In the late nineties, what was the emo music scene had evolved from its hardcore roots to incorporate pop hooks and a much more melodic sound. Bands like The Promise Ring + Braid were suddenly doing a lot less screaming and a lot more bop-bopping and we were into it.

One such band that thrived in this newly changed genre was LA’s Sunday’s Best, a band that wrote solid pop gems that embraced the rhythmic elements and edge of emo but kept melody central in their appeal. Sunday’s Best dissolved in the early oughts but two of the band’s central members, signer/guitarist Ed Reyes + guitarist Ian Moreno, went on to form a new group, The Little Ones.

Frontman Reyes was kind enough to talk with us about the move from emo to straight pop, the band’s just-released new album, The Dawn Sang Along, and how he balances a steady 9-to-5 with kids and rock stardom. Read on and give the band’s superbly catchy track “Argonauts” a listen below.

So, first off, let’s get the ‘how did the band start’ question out of the way…. How did the band start? Did you all have a goal in mind or anything like that?

The band started around 2004 right after Ian (Moreno) and I stopped playing as Sunday’s Best. We wanted to start a brand new project and go in a whole new direction. The band grew out of hanging out with friends. I asked my brother Brian to jam with us and like they say, the rest is history. Our only specific goal at the time was to play a live show.We were huge Sunday’s Best fans, by the way. I still have “In Beats Like Trains” + “Looks Like a Mess” in heavy rotation on my playlists. But yeah, I feel like a professor trying to describe the transformation the music industry has undergone could use you all as the perfect case study to explain that. Was it disheartening to sign on to a relatively big label and then lose that deal so early on when the industry was just beginning to shift?

We were excited to be signed to Astralwerks in the US and Heavenly Recordings in the UK/Europe. We felt that we could reach a wider audience than just putting the album out on our label, Branches. I’ve always felt that 75% of music is timing. Unfortunately our first full-length was beset with drama as were released from EMI. It didn’t come out for another 6 months after our initial target street date. I could see that it would be challenge for our music to be heard given the delays. However, I wouldn’t change anything other than probably releasing our full-length sooner.

Over the years, I’ve heard many people from all corners of the music industry chime in with their opinion on whether the new environment, with lower album sales, more piracy, and generally less revenue for most everyone is better or worse for music itself in the long run. What’s your take?

I think there are more avenues for music to be heard nowadays and generally it’s great for bands doing it themselves. Bands are more business-savvy and most likely don’t need a big label to get their music out. This means more money in the pocket of bands. I think if you create a quality record/product people will notice.

Totally agree. Honestly, I don’t think I ever would have guessed The Little Ones would have shared members with Sunday’s Best, whose sound, while poppy, was much more rooted in the 90’s emo scene. Clearly you’ve got four other guys there, but was there any intentional move toward such a different sound for you and Ian?

I think the Little Ones in essence is the grown-up version of Sunday’s Best.  Ian and I both matured age-wise and matured as songwriters. We also started to create music in a more family environment which definitely shows in The Little Ones music.

I personally had the most humble of involvements in that mid-/late-90s scene myself and remember it very fondly. Is it a time you feel like you often miss?

I have nothing but fond memories of that time. Everything was DIY. We slept on floors, booked our own shows, and it was all done for the fun of it. I do miss it.

And now we’re old men. What can you do. So, I know—this question 100% sucks balls, but how would you describe The Little Ones’ sound?

The Little Ones create ‘social music’.  When I say ‘social’ i mean that it’s the kind of music that makes you tap your toes, dance, or generally makes you feel good.

I like it! Since we’re marketing types, we have to ask: Where did the name of the band come from?

When we were originally writing songs at my house my two pugs would also come in and out. They became our first audience. We would always refer to them as our Little Ones.

Well that’s just adorable. We heard you all recorded the new album while juggling day jobs for the most part. Do you all find that difficult? It’s gotta make touring tough.

It was definitely difficult juggling rehearsal and writing while working more than 8-hour days. Since half of the band lives in San Diego, we would meet in Anaheim for rehearsal once a week for 3 years. It became our ritual but in the end it was well worth it. Touring is tough and makes it difficult for us to plan things. However, we hope to get out there in the summer.

Alright then, who’s got the most interesting day job in the band?

