Co-Premiere With Nofop: Local Winds “Small Towns” From In The World Of Ours(2010)

I tend to be anti premiere / co-premiere.

This is because I think it cheapens the blog to be swayed in what you post based on the exposure it gives you, as opposed to how good it is.

So, that being said, I agreed to do it here because:

A: The songs good

B: It allowed me to open with a rant about premiere’s and co-premiere’s.

But, you won’t see a lot of them here and you’ll never get one I agree to post without hearing it first.

That precursor out of the way, Scott Dickson of Local Winds and Closed Cassette was a pleasure to work with on Collaborations and delivered one of my favorite jams off that tape in “For Now”, his collaboration with Top Girls. With his new project, Local Winds, he’s taping further into the spacious electro soundscapes he works so well with.

I’ve always liked Scott’s seeming tendencies towards organic inspiration in his pieces. And in “Small Towns”, the first track released off his upcoming In The World Of Ours, this is absolutely present. The slow grow of urban sprawl displacing plant life and animals in it’s parasitic advance, only to house middle class mundania at it’s finest. 

Or maybe that’s just my interpretation. But one of the best things about Scott’s tracks is there’s enough space for anyone to breathe whatever world they’d like into it.

Download Local Winds “Small Towns”

Order Local Winds In The World Of Ours from Alchemist Records (Limited Edition Of 100)

Daily Doses: Steffaloo “Fly Away” (2011)

Ahhh the simple things.

I saw Steffaloo, aka Stephanie Thompson play her first show the other night and was really impressed by the honesty, and simplicity of communication.

Don’t get me wrong, I like twisted and spit out, brain melting lyrics as much as the next guy. But on the other side of the spectrum, when a song can be broken down enough to communicate just the bare essentials of the picture, that trace drawing can be more perfect than if you spend 5 years on it with acrylic paint.

Also those second verse harmonies pretttyyyy much kill it.

So lay back, slow down, let your brain wander, and just relax into the imagery. 

Download Steffaloo’s “Fly Away”

Artwork by: Nathaniel Whitcomb - www.thinkorsmile.com

Song Premiere: Holy Spirits and Gem Club “Fingertips” From The Collaborations cassette (Limited Edition of 100)

Early in July, I, together with Dave from Stadiums and Shrines, and Cam from The Road Goes Ever On came together with a plan. Having noticed the increasing number of collaborations happening between (mostly) DIY artists we decided to capture this movement. What was intriguing about these joinings was that in some cases enormous geographical distances separated most of the artists and quite a few had never even met in person. Not that to say this had never happened before, but the regularity with which it was occurring was amazing.

The plan was to release a tape that captured this rising trend in a bubble. We wanted to preserve the artists both in their personal infancy (The majority of the artists on the tapes had risen to prominence only within the last year) and in the infancy of their long distance creative joinings.

Each of the us tapped some of our favorite artists and asked them if they’d like to release a track for a cassette/digital release, the catch being that the track had to be in collaboration with another artist.

The task ranged in difficulty for each selected pair.  For example, Edmonton, Canada’s Kumon Plaza and Los Angeles’ Rachel Levy, who had already collaborated on an albums worth of songs. For others it was a whole new enterprise. New York’s Holy Spirits and Massachusetts’ Gem Club had a mutual respect for each other, but had never collaborated on anything together, or even talked about it.  But slowly the artists started pairing off.  From Manchester, England to Texas (Star Slinger and Pandit), Sydney, Australia to South Carolina (Guerre and Top Girls) and Laguna Beach to the UK (Pepepiano and Warm Waves) they found each other. Musicians sent tracks via file sharing services and e-mailed in abundance, sharing ideas and building something out of nothing.  Distances it would have taken months to travel just 100 years ago proved to be no barrier as the “send” button quelled the significant distance.
 
The artists participating and tracks submitted ranged significantly in styles: from the beat heavy sample based hip-hop soul of Star Slinger to the fuzzy R&B of Top Girls to the electronic nostalgia pop of Teen Daze and Warm Waves.  Gem Club, Holy Spirits and Pandit with their intimate dream-pop and Ghost Animal with his blend of fuzz rock. Despite this wide stylistic differences, somehow all the tracks seems to fit together like pieces of a puzzle. 

 In the end, I think everyone involved in this project is just extremely proud of what we’ve finished with. these tracks will stand up under any scrutiny. A beautiful ode to the digital age and the power of collaboration.

The “Collaborations” tape is currently up for Pre-order on http://www.weget.by, a new tape label based out of Los Angeles.  

Other than 1 track which is exclusive to the tape, the tape will be released for free download on the 1st. However, we’d love for you to order it. This tape is professionally dubbed, from uncompressed audio files directly from the Master recording. It’s also printed with mind-blowing artwork by Nathaniel Whitcomb over at www.thinkorsmile.com. Nothing about this was skimped on. Putting something like this out physically is something that’s important to us, and your support on that will be what determines our ability to do that in the future. We also encourage every one who buys the tape to feel free to re-dub it and distribute it (for free obviously) to friends. Let’s take mixtapes back to the medium they belong on!

In exchange for buying it, you will receive a link to d/l the tape (minus the exclusive track) a full week before it’s release, you will also get the exclusive Ghost Animal/Rachel Levy track that is will only ever be released on this analog version, as well as whatever else we can come up with to surprise you.

As a teaser, featured above is one of the songs that will be on the tape. A truly amazing collaboration between Holy Spirits and Gem Club that for me highlights what can be done by these artists when they get together. “Fingertips” features a flawless string covered instrumental track, intwined with haunting vocals resulting in a track that feels so beautifully personal and pulls together so well, you can’t imagine these two haven’t been working together for years.

Be sure to check out and Download Cam’s featured song from the tape by Teen Daze and Jaded Hipster Choir, as well as an extremely special cover Dave will be releasing at Stadiums and Shrines at some point in the upcoming day.

Download (And distribute far and wide!) Holy Spirits and Gem Club’s Collaboration “Fingertips” from the “Collaborations” Tape

Order “Collaborations” From We Get By

Collaborations Track Listing:

Side A

1. Top Girls and Guerre “Melt”
2. Teen Daze and Jaded Hipster Choir “Low Glow”
3. Weed and Foxes In Fiction “Teenage Dream” (Katy Perry Cover)
4. Closed Cassette and Top Girls “For Now”
5. Ghost Animal and Rachel Levy - “We Don’t Care”*
6. Ghost Houses – “Ritual”

Side B

7. Holy Spirits and Gem Club - “Fingertips”
8. Seeing Suge (Star Slinger, Emay, Blackbird Blackbird) - “Breaking (DEMO)”
9. Pepepiano and Warm Waves - “Air”
10. Gay Boiz (Kumon Plaza and Rachel Levy) - “High Level Alchemy”
11. Star Slinger and Pandit - “Self Love”