Electric Electric: Crystal Castles & Apartment Play

Crystal Castle take 'electric electric' to a whole new level; obscure vocals & bleeps throughout; the one word their music screams is 'DISTORTION'. It might not appeal to all, but they have a unique sound, and their distorted vocals punctuated with 8-bit synth beats are the kind that mess with one's mind. It's screechy, it's beepy, it's electro.



Alice Glass - vocalist
Ethan Kath - producer/remixer

The band's ascent to fame is an interesting story in itself; their first publicly released single was "Alice Practice", which was a microphone test by vocalist Glass (she didn't know it was being recorded). However, hearing it on their MySpace, a record label offered them a deal -- and three years later the result takes the shape of "Crystal Castles" (yes! self-titled debut albums! we ♥ them!).

If you like your music to have deep, meaningful lyrics or clear-cut instrumental riffs, clarity of sound & entwining of melodies -- forget Crystal Castles. They're not for you. Crystal Castles make music that's nihilistic; their seemingly chaotic sounds believe in adhering to no musically-set precedents, no musical traditions. It's 'dance music', but the kind that would electrify and migraine down a drunk body; as the BBC so perfectly puts it in their review: "this is the soundtrack for 20-something chaos seekers who grew up playing Ataris rather than listening to Kraftwerk." If you do like your music to be unique, different, something sublime and wholly untried before (and it'd help if you fancied dance music, electro, synth, blah blah blah as well) -- then definitely, definitely give these guys a go; they're something revolutionary, they're mind-fuckingly distortive. And who knows but it might fit certain moods and temparaments?

Crystal Castles - xxzxczx me


A random band I came across with a similar sound to Crystal Castles: Apartment Play. With a cryptic profile on MySpace ("cortex boy. cortex girl."????!!?), only 3091 profile views & 935 plays on last.fm, these guys are mysterious. Their music has been labelled (kinda negatively) as 'noise' and 'trash', but if one takes the trouble to actually listen to it -- it's quite fantastic. Ignoring the fact that they've only released 4 songs.

If anything, it's more distorted and confused than Crystal Castles', which shows a semblance of structure in some songs and has underlying depth in all, despite the cover of chaos. Apartment Play's songs don't really speak of structure or construction as such; but it's a nice sound, and if you liked Crystal Castles, you might just like this too, intense as it is.



And for your downloaaading pleasuree~
Apartment Play -- toanwts
Apartment Play -- Greco is a Parasite
Crystal Castles -- Dolls

Enjoy!

Folkie: Lightspeed Champion

Being a former Test Icicles fan i know him as Dev, and will refer to him as Dev. Wow! 180 180 - from the "make my ear bleed" dance punk sound of the Test Icicles to the more folk-like sounds of Lightspeed Champion - with the name coming from a series of comic strips Dev did as a teenager in his school maths books.

Having crossed the pond in early 2007, Dev went over to Omaha, Nebraska to record his debut album - "Falling Off The Lavender Bridge". Being a one man band Mr. Champion had to turn to several established musicians from The Faint, Cursive And The Tilly Wall and Emmy The Great. The coming together of so many different musicians of whom have very different influences can be seen throughout the album - highlighted by the showcasing a wide variety of instruments. Violins, Banjos, Horns alongside the sounds of any indie-folk artis - heavy strumming and twinkly synths.

Personally i think the album is brilliant, despite such a happy feel the album is able to convey such dirty and grungy lyrics. Songs like "Midnight Surprise" and "Let The Bitches Die" provide an outlet for Hynes to be rude, provocative and frank, whilst still being able to maintain the light hearted sounds of the record and without having to resort to darker elements or a slower tempo. His songwriting ability has not impressed many...i disagree - Dev's voice is superbly melodic and versatile - the defining characteristic of his songs. These range from straightforward folk ballads, to rock, to harmonic pop. The mid-song banter is suitably inane, but free of swearing. The album emits a comfortable Brit-pop and Omaha-laced country-rock energy.