That’s a tough question. We all have interesting day jobs. Some people work in the music industry, video game industry, ad agency, and are full time students.

What’s your day job, if you don’t mind me asking?

I work in A&R at a record label.

Ah, cool. Are you all planning on making it over to NYC to play at any point?

We hope to play NYC at some point this year. Maybe when it’s warmer there!

What? You don’t like thunder snow? Okay, lightning round time—Best thing about LA?

Mexican Food.

Worst?

Dude Bros.

Wait, what are dude bros? Like frat boys?

Yes, dude bros are very frat boy.

Alright. Most ridiculous potential band name that got shot down?

Meat City.

Good god. Best bar in LA?

Blind Barber.

Oh, well you guys stole that from us. Most under-rated/unheard-of 60s band?

Heron.

Oh, I don’t know them. Current artist you can’t stop listening to lately?

Kendrick Lamar.

Again, new to me. I’ll have to check him out. Best tattoo ever?

Teardrop tattoo,

Timelessly tough + elegant. Band you wish you could have been part of in your wildest fantasies? 

The Zombies.

Totally. Craziest town you’ve played on tour?

Belfast, Northern Ireland.

Wait, why?

I remember us rolling into Belfast and seeing some fist fights in the streets. I’ve never seen so many fights.

Ah. What was your pick for Best Picture last night? 

Silver Linings Playbook.

Same. I think we were close. Affleck just out-bearded Bradley. If you could have one superpower what would it be?

Ability to fly.

Classic. Finally, can we request some on-stage emo finger pointing at your New York show or some post-hardcore anthemic choruses or…has that age passed?

Yes, I promise to do it next time we’re in New York.

You can listen to “Argonauts” below and then hear more of The Little Ones’ sophomore full-length, The Dawn Sang Along, and download it or order the CD on their bandcamp page.

Band photos by Jean Claude.

This Presidents’ Day, Reader, we celebrate the protectors of liberty + freedom with Philly band, Free Energy.

Long-time friends and Red Wing, Minnesota natives Scott Wells (top left) + Paul Sprangers (bottom left) first played together in lo-fi indie band, Hockey Night, one of the last bands to put out an album on the now-defunct, venerable label, Lookout! Records. After that band folded, Wells + Sprangers signed to NYC’s DFA Records off of homemade demos they recorded for their new, much more mellow project, Free Energy.

Though most would rightfully describe Free Energy as a bit of a throwback to some solid 70’s era—I’ll say it—Freedom Rock, I’d be hard-pressed to call the band a knock-off or joke act in good faith. Sit down and listen to their music and it’s hard not to be pulled in by their accessible pop hooks and singer, Paul Sprangers’ smooth, easy vocals. Once you get used to the mad riffage and nod to the days of bellbottoms + sideburns, you may even hear a resemblance to pop masters, Phoenix.

After signing to DFA, Wells + Sprangers made a move from the Midwest to Philly and filled out the band but, as Sprangers says, the band’s sound still pulls significantly from the slower pace of non-city life. “Being from the Midwest definitely informed our aesthetic. Growing up in a small town with radio and MTV—then later discovering indie rock and punk rock—really shaped the kind of music we make now. So, I had the same kind of unabashed love for Phil Collins as I did for Pavement—I don’t think I ever grew out of that. It probably shows.”

Give their superb song “Dance All Night” a listen below and then check out their get-rich-quick/lose-your-way/get-poor-quick/rob-a-convenience-store/find-your-way-burn-your-clothes-and-go-swimmin’ video for “Girls Want Rock”. Both tracks are from Love Sign, the band’s sophomore album, just released on their own imprint, Free Energy Records. You can listen to + purchase the album or individual tracks via the band’s bandcamp page or, if you want the CD or vinyl, through their store at Impact Merch.

And frontman, Sprangers, hopes you like it:

“When I think of great songs by Peter Gabriel, or Tom Petty, I hear the them almost like hymns. They speak to something greater than ourselves. Even the simplest rock music—songs about partying and girls—can be transcendental,” says Sprangers. “I hope people can relate to what we do on some level. I hope kids like it. I hope moms like it. I don’t care about being cool, I just want to connect. I want people to know that no matter what, life is good, and every experience is meaningful. Maybe that’s weird. But we definitely feel like weirdos and we always have…maybe we always will, which is totally fine.“

Hey man, is that Free Energy? Well turn it up, man!

