Oh. It's been way too long. That's cool. Back now.
I gave myself the challenge to only post new stuff (as in, from June, July and August of 2014) for the posts below. So if you're looking for more current stuff, this is the post for you. It's also going to be ridiculously long, so I'm sorry in advance. Let's get into it.
Number Sixty Three
Electronic producer XXYYXX, who came into overnight fame in 2011 (I think) with his self-titled debut, has just released a single from his forthcoming untitled LP. Called "Unknown", it features Vanessa Elisha with vocals, and has his classically dark, cacophonous production turned up, using a steady synth beat in the background to keep the track moving.
It almost has a bass drop type thing around two and a half minutes in. It's an interesting shift in XXYYXX's usual production. If his album sounds like this single, it'll be pretty good.
If you like this single, check out his debut, featuring the song "About You", which is pretty great.
XXYYXX - Unknown
XXYYXX - XXYYXX (Full Album)
Favorite song: About You
Related artists: Analog Tape Dispenser, Shlohmo
Number Sixty Four
Tom Krell, also known by his stage name How To Dress Well, has been releasing strange and interesting pop/R&B songs since around 2011. His songs are slow moving, self deprecating ballads about mostly love and the lack of it. Yeah, sure, it's a little cliche, but what isn't?
His new album, "What Is This Heart?" follows in the same vein. The production is smooth as hell, and his voice matches the electronic backgrounds very well. It's leaps and bounds above most modern R&B (PartyNextDoor, Frank Ocean) and is pretty darn good.
It might not be really, really recent but it's current enough to get on the list.
How To Dress Well - Words I Don't Remember
How To Dress Well - Repeat Pleasure
Favorite song: Words I Don't Remember
Related artists: PartyNextDoor, Janelle Monae
Number Sixty Five
Holy crap, new Milo track, upcoming Milo album, need I say more?
This new track (with an absolutely genius title) is a love song as only Milo can do it. It's masochistic, moving, deep and witty at the same time. Produced by Tastenothing, the gentle beat to this song matches the lyrical content perfectly. It's one of Milo's best songs, hands down.
His new album, "A Toothpaste Suburb" is dropping September 23 on Hellfyre Club.
Just listen to it.
Milo - You Are Go(o)d to Me
Favorite song: Yup
Related artists: YC the Cynic, Cunninlynguists
Number Sixty Six
I WANNA BE LIKE KANYE.
Or so say The Chainsmokers on "Kanye", with Siren wailing the chorus over some strange piano chords followed by the most mundane of bass drops. It's catchy, sure, but not really anything else. Why I'm posting it is beyond me.
First "#SELFIE" and now this. The Chainsmokers are making a name for themselves. What kind of name it is seems unclear, though.
Anyway, here it is. Enjoy?
The Chainsmokers - Kanye
Favorite song: Anything but this song
Related artists: Any other popular electronic artist
Number Sixty Seven
Yes, I know the posts get less detailed as it goes on. I'll take a break and come back some other time. Writing all this is difficult. Especially after making a post about a song called "Kanye". I'm ashamed and proud at the same time.
Anyway, this post is on the pop-punk band Joyce Manor. Their debut album, "Joyce Manor" was a fun but poorly produced album that went over well with fans and not so much with critics. Personally, I'm enjoying their new album more, it has more punch to it than most pop punk acts (I'm looking at you, Manchester Orchestra) and that is a good thing.
Clocking it at just under twenty minutes, this album plays more like an adrenaline shot than anything else. The lyrics, surprisingly, are worth checking into. I'll post the album below.
Joyce Manor - Never Hungover Again (Full Album)
Favorite song: Falling In Love Again
Related artists: Dogbreth, Cheap Girls
Number Sixty Eight
Speaking of pop-punk, here's Hard Girls.
Their new album "A Thousand Surfaces", out on Asian Man Records, is actually pretty darn good. The riffs are aggressive and catchy, the singing is much more punk than pop (a very smart move), and the drumming is very good as well.
One of the best songs off the LP, "The Quark", is a real earworm. It'll stay in your head for a while. Not that that's a bad thing.
They sound great live as well.
Hard Girls - The Quark
Hard Girls - Plan
Hard Girls - The Chord
Favorite song: The Quark
Related artists: The Front Bottoms, The Frights
Number Sixty Nine
Ha ha ha ha ha ha, yes, I know. It is so funny. Ha ha ha.
When I saw that Black Milk and BADBADNOTGOOD were teaming up for a song, my mind sort of collapsed in on itself and came back ready to have it exploded again. Black Milk, a rapper who released a great album last year ("No Poison No Paradise") and indescribable kinda-jazz kids BADBADNOTGOOD end up complementing each other perfectly. This song shows off the dark and rhythmic BADBAD production and Black Milk's intense, quiet lyrics very well.
