OMG! Read More!
15. Arcade Fire – Neon Bible
14. Sigur Ros – Hvarf-Heim
13. Interpol – Our Love to Admire
12. Feist - The Reminder
11. Beirut - Flying Club Cup
10. Laura Veirs – Saltbreakers
9. Emily Jane White - Dark Undercoat
8. Jens Lekman - Night Falls Over Kortedala
7. Andrew Bird - Armchair Apocrypha
6. Radiohead - In Rainbows
5. Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
4. Eskimo and Sons – How Does It Feel To Be Crushed By One Man With The Strength Of A Million? EP
3. Caribou - Andorra
2. Alela Diane - The Pirate’s Gospel (2007 UK release)
1. Menomena - Friend and Foe
there you have it. questions, comments, concerns?
Tuesday, December 04, 2007
Best of 2007
Saturday, December 01, 2007
state of the union
as 2007 winds down, undoubtedly the general consensus will be that it was a great year for music. screenwriters are on strike, immobilizing the tv and movie industry, but the music industry keeps on keeping on. amidst all the bullshit about the state of popular music and the crippling effects of downloading, artists like radiohead have found new ways to turn standard practice on its head and still be successful. and they were able to do something special: inspire real excitement about the music itself. kanye west and 50 cent boosting each other's respective record sales by sharing the same release date? genius. living in portland, the opportunity to see great bands play at smaller shows at houses and clubs is unique. i think we can all agree that seeing kickball playing a sexy, sweaty set in a basement trumps seeing most any band sell out a swanky venue. so, for as much negativity that's swirling around in the music world, there's twice as much positive, amazing material being created. both artists and fans might just have to try just a little bit harder, but, as we've seen, that sort of challenge does pay off.
this video was actually the reason for this post.
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Cars & Trains
Today's update features an artist hailing from sunny Portland, OR. His name is Tom Fillep, but he goes by cars & trains. His music draws largely from that anticon/mush sound of Clouddead, Why?, Telephone Jim Jesus and others. In fact, Sole lends his vocal stylings to "The Sky is Clear". The iTunes genre tag calls it electronic/dance. I think you could dance to it, but it would be occuring at half-speed with soft lights pulsating on walls and lots of pillows strewn about. I didn't mean for that to sound so soft-core porn, but it speaks to the mellowww phantasmagoria of the album. The production sounds almost tactile and organic. I imagine it would translate well into an intimate live show.
"Rusty String" is out now on circle into square records.
website
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
The Company Kang
Word to dance music popping off at Whitman College. The Company Kang has got some tunes on their myspace and are currently working on their first album entitled "Winter Pimps". Don't miss the Wamp Wamp remix.
The Company Kang
Monday, November 26, 2007
Seabear - I Sing I Swim
Heres a cute little song accompanied by a cute little video from morrmusic's Seabear. The Berlin label's youtube account also has videos posted for Lali Puna (a personal fav. of mine) and cool electronic outfit ISAN among others. In an interesting but probably outdated bit of news, Seabear was said to be sharing a tour bus with Mum. Talk about cute overloading.
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Fiery Furnaces - Navy nurse
Yay! Fiery Furnaces! The song is almost as weird as the video. But probably not as weird as that BMSR vid we posted a lil while ago.
Thursday, November 15, 2007
I'm Not There
So there's this movie directed by Todd Haynes with a bunch of different people playing Bob Dylan... yadda yadda movie shmoovie. The soundtrack, however is a x2 disc compilation of covers by bands/people like:
Yo La Tengo
Cat Power
Sufjan Stevens
The Black Keys
Sonic Youth
The Hold Steady
Karen O
Jeff Tweedy
Iron & Wine
Stephen Malkmus
Calexico
+MORE!!
You can listen to the Sufjan Stevens, Cat Power and Calexico songs here
The songs they cover definitely lend themselves to the styles of the artists that are covering them which is comforting, it seems like someone knows what they are doing.
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Radiohead > Kiss + Oasis
kids enjoying "In Rainbows"
From a Billboard interview with Gene Simmons:
"Every little college kid, every freshly-scrubbed little kid's face should have been sued off the face of the earth. They should have taken their houses and cars and nipped it right there in the beginning. Those kids are putting 100,000 to a million people out of work. How can you pick on them? They've got freckles. That's a crook. He may as well be wearing a bandit's mask.
Doesn't affect me. But imagine being a new band with dreams of getting on stage and putting out your own record. Forget it.
BUT SOME ARTISTS LIKE RADIOHEAD AND TRENT REZNOR ARE TRYING TO FIND A NEW BUSINESS MODEL.
