Halloween, Alaska - Champagne Downtown (2009)

01. Hot Pink 

02. In Order 

03. Ends

04. Gone with the Wind 

05. Hollywood Sign 

06. Champagne Downtown 

07. Un-American 

08. Be a Man 

09. Hurry Up 

10. Knights of Columbus 

Having earned widespread acclaim for its atmospheric brand of synth-driven indie, "CHAMPAGNE DOWNTOWN" sees Halloween, Alaska crafting its most distinctive and disarming set to date. Songs such as "In Order" and "Gone With The Wind" are complex and thoughtful, rich with simmering textures and literate lyricism. Melding an expansive range of inventive sounds with anthemic indie-rock hooks, "CHAMPAGNE DOWNTOWN" straddles the boundary between the electronic and the organic to create a novel rethink of what pop music can mean in a new millennium. Halloween, Alaska is comprised of James Diers (voice, keyboards, guitar), Matthew Friesen (bass, sampler), Jacob Hanson (guitar, keyboards, voice), and David King (acoustic and electronic drums)- the latter also serving as the enigmatic drummer with modernist jazz giants, The Bad Plus. Though founding keyboardist/programmer Ev has since left the official touring line-up, he remains on board for recording and assorted sound manipulation. "CHAMPAGNE DOWNTOWN" was recorded by Ev and mixed by Grammy Award-winning engineer Tchad Blake (Peter Gabriel, American Music Club, Latin Playboys).

Halloween, Alaska came together in 2002, encompassing members of such esteemed local outfits as Love-cars, 12RODS, and Happy Apple. The band self-released its eponymous debut in 2004, drawing critical praise and nationwide exposure when two tracks - "Des Moines" and "All The Arms Around You" - were featured on the Fox series, The O.C. Popular demand saw "HALLOWEEN, ALASKA" reissued the following year by East Side Digital, prompting a further flood of accolades. 

"Halloween, Alaska's emotive verve and electro-organic poise is so accomplished, you'd think you'd got your hands on The Blue Nile's mislaid comeback album," declared MOJO in it four-starred rave. "Melancholy stains every measured note, but HA reside slap-bang in the heart of America's Midwest, and the atmosphere of low, distant horizons and isolation is palpable." "Mesmerizing stuff," hailed the Sunday Times , while the Twin Cities' own City Pages noted that "the album drowns the ears in alien lullabies, though Diers's candid lyrics about living-room clutter make everyday things just as song-worthy as these strange soundscapes...King combines his traditional drum kit with electronic pads that sound just as they should - beautifully artificial."

That same year also saw the release of Halloween, Alaska's sophomore outing, "TOO TALL TO HIDE." The album - which includes a striking rethink of LL Cool J's classic "I Can't Live Without My Radio" - also reaped copious critical hosannas. "Having laid out a defining blend of lush electronica and spare, somber emo-rock on its debut," wrote The Onion AV Club , "this time out the foursome explores the territory further - it's soaring and introspective by turns." "It displays all the charms of this band," affirmed Pulse , "sentimentality tempered by a wink and masterful musicianship uncluttered by virtuoso-style wankery." -musicremedy.com

Metric - Fantasies: Limited Download Bundle EP

01. Gimmie Sympathy (Acoustic)
02. Help, I'm Alive
03. Nobody's Home (Pink Floyd Cover)
04. Waves (Bonus Track)

Cut The Blue Wire - Revert, Restart, Reset (EP - 2008)

Every time I hear a new BSM/Alcopop band I proclaim them my new favourite on the label. It's usually lazy journalism, but I'm serious - Kev and co seem to outdo themselves with every release. CTBW are probably my new all-time favourite - 'Everest' is easily the best song the label has put out anyway. A joyous slab of indie-rock, these south-coast lads know how to write a good catchy pop song. All of the tunes on this EP are less than three minutes which means there's no fat to trim; it's all just good time party music.
'Everest' is, as I said, quite brilliant. And that's how I could also describe 'Rockets Ready To Fire' or 'No Song of Mine'. Choppy guitar riffs, fast drumming and inventive basslines are in abundance with some high-pitched vocals topping things off. CTBW are like trifle; so many layers every one of them is seven shades of awesome. You should buy this EP just for 'Everest'. Listen to that song over, over and over again and then play the others on repeat too. Then they'll maybe become your new favourite BSM band too.-Punktastic.com

1. Everest
2. Get Out Of The Road 
3. All Of This Was Buildings 
4. Rockets Ready To Fire 
5. Race To The King 
6. No Song Of Mine 

