Soft, silky vocals

And for dessert...

I think Py's gone without a mention here at TISFWO! so far so it pleases me to fix that today. I originally found her through Breton, who collaborated with her on the track Withdraw The Ambassador. She's also worked with the wonderful Lapalux on the tracks Moments and Flower. (This new track from her also contains the lyric "Fresh cut flowers" but sung differently - I wonder which came first?) She's a busy lady having released an E.P with Throwing Snow and tracks with Damu and Kadabrah plus her own mixtape Tripping on wisdom. Her rendition of Christmas Baby Please Come Home was used on an advertisement for the Christmas special of historical T.V drama Downton Abbey - She's been working hard.

This new track, Polyethers is available now on iTunes but Soundcloud says that it's coming June 30 so either there's been a mistake or this might be a single from a forthcoming E.P or maybe even an album? (I hope?) Who knows. Anyway, on to the track itself.

Py's soft, silky vocals drape over deep, slow electronic beats, click and claps. She shows off her range in this track more than other releases, coming back to a slightly husky, sexy voice for the main lyrical flow of the song with scattered high pitched notes. building to a lovely crescendo which feels fulfilling and exciting, even though it's quite subtle - There's no sudden break or drop, just this wonderful huge feeling as all the elements of the song come together. Wonderful stuff!

Soundtrack to: An innocent love story.

Ecstatic and full of joie de vivre

Well, this excites me rather.

Empire Of The Sun released a new single last month titled Alive. I had no idea about it until today so it managed to stay under my radar for quite a while! A second single called Discovery is coming up shortly followed by a new album early next month, Ice on the dune.

The new single's sound is a little more modern than the last album but is none the less lovely. Heavy, dancey drum beats, lofty, echoing, vocals and that wonderful just-so-slightly-pouty sounding voice in the recurring phrase "Loving every moment cause you make me feel so alive...alive." The whole song feels ecstatic and full of joie de vivre. A summer anthem, for sure!
As a side note, I friggin love the costumes these guys wear. That head piece is nuts!

Soundtrack to: Running hand in hand, laughing like children.

Chilled, funky, guitar infused rap

It's been a little quiet on the new release front, (Well, other than the massive and critically polarising release of Random Access Memories and the deliciously 80s Hearts And Knives.) and actually they'd been keeping me so busy that I'd been just posting them with the odd new discovery!
Well, that changes today because I'm going to dig into the crate and post something I love from the archive.

This is Gideon Conn. He's a strange chap for sure. I discovered him when he was an opening act for Dan Le Sac and Scroobius Pip. He plays (mostly) chilled, funky, guitar infused rap and pop. Most of his songs are goofy (In a good way.) and great fun with lyrics about a man who drives around selling fish, having a lovely date or just being eccentric.

This one, Yes, No, Maybe, is catchy as all get out. There's a lovely blaring trumpet riff, energetic guitar, some fast paced lyrics about the confusing nature of the opposite sex and it has one of those catchy-but-complicatd vocal sections which I'm a sucker for - Something about being able to sing along to it is particularly satisfying. The lyrics are pretty bitter which contrasts nicely with the happy sound of the song.

Mr. Conn has two albums available here and here. Show some love!

Soundtrack to: A montage of your failed relationships.

Shrill electronic air raid

It's Free Willy Wednesday again!

Willy Joy has teamed up with someone named Tittsworth to bring us a new track!

BAWSE is about as trap as it gets. Skittery, jumping, chopped vocals, a pounding beat made of 808 drums and claps and a break into a shrill electronic air raid. Shut-off-your-brain-and-dance fun!
Soundtrack to: The entrance of an evil dictator, presiding over his sexy army of scantily clad female super assassins. Yeah.

Wobbly electronics and fat drums

Alas, alack! The weekend is almost over again.

Better give you something to spice up your Monday morning then, eh?

Falcon Funk is a side project from F.O.O.L and their debut E.P "Bust" was due out by now. For whatever reason, there's been some problems and it has been delayed so as an apology they released a free E.P titled Punch today, and here it is.

It's a nice funky, electro/dubstep E.P that reminds me a lot of Koan Sound's Funk Blaster in places. Wobbly electronics and fat drums all round, then!

