White Lies

My, it's been a while since I posted here. Found something that's a little out of character from my own blog. Heard this track on the radio during my lunch hour and I immediately thought of Interpol, the Editors, and maybe a little bit of the early Killers.

White Lies - Unfinished Business


Looks like they've been around for a handful of years already. Currently they're supporting Glasvegas on tour, both of whom will be part of the 2009 NME Tour along with Friendly Fires and Florence & The Machine.

At the end of the video above, you can check out a couple other songs of theirs, "Death" and "To Lose My Life".

Also, here's one more track you can preview over at Hype Machine.
White Lies - From the Stars

White Lies myspace
White Lies website

AnnieB's Detour: Keedz

There’s this track that’s been floating around the blogosphere and I guess it’s been on heavy rotation somewhere in Europe. Anyway, the reason behind the latest hype appears to be because Justice’s “D.A.N.C.E” comes to mind. People have been speculating that it’s Justice under a different alias, or that it is Keedz but mixed by Justice. The tracks are rather similar, so there’s no real breakthrough or anything.


Keedz – Stand On The Word
(video link)

In the end, it’s really just a rebirth of a gospel song. I'm a bit confused and am not sure if it's by Celestial Choir or The Joubert Singers. All I know is that it was mixed back in the day by Larry Levan, a legendary dj of his time, and that now we have a modern version with a current artist’s name linked to it. Here’s the older version for comparison.


Celestial Choir/The Joubert Singers – Stand on the Word (Larry Levan Remix)

AnnieB's Detour: Passion Pit

A couple weeks ago, I found this addictive track by Passion Pit, a band who’s been getting a lot of references to MGMT. Their EP, Chunk of Change, is expected to be released mid-September followed by an full length album next year.


Passion Pit - Sleepyhead

You can preview a couple more tracks over at myspace, or download four free tracks at last.fm.

AnnieB's Detour: Little Jackie

Like Estelle, guess you can consider this mainstream now, but I heard the first track on the SXSW sampler back in March, and it looks like they've been getting a lot more press over the past month since her album was released last week.

From myspace:
Blend the old-school R&B sound with a quirky hybrid of hip-hop and pop and you get Little Jackie, the creation of genre-defying singer-songwriter Imani Coppola and programmer Adam Pallin. With a nod to the soulful Motown rhythms of the past and a sneer to many of the social and cultural issues that consume the public today, Coppola has crafted an album of musical sugar and spice, filled with sweet, saccharine-tinged melodies and spicy, bold commentaries.


Little Jackie – The World Should Revolve Around Me


Little Jackie – The Stoop


Little Jackie – 28 Butts


Little Jackie – One Love

I streamed the entire album and it’s a good listen if you like the poppy 60’s hip-hop throwback era. Recommended for those who listen to Joss Stone, Lily Allen, Estelle, Lauren Hill, and Corinne Bailey Rae. She also did a set on KCRW's Morning Becomes Eclectic.

AnnieB's Detour: Minipop

For me, this week’s t61 highlight was that San Francisco-based band, Minipop, joined the site. Honestly, with so much music from the SXSW sampler, I was easily overwhelmed, especially with more of the rock stuff. However, Minipop was one of those bands that just stood out to me after listening to their song, “Like I Do”. If you don't know already, I have a slight bias toward dreamy indie pop songs. I actually thought about blogging about them before, but now that they’re t61 official…even better!

Minipop’s website

Minipop’s myspace

AnnieB's Detour: Moulinex and SymbolOne

A double post!



Before t61 came along, I had no idea I’d be digging this electronic, 80s-vibe sort of dance music. Particularly, I’ve been very pleased with the two mixes from Moulinex that have come to the site, and I hope more are on their way. Not to be confused with the French manufacturer of small household appliances, Luis Moulinex is a Portuguese dj/German producer who is part of D.I.S.C.O.Texas, a collective of artists (think RAC). I didn’t think anything would come about my random question during my interview with Andre (of RAC) about being from Portugal, and then I read this interview with Luis Moulinex who also admitted Portugal not having a thriving music scene. Portugal sure looks like it's missing out as these artists are fleeting their native country and going elsewhere. Anyway…Moulinex = good stuff!