We’ve had our eye on Brooklyn’s Field Mouse ever since we first heard them early last year. The band strikes an enticingly delicate balance between 90s shoegaze/noisepop influences and more contemporary sounds, keeping it al rooted in solid song-writing.  To date, they’ve released a few songs digitally and as limited edition 7″s, but now Field Mouse is working on their debut, as of yet unnamed full-length. After catching a couple of their live shows—shrouded in a beautifully curated wall of sound—and hearing some of the new material, we’re predicting big things for them in 2013.

We recently got a chance to catch up with Field Mouse singer/guitarist, Rachel Browne, and got her thoughts on shoegaze, how many guitar pedals is too many, what’s she’s listening to lately, and we get a brief interjection by bandmate, Andrew, regarding the most terrifyingly awesome tattoo we’ve ever seen.

Read on and then give their newly released track, “Tomorrow is Yesterday” a listen and watch the video for their earlier song, “Glass,” below.

So, first off, tell us how + when the band started. Is it something you + Andrew struck up with any goals in-mind or was it begun more organically?

We went to a music conservatory in Westchester, NY and Andrew played bass at one of my recitals. We had fun and just kept making music together and eventually we made a band out of it. Andrew has always liked to focus on production and tone and I focus more on the songwriting and melodic aspects, so we compliment each other well and are able to write together pretty effortlessly.

That’s great. Sounds like a balanced creative partnership. You all seem to have gone through a number of lineup changes over the years, growing beyond a duo and then back down again. Last we saw you, you had a great live drummer and seemed to be playing with pre-recorded bass. Plan to keep it that way for a while or…I don’t know, throw in a six-piece horn section?

We have not really gone through that many. The core of the band Is just Andrew and myself. Geoff has been playing drums since the first 7″ we released. We would love to have more focused bass and synth players, but that’s more a matter of meeting kindred spirits with free time (which hasn’t proven to be easy).

Fair enough. Yeah, the resulting live sound you all get with just three people is really impressive—very deep and layered. I’m guessing there are a lot of live loops going with the guitar, but is that something that was difficult at first to get down in the live setting?

Less of the sound than you would think comes from the programming. We spend way too much time thinking about guitar tone and I think that is the lion’s share of what we are working with live. I’d love to have a full-time synth player, but I think, in the meantime, Andrew and I will be alternating playing them with guitar live in the coming months.

How many pedals do you all use between the two of you?

Well, one thing I’ve learned is that if you aren’t careful, the more pedals you have, the more it can just become a wall of reverb and distortion. We each just have a few fuzz, reverb, and delay options but that’s about it. I’ve been using an analog chorus pedal lately which I really love. But I’d say the live pedal count is about 10 between us.

Ah, that’s not bad. Having been a big fan of the early-90s shoegaze sound, I hear a lot of that influencing your songs, but how do you think you differ from a straight retro act in that sense?

It’s hard to say because shoegaze isn’t exactly a well-defined sound. Souvlaki sounds a lot different than Loveless. There is a similar production aesthetic to much of it but I think the thread that tends to carry is that drums and bass are pretty buried in the mix. Where I think we differ is how those elements are super important to our songs and how they come out in production. If you strip our songs down to their demo form, they are clearly influenced by many other things in much more obvious ways than shoegaze. I like to think that we borrow from that era of production a bit, but less so with the actual songwriting.

Great answer. I’ve always thought that truly well-written should be able to stand up on their own, with minimal production—say, acoustic guitar + voice in a café. Are they any particular bands, albums, or songs that you feel directly fed into your early sound or the things you’re writing today?

Early on when we were working together as a duo, a lot of common ground music fed into the things we wrote. Early Smashing Pumpkins, Pixies, Breeders, and some poppier bands like Rilo Kiley and even that first Anniversary record—just things we grew up loving and emulating. We’d both been in a bunch of bands before we met. Today I feel incredibly moved and influenced by my local music scene and my friends within it.

God, I love that first Anniversary record. Where did the band name come from?

It’s just a name. It came from a note I wrote in a journal when I wanted to make the band a real thing.

