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Thursday, December 31, 2015

Reset, refresh, renew: 16 songs for 2016 about starting over

Welcome to 2016!

“New year, new you” is a bit simplistic, but it is tempting to think that just like September ushers in a sense of possibility for students, so does January 1 bring with it a little something like hope.

But starting over isn’t easy and sometimes it seems absolutely impossible. New beginnings aren’t all sweeping changes and dramatic overhauls. Sometimes it’s as simple as reading a page a day of a new book, flossing, or throwing out the socks that have holes in them. Whether you’re resetting, refreshing, renewing or starting over in a big, bold way, we have 16 songs to help you take on 2016.



Sally Seltmann, ‘Dream About Changing’

Australia’s Sally Seltmann knows a bit about writing perfect pop songs. She co-wrote Feist’s beloved “1234” and this little ditty about identity overhaul holds its own against that mammoth hit. “I close my eyes and dream about changing,” Seltmann sings wistfully against a sweetly sunny backdrop.



Thao & the Get Down Stay Down, ‘Brand New Key’

The stompy brass and drums cover of Melanie’s ’70s-era hit is packed with attitude and affection. But the best part is Thao Nguyen’s vocal delivery: every line is a wink and a coy shrug, and it’s endlessly charming.


 

Hey Rosetta!, ‘Promise’

“You don’t know me or my purpose / or my promise, I got promise,” Tim Baker sings on this hugely vulnerable song. It’s self-affirming and soul crushing in all the best ways.


 

Lucius, ‘Turn It Around’

Participating in one’s own destruction is a rite of passage. Please don’t worry, we’ve all been there, and thankfully now we have a song to soundtrack our solo dance parties when we’re stubbornly refusing to break our own stupid cycles. “Turn it around turn it around:” an anthem for all of us.


 

Hayden, 'Nowhere We Cannot Go'

There’s so much tenderness in this song that it has to be couched in an almost wry, clever delivery. Hayden’s wisdom is hard-won and wholehearted: “I do it all the time / Forget the man I’m tryin’ / To be because I’m climbin’.”


 

Laura Mvula , 'Green Garden'

Twinkling percussion and handclaps, every beat of this song is flooded with sunshine and renewal, particularly Mvula’s soulful, earthy and enchanting voice as she turns a simple celebration of nature into one of the most gloriously, infectiously cheerful songs of the decade.


 

Naomi Shelton & The Gospel Queens, ‘Bound For The Promised Land’

Whatever your version of a “promised land” looks like, Naomi Shelton’s voice is a never-ending gift and the groove of this gospel stunner is impossible to deny.


 

Lennon & Maisy, ‘Bright Side’

The Canadian sister duo formerly known as the Stella Sisters (and who can be seen regularly on Nashville) have a way with covers but this shiny, happy singalong gem is an original tune and it’s the perfect pick me up to start off the new year.


 

The Zombies, ‘This Will Be Our Year’

This rock classic just never goes out of style. In part, it’s the phenomenal arrangement and the flourishes of brass throughout, but it’s also the lyrics, which are perfectly uplifting and yet rooted in some darkness.


 

Basia Bulat, ‘From Now On’

Beautiful and contemplative, Basia Bulat’s piano-driven meditation on moving forward is short (under three minutes), but she packs so much narrative inside its slim frame, it’s like an Alice Munro short story with melody.


 

Modest Mouse, ‘Float On’

The strange magic of this song — jolty, jagged vocals, great lead guitar, perfect, stamping bass — is just how compulsively listenable and catchy it is. The singalong shift at the end is the ultimate perseverance anthem for both slackers and the overly anxious: “Alright already, we’ll all float on / alright don’t worry / even if things end up a bit too heavy / we’ll all float on alright.”


 

Leisure Cruise, ‘The Getaway’

“Don’t wanna take the highway / wanna go our own way,” sings Leah Siegel on this spacey, synth-pop soundtrack to overhauling one’s whole world without a backward glance. Shimmering and vulnerable, this is pure sonic courage, the sound of 1000 hands cheering you on into a new adventure, a new year.


 

The Walkmen, ‘In The New Year’

It’s not always a clean break. Stuff gets messy. Take refuge inside the barroom brawl of Hamilton Leithauser’s vocals as the words tumble like shadow boxers out of his mouth: “I know that it’s true / It’s gonna be a good year / Out of the darkness / And into the fire.”