Cazals – Somebody, Somewhere (Moulinex Remix)

This is the first remix of his I heard.

…and obviously I immediately liked SymbolOne too. Apparently these are long lost “musical” twins that reunited. Not only that, they are Justice and Danger-approved! Justice featured “Love Juice” on their (rejected) Fabric Xmas Mix, and Danger has put his own spin on the track as well.


SymbolOne – Love Juice (Danger TV Remix)

This is another SymbolOne track I like. I should say they have Erotto’s seal of approval too as it is featured in his mix, "The Double Edge".


SymbolOne – Everything Louder Then Everything Else


Moulinex’s myspace
SymbolOne’s myspace

AnnieB's Detour: Lykke Li (Concert)

So…I saw Lykke Li last Monday at the El Rey Theatre in Los Angeles. To be honest, I thought I was going to miss out since I got off of work late and she was the opening act. Luckily, there was another act before her, so I sort of sped for nothing. Anyway, the crowd was mainly filled with a rather eager, bright-eyed, college youngsters from what I can tell near the stage. The older folks seem to be content being on the sidelines.

Eventually, out walks Lykke Li in her belted baggy black attire and gold chains, followed by the rest of her bandmates. The setlist starts off with Lykke Li singing the high-pitched, staccato ooh, ooh, ooh's of the slow tempo "Time Flies". Then, it picks up with "Dance Dance Dance" and slows back down a bit with "Everybody But Me".

El Perro del Mar was the main act of the night and she came out to do a guest performance on "My Love". The next song might have been "Let It Fall", but my memory has faded regarding the setlist. Anyway, the crowd, of course, got giddy for "Little Bit", but I really thought the highlight of the show was the upbeat performance of "Breaking It Up." Even my friend who is absolutely unfamiliar with Lykke Li remembered that song the most. Lykke Li then closed out her act with "Tonight" and "I'm Good, I'm Gone".

This show had so much more than the expected handclapping. Add the cowbell, the kazoo, and the megaphone on top of Lykke Li's pelvic thrusts and hip sways, just makes it a great show. That, and I love the fact that the guys who play the keyboard and drums were on either side of Lykke Li at the front of the stage, and the guitar in the back. The percussive aspects are really instrumental to her music, in my opinion.

While my friend and I didn't stay for the main act, we ended the night by walking past the star of Entourage on our way out of the venue. That was my friend's highlight of the night, even though we didn't know his name other than 'the guy from Entourage'. (Btw, it's Adrian Grenier...however, I had to look that up.)

Oh, and I guess I should end off this post with something new. Here's a track by Kleerup with Lykke Li on vocals.


Kleerup - Until We Bleed (ft. Lykke Li)

Lykke Li's Website
Lykke Li's Myspace

AnnieB's Detour: D*R*I

Perhaps you guys are better than me and looked into D*R*I a bit more earlier when it had posted onto the homepage. Dri is Adrianne Verhoeven of the Anniversary, Art in Manila, and Fourth of July…and should definitely not to be confused with the punk, metal, trash music of D.R.I. In contrast, her music is downtempo trip hop and easy on the ears.

I don’t know how long it’s been, but I still can’t get enough of this song. It’s from her solo debut album, Smoke Rings, which was released last November.



I highly recommend that you visit her Virb page where you can stream most of her album.

Otherwise, here’s another taste of D*R*I.


D*R*I’s Myspace


Btw, I just made two other posts as brief commentary, but I set them at an earlier date so I don't bombard this blog simply because I'm trying to play catch up. If you're interested, you can click on the link or tag to my column.

Old Nerdy Bastard

I thought there might be quite a few people around here who would be interested in a compilation of nerdy remixes that dropped yesterday, since there are quite a few names on it that should be familiar to all of you.

