New Four Tet Single “Love Cry”

Four Tet has released a new 12″ single through Domino titled “Love Cry”. The single includes the aforementioned song as well as a b-side track titled “Our Bells”.

The single “Love Cry” sounds similar to Four Tet’s more minimal dance/techno oriented theme as of late which he initially ventured into on his recent Ringer EP (which is not a bad thing by any means, just different). “Our Bells” consists of a more familiar Four-Tet sounding bell clinking ambient noise song. You can purchase the “Love Cry” 12″ here through Bleep, as well as listen to short samples of each song.

Four Tet also recently posted “Love Cry” on his myspace page. So go check that out to hear his new single in its entirety.

While getting to hear new material from Four Tet is always a treat, his stylistic changes of late are really starting to fuel my curious anticipation for what his next album will sound/be like. Only time will tell, but it’s always nice to have something to look forward to.

On another note, I recently stumbled across a 30 min. mix of minimal techno that Four Tet compiled during the promotion of his Ringer EP. Most sites that I came across had the link removed, but Fader’s download link still works so get that while you can. The tracklist for his mix is below.

Four Tet – 30 min. DJ Mix Download

Four Tet DJ Mix Tracklist:

1. Four Tet – Ringer
2. Liquid Liquid – Bell Head (Harvey edit)
3. Avus – Tear
4. Burial – Raver
5. Sam Clarence – Sextant daktari
6. Wookie – Manchu 2
7. Autechre – Play neu!
8. Matt John – Olga dancekowski
9. Kraftwerk – Ruckzuck
10. Plastikman – Helikopter
11. Siobhan Donaghy – Carl Craig remix
12: The Field – Action

Steve Aoki – Live DJ Set in Berkeley, CA (10/28/09)

Steve Aoki played a free live show on UC Berkeley’s Lower Sproul (put on by UCB’s Superb) this past Wednesday, October 28 to a young and excited crowd that was surprisingly ready to dance/party/jump around/rave (or whatever you want to call it) regardless of the fact that the show began at 5pm outside on a sunny day and ended a little less than 2 hrs later just as the night was beginning to arrive. His DJ set ran through a variety of fan favorites beginning and more or less ending with his recent collaboration song with The Bloody Beetroots “Warp 1.9” (you know, the “One Two Woot! Woot!”). I guess if people really like a song that much, you might as well play it twice, right? Or is that kinda lame? Hmm…either way, the crowd seemed to enjoy it through and through.

Mr. Aoki is definitely well liked by his fair share of dedicated fans, and very early on it was obvious that he likes playing to the crowd just as much. Granted, Aoki is a decent DJ but he’s not going to wow you with slick transitions or interludes, odd electronic or sampled sounds you’ve never heard before, or a lot of original production. Aoki’s forte lies in bumping well known/popular dance songs (ranging from Daft Punk, Justice, The Bloody Beetroots, Deadmau5, Kid Cudi, Nirvana, Bloc Party, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and even the techno ballad Sandstorm, to name a few from memory), amping up the crowd (full with stage diving and all), and looking like he’s having a great time all the while in hope that it rubs off on everyone else. And to be honest, it’s hard to say that the enthusiasm shared by him and his fans isn’t highly contagious. Within no time, you’ll find yourself bobbing your head and moving your body before even thinking much of it. It’s almost as if you’re just blending in. But that’s ok. A Steve Aoki show is not about expanding your musical horizons, it’s about having fun.

Check out a few short videos I took, giving you a taste of what Steve Aoki is like live….A little dancing, a little crowd surfing, and a bit of Daft Punk never hurts either.

Aoki playing a bit of Deadmau5’s “Ghosts N Stuff”

Aoki closing out the set with The Bloody Beetroots “Warp 1.9”

Phaseone Releases New Mixtape and Album for Free

Phaseone is an up and coming St. Louis based producer/artist/dj that has turned a lot of heads in the past year by crafting his own style of woozy electro-crunk hip-hop headlined by a number of successful heavy remixes of non hip-hop artists (tackling artists from Panda Bear, Burial, Animal Collective, Bloc Party, and Radiohead to name a few), not to mention his impressive debut release from this year titled “Thanks But No Thanks”. Being the generous guy that he is, Phaseone has offered his album as a free download through his current label Lefse Records (which can be downloaded below).

Phaseone – Thanks But No Thanks (Download)

And Phaseone keeps the beats rolling with his new mixtape release “White Collar Crimes”, which includes many of his spectacular remixes (that have gained him some well deserved respect as heard through his myspace) as well as a few new pieces of hazy knocking production. Just wanting the music to be heard, Phaseone has once again made this a free release (see the download link below).

Phaseone – White Collar Crimes Mixtape (Download)

Check these two quality releases out and download them while they’re still being offered for free! This is one guy you are going want to keep your eyes/ears on in the future.