Fine then. What do you all do day-job-wise?

Psychic cops is what Andrew told me to say. In reality I am a pretty bad waitress.

I’m assuming you don’t mean that in the Michael Jackson sense of the word. I won’t ask where you work, but what originally brought you to New York?

Andrew and Geoff are both native New Yorkers. I’m from Connecticut and my college was halfway between the city and my home, so moving here was not so much a big decision as it seemed a default choice. We are not exactly sure why we are here at this point, to be honest. I think the cons are starting to outweigh the pros—namely the cost.

I hear you on that. The neighborhood in Brooklyn where we our studio is just got crowned the priciest in the borough. So that’s fun. Do you all have any notable goals for the new year, musically or not? Debut full-length, sell out Radio City, cure lycanthropy?

Definitely finishing our full length and releasing it; touring, of course, and hopefully writing much more.

Excited to hear about the record. How about any acts you’d love to be paired with in coming live shows? You know, besides a split ticket with Jay-Z at Barclays.

I have been freaking out about Melody’s Echo Chamber lately. I think that would be a fun show.

Oh, yeah, that’s a great album. So French-psych. Not the answer I would have expected, but I could totally see some commonalities between your sounds now that you say it. What other new stuff are you all listening to lately?

Grooms, Swearin’, Foxygen, Widowspeak.

Good that you got Foxygen in there lest we be accused of insular New Yorkers. Okay, lightning round time—Best thing about New York?

Any food at any time of night.

Worst?

Absolutely the cost of living. Runner up is the brutal summer/winter climate situation.

Both bummers. Most ridiculous potential album name that got shot down?

We are just starting to work on the LP so we have not come up with any names. I think I will pitch 2 Phast 3 Phurious though.

I was 100% going to suggest that. Best bar in Brooklyn?

Lulu’s is my general go-to place, but Night of Joy has delicious cocktails and I usually have my birthday there, so try em both I s’pose.

Oh, haven’t been to Night of Joy. We’ll have to check it out. Cat or dog people?

Geoff owns a dog-walking business, so we hear about dogs a lot. I am neither, and Andrew has a rabbit, so I think we will go with two rabbit people + one dog person.

Rabbits do seem oddly shoegaze. Pro- or anti-wammie bar?

Deeply, deeply pro. I think calling them wammie bars is a bit silly though. They are definitely tremolo arms. There is a way to make them sound stupid but where would My Bloody Valentine be without them? The vibrato effect they can produce is one of the most beautiful things about guitars and is part of the reason we tend to play Jaguars and Jazzmasters.

Agreed, and apologies on the terminology. I’m a child of the 70s. Favorite venue in New York?

Glasslands/Shea Stadium.

Craziest tattoo?

A tattoo of Sharon from Lost crying from the pilot episode.

Where the FUCK did that tattoo come from? It’s nuts.

(from Andrew) Haha! It was one of those things floating around on the internet. I saw it a year ago in a Lost related tattoo blog post. The place where I found this specific version was a comment on a videogum article. I would LOVE to know the original source though. Someone out there is FILLED with regret.

Good god. Ideal guest musician you’d want featured on a track?

Joey Santiago.

Nice. Best town you’ve played on tour?

Atlanta was really nice the last time we were there.

Signature cocktail? 

A drink I just now invented.  It’s a bunch of top shelf stuff mixed together in a bucket with ice.

I think that’s called ‘the Bucket Kickah’. Best Hitchcock movie?

Vertigo is my favorite!

Finally, how do these pants look? Can I pull them off?

You can pull off anything, but the first thing you need to do is not ask if you can pull them off. Pulling something off is about confidence. Some clothes can make you feel confident by themselves, but some clothes are more adventurous and it just means you need to supply the confidence. Straight up put them on and give zero fucks.

Damn. It’s like you’re channeling Clinton Kelly.

Field Mouse will be playing—as luck would have it—Shea Stadium along with the superb Darlings March 8 and Pianos on the LES March 20. Check their Shows page for other coming live dates + stay tuned for their debut full-length album. 

Band photos by Shervin Lainez.

Field Mouse – “Glass” from stereogum on Vimeo.