The ensuing round of musical mayhem is a collection of remixes, mash-ups, and re-orchestrations of geeky tracks from across the spectrum. There’s nerdcore, of course, and Wizard Rock, geek rock (or, grock, as it’s come to be called in some circles) and even a dash of foreign language goodness on the menu, reworked by a delightfully eclectic collection of DJs, producers, and musicians. I owe each of these participants an equal measure of thanks, as this is really their album.

thesixtyone artists involved with the compilation (I'm probably missing some):
Jonathan Coulton
The Grammar Club
Brad Sucks
Glenn Case
Hidari
nYgel

For those whose interest is piqued, it's a free download at hipsterplease.com

AnnieB's Detour: Luisa Maita

While thesixtyone appears to be more geared toward indie rock, every so often we get a refreshing addition to the site. If you like CéU, you should definitely like the sounds of Luisa Maita, another native of the Brazilian São Paolo music scene. Modernizing traditional Brazilian music, she delivers a variety of samba, jazz, afrobeat, and soul, creating an eclectic sound that makes for easy listening.







Just in case you were unaware, she actually debuted on thesixtyone months ago with this track below. Took a while for it to take off from what I remember since some listeners told me it wasn’t there cup of tea at the moment, so I’m really glad she received a better reception this time around.



Lastly, she has also been featured on Musica de Bolsa, which is like Brazil’s equivalent to La Blogotheque’s Take Away Shows.

Sidenote: Once again, I highly recommend Aurgasm, a music blog that deviates from reporting the usual rock form and focuses on presenting a variety of other musical styles such as downtempo, folk, nu jazz, chanson, scandinavian, jazz, cuban, brazilian, electro, soul, jump blues, bluegrass, film score, and electronica.

AnnieB's Detour: Electric President

I’m a bit surprised Electric President didn’t take off immediately when it was uploaded to thesixtyone, especially when their sound reminds me of Death Cab for Cutie, Postal Service, and Styrofoam. A few weeks versus a day sort of shows how reliant we are on familiar names. Anyway, Electric President is comprised of two guys, Ben Cooper and Alex Kane.

….and I literally kept playing these two songs over and over again.





From last.fm:
The songs are characterized by nasalized voices, acoustic riffs, MD-four tracks, SM58, and some computers.

Also, to find out more about Ben Cooper’s other music projects, you can visit his website at this link. If you’re interested in checking out his artwork, you can click here.

P.S. I sent a brief message over myspace letting him know the songs were sitting at the top of the homepage at the time. He replied and was appreciative. So he knows about thesixtyone now, but I think it ends there.

Radical Face’s Website
Radical Face’s Mypace
Electric President’s Mypace (I think this one is run by the label)

AnnieB's Detour: The Ting Tings

How fantastic! The Ting Tings have a song featured as a free download this week on iTunes. The song is called “Great DJ” which according to NME, was the most popular indie track so far for 2008 back in March. Amazing what an accidental wrong chord can create when learning the guitar (see interview clip below).


The Ting Tings – Great DJ"

The Ting Tings is a British indie pop duo, and they are set to release their debut album, We Started Nothing, on May 20th. I was instantly hooked when I first heard the percussive opening of “That’s Not My Name” on KCRW’s Morning Becomes Eclectic last fall. The rest was just darn energetic and catchy, not to mention, there's handclapping too. Nic Harcourt even listed their self-released Demos as number two on his top 10 albums of 2007. You can also catch a studio session and interview they did on his program here.They’ll re-release the single on May 12th.


The Ting Tings – That’s Not My Name"

This next track below is actually my favorite of the bunch. You can even hear some cowbell in this one.


The Ting Tings – We Walk (Demo)

Also, they are now part of the iPod campaign, which features their song "Shut Up and Let Me Go".


Okay, signing off…Ting Ting Ting!!! Really, don’t you just love their name? Watch the Yahoo! interview and you can find out how they came up with it.



The Ting Tings myspace

AnnieB's Detour: Melody Gardot

Diving into the world of jazz, I liked this week’s iTunes free music download selection, Melody Gardot’s “Worrisome Heart”, the title track off her latest album.