Bibio - Vignetting The Compost (2009)

Seamlessly amalgamating nature and electronics, Vignetting The Compost, the third full-length release from Bibio, channels instruments and vocals from a bygone era through a futuristic digital portal. History may credit Edison with the phonograph but, in truth, the first such device mysteriously washed up on the shores of England in 1876… playing Bibio. Vignetting The Compost is at once timeless and innovative; 60s-esque folk guitar and mechanic manipulations of sounds whose instruments of origin are less important than the feelings they evoke, layer upon each other with ease and intricacy. Just when you expect to hear Nico’s moan escaping your stereo, Bibio himself comes through with a voice that could have sung next to her on “These Days.” Truly, this is an album for the ages. -Mushrecords.com

01 Flesh Rots, Pip Sown
02 Mr. & Mrs. Compost
03 Everglad Everglade
04 Dopplerton
05 Great Are The Piths
06 Odd Paws
07 Under The Pier
08 Weekend Wildfire
09 The Clothesline And The Silver Birch
10 Torn Under The Window Light
11 The Ephemeral Bluebell
12 Over The Far And Hills Away
13 Amongst The Bark And Fungus
14 Top Soil
15 Thatched
16 The Garden Shelter

Sonic Youth - Sensational Fix (2009)

01. Rats
02. Song for Reverse Karaoke
03. Aerosol
04. Ivan

Her Name Is Calla - The Heritage

The soon-to-be Leeds, UK based 4-piece released their well-received debut single "A Moment of Clarity" on Gizeh back in October 2007 alongside a string of dates with Beggars Banquet new-boys iLiKETRAiNS. The band centers around a core of 4 in Thom Corah, Michael Love, Tom Morris and Adam Weikert but is often expanded for live shows to include David Dhonau(Cello) and Sophie Barnes of The Rosie Taylor Project (Trumpet). This recording features the string section of The Monroe Transfer on "New England."

"The Heritage" is Her Name is Calla’s second release for Gizeh and it is a much darker and harrowing affair. Self-recorded and produced by the band it appears to open up a deeper and more turbulent mind-set. The fury spewed forth throughout the closing stages of live-favourite "New England" - complete with a quite epic string section - pulls this mini-album to its loudest and heaviest moment. There is even room for a hidden-track in "Long Distance Runner," an old song dug from the ground to again see the light of day. -Metalunderground.com

01. Nylon
02. New England
03. Paying For Your Funeral
04. Wren
05. “Motherfucker! It’s Alive and It’s Bleeding!”
06. Rebirth (hidden track - Long Distance Runner)

Love is All - Nine Times that Same Song

01. Talk Talk Talk Talk

02. Ageing Had Never Been His Friend

03. Turn The Radio Off

04. Used Goods

05. Busy Doing Nothing

06. Make Out Fall Out Make Up

07. Felt tip

08. Spinning & Scratching

09. Turn The TV Off

10. Trying Too Hard

Broadcast - The Future Crayon

1. Illumination
   
2. Still Feels Like Tears
   
3. Small Song IV
   
4. Where Youth and Laughter Go 
   
5. One Hour Empire
   
6. Distant Call 
   
7. Poem of a Dead Song 
   
8. Hammer Without a Master 
   
9. Locusts
   
10. Chord Simple 
    
11. Dave's Dream
    
12. DDL
    
13. Test Area 
    
14. Unchanging Window / Chord Simple
    
15. A Man for Atlantis
    
16. Minus Two 
    
17. Violent Playground 
    
18. Belly Dance

Snowman - The Horse, The Rat, and The Swan

1. Our Mother (She Remembers)
2. We Are the Plague
3. The Gods of the Upper House
4. The Blood of the Swan
5. Daniel was a Timebomb
6. A Rebirth
7. She is Turning into You
8. The Horse (parts 1 and 2)
9. Diamond Wounds

By the End of Tonight & Tera Melos - Complex Full of Phantoms (2007)

By the End of Tonight is a Math Rock band from Alvin, Texas, US. The band was formed in 2003 by Stefan Mach on guitar, Josh Smith on guitar and keyboards, James Templeton on bass, percussion and Jeff Wilson on drums and xylophone. After releasing their demo in 2003 the record label Temporary Residence Limited signed them. In 2005 they released their first album with a record label called “A Tribute to Tigers”. In the proceeding year the band had trouble writing and meeting each other so they released a set of four EPs which where made by a member of the band respectively. In the same year guitarist Josh Smith left the band and was replaced by Brett Taylor. In 2007 By the End of Tonight made a split album with Tera Melos called “A Complex Full of Phantoms”. Drummer Jeff Wilson left the band after the release.

