Daughter - The Wild Youth EP

Following on from her previous EP "His Young Heart" which has been immensly popular in my household this year, Daughter or Elena Tonra has another new set of 4 songs out called "The Wild Youth EP".

The Wild Youth songs are more heartwrenching folk songs with a productionally experimental edge which makes Daughter stand so tall above the plethora of acoustic guitar and vocal acts out there. Whilst often her voice alone is captivating enough, Elena can and does incorporate reverbed ghostly backing vocals, dark brooding synths and sometimes even beats we're more used to hearing with the likes of The XX into the mix to create a greater sense of gravity and loss.

On a lighter note, don't they look cute on that cover?

Look-a-likes pt I

Why does nobody ever point out that Manchester City's David Silva and Justice's Xavier De Rosnay are pretty much exactly the same person. Am I the only person who sees the resemblance? Or is it some well known fact that the best player in the Premiership is just the cleaner cut alter-ego of that guy from my mate's favourite band?

Anenon + Me Out in London - A Love Story

There aren't a lot of feelings greater than the one you get when you accidentally happen upon some good music. Either just listening at home or, in my case on Saturday, actually seeing it live.

We were on our Shoreditch pub crawl and I had no plans or expectations to see any music. If anything I was happy sticking my money into jukeboxes just to hear Fleetwood Mac's The Chain and no, contrary to popular belief, The Mac are not "bullshit munchers".

Apparently googling "London gigs" is a tad too broad and resulted in me finding fuck all. Naturally I presumed there's nothing happening in the entire city, you know, a bit like how Turku works.

Fate, destiny and our working legs took us to our trusty "regular". The Old Blue Last. Given the title "the world's coolest pub" by NME and me.

You can believe either one you want.

The fact it's run by the people at Vice and that I'm now also owned by the people at Vice is just one big happy coincidence. This has been a place of great emotions in the past. We're talking about the place where I was briefly disowned last new year's eve by my little sister who was less than happy with my drunken shenanigans. Good times.

TOBL was jam-packed choc-a-blocked booming busy. I had to crowdsurf across the downstairs foyer. Crowdsurf up the stairs and then crowdsurf all the way to the upstairs bar. Upstairs wasn't really all that busy so by crowdsurfing I mean some unlucky guy just had to carry me across an empty dancefloor to the bar because I was really starting to enjoy being up in the air. Familiar drink in hand it was time to scout the area. All kinds of scenesters and hipsters bobbing heads in time to some ace tunes. I had arrived, now kneel before me London.

Who was this incroyable beatmaker standing before and above us on his stage playing exactly what I wanted to hear? Wielding his mighty Macbook and looping his saxophone (yeah that's right, a motherflipping saxophone) like the John Coltrane of electro, he was like nothing I'd ever seen before. Mainly because "cool kids don't play sax". Well they do now.

Some sneaky recon revealed the man to be Anenon or Bri(an) All(en) Sim(on) who's also the founder of the label Non Projects all the way from LA. Now do yourself a favour and check him out on Soundcloud

  Dark Navy Blue - Improvisation Live at Dublab 11-23-10 by anenon

Quick spot of record shopping + generally being super hot

This is the very first of a whole new world. Joint posting. That means there are two people posting instead of just the measly one. The other person is a hobo eating a jacket potato, but you know I take what I can get. Me and hobo went record shopping today. Yeah. I say we but I mean I went record shopping and hobo stood there and warmed her hands against the insulating capacities of warm vinyl.

Oh yes, I perhaps forgot to mention that I'm no longer in the summery joyous land of Finland. Nay. The bright sunny shores of Brighton have once again beckoned and I, the T-Bone has answered.

Look, this is me and Ms. Jacket Potato drinking hot beverages. I think you'll find we are every bit as hot as the drinks stuck in our faces. We are like lava, baby.

I managed to find Fixers' "Here Comes 2001 So Let's All Head For The Sun" Ep which I've wanted to get my hands on for what feels like an eternity. All in fancy 10" form too. Who even does 10s anymore? 

Who even buys 10s anymore?

That would be me. Because I'm fucking awesome.

Got it mainly for one song: "Crystals". I'm sure the rest of it's super too, but I just haven't been able to find it/listen to it anywhere.

  Crystals by Fixers. 

I'm a bit low on the old cash front at the moment so I had to borrow a bit of money off the hobo so I could squeeze in a reduced price 7" single of Teeth's "See Spaces". Yeah, that's right. I had to borrow 40p. But can you really put a price on happiness? No regrets though because See Spaces is so fucking tight it would make Russell Brand's jeans look like Mark Wahlberg's flares in Boogie Nights.

  See Spaces (Single Version) by TEETH

Looks like the other person's only contribution to this post was a brief cameo in a shit webcam photo. Oh well. At least you've got me. Right?

This was just a quick bit of shopping, because there's a wedding I'm attending and as Alfred Doolittle once sang: "Get me to the church on time" but I ain't leaving here until I've got more.

Laterz

Bleeding Knees Club

Since when have lo-fi garage bands been signing to mega-labels such as Sony and Columbia? (Alright smart-arse, Columbia's owned by Sony. Whatever. Deal with it.) It's just that they're not the first acts you'd associate with the big labels.

Me here in my basement, I have no idea how record labels work. Especially not huge ones.
It would just seem that Bleeding Knees Club who sound a great deal like my faves Lovvers and whom Sony have "big plans" for wouldn't be much of a sound investment. Surely there isn't that great a market for this kind of stuff? Or maybe there is. With the success of bands such as Black Lips and Wavves who've neatly, at some level at least, crossed over into more popular territories, you might be led to believe this could be the next big thing. Those two are however still on Vice Records and Fat Possum Records respectively which aren't famed for being 'effing huge and don't have the likes of Susan Boyle on their rosters. So do the big boys feel the need to get in on the game too? Has someone up there at Sony gone: "Hey, find me a good raw punky sounding band so we can have the next alt-kids' favourite band"?