Melody Gardot – Worrisome Heart

She has a very interesting story as well. Four years ago, she was struck by an SUV while riding her bicycle, suffering serious pelvic and head injuries where she could barely sit up for ten minutes. In addition, she endured short term memory loss and heightened sensitivity to light and sound which still continues even today. Thus, she has to wear sunglasses and hearing devices in order to perform. During her recovery period, her doctor suggested music therapy as a way to rebuild neuropathways in the brain. Unable to sit at the piano, she instead picked up a guitar and made some recordings from the bedside, eventually releasing them on an EP titled Some Lessons – The Bedroom Sessions. It’s interesting that prior to the accident, she didn’t even consider pursuing music as a career. Anyway, she is often described as a mix of Madeleine Peyroux and Norah Jones, the latter more apparent in some of her other less jazzy songs.


Melody Gardot - Goodnite

You can also check out her interview on NPR here.

Melody Gardot’s website
Melody Gardot’s myspace

AnnieB's Detour: Brooke Waggoner

Speaking of Teitur earlier, I’ve been meaning to post something for the longest time about this next artist who has recently been touring with him.


Brooke Waggoner – Hush If You Must

From CD Baby:
Brooke Waggoner began playing piano at age 4 and took classical lessons for a grand total of 17 years. She graduated with a bachelor's degree in music composition and orchestration, hoping to one day score films and orchestrate her own projects. She says her songs tell of a "lone 23-year-old girl, sagas of daily life, [and] bits of poetry" that are "all melded with honest proclamations and confessions."

At performances, she says she "tries to create pictures and take people on journeys." She pulls from many artists to create her sound, such as Electric Light Orchestra, Rodgers & Hammerstein, Aaron Copeland, David Bowie, and Chopin. Doo-wop, droopy melodies and sighs and swoons also find their way into her songs.

Never forgetting her classical lessons, Brooke says she strives to "connect the 'classical world' with the 'mainstream world' by showing people it all works hand-in-hand." Although they may be presented differently, she says: "The beauty in the structure of a Mozart piece is essentially the same structure used in pop songs”


Brooke Waggoner – I Am Mine

Anyway, here are a couple sites that provide reviews of her six-track Fresh Pair of Eyes EP, which you can download entirely for FREE at her website.
http://popwreck.blogspot.com/2008/03/brooke-waggoner-fresh-pair-of-eyes.html
http://www.stereosubversion.com/album-reviews/brooke-waggoner/

While the second review wasn’t all too thrilled about her EP, I really don’t think you can beat the fact that she made it available for free. I've listened to it multiple times over the months and that’s pretty good in my book.



Also, here’s another link of an interview conducted by Stereo Subversion. There’s a pretty good descriptive introduction as well.
http://www.stereosubversion.com/interviews-features/brooke-waggoner/

Brooke Waggoner’s website
Brooke Waggoner’s myspace

AnnieB's Detour: Gotye

You know, on rare occasions the Palms Out Blog does good things. While I may not like a majority of the mixes, it does introduce me to artists worth looking into a bit more, like this Belgium-born, Australian-raised, ARIA-award winning artist, Gotye (Wally De Backer). I honestly don’t even know where to begin in describing his sound because he has a very wide range. One song will you remind you of one artist, while another song will remind you of a different artist, or a combo…yet in the end, creating a sound all his own.

Anyhow, the song that came cruising through t61 is a remix of “Heart’s a Mess”. To me, the vocals in the mix start off like Junior Boys that then progress into something similar to Shiny Toy Guns. Check out the music video of the original version below.

He also has other crafty music videos which can be viewed here.

So where does the name Gotye come from? Well, according to wiki:
Wally was embarking on a project that was, in his own words, "about refiguring past things (old vinyl sounds) with my own ideas". It therefore seemed appropriate to draw on his past for inspiration for the project's name. Wouter, Gotye's real name, from Flemish translates into French as Gaultier (or Gautier or Gauthier). Wally's mother used to call him Gaultier as a pet name. Drawing on this and choosing his own spelling gives us 'Gotye'.

Gotye is pronounced "gore-ti-yeah" in Australian English.