By The End of Tonight’s music is heavy and complex often veering into metal territory from time to time, but this isn’t their main concern. Post-Rock is another slight influence in their sound, but it’s less noticeable than their metal leanings. Fans of Oxes, Don Caballero, Tera Melos and other Math Rock bands will find By the End of Tonight’s music highly enjoyable.-Ruben Dario (Chamberry) 

1. Deleware Is Depressing
2. Philty Collins
3. Jealous Of A Ghost
4. Cold Hands
5. Ghost Hands
6. Elvis Never Didn't Die
7. 555-9676
8. Party With Tina
9. When Worms Learn to Fly
10. Meldoy 9
11. Last Smile for Jaron

http://rapidshare.com/files/60260162/By_The_End_Of_Tonight_Tera_Melos_-_Complex_Full_of_Phantoms__Split___2007_.rar.html

The Old Romantic Killer Band - The Swan With Two Necks (2008)

With the emergence of artists as diverse as the Dodos, No Age and even Flight of the Conchords, 2008 has been particularly kind to the concept of ‘the duo’. Unfortunately for the Old Romantic Killer Band, 2008 is all but over. As we all turn our attention to the imminent delights promised by 2009, the debut album from this young Leeds band is about as fresh as a pint of warm, stale lager.

The aim of the Old Romantic Killer Band is clearly to fuse bluesy guitar riffs with punk rhythms. In the live setting, at least, this works reasonably well, but the lack of variety on record is truly stifling. Taken individually, tracks like Girl, You Have All The Fun, Lovers Pass and Things to Come are all respectable enough efforts, but in the context of the album – which at 22-minutes is hardly an epic – they seem to coalesce into one stodgy, unappetising whole.

The tinny production job is partially culpable here, but I think The Swan With Two Necks’ failure ultimately lies with the band’s refusal to broaden its horizons or, at the very least, embrace its limitations. -David Coleman

01 Girl You Have All The Fun
02 Pigs
03 Trouble Causer
04 Your Girlfriend Is A Drug Addict
05 Lovers Pass
06 Things To Come
07 The Resolve
08 You Knew I Had A Drakness In Me
09 Four Seasons Blues

http://rapidshare.com/files/169331700/t10old.rar

Scarlett Johansson-Anywhere I Lay My Head (2008)

The Hollywood hottie it’s respectable to like: it was always clear that if Scarlett Johansson launched a musical career, it wouldn’t be a sub-Britney exercise in bottom-wiggling. Even so, a whole album of Tom Waits covers is pushing the boat out further than anyone could have foreseen.
Johansson’s perceived coolness is built on a mixed bag of performances: beguiling in the Coens' 'The Man Who Wasn't There', loathsome in the overrated ‘Lost In Translation’.

‘Anywhere I Lay My Head’ is a record which, with its My Bloody Valentine-esque multi layered and reverb-heavy production (courtesy of TV on the Radio’s David Sitek, with guitar by Nick Zinner of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs), could have been released on Creation/4AD in the late 1980s. It’s a pleasure to hear Waits’ songs delivered in a voice other than his own gruff growl.
Johansson is no great singer herself, but her bovine lowing, multitracked and echo-laded in excelsis, is as demure as her screen persona. Being able to rope in none other than David Bowie as a backing vocalist is a perk of Scarlett’s star status.
A collaborative effort and a triumph of the producer’s art it may be, rather than the statement of a sole auteur, but as a pop artefact ‘Anywhere I Lay My Head’ isn’t remotely diminished by that. - Simon Price

track list:

1. Fawn (originally on Tom Waits' album Alice)  

2. Town with No Cheer (originally on Tom Waits' album Swordfishtrombones)  

3. Falling Down (originally on Tom Waits' album Big Time)  

4. Anywhere I Lay My Head (originally on Tom Waits' album Rain Dogs)  

5. Fannin Street (originally on Tom Waits' album Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards)  

6. Song for Jo

7. Green Grass (originally on Tom Waits' album Real Gone) 

8. I Wish I Was in New Orleans (originally on Tom Waits' album Small Change) 

9. I Don't Want to Grow Up (originally on Tom Waits' album Bone Machine)  

10. No One Knows I'm Gone (originally on Tom Waits' album Alice)  

11. Who Are You? (originally on Tom Waits' album Bone Machine)

http://rapidshare.com/files/118101319/Scarlett_Johansson-Anywhere_Head-2008-hell.rar

