Despite the fact that solid information on Wu Lyf is exceedingly scarce, they’re the type of band I feel I know better than half the bands whose middle names and favourite TV shows I could find on their myspace pages in a matter of minutes. For one thing, they’re genuinely different from anything else around right now. They’re a band who seem to willingly defy and avoid any sense of definition; the most unwilling of rock stars. But for a group so determined for mystery and behaviour that seems to only perpetuate their legend, their elusiveness only serves to shoot down the idea that it’s all a gimmick. And if that isn’t enough, the music should speak for itself because what Wu Lyf have is something truly special: tortured, melancholic and absolutely mesmerizing. I couldn’t recommend it enough.
To mark the death of Scottish singer-songwriter Gerry Rafferty, acknowledged here on Tuesday, Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters dug out an old cover of the late great’s biggest hit, ‘Baker Street.’
The Foos’ cover of ‘Baker Street’ originally appeared way back in 1998 as a b-side to their ‘My Hero’ single (this being back in the days when physical singles actually existed, although most were on CD by then, thus rendering the term ‘b-side’ technically obsolete).
Before you post the final and non-retractable version of your “2010 Songs of The Year” list, be sure to listen to What Happened?, a criminally unheard gem off Animal Collective’s score to the experimental film ODDSAC. It’s a track that mixes the reckless forward momentum of “Turn Into Something” with the electronic pallet of Strawberry Jam, Avey Tare combating a constant squeal and a relentlessly uptempo drum loop for three breathtaking minutes. Tare’s on his A game here, his yelp of the title lyric warm but also shrilly desperate, Animal Collective invoking its trademark brand of nostalgia and adding something sinister. “What happened to make me suffer inside?” goes the opening lyric. Who knows exactly, but looking at the wild party scene the song accompanies, my guess is growing old happened, and youth is now a hazy, hallucinatory memory of constant abandon. Not to be missed.
As the international media descended on Ireland in November to cover its impending financial crisis, their choice of imagery was striking. Almost all pictorial coverage, in the UK and American media at least, focused on one of three images: beggars, ghost estates or horses.
The first two are predictable enough – similar pictures exist in almost every major city across Europe and the United States – but the third is a puzzler. It appears that for all the rapid financial and technological advances we’ve achieved over the past twenty years, Ireland remains the only country in the world where a horse can freely roam the streets of a major city, with or without its owner, and nobody will bat an eyelid. Except for foreigners, of course, but they hardly count.
Limerick comedy rap duo Rubberbandits have made a small industry of this “only in Ireland” schtick, achieving unlikely success with Ireland’s usually hyper-conservative state broadcaster RTE. They first came to (indie) prominence with the hilarious ‘Up Da Ra,’ a sly satire of those radical Irish nationalists (many of them in the US) whose grasp of historical fact is only rivaled by their loose grip on intelligence. ‘Willie O’Dea‘ is no less funny for the fact only a few thousand people could ever understand it.
As comedians, Rubberbandits are as much miss as they are hit – like a crude, very esoteric, Irish version of the Lonely Island – but as musicians they definitely…
One of the blogosphere’s more interesting stories of late has been the rapid rise of Sonny Moore, better known now as Skrillex, in the electro scene. With only two EPs to his name on deadmau5’s label, Moore at one point had six songs near the top of the Beatport Top 100, a site that specializes in electronic releases and is an excellent barometer of artist success. This is a feat that has never happened before, and it’s even more fascinating when you learn that Moore, who was the former frontman for post-hardcore band From First To Last, only began DJing in the past couple of years. His debut EP came out in June, while Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites, featuring this rather filthy dubstep remix by everyone’s favorite Dutch drum ‘n bass trio Noisia, was just released last month. Who knew all that pent-up hardcore aggression would translate so well to electro?
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I don’t know much of anything about Young Magic (I don’t even know, really, what that picture above is, except has something to do w/r/t the artist), except that his debut song, “You With Air,” is the exact kind of dark, soulful, lo-fi pop that I’ve been searching for relentlessly after Love Remains spiked this hunger, this crave, for such music into my brain. It’s a little more spirited than How to Dress Well, with less focus on ambiance, but the song’s stifling, throbbing synths and the confessional slur of the vocalist combine to give the same sort of nightly glow. Plus, it’s rather catchy, which is always a plus. More stuff to be moody to, basically.
You With Air 7″ comes out February 11, 2011, on Carpark Records.
Time was, all the phrase “UK hip hop” brought to mind was the impossibly cool Slick Rick and the slightly less cool John Barnes. Ireland was in worse shape, almost apologetically claiming credit for New Yorkers House of Pain. Of course there were wonderful underground acts on both scenes, but they would always lack legitimacy in a genre still dominated by inner-city black Americans.
Times have changed immeasurably since: British rap acts have become a genuine force internationally, and being white and European is no longer the stumbling block it used to. Nevertheless, London-born, Wexford-raised Maverick Sabre had always struggled to define his own identity since leaving the city of his birth aged 4 to live in the land of his father, a nation where to be both Irish and English is often viewed as an oxymoron.
That struggle is one the 20-year-old teases out on his debut single, ‘Sometimes,’ and one of many fresh perspectives he offers to an already creatively thriving London scene. His style will most commonly be compared with Plan B’s – and indeed he’s already played support for his fellow Londoner – with acoustic guitar prominent in all his songs and reggae-tinged singing interspersed with his half-caste rapping voice.