In summary:
Wouter > Walter > Wally
Wouter > Gaultier > Gotye

Voila!

Gotye’s Website
Gotye’s Myspace

AnnieB's Detour: Thao Nguyen (t61 Reflections and Concert)

One of the early artists I learned about from t61 was Thao Nguyen. This may be strange, but I vividly remember "Beat (Health, Life, and Fire)" being the first song I ever double-bumped, and it was a rather costly, early bump too. However, it was well worth it when I was “poor” since I had listened to the song over and over again. What’s kind of interesting is that the listener who had “discovered” the song was my first-ever subscriber, which in turn ended up being the first listener I subscribed to (both cases excluding Sam and James, of course), and is now the first fellow 61er that I’ve met in real life…and out of all things, we caught Thao Nguyen in concert. Sort of brought things in full circle for me.

While temporarily sitting on a side bench inside The Echo (a hip, low-key, small venue in Los Angeles) before the show started, I looked down and about five or six feet in front me, I see these cowboys boots, which I knew was a signature of Thao’s…and long and behold, it was her standing and selling her merchandise at a table. I didn’t have the guts to talk to her or anything, but from what I observed, she seems really cool, charismatic, and down to earth.

It was almost inevitable for me to see Thao with the Get Down Stay Down perform. There was quite a bit of handclapping and stomping involved, and you guys know how much I like the handclapping. It was even syncopated too. They certainly brought the energy on the little stage. It also helped knowing her songs beforehand too because I don’t think these guys in front of me really knew who she was since they were pretty stoic and one kept checking his phone. On the other hand, I had these two girls right next to me who were upbeat and excited to see Thao, which made up for them initially trying to push me over to the side in attempts to move closer to the stage.

Occasionally in between songs, Thao would just say whatever came to mind. One was mentioning how she wanted to shop for some vintage clothing to wear for the show (there’s lots of vintage stores around the Silverlake/Echo Park area) but ended up wearing an outfit she’s been wearing for much of the tour, so she joked, “Don’t come any closer, really, don’t.” I wish I had pictures to share since I had a really good view, but unfortunately the few that I took came out all blurry since I hadn’t taken the time to learn the different functions on my relatively new digital camera. I’ll figure it out someday, but at least I found a picture on her myspace where she's wearing the same shirt dress, so that works.

All in all, I liked it. From what I can tell, most of the songs came from her latest album We Brave Bee Stings and All. Would've been nice to hear "Chivalry" but they ended up playing another song called "Tallymarks" off her previous album, Like the Linen. Anyway, being Vietnamese myself, it’s nice to see an artist like Thao break the conventional mold of indie folk rock. Too bad I couldn’t bring my friend who is also named Thao Nguyen (yes, it’s a very common Vietnamese name). Unfortunately that Thao has different taste in music and went to see Leona Lewis perform at the Jimmy Kimmel show.

Though you won’t get the same energy as from a live show, you can check out her studio performance on KCRW’s Morning Becomes Eclectic by clicking here. Below is a video clip of "Big Kid Table" from the live session.


Excerpt from an interview conducted by The Guide: Los Angeles Times:
Q:What do you want for yourself 10 years down the road?
A: I think I have very realistic goals. To be honest, I’d like to get a salad spinner…

Thao’s website
Thao’s myspace

A Conversation With Temple Scene

Among the musical gems that T61 listeners have bumped to glory are a dozen brilliant tunes from London's Temple Scene. Four of these near-flawless jewels were recently set into the Another Town EP. Temple Scene was kind enough to answer some questions from MaxBumps about their experience at t61, the new EP, and the process of crafting and polishing the musical treasures they've laid before us.

silkworm: What effect, if any, has your experience with thesixtyone.com had on the process of putting together the new EP? What are your thoughts about the site?

Temple Scene: Until recently, we’d been streaming the music and keeping our options open about the next move, but the fantastic feedback we’ve been getting on the61 encouraged us to re-assess that. There’s nothing more satisfying for a musician than people wanting to buy your music - and nothing more frustrating than telling them they can’t! The best part has been seeing the reaction to our songs. We just try and make music we like, but it’s amazing to find out that other people like it too.