No. Because Sony via Columbia also own IAMSOUND Records who have the likes of Salem, Cocknbullkid and Telepathe on their roster. We just live in a time where at the end of the day everyone is ultimately owned by someone else. So even if YOU think you're your own man/woman, you're probably not. You're a corporate bitch just like me. #Proudtobeacorporatebitchsince1987

Australian Bleeding Knees Club are a lot of fun. Surf punk at its best is insanely catchy with its melodies and rampaging with its riffs. And that's pretty much what we're looking at here. Someone once told me Australia's pretty ok for surfing and stuff, so BKC's surf-punk aesthetics might actually even be authentic and not horribly contrived like, I don't know, Susan fucking Boyle.

This is their new single "Teenage Girls"

  Teenage Girls by Bleeding Knees Club

This is my favourite picture in the history of pictures.

Back in day (end of the 1400s to be vaguely precise), when the world was going crazy with Renaissance and shit like colours and details, Finland and their church's fresco painters were keeping it real. (Here's a clue if you don't do the lingo. The bottom one's my local church and the top one, well, isn't.)

Hola baby, ciao.

False alarm. Turns out I wasn't virally infected. I just had some mad spyware shit going on. Like a virtual  renegade Daniel Craig working, like the crazy action hero superspy that he is, for penis enlargement companies all over the world. Anyway this problem should be resolved now so back to the important stuff.

Like what's been happening since I've been away?

Super stuff. Stuff you won't believe. Like I grew a moustache. You know for this "movember" thing that's happening.

It would seem that I don't have the age/genes/awesomess to grow a kick-ass moustache so I settled for the next best thing.

A shit moustache.

The kind of one that looks like I've been blowing that albino pyscho-killer from The Da Vinci Code and caught a whole load of his pubes on my upper lip. But hey, it's all for charity right? Well no not really because I didn't know how to get in on that whole charity/donation thing. I did make a little bit of money from my moustache though: From my mum, telling me to "buy a fucking razor" and to "stop blowing albino guys."

During my hiatus I also got asked to join Vice's blogger's network. You know Vice right? The Ace-est coolest magazine you get to pick up for free at your local record shop/other cool place. Yeah that one. They're starting up a Scandinavian site and are recruiting independent bloggers to be "ambassadors of VICE". What this supposedly means is that they'll send me info about various happenings and I get to write about them. Cool deal, no? So I had to think long and hard about joining VBN because what if it means compromising my style and uniqueness then I realised that I had neither of those and agreed to join their "little" network. So notice the VBN badge on the right hand side. FYI it means I'm cooler and quite possibly a much better person than you. Rock and roll, baby. Rock and roll.

I might post some actual music soon. Or maybe I'll start AndygoesdowntoChinatown up again as a fashion blog. Who knows. All I know is I'm part of VBN. Suck it bitches.

To end this post with a bang here's Vibelung's remix of StrangerS' Beneath the City.
I don't know who Vibelung is and I don't know who StrangerS are but someone sent me this hoping I'd listen to it and I did. Disco dancing time. Four to the floor and all that lark. Laterz.
(Be warned this is not chillwave or witchhouse or glitchhop or dronestep or anything that's in fashion. Just good old house music)

  StrangerS - Beneath The City (Vibelung Remix) by Vibelung

Stop the press! I've been infected

Right so the blog is going on hold for a while because my computer's been subjected to an evil malicious viral infection.

Apparently I've been sending out emails about sex supplement offers to everyone I know. Now this would't normally be too out of the ordinary as I do have a pretty lucrative Viagra side-business going on, but these emails were shameless even for me. Plus the spelling was terrible.

So now I've taken my loyal laptop of about 15 years over to my whizz(kid??) of a grandad's computer clinic. Seriously my grandad is like the Bill Gates of computers. Just without all the money and orgys.

He's so good at computers it's getting embarrasing telling him my computer got another virus because I was on the internet searching for dodgy copies of russian animal excrement porn again.

In fact my grandad is so good at computers that I don't even need to tell him that. He'll just fucking know, and give me these long hard disapproving stares. And then use his knowledge to blackmail me for whatever the hell he wants. Generally not money or orgys though.

Anyway, once my fujitsu-badboy is back in business we can all go back to the amazing fun that is: AndygoesdowntoChinatown.

Sorry "world".

Said the Whale

Said The Whale are next in line of the plethora of Canadian talent waiting for the chance to make your ears happy. The Vancouver 5-piece just won the esteemed Juno prize for "Best New Group of the Year" at this year's Canadian music awards.
Actually, I don't know if it's esteemed at all. I'm just guessing. Maybe it's the musical equivalent of me lining up all my awesome Warhammer miniatures for a huge "fantasy world tea party" ie. not really that interesting for anyone who's not involved in it.

(Me) - "Would you like more rooibos, Mr. Space Ork?"
(Mr. Space Ork) - "Whatever, bitch"

Let's hope this isn't the case. For all our sakes.
Anyway Said The Whale sound a lot better than anything my legion of High Elves could ever muster up.

Their brand of upbeat hook-laden folk should/could/would bring a smile to even the most downtrodden face and to prove it, here's "Lines" (mp3) off their brand new EP "New Brighton".

Even if smiling isn't your thing, just look at that cover art above. Nudity, happy playing children and huge sunbather sized colourful letters! Come on people, what's not to like?

Strange Boys - Live Music

After listening to some new Black Keys I wondered how my old buddies The Strange Boys were doing and what do you know? They've got a new album that came out yesterday.  It's called "Live Music".

You kept that one quiet didn't you boys?

I wonder how "strange" these boys really are? Have they ever drank Baileys from a shoe? Have they ever been to a party where they wee on each other?

Whatever, neither have I (ahem), but what I have done is I gave Live Music a cheeky listen and loved it so much I thought I'd best post it on here too.