The song feels like the darker moments off "No Poison No Paradise", kind of like "Monday's Worst" or "Interpret Sabotage" and the instrumental reminds me of "Can't Leave the Night" from "III". It's a great song, and a really interesting collaboration for both groups.
I'll post their single below, and one Black Milk and one BADBADNOTGOOD track.
Black Milk - Sunday's Best/Monday's Worst (Official Video)
Black Milk x BADBADNOTGOOD - Now or Never
BADBADNOTGOOD - Can't Leave the Night
Favorite song: Now or Never
Related artists: YC the Cynic, KA
Number Seventy
Seventy posts? Woah, that's crazy. I'm proud and ashamed at the same time.
This post is on iamiwhoami, one of the best pop projects to come out in recent years. Her sound is electronically based, but has all the emotion of a folk or singer/songwriter project. Her performances on all the music she puts out is fantastic, it's an experience listening to her work.
Her last album, "Kin", was fantastic. It combined all the best parts of the project's sound. It's one of the best pop albums in the past five years. Her new album, coming out in September, is looking to be great too. Called "Blue", it has an even poppier sound, but still deep and interesting.
This is one to watch out for. One of the best pop projects out there, iamiwhoami does not mess around.
iamiwhoami - tap your glass (Official Video)
iamiwhoami - kin (Full Album)
Favorite song: idle talk
Related artists: The Knife, Miriam The Believer
Number Seventy One
It's been a while without a hardcore post.
Experimentation in black metal isn't played out yet, but it's getting close. With bands like Agalloch showing up and playing with black metal in a very public light, the genre is becoming diluted. Bands like Behemoth, playing straight black metal are almost falling into the background.
But this is not always a bad thing. The new Saor album, for instance, is great. It combines Scottish folk with black metal. A very strange combination, I know, but it works surprisingly well. Especially on songs like "Aura", where the soaring woodwinds over the pummeling blast beats only to have cacophonous vocals layered on top is actually a good thing.
I'll post a link to their bandcamp below. Very good album.
Saor - Aura
Favorite song: Aura
Related artists: Agalloch, Panopticon
Number Seventy Two
Some lo-fi pop/rock is always welcome. General rule.
The new track from Sharpless, titled "Gemini" is a real earworm. It combines catchy as hell guitar riffs with an almost bubblegum pop synth lead that works very well. The vocals are somewhat mundane, the only real downside to the track.
Their new album, "The One I Wanted to Be" is coming out via Father/Daughter Records on August 26. If it sounds like this song, it'll be a pretty fun ride.
The weird-ass group harmonies are a nice touch as well.
Sharpless - Gemini
Favorite song: Gemini
Related artists: Kitten, Bad Books
Number Seventy Three
I made a post on Father John Misty a while back. As much as I want him to put out some new material, this post is actually about a cover of his most well-known song.
This cover, done by Marissa Nadler, is a fantastic, slow version of "Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings", using pretty much only an electric guitar and bass, with muffled percussion in the background, giving the entire thing a very eery feel.
Her voice is fantastic, too. It matches the style she shoots for very well. The lyrics are even more haunting. It's a great cover, and it's just a great song.
I'll post it below.
Marissa Nadler - Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings
Favorite song: Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings
Related artists: Julia Holter, Father John Misty
Number Seventy Four
I've been wanting to post about B L A C K I E for a while now, but never found a reason to. Now I do.
B L A C K I E is an experimental as hell music producer and rapper whose EP "True Spirit and Not Giving a Fuck" is one of the best EPs, well, ever (according to me). His album "GEN" was a polarizing, confusing album, but like everything he does, he went all in.
His beats are brutal. Absolutely mind-meltingly loud. Full of noise and just screeching, disturbing melodies. His voice is harsh and abrasive as well. It's confounding. You don't know what to say when hearing B L A C K I E. And that's a great thing.
He released a new song recently. And it's even more disturbing and confusing than the rest. Titled "None Above", it plays out more like a spoken word track than anything else. The noise and synth leads are distorted and ground together, making the entire thing truly freaky.
I'll post it below, as well as some from "True Spirit". Form your own opinion on B L A C K I E, and then listen deeper. He's that kind of guy.
Headphone warning: loud as hell.
B L A C K I E - None Above
B L A C K I E - Warchild
B L A C K I E - This Blood
Favorite song: This Blood
Related artists: clipping., Death Grips
Number Seventy Five
Wait, are you kidding me?
Alt-J and Clipping, two really, really different projects have collaborated. By "collaborated", I mean Clipping totally tore apart an Alt-J song and made it into Story 4. I completely missed the fact that there was a Story 3. But who cares, it's new Clipping.
Their "story" series is some of their best stuff, so this is a fantastic addition to their catalog. This entry focuses on razor sharp satire, and odd snippets of melody flying around the background, coming to a head after two and a half minutes before diving straight back into the mess of Daveed's rhymes.
