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2013

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Are you walking on sunshine? Toes tapping, 100-watt smile on your face? Feel the happy vibes and bounce to the upbeat rhythms.
http://www.stereomood.com/mood/happy

happy

video music

Indie 2013

new songs

Marzo 2013

Mai 2013

DD010: Amateur Best - Be Happy // The Wave 7" 
Limited to 300 copies worldwide 
Release Date: February 13th 2012
Pre-order
http://doubledenimrecords.bigcartel.com

Amateur Best is a new creation from London's Joe Flory (formerly Primary 1). Through soft, lilting pop songs Flory tells the story of James Best, a sometime London DJ, latent alcoholic and lifelong amateur. Best's hijinx are also chronicled in an accompanying comic book following our hero through the murder and mayhem that is pre-Olimpik London, as James' fate becomes inexorably entwined with that of the city he lives in.

Double Denim are hugely excited to announce the physical release of a 7" single on February 13th and also an accompanying comic book to complete the story. On the A-side on the single is 'Be Happy' a bittersweet song carried along by languid electronics and an anxious but soulful vocal that looks into the mirror and can't seem to find anything familiar. With an even darker complexion is 'The Wave' a song that makes up the B-side of the record.

DD010 A1: Amateur Best // Be Happy

Turn Me On

Scoured over at :  http://ghettofunk.co.uk/spinforths-weekly-soundcloud-scour-65/ aaaaand http://hongkongpingpong.co.uk/spinforths-weekly-soundcloud-scour-190712 

Blogged aswell at : http://sunday-swing.com/2012/07/28/monetrik-swing-flirt/ & http://electro-swing.com/

Monetrik - Swing Flirt !

Together At Last

Haiku Salut are Gemma, Louise and Sophie from the Derbyshire Dales. "Los Elefantes" appears on the trio's debut album, "Tricolore", which came out in March 2013. 

You can pick up a copy here:
www.howdoesitfeel.co.uk/hdiflabel.html

More about Haiku Salut here - http://haikusalut.com/



Haiku Salut, "Los Elefantes"

Monkey Records is proud to present Whatcha Got, the first single from a major new songwriting talent - Chris Hurn. In this infectious debut, Chris reminds us that despite all our day-to-day problems and worries, it’s important to appreciate the little things in life and that quite often “you just don’t know whatcha got”. From his debut album Too Busy Dreamin'.

LYRICS

it's too easy to tumble on yourself
comforting to hang on to old books on the shelf
with easy destinations, without weary knees
everybody knows what it looks like
but how does it feel

(instr.)

you give me wrongs
get you rights,
tell me everythin' you need
but you just dont know 
whatcha got

well you're busy flippin' papers thinkin' over what you're makin'
thinkin' over what you're not
it's your disease of the soul 
chippin' your mind of control
well these bones are for breakin'
livin' underneath your clothes
you got it all, you got a lot,
more than most people ever come to know

you give me wrongs
get you rights,
tell me everythin' you need
but you just dont know 
whatcha got

(bridge)

you give me wrongs
get you rights,
tell me everythin' you need 
but you jus don't know
whatcha got

Before the needle hits the sun
when you're countin' every step til the day is done
take your time, take it slow, drink your wine
well use your hands, use your eyes, hold someone

you give me wrongs
get you rights,
tell me everythin' you need x 3
but you just don't know
whatcha got

oh you just don't know whatcha got
mm you just don't know whatcha got
oh you just don't know whatcha got


Whatcha Got

Out February 25/26, 2013 on Slumberland Records (US + Canada) and Night School (Europe)

Glasgow's Golden Grrrls are Eilidh Rodgers, Ruari MacLean and Rachel Aggs. What began as bedroom guitar experimentation soon bloomed into a fully-formed pop language inspired by the 80s New Zealand and Australian indie pop scenes, DIY punk and Glasgow's own rich pop history (think The Vaselines, The Pastels). Drummer Eilidh Rodgers' inventive, loose-cannon drumming and lead vocals have framed MacLean's baritone from the beginning, with newest member Rachel Aggs (also of Trash Kit) bringing an effortless melodic sensibility on guitar and backing vocals. Golden Grrrls’ first releases exemplified the lo-fi aesthetic they came from. Now long sold out, the two previous 7”s on Night School married the roughed-up recording dynamic with a boisterous, inventive melodic sense that has blossomed further on this, their self-titled debut LP.