 

Tom Waits, ‘Ol' 55’

It’s the crescendo of Waits’ voice against the sparse restraint of the acoustic guitar. But it’s also the expanse of his voice opening up as he sings about the sun coming up, the life we feel and the promise of a new day, of surviving another night, of staring down the open road again, and the quiet solitude of promise.


 

David Bowie, ‘A New Career In A New Town’

This is the sonic equivalent of hope and new beginnings for David Bowie, who wrote this instrumental mind-melter after leaving Los Angeles in an attempt to kick his cocaine addiction. Chunky and delicate, funky and spacelike, upbeat and sluggish, it’s full of contradictions and utterly confounding, but also completely great.  


 

Florence + The Machine, ‘Dog Days Are Over’

Soaring and sprawling, a brilliant energy flows through Florence Welch’s wild, dark heart. It’s a dance party to shake off all the demons, a parade to welcome back those who were lost or gold glitter cannons shooting into the sky to celebrate a fresh start.

Happy New Year!

Hang out with me on Twitter: @_AndreaWarner


by Andrea Warner via Electronic RSS

LCD Soundsystem to play Coachella, say reports

James Murphy will re-form LCD Soundsystem for a slot at the Californian festival, according to the New York Times

LCD Soundsystem could be set for a surprise comeback, with reports suggesting they are due to play California’s Coachella festival in 2016. James Murphy’s seminal electronic outfit have not played live since a farewell show at Madison Square Garden in 2011.

According to the New York Times, LCD Soundsystem will be coaxed out of retirement to appear at the festival, alongside another alleged surprise booking – a headline slot by Guns N’ Roses, featuring Axl Rose and Slash.

Related: James Murphy: soundtrack of my life

Continue reading...
by Guardian music via Electronic music | The Guardian

The Underground Is Massive: How Electronic Dance Music Conquered America by Michaelangelo Matos – review

Why, after three decades, is rave culture suddenly big business in America? A history of the scene links its rise to the internet

Three decades after its inception in preponderantly black and gay club scenes, dance music has finally seized commercial hegemony over the white, middle-American audiences that had previously ignored it. In the process, however, the nomenclature has been disfigured. I can’t think of any three-letter abbreviation that discomfits me as viscerally as EDM (electronic dance music), nor one that forces me into such stark confrontation with the depths of my own elitism.

In the introduction to The Underground Is Massive, the music journalist Michaelangelo Matos’s chronicle of the genre’s strange journey from chthonian reverie to ubiquitous clamour, the dread letters are unfurled in their redundant ungainliness. Like three shuffling dads shanghaied into a four-legged race at a school sports day, EDM as a term is desperately behind the curve and painfully parochial. Thinking of those for whom house, techno and their evolutionary offshoots have long been the only game in town, I’m reminded of a brilliant scene in Girls, where Jemima Kirke’s Jessa hurls a bottle at two “crusty sacks of shit”, one of whom responds: “You’re going to reduce us to a subculture and then not accurately name the subculture? Nice.”

He bites his tongue regarding the current generation of superstar DJs

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by Alexis Forss via Electronic music | The Guardian

The playlist: the best Middle Eastern and North African music of 2015 – with Insanlar, Melechesh and Mdou Moctar

From a Purple Rain tribute that doesn’t have the word purple to the keyboard king of the Nile delta, here are some of the year’s best soundtracks, metal and more

This amazing slice of Turkish psych disco was recorded live at MiniMüzikhol studios in Istanbul in 2010. Thanks to Honest Jon’s, it finally got a full UK release – backed by two decent Ricardo Villalobos remixes – earlier this year. These time-dilating grooves, pitch-shifted vocals (the lyrics are modernised verses by the 17th-century poet Kul Nesîmî and 16th-century poet Pir Sultan Abdal), acid house beeps and blats, not to mention smoking bağlama jamming, all add up to an essential Balearic-sounding classic that never outstays its welcome, even at 24 minutes long.

