A new solo project from Beau Cole of Lands & Peoples and Raindeer - I present you with Zu Shapes. The debut EP got started last summer and is being finished up as we speak, and Beau recently shared the first track to be heard from the debut, dubbed "Olivia".
"Olivia", the first heard track from Zu Shapes, is a catchy-as-fuck slow-building pop song that eventually erupts with luminous chants and a beat strong enough to summon your inner-glee. Beau tells me the song is about social anxiety, living in your mid-twenties, and watching old girlfriends get married and have kids.
I was chatting with Beau last night, and along with an abundance of other info about the new project, he filled me in on where the moniker "Zu Shapes" came from:
"Zu Shapes is this game my mom and I used to play one the highway in Mississippi. There's kudzu EVERYWHERE there. It takes over everything: trees, powerlines, entire buildings. My grandmother called it "foot-a-night" because it can grow more than a foot in a 24 hour period. My mom and I used to call out what the kudzu forms resembled, and she'd make me laugh with silly voices and we'd just have a good ol' time."
Beau Cole plays with his two other bands this week in Baltimore, starting with tomorrow night as Lands & Peoples play the Talking Head with Colour Revolt. On Saturday night, you can catch Beau as part of Raindeer who play the Golden West with Weekends, Winks, and Holy Ghost Party. Look for more to come from Zu Shapes in the coming months.
Cass McCombs no longer resides in our city of Baltimore, but he used to, and more importantly he's remained to be one of my favorite songwriters of our modern era.
Cass is back with a new LP this year, to be titled WIT'S END. The first-heard sounds from the new record hit the interwebs recently, in the form of the track "County Line".
"County Line" is another easy-going number from Cass McCombs -- a steady swayer that croons and entrances with Cass's silky smooth vocals combined with production that's as clean as a whistle. The production comes with help again from Ariel Rechtshaid, as he and Cass recorded the songs in various cities throughout the U.S. which is fitting to McCombs' nomadic nature. The result is just another gem added to the growingly prolific catalog that Cass has been somewhat quietly building over the past nine years.
WIT'S END is out April 12, 2011 in North America on Domino Records.
More often than not, album titles have little to do with the actual sounds and frequencies that emanate from the grooves of the record or tape that it labels. However Ken Seeno's new album, Invisible Surfer On An Invisible Wave, is not one of those occurrences, as the album drifts and dashes through salt water and curling waves that could only exist in some sort of unobtainable fantasy land. Check out "The Ocean After a Storm" below.
Ken Seeno is originally from Ponytail, Baltimore's favorite spazz punk purveyors of melody that are currently on hiatus. You've heard me rant and rave about Ponytail's Dustin Wong, and now you'll likely hear me go on and on this year about another member's solo work. Ken's work is shown in a different light, one that shines from deeper in the cosmos down on unknown landscapes and exotic habitats.
It feels innately spiritual, the kind of music that throws you deep into a daze, but never once allowing you to take your mind off the sounds you're hearing. This particular release does an excellent job in capturing complex and intimate ideas using incredibly simple synths and melodies that cascade and scatter like skipping several rocks across a lake at the same time. It's ideal for late night zone-outs, but as hard as it is to imagine right now, I can see it working best on a hazy summer evening.
Get Ken Seeno's Invisible Surfer On An Invisible Wave from NNA Tapes.
An album that has been almost three years in the making -- Celebration's Hello Paradise - Electric Tarot is officially out today. Friends Records and Celebration are giving away the entire LP digitally online for free, and offering the chance to purchase the record on vinyl -- the band's first physical offering since 2007's The Modern Tribe out via 4AD.
Fader just premiered the last remaining card to be dealt for this LP, which came in the form of the last track on the album, "Kilamanjaro". A fitting capstone to this grandiose affair, "Kilamanjaro" is an epic psych rock ballad that churns your deepest illusions and glorifies your most vivid dreams. Hear for yourself.