Clinic - Clinic

1		I.P.C. Subeditors Dictate Our Youth
2		Porno
3		D.P.
4		Monkey On Your Back
5		D.T.
6		Evil Bill
7		Cement Mixer
8		Kimberley
9		Voot

The Kills - Keep On Your Mean Side

A1		Superstition
A2		Cat Claw
A3		Pull a U
A4		Kissy Kissy
A5		Fried my Litte Brains
A6		Gypsy Death & You
B1		Hand
B2		Hitched
B3		Black Rooster
B4		Wait
B5		Fuck the People
B6		Monkey 23

Little Joy - Little Joy

1. Brand New Start
2. Don't Watch Me Dancing
3. Evaporar Little Joy
4. How To Hang A Warhol
5. Keep Me In Mind
6. The Next Time Around
7. No One's Better Sake
8. Play The Part
9. Shoulder To Shoulder
10. Unattainable
11. With Strangers

Tahiti 80 - Activity Center

get this album now..

Where does the title of your new album come from?
Xavier: It's the name of a Fisher Price toy for kids! The Fisher Price Activity Center is this big plastic panel for kids complete with moving wheels, dials, dingers and all sorts of special sound effects. We figured our studio looks pretty much the same with all our consoles and all the instruments we've amassed over the years. We can just turn up and record ourselves there whenever we like. And we felt the title suited the way we produced the new album, all four of us tucked away behind closed doors.http://www.rfimusique.com

01. 24×7 Boy


02. Unpredictable


03. All Around


04. Brazil


05. Fire Escape


06. One Parachute


07. Tune In


08. Dream On


09. White Noise


10. Come Around


11. Whistle


12. Ear to the Ground

Youth Group - The Night Is Ours

get this album now..

Youth Group are a four piece from Sydney, Australia and The Night is Ours is their fourth album. Best known for their hit, Forever Young, this is mournful, moody pop with sentimental, sappy lyrics that are, well boring.

Sounding like a less charismatic Editors; there is some nice rhythmic guitar in there and some cool synths pops up in one track, but this is very middle of the road stuff. Toby Martin’s voice does remind me of Madchester band, James’ Tim Booth at times, which is a good thing I guess. Track Babies in your Dreams is just awful. 

http://www.undertheradar.co.nz

1. Good Time

2. One For Another

3. Two Sides

4. Dying At Your Own Party

5. All This Will Pass

6. Friedrichstrasse

7. A Sign

8. Babies In Your Dreams

9. In My Dreams

10. What Is A Life

Reefer - Reefer

Nick Thorburn is a busy guy. Between Islands and Human Highway, it's unclear how he finds the time to keep up those fashionable haircuts. We recently reported on HH's first live shows. Now Islands, who have a six-song Live Session available at iTunes, are also on the road. The iTunes EP includes Arm's Way tracks ("The Arm," "Pieces Of You," "Creeper," and a "revised" "J'aime Vous Voir Quitter") as well as covers of Spiritualized's "Broken Heart" and Sinead O'Connor's "Red Football." If these two projects weren't enough, you can add Reefer to the mix. It's the duo of Thorburn and LA-based hip-hop producer Daddy Kev. The two met via Subtitle, who we saw in Nick's arms at SXSW '08, and went off to Maui sans Subtitle (Thorburn clearly digs islands) to put together their self-titled debut. It includes six songs, three interludes, and remixes by Dntel and Flying Lotus. 

http://stereogum.com

1.      The Simplest Way

2.      May Baleen

3.      Let It Go

4.      Five Hundred An Ounce

5.      Crony Island

6.      Hit and Run

7.      Blue Moon

8.      Until We Meet Again

9.      Hit and Run (Dntel Remix)

10.      Let It Go (Flying Lotus Remix)

Clinic - Internal Wrangler

1 Voodoo Wop

2 The Return Of Evil Bill

3 Internal Wrangle

4 DJ Shangri-La

5 The Second Line

6 C.Q.

7 T.K

8 Earth Angel

9 Distortions

10 Hippy Death Suite

11 2nd Foot Stomp

12 2/4

13 Untitled

14 Goodnight Georgie

The Raveonettes - Sometimes They Drop By EP

01. Way Out There

02. Blood Red Leis

03. Sometimes They Drop By

04. Vintage Future