Here's the video for the first single off the album, "Me and You" (mp3)



The whole thing's streamable on Spotify or their website http://strange-boys.com/

Black Keys - Lonely Boy (new song)

I mentioned yesterday that I've got a Russian Circles poster on my wall so carrying on that subject why not talk about The Black Keys, of whom I've got 2(!!! fanboy alert) posters up, and their new up 'n' coming album "El Camino" which is out at the start of December. Just in time for Christmas. If you for some reason feel an imcomprehesible urge to get me a copy of El Camino, that's all fine. Just make sure it's a signed copy on gold-flake infused vinyl. Otherwise you ain't getting anything in return.

The duo are getting word out there with first single "Lonely Boy". Perfect vintage Black Keys. Dirty guitars and the kind of chorus that would have you sell everything you own just to buy a guitar and a plane ticket to the deep south swamps of America. Personally I haven't done that yet because I still haven't seen every single episode of Entourage, but the way things are going I'll be there soon.

  The Black Keys - Lonely Boy by The Black Keys

Russian Circles - Empros

Just as I'm about to write this day off as just another one of those days where I've accomplished absolutely nothing worthwhile I come across Russian Circles' new album "Empros". Not that listening to Empros would class as much of an accomlishment, but it's certainly worthwhile.

Russian Circles' last album "Geneva" was and still is one of my favourite albums of all time. Hell, I've even had a Russian Circles poster on my wall for the past 3 years.

Where Geneva was beautiful (it even had string instruments) and lulled you into a state of post-rock induced bliss, this time around it seems they're also slightly more forthcoming and ready to whip out that metal background of theirs. Right from the off with opener "309" and its raging guitars and drums.

If post-metal sounds slightly scary to you, don't fret because Empros has it's Geneva-esque gorgeous cinematic moments too.

If this were "true metal" we probably wouldn't be here right now. Me and metal, we just don't see eye to eye. I think it's the vocals that usually put me off. Or that "attitude". The people who listen to it, the "metalheads" have got way too much "attitude"

I know this metalhead guy and every time I see him (which is quite a lot, some might say maybe too much, because he's a regular at the bar I work at) we have the exact conversation:

(Him) - Hey man.
(Me) - Hey yourself.
(Him) - So, well, um you listened to the new Children of Bodom album yet?
(Me) - No.
(Him) - Oh.
(Me) - Uhhuh, anything else?
(Him) - Well, um....
(Me) - ......
(Him) - ......
(Me) - You listened to Of Montreal's 'The Gay Parade' yet?
(Him) - Um, no I don't think I have.
(Me) - Stop talking to me then.

Reading that,  I actally think it's me who's got the attitude. What a bastard. Gonna change my ways so I just went out and bought the entire Cradle of Filth discography.


  Schiphol by RussianCircles

  Atackla by RussianCircles

Stream Empros here: http://russiancircles.bandcamp.com/releases

Marshall Headphones: On the Road

When the good people at Vice Magazine got in touch about their new show "On the Road" I was genuinely intrigued. Not least because it was them who got in touch with me. Hah, and I always thought Vice was supposed to be cool.

Anyway, seeing as my baby cousin's completely enamoured by everything Vice-related I thought I could break away from my busy-doing-fuck-all schedule and check it out.

"On The Road" is about roadies. The road crew. You know, those people who always dart about live gigs on stage fiddling around with all the instruments carrying loads of stuff?

How many times has it happened when you've been to a gig and it's about to start. All the spotlights are pointed at the stage and the background music's turned off. All systems are go. 

Enter the stage a couple of scruffy guys in band t-shirts who take up the mics and instruments. In your intoxicated little head you think this must obviously be the band you've been waiting your entire life to see and you make this banshee-like shriek: "I LOVE YOU FLORENCE AND YOUR MACHINE". 

Nope, never at any point did you notice anything wrong with Florence's oversized beard and hair.

Roadies are the unsung heroes. The people who make shit work. And that's what On The Road's about. People who make shit work. Oh and it's hosted by Jesse Hughes from Eagles Of Death Metal who may be one of the coolest guys out there.

Here's Episode 1 where Jesse meets up with Queens of the Stone Age to talk about their experiences with the road crew.

Initially this video started playing automatically. I did a bit of html magic and now it doesn't and I'm quite proud of myself now. Show me some love.

Check out all the episodes at http://www.vice.com/ontheroad

Soundcloud Showcase (The Doldrums, Shells, Hard Mix and a Balam Acab remix)

Bringing back the mighty Soundcloud Showcase again with some more mighty fine tracks you just simply NEED to hear. I've been a bit ill/a bit hungover/watching way too much Entourage to write this post any earlier than now, which is why you might be thinking: "Hey, this is yesterday's news!"

If that's what you're thinking, it means you're obvs way too pretentious anyway...

On to the goods then mi amigos. (I've just started studying Spanish, and that was a little taster of my mad skillz)

I know nothing about the next band The Doldrums and don't intend to find out about them until this post's been written. Lazy journalism yes, but it's all good because I'm hardly the journalist. Y'see, these days I'm just a guy who embeds flippin' Soundcloud clips.

"I'm Homesick Sittin' Up Here In My Satellite" is a catchy tune. In fact as tunes go, it's pretty much a fishing hook made of Velcro  That's how catchy it is.

You want more?

This tune's so contagious that I heard Danny Boyle's thinking of making a film about it called "2.33 minutes later".

 Doldrums - I'm Homesick Sittin' Up Here In My Satellite by NO PAIN IN POP

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We're at that point where the entire world's making remixes of Lana Del Rey's "Video Games", and why shouldn't they? Video Games is an ace tune.

Balam Acab are usually categorized somewhere between Witch House and Post-Dubstep but their remix of Video Games is a wondrously lush track, rich in soft textures with only the slightest modifications on Lana's vocals, which were the main focus point on the original version too.

