Cass McCombs
Wit’s End [Cassette]
Domino Records
Release Date: April, 12th 2011
LIMITED TO 500 PIECES
The cassette comes with a full color insert and a MP3 download card.
Singer/Songwriter McCombs WIT’S END is the follow up to the critically acclaimed Catacombs – his biggest selling album so far. WIT’S END, his fifth-and-a-half album and his third for Domino, will be released on April 12th.The album is the result of two years of recording in various homes and studios in California, New York, New Jersey and Chicago. McComb’s teamed up with Ariel Ariel Rechtshaid to produce the album; this same duo created 2009′s Catacombs.
McCombs’ will hit the road in May with tour dates lined up across North America and Europe. The lead single “County Line” premiered in late January, listen to it below.
Bibio
Excuses 10″
Warp Records
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES
The first single from Bibio’s upcoming album Mind Bokeh is “Excuses”, available on 10″ the first of March. The track is a warm haze of layered sounds and clip-clop percussion, which gives way as the song is hoist upright, with Bibio’s bright vocals percolating through a cluster of rhythmical spikes. Its effects are achieved in part through Bibio’s use of the old, Surrealist technique of automatic writing – a partial switching off of the conscious mind in order to explore and liberate deeper, repressed truths. The B-side from the 10″ single is a non-album track titled “Old Friends”. Check out the video for “Excuses” below.
The Fleshtones
Bite Of My Soul b/w Remember the Ramones 10″
Yep Roc Records
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES
To commemorate their new album Brooklyn Sound Solution featuring the legendary Lenny Kaye, America’s garage band The Fleshtones bring you this limited edition 7” featuring two original tracks; album standout “Bite of My Soul” and bonus cut “Remember the Ramones.”
Margot and the Nuclear So & So’s
Happy Hour at Sprigg’s Vol. 1: Live and Acoustic
Mariel Recordings
LIMITED TO 450 PIECES
A 6-song acoustic EP featuring acoustic renditions of three songs from Margot and the Nuclear So and So’s recent acclaimed full-length release, Buzzard. The collection also includes previously unreleased songs, recorded specifically for this EP including a fan favorite from MNSS 2009 Daytrotter session, “A Journalist Falls In Love With Inmate #16”. Where Buzzard captured the raw energy of MNSS live rock songs, Sprigg’s… represents the opposite side of the MNSS coin — the break in the live set where the band goes to the side, and Richard sings alone… his distinctive voice singing folksy narrative lyrics, accompanied only by his acoustic guitar.
Stream the first song off Happy Hour at Sprigg’s Vol. 1: Live and Acoustic
Hammock
Longest Year EP
Hammock LTD.
LIMITED TO 350 PIECES
“A band that effortlessly transports the listener to extraordinary mind’s-eye horizons” (BBC). An engrossing new mini-album by Hammock, “Longest Year” is a soundtrack for winter, a gorgeous wall of sound imbued with the introspection, melancholy and mystery of the season.
The main attraction to Hammock, the Nashville duo of Marc Byrd and Andrew Thompson, are the guitars. Drones and lead guitar parts are blended together to create fluid moments of musicality that allow ambiance and atmosphere to open up and overtake the listener. Hammock’s critically acclaimed studio albums and entrancing live performances won over tastemakers and listeners across genres ranging from Post-Rock to Ambient, Electronic and Shoegazer. Their music eventually reached the ears of Jonsi Birgisson (Sigur Ros) and Alex Somers (Parachutes), who invited them to perform live for the first time at the overseas debut art exhibition of their art collaboration Riceboy Sleeps. Byrd and Thompson composed music specifically for the event, and those songs eventually became Maybe They Will Sing for Us Tomorrow (May 2008), a minimalistic “live studio performance” album. The duo’s follow up, Chasing After Shadows…Living with the Ghosts (May 2010), went a different direction entirely, going for a more organic, larger, and darker sound, featuring their first use of live drums, horns, and strings. “Longest Year” could be seen as a bridge between those albums–it is wordless, beat-less and creatively impulsive like “Maybe…” yet has the sonic heaviness of “Chasing…”
Jonquil
One Hundred Suns 12″ EP
Dovecote Records
LIMITED TO 500 PIECES
Jonquil’s self-proclaimed “Paul Simon’s take on The Smiths” tag nails them well, however the six-piece also encompass a level of intricacy not unlike a more subtle Dirty Projectors without the r ‘n’ b. There’s also an inclusion of a majestic summer flourish of romantic indie-pop very much in the modern tradition – similar to Beach House, Vampire Weekend or Wolf Parade. Emerging initially as the more folky end of Oxford’s burgeoning match rock scene that brought us (close friends of Jonquil and recent touring partners) Foals and Youthmovies, Jonquil have constantly evolved and morphed into a very accomplished and mature band with a now newly focused, fresh output of work.
- Dan Monsell, Rockfeedback
[...] online in less than a week; and all along the way, everyone from Cass McCombs to Of Montreal have released albums on the magnetic-tape-in-a-compact-plastic-shell format known as the [...]