"IT'S ALL FUCKED UP NOW" will be reverberating in your head for days.
Alt-J x Clipping - Story 4
Favorite song: Story 4
Related artists: Neil Cecieraga, Love Grips
Number Seventy Six
Socially conscious hip hop has gotten pretty big now, with rappers like Common hopping on the bandwagon, but the really great stuff is pretty underground, at least for now.
One of the best out there is Armand Hammer, the collaboration between Billy Woods and Elucid. Billy Woods' output has gotten great in the recent years, and Elucid, who is pretty much unknown, also does a great job with this group.
Their album last year, "Race Music" was a fantastic dissection of race and class in America. Songs like "Where The Wild Things Are" and "No Roses" really attacked the world in a new and interesting way. Their new song from a forthcoming EP, "B.E.T." is a slow-moving track, but just as powerful as anything on "Race Music".
Armand Hammer - B.E.T.
Armand Hammer - No Roses
Favorite song: B.E.T.
Related artists: Billy Woods, Elucid
Number Seventy Seven
The blog has almost seven hundred views. That's insane. Thank you.
Andy Falcous of Future of the Left and Mclusky has a new side project. Called "Christian Fitness", they just released a new album titled "I Am Scared of Everything That Isn't Me" and if you don't think that's funny then this project may not be for you.
This album combines all the elements of Mclusky and Future of the Left: quick, clever lyrics and angular riffs with well-done mixing and production. It's a strange release, sure, but it's definitely a fun one. The self-titled track is especially good, and a great show of Andy's talent.
Overall, very good. Link below.
Christian Fitness - I Am Scared of Everything That Isn't Me
Favorite song: Christian Fitness
Related artists: Mclusky, Future of the Left
Number Seventy Eight
Electronic producer Rustie is back, and is teaming up with... Danny Brown...?
Rustie made a name for himself in 2011 with "Glass Swords", a fun and interesting electronica album that combined elements of techno, house, and even some dubstep for a nice sounding album. Danny Brown also made a name for himself in 2011 with "XXX", a great album that has brought him a lot of fame. Check it out if you haven't yet.
This unexpected collaboration is actually pretty good. It has a dynamic performance from Danny, going from mumbled lyrics to yelling within a minute. The beat is also very good. The synth lead really sounds like sirens going off, the bass is like listening to bombs drop. Fitting, since the title of the song is "Attak".
The only downside is the lyrics. Not awful, but could be better. Anyway. Link below.
Rustie - Attak (feat. Danny Brown)
Favorite song: Attak
Related artists: XKore, Ab-Soul
Number Seventy Nine
How to make any current punk fan happy: tell them there's a new Dope Body single.
And that there is. Dope Body, after bursting onto the scene in 2012 with "Natural History" and being signed to Drag City have been gaining popularity since then. And for good reason. Their style is alternately throwback and experimental. It's a winning formula, and Dope Body really has it down.
Their new track, "Hired Gun" has a guitar riff that is absolutely killer. The lyrics and vocal delivery are very good, common for Dope Body. It's just a great song, and a really great into to "Lifer", the new album, out October 21.
Link below. Check it out if you're into rock of any sort.
Dope Body - Hired Gun
Favorite song: Hired Gun
Related artists: This Routine Is Hell, OFF!
Number Eighty
Eighty freakin' posts. Eighty. Posts.
Tops is back with another song. You might remember them from my halfway-through-2014 list. Their song "Sleeptalker" is one of my favorite singles this year. Their new track is pretty nice too.
Titled "Way to be Loved", it focuses more on the rhythm than the melody, and is different from "Sleeptalker" in lyrical content as well. It asks the listener quite a few questions in its four and a half minute run time. It's a good song.
"Picture You Staring" is out September 2 on Arbutus.
Tops - Way to be Loved
Favorite song: Way to be Loved
Related artists: Best Coast, Alvvays
Number Eighty One
Busdriver always something interesting to say, even if no one is agreeing with him. His very intense brand of socially conscious rap caught the attention of Nocando early in Hellfyre Club's career. His unmistakable voice is another way Busdriver sets himself apart from the pack.
This new song, "Colonize the Moon", is a floaty song with Busdriver rapping pretty darn fast at some points. It's an interesting instrumental. Riley Lake, responsible for Milo's "Things That Happen at Day" and "Cavalcade" helped Busdriver out for this song, and it shows. It's good.
While I'm not totally loving the song yet, it's still Busdriver, and is a very interesting track in its own way. The link is below. Check it out.
"Perfect Hair", his new album, is out September 9 via Big Dada.
Busdriver - Colonize the Moon (feat. Pegasus Warning)
Favorite song: Colonize the Moon
Related artists: Nocando, Milo
PS: Wow, this post is long.