 Video Games (BALAM ACAB Remix) - Lana Del Rey by BALAM ACAB 

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Shells is a bedroom producer from The UK, whose previous Bret Easton Ellis themed works (Lunar Park EP) have been big ol' favourites of mine. Now he's got a new 2-track EP out Arctic b/w Spiders. I'm pretty sure neither track name is an Easton Ellis reference and I can't think of any other piece of literature it might refer to either. (I thought this was your thing Mr. Shells) Perhaps the closest we can get is my yet-unreleased book: Tundra Tarantulas - A cool arachnid love story.

If you're a fan of Four Tet, Bonobo and Seams, odds are you'll love this too.

 Arctic by shells 

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To end this post on a high, we've got a 10-minute house jam of epic proportions courtesy of South Carolina's Hard Mix. "I Wonder Why You Cry" is a huge track. Using vocal chops from The Originals' "Baby I'm For Real" and Thelma Houston's disco classic "Don't Leave Me This Way" (also heard on Pariah's "Orpheus") to create a wicked kind of shoutback feel to the tune. Banging.

 I Wonder Why You Cry by Hard Mix 

Soundcloud Showcase (Monarchy, 65daysofstatic, Oneohtrix Point Never, KXP)

Here we go folks. A super hot, new and perhaps even recurring theme here on my blog now. Something I'm just gonna call Soundcloud Showcase, because it sounds snazzy and very "now".

In fact it's basically what I've been doing all along ie. posting new tunes off of Soundcloud that I personally love.

- Does that sound like something you might be interested in?
- Well I hope so, because it's all I've got.

So what's a better way to get this party started by posting a hot little summery dance number on a cold, Wednesday morning in November, seeing as I have it on good authority that Wednesdays are the new Saturdays and winter is the new summer.

Anyway, Monarchy came out with their debut album earlier this year, "Around the Sun" is exactly what you've been looking for if "exactly what you've been looking for" is something to fill that chart-friendly electro-pop sized hole in your heart that was left by Hurts only really having one decent song.
Monarchy's bass player obviously thought it wasn't enough to be "exactly what you're looking for" and went on to remix one of the best tracks on the album to make it even better. That's a whole load of better-ness right there. This is Vivien's remix of Monarchy's "You Don't Want To Dance With Me".
Play it, download it, love it.

Monarchy - You Don't Want To Dance With Me (VIVIEN Remix) by AndygoesdowntoChinatown

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65daysofstatic are generally known for their energetic break-neck speed post rock bangers or not known at all, depending on who you are. But now they're on to something special, live-soundtracking the 1972 "classic" movie Silent Running. Not a lot of people tend to do this kind of thing these days, do they?

If the first released song "Burial Scene" is anything to believe, it seems 65dos have ditched the techno-vibes and whipped out the entire Explosions in the Sky discography

Burial Scene by 65daysofstatic

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Slight change in style is also something Oneohtrix Point Never's gone through. After his ace little sidetrack with Joel Ford earlier this year to make the fantastic "Channel Pressure" album, Daniel Lopatin is back to his OPN alias and blessing us with an entirely piano driven slow number "Replica". Not to worry though. The trademark 80's style pulsating buzzsaw-synths are still there and still going strong. As ever with this guy, listening to him brings back memories of that bit where you're stuck in Metal Gear Solid. You know that bit where you have to plug in and play with controller 2 so that levitating psychic motherfucker can't "read your thoughts". Best day of my life when I got past that bit.

Oneohtrix Point Never - Replica by Mexican Summer

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And finally for today, Finnish kings of drone KXP have got a new tune out. It's the title track from their up and coming 3-track "Easy" EP which celebrates the band's signing to Manchester label Melodic Records. Featuring more vocals than probably their entire debut album put together this is a song you'll find either brilliant or super annoying.

K-X-P - Easy (Infinity Waits) by Melodic Records

What a day. (Burial, Massive Attack, Martyn, Rustie)

What a day yesterday was for us lot who love electronic music. Loads of new releases means there's gonna be that much less spare time to do anything other than just listen in awe.

First off is of course the new Massive Attack and Burial collab "Four Walls" that got aired on Mary Ann Hobb's radio show last night. "Four Walls" is the A-side of the super limited 12" that features two Burial mixes of Massive Attack tunes.

B-side "Paradise Circus" is off MA's last album "Heligoland", whereas "Four Walls" is a never-before-heard unreleased piece. So feast your ears on it below. Burial's reworking is exactly the kind of late night ghost walk we've come to expect. No seriously, I should have slept a lot more last night, but there I was listening to it again and again.

If you were in the intention of purchasing said 12", it would set you back roughly 25 quid but hey that ain't nothing if you take into account the fact it's made of solid gold and unicorn tears. That's how special this baby is.

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Yesterday also marked the day the Dutch master (no not Edwin van der Sar) Martyn (possibly a pseudonym of Edwin's) released his new album "Ghost People". Martyn says his music doesn't categorize under house, dubstep, techno or D 'n' B because it is simply Martyn-music.

Martyn-music's fine by me if it sounds this sweet.

Mixmag are doing us all a favour by streaming the whole thing. You'll want to check out "Masks". This tune is a fucking beast.

Martyn - 'Ghost People' LP Exclusive Stream by Mixmag

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And seriously as if that wasn't enough for one day, Rustie comes along and bangs out his debut LP "Glass Swords", so expect some crazy Hudson Mohawke -styled playful, all over the place beats.

Rustie's a Scottish guy who's apparently 28 but looks about 12 so I'm just gonna average those two and say he's 20 which makes "Glass Swords" phenomenal stuff from such a young kid.

The whole album's being streamed over at The Guardian. Enjoy.

Also don't forget to "enjoy" the album cover which kind of brings up images of two futuristic penises (one vastly inferior) having a little cuddle in the desert while the sun goes down. That's pretty deep stuff, man.