Like a lot of people, we found the61 on Digg, and it was immediately clear that someone had finally solved some of the fundamental problems with music discovery sites. There are countless places that use competitions and votes as a way to get extra traffic from a band's existing fan base, but where no one has any incentive to stay and explore. the61 actually puts listeners in contact with new music, and makes it fun - any site that can do that is something special.

silkworm: Your EP, Another Town, is available in the US through Amazon.com's digital music marketplace - a great beginning! What's your ideal vision of how the commercial side of the band will evolve? Are you still sending your music to record labels or are you hoping to make your mark independently?

Temple Scene: Of course, we would love to have the kind of backing that would allow us to reach a huge audience, but at the moment, it’s just fantastic that there are people out there who have reacted in such a great way to our music.

The plan is to release our songs four tracks at a time, as E.P.s. This way we can build up a relationship with people by releasing new material on a regular basis, rather than throwing everything at a huge campaign every year or two for a whole album. If this E.P. goes well, we have things in place for the next two releases. In fact, we are just in the process of recording E.P. number four.

silkworm: The name of the EP "Another Town" is presumably taken from the lyrics to Everything: "And somewhere there's a wall falling down/ And these stones are gonna build another town." That sentiment of rebuilding is also echoed in the opening song Somewhere In This City: "...instead of beating your heart out/You can start again instead." Where do the inspirations for your lyrics come from and how do you go about crafting them?

Temple Scene: Many of our lyrics play with a sense of place, and it’s certainly this strand that makes these four tracks work together. "Somewhere In This City is about someone who feels the need to be uprooted, who never wants to stay still. It’s about trying to exert control over where you are emotionally by changing where you are physically.

"Breathing" is a natural counterpoint to this. It expresses almost the opposite feeling - of how someone feels dislocated and uncomfortable in unfamiliar surroundings. One song is about running away from life, the other is about trying to hide from it - neither character really knows how to connect with it.

"Everything" and "Half Life" continue the theme of our lives and relationships being a kind of journey. There is constant moving and searching in "Everything". "Half Life" is about pausing to take stock of where we’ve come from and where we've got to.

We try to get across feelings and sensations rather than concrete stories, but we tend to have a type of lead character in each song. We create a personality and then put them in a situation and imagine how they are feeling. The fact that we write together has a big influence on this - instead of only having our own experiences to draw on, we pool them and come up with something - or rather someone - new.

silkworm: And on the topic of names, here's the obligatory question - how did you come up with the name Temple Scene and does it have any special meaning?

Temple Scene: It's nothing more complicated than a corruption of Temple Sheen, a place near where we make our music.

silkworm: Blog contributor Apocalypse says that, to him, Temple Scene's music embodies the "hopeful melancholy of attachments," and that "each song is nearly a perfect one act play, taking us through a full range of emotions, all the way to catharsis." He would like to know, how much thought goes into the arrangement or layering of each song? Or is that just a natural progression of the collaboration between the two of you?

Temple Scene: We know broadly the feelings we want to get across, but we work pretty instinctively and we often feel like we’re just going along for the ride - we’ll know what it sounds like when it’s finished!

Brian Eno said you should “use your limitations as secret strengths” and we definitely believe that having certain musical avenues closed off to you is a help, rather than a hindrance - it gives you a direction. The most obvious example of this is our working lives. There are huge benefits to being audio engineers, particularly having the chance to watch some great people at work. On the flip side, the hours are long and unpredictable. This has meant we have to be a two-piece, so that juggling our time is just about workable. Trying to keep up a full-size band would probably be very unfair on the other members when they were left hanging around.

It’s meant that there are often periods when just one of us is able to work on a track for some time. Finding that a track had taken shape and completely changed in your absence was difficult at first but we think it has some real advantages. It gives each of us opportunities to run with ideas without them being shot down before they're fully formed. Also, it helps us remain objective which is important when you're not working with outside producers who come along with a fresh set of ears. We’ve got to the stage now where if the other guy comes back and says “Sorry, but I really don’t like what you’ve done”, it’s not a problem. We trust each other’s judgement.