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by John Doran via Electronic music | The Guardian

Wednesday, December 30, 2015

BamaLoveSoul: Black Zone Ensemble – Chasing the Light


BamaLoveSoul: Black Zone Ensemble – Chasing the Light

Link to Bama Love Soul

Posted: 29 Dec 2015 02:10 AM PST

Black Zone Ensemble – Chasing the Light

“Some call it Lounge, Balearic House and/or Nu Bossa, but what Black Zone Ensemble are really all about it…a laid back vintage party sound for adults.” This is the first sentence you read when you visit Black Zone Ensemble‘s Bandcamp page to purchase Chasing the Light. My introduction to Italian writer and musician Daniele Miglietta’s sound was the Bossa/House hybrid, Na Hora Certa (Listen) so I wasn’t sure quite what to expect upon hearing the other 12 tracks on the album. No need for concern however, because although largely unlike my entrance point into the collective’s music, the tracks still bang from start to finish! If I had to make comparisons, I would place it as a cross between Incognito, Koop and Bebel Gilberto, however we only get vocals on the aforementioned Na Hora Certa. Perfect for relaxing with a Mojito or entertaining with a pitcher of Sangria!

XLR8R News and Features: XLR8R's New Years Party Guide


XLR8R News and Features: XLR8R's New Years Party Guide

Link to XLR8R


Resident Advisor is marking its 500th podcast in style by enlisting five top producers and DJs to contribute exclusive mixes. Dixon (pictured above), SteffiBen UFO, and Nicolas Jaar mixed four of the series' most successful entries and have returned for an encore, while Detroit's Omar-S is making his inaugural appearance. Stream and download all five mixes and get details of how and where each mix was recorded here.

DJBooth.net: [Download] Russ - 2 A.M.


NPR Jazz: For John Scofield, Everything Old Is New Again — Even The Hard Parts


NPR Jazz: For John Scofield, Everything Old Is New Again — Even The Hard Parts

Link to Jazz : NPR

John Scofield's latest album, Past Present, reunites an old quartet for set of tunes steeped in reflection and loss.

John Scofield's latest album, Past Present, reunites an old quartet for set of tunes steeped in reflection and loss.
Philippe Levy/Courtesy of the artist
Jazz guitarist John Scofield has had a pretty remarkable career. Without even finishing music school, he found himself on the Carnegie Hall stage playing with jazz legends Chet Baker and Gerry Mulligan. Then it was on to Miles Davis, his own successful jazz-funk fusion groups, and even greater exposure playing with jam bands. His latest release, Past Present, takes him back to a sound he perfected in the early 1990s — and it's up for two Grammys in 2016.

Scofield didn't come from a particularly musical family, nor was there much music happening in the suburban Connecticut town where he grew up. But he is definitely a product of his place and time: the early 1960s.




SONGS WE LOVE
Songs We Love: John Scofield, 'Mr. Puffy'

URB Magazine: Editors Pick 2015 Top 10 Albums (Chris Carrasquillo Version)


URB Magazine: Editors Pick 2015 Top 10 Albums (Chris Carrasquillo Version)

Link to URB Magazine



2015 top 10 Carasquillo
Posted: 27 Dec 2015 01:00 PM PST
I pretty much got all albums that are coming out for this year unless a mixtape drops. All 2015 releases. D’Angelo’s Black Messiah would have been No. 4 but it released 2014.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!!

10. PROF, Liability:

2015: when music destroyed mental health stigma

Candid talk about psychological illness, from Brian Harvey’s industry takedown to the Amy Winehouse documentary, dismantled stereotypes about depression in a year of refreshing openness

Last January, East 17 singer Brian Harvey posted a video online. Filmed in a brick-walled alleyway, it showed the musician smashing up his own platinum discs before delivering a short explanation to the camera: “That’s what I think of your fucking music industry.” Harvey, it emerged, had reached a point of despair with a business that had offered him no care and no financial or psychological support. Despite having sold 18m records, he now struggled to heat his home, suffered from long-term depression and frequently contemplated killing himself.

Historically, there has been a near-fetishisation of the relationship between mental illness and creativity, as if one might feed the other, as if Oscar Levant’s assertion that “there’s a fine line between genius and insanity” was true. What’s notable about the coverage of mental illness in the music industry in 2015, however, is how profoundly normalised its portrayal has been. Harvey’s video marked the beginning of a year in which the industry’s approach to mental illness seemed to shift; musicians began discussing problems with a striking candour and readiness. From Pete Doherty’s anxiety attacks before Libertines shows and Ezra Furman’s songs about mental precariousness to Florence Welch’s public account of depression, there has been no flaming glamour to these tales, only straight-talking stories of the distress and the drudgery of mental turmoil.