Random Access Memories leaked!

Just breaking news, this time! This has all happened in the last few hours!

Daft Punk's upcoming album, Random Access Memories has been leaked! It's all OVER the place. In the smartest move possible at this point, the album appears to have been given an immediate release on iTunes (I can't confirm that, though. Daft Punk's official page has a link to the iTunes store, but the iTunes UK store lists it as a pre-order for May 20.)

It's kind of a shame that this happened, but on the other hand an album as eagerly anticipated as this should probably have a release date as close to the time it's completed as possible - This kind of stuff is common these days. 

Bouncy and upbeat

So! Here's a scene I was completely ignorant about!

There are quite a few really, really great brass bands around. The Hackney Colliery Band are, as the name suggests, from Hackney in London and their album came out recently. Looking at their site, they're busy touring around. I'm hoping to get the chance to see them play this summer. Their album includes quite a few (Great) covers, but I wanted to post an original of theirs. I can't really describe the track too well, other than to state the obvious - that it's brass band music. The song is an instrumental. It's quite jolly and bouncy and upbeat. OH JUST CLICK THE VIDEO.
Soundtrack to: Summer in the 20s.

Sprawling nine minute suite

I'm really happy to be making this update!

This news is actually a little old, but Juno Reactor has a new album coming! 

The key element to Juno Reactor for me above other trance artists is his use of real instruments. They give his tracks that extra edge and make them more exiting, at least for me. This one uses traditional Indian instruments and vocals on top of a pounding electronic backdrop. The result is a sprawling nine minute suite with great, sweeping strings, galloping tabla, sitar riffs and a repeating section that ties the entire thing together. It has the traditional sound of asia (At least, to western ears.) mixed perfectly with modern beats. I am throughly impressed. I'll be picking this album up for sure.
Soundtrack to: A big budget Bollywood sci-fi.

Sensuous and sinister

I've heard a lot of good stuff this weekend, so there's gonna be a few big updates. I don't have time to fit it all in tonight before bed! Also, TISFWO inexplicably had 50 views in one day yesterday without my posting an update. Very encouraging, but a  mite confusing. It's great, but where are you people coming from!?
Curiouser and curiouser...

Silq uploaded this other song, The Way It Was to youtube late on Friday, and also provided a link to this place where you can buy both tracks. Who is this person!? They don't appear to have any of the usual accounts or even a soundcloud or website to contact them. Very peculiar...

Anyway, this song sounds a mite darker than the other one with some really nice staticy drums, a groaning, buzzing bassline and some pitch shifted moaning for vocals. It manages to sound at once sensuous and sinister.
Soundtrack to: Making out with a demon.

Gentle, airy and deep.

Since our first update today was a mysterious one, I'll continue with a second mystery.

This is Antihoney. Who are/were they? Why did they vanish? Who knows? I found them on a jaunt around youtube and fell in love with their incredible sound. A lot of poking around online later and pretty much all I can tell you is that this track, Stars On My Window is the only song ever released in full on a compilation album named Interregnum - Which is apparently hard to find. Luckily, some wonderful person has uploaded the full track and made it available to download here. 

The Antihoney website over here has free MP3s of some tracks that seem not-quite-finished and a contact email address. I have contacted the owner who is Japanese and didn't speak much English, but was able to tell me that pretty much it all fell to bits and what's there is what's left.

Every song is similar to this one in that everything just feels so gentle, airy and deep. There's something in this music that feels so light but at the same time so heavy. It's slow paced and filled with echo, but those super-high vocals lend it an eerie, dreamlike quality. It's lovely, lovely stuff. 

If you look around in youtube comments, people LOVED this stuff. It's a real, real shame that it was just someone's project that died out. I think with an album and the right promotion, they could have been huge in some circles. Sometimes these things happen...

Thick wall of foam

'Allo chicken!

Something very suspicious for you tonight!