Rustie - Ultra Thizz (taken from Glass Swords) by Rustie

Ólafur Arnalds - Living Room Songs

Ólafur Arnalds is at it again. The Icelandic neo-classical wizard is yet again creating and releasing a new song each day of the week. He did it "way" back in 2009 to create his 'Found Songs' album, recording a new song every day and giving it away as a free download. Ultimately they'd also all be compiled into a physical release. This time around he's calling it 'Living Room Songs'. Why? Because it's all going down in the man's living room in Reykjavík. Which is also where you can see him next week if you're lucky enough to be heading over to the Iceland Airwaves festival.

With Living Room Songs we also get to peek in at his work because each day/song is also preserved in video format in addition to just sound. Y' See? This is day 2's song 'Near Light' (mp3) but you can see them/download them all over at http://livingroomsongs.olafurarnalds.com/

There's still a couple of tracks to be released. Get in on this!

Lana Del Rey with a teeny bit of Jamie Woon

You just know this girl is gonna be huge. With an already crazy amount of radio play for her new single 'Video Games' which isn't actually physically released until october 9th things should only get bigger for Lana Del Rey or Lizzy Grant amongst friends. Video Games is a simply beautiful song. Haunting and subtle at the same time. She's also got a knack for ace videos. Both the videos for 'Video Games' and b-side 'Blue Jeans' are montages of old footage mixed with new ones to create a kind of retrophile pornography. It seems as though I'm not her only fan though, because Jamie Woon's gone and remixed Video Games and given it his own very recognizable sheen. Sounding perhaps a little bit too much like Lana's vocals superimposed onto Lady Luck . Nevertheless it's pretty damn sexy. Lana Del Rey - Video Games - Jamie Woon Remix by woon If you weren't aware of recent developments, Jamie Woon is returning to Helsinki after his triumphant set at this summer's Flow Festival and is playing Helsinki's Circus on November 28th 

James Blake - Enough Thunder EP (stream)

Okay so I seem to be the advocate for everything James Blake but, hey, give me a break. The man has stolen my entire look, face, body and soul so the least I can do as a bit of payback is stalk his entire life.

You might remember a while back I posted 'Fall Creek Boys Choir' his collab with Justin Vernon aka. Bon Iver? Well that track was just a sample of the new James Blake EP titled 'Enough Thunder'.

Enough Thunder's released October 10th but the good people at Blakey HQ have decided that an online stream of the EP is the right way forward. True dat. It's ace.
Thing's even got a Joni Mitchell cover on it (A Case of You) which is basically just James and a piano making a hell of a lot of young women moist in the loins.

So here it is James: I'm still pissed off with you for completely cramping my style, but yet I do salute you for making an album of babe-friendly smooth tunes to accompany sweet tender love-making.

This is the stream. Dig it.

Welder

Do you all remember Eskmo? Well he released a wicked good beat heavy s/t album last year but now it seems the San Franciscan has gone on to concentrate on something a bit but luckily not completely different. That being his Welder project. Welder has just released a new album titled Florescence. The new stuff is more percussive and adventurous than Eskmo, and somehow sounds more like the Ninja Tunes material we're used to hearing than Eskmo's album which actually was released on Ninja Tunes. The man (Brendan Angelides) says making the album helped him through a tough period of his life and I can imagine that same would apply to those listening to it.
Get the album here http://www.weldersounds.com/ or stream it below.

Run (mp3)

James Vincent Mcmorrow - Wicked Game (Chris Isaak cover)

Sexy voiced Irish songsmith James Vincent Mcmorrow loves doing cover versions. Well, I don't know if that's true. Maybe he hates them and they're just some record company's gimmick but when he does them he does them well. The man gained a somewhat cult-ish following after his cover of Willow Smith's 'Whip My Hair' and now he's at it again with a version of Chris Isaak's 'Wicked Game' which is perhaps more widely known as my choice of karaoke song. Oh yeah, I could go on forever about that time I got a 99% score on the easy level of the Wii's version of Singstar doing this song, but I'll save that for another time.

This is James Vincent Mcmorrow doing Wicked Game (mp3). (not sure if he'd beat my 99% score though)

Fair Ohs - Pacific Rim

To celebrate the fact that today is the first time in two months that my new shitty little usb modem has picked up the 3G network I thought I'd write a post. For all you non tech-savvy folks like myself 3G means good happy times whereas 2G means punch-yourself-in-the-face frustration. Great to see I'm getting my money's worth.

Anyway, what would be a better way to return to the blog than long time AGDTC favorites Fair Ohs, who've now released a limited edition 7" recording of their early more garage punk style tunes called Pacific Rim. Most of the tunes here are rapidfire in-your-face energized frenzies which tend to clock in at just under 1 minute. See 'I'm A Woman, I'm Your Wife' (mp3)


Get the whole thing over at Tough Love Records

If you need convincing, the whole thing's up for listening on soundcloud this week.
http://soundcloud.com/tough-love/sets/fair-ohs-pacific-rim-early

Spotify playlist of my favourite songs of 2011

Watch me go! 3 posts in one day. I'm on fire baby.
Ok you might argue that none of my posts are any good or well written but, whatever, it's all the about the music baby... Am I right?

Good.

Because I bring thee my Spotify playlist of Doom! And by Doom! I mean favourite songs of the year so far. I'm gonna keep on updating this baby as long as I keep finding ace tunes.

Spotify playlist of Doom!

(Oh yeah, you might need Spotify to make this work. Just a hint.)

Justice - Audio Video Disco

Lalalaalaa

Here I am watching the new Justice video for Audio Video Disco on a school computer without sound trying to remember what the song sounds like. I heard it over the weekend a few times but now have no idea how it goes. Picturing how the images go together with the sounds...
Why do they have guitars in the video? Are there guitars in the song? I can't remember. My brain is like a fucking sieve.