Them Crooked Vultures = Josh Homme + Dave Grohl + John Paul-Jones

Them Crooked Vultures is the new supergroup consisting of Queens of the Stone Age’s Josh Homme on guitar/vocals, Dave Grohl of Foo Fighters/Nirvana fame back at the drum set, and John Paul-Jones of the late great Led Zeppelin doing his thing on bass guitar. It’s a pretty impressive trio if you ask me, and soon you’ll be able to hear how ridiculously good they sound for yourself as they just announced that they will be releasing their debut self-titled album on November 17 via DGC/Interscope.

Up to this point the group has only released a few short videos of song clips or of them in the studio (check those out below), and yes, I am disregarding the many youtube videos (of questionable quality) that concertgoers have posted showing them playing some of their new songs live (I’d rather wait to hear them in their thrashing 320 kbps glory). It’s always hard to make premature comments about an album yet to be released, but from whats been heard so far, Them Crooked Vultures sounds like it could be one of the best rock records to come out in a long time. Check out the tracklist and “official” videos below.

Them Crooked Vultures:
01 No One Loves Me & Neither Do I
02 Mind Eraser, No Chaser
03 New Fang
04 Dead End Friends
05 Elephants
06 Scumbag Blues
07 Bandoliers
08 Reptiles
09 Interlude With Ludes
10 Warsaw or the First Breath You Take After You Give Up
11 Caligulove
12 Gunman
13 Spinning in Daffodils

New Band Worth Checking Out: Neon Indian

Neon Indian is comprised of Austin, Texas’ Alan Paloma (also known from his quality work as VEGA) and visual artist Alicia Scardetta (who creates visuals to accompany the songs). Neon Indian’s debut album “Psychic Chasms” consists of washed out, nostalgic sounding songs that are surprisingly catchy (after a few listens) resulting in an enjoyable album from start to finish. Pitchfork has thrown a lot of hype their way recently; however, in this case, it seems pretty well deserved.

So go check it out for yourself already! Listen to some songs on their myspace page and if you like it, then go and buy their album to support them!
Neon Indian Myspace

Dan Deacon Cartoon Poster Contest

Dan Deacon is somewhat of an eccentric man, and don’t get me wrong, I definitely mean that in a good way. His concerts are always interactive and entertaining, his music sounds like it’s made by a savant eight-year old mad scientist, he tours in a vegetable oil powered bus, and his live setup is an odd conglomerate of electronics, wires, duct tape, and a trippy green skull. The man is unique to say the least.

And now, in preparation of a new tour featuring himself and Nuclear Power Pants, he has launched a poster contest on his website (Dan Deacon Poster Contest Site) consisting of a ridiculous 247 cartoon characters (that are to be identified) from a variety of cartoons, shows, and pop culture of the past to the near present. It is a daunting task; but, if completed first there are a plethora of prizes (see below).

THE PRIZES:
1. $500 cash
2. A Portrait of you painted by Dan Deacon
3. One of the last copies of Wham City Box set #1
4. A Copy of each of Dan Deacon’s first 8 releases in real life (silly hat vs egale hat, meetle mice, goose on the loose, a green cobra is awesome vs the sun, porky pig, twacky cats, live 2003, acorn master)

Not too shabby. And take it from me, this contest is pretty fun (and nostalgic) to start given you watched a decent amount of tv in your youth; however, it seems nearly impossible to finish and get them all correct. After two days of wracking my brain  and dubious internet searching, I worked my way up to about 160 out of the 247 (and who knows how many of those are wrong) and then started to lose steam. But you shouldn’t! There’s plenty of time left in the contest and no declared winner yet.  If enough people put their collective minds together it could be done. And if you want to join forces, I’d be more than happy to help. Happy character hunting!

And go see Dan Deacon live. Seriously. It will make you smile.

Check out the remaining Dan Deacon tour dates at his website (http://www.dandeacon.com/):

October 14th – Irvine, CA @ The Pacific Ballroom

October 15th – Los Angeles, CA @ The Echo

October 16th – Los Angeles, CA @ The Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock

October 17th – San Francisco, CA @ Treasure Island Music Festival

October 19th – Sacramento, CA @ The Fungarden

October 21st – Eugene, OR @ Wow Hall(VENUE CHANGED)