"Kilamanjaro" represents the The Moon card, which singer Katrina Ford's painting below depicts. Katrina illustrates this card as "Self deception, Illusion,Waxing and waning of emotion, Dreams, Memories, Subconscious, Facing your fears, Nightmares, Different sides of you crying out, A karmic relationship, Losing touch with reality."
Celebration play tomorrow, February 4 in Philadelphia at The Ox, February 19 in Brooklyn at Death By Audio, and will have their release show for Hello Paradise on Saturday, March 5 at the 2640 Space in Baltimore with Future Islands and Arbouretum.
This record comes wrapped in a gate-fold jacket that includes 150 gram vinyl, a CD of the album, and an insert which contains the key to this tarot spread. Check it out here.
Over the past several years some Orioles have been heading up north to play at Shea Stadium. And much to our excitement to find out, the venue has been documenting these along with many other outings that they've hosted. The space serves as both a recording studio and show venue, an ideal arrangement for this sort of thing. I recently stumbled upon live recordings from some Baltimore residents including sets from Double Dagger, Dustin Wong, Future Islands, Run DMT, Teeth Mountain, and Weekends.
I've posted a handful of live Dustin Wong recordings over the past year, but here's the first from out of town. Dustin hit this one straight up into the cosmos as usual.
A pretty full set from Double Dagger -- from last September so this one's a playoff game. Nolen, Bruce, and Denny were clearly all batting well over .400 for this one.
Future Islands were hosted after the All-Star break, and we certainly pushing their way to a pennant in 2010 when they played this one. Hear the full set for this right here.
Run DMT knocked three jams out of the park in a psychedelic whirlwind last October.
Weekends have stepped up to the plate a whole lot of times at Shea Stadium, but here's the venues favorite pitch of their hit "Raingirls", knocked home of course.
Check out Shea Stadium's entire archive right here.
Friends Records has had a busy start to 2011, so here's a status update on some things to let you know what we're up to. We have three full length records that will be out by the end of the month (one already is), and a healthy dose of awesome shows plotted.
Microkingdom's Three Compositions of No Jazz dropped a few weeks ago, and copies on white or black vinyl are beginning to trickle on to turntables as we speak. We pressed up 250 copies of each color, accompanied by packaging that features mind-numbing artwork by Chris Day of Open Space / Lost Ghosts Records / Bear & Pieces acclaim.
Microkingdom's next show is February 19 at Death by Audio in Brooklyn with Celebration.
Celebration's Hello Paradise will be officially unveiled this Thursday, February 3. The last song card to be dealt in the Hello Paradise portion of the Electric Tarot will be given out, coming in the form of "Kilamanjaro" which represents The Moon in the tarot deck.
The first few copies of the wax will be available in Baltimore stores only on Thursday, then up in Philly on Friday, February 4 at their show at The Ox with Sun Airway and Golden Ages. All pre-orders begin shipping next Monday, February 7.
Celebration play in Philly February 4, NYC February 19, and in Baltimore on March 5 for the LP release show with Future Islands and Arbouretum at the 2640 Space.
In a few weeks Friends Records will FINALLY be releasing the first album in our catalog - FR001: Weekends' Strange Cultures. This my friends, will be a happy occasion, as the release has been twisted and turned through production delays but will now see it's actual physical inception on vinyl. Look for more details on this in the coming weeks.
Weekends play Baltimore on February 12 at Golden West with Winks, Holy Ghost Party, and Raindeer. They also play DC February 23 with Lower Dens and Secret Mountains.
A few weeks ago Dan Deacon and So Percussion collaborated on a performance in NYC for the Ecstatic Music Festival. Baltimore's favorite A/V junky, Guy Werner, took the trip up I-95, and you can check out his highlight reel of the performance below.
