Nov 6 2009

The Golden Filter return

What a day! Kicking off with new Shy Child and rounding up with the new single from The Golden Filter!

‘Thunderbird’ is their second single after the fantastic début ‘Sold Gold’ earlier this year and it doesn’t fail to live up to the high expectations that were set. It’s got that Golden Filter bass, those Disco drums and the floaty vocals that ‘Solid Gold’ had but manages to be a completely different sounding song, with a different atmosphere, more edgy.

If you loved ‘Solid Gold’, you’ll love this. End of.

♫ The Golden Filter – Thunderbird (zShare) (MediaFire)

The ‘Thunderbird’ 12” comes out on November 16th.

The Golden Filter @ Beatport

The Golden Filter @ Juno

The Golden Filter @ 7Digital

The Golden Filter @ Amazon

Nov 6 2009

Music Go Music & Fred Falke

Oh man, this is one smooth Nu-Disco jam! The always quality Fred Falke has brought the funk to LA avant-garde popsters Music Go Music.

Clocking in at just over eight minutes it’s an epic, funky, electronic journey (and mildly shorter than the original!) that dips and peaks in all the right places.

♫ Music Go Music – Warm In The Shadows (Fred Falke reMix) (zShare) (MediaFire)

‘Warm In The Shadows’ is out on Secretly Canadian:

Music Go Music @ Juno

Music Go Music @ Amazon

Nov 5 2009

Lifelike reMixes Plastiscines

French all-girl pop rock outfit Plastiscines have had their most recent single reMixed by a whole bunch of cool names including producer of some of the best reMixes of the last couple of years Lifelike.

With heavily filtered vocals and a chilled Nu-Disco vibe this is the perfect track for the tail end of the summer.

♫ Plastiscines – Barcelona (Lifelike reMix) (zShare) (MediaFire)

‘Barcelona remixes’ is our now on NYLON’s label.

Plastiscines @ Juno

Plastiscines @ 7Digital

Plastiscines @ Amazon

Nov 5 2009

New Shy Child!

Exiting times! Shy Child, one of the finest live electronic bands around right now are hard at work on their third studio album, ‘Liquid Love’. Personally, I can’t wait!

To tide us over here we have track from the forthcoming album. ‘Criss Cross’ is classic Shy Child, bass heavy Indie-Electro that builds to a hypnotic noisy finale. It’s a great teaser for what promises to be an amazing record.

♫ Shy Child – Criss Cross (zShare) (MediaFire)

‘Liquid Love’ is slated for a March 1st 2010 release on Wall Of Sound, stay tuned to Shy Child’s MySpace for future information and you can pick up the previous two records below:

Shy Child @ Beatport

Shy Child @ 7Digital

Shy Child @ Amazon

Nov 4 2009

Jinder; not so Little anymore?

All’s been quite in the Little Jinder front for a while, during which time she apparently dropped the ‘Little’, now being just Jinder. Still signed to Trouble & Bass, Sweden’s Jinder is currently gearing up for the release of her next single ‘Youth Blood’ (a track that previously appeared on Trouble & Bass’ instalment of the Scion A/V sampler compilations), an ElectopPop gem, which will include reMixes by some of Sweden’s top electronic artists.

This reMix, however, comes from London’s Bok Bok which heavily vocodes the vocals and rings some heavily disjointed disco:

♫ Jinder (Little Jinder) – Youth Blood (Bok Bok reMix) (zShare) (MediaFire)

‘Youth Blood’ December 1st followed by a remix EP, you can hear the original version on Jinder’s MySpace.

Jinder (Little Jinder) @ Beatport

Jinder (Little Jinder) @ Juno

Jinder (Little Jinder) @ Amazon

Nov 4 2009

Versant (what Carah Faye did next…)

So, what’s the worst decision once great Indie-Electro act Shiny Toy Guns ever made? Quite simply it was ditching vocalist Carah Faye Charnow in favour of some reality TV wannabe, this has been proved by their disappointingly mediocre second album.

The decision, however, seems to have turned out for the best for Carah. Now based in Sweden she’s back with her new outfit Versant and dropping the kind of powerful Indie-Electro that the STG’s album wishes it was.

Just check these three demos here; from the huge Electro Rock of ‘Out Of Touch’ to the more intimate ‘Push Away’ these tracks would work just as easily on the dancefloor or in a gritty rock club and see a welcome return of Carah’s voice powering through cutting synths and dirge guitars.

♫ Versant – Out of Touch (Demo.) (zShare) (MediaFire)

♫ Versant – Push Away (Demo.) (zShare) (MediaFire)

♫ Versant – Quick Escapes (Demo.) (zShare) (MediaFire)

If I was a surviving member of Shiny Toy Guns I would be kicking myself!

Versant release their self-titled début album on February 17th 2010, until them go show them some big MySpace love!

