Nov 17 2010

Pet Shop Boys…Grum…West End Girls…awesome!

Well, this is already vying for position as my favourite track of the year, it feels like I’ve been waiting all my life for this tune.

Nu-Disco über-producer Grum’s reMix of Pet Shop Boys’ ‘West End Girls’ features as B-side on the SynthPop duo’s new single ‘Together’ and, for me anyway, it’s an almost perfect meeting of everything I grew up with and everything I love now. I love the big analog bassline and the massive Dreamwave-esq pads and the fact that the song remains intact, but totally updated. This thing is one of the classics of the genre but sound fresh as fuck!

Pure, undiluted awesome!

♫ Pet Shop Boys – West End Girls (Grum reMix)

I swear I can hear a Korg Monotron in there too!

Pet Shop Boys greatest hits, ‘Ultimate’, and the digital single of‘Together’ are out now with the physical release, featuring the Grum reMix, coming soon.

Pet Shop Boys @ Beatport

Pet Shop Boys @ Juno

Pet Shop Boys @ 7Digital

Pet Shop Boys @ Amazon

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Nov 17 2010

Black Van Vs. The Glass

This week sees the release of New York/Berlin based duo The Glass’ début album.

Titled ‘At Swim Two Birds’, you can stream the album on the bands SoundCloud, is 10 tracks of cool garage Disco, raw and funky. Dark at times but always with a rad bassline. Better still is the reMix of of ‘Four Four Letter’ by Black Van (Kris Menace and KoweSix from Moonbootica) who layer up the huge synth chords in this killer Nu-Disco/House track.

♫ The Glass – Four Four Letter (Black Van reMix)

The Glass’ ‘At Swim Two Birds’ is out now on Plant Music in the US, us rest-of-the-world citizens will have to wait until early next year.

Nov 17 2010

Vice’s ‘The Producer’s series features Gareth Jones

Anyone interested in electronic music production should head on over to the Vice Broadcasting System and check out their new series ‘The Producers’.

Each episode of the series spends a little time in the studio with some of the UK’s most exiting producers and discusses their techniques and philosophies and how they approach making the ground breaking records they do.

The latest episode focuses on Gareth Jones, the legendary producer/engineer responsible for some of the classics of SynthPop including albums by Depeche Mode, Erasure, John Foxx, Wire, Einstürzende Neubauten and Mesh.

Check out the trailer for the series…

…and head on over to VBS-TV to watch the episode and catch the previous instalment featuring Sheffield producer Toddla T.

[Via Vice Magazine]

Nov 16 2010

Kitsuné Maison 10; MiniMix By JBAG – The Sequel

Blah, blah, blah, Kitsuné Music releasing the tenth instalment of their Maison series, titled ‘The Fireworks Issue’. Yadda, yadda, yadda, JBAG put together a minimix to showcase the album…

If you want the lowdown on Kitsuné’s new Maison album, with tracklist, you can read our original post here. The original post contains part 1 of JBAG’s album minimix, here’s part 2 for your listening pleasure. Gonna’ be a tidy compilation!

♫ Kitsuné Maison 10 ‘The Fireworks Issue’ Minimix By JBAG (Part 02)

‘The Fireworks Issue’ is out 6th December, and check out some of JBAG’s other tracks and reMixes:

Nov 16 2010

Groove Armada reMix HURTS’ new single

HURTS’ new single is released this week and even though everybody seems to agree that ‘Sunday’ is perfect single material it is ‘Stay’, which is fair enough, it’s a pretty powerful track.

So, to the reMixes! The awesome surprise of the single is Groove Armada signing up for reMix duties, and the reMix doesn’t disappoint. Slightly less vocal than I would have liked the mix is nonetheless an enticing House track with an early 90’s feel to it. From it’s orchestral stabs to it’s floaty piano, to it’s killer digital bassline this is 1991 warehouse stuff!

♫ HURTS – Stay (Groove Armada reMix)

‘Stay’ and the album, ‘Happiness’, are out now.