Here I am wondering if the Justice song I've just made up in my head is actually better than the real thing. Who knows? Right now it's a mix between Phantom pt. 2 and Mr. President's Coco Jambo, but it keeps morphing and I don't know what's coming next.

Anyway, as Arsene Wenger would say: "Ere eez ze viideo for Audio Video Disco." And you can download the mp3 from here


Justice - AUDIO, VIDEO, DISCO. by justice

Hiatus & Shura

Yet another one, that's taken me ages to post. But now I'm back at uni I can use these computers.
Easy-peasy.

Anyway.

Is this one of the best songs I've heard all year?
- Yes

Is this the kind of music I'd love to make if I were that way talented?
- Hell yes

Does this show that a dubstep influenced producer can work seamlessly with a singer-songwriter?
- It most definitely does. (if you perhaps weren't entirely convinced by James Blake & Bon Iver...)

Hiatus (Cyrus Shahard) released his debut album Ghost Notes last year and it featured this cracking tune which was released as a single this April on the 30th anniversary of the Brixton riots in London. It seems somewhat ironic that I heard his new track, his collaboration with songstress Shura (Aleksandra Denton), at roughly the same time as the latest London riots. New track Fortune's Fool isn't much of a political statement though. 'Tis a good old fashioned love song but, you know, with sexy beats and Shura's beautiful haunting vocals and guitar-work looped up and down and all around. Oh Yes.

Starsmith - Lesson One

Under Seige 2 was on TV last night but because I haven't got a TV (take note Finnish TV-licence inspectors and stop wasting your time) I couldn't watch Steven Seagal kick shit-loads of ass.

But as everyone rushed home from our football game in time to get in on that action, I remebered an e-mail I recieved from this dude with an incredibly similar name to Mr. Seagal telling me about Starsmith's new EP 'Lesson One' and how I should probably listen to it and that I should probably write about it on here.

Fair do's. This happened ages ago and since then the EP's already seen the light of day as it dropped on August 22nd but I'm still gonna get in on that action.

You might have heard of Starsmith before as he's been producing all sorts recently but perhaps what he's most known for is his work on a certain Ellie Goulding's debut album.

Now however it's time to spread your own wings Mr. Smith and get your own beats out there.

Starsmith - Lesson One by Vulture Music

Starsmith - Champion by Vulture Music

Florence + The Machine - What The Water Gave Me (new song)

Flo and her machine are back with a bang. And by bang I mean more of the same as where she left with 2009's Between Two Lungs album.

What the Water Gave Me is by no means a groundbreaking masterpiece but it's still a fine piece of music in it's own genre of "operatic rock-pop how ever you want to call it".
It's a touch darker than her previous stuff, but you wouldn't really write a bright and upbeat tune about drowning would you?

She's got a new as of yet untitled album coming out in November.

James Blake & Bon Iver collab

James Blake & Bon Iver - Fall Creek Boys Choir


This song just has to be blogged about for the simple reason that it's a collaboration between two of the most blogged about artists of the past year or so. So it doesn't matter if it's a good song or not, when two artists like that release a tune together they they could be doing armpit farts for 20 minutes and odds are, it'll still be everywhere sooner or later.

Guess what?
It sounds a lot like Justin Vernon singing onto a James Blake backing track.

Who'd have thought?

But seeing as I'm quite fond of both of them, I'm more than happy to just go along with the ride, even though Vernon's wailing at some point sounds a bit like an autotuned car alarm.

Flow Festival 2011 baby. Wow wasn't it crazy?

So once again Helsinki's Flow Festival came and went and I came and went somewhere completely different. That's right, I didn't make it to Helsinki much to the dismay of myself and not a lot of other people.

I felt like writing up a totally bogus festival review about how Kanye West had his voice so autotuned that at the end of his set an actual Daft Punk-esque cyborg erupted from his mouth, tweeted pictures of its own metallic penis and then fucked over Finland's version of Taylor Swift, who may or may not be called Ronya.

"Yo Ronya, I'm really happy for you and I'ma let you finish, but your song 'annoying' is just really fucking annoying, so actually I'ma not let you finish" -insert metallic penis here-

James Blake, the golden boy of dubstep, has definitely hung up his dubstep shoes as he proceeded to sit on a stool for 45 minutes repeating the same 14 words over and over for 40 of those minutes. Then he played a cover song.

Turns out that someone called Bridget Hayden played the best gig of the festival on Sunday at the Cirko stage but because there was literally nobody watching her, due to a) not finding the stage b) not giving a fuck, I'm the only person who knows this. The empty crowd gave Bridget an eerie sense of mystery and set every hipster on the face of the earth on to red alert, because as we all know there's no greater feeling than being able to slip "Oh, you haven't heard of her? Oh, please everyone has heard of her" into a conversation to make you a superior being.

Superior enough to look like this.

From http://www.hel-looks.com

Just days before the festival Q-Tip had to cancel his show and the organisers luckily managed to fill in his slot with MF DOOM. Unfortunately just before his gig, DOOM realised he's allergic to nickel and that wearing a nickel plated mask for all these years was a terrible idea. Needless to say, DOOM had to cancel as well because he'd ended up looking like Leonardo Di Caprio. Eesh.

The organisers yet again worked their magic and roped in Vanilla Ice to please the Hip Hop hordes. VN-ICE was right at home on the main stage and due to popular demand he played 7 encores. Every single one of them being 'Ice Ice Baby'. After his gig everyone rushed off to the merch stands to buy his super limited 7" prints of 'Ice Ice Baby' b/w 'who cares what track, you'll never listen to it anyway'.

Just before her performance Lykke Li found herself in a lot of pain and that she couldn't sing any songs and had to cancel. Turns out she had a trumpet in her head and just couldn't get it out. I blame Kanye. We've all seen what he's capable of and cranial insertion of brass instruments is probably a piece of piss compared to all the other shit he's done.