For "Golden Grrrls" the band has written eleven perfect songs about life's realities dressed in three-part harmonies, heart-tugging changes and a playing style derived from punk and classic crash-pop enthusiasm. Like contemporaries Twerps and Sea Lions, they've joined a storied lineage of pop essentialists such as The Clean, The Bats and The Feelies -- bands who eschew complexity for concision and never sacrifice melody to mere primitivism. Each chord, beat and vocal line is perfectly placed, essential and simply has to exist as it is in its moment in time.

With all three members singing throughout, the harmonies and guitar lines interweaving, there’s a warmth in every song that adds to the poignant punch of the album as a whole. Opener ‘New Pop’ is a blast of breakneck spiked power pop while "Think Of The Ways" is a sweetly melancholic song that plays MacLean and Rodgers’ vocals against each other. "Take Your Time" and "Date It" are a punked-up indie pop gems, while album closer "We’ve Got…" is the catchiest 'anthem’ you’ll hear from a band that would be repulsed at the idea of writing anthems.

Golden Grrrls - We've Got...

Las Robertas - Seconds Away

CHROMATICS / CHERRY

Alpaca Sports - As Long as I Have You

Chica de oro - El mato a un policia motorizado

From the album Heza. Purchase CD/LP here: http://www.polyvinylrecords.com/heza

Buy on iTunes

Generationals - Spinoza

Tripping the Light Fantastic - Heavy Heart

Flowers - When You Lie

WIRE – CHANGE BECOMES US – pinkflag (pf20)

“Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time…,” laughs Colin Newman when asked to explain Wire’s original motivation for Change Becomes Us. While that might sound like the kind of feeble excuse you’d offer in mitigation when a drunken escapade goes horribly wrong, not only was it a good idea, it actually turned into a superlative one. 

In spring 2012, Wire’s plan had been to convene at Rockfield Studios in Wales to review the rudimentary blueprints of songs that had never made it beyond a few live performances in 1979 and 1980 – a time when the band-members were in creative overdrive yet the band was disintegrating. The aim wasn’t simply to resuscitate and record old songs – in fact, many of them hadn’t become proper songs in the first place, existing only as basic ideas or undeveloped parts. Rather, the objective was to approach that unrealised work as an oblique strategy, a potential springboard for Wire’s contemporary, forward-looking processes, a possible point of departure for new compositions.

This took place with Wire firing on all cylinders, as a four-piece studio entity again, the core line-up of Newman, Graham Lewis and Robert Grey now enhanced by guitarist Matthew Simms. Simms had played a key role in helping the band to cultivate and shape its new sonic landscape throughout the preceding year’s live work. Out of the exploratory Rockfield session and subsequent, extensive development and production at Newman’s Swim Studio, the ostensible source material became, in the classic Wire tradition, something quite other than what it may have once been or what it might have become if it had been pursued in 1980. 

“Love Bends” is a case in point. Its roots lie in “Piano Tuner” -- the raucous, octave-hopping number performed in February 1980 at the Electric Ballroom in Camden and preserved on Document and Eyewitness -- but it’s now morphed, improbably, into an irresistible, totally modern pop song. “It had to be turned into something else,” explains Lewis, “because it only really had one bit.” Just as improbably, the gently lilting “Re-invent Your Second Wheel” is tangentially connected to the notorious “Zegk Hoqp,” which was more of a one-time happening than a song at the Camden gig -- mostly shouting and banging, executed by a stage-full of Wire cronies in funny hats. “It was written for performance, around people with newspaper headdresses; not with music in mind,” Lewis emphasizes. Similarly transformed, “& Much Besides” is a six-minute oneiric-melodic interlude that gives no hint of its putative origins in “Eastern Standard” --  a dreary, obtuse three-minute geography lesson delivered with former manager Mick Collins at the Electric Ballroom concert.