This went down Thursday, January 20 at the Merkin Concert Hall, and featured works from both artists including a composition written by Dan Deacon exclusively for the So Percussion ensemble to perform. This composition was called Ghostbuster Cook: Origin of the Riddler, and you can catch the performance in it's entirety below with many thanks to Guy Werner, Lawson Smith, Sam Herring, and all of the musicians involved.
With not a ton going on this weekend after being blessed with the wonderment that is THUNDERSNOW this week, I figured I'd share an oddly-matched bunch of local videos.
Wye Oak performing the title track from their forthcoming Civilian LP in Amsterdam.
DJ Dog Dick + Sewn Leather = Dog Leather. Oh my goodness. [via Ehse Records Blog]
Height with Friends performing the closer to Bed of Seeds up in NYC. This was a really killer show that I had the privilege to attend that included Dan Deacon and Dustin Wong.
Benny Boeldt aka Adventure is due out with a new LP on Carpark this year, and yesterday Pitchfork pointed out a new mix put together by the currently morphing electro-junky.
The mix kicks off with a brand new song by Adventure called "Relax The Mind", a sort of electronically-infused meditation that only contains traces of Benny's prior work. The rest of the mix is rounded out with other like-minded sounds including Blondes, Light Asylum, Cex, Teengirl Fantasy, Emeralds, and more. The full track list is after the jump.
Adventure's new LP, Lesser Known, is due out March 22 on Carpark Records.
Here' a mid week treat for all the lonely weirdos and goth nerds out there (or just regular people), a new EP from Winks who are fresh off their latest album called She's Done.
Daisy Ingraham is the name of the new three song EP, and is also the title of the second song on this short voyage. This journey didn't originate in any sort of exotic or far-off land, nope. It set sail in the depths of Chase O'hara's bedroom just like Winks' debut album. This was recorded straight to cassette, as the quality of fidelity in these jams will indicate. This bodes well for the types of noise worked into each track.
"Daisy Ingraham" is a fine example of portraying subtle noise interlaced with pop music using cassette tape to record to. This marks a slightly new direction for Winks, one that might find Chase listening to John Maus through a kaleidoscope frequently. There's plenty of indistinguishable textures and tones, but they are all somehow worked in to help create an ambient atmosphere for the simple melodies to flourish in.
Get the new EP for free right here, and don't sleep on the new full length, She's Done.
We're pleased to help present a great show down in D.C. next month - as Lower Dens, Secret Mountains, and Weekends all bring Baltimore to it's neighboring beltway.
This offering of some of Baltimore's finest will take place at Subterranean A, a small and fantastic space that just got up and running last year. Weekends' drenching noise-pop sonics will blast your ears backwards while Secret Mountain's lush psychedelic swirls will capture your hearts as Lower Dens' undeniably amazing brand of rock will leave you breathless. Yeah, it'll be like that and you're not going to want to miss it.
This show takes place on February 23, which also happens to be my birthday. I would like to thank the bands in advance for the killer birthday present, and hope to see everyone down in D.C. in a month. The show costs $7 and will get going around 8 PM.
Click through below to after the jump for a couple videos from these folks.
A couple weeks ago Mobtown Studios hosted a special performance by Celebration, part of their awesome Microshow series that happens once a month. 5/6 of the current full Celebration lineup performed, but did so in a stripped-dowb acoustic fashion. The result was almost 40 minutes of some of the most elegant and pristine sounding Celebration jams to ever grace our presence. Here's a brand new song called "Only The Wicked"...
In addition to breaking out some older songs like "Pressure", and some current ones from the forthcoming Hello Paradise LP like "Open Your Heart", a handful of never before heard songs made their debut. It was a chance to see the future of the Electric Tarot, and boy does it's fortune sound impressive. This one's called "Don't Stop Dreaming"...
A nine song set was played, and the whole thing is available to hear in full over at Mobtown Studios. I recently wrote a more detailed piece on this show and my relationship with Celebration, which you'll be able to read on Thursday over at What Weekly.
