20 January 2011 - 0 Comments

THE BIG PINK - TAPES

Enter ‘The Big Pink’, Tapes, mix CD. Leaving his usual electro rock behind him, Milo Cordell, aka The Big Pink, has instead drafted in a selection of music to showcase in your headphones the way a proper mix CD is meant to. As he himself puts it, “it’s like being trapped between a dream and waking”. He continues, “I guess because it’s made in people’s bedrooms, maybe people’s computers are acting as some kind of dream catcher.”

The dominant theme throughout the mix is an eerie sound, spooked, spectral electronica, its night time music. Featuring music from heavy hitter’s such as Joker and Actress, alongside a stellar cast of underground producer’s, this is the soundtrack to your late nights of insomnia.

Also features a couple of bonus beats from one of the hottest properties out there, The XX and up and coming producer oOoOO..

For Fans of: Joker, Actress, Gang Gang Dance, The XX

NEVERNUDES – CREEPY CRAWLIES

Nevernudes formed in late 2008, playing their first gigs in April 2009. They released a self-titled EP in September that year and after a line-up change and signing to Mole Music are releasing their debut album Creepy Crawlies which features Anthony Sheehan-Drent who sings and plays guitar Sam Harper on guitar and Chris Smart and Tom Nicholls on bass and drums. The album was recorded at The Porch studios by Shannon Walsh.

For Fans of: Muzai Records, Popstrangers,

EBO TAYLOR – LOVE AND DEATH

Now 74 years-old, Ebo Taylor’s music has become increasingly in-demand in recent years with a series of Ghanaian compilations on Soundway Records, Analog Africa and an unexpected sample as Usher lifted a riff from ‘Heaven’ for his hit with Ludacris, ‘She Don’t Know’. A new Ebo Taylor album was a natural progression. “For the new album, I wanted to advance the cause of Afrobeat music. Fela started it and we shouldn’t just abandon it.

We should push it so it is a standard form of music.“  The result is a firing new set backed by AfrobeatAcademy, a Berlin-based collective featuring members of Poets Of Rhythm, Kabu Kabu (Jimi Tenor collaborators) and Ghanaian legends Marijata. Tracks include new versions of Taylor classics ‘Victory’ and ‘Love And Death’ and a selection of new compositions including ‘Kwame’, celebrating Ghana’s late, lamented leader Kwame Nkrumah.

For Fans of: Mulatu Astatke, Gilles Peterson,

VARIOUS – THE SOUND OF RHYTHM AND CULTURE

Rhythm & Culture Music is a locally brewed record label that reflects Washington, DC’s eclectic    influences and organic music scene. With a talented roster of local and international artists, the label strives to harness sounds from around the world and challenge conceptions of what is considered dance music: Tracks put out by the label can be enjoyed while driving down DC's RockCreekPark or dancing into the late morning hours in a an energy-filled club.

This artist owned-and-run label was created by Farid Nouri, resident DJ and one of the founders of Eighteenth Street Lounge and Red (a dance club in DC from 1997 to 2005), and Thomas Blondet, a DC staple of world-class deejaying. The label strives to invigorate today’s music community with sultry infusions of soulful and exotic melodies. Combining this concept with acclaimed productions, the label is poised to create a genre of its own.

For Fans of: Thievery Corporation, Mr Scruff

OUR BROKEN GARDEN – GOLDENSEA

Hailing from Denmark, Our Broken Garden is the sound of sometime Efterklang keyboardist Anna Bronsted’s bewitching voice and songs GoldenSea is a substantial step forward for the band. There’s more drama and rhythm this time around - check ‘Garden Grow’ and ‘The Feral’ for clear proof – as if the golden sea was more restless and darker than its colour suggests. Anna puts the change down to wanting to recreate the romantic and grandiose feel of classical music.

You can immediately hear that on the opening ‘The Departure’, with its undulating piano undertow and hymnal beauty. The violins that distinguish ‘The Feral’ could be Haydn, but the vocal style and melody is pure modern-day Scandinavia. Talking of which, Anna adds that she also saw [film director] Lars Von Triers’ Antichrist at the beginning of writing GoldenSea, “and I was very moved and influenced by it. It's so graceful and overwhelmingly dreadful at the same time.”

For Fans of: EfterKlang, Goldfrapp

GOOSE – SYNRISE

On Synrise the band look to '70s space disco such as Automat and '80s movie soundtracks, names such as Philip Glass, Giorgio Moroder and Vangelis. The end result is more than the sum of these parts: it’s an album of dance tunes with pop song structures. It opens with the title track, Synrise, a jet streaming soundscape of Moroder-like synth arpeggios that build and build to a guest appearance from Peaches, who hums the hook.

The band’s final thought is this: “Synrise feels like a new start to us. We’re proud that we’ve written an album with a specific vision that’s coherent. It has one story and works as a whole. Writing an album is the hardest thing because of all the possible options and directions.  Sometimes you want to leave it all behind and go into an other direction, but you can’t do it, because you have made a commitment.”

For Fans of: Chemical Brothers, Depeche Mode

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