October 22nd – Portland, OR @ Worksound

October 23rd – Portland, OR @ Holocene

October 24th – Seattle, WA @ The Vera Project

October 27th – Denver, CO @ Rhinoceropolis

October 29th – Northfield, MN @ Carleton College The Cave

October 30th – Chicago, IL @ Logan Square Auditorium\

November 1st – Gambier, OH @ Kenyon College Horn Gallery

November 3rd – Toronto, ON @ Sneaky Dee’s

November 4th – Toronto, ON @ Great Hall

November 5th – Montreal, QC @ Il Motore

November 6th – Montreal, QC @ Eastern Bloc

November 7th – Middlebury, VT @ Middlebury College

November 8th – Boston, MA @ Pozen Center

November 9th – Providence, RI @ Machines With Magnets

November 10th – Northampton, MA @ Pearl Street Nightclub

November 13th – Troy, NY @ Rennselaer Polytechnic Institute

November 14th – Worchester, MA @ The Grind at Clark University

November 15th – Ithaca, NY @ Emerson Suites at Ithaca College

November 16th – Purchase, NY @ SUNY Purchase

November 18th – Baltimore, MD @ The Ottobar

New Animal Collective EP and Single Coming in 2009

Animal Collective are a busy bunch of guys. This year alone has brought a new album (Merriweather Post Pavilion), a US and European supporting tour that included new/reworked songs and visuals, a variety of remixes (including their recent Phoenix remix), a couple of music videos to go along  with their associated single releases, work on a visual film/record with Danny Perez, and now an upcoming Brothersport single release and a new 5-song EP titled Fall Be Kind. And you thought you had a busy year.

The Brothersport 10″ (see the cover art above) is due out on November 9 from Domino and includes the title track and b-side “Bleeding (Live)”, which  is a song that was recorded at a show in Big Sur earlier this year (and is supposed to be a jammed out version of new song “Bleed” that transitions into “What Would I Want Sky”) . However, the bigger news lies in the rumored (and now confirmed from Dave/Avey Tare himself) Fall Be Kind EP that mysteriously showed up on Amazon recently as a pre-order and had fans wondering if this was some sort of hoax or a dream come true.

Well, it’s true and the EP is planned to be released in digital form in mid November and in vinyl/CD form in early December. Dave discussed all of the details regarding both releases and everything else going on in their crazy lives in a recent Pitchfork interview explaining that the EP is a little darker than MPP and was ideal for a fall season release, that the anticipated visual film/record is in the final stages of completion and should see the light of day next year, and that the band is going to take a break from touring for a while to focus on music and other things. And given how busy they’ve been, it seems only fair that they take a break and enjoy all the success that 2009 has brought them.

The Fall Be Kind EP (see cover art above) opens with one of their former live staples “Graze” (formerly known as the Pan Flute Jam) that they had been playing in concert since 2007 and is probably the song that I’ve most anticipated hearing in  its final produced form ever since it has vanished from their live sets. Then comes “What Would I Want Sky” which is a newer song they’ve played live starting this year which quickly became famous for being the first song to ever include a licensed sample from The Grateful Dead. The third song “Bleed” is the newest song to grace their live set and is a short droney piece that also shows up in its live form on the Brothersport single. Fourth comes the nearly forgotten “On A Highway” which briefly made its way into their live sets a few years back and was recorded in a 2007 BBC session (which many expected to be the closest to a final recording of the song that we’d ever hear), and lastly is “I Think I can”, which appears to be a completely new song (unheard in any fashion) although some are speculating that it is the song that Panda Bear opened with in his recent solo set at ATP NY that segued into “Chores”.

And if all this news isn’t exciting enough, Panda Bear is also supposed to guest on Pantha Du Prince’s upcoming album Black Noise (the follow up to his gorgeous 2007 release This Bliss) which is slated to be released on February 8, 2010. According to the liner notes, Panda Bear adds vocals to a song titled “Stick to My Side” and is sure to be an album highlight.

Daft Punk in Tron Legacy

Although there has been no official announcement, it has been a reportedly confirmed rumor for some time now that Daft Punk are going to be scoring the soundtrack to the upcoming sequel to the 1982 hit film Tron, titled Tron Legacy (which is slated to hit the big screens on December 17, 2010).

A snippet of the Daft Punk Tron Legacy theme premiered a while back at Comic Con, and now a higher quality version has surfaced on the information hungry internets (see youtube link below). The theme sounds adequately robot-like and has Daft Punk fans worldwide salivating at the promise of another quality audio release, soundtrack or otherwise.

More recently, Olivia Wilde (who will be starring in Tron Legacy) confirmed in an MTV  interview that not only did Daft Punk score the film, but that they also make a cameo in the movie (as quoted, “they were in the movie”). Sounds pretty awesome. However, the french duo has had others don the robot suits in the past (such as for their film Electroma) so there’s no real knowing yet as to whether they actually were on the set. Either way, the news is all very exciting; unfortunately, there is still over a year until we can see any of this come to fruition.