Related: When rap raged against racism – 2015 and the black protest anthem

This industry is all about perception: a lot of people wouldn’t want anybody to think they’re weak, or that they can’t do what they do, or that they’re not cool. Nobody wants to come clean, let alone an artist.

Continue reading...
by Laura Barton via Electronic music | The Guardian

FACT Magazine Aphex Twin drunkenly uploads new track, ‘T17 Phase Out’ @ Musique Non Stop


DJBooth.net: [Listen] Nef The Pharaoh - No Masturbation


XLR8R News and Features: Podcast 419: DeWalta & Shannon - XLR8R Festival 2016 Tulum Edition


XLR8R News and Features: Podcast 419: DeWalta & Shannon - XLR8R Festival 2016 Tulum Edition

Link to XLR8R




Podcast 419: DeWalta & Shannon - XLR8R Festival 2016 Tulum Edition

We here at XLR8R are excited—and not just because we're finishing up an amazing 2015, with what's looking to be a great new year just around the corner. No, what's really got our heart pumping is the anticipation of XLR8R Festival 2016, coming up in Tulum, Mexico on January 6. The lineup for the gathering's premiere edition is damn near epic, withBlond:ish, Dauwd, Deadbeat, Rebolledo, Rob Garza of Thievery Corporation, Clovis, Roam and—last but certainly not least—Mike Shannon and DeWalta all part of the lineup. For our final podcast of the year, we've tapped those last two artists, frequent partners on the decks and in the studio (the pair have an album coming out soon on the Indigo Raw label), to collaborate on a mix. And are we ever glad we did, as they've come up with a captivating set of tunes that veer between dreamland house, stripped-down jackers and plenty more. “It’s a selection of tracks that showcase the dancefloor side of what we’ve been up to in the studio," the two inform us. "All of the tracks in this mix are written and produced, or remixed by either Shannon or DeWalta—or by DeWalta & Shannon together. All of this content is still unreleased or forthcoming. We hope you enjoy the sound!" We do, guys, we do—and we're sure you will as well. Have a great New Year's Eve…and see you in Tulum!



Podcast 419: DeWalta & Shannon - XLR8R Tulum 2016 Festival Edition by Xlr8r on Mixcloud


01 Mike Shannon “Chez Michel’s Spaceship Landing Intro” (Apollonia )(forthcoming)
02 Le Loup "Champagne Magnum" (DeWalta remix) (Concrete Music) (forthcoming)
03 DeWalta & Shannon "Lets Begin" (unreleased)
04 DeWalta & Shannon "Wilson Space" Residual Album (Indigo Raw) (forthcoming)
05 Nu Zau "Fum E" (DeWalta Remix) (Castanea)
06 DeWalta "Snyperope" (unreleased)
07 DeWalta & Shannon "Skipjack“ Residual Album (Indigo Raw) (forthcoming)
08 DDMS "Tintin´s Rocket" (Mike Shannon mix) (unreleased)
09 Mike Shannon "Over and Over" (Berlin Romance mix) (Castelar Discos) (forthcoming)
10 DeWalta & Shannon "Come Dance" (unreleased)
11 DDMS "Snowy" (DeWalta mix) (unreleased)
12 Mike Shannon "McFilthy" (unreleased)
13 Wareika & Maijika "Keen To Rebel" (DeWalta & Shannon remix) (Visionquest) (forthcoming)
14 DeWalta & Shannon "Right Under Your Tongue" (Indigo Raw) (forthcoming)

Stones Throw News: Stones Throw Podcast 94 - 45 Minutes of Funk by PB Wolf and Dam-Funk


STONES THROW PODCAST 94 - 45 MINUTES OF FUNK BY PB WOLF AND DAM-FUNK

Stones Throw Podcast 94 - 45 Minutes of Funk by PB Wolf and Dam-Funk

  • December 29, 2015
Stones Throw Podcast is free. Subscribe using any podcast software or aggregator. 

Download on iTunes | ST PODCAST #94: 45 MINUTES OF FUNK 

Peanut Butter Wolf and Dam-Funk each created a 45 minute funk mix, using all 45s, 7-inch vinyl. A few cassettes were made of the mixes, and here they are for those of us in the digital world.