Someone said Hauscka was a bit of a let down after he forgot his piano in Germany and his gig was just 2 hours of complete silence (but you know the artsy type of cool silence). It was however miles better than Empire of the Sun who came on the stage in crazy headgear and played the entirety of MGMT's back catalogue in the hope no-one would notice anything was wrong. There was. It's not 2008 anymore.

Apparently everyone who knew anything about anything, went to see Finnish superstars Rubik who were headlining the cube stage. There was some crazy discrimination going on as the band attempted to segregate different coloured members of the audience to stand in their own sections in the front, back and at the sides of the stage. The gig however was deemed a failure as one stubborn white dude wouldn't get over to his own allotted section and just stood there with all the blue dudes. This frustrated the band so much that they've now opted for a name change and are now known as Sudoku.

That's it for my festival report, it's good to be back.

Toodles.

Aves - Shoreline

Once again some fine music has been deemed junkmail by my oh-so-trusty e-mail, but luckily as I was checking up on my penis extension and viagra offers I happened to notice an e-mail from Stereotype Helsinki.

Stereotype Helsinki are an audio-visual arts collective from, you guessed it, Helsinki, Finland who blog, have their own radio show, organize club nights and now, it would seem, are branching out towards becoming a record label.

"Ooh ooh check me out, I'm a busy bastard!" is what they're all saying whilst all smugly enjoying all the blog-love their first release is getting. What is this release you ask? Well it's Helsinki's very own Aves and Aves' first single 'Shoreline'.

What is Aves? Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Is it a bloke with a synth who hasn't left his dark flat in two months? Who knows? I really don't...

Anyway, Shoreline's a summery synth-number which sounds like what I'd imagine The Doves would sound like if they were into chillwave.

Aves - Shoreline (mp3)

Laura Marling - Sophia

Just how bloody prolific is this girl?

21 years old and her third album is just about ready for release. With her new single Sophia, she sounds more mature than I'll probably sound my entire life. Starting off slowly and familiar, Sophia builds up towards its booming crescendo via some brilliant Joni Mitchell-esque final verses.
.


Laura Marling's third album 'A Creature I Don't Know' is out September 12th but available for pre-order here. Do so and you'll get a download of Sophia.

Benjamin Francis Leftwich - Atlas Hands (Mike Skinner remix)

Ah man, I've been waiting to hear this remix ever since I heard it was on the cards.

So Mike Skinner from The Streets has gone and remixed Benjamin Francis Leftwich's Atlas Hands, which is the second single from the super acclaimed young singer-songwriter's debut album 'Last Smoke Before the Snowstorm'.

The original goes a little like this:



Skinner seems to have taken such a liking to Benjamin's tunes that he's even come out of retirement to make this ace reworking.

Benjamin Francis Leftwich - Atlas Hands (Mike Skinner Remix) by Dirty Hit

New Flying Lotus

On actual music related terms, beatmaestro Flying Lotus has banged out two new tracks for us.
Lullaby and Heave(n) mix 2 are the new tunes. Super heavenly spaced-out hip hop beats that are just so recognizable as FlyLo.
Maybe they're off an up and coming album, or maybe he just does this stuff for fun. Who knows?

Flying Lotus - lullaby by Flyinglotus

Flying lotus - heave (n) mix2 by Flyinglotus

Thought I'd use this moment to let you lot in on what's going on.

I've reached a milestone in my life. Great deeds are being done all over the world every single day, but my milestone, my achievement has nothing to do with anything like that.

Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time in my life, I had a real life drink thrown in my face.

Fantastic.

I've never entirely understood why throwing your drink in someone's face has become such a strong and almost iconic gesture, because it's more or less a waste of a perfectly good drink. Coming from my alcoholic Ebeneezer Scrooge mindset, if you go round carrying free glasses of water just in case someone happens to piss you off, then, it's perhaps totally justifiable, but otherwise you're just losing money and alcohol.
To make the most of the situation I did the old "sucking-on-my-alcopop-drenched-clothes-just-to-get-drunk" thing, you know which one I'm talking about...

Perhaps I was being a dick or perhaps it was an unfortunate misunderstanding but whatever it was it has gained me entrance to the elite club which is generally reserved for the worst kinds of chauvinistic pigs and of course who could forget French dubbed Amanda Righetti (see video)



Anyway it's almost time to kick off Karuna Unplugged which starts in a couple hours in our back garden. Branded "THE best unplugged festival between Paimio and Kemiö" and this time featuring even more international superstars than last year. It's gonna be huge! Whoop whoop.

Gonna fistpump to Jukka Kuoppamäki.
Check it out:

The wedding

I attended my mate's wedding on Saturday.

I haven't been to a wedding in roughly 20 years but it would seem that I've now reached the age where it's starting to happen that friends and relatives of a similar age to me are expressing their desire to "love and be loved until they die".
Seeing as I haven't been to a wedding in a while, I'd forgotten how tough they can be.
Finnish weddings with an open bar are in particular physically very demanding. It's been like 72 hours and I'm finally starting to show signs of life again.

I haven't seen the film 4 weddings and a funeral, but I'm pretty sure it's just about this one guy going to 4 weddings in a row, getting shitfaced at every one of them and then just simply dying. His death is a horrible, painful one. Serves you right Hugh Grant you smug bastard.
I felt pretty damn close to this on Sunday.

Anyway, the ceremony was lovely. Everyone looked super pretty and looked to have enjoyed themselves rather nicely... At some point as the night progressed, the newly-weds had enough and fucked off to a different country, but I'll be damned if this was going to stop me having a good time.
As the night neared its end and I was ordered to stop tearing up the dancefloor, I gathered up a troupe of merry (ie. absolutely hammered) wedding guests and some extras (the bar staff) and we headed on a vodka-fuelled quest towards the local beach. We were like a shit Lord of the Rings and some members of our group even had the demeanor of orcs.
I was, of course, Aragorn son of my mum, King of awesomeness.
Our quest? A little late-night swimming, which btw. is exactly the kind of thing you're always warned not to do, and a lot more late-night drinking.
We only stopped to pick up (steal) my little sister's giant inflatable crocodile, which I then named Steve Irwin.
Steve quickly lived/died up to his name as he suffered a fatal puncture which instead of a pissed-off stingray was caused by a pissed-up group of young adults. So without the aid of inflatable toys we were forced to entertain ourselves.