There’s no denying that we all go through musical phases, Reader. Be us a casual listener or the most serious of audiophiles; be us fair-wether dabblers in music-making or seasoned musicians selling out stadiums; our tastes change. It’s a good thing.

I personally tend—both as a listener and as the occasional music-maker—to find a new sound or genre and then latch on to it, sinking my claws fully in and pulling as much as I possibly can from it. Then I move on to a new thing that I’m utterly excited about, keeping what I found earlier as part of this new appreciation. When I was in high school, it went from Brit pop to shoegaze. In college, early emo + hardcore. Then after college + a short stint in the Peace Corps, I got really really into glitchy electronic pop. I doubt that’s a cause-result correlation, but who knows.

I think my ‘gateway drug’ for this excitingly weird but still very much accessible genre was the ever-odd Björk. But, through what was a then religious reading of the Other Music newsletter (which still exists and is still highly recommended), I soon came across Morr Music. Morr Music is a small, Berlin-based independent label that was started by Thomas Morr right around that time—1999—and very much reflects his personal musical tastes, being “intelligent” dance music, the occasional shoegazing, dreampopping type, and beautifully glitchy electronic music—or “Plinkerpop” as he called it.

Through Morr I found such amazing groups as múm, Styrofoam, The Notwist, and the superb Lali Puna, among others; groups that entirely changed the way I approached music.

Fitting then that Sin Fang‘s Flowers—an album that has me entirely floored right now—is being put out by Thomas Morr + co.

Sin Fang is the moniker used by Iceland’s Sindri Már Sigfússon, founder of the indie folk group, Seabear, and maker of DIY beards. Oddly. Flowers—Mr. Sigfússon’s third solo full-length—is an album full of deep, lush layers of glitched out electronic melodies, choral chanting, sweeping orchestral movements, driving tribal rhythms, and beautifully approachable vocal hooks. Some songs build to dramatically epic peaks and then suddenly break into tiny, quietly elegant moments while others have you chasing after them in head-nodding, foot-tapping bliss as crunching, plinking electronic tones surround you.

Honestly, we write about a lot of music in this space, and I’ve never posted anything that I didn’t like, but it’s difficult to communicate how excited I am by this album without coming across like a gushing schoolboy. By all rights, if there is any artisctic justice left in the world—which I’ve been assured there is not—this album and, with it, Sin Fang, should be known and loved in every household in America.

Listen to the album opener, “Young Boys”, below—a catchy, chorus-driven number that sounds like a Gotye song making out with a Sigur Rós song while the Animal Collective back catalog watches. Or something. Then listen to the truly sublime “Look at the Light” via the official music video, also below.

Though the US iTunes store shows an expected release date of tomorrow for the digital version of Flowers, we’re told it won’t be state-side until the following Tuesday, February 16, when you’ll be able to order domestic CD + Vinyl as well. In the meantime, you can listen to song samples via iTunes or the German distro site, ANOST. We’re told a European tour is in the works and they hope to bring Sin Fang stateside later this year.

Photos by fellow Seabear member and artist, Ingibjörg Birgisdóttir.

2.5.13 Update: You can indeed now buy the digital album on iTunes and via Amazon. It seems the physical versions of the album are hitting our shores on the 19th. You can also pre-order those at Amazon.

Last week, we mentioned in this space about how we’ve noticed a distinct stirring within ourselves of late to move; to travel; to step from one place into another so as to dislodge our bodies + minds from the funk that is post-winter-holiday New York. One place that is unquestionably not on our list of place to go, though—Minneapolis, Minnesota. Please, mid-westerners, I beg of you not to take offense. We, in fact, love the City of Lakes, with its superb parks system, sincerely earthy old-school hippie feel, and oddly cute way of saying the word ‘bagel’. We would just never willingly place ourselves anywhere near it this time of year. I mean, we can barely handle New York right now and you have to employ heated tubes to make it around town. Heated tubes! So hats off to the hale and hearty who dare to populate such a place in these harsh white months. Were it not for you, everything north of Saugerties would be a wasteland of culture and society. One particular honoree we would like to highlight today—the very difficult to Google, Carroll, a band of four transplants to Minneapolis by way of Seattle, New York, Philadelphia, and…somewhere in Nebraska. From the band’s Facebook page: “Carroll was a twinkle in your father’s eye. Carroll was your grandmother’s name and the street you grew up on. Carroll is the combined effort of people who eat, sleep, and dream in close proximity to one another. Brian Hurlow, Charlie Rudoy, Max Kulicke, and Charles McClung gathered together their guitars and synths, their basses and percussion and did what felt right. They stopped running away from Pop and instead invited it in for a snack in a house made of candy, only to lock it in a cage and fatten it up for their own devices. Carroll has been found on quite a few stages and radio dials around the Twin Cities. If their sound is anything, it’s eerie warmth—a Minnesota winter that barely goes below zero.” For the record, it’s supposed to be -10° there Thursday. Warm up with the band’s superbly pleasant pop gem, “Lead Balloon”, below. The track will be part of their debut EP, Needs, out February 12 on Minneapolis-based Humans Win! You can hear another track from the forthcoming EP—“Sticks”—via YouTube.