That doesn't count. You can't pick on one person as an exception. And that's not a business model that works. I open a store and say "Come on in and pay whatever you want." Are you on f---ing crack? Do you really believe that's a business model that works?
And Liam Gallagher talking to Reuters:
"Gallagher, peppering his speech with expletives, told Reuters it would be over his "dead body" before he went into a studio and worked hard to release his work for nothing."
Broken Social Scene on NPR
"Broken Social Scene presents the music of band member Kevin Drew in a full concert, webcast live on NPR.org Nov. 18. The performance from Washington, D.C.'s 9:30 Club will begin at approximately 8 p.m. ET."
sounds like a good way to spend a sunday night.
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Dylan's 2007 Top 10!
Well folks 2007 is winding down and what a year it was. Lots of cool things happened, a lot of crazy things happened too. Radiohead shocked the world with their free album, elvis came back, I got a new phone etc. Anyways, here it is. 2007 Top 10*
11. Kickball - Everything Is A Miracle Nothing Is A Miracle Is
10. Feist - The Reminder
9. Sean Price - Jesus Price Superstar
8. Simian Mobile Disco - Attack Decay Sustain Release
7. The National - The Boxer
6. Menomena - Friend and Foe
5. LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver
4. Radiohead - In Rainbows
3. Black Moth Super Rainbow - Dandelion Gum
2. Jens Lekman - Night Falls Over Kortedala
1. Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
Yeah so definitely get all of these albums if you don't already have them. They're all good, I promise.
*I can change this because 2007 isn't over, and because maybe I'm forgetting something, and maybe I just want to just cus.
Thursday, November 08, 2007
Win, Regine, & The Boss
this video kind of gave me chills. and i don't even listen to bruce springsteen.
Sunday, November 04, 2007
hello! it has been a while. i have heard your eternal clamoring for more audiosurface music-blog-nerdery from my private castle observatory nestled in the blue mountains of eastern washington . so, without further ado, here are new artists or albums i think are worth looking into:
Emily Jane White - Dark Undercoat myspace!
she sounds a lot like cat power. and that is a-ok in my book because i am love with chan. there, i've said it. also, this is her debut album and i can't really believe that.
Sigur Ros - Hvarf-Heim read about it here
new songs, old songs. all amazing, all the time.
Le Loup - The Throne Of The Third Heaven Of The Nations' Millennium General Assembly myspace!
this is a really great album. sort of like the books with more banjo and vocal harmonies.
on an unrelated note, i love learning about outer space and dreaming about iceland.
Thursday, October 18, 2007
Black Moth Super Rainbow - "Sun Lips"
holy crap. i don't quite know what to make of this. it's bizarrely compelling, perverse and morbid. i hope mtv somehow finds a way to wedge this in between t-pain and soulja boy videos in the near future.
p.s. thanks pitchfork.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Melee Beats - Bel Esteem
Put your dancing shoes back on. I'm not off this dance shit yet. I've been listening to this album recently and I've decided it is blog worthy, and definitely danceable. The hook in the first song titled "Bel Esteem (Intro)" is "I keep on coming, one more time." So I know Daft Punk has trademarked the "one more time" thing but this just works so well and when the crazy synth solo comes in... hoo boy.
While the album itself is not that impressive, a few of the singles on this album hint at some mighty fine dance music to come. The songs are complete with Daft Punk esque times when the beat falls out and leaves this vocoded out voice singin' bout love and the usual. If you can sit still and listen to this you a stronger person than most I think. "Distraction" has some crazy scottish sounding solo in it that makes it probably the strongest track on the album. Then there's "Wondering". This song is probably the most interesting because it sounds like Daft Punk does live. Imagine homework and human after all being smashed together, by this I mean crunchy guitar arpeggio's over that "buh tst buh tst buh tst buh tst". Umm yeah, then theres Champs, which is pretty much a revamped version of "Short Circuit." Okay, go have some fun with that.
Saturday, October 06, 2007
Friday, October 05, 2007
Calvin Harris - I Created Disco
Hey, so lets talk about this album that came out in the US recently. Sound good? no? too bad.
When giving your debut album a title like: "I Created Disco" and putting songs on this album where the chorus might go something like this: "I get all the girls/ I get all the girls" you better be damn good. Calvin Harris is, luckily, damn good.