Versant @ MySpace

Nov 3 2009

Róisín Murphy’s new single

Highly underrated queen of UK ElectroPop Róisín Murphy returns this month with her eagerly anticipated new single ‘Orally Fixated’.

Never one to completely bow to the mainstream, Róisín litters ‘Orally Fixated’ with broken beats and cut up samples that power through a spacious 80’s sounding mix (huge reverb washed snares!) before unexpectedly dropping a wailing guitar solo!

Experimental and Pop seem like two diametrically opposed terms, but Ms. Murphy skilfully brings the two together and takes them both to the disco.

♫ Róisín Murphy – Orally Fixated (zShare) (MediaFire)

‘Orally Fixated‘ let’s loose November 16th on AWAL, also The Guardian will be offering a free download for 48 hours.

Róisín Murphy @ Beatport

Róisín Murphy @ Juno

Róisín Murphy @ 7Digital

Róisín Murphy @ Amazon

Oct 31 2009

The Vault: Creaking open to bring you some Halloween Ministry!

The Vault: The classics of Electronic Music. The influential and the groundbreaking. The pioneering and the music we grew up on…

Happy Halloween readers!

Just a quick one today, but we couldn’t really let Halloween slip by without posting this gem could we?

You may know who Ministry are; black dreads, long beards, Metal guitars, shouty vocals, skulls on mic stands etc…, basically a walking Metal cliché. Things weren’t always the case!

1981 to 1984 Ministry were actually a really good SynthPop band, probably one of the best the US has ever produced Releasing a handful of 12”s on Wax Trax! Records culminating with the album ‘With Sympathy’ on Arista Records, Al Jourgensen (above; later to sport black dreads, a cowboy hat and a heroin addiction) produced some fantastic, emotional and groove laden New Wave music. With 1986’s ‘Twitch’ album Ministry discovered Industrial music, and it was still all good. ‘Twitch’ is a well crafted, harsh, electronic record. Even 1998’s ‘Land Of Rape And Honey’ has some good tracks on it, although it’s standing at the top of (if not actually sliding down) the slippery slope of mediocre rock music.

Ministry’s career, from1989 onwards, is just a decent into stereotypical Heavy Metal with any originality or innovation stripped from the mix. In a laughable attempt to sound ‘hard’ Al Jourgensen has disowned his early recordings as “…an abortion”.

Such a pity…such talent gone to waste…

Anyway, it’s the ‘season of the witch’ and all that, so get your listening gear ‘round Ministry’s classic ‘Everyday (Is Halloween)’, a brilliant poppy disco track, and imagine the band that could have been…

♫ Ministry – Everyday (Is Halloween) (zShare) (MediaFire)

Ministry’s early works are still available on CD:

Ministry @ 7Digital

Ministry @ Amazon

Oct 30 2009

Fire For Effect

Firstly, let me just say amongst the list of words you should never use are Darkwave and Graver. Unless you are Das Ich, Project Pitchfork or an actual Darkwave band, using Darkwave ‘cos you think it’s cool as it has the words Dark and Wave in it just make you look ignorant and needy. Graver, on the other hand, is one of the most embarrassing terms ever conceived.

Both words were used in Fire For Effect’s press release…shudder.

So it’s a good job the music speaks for itself. Solo project of Albert J, who played keyboards for SSION and Josephine Collective, and DJed alongside the likes of FischerSpooner and CSS, Fire For Effect make some rockin’ noise-Pop. Heavily AutoTuned vocals blend hauntingly with bit-crunched beats and distorted synths. Each track manages to hit you with the unexpected at least once without veering off into the murky world of experimental. A spacey yet quite harsh sound makes for some intelligent dance-Pop tunes.

‘Paradise Drudge’ would have to be my favourite, I’m lovin’ the lead line:

♫ Fire For Effect – Paradise Drudge (zShare) (MediaFire)

♫ Fire For Effect – Cell (zShare) (MediaFire)

♫ Fire For Effect – The Beach (zShare) (MediaFire)

Fire For Effect’s album should be dropping some time in January, ‘til then I believe some MySpace love is in order!

Fire For Effect @ MySpace

Oct 29 2009

It’s Van She day!

Matt Van Schie, of Van She fame, has dropped this solo effort onto an unexpecting interwebz and it’s a really nice little ElectroPop jam, it’s kinda’ late 70’s/early 80’s post-punk sounding track. Like a (more) retro Van She.

♫ Matt Van Schie – Saturday Night (zShare) (MediaFire)

Also, this cover version of Blue Öyster Cult’s ‘(Don’t Fear) The Reaper’ by Van She proper has surfaced. It’s from Australian radio station Triple J and it’s huge sounding with massive synth stabs.

♫ Van She – (Don’t Fear) The Reaper (Radio Rip) (zShare) (MediaFire)

I really hope this gets properly released!