A mystery youtube account with the name "Silq" uploaded this today. They haven't uploaded anything else. I can't find anything about a musician called Silq online. But who posted the link up on facebook today, when it only had 25 views? Mr Lapalux! Hmmmm...I suspect...something.
Making Up For Lost Time sounds like a Lapalux track name and the track certainly FEELS like a Lapalux track, in that it fits into that genre I love but have no name for, (Let's call it Claps for now. It always has those awesome claps.) only it's a little too same-y to be Lapalux himself.
It features a distant-warbling guitar like sound, as if it were being played through a thick wall of foam and some really nice drum and clap percussion sounds. Interesting. I wonder what's going to come of this?
Soundtrack to: Laying in half-light thinking back.

Very scruffy update this morning because I have to go to work!
Ta-ku dropped his new track, I Love Beyonce 5 hours ago (While I was asleep.)

https://soundcloud.com/takugotbeats/i-love-beyonce

It has some chimey sound that sounds classy to me for some reason and some big echoy claps and synth stabs. Awesome. Download coming with Re-Twerk vol. 2. Very nice track, though I'm not a Beyonce fan.

Out of tune chip

A second update!? SURELY NOT, NO!
Oh yes.

Kyary's done it again!

Kyary's new song about laser eyes and ear missiles - Invader Invader - had it's music video release today! As always it's cute, catchy the video has it's oddities and it has a cool dance to go along with it. I really like the wonky out of tune chip sounds and the catchy chorus but I'm not too sure about the unnecessary "Drop" in the middle. It doesn't ruin the song particularly but it seems like a kind of desperate thing to do since Dubstep seems to be the flavour of the year. (Tied with Trap? Hm.) If I recall correctly a recent song of Perfume's did this too and both have the same (Genius.) producer. Maybe he just wanted to play around with it a bit? Who knows.

Anyway, Invader Invader is another ohrwurm from my favourite guilty pleasure. I'm already chanting "Da da dada in va da" in my head over and over. Enjoy!

Soundtrack to: MECHA BEAMU!

Fires on trains

A bank holiday! How unspeakably lovely. One of my first ever when I haven't been working but have been getting paid! (I think? I better check on that.)
Anyway! I haven't tried uploading video to this blog before, mostly because it's easy to link and that way, I don't get in trouble (Well, if someone was really going to get mad about me giving them free promotion for no profit...But anyway...) Today's an exception, because this new song came as such a surprise for me, and once again I wasn't able to link to youtube. So, if somehow, for some reason, Mr. Kevin McMahon is reading this and wants it removed...let me know, sir!

Kevin MacMahon is a hard guy to follow. After an amazing debut as Prick, he released a second album, The Wreckard (Nice pun.) on his own website which, after a time (Before I managed to get a copy...) vanished. I'd also read about his releases as Lucky Pierre, but was never able to find them around. A few years ago I found that the people at www.luckyprick.net/, as well as being the most AVID of fans, to a level that's damn impressive, were producing re-issues of The Wreckard, Lucky Pierre's albums AND two side projects I'd never even heard of, Fear of Blue and (Sic.) So in exchange for some shiny pennies I was able to get hold of some obscure treasure. Try contacting them from their contact section if you're trying to hunt this stuff down - It might still be available. So it's all been quiet since 2008-ish, when Lucky Pierre's last album came out.
This was uploaded to youtube four months ago, and luckypierre's official site contains only this. I wonder what's in the works?

Anyway, the song's a short little guitar driven tune about fires on trains. I really like Kevin's odd voice, it seems to always be right in the mid section between high and low, always a bit unsure and wobbly. Noice. I hope something comes of this! I'll keep an ear to the...well not ground. To...The internet, essentially.
Soundtrack to: Taking a tube journey.

Old school sound

Hellohello!

I hope you're having a wonderful weekend!

Week old news, so it's lukewarm off the presses. Kelis has signed to a new record label and is apparently going to release two albums this year. Along with this news comes a new single! 

You can grab a free download of Jerk Ribs here.
Kelis is always changing direction and trying out new sounds. From the modern sounds of her last album, Fleshtone, she's gone back to a really old school sound with this one. A fat drum kit with bongos, the odd twanging guitar and some gutsy brass back her ever-so-slightly husky vocals with some cool lyrics, though I couldn't say for sure what the song is about exactly. (But since when has that mattered, huh Beck?) Noice!

Soundtrack to: End credits of a bad ass female heist movie.