Newman’s writing and production reimagines the past in ways that ultimately break any substantive connection with it, making entirely new pieces; and these songs themselves enact Wire’s restless drive to become other, often thriving on a fundamental tension between opposing sonic characteristics. With its stop-start, soft-hard, quiet-loud structure, “Adore Your Island” veers between what Newman describes as “prog and unhinged punk rock,” never quite resolving itself; the drama of “Attractive Space” hinges on a progressive splitting of the song’s personality, between its calm expansive, anthemic orientation and an increasing sense of intensity and claustrophobia. 

Change Becomes Us encapsulates the paradoxical essence of Wire’s creativity. The tendency of these new songs to refuse a single, settled identity is emblematic of the band’s ever-evolving aesthetic -- one that’s always hinged on sustained tensions and oppositions: between the familiar and the unfamiliar, the comfortable and the unsettling, the melodic and the brutal, the cerebral and the visceral, the smart and the moronic, the obvious and the inscrutable, the rational and the absurd. This intrinsic, core ambivalence generates the essential otherness that has characterized Wire’s most memorable, distinctive work -- from the epochal innovations of Chairs Missing and 154 to the electronic-pop deconstructions of A Bell Is A Cup to Send’s postmodern-punk expressionism and the widescreen lyricism of Red Barked Tree.

Change Becomes Us is an undeniable part of that illustrious lineage. Definitely more than just a good idea at the time.

Wilson Neate


Change Becomes Us

Love Bends

Toy Love // Swimming Pool

In anticipation for the first new Tullycraft album for five years, Fortuna POP! are releasing a single featuring the title track ‘Lost in Light Rotation’. One of the most influential bands to have emerged from America’s indiepop underground, Seattle’s Tullycraft revel in a DIY aesthetic having honed their particular brand of clever, self-reverential pop to perfection.

‘Lost in Light Rotation’ is an all-in-one banner anthem for the heartbroken, the disenfranchised, and the fleeting pop star. The song also makes a not-so-veiled reference to the 1996 single “This is Fake D.I.Y.” by the Scottish indiepop band Bis.

The b-side ‘Bad Connection’ is a cover written by the British synthpop duo Yazoo (also known as Yaz in the United States). The song originally appeared on the group’s 1982 debut album, Upstairs at Eric’s.

The album ‘Lost in Light Rotation’ was mixed by Phil Ek (The Shins, Band of Horses, Built to Spill, The Halo Benders, The Shout Out Louds, Fleet Foxes, The Walkmen). Sparkling with brainy fairy dust and glittering with proper pop songs, Ek irons out the quirks to create a wonderfully polished, yet still as punk as ever, sheen on the 11 delightfully upbeat, smart, indiepop anthems. With Sean Tollefson’s nasal vocal delivery counterbalanced by the sweetness of Jenny Mears’ responses, if you need a template for what the best indiepop sounds like, look no further.

Tullycraft - Lost in Light Rotation

THE HISTORY OF APPLE PIE NEW SINGLE – ‘SEE YOU’

BUY ON ITUNES: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/album/see-you-single/id587334514

Released on MARSHALL TELLER RECORDS

London based five piece, The History Of Apple Pie are set to release a new single digitally on Marshall Teller Records on the 14 January, 2013.

‘See You’ is available to download and is lifted from the bands eagerly awaited debut long player ‘Out Of View’, which is released on 28 January, 2013 (UK) / 29 January, 2013 (US).

PRE-ORDER 'OUT OF VIEW' NOW: http://t.co/ayh0x5Gm

The album, recorded in London over the last few months, was self-produced by guitarist Jerome Watson, mixed by Charles ‘Chicky’ Reeves and engineered by Joshua Third of The Horrors.

A truly great and exciting live band, to coincide the release of ‘See You’, The History Of Apple Pie line up of Steph Min (Vocals/Guitar), Jerome Watson (Guitar), James Thomas (Drums), Aslam Ghauri (Guitar) and Kelly Owens (Bass) will set off on their first UK tour for over a year. The dates kick off in York on 31 January and finish up with a London show at The Old Blue Last on 19 February. 

Prior to the tour, the band will play a special in-store show at Rough Trade East in London on the day of the album release on Monday, 28 January 2013.

