The Tallest Man On Earth, otherwise known as Swedish troubadour Kristian Matsson, has announced the follow up to his wonderful 2008 debut Shallow Grave. Matsson's second full-length is titled The Wild Hunt and will be released via his new label, Dead Oceans, on April 13th.
Portland, Oregon, one of the country's meccas for artists and musicians, now has its own music-centered web video series over at famed advertising firm Wieden + Kennedy. You can watch the free series here, which contains interviews with local record labels like Marriage Records and Audio Dregs as well as performances from local bands Explode Into Colors, Grouper, Rob Walmart, White Fang, Atole and more. If you enjoy weird, eccentric and experimental music, this is certainly a great place for discovery. 
Future people looking back on Earth's history are going to be very confused when they open a 2010 time capsule containing Goldfrapp's "Rocket." Did the single slip through the time continuum from the 1980s? No, they'll learn how artists from later generations would ironically and sometimes blandly copy and sample from the glossy, flashy, and oft synthesizer-centered 1980s time period.
Everybody Taste favorites Brazos and Port O'Brien both played great sets recently over at the Daytrotter studios. I've been especially fond of the loose reverby guitar sound on Brazos' "Day Glo"—one of 2009's best. Head over now to grab both band's complete sets. 
London, England and Orkney, Scotland psych-folk group Erland & The Carnival's self-titled debut is due out tomorrow on Full Time Hobby. Singer/songwriter Gawain Erland Cooper (yes, that's a bad ass name) and former Verve and Blur multi-instrumentalist Simon Tong lead the charge on "Trouble In Mind"—the group's first single off the record—with a collection of whirling electronic flourishes and softly sung lyrics steeped in regret. 
M. Ward and Zooey Deschanel are picking up where they left off after 2008's Volume One with the follow-up Volume Two set for release on March 23rd via Merge. The first of the 13 tracks to reach the interweb is "In The Sun," which features a chorus of backing vocals from Omaha band Tilly and The Wall and a nice crescendoing guitar solo from Ward that starts at the 2:10 mark then proceeds to orbit into space. Over at Merge you can pre-order an "In The Sun" 7-inch with a B-side cover of the Phil Spector and Ronettes classic "I Can Hear Music."
Portland, OR band the Good Listeners took to making their third record, Don't Quit Your Daydream, on the road: 11 tracks in 12 cities over 24 days. Over the course of recording and playing with a different musician nearly every day, the band filmed a documentary about trying to make a living while pursuing their musical aspirations (watch the trailer here). One of the best songs off the album is the ethereal "Can't Be Held"—a slowly forming haze of quiet electronic rumbling and acoustic guitars centering around a clean-toned guitar riff. 
Recorded for the Velvet Underground's 1969 eponymous third record, "Pale Blue Eyes" is a near six-minute drifting classic Lou Reed penned after his college sweetheart, Shelly Albin. The song's been covered numerous times by everyone from Patti Smith to the Counting Crows, but the best versions add something new. In M. Ward's live cover, he adds a surprising high note to the chorus. In R.E.M.'s 1984 "So. Central Rain (I'm Sorry)" b-side, Michael Stipe polishes off a country twang for his delivery. Alejandro Escovedo keeps his cover basic with just an acoustic guitar, but it nicely emphasizes Reed's potent vocals.
Nothing on Spoon's new album Transference—out today—is as instantaneously catchy as Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga. There's not even a real single, unless you count the bass-beaten funk of "Nobody Gets Me But You" or the furiously uptempo "Trouble Comes Running"—but even those two songs are embedded within layers of fuzz and distortion. People often make note of Spoon's use of the studio as a laboratory and it's never been more obvious than on Transference—a record of messy and distorted calculation. Spoon may be a band with the talent to craft perfect pop songs (see: "The Way We Get By,", "Sister Jack," "I Turn My Camera On," etc.), but precisely because of that they rarely ever feel the need to. Songs like "Out Go The Lights" and "I Saw The Light" are fiercely rhythmic collaborations of noise that revel in their jagged architecture. There's no wasted time in Transference; no filler leading up to the great sweeping chorus. The focus is always on the moment, and intensely so. And in a way that's the point, because you don't always know what's coming next nor are you even thinking about it. The abrupt ending in "Is Love Forever?" is Britt Daniel more or less pulling the carpet out from under the listener: there's no verse to chorus map of expectations, just a hammered-over-the-head down beat that disappears just as it finally reveals its appeal: it's pop music perfectly deconstructed. 
Aziz Ansari, easily one of the funniest working comedians, released his first standup special today titled Intimate Moments for a Sensual Evening. If you like Mitch Hedberg and Patton Oswalt or have ever watched Parks & Recreation, I would highly recommend Sensual Evening. To keep things music-related, here's his take on the "sonic forest" at the Bonnaroo Music Festival. Get more free Aziz via his blog.
I have a big thing for New Order. In fact, their 1982 single "Temptation" is my favorite song of all time (if you've ever seen the movie Trainspotting, it's an oft-quoted running motif). With that in mind, I always keep my ears out for fellow dance- and synth-friendly Brits with a knack for melody. Lately, I've been tuning into Brighton four-piece Mirrors. The band—who currently has two singles out via Moshi Moshi Records—has as much a thing for New Order as they do for Depeche Mode. The two influences can be heard in Mirrors' wide open spacing and unhurried sense of timing and development. In many ways, the best notes are always the ones that seep into your brain the slowest. 