File this post under “Awesome Gifts from Katie”.

A while back, I came across the 12″ vinyl release of My Bloody Valentine‘s 1988 EP, You Made Me Realise. We were over at the house of friends of friends and there it was, just sitting face-out in their considerable record collection, calling to me.

No, I didn’t steal it—what do you think I am, a monster‽

First off, for anyone who doesn’t already know, My Bloody Valentine is a noise-pop band that formed in Dublin in the early 80s. More importantly, on a personal level, they are one of my all-time favorite bands, providing a touchstone for hundreds of musicians to come and for me as music-loving teenager just figuring out who he was.

Their sound, which they were just beginning to find themselves when they released the EP—their first release on the seminal Creation Records; built out from an earlier two-song 7″—was something I always thought of as beauty wrapped in noise. Their use of heavy distortion, pitch-bending, and other dreamy effects situated them firmly in the newly coined genre of shoegazing, but Kevin Shields + company took that sound to the next level, culminating in the epic 1991 full-length, Loveless.

But before that and the slow-motion break-down of the band over the years to follow, came You Made Me Realise, a five-song EP that begins with the title track—a rocking, cacophonous, ear splitting number— and ends with “Drive It All Over Me” which I still hold high as one of the finest pop songs of all time.

I had bought the CD version when it was released in the US, but, with its iconic, slyly dangerous album cover (one of my favorites ever) and the growing obsession with vinyl Katie + I have developed in the wake of the digital music revolution, the original, larger-than-life 12″ became a musical holy grail as soon as saw it.

So a heart-felt ‘thank you’ to my dear love, Katie, for knowing me so very well and being so very generous.

In an attempt to share the love, below you’ll find said fine pop song.

Though rumors of new recordings have been rampant since the band’s 2007 reunion, it does indeed seem that—according to Shields via the band’s Facebook page—a new album has been recorded and mastered as of December 21st. So fingers crossed, Reader. Fingers crossed.

I’m looking longingly at planes passing overhead of late.

That line came to mind the other evening for whatever reason as I sat on our stoop and watched the sunset color planes miles above me. It’s true—we have been itching to travel lately but, in the meantime, as we read through books on South America and suss out mutual schedules with friends, we need to find a fix closer to home.

Luckily, the LA-based band Lord Huron writes beautiful, rolling, majestic music that transports you far away, which should come in handy as New York begins it’s slow decent into post-holiday winter weather.

The band began and largely remains, in spirit, the solo project of Michigan-born Ben Schneider. Schneider studied art, living in France + New York before moving to Los Angeles in 2005 to pursue a career in the visual arts, which remains a strong part of his music. Lord Huron began five years later in the summer of 2010, when he spent a week on the shores of Lake Huron recording what would become his debut EP, Into the Sun. From Lord Huron’s label, IAMSOUND:

“For several months he had been writing songs and designing artwork in Los Angeles, though he wasn’t sure exactly where his ideas were headed. There at the lake, where many of his formative experiences had come to pass, Schneider recorded the three songs that would comprise the Into the Sun EP. Like most of his work up to that point, the Into the Sun tracks were heavily influenced by places. Schneider had recently taken trips to Indonesia and Mexico, and the sights and sounds of those places had lingered with him. His return to Lake Huron helped these influences to coalesce. He released the EP online in June and dispersed a small number of CDs complete with the artwork he had been working on. With help from a post by San Francisco bloggers, Yours Truly, the songs quickly gained traction online and Schneider set to work recruiting musicians to help him translate the recordings into a performance. Lord Huron’s first live show was in August 2010.”

