New Music Thursday :: The dø

Here is something completely new and different, The dø! The dø is an indie pop duo from Paris and Helsinki. They just released their first full album, A Mouthful in Europe this month (not available in the US, yet) that completely unique and very great.

They are about as eclectic as it gets - one of best tracks on the album, At Last kinda sounds like a Velvet Underground track, layered with a gorgeous female vocal lead. Which brings me to the best thing about this band, the incredibly mysterious and exotic vocalist, Olivia Merilahti. Give a listen and check out their myspace - she is quite lovely.

That's all I've got for these guys - great album, will be one of the best of 2008... BTW is it just me or has 2008 been somewhat unimpressive as far as music goes?
Here are a couple samples of The dø, enjoy!

The dø Myspace

The dø - At Last
The dø - The Bridge Is Broken

Girl Talk :: Feed The Animals

I don't think that I have met one person who has not instantly fell in love with the Night Ripper album after their first listen. It kinda turned into the go-to album for latenight parties, tailgates, boat tunes, etc. Lucky for all of us, Greg Gillis aka Girl Talk just released his new album Feed The Animals online. The purchase process is exactly like what Radiohead did with In Rainbows, he gives the option to pick your price and paypal him. Then, you just download it and in a couple minutes you are in! Thus, increasing your weekend fun by 22%.

I have been listening to it all morning and each track is better than the last. It is amazing how many awesome transitions and moments he creates in each song. Such a fun album, every bit as good as Night Ripper. Some of the more interesting samples layered in with gritty hip-hop includes "A Whiter Shade of Pale", Metallica's "One", and "The Weight" by the Band, there is also pretty sweet Paranoid Android mash-up with Jay-Z. If you paypal $10+, they will send you the CD when it is released in September. The album art is pretty great as well.

Download Feed the Animals here: http://illegalart.net

Heres a sample -

Girl Talk - What It's All About

SCD Recommends :: Darkon

There are few genres of film that I enjoy more than the documentary. Especially documentaries that document mega-nerd subcultures (see American Movie: The Making of Northwestern, and King of Kong). Right there sandwiched in between those two epics docs is the greatness of Darkon. Darkon follows a giant kingdom of LARPers in the Darkon Wargame Club in Maryland. LARP stands for Live Action Role Playing, which is essentially a dressed up, real life Dungeons and Dragons mixed in with some sword-play and combat.
Every Saturday some 2oo adult nerds gather to wage epic battles against each other in a giant struggle for imaginary land in an imaginary world. The battles basically look like a scene from Braveheart, but instead of warriors, the crowds are made up of fat nerds slapping each other with foam bats. It is a light-hearted doc that is a good time for everyone, even if your not interested in this sort of thing at all, it is hilarious and def. worth checking out. Here is the trailer.
I love how address each other - "Lord General Keldar, it has been your hipocracy that has been noose about the neck of the realm for so long!" Are they just making this stuff up on the fly or what? Either way it is pretty impressive. I am kinda interested in putting together a group of LARPing warriors, seems like it would be fun.

David Ford Tonight @ HOB

UK singer/songwriter David Ford is playing a show at HOB tonight opening for Aimee Mann. His style is kinda similar to Damien Rice or Amos Lee, but he does a lot of looping as well so it seems as if you could also compare him to KT Tunstall. His new album, Songs For the Road came out in April, and there are some really nice moments on it. Enjoy a sample track off his new album below. I am gonna check it out tonight - if anyone is down for seeing some live music tonight, give me a shout. I also secured a photo pass, so I am gonna do some shooting as well.

Lots of music this week, a friend fell into some Deathcab VIP's last night, so we went and did that as well. Rogue Wave opened, I am not too familiar with their music, but they did play the two songs I knew - don't think there is really anything special about those guys. Deathcab was really good though - the mishmash of fans was almost as interesting to see as the show. Half your basic concert-going indie crowd, half adolescents with their parents. The show was great though, great seats! I have seen them a couple times and it was good to see them perform the new material. Ben Gibbard is slimming up these days and looking a lot more rock n roll - his every man appearance which made them so interesting is yesterday's new I guess.

David Ford - And So You Fell

New Music Tuesday :: Fleet Foxes

It is pretty obvious I have been slacking because I haven't posted about this album yet. It has been spinning in my car non-stop the past couple weeks. I don't really wanna bore you with a bunch of drivel about what makes these guys so good, so I will just leave you with some links to a couple of their tracks. White Winter Hymnal is such a great one, my favorite song of the year so far. The vocals of Robin Pecknold are somewhat similar to that of Jim James and Ben Bridwell, but the band doesn't really sound at all like MMJ or BOH. This may seem kinda weird, but it kinda sounds like an acoustic Animal Collective.

Fleet Foxes are from Seattle, and like a lot of Seattle's best bands, they are with Sub Pop. Wolf Parade, another Sub Pop band, just released their sophmore effort this week - really excited to hear that one as well. Man, music is so great!

Should also throw in there that Jenkins was the one to tell me about this band a few months ago when their EP came out, so I guess a small scoreboard for J-stain.

Fleet Foxes - White Winter Hymnal
Fleet Foxes - He Doesn't Know Why

The "Burntwist's" Mega Ramp

I love how the "extreme" sports keep getting more extreme... Clearing 50 ft gaps and doing backflips on motorcross bikes is all too common these days - and it is awesome!

Don't Get Any Big Ideas.

Big Ideas (don't get any) from James Houston on Vimeo.
Interesting remix of Radiohead's Nude.

I Wanna Make Luv in this Showbiz Pizza.