Lightspeed Champion -- Fresh Failures (Let the Sunshine In).mp3

Electric Electric: Steve Aoki

ARE YOU READY ARE YOU READY ARE YOU READY ARE YOU READY ARE YOU READY ARE YOU READY ARE YOU READY

Pillowface And His Airplane Chronicles. Aoki explained that there's a meaning behind the album name. Pillow Face is a character he created who is really his alter ego. He is "traveling and surviving with no sleep – practically, no sleep for weeks, yet still being able to function. His head turns into a pillow. Airplane Chronicles – was referring to the constant traveling, living in airports and going global.



Going global is exactly what he did; with his touchdown in KL little under a month ago. I do enjoy the album it is really "dancey" and makes me want to stomp my feet. Aoki has managed to include some of your favorite bands and performers into an "actionpackallstarcast" cd. Yelle, Justice, Bloc Party, Klaxons and Mystery Jets. He has also been able to capture the essence of the Hollywood sub-culture "Scarlet Jo and Lindsay Lo" + "Found god on the next episode of LOST". Unfortunately he has also managed to include the likes of Mickey Avalon "Chilling in the locker room with Mark the Cobrasnake, taking pictures of my dick".I don't know, it may just be me -- but i would never admit to something like that through a press statement or a track. Mickey Avalon you homofreak. Besides "Wet N Wild" there seems to be a recurring theme throughout the CD; sexxsexxsexx. "All i say is sex sex sex" and again in the same song "I sleep all day and i fuck all night" - thank you Waters of Nazareth. 

The opening track "New Noise" is the worst mix/dance track i've ever heard. I'm tempted to rename the track into something more fitting like -- "Electric Nazism". It doesn't seem to fit with the feel of the CD - sexxsexxsexx. Though it does come close as it screams raperaperape.

sexsexsexing everyone

Needless to say there are still some great great great tracks on the mix. Aoki has been able to appeal to many cultures and music tastes through a single album, hippidy hop, indiecindy, jewhatingnazifuck and pop. All of which are going to contribute to mazzive CD sales and undoubtedly mega chart success. Props.



BUY BUY BUY

Folkie: Joanna Newsom

Female singers; we've all seen the category labels, in the music stores, at the Grammys, on music blogs. And they're all women & they all sing. Woohoo. Lots of them sound shit, and lots of them sound like each other -- get lost, get lost! you scream; we don't want another excuse for a strip-tease of a music video parading around pretending to make 'music'! Go find yourself a red light district, jesus.

So I'm going to tell y'all about a woman who sings unlike any other musician I have ever come across, and whose voice I hated upon hearing. Because it was just so odd & unusual & (as the harshest of critics say) "child-like" -- how could anyone sing the way Joanna Newsom did? Why would anyone sing this way? (Yes, her screeches of "disembodieeeed" sounded horrible.) And so my face would scrunch up with a look of disgust everytime "Bridges & Balloons" came up due to the iPod Shuffle's lack of judgment.



But like fungus grows on old bread & moss on old stones, so grew Joanna Newsom's eerie, quirky, completely unusual brand of music on me. This woman makes music. And she doesn't just do it with an endearing (once you hear it enough) & beautiful voice, but also with some amazingly elite harp-playing skills & some brilliantly eloquent lyrics to match (who else would sing about calm canaries getting irritable? or scraps of sassafras?). Her style of music is usually classified as 'indie folk'; some say it has strains of 'Appalachian music' -- I don't even know what that is, so I'm not going to pretend it is -- & others 'psych folk', along the breed of other eccentric & experimental folkies: Devendra Banhart, Mirah, Cat Power & the Animal Collective. I'm just going to classify it as 'beautiful' & 'inspiring' & 'lovely-to-fall-asleep-to' -- the harp lends her music a serene quality, and her lyrics are almost stories in themselves (particularly in the album Ys).

And despite her unique classifications, she still finds the time to lend her classical harp-playing skills to noise-rock trio Nervous Cop (which features the likes of Deerhoof's Greg Saunier), and her keyboard-playing skills to rockers/post-punkers The Pleased. They're worth a check-out too, if only for variance. (: There's also a loverly loverly loverrrrly cover of "Bridges & Balloons" done by none other than The Decemberists, which appears on their Picaresqueties album & has some uplifting jangly guitar chords :-) check THAT out too, because it's actually one of the best covers I have ever heard. Annnnnd long post, but I could go on about her awesomeness forever. So give her a listen.

Pop: The Kooks (Konk)

Luke Pritchard
Hugh Harris
Paul Garred
Dan Logan

The Kooks never cease to impress me; from the day i found out that Pritchard wrote "Naive" at age fifteen i have been in awe of their musical talent. The Kooks have shown such promise; with their debut album Inside In/ Inside Out going platinum, opening for the Rolling Stones, the adoring fans, the adoring women, the length of playtime they receive on mainstream radio and my play count of Eddie's Gun.

And then Konk came along.

Not to say that Konk is a bad album, in fact in isolation it's a great album. The guitars are catchy, the lyrics are intelligent and there is a definite "sing-a-long" vibe to Konk. "Always Where I Need To Be" is a perfect "first of summer song" for 2008.

The only problem i have with it is the lack of progression. Kooks 08 is still Kooks 06. What has changed? There has been little sign of the band maturing and moving away from their original sound. But why should they? Well for starters when i listen to them on my iPod, (off the top of my head) i cant tell where one album stops and the other starts. How long can they continue this "Kook Album Template" before people get bored and turn towards other bands who provide a little bit more than the Kooks or are exactly the same but with a more catchier name "The Crayon Kids". I'm tired of hearing about Luke Pritchard's love life and the groans of wasted teenage dreams. Give me something more.

Maybe this is me just being overly pedantic - trying to find faults in what is destined to be a best seller. Errgh. I don't know if i truly like it or not - well i do...i like it.

'Ardcore: This City

Chris Purr - Vocals
Arran Day - Guitar
Grant Coleman - Guitar & Vocals
George Travis - Bass Guitar & Vocals
Ben Morgan - Drums & Vocals

A bunch of neo-post-quasi-sub-pseudo-new-wave kids, picking up where the Test Icicles left off. This City. Who label themselves as “Hardcore Indie Pop” are a testament to a good jamming session – yelpy vocals and jagged riffs. Leaving me screaming for moreee.

I like it very loud.

The band are able to melt and mix together the indie guitars, yelpy lyrics and disco choruses to create a song that has a holistic approach to my music taste.

Pop: Foals

Foals Foals Foals. With a new album "Antidotes" out, these five guys reek of yummy British accents and strange obscure bleeping sounds in the middle of their songs.

Yannis Philippakis
Jack Bevan
Jimmy Smith
Edwin Congreave
Walter Gervers

Formed by various cliques of childhood friends; a pair of Oxford drop-outs, a pair of cult math-rockers & then some, Foals bring a unique mix of sounds to the fore: they fuse synthesizers with guitar lines. Their music is experimentative, having been produced by Dave Sitek of "TV on the Radio" -- it's a mixture of the usual mechanic techno beats & slightly more unusual 12-piece brass afro-beats, and it's bit of a rollercoaster listen through the whole album.

If you like the experimentative, math rock, obscure (and sometimes slightly angry?) lyrics or even just a bit of unclassifiable synthesised pop, then this band is one you should definitely check out; their debut album has been heralded as one of the best Britain will see released this year, and tracks such as "Cassius" & "Electric Bloom" do not disappoint :-)

Electric Electric: Ghost Frequency

Doran Edwards - Vocals
Barney Ward - Synthesizer
Ross Colgan - Guitar
Ben Chetwood – Drums

“we want prosthetic limbs, we want disasterrrr”

If you were into the Test Icicles or enjoy the sounds of raging laptops, flaying guitars and pulsating synthesizers then this ma copain is the band for you.

Having formed in the Spring of 05 the Ghost Frequency has been able to gain a lot of ground in such a short time. Supporting “Hadouken!” and other acts like “Does It Offend You Yeah?”

The beats are catchy, the lyrics are witty and the synths are synthy synthia.