A well-recieved second EP—Mighty—followed as did touring as a five-piece. Last fall, the band released their beautiful debut full-length, Lonesome Dreams, and we’ve been wanting to feature them ever since. Their sound will definitely appeal to fans of the first Fleet Foxes album and more tranquil Band of Horses songs—rootsy rock that blends choral vocal melodies and sweeping music. Schneider describes the album’s visual + musical theme accurately as a sort of folk-Western—“I kind of think of these songs as stories from some folk-Western series of novels, but it’s got an exotic twist, too. So I had this image in my head of this desert that’s…Western, but it also kind of looks Middle Eastern, and the crescent moon kind of hints to that. And the lone rider reflects the lonesome idea that runs through the record.”

See what he means by giving a listen to Lord Huron’s “Time to Run”, a song that ebbs and flows, moving from quiet twinkling rests to foot-tapping, driving rock. The band also put out little video teasers for songs. You can see the one for the album opener, “Ends of the Earth”, below and the rest on the band’s site.

Listen to Schneider’s first two EPs and download the MP3s on the Lord Huron’s bandcamp page. Buy the vinyl/CD for Lonesome Dreams via District Lines or use this Record Store Day link to find a local record store near you that sells the album. You can also listen to the album via Spotify on the band’s site. So take a trip in your miiiiiiiiiiiiind, maaaaaaaan.

Album + band artwork by Ben Schneider.

1.23.13 Update: Lord Huron has just added a second show to their coming appearance at the Music Hall of Williamsburg since the first one sold out so quickly. The new show will be Sunday, February 24 + tickets will go on general sale this Friday at noon. American Express card holders can buy the tickets as of today at noon. 

A ragged, forlorn cat—fully clothed—comes to, finding himself on the floor of an abandoned warehouse in downtown LA as the harsh, unforgiving sun rises to greet him once again. He kneels, marking this as his ninth and final life, one that he fills dancing for pocket change in Chinatown, contemplating freedom, mortality, and dinner as he gazes at a tank full of goldfish, and finally collapsing in the scrubby in-between urban wilds of the City of Angels, defeated but finally, truly at rest.

Such is the life of Mr. Quiche. According to the official video, at least.

While we wholeheartedly do not support the naming of the new single from LA band, Wildcat! Wildcat!, “Mr. Quiche” does showcase the trio’s quietly beautiful sound wonderfully. We just have an oddly hard time accepting naming conventions that incorporate food. Bleh.

Wildcat! Wildcat! is Jesse Taylor, Michael Wilson, and Jesse Carmichael—three very beardy friends who played together in various incarnations over the years before officially forming W!W! in 2011. With their falsetto melodies, groovy keyboard lines, and light rhythms, the band’s sound can immediately draw comparisons to the softer songs of Passion Pit, MGMT, or even Foster the People. But they thankfully stop short of the more grating, annoying tones or progressions that those bands can sometimes wander into. Wildcat’s sound is more delicate and subtle, reaching more for a well-constructed, mature song than an easy hook and weaving vocal harmonies that almost sound reminiscent of Fleet Foxes or other more vocal-forward groups.

You can download “Mr. Quiche” and watch their video for the song below. Scroll down a little further to check out two more tracks—”End of the World Everyday” + “The Chief”, the latter of which features a pretty sick sax solo. You can purchase a 7″ of “The Chief”/”Mr. Quiche” via Insound.

Wildcat! Wildcat! is just back from supporting the superb Alt-J—who we wrote up last September—and will be playing SXSW this March, and is doing some local LA shows in the coming weeks. Details here.

Side note—you can still listen to and download that Alt-J track on the fall post, but only for the rest of the week as we’ll be cleaning house over the weekend, deleting all 2012 MP3s out of fairness to both the artists and our server. So we encourage you to browse through the archives when you have a chance before all that music bids you a fond farewell.

Now enjoy yourself some “Mr. Quiche”! *shudder*

Photos by Taylor Woods.

