new track from tame impala

new dodos single with b-side

The title pretty much says it all.

A side - Don't Try and Hide It



B side - So Cold

jj chopped & screwed

Here's one of my favorite mixtapes of 2010, jj's Kills chopped and screwed. Strangely enough, I was just listening to the original tonight in the car. If you don't know what chopped and screwed is, you're obviously not from Texas. But I promise you you've heard it in your mainstream, top 40 hits.

Follow this link to download.

new twin shadow track - changes

new track from twin shadow

Twin Shadow debuted a new track called "Changes" on KCRW. Unfortunately, in my lameness, I can't absolutely confirm this is the new song they've been playing at recent shows (Atlanta, ACL), but I think it is. Here's your opportunity to download and listen to it yourself.

Twin Shadow - "Changes" by Pretty Much Amazing

jens lekman announces fall 2011 tour & new EP

The darling of Sweden Jens Lekman recently announced a spate of fall 2011 tour dates. His scheduled appearances so far stretch from the end of September until October and land on both the American and European continents. No Atlanta date announced so far.

Sept 28 - Los Angeles, CA - Hollywood Forever Cemetery
Sept 29 - San Francisco, CA - California Academy of Sciences
Oct 1 - Seattle, WA - Columbia
Oct 3 - Chicago, IL - Lincoln Hall
Oct 5 - Washington DC - Sixth & I Historic Synagogue
Oct 6 - Philadelphia, PA - Philadelphia Ethical Society
Oct 7 - Brooklyn, NY - Music Hall of Williamsburg
Oct 8 - Boston, MA - Somerville Armory
Oct 9 - Brooklyn, NY - Music Hall of Williamsburg
14 oct - Nijmegen, NL - The Vereniging
15 oct - Düsseldorf, DE - Schumannsaal Düsseldorf
17 oct - London, UK - Heaven
19 oct - Manchester, UK - Band on the Wall
22 oct - Stockholm, SE - Södra Teatern
24 oct - Köpenhamn. DK - Jazzhouse
27 oct - Milano, IT - Salumeria della Musica
29 oct - Paris, FR - Pitchfork Music Festival

He's announced a new EP will be released in September. I suspect he'll be touring to support it. You can listen to a track off the EP, title "An Argument with Myself" and download it here.

twin shadow remixes "heart in your heartbreak"

Two of my favorite artists together again like chocolate and peanut butter. George Lewis Jr., aka Twin Shadow, a new wave delight has remixed the Pains of Being Pure at Heart's single "Heart in Your Heartbreak." And you can download it for free.

download new track from toro y moi

Chillwave pioneer Chaz Bundick released a follow up to his band Toro y Moi's Underneath the Pines, a 5 track EP entitled Freaking Out last month. You can download Alexander O’Neal & Cherelle’s “Saturday Love" here.

download free album from ghost ghost

Wow! I'm literally giving away music this week. Here's another LP for free courtesy of Ghost Ghost. They rotated through on my last.fm account (my user name: katosmullet - keeping it simple). I enjoyed 'em and here's your chance to do the same.

download free solo album from nick diamonds

Right now Nick Thorburn, aka Nick Diamonds (currently the mastermind behind Islands, member of Mister Heavenly, and formerly of Unicorns) is giving away his LP I Am an Attic for free. Well, it's a pay what you want model and US$0 is a-ok. But for those who spend US$10 or more, Nick's throwing in a 6 song EP called I Am an E.P. as an incentive.

washed out - within and without

Sub Pop will drop the new album from chillwave pioneer Washed Out on 12 July. In the meantime, you can stream the full album for free from NPR and download the first single, Amor Fati, for free by following this link. "You can also sign up to download Eyes Be Closed" below.

some mixed media to mediate your monday melancholy

Frank Ocean, the lead singer of L.A. based R&B group Odd Future has just put out a new mixtape called "Nostalgia, Ultra" for your digital consumption. It's available HERE.

And here's a video that True Blood's Kristin Bauer recorded for the Animal Legal Defense Fund to help free Tony the tiger. Keep your Frosted Flakes in the bowl. Tony is a Siberian-Bengal tiger who has been kept in a cage at a truck stop in Gross Tete, Louisiana for the past decade as a "tourist attraction."



The ALDF is currently litigating in the state to set Tony free. For more information and to sign a petition letting Louisiana know you think it's wrong to keep Tony locked up at a gas station, please visit www.aldf.org/tony.

And finally, to leave you on an up beat, here's some comments Orson Scott Card recently made in praise of Cowboy Bebop and Firely, two of my favorite cowboys in space sci-fi properties and tv series in general. He was writing in the 6 April 2011 issue of the Greensboro Rhino Times.

What can I say, except that to my vast surprise, I found this series brilliant. It's often funny, sexy in a mostly chaste kind of way – these are drawings, after all – and the action is gripping.

But what held me was a combination of strong relationship-based storytelling, a moody visual style that never got old and really smart dialogue.

I'd compare this to the great TV series Firefly, except that since Firefly came out in 2002, and resembles Cowboy Bebop in many ways (including quality), I can't guess whether Firefly creator Joss Whedon was influenced by Cowboy Bebop, was deliberately doing an hommage, or created such a similar series by sheer coincidence.

You can read the full text here.

Hmmmm... maybe I should do a review of Cowboy Bebop one day. It would be an excuse to watch the series all the way through. Again. I've literally seen it through at least a dozen times and the first 5 episodes probably 30 or 40 times. It's a property I always recommend to friends with good taste.

Here's a teaser, the actual pitch that was used to sell the show.

Once upon a time, in New York City in 1941... at this club open to all comers to play, night after night, at a club named "Minston's Play House" in Harlem, they play jazz sessions competing with each other. Young jazz men with a new sense are gathering. At last they created a new genre itself. They are sick and tired of the conventional fixed style jazz. They're eager to play jazz more freely as they wish then... in 2071 in the universe...

The bounty hunters, who are gathering in the spaceship "BEBOP," will play freely without fear of risky things, they must create new dreams and films by breaking traditional styles. The work, which becomes a new genre itself, will be called... "COWBOY BEBOP."

See you space cowboy...

"house of balloons" mixtape

Normally the way I decide on my top 5 songs of the week is by the number of times I've played a track during the previous week. It's sort of a retrospective on what was pouring through my ear buds. If I followed that rule for 4 April, the top 5 would be 5 of the 9 songs on The Weeknd's mixtape House of Balloons. Instead, here's a step to keep some variety on the list while exposing you to the 3rd album to make my short list for album of the year so far.

It's the most sleazy, sexy, sensuous album I've heard since 2009's debut from The xx. Enjoy

You can currently download "House of Balloons" for free at Pretty Much Amazing.