Tag Archives: Pop

Nov 20 2012

[Audio] Mereki – Blue Lake

Mereki

So, we’ve been hearing a bit from Miami Horror drummer Aaron Shanahan’s solo offering, Good Night Keaton, particularly his début single, Next To Mexico. It’s a track that features the soulful yet quirky vocals of LA singer Mereki. Well, it turns out the girl’s not too shabby on her own!

There just the one track on her SoundCloud page, the demo version of a track called Blue Lake, and it’s pretty special. Rich, bombastic ElectroPop tempered with introspective vocals gives the track the best of both worlds. It’s like Dreamwave, Indie-Electro and Chillwave have been distilled into their pure pop essence and delivered in their logical evolutionary form. It’s a hazy, reverb washed wall of groaning synths and starburst melodies as Mereki’s breathy voice slips in and out of the track. But despite all the dreamy summer musical blur the track still manages to be insanely catchy. Definitely one to watch in 2013.

♫ Mereki – Blue Lake (Demo.)

Check out more from Mereki on SoundCloud.

Nov 20 2012

[Video] Queen Of Hearts’ ‘Warrior’

Stop what you’re doing, there’s a new Queen Of Hearts video in town. The amazing Warrior has only gone and got itself all visual.

The clip’s directed by Elliott Morgan and sees The Queen deftly conveying the rousing bombast of the track. Which is still produced by Diamond Cut, and still amazing.

Queen Of Hearts’ Warrior is released on 2nd December.

Buy Queen Of Hearts’ music from:

Nov 19 2012

[Audio] Strange Talk’s new single

Strange Talk

Here is the forthcoming new single from Australia’s reining Indie-ElectroPop outfit Strange Talk. Amongst certain circles they took the end of the summer by storm with their Cast Away single (as they did the summer before with Climbing Walls). It;s hard to imagine Strange Talk releasing a song for the winter months, but let’s see what they’ve come up with.

Falling In Love is pretty typical Strange Talk fare on the surface. Big dancefloor beats, anthemic vocals, and upbeat Indie vibe, but this is probably the most commercial, and commercially dancy, track they’ve done to date. And all that rests on big piercing rave synths. Which leaves us feeling a little two-minded about the tune. One the one hand it’s an amazing song track, just as you’d expect from, brilliant ElectroPop, then on the other had you have big 90s Trance synths, which always strike us as really musically lazy. The Pop producer’s first resort to make  a tune sound a bit ravey. Sounds like a Stargate production, and that’s not a good thing. Still, there’s a class tune underneath all that, hands-in-the-air brilliance (that’s why we’re posting it) and hopefully this is Strange Talks last experiment with Trance leads, we know they are better than that.

♫ Strange Talk – Falling In Love

Falling In Love is out early 2013.

Buy Strange Talk’s music from:

Nov 16 2012

[Video] Icona Pop’s ‘We Got The World’

It’s the video for insane Swedish ElectroPop duo Icona Pop’s We Got The World. It’s probably the most commentarial track they’ve done, big Trance leads and all.

Fredrik Etoall directs the clip. Be warned, Icona Pop are having more fun than you.

Buy Icona Pop’s music from:

Nov 14 2012

Hercules And Love Affair’s ‘Release Me’ video

We’re still jamming to Hercules And Love Affair’s new tune, Release Me, taken from their new DJ-KiCKS album. It’s definitely one of the highlights of the tail end of 2012.

The track’s video has just premiered, directed by Mo Stoebe, and comes loaded with retro video effects.

Hercules And Love Affair’s DJ-KICKS is released 29th October on Studio !K7

Buy Hercules And Love Affair’s music from:

Nov 14 2012

Goin’ Old School: Jean-Michel Jarre, Anne Clark & D-Mob with Cathy Dennis

Goin’ Old School isn’t a trip down music memory lane, it’s a mugging in the dark alleyway of nostalgia:

In 1981 Jean–Michel Jarre continued to break new ground, both in synthesizer music, and chart music, with his hit Magnetic Fields II.