LIVE DATES:

28 Jan - Rough Trade East In-Store, London
31 Jan - The Basement, York
01 Feb - Inside Out, Darlington
02 Feb - Victoria Inn, Derby
03 Feb - Banquet Records In-Store, Kingston
04 Feb - Soup Kitchen, Manchester
05 Feb - Art School, Glasgow
06 Feb - Dog & Parrot, Newcastle
07 Feb - The Compass, Chester
08 Feb - The Cockpit, Leeds
09 Feb - West End Centre, Aldershot
11 Feb - Bodega, Nottingham
12 Feb - Undertone, Cardiff
13 Feb - Joiners, Southampton
14 Feb - Marlowe Theatre, Canterbury
15 Feb - Green Door Store, Brighton
16 Feb - 60 Million Postcards, Bournemouth
17 Feb - Thekla, Bristol
19 Feb - Old Blue Last, London
20 Mar - Point Ephemere, Paris
21 Mar - Fuzz'Yon, La Roche-Sur-Yon

See You

Taken from the 4-track 'Pretty Decent Swimmers' 10" EP: http://matineerecordings.com/item.php?item_id=235

Northern Portrait - Greetings From Paris

Jens Lekman - Olivia & Maddy

The Swedish singer writes a song for two girls who drove his pianist all the way from New York to Boston to catch a flight.

http://www.thelineofbestfit.com

Jens Lekman - Olivia & Maddy

Shelflife is excited to announce a very special release by one of our long time favorite bands Pia Fraus. Silmi Island is a celebration of their ten year history featuring 13 of their very best tracks from 1998-2008 and presented on limited LP+CD format. All tracks were completely re-recorded or remastered and appearing on vinyl for the very first time. There is also two bonus tracks included on the enclosed CD -- one being a surprise My Bloody Valentine cover! 

The band formed in Tallinn, Estonia in 1998 by a group of art-school students Rein Fuks, Reijo Tagapere, Tõnis Kenkmaa, Kärt Ojavee, Kristel Loide and Joosep Volk. Eve Komp and Margus Voolpriit later joined replacing Kristel and Joosep. They all shared their common love for early 90s shoegaze and US noise / indie rock groups and instantly began writing songs and playing live. Since then they have released four albums and numerous singles (on Clairecords, Vinyl Junkie and Seksound), have been produced by Teenage Fanclub's Norman Blake and Ulrich Schnauss, and have remixed the likes of Hood, Teenage Fanclub, His Name Is Alive, Future Pilot Aka, Seeland and International Airport. 

Pia Fraus have become well-known for their perfect blend of dream pop -- mixing guitars, vocals and organ layers masterfully. They've been hitting their reverb pedals way before it was so trendy to do so and have paved the way to the modern dream pop genre. Silmi Island is a must have for any Pia Fraus fan's collection and also a perfect introduction to the band for those who have been missing out. 

Silmi Island is a co-release with Seksound in Estonia in a limited edition of 500 hand-numbered 180 gram LP (with included CD) copies worldwide. 

For fans of: Stereolab, My Bloody Valentine, Pale Saints, Unrest, Sonic Youth, and of course - Pia Fraus!

Pia Fraus "Feeling Is New"

From the new album Heartthrob, out January 29th! Pre-order now at http://teganandsara.warnerbrosrecords.com/ or on iTunes at http://bit.ly/TvaQMn.

Heartthrob

I Was a Fool

From the new album Heartthrob, available now on iTunes! bit.ly/XOkqI6

Now I'm All Messed Up

Music written and performed by Jimmy LaValle
Words written and performed by Mark Kozelek
This is our collaboration.

"Perils from the Sea" to be released April 30, 2013 - Caldo Verde Records

www.caldoverderecords.com
www.thealbumleaf.com
www.sunkilmoon.com
www.facebook.com/sunkilmoonthealbumleaf

Caroline

Feels

Going Up

Check out the full track via DFA White Out Sessions: http://bit.ly/YoOHhu
Snag a limited edition White Label at DFA Direct: http://bit.ly/10Jmk3N
Digital releasing April 9th. 

The Juan Maclean - You Are My Destiny [EDIT]

Compliment Your Soul is released on April 1st. Pre-order on iTunes now http://bit.ly/DanCrollCYS

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