16 Apr
Spectral Hypnosis is a recurring series, featuring mesmerizing songs for one to lose sense of time and space, mind and body.
SEE ALSO: FULL POST + ALL SPECTRAL HYPNOSIS POSTS + ALL COLUMNS

Factory Floor - "How Do You Say"

The music video for Factory Floor's "How Do You Say" is really nothing more than monotonous vocals, Nik Void's bouncing hair, and geometric projections upon an empty wall -- but this, in essence, is Factory Floor. Having just caught them on their national tour, I will say that this is techno for those who don't really feel the need to go anywhere over the course of a song or even a half-hour set, because when jogging in place looks and feels like this, it's somewhat enthralling enough. Directed by Factory Floor's Nik Void and Dan Tombs themselves. Releases are spread on two digital EPs and three physical 12 EPs, to be released throughout the month of April, featuring the original as well as a number of remixes; hear Daniel Avery and Helena Hauff's below.    
09 Dec
Out with the old, no matter how good it is! Here's our comprehensive list of Top Albums of the Year 2013, schizophrenic as always to reflect the diverse tastes of our staff, though there is some overlap. It's highly recommended you check out every release here, as each has its own creative strengths.
Matthew Carter - electronic, experimental, metal, pop, rock Vivian Hua - dance, indie, pop, psychedelic, soul Troy Micheau - classical, electronic, experimental, instrumental Judy Nelson - dance, electronic, indie, pop, psychedelic, soul Elizabeth Perry - indie, mainstream, pop, rock Peter Woodburn - classical, instrumental, metal XUA - electronic hip-hop, mainstream, pop Albums of the Year 2013
09 Oct
CMJ Music Marathon 2013 is the time of year when one runs through the streets of the Lower East Side, hopeful that you will be able to get into a jam-packed venue to see your favorite band -- or maybe discover a band that you haven't heard of will become your favorite band. It's also the time of year for those of us who are not 25 or under try (in vain) to re-live our wild partying years, and for those of us that are 25 and under to stay up until 4 AM partying with the band that is sleeping on our couch. CMJ 2013 is one of the last of the big festivals of the season, so make the most of this indie music feast for the senses! Here are some of our picks for bands to put on your "must see" list:

Father John Misty

Saturday October 19, 2013 10:00pm - 11:00pm @ Music Hall of Williamsburg (66 North 6th St. Brooklyn, NY 11249) Having recently seen Father John Misty at Newport Folk Fest, I can guarantee this will be a good time. Otherwise known as J. Tillman, he released his debut album under the Father John Misty moniker in 2012. He plays a blend of indie folk and alt-country that is alluring to even the staunchest anti-country music fan, especially those that are into the recent trend of the classic rock throwback. - Judy Nelson

 

Shy Girls

Wednesday October 16, 2013 9:45pm - 10:15pm @ Tammany Hall (152 Orchard St. New York, NY 10002) Thursday October 17, 2013 8:45pm - 9:15pm @ The Delancey (168 Delancey St. New York, NY 10002) A unique indie take on soul and R&B mixed with electronica, Shy Girls were just covered in our Top Pops! section here. The Portland based project of Dan Vidmar has amassed a ton of media attention West Coast, and will attempt to do the same here in NY during CMJ. - Judy Nelson
23 Sep
Tripping over sonic palates with spacey, soaring melodies that embrace the essence of pop in all its purposely dated glory, British electropop artist Little Boots returned earlier this year with her sophomore effort Nocturnes. Since then, the record has run through a number of hands for raucous remix treatment, beginning with a wonderfully hypnotic and dubby remix of "Broken Record" by the record's producer and DFA's co-founder Tim Goldsworthy. "Satellite" followed, with an entire accompanying package featuring remixes by Escort, Lindstrom, and John Dahlback, thus beginning the exploration of all possible club-ready territories Nocturnes could possibly offer.
Fast-forward to today -- and in the name of helping out the family, DFA's Larry Gus has offered up his own take on Little Boots' latest single, "Crescendo". Highlighting the track's already unique sound, Gus transforms "Crescendo"'s original percussion and chord-driven foundation into a melty bed of synths, vocals, and tribal drumming, topped with cascading electronic sounds and -- of course -- re-tooled samplings of Little Boots' clear, sing-song-y vocals. The resulting track retains the song's original light-heartedness, while combining it with the vague, exciting feeling of a skipped record and an eclectic collection of regional sounds and styles. See more Little Boots media after the jump, or enter below to win tickets to see her live in Seattle and Portland this week!

Little Boots - "Crescendo" (Larry Gus Remix)

WIN TICKETS TO SEE LITTLE BOOTS LIVE IN SEATTLE & PORTLAND THIS WEEK! LITTLE BOOTS TOUR DATES 9/22: Costa Mesa, CA @ Constellation Room 9/23: Los Angeles, CA @ Troubadour 9/24: San Francisco, CA @ The Independent 9/26: Portland, OR @ Doug Fir Lounge w/ MDNR 9/27: Seattle, WA @ Decibel Fest w/ Light Asylum, Young Galaxy, MNDR 9/28: Vancouver, BC @ Fivesixty 11/8: Austin, TX @ Fun Fun Fun Fest
22 May
Bleep is a weekly column focusing on varying degrees of electronic music news, videos and MP3s. This week we feature the new Shit Robot 12", a mix from the impeccable Nicolas Jaar, another Carl Craig project to keep track of, and more. Read previous Bleep columns here.