The amazing Anne Clark’s 1984 breakthrough Our Darkness. Pioneering electronics.

D-Mob with Cathy Dennis, before she penned one of the greatest British Pop songs of all time, hitting the charts with House-lite and C’Mon And Get My Love in 1989.

You can buy most of this  music from:

 

Nov 14 2012

Dragonette’s X-Mas single

Dragonette

Ladies and gentlemen, it’s the first X-Mas single of the year! jumping the gun slightly in early November (is it time to feel X-Massy yet?), but still wining the prize is Canadian ElectroPop noiseniks Dragonette, who have managed to be seasonal and ‘down with tha kids’ by combining a bittersweet X-Mas tune with text messaging. Nice!

Merry Xmas (Says Your Text Message) has got bells in it, we should make that clear from the start, and choir sounds. Oh and copious amounts of the work “Fuck”, which is pretty special for an X-Mas song, also pronouncing X-Mas, “X-Mas” is appealing too. So, as you can probably gather, this is the anti-X-Mas love song set the traditional seasonal Pop that’s has had a few rounds in Dragonette’s grinding machine, sounding in-your-face but still holing on to some of that sparking X-Mas tune hopefulness and majesty. The best of all worlds really.

♫ Dragonette – Merry Xmas (Says Your Text Message (Explicit Version))

Dragonette’s Merry Xmas (Says Your Text Message) is released 20th November.

Buy Dragonette’s music from:

Nov 13 2012

Chordashian’s ‘Call Me’

Chordashian

Released yesterday was Call Me, the new single from Brooklyn Boogiemeisters  Chordashian. Of particular note  with Call Me, is this is the first track from this duo that features in-house vocals. Felix Feygin and Michael Banks lend their vocal tones as well as their production chops to the track for some smooth R&B tinged DiscoPop.

Call Me is a melting pot of ideas and influences wrapped up in slick summer Boogie packaging. The track is actually pretty Housey during the verses. With a deep Chicago bassline and a Warehouse vibe the track lulls you into it’s moody groove before exploding in a shower of 90s R&B beats and Disco synths in each chorus. the vocals work really well, fitting into each section of the song in a similar style, and having a big sing-a-long chorus never hurt anyone. But for a serious House groove, check out the Bronx mix,

♫ Chordashian – Call Me

♫ Chordashian – Call Me (Bronx reMix)

Buy Chordashian’s music from:

Nov 9 2012

Chela

Chela

So, we’ve all got pretty used to Australian songstress Chela over the summer. Partly due to her appearance on Clubfeet’s Heartbreak, but mostly from her turn as the voice of Goldroom’s summer destroying Fifteen, one of the biggest tunes of they year. Now it’s time to check out some of her own output as she released two singles, Full Moon and Plastic Gun.

Released yesterday, Full Moon feels a few months too late, it would have been a stonking summer anthem. it’s got all the best qualities of smooth beach part Disco, but with a hazy shimmer that feels pretty unique. The track’s pulsating cosmic Disco and funk bassline are perfectly married to Chela’s vocals, that flip from ethereal to rowdy. It’s a track that sticks in your head for ages. Plastic Gun bring s more live sound to Chela’s repertoire. A reverb washed Indie-Disco jam with an energetic garage feel and a hint of Ladyhawke going on. Chela’s definitely got out interest.

♫ Chela – Full Moon

♫ Chela – Plastic Gun

Check out more from Chela on SoundCloud.

Nov 9 2012

Elijah Collins & Slow It Down’s ‘I Don’t Need’ video

Elijah Collins & Slow It Down slight edit of Cherelle’s 1989 hit Affair, now titled I Don’t Need from their new four track edits EP, has hit the internet in video form.

Produced by Beaver & Beaver’s Ely Dagher, the clip plays up the vintage half of the track with some decidedly retro visuals.

Slow It Down & Elijah Collins’ Alright EP is out now.

Check out more from Slow It Down & Elijah Collins on SoundCloud.