Snowden Slow Rolls Another Track

Here is another streaming offering from Snowden’s latest effort, No One In Control called “So Red”. Those familiar with Jordan Jeffares work will love this. Those not should take note. As we get ready to be all Psyched out, how about a little hazy gaze goodness.

Snowden will make a stop in the new home base to play Red7 on June 7th. I sincerely hope the merch table is stocked.

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/89151124″ params=”color=ff6600&auto_play=false&show_artwork=false” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

SxSW 2013: The Rest of the Showcase Pics

Nothing quite like figuring out that you still have 1600 shots to go through after six posts already up for SxSW…

Sorry, SxSW seems like a distant memory, but I may just rekindle some fond memories of the smaller shows that you should have gone to. Official SxSW stuff, I have already shared the shots of The Flaming Lips headlined party and Iggy and The Stooges. This gallery has shots of Mompox, Young Galaxy, Local Natives, Gold Fields, Shout Out Louds, Shout Out Out Out, GEMS and more. If you click, you will also get a few quick notes on winners and losers.

So do it. Sing with me, MEEEMMMOOOORRRIIIEESS!!!11!shift+1

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My New Best Friend, James Murphy…

We are pretty lucky to live here in Austin. Friday night, the wife and I started out at the friendly confines of The Mohawk, caught a kick ass set from Flesh Lights, chilled at a picnic table, had beer, whisky, and Topo Chico with good people that also love our music scene.

Red7 played host to a DJ set from James Murphy thanks to Learning Secrets. The wife got tix and that means that we became besties with the leader of one of my favorite things, LCD Soundsystem.

Click though for evidence…

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Show Pics: Two Door Cinema Club @ Stubb’s (4/10)

Guilty pleasures, we all have them (Timberlake, comics, shimmying, wrestling, jello shots). I have a thing for Brit-Pop and the poppiest stuff going in my playlists has to be Two Door Cinema Club. I swore them off after the last show based on their destined rise with a rabid fan base of teenage “drop me off at the show, mom” crowd. More on them in a bit.

Inevitably, openers will get also get more mainstream as the crowd changes. Robert DeLong is an interesting creature.

But, even if you hate the bands involved, I hope you will take a look at the photos. I shot the second night and the photo pit to myself. It was well lit and a ton of fun to shoot.

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Dark Wave from Vår

This came across the twitters and I decided to share.

The band is called Vår, formarly War. They are a four-piece composed of friends living in Copenhagen, including a dude from Ice Age. The bio on the Soundcloud page for Sacred Bones has plenty of great descriptives for the band’s sound, but give it a listen and get transported onto a fog filled club with very little lighting wearing all black. This is goth-punk-dance-synth done at a high level.

The album No One Dances Quite Like My Brothers lands 5/14.

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/86400675″ params=”color=ff6600&auto_play=false&show_artwork=false” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

Buy Teen Daze a Wedding Gift

The best part is you get an EP.

You can go to the Teen Daze bandcamp and check out the story behind the EP. It includes stories mountainside houses, roommates with instruments, British Columbia’s beauty and pizza and video games. But add to it, the last bullet point is this, “ps – All proceeds made off this record will go towards my wedding budget. Love you bean!”

Just $4, a gift that gives back…

Show Pics: Grizzly Bear @ Stubb’s (4/8)

Hi, nice to meet you. You mind giving me some air?

Wow, Stubb’s was it packed for Grizzly Bear. So packed that the photo pit was moved in to allow for more people space because the show was oversold. I didn’t know that sardines had date nights. Was it worth it the uncomfortably close neighbors?

A couple quick notes on the show including my love for Owen Pallett and of course the human monopod show pics…

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Andre Obin – The Arsonist

Rating: ★★★★☆

We rarely think of electronic artists carrying stage presence. We rarely consider live performance an important aspect of an electronic act. Andre Obin won electronic performer of the year according to hometown Boston’s Music Awards.

The reality is that having good material can trump all. The latest album effort from Andre is called The Arsonist, assumingly for the strong third track we have shared here. But we’ll get there, let’s start at the beginning.

The first seven minutes of the record is dedicated to a song called “Golden Hair”, a simple progression of tones set the stage for an oncoming bassline that starts in the higher octaves and is filled in with angrier deeper synth tones and an inevitable drum track no less that two and half minutes in. I love the slow builder, though formulaic, when the right sounds are peppered in, it can be raise the hair on your arms at high volume. This sends me right to my roots in electronic music of GOA trance, D&B and bands like Orbital and Higher Intelligence Agency. Lofty affected vocals, allegory to Rapunzel, fill the content so the wife doesn’t get mad about songs with out words.

“Blue Powder” changes things up a beat, slows it down, less dream, more synth ballad. Lyrically soft, but intentionally, so, think M83. Title track next, holy crap, I love this song. And quite honestly, it may be the biggest barrier to me upping the score on the album. It is a stand out for me, setting an unreasonable bar.

“Lemondrop” peppers in more M83 vibe, maybe even a little chill wave meets Massive Attack, coolly hollowed breaks and dominant drum track. “Soft Rain” is the probably the poppiest jam on the album. I used it in the SxSW preview and the synth hook makes you smile. Mood changer. “Gazelle” is a mantra-driven darker jam, perhaps the low point on the album for me, but the previous and next tracks are that much better. “Enjoy” deploys the longwave synth bassline and high atmospheric tags that I have always been a sucker for. It is brow down driving music.

The 43 minutes with Andre ends with track eight, “Anthem”. It is a statement, kind of all the things he loves in one song. Big synth hooks, changing tempo, breaks and beats; I think Andre is a Gary Numan fan. The circular lyrics run, “it’s a lot to take home, the thoughts that take hold, there’s so much at stake, it’s a lot to take.”

Unfortunately, my brief SxSW encounter was a late night technical difficulty. The tracks I heard performed were hampered by I/o issues, but did still sound solid as he tours with a drummer and and synth/bass/guitar. I would like to see him again in a proper setting…

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/77324695″ params=”show_artwork=false” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

SxSW 2013: Day Party Pics

No, I am not done yet. This one and a gallery of the showcases is all that is left. If I can muster it, I’ll do a best of post. Best-ofs are easier well removed from a festival because lasting memories help define what really got you going.

Anyway, this giant gallery of daytime show goodness includes some candids and portraits from around the conference during the unofficial events. Highlights include Wax Idols, Nobunny, The Soft Moon, Criminal Hygiene, Bleeding Rainbows, that band Thurston Moore is in, Delorean and so much more.

Click through. Play a game of “oh yeah, I was there.”

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Sharing A Track By Fol Chen

Good Friday. Slow Friday.

How about a little something you might have missed post? Well, don’t mind if I do do. Take a listen to this lovely track by Fol Chen off the album The False Alarms on Asthmatic Kitty. <- one of my favorite label names Hang with it through the lead in…

BTW, there will be a couple more SxSW related posts from this kid next week. Not done yet. Nope, not me.

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/73666975″ params=”color=ff6600&auto_play=false&show_artwork=false” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

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