Hey hello @pbwolf @DaMFunK 

Tuesday, December 29, 2015

New Year's Eve party playlist 2015: Jess Glynne, Peaches, Kendrick Lamar, more

New Year’s Eve can sometimes be way too much, but we’re here to help the best way we know how: by giving you a great, versatile soundtrack that should cover almost every NYE situation.

Solo dance party, pre-gaming hype music, late-night polar bear swim, gala ball or DIY DJing your own wild and rollicking midnight countdown — this playlist of fantastic tracks from 2015 will get you grooving, shaking, shimmying, sidestepping and stanky-legging like nobody’s business. Check out the list of artists below, press play and then pump up the volume.

Artists on the 2015 NYE party playlist

Jess Glynne
The Weeknd
The Internet
Missy Elliott
Chvrches
Peaches
Sleater-Kinney
Grimes
Zedd
Shamir
Silentó
Drake
Disclosure ft. Lion Babe
Rihanna
Taylor Swift
Calvin Harris & Disciples
Thundercat
Icona Pop
Kendrick Lamar
Malukayi (feat. Konono No.1)
Carly Rae Jepsen
Skrillex and Diplo ft. Justin Bieber
Hailee Steinfeld
Major Lazer ft. Ellie Goulding and Tarrus Riley
Petite Noir
Majid Jordan
Snakehips ft. Tinashe and Chance the Rapper
Robyn, La Bagatelle Magique ft. Maluca
Nicki Minaj

Hang out with me on Twitter: @_AndreaWarner


by Andrea Warner via Electronic RSS

Guru Josh, rave star, dies aged 51

Agent confirms the death of Jersey-born musician, who had a pan-European hit with Infinity as rave culture invaded the charts in 1990

The musician Guru Josh, who had a hit with Infinity in 1990 as rave culture swept Britain, has died aged 51.

His agent, Sharron Elkabas, confirmed to the Guardian that Guru Josh, whose real name was Paul Walden, had died in Ibiza on Monday. The cause of death is unclear.

Continue reading...
by Alex Needham via Electronic music | The Guardian

Slamming, smiling and unearthly silence – the music gigs our writers loved most in 2015

From Mary J Blige in the rain to Coldplay in a church and Craig Finn at the seaside – here are our writer’s most memorable shows of the year

Some musicians are clearly born with more stamina than others. In 2014, aged 86, Ennio Morricone was forced to cancel his O2 show after spending the year recovering from a spinal injury. Yet he swiftly rescheduled it for the following February, neatly timing it to land on my birthday (thanks, Ennio, just leave my cake with the cloakroom staff).

Continue reading...
by Tim Jonze, Dorian Lynskey, Alexis Petridis, Dave Simpson, Tshepo Mokoena, Harriet Gibsone, Michael Hann and Kate Hutchinson via Electronic music | The Guardian

Monday, December 28, 2015

Hidden gems: all the artists you should have listened to in 2015

There's always so much great music, and so much super-hyped music, that sometimes truly wonderful artists put out great albums and almost nobody notices.

It's an awful fate for a piece of art that has, ostensibly, been lovingly crafted and created by hard-working, talented folks who put a lot of time and money into making their dreams come true. But the great thing about taking stock of the year that was is that we can "rediscover" — or properly celebrate — musicians who never quite got their dues when they should have.

There are so many incredibly cool, unusual and inspiring artists you may have never heard of on the list below. Some of these artists have been covered by CBC Music in the last 12 months, but others are totally new to the site and we couldn't be more thrilled to help you discover these hidden gems of 2015.

Tweet us @CBCMusic or comment on this post and tell us how many names below are new to you. We'd also love your suggestions regarding other musicians we absolutely must check out before the new year.



Petite Noir

From the First Play of La Vie Est Belle / Life Is Beautiful: You've never heard anything quite like Petite Noir's incredible debut album. It's futuristic, nostalgic, traditional and modern all at once, an impossible feat in anybody else's hands, yet this is the expansive, wide-open heart of Petite Noir's Yannick Ilunga. Every track could be equally at home on a runway or an afternoon on the beach, a house party or an after-hours club. It's music for everyone and everywhere precisely because of its sense of future: a future where influences coalesce and blend and morph seamlessly, naturally, unrestrained by genre. Ilunga is leading us toward something special, a promised land of some kind, where life really is beautiful. This is a remarkable debut from a thrilling new artist.