The album starts out with the song "Merrymaking" some sort of LCD SS Jamie Lidell hybrid about taking drugs at what is presumably Calvin Harris' house. Not sure how I should feel about this but I can tell you one thing, the kid can groove. Without his cocky attitude Harris might not really amount to much but this is exactly the kind of 'tude that dance music needs right now, especially in the wake of groups like Justice and Simian Mobile Disco. On "The Girls" he follows the ultimate recipe for a dance song: simple repitition. But unlike most dance hits out right now, he's got a verse telling some weird story and then one of the best choruses imaginable. Also, he is not afraid to tell girls how to dress, on "Colours" you better have some colour in there. As the album goes on it falls into that new-rave style dance stuff all you kids are into these days. For example "Disco Heat" could have easily been on Mylo's Destroy Rock n Roll. This album's main strengths are it's diversity and it's ability to seemlessly blend together the last 25 or so years of dance music.
Tuesday, October 02, 2007
A.O. & C.J. show review.
We met Adrian and Calvin in the radio station about two hours before their show. They had just eaten at Clarette’s and remarked upon the quality of its product (as opposed to the thin porridge they found in Kennewick the night before). After recording a few promotional vignettes about African music and their disappointment in us as a radio station, they left to set up for their show.
We joined them around six or so outside the Metropolis, a live music and art space located on Colville across from Luscious: An Urban Market® and next to the Patisserie. It had reopened with a new name and a more cosmopolitan façade after the Underground went dormant in mid-2006. The space is open and accommodating for small shows despite the lack of a full-sized stage or, from what it appeared, any sound equipment at all. Approximately twenty-five attendees gathered for the occasion, taking the seats neatly arranged against the walls, giving the performers ample space to roam and people to dance. From time to time, audience members left to smoke cigarettes or purchase coffees and teas from Coffee Perk, returning either one cigarette less or several cups of hot beverage more.
At approximately 6:05 pm, Calvin Johnson, owner of K Records and formerly of Beat Happening, Dub Narcotic Sound System and several other bands, took the floor with a single acoustic guitar. Johnson’s set, almost an hour long, consisted largely of songs off of his recent solo albums, What Was Me and Before the Dream Faded, many of which were long and sounded crushingly, inconsolably sad despite his enthusiasm. His distinct baritone filled the tiny room well, creating a mellow, somber, almost funereal atmosphere as he sang songs of longing and told us stories about how Adrian was to perform sans Her Band and about impeaching Dick Cheney.
Adrian Orange (or Age-O, as he likes to call himself now) set up in the corner, above the staircase. Declining to use a microphone stand, he preferred to wedge the mic between his shirt and chest, craning his neck each time he sang. He used loops for both his vocals and rhythm guitar, making his warbling voice and haphazard playing seem slightly less stark. He talked about the Phish and Grateful Dead concerts he supposedly attended in his youth despite the fact that he’s only twenty-one, lamenting the fact that he’d yet to see people dancing like they had then at his shows. His seemingly-endless loops, abrupt stops, and the general feeling of formlessness, however, kept the crowd content with moving as little as possible.
Maybe it was the fact that it was Sunday. Or maybe it was because of the cold, grey atmosphere on the other side of the windows. But the show was exhausting. Kids from town sprawled out across the floor, doodling in their sketchbooks and clapping politely. This was not a show about playing guitars well or making people dance, or even making people smile. The two men from Olympia and Portland rolled through town like musical, vagrant, gypsies and were so understated it was almost as if they were never here at all.
by: Andrew Hall & Kyle Gilkeson
what? what?! WHAT?!!!!
I feel as though I would be doing all loyal audiosurface readers a disservice (I know its the first sentence and I'm already making shit up but whatever) if I did not tell the tale I am about to tell.
As most people in the western world know by now, radiohead's new album will be available to download on Oct. 10th, the actual box set crazy 80$ bonanza wont be happening until later, December that is. So you can download it for free, is this going to turn the industry on its head? Probably not. Because newsflash: You can download pretty much any album ever made for free, that is the magic and beauty and hideousness that is the internet.
I was awoken on that first day in October by what sounded like a girl screaming because she saw a spider. Turns out it was my roommate hyperventilating because the new radiohead album is coming out in 10 days. The radiohead website was not loading properly though because so many people were trying to access it at the same time, if that is any indication of the sales(free album give aways) everyone and their mom will have a copy of In Rainbows.
If the studio versions of the songs are anything like the recordings from their last American tour we are in for some treats.
Tracklisteh:
1. 15 Step
2. Bodysnatchers
3. Nude
4. Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
5. All I Need (seriously though, this song could be the only one on here and I would pee my pants
6. Faust Arp
7. Reckoner
8. House of Cards
9. Jigsaw Falling into Place
10. Videotape (this one is wow.)
If you get the boxset you get more stuff too, like x2 but it ends being about 80 bucks. :(
www.radiohead.com
pre order it.
its... free???
whatever.
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