Nov 15 2010

Woolfy; Looking Glass video

Here we have recent DFA signing Woolfy’s video for his new EP ‘Looking Glass’

Woolfy is LA based Londoner Simon James who’s new EP is a particularly epic, Post-Punky, journey through Dirty Disco and SynthPop and includes a reMix by Canyons.

The gorgeous video was directed by Collin LaFleche.

The ‘Looking Glass’ EP is out now.

Nov 15 2010

French ElectroPop from Echo

Echo is the ElectroPop/Indie-Electro project of Frenchman Rougier Armand who’s unique and raw take on the genre has been played a lot here at electronic rumors this past week.

Mixing up live instruments along with dirty sounding drum machines and old analog synth sounds, topped with Rougier’s wistful, floaty, vocals makes for a contradictory, but interesting, record. Listening to his just released third album ‘About To be A Man’ I find myself thinking of a more poppy version of Kevin McMahon’s Prick outfit, it’s that kind of combination of noisy, garage, electronics with the slightly otherworldly, slightly dreamlike vocals that is at once aggressive and calming.

Check out two tracks from the new album. ‘We Dance The Same’ is probably the track most likely to be dropped in Indie-Electro clubs and could do really well licenced to someone like Kitsuné. ‘Just Ask The Other Guy’ has, almost, touches of early IAMX about it and is a prefect example of Echo’s work.

♫ Echo – We Dance The Same

♫ Echo – Just Ask The Other Guy

‘About To Be A Man’ is available now over on Echo’s Bandcamp site and check your favoured mp3 store for his previous releases.

Echo @ Bandcamp

Echo @ Amazon

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Nov 13 2010

Listen to Chromeo & La Roux’s ‘Hot Mess’ team-up!

So here it is! The internet’s been chatting all week about Chromeo’s forthcoming single ‘Hot Mess’ which features a version of the track laid out as a duet with La Roux’s Elly Jackson and now we can finally hear it.

Annie Mac, in her awesomeness, premiered the song on her Radio 1 show last night and yours truly ripped it for you all to have a little taster. The back and forth vocals aren’t what I was expecting. I was expecting something simple and, almost, tacked on, but Elly’s parts seem both fresh and like they have been there forever. You wouldn’t necessarily think that Elly’s stark vocals would sit well with Chromeo’s slick Electro Funk, but it really does! Colour me impressed!

This might well be the last time we hear Elly’s unique vocals on an ElectroPop track. Despite riding high in the American dance charts with her US re-release of ‘In For The Kill’, Mz. Jackson has stated she wants to move on from synth music. Damn shame really, another one bites the dust, so enjoy this while you can!

♫ Chromeo (Feat. Elly Jackson From La Roux) – Hot Mess (Radio Rip)

The ‘Hot Mess’ single is out 17th January and along with the original and the new duet features reMixes from the likes Duck Sauce and Tiga.

Annie Mac’s show from yesterday is still available to listen to here.

Nov 12 2010

Fenech-Soler on the road

Fenech-Soler have just released this beautifully shot video showcasing their recent (and amazing) UK tour.

It’s set to their next single, ‘Demons’, I don’t know whether this will end up being the official music video, I doubt it, but it’s nice enough to be. It was shot and directed by Ben Thomas with editing by Gavin Kerr.

Fenech-Soler release ‘Demons’ as a single in January, their self-titled album is out now.

Fenech-Soler @ Beatport

Fenech-Soler @ Juno

Fenech-Soler @ 7Digital

Fenech-Soler @ Amazon

Nov 12 2010

Ellie Goulding video for ‘Lights’..oh no wait, it’s ‘Your Song’, from that advert

We were a little surprised to find Ellie Goulding’s next single will be her cover of Elton John’s ‘Your Song’ rather than the previously announced ‘Lights’, then we saw it was on the new John Lewis X-mas adverts and everything made sense. Sigh.

I hope ‘Lights’ still sees a single release, with some nice reMixes. Meanwhile, here’s the brand new video for ‘Your Song’.

As much as I love Ellie and her music, the record label are just making blander and blander decisions when it comes to videos. At least this one isn’t a literal interpretation of the lyrics like the previous