Sheer Mag

Drown inside the distortion of Sheer Mag’s gorgeous, abrasive, intricate brick wall of sound. The Philly punk outfit (who also can’t get enough of '70s rock) would be at home on a bill with Shannon and the Clams, Chastity Belt, La Luz and a number of fantastic, next generation DIY-ers who cram a ton of scratchy, melodic feelings inside seemingly simple, three-minute arrangements. Plus, lead singer Tina Halladay unleashes a tornado every time she opens her mouth on the band's latest release, II EP, and it’s absolutely mesmerizing.



Gang Signs

From the First Play of Geist: It is weird and great, gloomy and glamorous, a hypnotic utopia of electronic ambiance, wild dark heart and cool, chilled-out spaciousness. Like the fractious chaos of a dance floor in a cave entirely rigged with black light, Geist is the kind of party where you never know quite what will happen next and the tension is both delicious and vaguely unnerving, though never off-putting.



THEESatisfaction

From the First Play of EarthEE: THEESatisfaction’s EarthEE is a historical reckoning of racism and reconciliation, social responsibility and equality, justice and sexism. The album feels like it contains its own ecosystem. From the opening track, which begins with an erratic pulse-like drumbeat, it’s total immersion into Stas and Cat’s world. Every moment is rooted in spacious, natural, sometimes esoteric beats. It’s a sonically challenging, chilled out, blissful creation, where samples are stacked and staggered, breathing and bleeding into each other. At turns it’s angry, sexy, vulnerable, empowering and healing, every moment flowing like liquid gold into the next.



Girlpool

The title track off of Girlpool’s debut album is like riding swings with your BFF. You reach that moment when you get almost too high and yet you hold hands because the immense risk of that two seconds when you take your fingers off the chain is totally worth it as soon as your palms touch. You’re flying, together, holding on so tight you’re choking the sky. The duo’s voices climb up against each other and loop round and round: “I just miss how it felt standing next to you/ wearing matching dresses/ before the world was big.” Deceptively simple but deeply affecting.



Jazmine Sullivan

Sullivan has always been amazing, but she doesn’t nearly get the recognition she deserves. Her newest album, Reality Show, was pure fireworks and should have pushed her into the spotlight. Instead, it got buried, but it’s never too late to appreciate excellence. Just make sure you tell all your friends after you fall in love. This is not a secret you should keep to yourself; her boundless talent and the joyful, bruising beauty of her voice deserve gushing adulation.



Teen Daze

From the First Play of Teen Daze’s new album: Morning World is a beautiful bird’s nest of a record. The flawless production provides a lush, layered foundation to the 11 near-perfect tracks, some of which are fragile in their delicate beauty, while others stretch and soar from first flight. Here, the music is everything, so deliberate and evocative that it can crack you in half with a perfectly placed acoustic guitar interlude then sweep you into a blissed-out zone, conjuring happy memories that maybe once were too painful to recall.



Loon Choir

From the First Play of All of This and Everything Else: For all that the record is awash in sounds and chamber pop waves, there are so many tiny moments that stand out: the rolling guitar line of "Mountains;" the scurry of strings crashing into drums while the piano fights for space on "Spiral;" the collision of voices catapulting across the final moments of the thunderous final track, "Shipping Lanes." All of This and Everything Else is the kind of record that will remake its shape with every listen. It can be as big or as small as you need it to be. It belongs to you.



Hop Along

Equal parts pained and pure, Philadelphia’s Hop Along isn’t quite like anything you’ve ever heard. Frances Quinlan’s voice is at turns rough and ragged, then suddenly sweet and sharp, like sugared glass shattering into a million pieces. Her shouts become screams, as if she’s a metal singer who woke up in an indie folk band, and yet Hop Along’s music never feels disjointed or unsatisfactory. Rather, their sound is defined by the precision of their imperfections, which is just one of the reasons to love their newest album, Painted Shut.



Melanie Fiona

The Toronto R&B artist should be a household name. Honestly, we should all be mad and questioning what is wrong with us as a country that she’s not revered as a national treasure. On her newest release, Awake, Fiona’s not afraid to take risks in her song selection and there’s a wild and willful centre at the heart of every word she sings.  