 

Shit Robot

Marcus Lambkin's debut record From the Cradle to the Rave was a long time in the making, over a decade in fact, but since then the German producer has had his foot on the gas. After a string of excellent singles and remixes in support of the album, Lambkin returns to Shit Robot in 2012 with a brand new 12" and the announcement of a singles series. "Space Race/Teenage Bass" is the first single in the Green Machine series, a line of brand new tracks from Lambkin. Although no specific timetable has been set for the releases, it's a sign of commitment to new music from this incredibly talented producer, and I'm all for that. "Space Race" is a pure house track, a booming trip through late-90's and early-00's dance music. It's a return to his roots in a sense, as it's the kind of music Lambkin was making when he first got together with James Murphy and company over at DFA Records. "Teenage Bass" follows a similar patterns, a track molded from a singular beat extrapolated over seven tense and twisting minutes. Although this 12" doesn't match some of From the Cradle to the Rave's often goofy nature, this new release is certianly worth checking out. Green Machine vol. 1 is out this week on DFA Records, and you can listen to both tracks HERE.

 

Nicolas Jaar

New York by-way-of Chile producer Nicolas Jaar took everybody by surprise in 2011 with Space is Only Noise, an amazingly poignant and minimal electronic effort, a record which still sounds effortless yet will ultimately become timeless. Jaar recently delivered the newest BBC Essential Mix for the British radio program, and to say that it's essential would be redundant but it shouldn't lose its meaning; this mix is amazing. Don't mind the *NSYNC track; Jaar even manages to make the boy band cool again. Everyone from Aphex Twin to Feist, to Marvin Gaye and Jay-Z are included on the mix, so you know Jaar's influences don't side with a specific era or genre. Stream or download the entire show below, and head over HERE to read the entire tracklist.

 

30 Apr
Los Angeles via Portland dance band YACHT are always staying busy, but the attention they're receiving is next-level as of late. This compound post samples the music video for their newest offering, "Le Goudron" -- a cover of a song by French singer Brigitte Fontaine -- and their current front-page-of-Hulu fame.

 

FROM YACHT'S PRESS RELEASE: "Le Goudron" is a surrealist revolutionary song originally recorded in 1969 with The Art Ensemble of Chicago; YACHT has reinvented its naive-apocalyptic candor for a neon-soaked dance floor, their preferred autonomous zone."... Of the song, YACHT says, "we can only hope that our frantic, starry-eyed cribbing of Brigitte Fontaine makes us better people. In the meantime, we wanted to pay homage."

YACHT - "Le Goudron" (Briggite Fontaine Cover)

YACHT have transformed Briggite Fontaine's acoustic track into a dancefloor single, in the name of reviving a revolutionary dance anthem. See the French lyrics, with a rough English translation, below; this is not a revolutionary song in the political sense, but in the sensually-aware sense.

 

Download YACHT - "Le Goudron" MP3 Briggite Fontaine - "Le Goudron" (Original)

 

31 Dec

Our third-annual album cover art feature uses interviews with artists and musicians to highlight the philosophical, thematic, and conceptual significance of great album cover artwork. THE BREAKDOWN    12 Collage + 14 Digital Illustration, Drawing, Design + 19 Illustration, Painting, Drawing + 8 Black And White Photography + 22 Color Photography + 6 Deluxe Packaging + 10 Fashion,...

13 Nov

Holocene - Portland, OR - 2011 / November 9 It's been a fascinating and, from a fan's perspective, incredibly fun year for Brooklyn disco-rock revivalists Holy Ghost! The band finally released their anticipated debut album on DFA Records, the label that has essentially raised the band from its infancy to their...

10 Mar
For two months in early 2008, Portland-based electropop duo YACHT set up camp in a small town located in the desert of West Texas, away from the city lights, but at the threshold of a completely different type of lights. Known as the Marfa Lights, the inexplicable dashes of lights that appear every night in the sky of Marfa, Texas, impacted Jona Bechtolt and Claire L. Evans, the two members of YACHT, in a profound way. On many occasions during their two-month stay in Marfa, the pair would grab a blanket, sit on the roof of their car, and observe the lights in the open desert. Not only did the lights go on to become the biggest inspiration for YACHT's latest album, See Mystery Lights, but they also changed Bechtolt and Evans' view of the world.
"We'd seen something truly rare, truly magic, truly unexplained, and yet evidently real," the pair explain. "Coming face-to-face with something like that changes you. It humbles you. It puts our microscopic human relevance in the grand scheme of this cavernous universe into perspective. We had long conversations about the lights and their implications to us as people. Although we're very different from one another, they affected us identically." Bechtolt was the first out of the two to see the Marfa lights. In 2004, some people in Austin recommended that he make a stop to see the lights in Marfa while on his way to California. After seeing the lights, he drove to Los Angeles to play a show and met Evans for the first time; her band was also on the bill. Later on, while traveling together, they decided to check out the Marfa lights together. The lights made such a lasting impression on the two that in 2008, they decided to rent a house in Marfa in hopes of producing some type of tribute to their experience. At the time, they were not sure if it would be in the form of music. "We didn't entirely know why we had come to Marfa, except that we wanted to know what it was like to live alongside the phenomenon," they say. The first thing that they came up with was an 8-minute compilation of mantras. Bechtolt and Evans decided to create the tribute around their own belief system after becoming interested in human rituals of esotericism and mysticism. Given pop music's tendency to feature repetitive elements, it was only natural for Bechtolt and Evans to mold the mantras into the tracks that make up See Mystery Lights. While the songs do contain Bechtolt and Evans' thoughts on topics such as heaven, hell, darkness, and light, they do not come off as commanding. YACHT do not go off on rants; instead, they hone in on catchy one-liners , such as "It's not a place you go/ It's a place that comes to you," on the song "The Afterlife."