It’s also directly affected the sound of the music. We don’t have a full band, so we have to build up the songs ourselves, piece by piece, and this lends itself to a certain kind of music. So at a given moment we might be listening to Jeff Buckley or Johnny Cash, but of course the way we have to work favours a more constructed, electronic type of sound. We’re not wedded to that sound - but we’re not scared of being pushed into it either.

silkworm: Throughout your experience recording top musicians, what's the most interesting or strange tip you've picked up from a musician and then applied to your own work? Which musicians inspire you musically or lyrically?

Temple Scene: The most important things we've learned are not so much specific tricks as instincts. Working for a long time with really good people, you gradually start to judge performances differently. Sometimes you need to keep at something until it's perfect, but sometimes perfection would ruin it. For example, we’ve learned to always record constantly when we're jamming around ideas for a guitar part - things often come out so much better the first time you play them, when you're not thinking about it.

In terms of influences, we’ve both always been drawn to music with rich, multi-layered sounds and a dark edge, such as Depeche Mode, R.E.M. and Pink Floyd. But one great thing about working with so many musicians is that they always end up showing you the music they love, and this has really broadened our tastes. We’ve discovered so much music that had somehow passed us by - like Carole King, Jeff Buckley and Robert Johnson. Of course, we have our individual tastes as well - Ric grew up listening to Michael Jackson and Lenny Kravitz; for Philippe it was Prince and Bob Marley.

silkworm: There's a nascent topic on the MaxBumps.net forums dedicated to recording gear. What gear do you the two of you use to help create such a full and polished sound? What about live performances?

Temple Scene: We’ve done all of our own music in a home studio, in Logic. We make sure each song is self-contained, so if we’re busy and having to ‘tag-team’, one of us can just load up and see where the other had left off. When we’re recording in a proper studio we use Pro Tools (or tape!), which is much more streamlined for dedicated recording, but as a studio-in-a-box it’s hard to beat Logic.

We’ve also made a big investment in plug-ins and samples; most of the Native Instruments stuff (amazing sounds but you have to put up with the bugs) and Waves. We tend to use Waves SSL channels as our go-to when mixing because they are the desks we are most used to in the real world.

Guitar-wise we do have a lovely Strat which you can hear doing the slide on Everything, but most of the time we use Philippe’s Telecaster which is such a simple, reliable guitar. The acoustic is Philippe’s Taylor (bizarrely, given that Ric plays more of the guitar, Philippe is the one who obsesses over them!). Since we’re recording in a home studio, all the guitar amp sounds are modelled (mostly NI Guitar Rig) and the limitations of this have again forced us to be creative with our sounds. For example, we don’t much like simulated amp sounds on big chugging guitar chords - they always seem to turn to mush. That why on Breathing we’ve got big Green Day style thrashing guitar on the chorus... but played on acoustics!

We enjoy throwing in odd sounds, too, like Ric’s suitcase harmonium. Such a delicate instrument, and we don’t really know what we’re doing with it, but it sounds great!

We haven’t been playing live recently because our jobs would make it so difficult for the other members of a 4 or 5 piece band. It’s something we regret - we would absolutely love to work out how we could get out and play for some of the people on thesixtyone and MySpace, but we’re not sure if people would want to see just the two of us playing over a backing tape!

AnnieB's Detour: Estelle

Alright, I’m going to stray into the mainstream world a bit because I really like this next artist who Rolling Stones listed as an ‘artist to watch’ last year. Her name is Estelle. She’s British and is already pretty big in the UK from what I’ve read and is starting to make a bigger mark in the States. She’s been compared to Lauryn Hill since they share a similar musical style and pull influences from all sorts of genres. That, and Estelle can rap and sing. I also sort of think of her as the female counterpart of John Legend, which makes sense since she was the first artist signed to his record label, Homeschool Records. Her album, Shine, has already been released in the UK and is set to release in the U.S. on April 29th.