Many warm salutations to you, Reader, and welcome to 2013—a year sure to be full of joy, wonder, and excitement.

Why, exactly, will 2013 be so high-five-worthy? I’m not exactly sure, to be fair, but why not? Let’s start the year off with positivity, why don’t we? Let’s throw caution to the wind, putting to bed our baseless numerological superstitions; forging ahead ignoring all the talk of economic doom + gloom; 100% disregarding this piece from CNN on how 2013 is essentially going to be a long, slow, much more realistic version of various world-ending disaster movies.

I mean, come on! Celebrate! Obama got his second term where he REALLY tell the GOP what he thinks! Same-sex marriage + pot are totally going legit! Downton Abbey’s back! The world didn’t end, for fuck’s sake! That has got to start things off nicely for 2013.

And we can at least look forward to an unprecedented light show near the end of the year, courtesy of the ‘comet of the century’…that totally won’t hit us, right?

Helping us kick off this year of positivity is BOY, a duo comprised of two women—stay with me—that’s based in Hamburg, Germany and plays poppy music ranging from upbeat, dancey numbers with strong hooks to soft, thoughtful, melodic pieces that keep you hitting repeat. This week’s Song is more the former than the latter.

“Little Numbers” starts off with a simple piano riff and handclaps and gradually builds into a beautiful piece of pop reminiscent of Feist but certainly not derivative. Swiss-born Valeska Steiner’s (left above) vocal style actually reminds me more of early Suzanne Vega than Ms. Feist’s. Both she and her partner, German-born Sonja Glass, played the majority of the album’s music themselves, bringing in Phoenix‘s live drummer to help out with a few tracks, and their debut album, Mutual Friends, has already sold over 100,000 records in Deutschland.

The record’s been out overseas since the fall of 2011, but the band’s just now making splashes stateside, set to release Mutual Friends next month on Nettwerk Records and supporting it with a small set of shows across the US in March. They kick things off right here in New York City with relatively intimate shows March 1st at Joe’s Pub + March 2nd at Park Slope’s Union Hall.

Listen to “Little Numbers” and then check out their softer side below with the video for “Drive Darling”…which does not go the direction you first think it’s going….

You can also download a sampler of their music featuring some acoustic versions of album tracks via NoiseTrade and pay what you like and, if you can’t wait for the US release, you can buy Mututal Friends via the band’s site or from their German label.

And stay positive, Reader!

Photo above and album cover below by Inga Seevers.

Sweden’s Shout Out Louds are a long-time favorite band of ours. We first saw them randomly play at the long-defunct LES club, Sin-é, with a friend’s band way back in 2004 and wrote them up for the first time at the opening of 2010, when they released their first album on Merge, the beginning-to-end superb Work. We’ve been fans of their catchy brand of pop ever since.

So we were thrilled when the band announced that they’ll be releasing their fourth full-length—Optica— in February.

The band has had some grown-up down time since Work, expanding families and exploring side-projects, so it should come as no surprise that they took their time writing Optica and spent a year and a half recording it in a small Stockholm studio. The band also celebrated a first, producing the album themselves with the help of  Johannes Berglund and working hand-in-hand with a string composer to create arrangements described by Carl von Arbin (guitar, second from left above) as “Disney on drugs” and by frontman Adam Olenius (far right above) as “like warm mayonnaise.” To Carl, we say: “That sounds rad, man”; to Adam: “You make our souls shudder in revulsion.”

The first single from the album, “Blue Ice”, is definitely a lower tempo, slow-burn kind of song, but it’s got all of the staples—driving rhythms, catchy keys, boy-girl harmonies, and oddly inconsolable lyrics. Dude’s bummed, man. Dude’s bummed. Maybe all that warm mayonnaise….ooh, bonus on this one though—80s-style handclaps in the chorus.

Download “Blue Ice” below and check out their official, very Space Camp video. You can sign up for Shout Out Louds’ newsletter (top of the page) to get first listens to other tracks from the coming album and stay up-to-date on shows, but they’ll be kicking off their tour right here in Brooklyn at the Music Hall of Williamsburg on March 11.

You can pre-order Optica on CD or Vinyl over at Merge and digitally at iTunes.

Now let’s get sadly spacey, Reader: