An empty dancefloor - Hear
HEAR is the enema your iTunes needs. Bringing you the most thought-provoking and up-to-date music reviews this side of Lester Bangs, HEAR sifts through the ever growing mountain of press releases and promos to only feature albums, EPs, LPs and mixes that we want to, not that we have to. Also, we try and make things make sense in 200 words or less so that you can just listen to the music.
Royal Headache 7"
Sydney's Royal Headache could be Australia's finest garage power-pop band. It seems that every song they write is infectious as hell, taking sugary '60s garage hooks and blasting them through your speakers with punkish fervor and velocity.
Opening track ‘Eloise' is the one that incited frenzy on Pitchfork, and if your misanthropic punk mate scoffs at the exuberance of the "nah, nahs" in the outro, chances are they're the only good thing that happened to him that week.
Four Tet, 'There is Love in You'
Kieran Hebden has had a good time of it just lately. The guitarist turned much-feted producer and DJ has continued along the rosy path of critical adoration, and he's done so by consistently straying from his comfort zone. Along the way, he has shed the long-standing ‘folktronica' tag that dogged his early Four Tet and effectively reinvented himself.
Lindstrom, 'Real Life Is No Cool'
The last time we wrote about Hans-Peter Lindstrøm was when we were drooling all over 2008's masterpiece Where You Go, I Go Too. Since then Lindstrøm has been a busy little guy releasing singles and full lengths, but by far the most ear catching of these is the ‘new' collaboration with Christabelle.
Eddy Current Suppression Ring, 'Rush To Relax'
When asked to describe the difference between ECSR's Primary Colours and their self-titled debut, guitarist Mikey Young said it was more '82 than '76. With their third album, Rush To Relax, I don't think Mikey would be able to sum up the difference so easily.
Rush To Relax picks up where Primary Colours left off.
The Emergency, 'Dreams That Money Can Buy'
Don't let The Emergency's name fool you - as much as I'd love to tell you that they've packed in some air-horn, sirens and earthquake sound effects, into their new album well, I just can't. It would be a lie.
So now that we've established that, let's reposition our thinking about Dreams That Money Can Buy away from simple word association to something more complex, along the lines of, hmmm, let's say cold city streets, illegal warehouse parties and sitting on a roof watching the sun come up and stuff.
Phenomenal Handclap Band interview
Heralded as the ‘perfect mix of of everything from the past 40 years of popular music' the Phenomenal Handclap Band collective started when Daniel Collás and Sean Marquand, two New York underground club DJs with an almost encyclopaedic knowledge of esoteric music ranging from Brazilian soul to vintage psych-rock got restless with playing other people's music and decided to produce their own.
Two Sides of the Truth / Do Anything Go Anywhere
World music has gotten a bad rap. It's too often associated with and passed off as music that late thirty-going-on-forty somethings are listening to, trying to seem relevant or hip. It's as if the entire hipster collective has bought into the eternal struggle of Rob Gordon versus Ian Raymond and of course, we all want to be fucking John Cusack.
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