♫ More Music Picks

Posted on March 28, 2010 by Simon Phipps

More of my weekly music picks. They are free of charge, as long as you’re in the right place to get them. This week’s favourites: The Six Degrees Sampler  and the great Loscil ambient track.

Loc Title Artist Comments
USA Coupled Key Cydelix Acoustic Spanish guitar lead, dreamy electronica backing, earnest piano melody growing to sustained sound-wall with psychotic fiddler – yes, people, we have a decent instrumental chill-out track on our hands.
USA The Best Treasure Stays Buried Zoey Van Goey Sounding for all the world like a junior Suzanne Vega
USA Dub for Cascadia Loscil Great ambient track that could have escaped from the Myst soundtrack.
USA Album: Global Grooves Sampler Six Degrees Records Another great sampler album from Six Degrees, with eleven quality tracks of world music.
UK One Time Justin Bieber A taster for the latest teen heartthrob. Disco heaven but I’ll be waiting until his voice breaks before I listen again.

If you don’t already have it, bookmark Mercedes-Benz Mixtape. Every eight weeks the M-B marketing folks post a new mix of new artists on this page, complete with a zip-file of the MP3s for easy download from anywhere (mouse over the player and click “MP3 Downloads”).

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♫ Music Picks, Probably Free

Posted on March 21, 2010 by Simon Phipps

Music picks. Because I like them – Bonobo is best this time.

Loc Title Artist Comments
Global Bright Orange Air Inlets Enjoyable acoustic track with close harmonies and quirky modulations. They are at SXSW Music.
Global Eyesdown(Warrior One Remix) Bonobo Dancing wildly in a darkened room with the bass turned right up. The original track is cute as well, see below.
USA Rocket Goldfrapp This was on my UK list last week, now available for US download as well.
USA Album: Six Degrees Sampler Various Great selection – try listening to Ceu if you’ve not already
UK AlphaMonsterMashUp AlphaBeat Boppy poppy mashup of Lady Gaga tracks, nicely done.

Here’s the original of that Bonobo track:

That’s it for this week, more coming soon.

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♫ Music Picks Now Spring Is Here

Posted on March 18, 2010 by Simon Phipps

Another week, more music picks (a bit early because there has been some great stuff this week). I keep playing Lake Orchard and I think JagaJazzist is a real find here.

Loc Title Artist Comments
USA Peace Among The Bones Sean McCann A modern folk-rock in the Fairport tradition. But from the US.
USA Lake Orchard Loscil Magnificent, pulsating, anthemic, ambient; think Robert Rich meets The Engineers
USA Magnetic North Fin Fang Foom Dark, guitar led, quite heavy but still nodding allegiance to shoegaze
Global Playlist of 5 tracks JagaJazzist Another group I’ve missed all these years, playing musical yet experimental jazz that is definitely worth a try. Video below too. Sample track: Going Down
UK BBC 4 Sessions kd lang Great performances in an intimate and warm venue. Fantastic viewing, bound to end up on YouTube when it times out on Tuesday

Here’s a video of JagaJazzist in action playing “One-Armed Bandit” recently:

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♫ Music from a lazy week

Posted on March 14, 2010 by Simon Phipps

Actually it wasn’t all that lazy, there has been so much to do. But here are some music picks for the week – don’t miss the Sister Hazel double album if you’re in the US, and the Turin Brakes track is the pick for the UK.

Loc Title Artist Comments
USA Mamaya The Souljazz Orchestra Take a brisk walk with this loping world-jazz track
UK Leave Me In Love The High Wire From the stylophone opening to the subdued vocals you know it’s chill time. It gradually perks up. Not bad.
USA Perfect World U-Melt Reminds me of Pink Floyd in some ways, a pretty good chill prog rock
USA Album: 20-in-10 Sister Hazel Really good Sister Hazel sampler. 20 excellent rock tracks, the best free download in ages
UK Apocolips Turin Brakes Very good track from a reliably good band. Rich & innovative sound with a travelling pace.
UK Rocket (Richard X One Zero Remix) Goldfrapp Strong dance track that Goldfrapp fans would grab anyway but the rest of us are likely to enjoy too.

One more thing – seems that there are downloads of the SXSW music showcase after all, assuming you have the patience for about 6Gb of torrent.

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♫ Music To Soothe A Wild Mink

Posted on March 7, 2010 by Simon Phipps

§ I’m still listening to new music and it seems the proximity of SXSW is triggering a cascade of releases. Here are some samples from this week’s listening.

Loc Title Artist Comments
UK Need Love Dr Meaker Laid back jazz-blues-funk with female vocals, rather than the dance track you might expect.
USA The Deep and Lovely Quiet SubtractiveLAD Dreamy, slightly metallic echo-acoustic of the shoe-gaze, Engineers variety.  Would not be out of place in a Robert Rich concert.
USA Culpa De La Luna Rupa and the April Fishes Pretty delicious stuff – imagine early Madness as world music with female vocals and you’re maybe close
USA Let The Riverrun Carly Simon Verging on gospel, this is a great track from Carly Simon as she is now (rather than the blast from the past you usually get from her Best-Of fodder)

Let me know what you think – I’ll keep listening and if people like the reports I’ll keep posting too.

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    All views expressed on this blog are those of Simon Phipps and do not necessarily reflect the views of any other entity, including current and former employers and clients. See my full disclosure of interests.

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