Maverick Sabre – ‘Sometimes’:
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Though this song has been floating around for the better part of 2 weeks now, here’s your friendly reminder to give it a listen if you haven’t yet been swallowed by its monstrous swell. Robert Smith, eccentric frontman of goth legends The Cure, teams up with glitched out troublemakers Crystal Castles for this enormous cover of Platinum Blonde’s 1984 hit ‘Not In Love’. Play it at a deafening volume and wait for that chorus to kick in.
They’re not doing anything we haven’t heard a million times before (particularly with the absurd amount of bands doing it right now) but where The Pains of Being Pure At Heart get off easy is that they capture a charm that few of their peers are able to tap into. Their debut record was playful and new-wave romantic in way that made you forget The Field Mice were doing this way back in the 80’s and their latest single “Heart In Your Heartbreak” shows us that nothing’s changed. Belong isn’t set for release until March next year but here’s your early litmus test (pro tip: don’t take it too seriously):
Were proof needed that ‘Fuck You’ is in fact the new ‘Crazy’/’Since U Been Gone’/’Poker Face,’ London singer-songwriter Eliza Doolittle is one of about a million artists (not an accurate estimate) to begin incorporating the song into live sets.
I shudder to think how many more artists would follow suit were there to be some sort of profanity-less version, but unfortunately that song simply does not exist.
Here’s Eliza’s cover recorded backstage with two awkward 14-year-olds she has charitably recruited to play in her band. Stripped down to just double bass and vocals, it’s got a nice laid-back jazzy feel, although it’s probably best not to actually watch the video because her actions and expressions are ill-fitting and really fucking annoying. I don’t think she’ll make it as an actress.
If you do watch the video, look out for the “oh shit she’s a gold digger…” line and the awkward expressions on the supporting cast’s faces as they struggle not to blurt out “nigga” at the end.
It’s no great secret that Amy Winehouse’s best music invariably comes about when she a) collaborates with otherwise nauseating super-producer Mark Ronson and b) channels the great female singers of the Spector-inspired Sixties.
With this in mind, it should come as no great surprised that Amy’s cover of Lesley Gore’s ‘It’s My Party,’ which features production from the still very nauseating Ronson, is what people who are prone to boorish sports metaphors might call a “home run” or perhaps even a “slam dunk.” Covering a genuine classic is always a risky business, but as with her cover of Sam Cooke’s ‘Cupid,’ it’s almost effortlessly brilliant.
‘It’s My Party’ is muted to appear on the upcoming Quincy Jones tribute, Q: Soul Bossa Nostra.
Electric Owls’ 2009 debut Ain’t Too Bright was one of the year’s overlooked gems – so overlooked, in fact, that we disgracefully forgot to ever get around to reviewing it (though I did save all of our souls by putting it on my year-end list).
No such mistakes this time. On November 9, the other band led by Comas frontman Andy Herod, will release an EP Cullowhee Songs and I will not let it go by without even a casual mention. So here is that casual mention.
Lead track ‘When I Was a Flood’ sets the tone, and that tone is a little more aggressive than we’re used to from the band. Ain’t Too Bright was, ironically, quite a bright record – expansive and ebullient with rich, summery chords and tight vocal harmonies offset with broody, fuzzy guitars.
‘When I Was a Flood’ sounds just as big, but the acoustic guitars have given way to sparse, plucked banjo; the vocal harmonies remain, but they’re stretched and disconnected, while Herod’s lead vocal is a bluesy wail rather than a twee holler; the guitar fuzz has been pushed right down the mix to bare background noise. There are lots of little changes that add up to a fairly different-sounding whole, yet it’s still unmistakeably Electric Owls.
Electric Owls – ‘When I Was A Flood’
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It’s either that I get distracted way too easily by shiny things, or it’s the mofukin’ latest video clip for Daft Punk’s Derezzed that just so happens to double for a TRON: Legacy trailer that’s got me hot and bothered right now. Either way, I’m getting my electronic on.
After clearly signalling his intent with movies like Men In Black and Independence Day (and probably others – what was Bad Boys II about? Did anybody even see it?), there’s not a person on this earth who wasn’t fully aware that “Turncoat” Will Smith had managed to breed with them and it was only a matter of time before his alien offspring descended on this planet to finish us off.
Damn it all, we just didn’t expect it to be this soon.
9-year-old Willow Smith… honestly, it’s one thing a father naming his son after himself – it’s a long established tradition – but a father naming his daughter after himself is plain weird, “alien” even. Anyway, 9-year-old Willow Smith has unleashed her first I Am Legend-sized virus on the world in the form of ‘Whip My Hair,’ a Rihanna-inspired number that’s been around all of 5 minutes but is never, ever going to go away. So get used to it.
Seriously, she’s 9. Her neck hasn’t even fully developed yet. This song is dangerous.
Here’s the video – you’re not going to be able to avoid it so you might as well just get it over with now.
James Blake is unstoppable. It’s gone beyond the point where everything he touches turns to gold… the man invents new elements to turn things into in the first place. Including this: a cover of Feist’s The Limit To Your Love, set to be the first single of his upcoming EP (yes, another one) and hot off the heels of the dazzling Klavierwerke EP. By now, he’s so far from his roots in dubstep that’s it’s only just perceptible in the deep sub bass horizon that takes this song – vocals and all – to a level I didn’t even know existed.
