album is huge. In a good way.