Dralms

Dreamy and devastating, the Vancouver-based band’s sound is slinky and psychedelic, spooky and sophisticated, gentle but insistent. It’s hard to know where to fit them in or what to do with them — can you throw a party where you exclusively play end-of-party slow jams throughout the whole night? A cycle of never-ending endings is its own magical spell. Dive into Dralms' newest release, Shook, and lose yourself.



Samantha Savage Smith

From the First Play of Fine Lines: This collection is a buoyant bunch of pop balloons and sugary melodies, but this isn't a quick-dissolve, cotton-candy job. The songs are teaming with intelligence and clever insights about love in all its blissful and screwed-up permutations. The groove of the opening track, "It's a Burn," is warm and inviting, and there's something really interesting about the way everybody plays fast and loose with the tempo. This sets the tone for the record: there are lots of quirks, tiny moments and deliberate little tweaks that reward a closer listen.



The Internet

Sometimes an artist’s name is just a shade too clever. Seriously, try Googling "the Internet." But once you finally get there, it’s so worthwhile. The new album, Ego Death, is sexy, expansive and so very soulful. There’s so much heart and vulnerability here and it does something similar to the Weeknd and a few other neo-soul/R&B groups right now, which is to plant one foot firmly in the past while placing the other far into the future, crafting a sound that’s both familiar and fresh. Plus, Syd tha Kyd is one of the coolest producers and vocalists working today.


 

LISTEN

Siskiyou

From the First Play of Nervous: Siskiyou’s Nervous is needles, bees, blood, voices in your head, a spider crawling up your neck — and then just as quickly, the album's awash in a sunny glow, becomes a slow-burning kiss, a walk in the woods, a heated blanket on a winter’s night. Whatever you’re most afraid of and whatever brings you tiny respites of joy, Nervous is a conjuror one minute, a soothsayer the next.


 

LISTEN

Masia One

The Canadian hip-hop artist dropped a new track earlier this year, which is hopefully a hint of more to come in 2016. She’s worked with everybody from Pharrell to Talib Kweli but she’s not a household name yet. “88 Vibes” should continue to gain momentum and build hype for whatever’s next.


 

LISTEN

Mas Ysa

This heartbreaking stunner was never going to be all fireworks and chart toppers, but it deserved to be a kind of slow-burn, word-of-mouth grower, a shimmer in the corner of the sky that slowly takes over your field of vision and swallows you whole. From the First Play of his new album, Seraph: "Garden" opens with Thomas Arsenault singing, "I guess this garden's good/ the snake won't bite you but its master could." Every line unfolds like a flower slowly revealing itself petal by petal as the day takes its shape. His voice never grows beyond its tone of hushed reverence, but there's something so magical about the way he straddles quiet confidence and whispered fear.


 

LISTEN

Gabrielle Papillon

The Halifax-based singer-songwriter paints vivid, human scenes of love, loss and endurance throughout her stunning new album, The Tempest of Old. The journey she takes us on throughout these songs is an all-encompassing spiral, a tempest in many ways, but a quietly pervasive and controlled chaos that unsettles your insides with its beauty without mussing a hair on your head. 

Hang out with me on Twitter: @_AndreaWarner

Related

CBC Music's favourite songs of 2015


by Andrea Warner via Electronic RSS

And the brands played on: how EDM can sell almost anything

Brands and advertisers are falling over themselves to tap in to the colossal success of dance music, and many of its stars are happy to help the marketing effort – with conditions

In May, Volvo released a sleek four-minute advert for its new XC90 car. In it, a golden-locked Swedish man drove through dramatic landscapes soundtracked by a wistful cover version of Nina Simone’s Feeling Good. But this wasn’t a normal ad. The driver was Avicii, the multi-millionaire EDM DJ, and the ad was in fact a music video. The Simone cover was his own track.

The collaboration has since been viewed almost 10m times on YouTube. And earlier this year Volvo’s chief executive Håkan Samuelsson announced that sales of the XC90 had “exceeded its expectations”, owing – one must assume, at least in part – to the 26-year-old megastar’s involvement.

Continue reading...
by James Hall via Electronic music | The Guardian

Thursday, December 24, 2015

Never mind the polls: the old albums we loved revisiting in 2015

From Simple Minds to Public Enemy, here are the albums our writers turned to when they’d had enough of new releases

One of the occupational hazards of writing about music for a living is that you spend so much time listening to new releases, or stuff that you’re writing about, that you don’t often get chances to listen to the music that made you want to write in the first place.