[Edit: The youtube clip I originally had posted below was removed, so I’ve put up a new one, which I believe is the same]

New Built to Spill Album – There Is No Enemy

Idaho indie-rock mainstays Doug Martsch and company have come together once again as Built to Spill to release their seventh full-length album in the 11-tracked There Is No Enemy. The album is to be officially released on October 6th via Warner Bros; however, the band is currently streaming the entire album on their myspace page and, (for those of you who “borrow” your tunes via filesharing) the album has leaked to the interweb as well.  The record features guest musicians Sam Coomes (of Quasi), cellist John McMahon, Scott Schmaljohn (of Treepeople, Doug Martsch’s former band), Paul Leary, and additional keyboards by Roger Manning. The full tracklisting is below.

1. “Aisle 13” – 3:17
2. “Hindsight” – 3:38
3. “Nowhere Lullaby” – 3:59
4. “Good Ol’ Boredom” – 6:31
5. “Life’s a Dream” – 4:53
6. “Oh Yeah” – 5:21
7. “Pat” – 2:40
8. “Done” – 6:53
9. “Planting Seeds” – 4:26
10. “Things Fall Apart” – 6:15
11. “Tomorrow” – 7:40

Built to Spill is touring too. Go see them!

Remaining Tour Dates
Oct. 6 – Lee’s Palace, Toronto, Ontario
Oct. 7 – Lee’s Palace, Toronto, Ontario
Oct. 8 – State Theater, Ithaca, NY
Oct. 9 – Middle East, Cambridge, MA
Oct. 10 – Middle East, Cambridge, MA
Oct. 12 – Webster Hall, New York, NY
Oct. 13 – Webster Hall,  New York, NY
Oct. 14 – Music Hall of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, NY
Oct. 15 – Music Hall of Williamsburg,  Brooklyn, NY
Oct. 16 – The Trocadero, Philadelphia, PA
Oct. 17 – 9:30 Club, Washington DC
Oct. 18 – Cat’s Cradle, Carrboro, NC
Oct. 20 – 40 Watt Club, Athens, GA
Oct. 21 – Minglewood Hall, Memphis, TN
Oct. 22 – Granada Theater, Dallas, TX
Oct. 23 – Warehouse Live, Houston, TX
Oct. 24 – Stubb’s Waller Creek Ampitheater, Austin, TX
Oct. 25 – Diamond Ballroom, Oklahoma City, OK
Oct. 27 – Sunshine Theater, Albuquerque, NM
Oct. 28 – Dry River, Tuscon, AZ
Nov. 15 – WOW Hall, Eugene, OR
Nov. 17 – The Nightlight, Bellingham, WA
Nov. 18 – Commodore Ballroom,Vancouver, BC
Nov. 19 – Showbox at the Market, Seattle, WA
Nov. 20 – Showbox at the Market, Seattle, WA
Nov. 21 – Knitting Factory Concert House, Spokane, WA

Animal Collective Remixes Phoenix’s “Love Like A Sunset”

And the Phoenix remixes keep on coming. In fact, after releasing “1901”, “Lisztomania”, and recently “Fences” for free in their multitrack form giving free reign to remixers the world over, Phoenix is now set to release an official remix album originally titled, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix (Remix Collection) due out in digital form October 13th on Glassnote/Loyauté.

The Wolfgang remix collection includes the amazing Animal Collective remixing “Love Like A Sunset”, thus fusing two of my favorite bands (who without coincidence, created two of the best albums of 2009). The remix collection also includes the previously mentioned Devendra Banhart Remix of “Rome” as well as 13 other remixes involving some other known bands such as YACHT, Friendly Fires, Passion Pit, The Soft Pack, and Alex Metric among others.

Animal Collective’s Deakin (aka Josh Dibbs) appears to have taken the helm on this enjoyable AC remix (he also successfully handled the remixing duties on the “Ratatat – Mirando (Animal Collective Remix)”), which comes as no surprise since he’s had time off (for personal reasons) while the rest of Animal Collective (Avey Tare/Dave, Panda Bear/Noah, and Geologist/Brian) have been busy touring the globe in support of the critically acclaimed Merriweather Post Pavilion. Deakin has been formally away from the band since 2007 in regards to touring and the recording of MPP but plans to return soon. Deakin had this to say about the Phoenix remix,

“This spring I was in Panama with Brian. We were cramped into a van on a bumpy, winding central american road going a little too fast. Feeling a little edgy, I put on my headphones and listened to United and Alphabetical back to back. I watched passing fruit stands, a sweet central american dusk and memories of the massive schools of jelly fish, snapper, and trevally; the few dolphin and even the few bluefin tuna (too few) that brian and i had just had the joy of diving with the blend of all of these things put me at ease.

Phoenix has been a staple for all four of us since Dave and Noah brought home United from the record store they used to work at. One of the records that would get us through some of those long cross country tour drives, we’ve listened to phoenix’s jams many many times. We were all totally psyched to get asked to do this and it was super fun to work on it.

All the best to those dudes”

Phoenix – Love Like A Sunset (Animal Collective Remix – Deakin’s Jam)