YEARLY ROUND-UP: HELADO NEGRO

December 30th, 2011 , by

We’re going back over our releases on the cusp of 2012 and trying to clump together a whole year’s worth of happenings into one post. Here's the one on Helado Negro's Canta Lechuza. We released Helado Negro’s Canta Lechuza in May. Roberto Carlos Lange – the brain and brawn  behind Helado Negro – is one […]

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AK ARTISTS ON SOUNDS FAMILYRE XMAS COMP

December 20th, 2011 , by

 Our good friends over at record label Sounds Familyre have put together a remarkable and lovely Christmas compilation, and it includes music from lots of terrific artists – including several of our own! John Ringhofer, of AK artist Half-handed Cloud, created the gorgeous cover art, and contributes “The Cloud Became a Baby To Be With Us.” Liz Janes, along with several special guests, sings, “Shepherd's Song.” And DM Stith sings a haunting, "I Stay Still."

Other great friends of AK make appearances, including Joshua Stamper, Danielson, Soul-junk, the Roches, and Vesper. You can listen and download it for free via Bandcamp right here, and previous volumes here. Thanks for the great present, Sounds Familyre!

LAZERS, MAGIC, MYSTICS IN NEW VIDEO FROM PEPE DELUXÉ

December 19th, 2011 , by

Lazers, guitars, and magic have a long, proud history together, and this brand new video from Pepe Deluxé proves it  indubitably, using historical footage pieced together by Pepe member Paul Malmström.

We'll be releasing the track and some remixes of it on January 17th, but you can also find it later on Pepe's fourth album, Queen of the Wave, due January 31st. In the meantime, do enjoy the show.

NEW LIZ JANES POSTER, INCLUDES MP3

December 15th, 2011 , by

 It’s been just about a year since we released Liz Janes’ Say Goodbye. About six months ago, Argentinean graphic designer Leandro Castelao contacted Liz. He was so inspired by the album that he offered to design a poster based on one of the songs. When Leandro delivered a final version based on "Firefly," and Liz showed it to us, we knew we had to share it with her fans. It’s terrific!

The poster is 12×15, and Liz sees as a great way of wrapping up the last year since release! Purchase the poster and we'll also email a link and code to download the full MP3 version of Say Goodbye. See more pictures of the poster here, or you can buy it for $25 by clicking here (sorry, we only ship posters to N. America).

HAPPY 10 BRASSLAND!

November 23rd, 2011 , by

 Our good friends over at Brassland are giving away a song a day, but without good reason: they’re 10 years old!

Back in 2001, Brassland was just a sparkle in the eyes of Alec Hanley Bemis and Bryce and Aaron Dessner. They released records by The National and The Clogs and the rest is history. Watch the above video for a nice recap. It’s a highly accurate re-enactment of the rise of Brassland from haphazard record label to Galactic Overlords Of Quadrant Earth.

Congratulations to Brassland on this fine achievement!  You guys make us all proud to be in the business. Here’s to ten more years of Brassland domination!

There’s just a week left in the celebration though! Go, post-haste, and grab some free tunes at Brassland’s expense. Set your iTunes to play and read a slightly more accurate accounting of Brassland at the Guardian here.




HELADO NEGRO PLAYING IN MEXICO

November 22nd, 2011 , by

 Helado Negro is currently undergoing a short but sweet minitour of Mexico. Last week he played at Festival Norte Sonoro en Monterrey, alongside DJ Rupture, White Rainbow, Grupo Esencias, and many others. You can see the tour poster and more info on that here.

If you missed him, you can catch Helado Negro this Friday, the 25th. He’ll be playing in Cuauhtémoc, Mexico at Caradura, as part of Nuestras Noches de Arts & Crafts México.  More details are here.

For those of you that are in Mexico, make sure you run by Starbucks. You might able to pick up a free track courtesy of iTunes (see here for example).

ANNOUNCING THE TETRAFOL, FROM FOL CHEN

November 21st, 2011 , by

Fol Chen has joined forces with Monome and Machine Project to bring you the Tetrafol. Some of you already instinctually know what this is, because you've been waiting for it all your life.

Others may need an explanation, so here goes: The Tetrafol is a hand-held tangible electronic sound toy. Circuits enclosed by a wooden tetrahedron detect orientation and motion-gestures to modify the playback of a collection of Fol Chen's micro-compositions. Users can explore sound through objectual physical manipulation. The battery-powered device has its own internal speaker but can additionally be hooked up to a headphone or amplifier for broader consumption and recording purposes.

The circuit and firmware are based on open-source hardware and is itself published as open-source, allowing anyone interested to learn about its deepest inner-workings.

There are only 100 of these devices. You can buy one for $110 right now by clicking here. For now.

To get information about Fol Chen in your email, go here. 

Hear a song created with these microcompositions below:

Fol Chen, “So Good” by asthmatickitty

MY BRIGHTEST DIAMOND TOURING EU, NEW VIDEO, NPR!

November 17th, 2011 , by

So much My Brightest Diamond! So little time!

Firstly: today marks the start of My Brightest Diamond's EU tour! She'll play tonight with a full ensemble in London, then visit Milan, Zurich, Berlin, Cologne, Utrecht, Leuven, and Paris. You can get details on the tour here.

Back to the USA. Above is a lovely video of "High Low MIddle," directed by Murat Eyuboglu, filmed in Detroit and featuring dancers from RunJitRun and Jitting Jesus.  

If you live in the US and  spent your Saturday morning ritual relaxing on the couch watching the November rain fall outside, eating your bowl of cereal, and listening to NPR’s All Things Considered, then you likely heard a lovely surprise: the voice of My Brightest Diamond frontwoman Shara Worden echoing over the airwaves.

It’s a terrific piece, on one of our favorite all-time bands. EU, US, anywhere; all of us  can hear the radio piece right here, along with a couple tracks from the album. And as far as the album goes, you can buy it right here in LP/CD/MP3, and even t-shirt form.

 

CHRIS SCHLARB GAME SOUNDTRACK IN INDIE BUNDLE

November 14th, 2011 , by

There are lots of interesting ways to pay for things on the internet. Radiohead came up with the pay-what-you-want method. We iterated with the "Critic-Based Pricing Structure." 

Now video game site Indie Royale has one-upped both us and Radiohead and invented a whole new kind of collective payment structure. It includes stars and graphs and besides that, we have no idea how it works but it is an exceptional deal (right now $4.61) for a bundle of superb games.  

The bundle includes Night Sky, a platformer by video game designer Nifflas. You will of course recall that our own Chris Schlarb scored the game. And according to the site, his soundtrack is now unlocked!

Why someone hid it in a safe to begin withor how one does that with a digital object is a mystery. No matter, you can now get Schlarb's haunting soundtrack as part of this Indie Bundle. There's only about a day left in the bundle run, so buy quickly here.

PEPE DELUXÉ PLAYS THE GREAT STALACPIPE ORGAN

November 4th, 2011 , by

Behold: a video recording of  the first ever composition for The Great Stalacpipe Organ, the largest musical instrument in the world. Located deep in the caverns of Luray, Virginia, The Organ consists of hand-tuned ancient stalactites of varying sizes that are hit with solenoid-actuated rubber mallets. It took Pepe Deluxé over 6 years of research and planning so you could enjoy these two minutes of unique sounds in the comfort of your bright, dry, warm home.

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