Best New Tracks - Pitchfork: Heterotic: "Rain" [ft. Vezelay]

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1. Heterotic: "Rain" [ft. Vezelay]
2. Real Estate: "Crime"
3. Hundred Waters: "Down From the Rafters"

Heterotic: "Rain" [ft. Vezelay] Posted: 20 Feb 2014 08:58 AM PST   Planet Mu boss Mike Paradinas is primarily known for his µ-Ziq alias that dates back to the 1990s, a project that had a resurgence last year with a new album, Chewed Corners, along with an early-works retrospective, Somerset Avenue Tracks (1992-1995). In addition, he and his wife Lara Rix-Martin make polyglot synth-pop as Heterotic, and following last year's LP Love & Devotion, the pair are already readying a new album, Weird Drift, for release on April 21 via Paradinas' label. Those familiar with Paradinas' u-Ziq work will undoubtedly be surprised by the gorgeous LP single "Rain", and fans of Love & Devotion might find themselves taken aback by how fully formed the track is, too: featuring a dreamy vocal by vocalist Vezelay, who appears on a few Weird Drift cuts, the song possesses a weightlessness that's nonetheless heavy enough to crush, with dripping synths reminiscent of OMD's own astral fantasias coating Vezelay's tender-but-not-cloying vocal.

Real Estate: "Crime" Posted: 20 Feb 2014 07:57 AM PST   Real Estate debuted "Crime" with a guitar tab tutorial, which is downright decent of them: they're one of the only contemporary bands that make you want to learn their guitar parts, and while they're economic and never flashy, they're also trickier than they sound. "Crime" is a prime song for this novel premiere: though existing within a decades-long lineage of wistful, jangling indie rock, the guitars immediately tell you "This is Real Estate", as Matt Mondanile's compact, melodic leads weave through a subtly off-kilter strum laid down by Martin Courtney. "Crime" demonstrates how Courtenay's lyrics are also economic, never flashy and often trickier than they sound. As on previous singles "Suburban Beverage" and "It's Real", Courtney is a man of few words on "Crime", but they're the right ones: "I don't wanna die/ Lonely and uptight." What else is there to say?  This is seemingly a love song, by the way, and also the centerpiece of a record that shows Real Estate taking on more weight than ever, both the pull of nostalgia and the heaviness of the future.

Hundred Waters: "Down From the Rafters" Posted: 19 Feb 2014 08:20 AM PST   Front page photo by Nicole Miglis Inasmuch as discussion could be centered around Hundred Waters' wonderful, quietly-received self-titled debut, it tended to focus on the Gainesville, Fla. band's maximalist aspects: the wild timbral diversity and compositional mastery, being signed to Skrillex's label, and so on. But some of the most enduring moments on Hundred Waters were the quietest ones ("Caverns", "Gather"), which demonstrated the group's firm grasp on unadorned melody to balance out their complex arrangements and searching song structure. New song "Down From The Rafters" is in that mode, too: Nicole Miglis' vocals remain lovely and limber, though the lyrics tend to convey a more palpable, knowable sense of ache compared to Hundred Waters' florid poetics. It's a far cry from the dense, extroverted material they've been playing live, yet while "Down From The Rafters" is hushed and lush, you can still hear the expert musicianship of the quartet, as their restraint allows all of these unknowable, inventive textures to be situated in the exact right place behind Miglis. Hundred Waters: "Down From the Rafters" on SoundCloud.