Celebration's new LP is called Hello Paradise, and is available in about a week or so.
It is also now available on vinyl, your choice of either white-colored wax or black. The packaging was all designed by Chris Day, who took it to another level with this one. The vinyl also comes with a CD, so you'll get your digital fix of no jazz as well.
Tonight Microkingdom will be performing as a rarely seen five-piece, adding even more cosmic chaos to the mix. They'll be joined by some of our favorites, the always raucous Witch Hat and the ever-transcendently psychedelic Violet Hour.
Tonight's show is at the Windup Space, starts at 10 PM, and costs seven dollars.
Here's the thing about Rapdragons - you probably wish you were doing what they did. With Baltimore's scary-diverse breeding grounds of aural wealth at their disposal, dude's are capturing the jams we all love and turning them into party anthems. Next up for 'em, a new one with a Moss of Aura (Gerrit Welmers of Future Islands) beat to back...
The music comes compliments of Moss of Aura's Still Parade, a sold-out CDR of some of Gerrit's finest work that came out towards the end of 2009. This Raprdragons song is the title track on their forthcoming Natural Born Chillers EP, which drops this March. As you may have guessed, this forthcoming release sees the Rapdragons riding the chill-wave with music from Small Black, Neon Indian, Memoryhouse, Panda Bear, and Toro Y Moi.
Celebration's Hello Paradise - Electric Tarot is just days away from it's official vinyl release, which means the full LP is almost available for free digitally online. One of the last tracks to be unveiled comes today via the full moon, and is called "Honeysuckle Blue". In addition to offering the MP3, YVYNYL and Friends Records are premiering the new video for the song created by Baltimore's own Miranda Pfeiffer.
"Honeysuckle Blue" represents the Alchemy card in their Electric Tarot deck, which is depicted up top in Katrina Ford's painting. Miranda Pfeiffer was asked to illustrate the themes that come with this card, and she chose to do that by highlighting the relationships we have between two separate urban environments. Here's Miranda's take:
“This animation was made using a stop motion process. While the Soft Cat video capitalizes on freeze-frame images juxtaposed with fluid animated movement, in this animation every hand-drawn frame is included so that all of the every motion is fluid. I used many different mediums to get a range of blacks from the colors. Some of these materials were ball-point pen, sharpie, graphite, chalk, and sum-i ink. I drew on both sides of frosted papers like vellum and tracing paper to get additional differentiation among the shade. This added a depth from the paper in the image.
The song itself was inspired by the tarot card, Alchemy, which illustrates two seemingly absolute opposites merging together. The video compares two aspects of Baltimore, interior and the exterior spaces. Because of the desolate nature of this city, a lot of social interaction occurs inside. For example, at night, there are places in Baltimore that aren’t safe to walk through alone. Because Baltimore has very few open spaces that are accessible and inhabitable by all its dwellers, residents often form special relationships with their apartments, with large-converted warehouses, and with interior spaces in general. The couple in the video is an average example of this kind of citizen.
Still, the interiors and exteriors reflect one another. Though seemingly opposite, the little room in the animation is similar in nature to the shots of the exterior city. In the video, all of the exterior shots show some form of plans made by humans that didn’t turn out like society imagined. The roaches reflect a sense of wilderness inside man’s habitat and man’s failure to truly plan a city. Simultaneously, the roaches traverse both the inside and the outside…the only creature able to fully do so. Because of the nature of the exterior spaces, the inside is also somewhat barren and scary. The female character cuts her hand when sawing a log…presumably one that came from the outside. Time is a theme. In the interior this is shown through the many clocks on the wall, ever ticking. In the exterior, the moon’s changing state represents another kind of cyclical time.
There’s a lot of charm in this world. It’s not an overwhelmingly bad place. Even the ugly bugs when viewed with a little tenderness are actually pretty endearing.”
Celebration's Hello Paradisewill be available on vinyl with CD at the end of January.