Her current single is “American Boy” featuring Kanye West which is already No. 1 in the UK. Speaking of Kanye West, there’s a new video out for his song “Homecoming” featuring Chris Martin.

Music Videos:
American Boy
Wait a Minute (Just a Touch)

Other tracks:
Estelle - No Substitute Love
Estelle - In The Rain

She has also worked with Faithless on a song called “Why Go” which I really like. If you haven’t already done so, check out the video. It should possibly encourage you to enjoy life and keep on dancing.

And to tie this entire post back to t61, guess who has done a mix of her current single? That’s right, Danger! Have a listen.
Estelle - American Boy (Danger Remix)

Estelle’s Myspace

I'll have some brie with that baguette: Taste of Japan - part 1

I started writing a comment to AnnieB's Teriyaki Boyz story, but quickly realised that the following links deserved a separate post.

First off, NIGO. I bought Nigo's (B)APE SOUNDS a while back, during a trip in Japan. I was in a Virgin Megastore in Tokyo and decided to buy a bucket load of Japanese music to take back home as fun souvenirs. I picked up CDs completely randomly and I actually ended up liking most of what I had bought. Not only that, but it also kicked off an interest in Japanese music that carries on to this day. I picked (B)APE SOUNDS off the racks for no paticular reason except that the CD cover looked really cool. I got lucky: it's a great album. The fact that I don't understand the lyrics, not being a Japanese speaker, is not really a problem to me (it could be a put off for some people I guess).

Here's a song from (B)APE SOUNDS, called "Planet of the Babes".

Now, here's another major hip-pop act from Japan that I like: M-Flo.



M-Flo is known to bring together foreign influences and Japanese sensibilities. Here's a really good example of that: M-Flo + Monkey Majik.

AnnieB's Detour: Teriyaki Boyz

Alright, so this next post of mine is completely out of left field as I know zilch about hip hop. However, I stumbled upon this new single that’s been out for a couple weeks from a group I haven’t heard of before but has worked with extremely notable producers.

From wikipedia:
“Teriyaki Boyz is a j-hip hop group from Tokyo, Japan. The four MCs in the group are Ilmari and Ryo-Z from Rip Slyme, VERBAL from m-flo, and WISE. Nigo is the DJ and founder of the popular Japanese streetware brand A Bathing Ape. Hence the group members are prominently seen sporting Bathing Ape wear for live concerts and in music videos.

Their debut album from Def Jam Recordings and (B)APE Sounds titled Beef or Chicken? was produced by a who's who of rap and electronica producers including ADROCK of the Beastie Boys, Cornelius, Cut Chemist, Daft Punk, Dan the Automator, DJ Premier, DJ Shadow, Just Blaze, Mark Ronson, and The Neptunes. Their first single "HeartBreaker", was produced by Daft Punk and contains elements of the Daft Punk song "Human After All".

Two tracks by the Teriyaki Boyz were featured on the The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift soundtrack, the title track "Tokyo Drift (Fast and the Furious)", and "Cho L A R G E", featuring Pharrell which had previously been released on their debut album Beef or Chicken?.

In 2007 the single, "I Still Love H.E.R.", was released, which was produced by and featured Kanye West. West also appears in the promotional video, which was shot as a YouTube parody.

On March 19 2008, the Teriyaki Boyz released their latest single, "ZOCK ON!", featuring Pharrell and Busta Rhymes.”

I don't know the slightest bit of Japanese, so I'm not really sure what they're rapping about, but it's catchy and has...how you say, a phat beat? (I'm definitely not one to use that sort of lingo.) Though, I did manage to skim through the video comments and find out that "zock on" is an anglicized spelling of a phrase in Japanese slang, zokkon, which is often used to describe when one is seriously crushing on someone or something, if that helps. Anyway, I like the suaveness Pharrell adds to the track. And a slight comment on the video, I could do without Busta Rhymes's attempts on breakdancing.

Also, I've linked the other tracks to videos I found on YouTube if you're inclined to check those out too.

[Sidenote: I've updated my post on Low vs Diamond by including a recent video clip they've added to their myspace.]