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by Dave Simpson, Laura Barton, Tshepo Mokoena, Tim Jonze, Kate Hutchinson , Paul MacInnes, Alexis Petridis and Michael Hann via Electronic music | The Guardian

Wednesday, December 23, 2015

The best albums of 2015 – readers' picks

We’ve had our say – but what did you think were the best albums of 2015? Here’s what you voted for

We are in accord! For the first time any of us can recall, Guardian readers and Guardian writers had the same two favourite albums of the year, in the same order. This year, in a rare moment of rigour, we decided to exclude obvious attempts to game the system – so, Tinker’s Mitten (“like a beefier Flying Pickets”, one reader suggested, enticingly), Jodie Marie and Karnataka, we’re sorry; but next time you suspect your admirers might be voting for you en masse in a poll, tell them not to all vote at the same time (we record exactly when each vote is cast, for exactly this reason). Had they only spread their votes out a little more, all might well have featured in our top five.

You nominated hundreds of albums, with strong showings for some that didn’t make it into our top 40 – Lana Del Rey’s Honeymoon and Blur’s The Magic Whip, for example. But you are now, surely, craving to know how it all panned out, right? We will keep you waiting no longer.

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by Guardian music via Electronic music | The Guardian

Monday, December 21, 2015

[DOWNLOAD] Barnt – Chappell (Justin Jay Edit ft. Henry Was & Benny Bridges)

Property of Gotta Dance Dirty

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From playing Coachella, to his Mom, I Graduated! EP on dirtybird, and launching his new project, Justin Jay & Friends, Justin Jay has had a rollercoaster of a year, so it only makes sense for him to deliver one last release, after dropping “Karma.” This new offering features Benny Bridges on guitar, and also a new name, Henry Was, on drums, who both lent their talents for this edit that was created with the help of live instrumentation. The edit is a relentless techno heater that adds grit, more percussion, and subtle FX to the original’s foundation. Justin is in the giving mood this holiday season so enjoy the track below and download it here.

“With Benny Bridges on guitar, I saw this techno anthem by Barnt as a way to start messing around with Henry’s crazy drum sounds. We had so much fun making it and even more fun playing it live. With it being the holiday season, we wanted to give it to you guys (especially DJ’s who need an extra jam for those holiday sets).” – Justin Jay

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Dom Servini – Amazing Radio Show #20

Listen again here!

1st Hour

Oddisee – That’s Love (Mellow Music Group)

Bodymoves – Mellow Cotton (Keep Up!)

Typesun – Water Song (DL)

The Polyversal Souls – Yelle Be Bobre feat. Guy One (Philophon)

Jamie Woon – Celebration ft. Willie Mason (PMR)

Tropics – Rapture (Innovative Leisure)

Electric Wire Hustle – Brother Sun (Rodi Kirk & Aron Ottignon Version) feat. Kimbra (Bastard Jazz)

Dele Sosimi – YNFTA (Medlar Remix) (Wah Wah 45s)

Album of the Week: Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings – It’s a Holiday Soul Party!

Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings – Eight Days of Hanukkah (Daptone)

Kamasi Washington – Cherokee (Brainfeeder)

The Milk – Lose That Way (Wah Wah 45s)

Collocutor vs Al Dobson Jr – Agama (On The Corner)

2nd Hour

Album of the Week: Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings – It’s a Holiday Soul Party!

Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings – Big Bulbs (Daptone)

Sonny Benton & the Typhoons – Brothers on the Slide (Freestyle)

Royce Wood Jr – Clanky Love (37 Adventures)

Young Gun Silver Fox – Spiral (Legere)

Retiree – Gundagai (Radio Edit) (Rhythm Section)

Golden Rules – It’s Over (Lex)

Breakplus – Silver Bangle (Mythstery)

Sarah Williams White – No Man’s Land (First Word)

Maribou State – The Clown feat. Pedestrian (Ninja Tune)

Romare – Rainbow (Ninja Tune)

Twilight – Playing My Game feat. Kon (Ubiquity/Luv’n’Haight)

Thundercat – Lone Wolf & Cub (Brainfeeder)

Crystal Winds – Signs of Winter’s Time (BBE)

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