From Wikipedia:
A little bit funk, a touch disco, and a lot soul, Maiko Watson's Sweet Vibration is an astonishingly good debut from an artist who was previously best known for her part in Sugar Jones, a Canadian pop group spawned from a reality television show. The record—currently out on iTunes via indie label Labeame Records—moves around genres, from the aforementioned funk and disco to cheerful reggae ("Lookin' Up") and more experimental leanings like "Wise Up," which features a more vocally aggressive Watson sounding like fellow neo-funktress Nikka Costa. Sweet Vibration may not bring anything new to the world of soul, but what Watson lacks in vision she makes up for in talent and quality production. 
Everybody Taste favorites Dr. Dog are set to release Shame, Shame—their 6th album and first via Anti-Records—on April 6th. If the band's past evolutionary leaps are any indicator, Shame, Shame will be one of the can't miss releases of 2010. From the charmingly lo-fi and Beatles-esque Easy Beat (check out the chorussing George Harrison guitar in "Easy Beat") to the pitch-perfect Last Waltz-inspired Fate, Dr. Dog have proven to be one of the most reliable and creative rock classicists of the past decade. The band starts touring for the album January 27th, playing a few shows with fellow folk-rock throwbacks Deer Tick. Check out the dates.
In "Diplomat's Son," Vampire Weekend stretch out an M.I.A. sample, a reggae-style upbeat piano, and a 8-bit rhythmic loop into a six-minute globe- and genre-spanning dub. If elements of ska, punk, and Afro-pop were prevalent in Vampire Weekend's debut, they're emphatically pronounced and expanded upon in Contra (just listen to the Bollywood-inspired "Horchata"). The record's ambitious creativity has spawned a rare moment—one where critical acclaim and universal popularity intersect. Clearly, this is no longer a band that can fit into your back pocket (if it ever was). And that's a good thing. 
Sea Lion, the 2007 album from New Zealand's Ruby Suns, was a richly textured tapestry of organic sounds that produced irresistible and original gems like "Tane Mahuta" and "Kenya Dig It?" Fight Softly, the band's follow-up set for release on March 2nd, sounds little like it. The layers of clanking percussion and riffing acoustic guitars are predominantly replaced with swirling synthesizers and drum loops. Surprisingly though, the hypnotic quality of Ryan McPhun's music still lies intact. Quite a feat considering the drastic change of landscape. 
Jamie Lidell's retro soul-funk jam "Multiply" is, in my book, a classic. And Anthony Gonzales's remix ain't bad either. Basically Gonzales takes out the song's original instrumentation and replaces it all with his own piano playing, transforming the song into a sweet cocktail-hour crooner.
Jim "Yim Yames" James and his cousin Johnny Quaid have launched a new online record label, Removador Recordings and Solutions. The site will be a platform "to shine a light on some of the musicians that [James] admires and would like to share with the world," says the press release. So far, the label's artists include Cortney Tidwell, The Ravenna Colt, Follow The Train, Mont De Sundua, as well as Yames himself and My Morning Jacket.
In the National's song "So Far Around The Bend" (one of my favorites of 2009), Matt Berninger croons: "You’ve been humming in a daze forever / Praying for Pavement to get back together." Foreshadowing perhaps, Mr. Berninger? On the heels of news of their reunion tour, 90s indie-rock pioneers Pavement have also announced they will be releasing a 23-track greatest hits compilation titled Quarantine the Past: The Best of Pavement, due out March 9. Back when Pavement disbanded in 1999 I was still listening to Puff Daddy cassette singles. Suffice it to say, I've been playing catch up ever since.
In honor of Yim Yames's upcoming Valentines Day appearance to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Louisville Is For Lovers compilation, here's an oldie but goodie the Yames gang covered for the series a few years back.
"I'm leaving you behind tonight" sings Ronald Moore over brush-beaten train engine rhythms, two-part vocal harmonies, and the jazzy puff of a New Orleans-style brass section. "Magdalena," off of Graveyard Town by Alabama's Barnstormers, is an irresistible pairing of melody and rhythm that reaches a truly original culmination when a sitar and tabla drum are thrown into the mix. Nothing quite says Alabama like traditional Indian instrumentation. 
Garage-rock trio the Ettes, known for their devastatingly big guitar chords and thumping drums, developed another dimension on their third record, Do You Want More—a soft side. Perhaps inspired by their Nashville recording setting, Lindsay "Coco" Hames offers up slow strummed country twang on "Love Lies Bleeding"—a welcome vulnerable moment from a band that spends the rest of its time knocking off heads. 
My introduction to Vic Chesnutt came through the 2004 Daniel Johnston compilation, The Late Great Daniel Johnston: Discovered Covered. In many ways it was the perfect pairing, with one near otherworldly yet wholeheartedly and deeply human voice singing for another. The world will miss Mr. Chesnutt. But thankfully, we don't have to miss his music. With 17 albums and collaborations with everyone from Widespread Panic, Elf Power, and Lambchop to his most recent work with Fugazi's Guy Picciotto, the man has left behind a vast record of his creativity that is fully worth diving into. And once you've come back up for air, return, again and again, for more.