Three things I noticed:

1) Trying to pull running backflips into the water just isn't going to happen at 5 in the morning while you're holding a bottle of Jaloviina.

2) Forcefully trying to remove the clothes of your female companions because "swimming's totally awesome and they should deffo swim with the guys" just makes you (look like) a desperate pervert.

3) The water was actually quite cold and I most probably screamed "like a bitch"

And it was that entertainment which ultimately tired our posse, as they all in turn managed to crawl back to our place and pass out, for some reason, each on a different step of our staircase.

Phew.

Two more weddings this year.

Becoming Real - Spectre EP

Although Becoming Real released his Spectre EP over 6 months ago, his record label Not Even records have just uploaded the EP onto Soundcloud with the added bonus of having the track Like Me as a free download. Dubbing his music as ghoststep, Becoming Real's greatest feat is of course naming one of his tracks Showdown in Chinatown. You know, almost like this here blog you're reading...

Becoming Real - Like Me feat. Trim by NOT EVEN

Pretty Lights vs Summertime

I stumbled across this the other day and it kind of makes sense to post this tune called Summertime, which is essentially a mashup of several summer related tracks, during the summer. I'm not entirely sure if it would go down as well in the middle of winter at -20°C as it does now. It was all put together by Derek Vincent Smith aka. Pretty Lights and just like a certain Daft Punk mashup that was doing the rounds on the internet, this one must've taken ages and effort to pull off. It's a bit hip-hop, a bit electro, a bit this, a bit that, a bit cwoar!
Bravo bravo.

Pretty Lights vs Summertime (Free Download) by prettylights

Seekae

I've never properly understood the saying:
"Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me."

Feel free to explain its meaning to me because the way I see it, it should be:
"Fool me once, shame on me; fool me twice, double shame on me for being such a gullible fucker."

That had nothing to do with anything, I just wanted to get it off my chest. So now that we've got my "proverb of the day" out of the way I feel obliged to steer you in the direction of Australians Seekae and their brilliant 2nd album +DOME


Seekae are being championed by and have been touring extensively with Mount Kimbie so it's no real surprise to hear the subtle changes from their largely experimental first album The Sound of Trees Falling on People to smoother Crooks & Lovers -style atmospheric post-dubstep soundscapes on +DOME.

This album is going to rank way up there on my end of the year highlights list.

Seekae - Blood Bank (Single) by Rice Is Nice

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As a bit of ps. I should add that Black Lips & Dum Dum Girls are playing at Turun Klubi tonight and tickets are whatever 18€ or something. So basically fuck all for a line-up that sweet. I wouldn't miss it for the world. But this time "the world" is being stuck in the countryside, broke and all flu'd up. Bummer.

Guitars and guitars. Athletes in Paris & T H E S L O W D O W N

When I was but a young boy bands had guitars and the likes of other real instruments. So in an attempt at pseudo-nostalgia I've had a gander at a couple of more traditionally equipped acts.



First up are Athletes in Paris. The geordie band play their summery pop tunes with a distinct indie-dancefloor vibe. Their new single Heartbeat (mp3) is no exception with its catchy-as-hell hooks that'll have you yearning to find that dancefloor to tear up Crash Bandicoot style.
They're already making quite a name for themselves up north and also played to a packed like sardines crowd at their record label The Animal Farm's sold out showcase at this years Great Escape festival. Grab some more of their songs such as Borrowed Time from their bandcamp

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Next is the band formerly known as B I G S L E E P but now known as T H E S L O W D O W N, either way it's a pain in the arse to type quickly. Gonna make my life easier and call them a string of consonants SLWDWN. Anyway Mancunians SLWDWN are a bit elusive and (note: this next part is heavily edited) and definitely not a bit of a one hit wonder with SEX. But if they were to make any more songs, say one called Ghosts, as good as this then I should bloody well expect them to be huge. Because SEX is huge. No really, sex is huge.

T H E S L O W D O W N - SEX by Dirty Hit

new music: Lucy Rose

Gdansk. A beautiful, beautiful city and the beer was cheap as tits. Not a bad combo me thinks.
I found myself a little safe haven in the form of a bar called Absinthe. T'was here I met a couple of fellow bloggy types from Sucking Lemons and a cool little bunch of exchange students (one of whom was wielding Daddy's credit card with the fury of a nerd with a 1d8 mystic bastard sword at a LARP event)

Anyway, being away from a computer for about a week means that even a small fry blog-type like me manages to get an inbox full of various requests to listen to this-or-that band. I love getting these music related e-mails because it means I get to listen to music that I'd perhaps not otherwise get the chance to listen to.
Sometimes even though some of the bands are pretty dreadful, I'm still very much appreciative of the time and effort they've put into it and because sometimes just sometimes some real gems are uncovered. The latest being Lucy Rose.



As far as I'm concerned 2011 has been the year of the female singer-songwriter. It's not really a scene that ever disappears anywhere, it's just that this year more releases such as Daughter, Emmy the Great, PJ Harvey have caught my eye (ear) than before. Now I need to add Lucy Rose's new single Middle of the Bed to the list. It doesn't get an official release until August 8th but you can listen to it on Soundcloud now.
The simple guitar + the odd clap here and there really accentuate Lucy's gorgeous voice and then when, halfway though the song, the curously electro-ish synth kicks in, the whole song just ties itself together.

Lucy Rose - Middle Of The Bed by Lucy Rose



think you've heard her before? Quite possibly seeing as she also sang on Bombay Bicycle Club's Flaws