EXCLUSIVE NEW DOWNLOAD: Groove Armada - Shameless (feat. Bryan Ferry)
(Photo: Tom Bunning)
How can a tune invoke both a smoky Parisian café glinting with the reflections of lost loves and early David Bowie? Bryan Ferry keeps his legendary Roxy Music roots front and center on this exclusive Groove Armada tune—replete with a downtempo melody, piano keys and a plaintive beat that turns tempestuous. It’s Groove Armada—sexy’s a given! But there’s something more intellectual at play; it’s clear this sound is more dance-informed progression than chillout track. Groove Armada’s forthcoming Black Light is their sixth to date, heavy with guests like the aforementioned Ferry, and drops stateside on March 2nd courtesy of Om Records.
Groove Armada - Shameless (feat. Bryan Ferry)
Previously:
Groove Armada - Pull Up (Crank It Up) (Mad Decent Remix)
EXCLUSIVE NEW DOWNLOAD: Boozoo Bajou - Sign (DJ DSL Mix)
Tomorrow brings Boozoo Bajou’s “Sign” single (from the current album Grains) with this exclusive mix below, and later this year, a full remix collection featuring reworks from Prins Thomas, Idjut Boys, and Quantec will drop. Will they all invoke a candlelit, D’Angelo pumping, red wine drinking, purple satin sheets rustling, babymaking fest? Dunno. But this one sure does. Silky.
Boozoo Bajou - Sign (DJ DSL Mix)
Previously:
Boozoo Bajou - Same Sun (Tontelas Roots Version)
EXCLUSIVE NEW DOWNLOAD: Cruel Black Dove - Love Song (Remix By Dean Rosenzweig From IAMX)
We've heard Cruel Black Dove's surrealist industrial rock in a variety of guises, thanks to the many remixes they've let us premiere over the past year or so. This new one of "Love Song" from Dean Rosenzweig of IAMX–Chris from the Sneaker Pimps' new band–is one of the best, flipping the original vocal into a central phrase and cutting it with boiling low end and BB gun snares. Basically, it's like downtempo Bangladesh. The band plays New York's Mercury Lounge next week, July 16th, alongside The Morning After Girls and Hopewell; before that they'll make an appearance on East Village Radio this Saturday, the 11th, at 4PM.
Cruel Black Dove - Love Song (Remix by Dean Rosenzweig from IAMX)
Previously:
Cruel Black Dove - Wasting (The Vandelles Remix)
Cruel Black Dove - Come On Over (The Clapp Remix)
Cruel Black Dove - Love Song (Gregory Shiff Mix)
Cruel Black Dove's RCRD LBL Page
DOWNLOAD: Tosca - Springer
No Hassle, the title of Tosca's fifth and latest album, serves as the electronic duo's mission statement and mantra. Consisting of Richard Dorfmeister (half of downtempo legends Kruder & Dorfmeister) and Rupert Huber, Tosca holds a mirror up to an increasingly frightful world and shows a gentler, less hectic possibility. They describe their double disc album as "an hour-long ambient symphony," of which "Springer" is a part. A digital patchwork of droning pitches leads into a call and response session between soothing synth flourishes and guitar/bass lines, taking Balearic vibes stargazing. Climb in Tosca's virtual escape pod and repeat after them: no hassles.
Sounds like: Windsurf, Meanderthals
DOWNLOAD: The Young Lovers - Album Mini-mix
A cursory tour through Hervé's back catalog suggests the British producer is all about bombast and, in the words of his 2007 single, "Cheap Thrills." But the many monikered Hervé (Joshua Harvey to his folks, half of The Count and Sinden to many others) has facets initially hidden by his rave-igniting tunes. One of the most surprising comes under the guise The Young Lovers, which finds Harvey exploring everything from nodding jazz laments, broken beat hip-hop instrumentals, jazzy house tracks, swinging samba and swerving downtempo jams. Skeptics should direct their ears to this classy minimix which cuts across each style explored on The Young Lovers' self-titled debut album on Loungin' Recordings. Cool your heels and let the stylings of Harvey at his most chill sooth your buzzing mind.
Sounds like: Madlib, J Dilla, Verve Remixed compilations
The Young Lovers - Album Mini-mix
Previously:
Hervé - Jungle Steppers (feat. The Count Of Monte Cristal)
The Young Lovers' RCRD LBL Page
EXCLUSIVE NEW DOWNLOAD: Bike For Three! - All There Is To Say About Love
(Photo: Tim McCready, Sabine De Moerloose)
Here's another version of today's musicians' version of a message in a bottle. Like Postal Service before them, budding Belgian electronicist Joëlle Phuong Minh Lê (Greetings From Tuskan) sent Canadian indie-rapper Richard Terfry (Buck 65) music (this time from across the Atlantic.) Rich wrote lyrics and then sent it back where Joëlle flexed each track into shape. The result is complex rap lyrics (from "indignant wishes" to "malignant kisses") peppered over delicate, building, downtempo arrangements - appropriate for a girl who used to tinker around with music boxes. Curiously, the two have never met in person.....Regardless, here is the first peep of Bike For Three!'s "All There Is To Say About Love."
Sounds Like: Postal Service, Buck 65, Greetings From Tuskan, Alias, Restiform Bodies
Bike For Three! - All There Is To Say About Love
Bike For Three!'s RCRD LBL Page
DOWNLOAD: King Roc - The Beginning (Radio Edit)
As as solo producer, one half of the tech-house duo Two Armadillos and an essential gear in the Secretsundaze UK club night/label machine, King Roc gets more than his fill of 4x4 beats. It's little surprise, then, his debut solo album explores other avenues within electronic music. Take "The Beginning," the lead track off Chapters, whose strings swoon like a film score under shaved glass, whose punchy drums and cascading piano melodies evoke downtempo's trappings. King Roc's arrangements suggest it's just the start of something much grander.
Sounds like: Zero 7, Massive Attack, Portishead
King Roc - The Beginning (Radio Edit)
STREAM: Nightmares On Wax - Da Feelin'
The last bit we heard from Ibiza-based trip-hop producer George Evelyn, bka Nightmares On Wax, he was melting our minds with his dusty downtempo jam "Hear In Colour," taken from his recent Warp album Thought So... In support of the release, Evelyn will be heading stateside for the first time ever this January, bringing his "soundsystem set featuring vocalists and players" to coasts both left and right with a few stops in between. Warp shot over another track from the album in anticipation of the dates, a droney funk burner called "Da Feelin" that's packing some well chosen Naughty By Nature samples. Stream that below and grab the full itinerary for Nightmare On Wax's inaugural American tour after the links.
Sounds like: The Mole, Studio, Low Motion Disco
Stream: Nightmars On Wax - Da Feelin
Previously:
Download: Nightmares On Wax - Hear In Colour
Stream: Nightmares On Wax - 195lbs.
Nightmare On Wax's RCRD LBL Page
Tour Dates For Nightmares On Wax:
01/26 - Boston, MA - Paradise
01/27 - New York, NY - Bowery Ballroom
01/28 - Brooklyn, NY - Music Hall of Williamsburg
01/29 - Washington, DC - Black Cat Backstage
01/30 - Cleveland, OH - Grog Shop
01/31 - Chicago, IL - The Abbey Pub
02/02 - Los Angeles, CA - Echoplex
02/04 - San Francisco, CA - The Independent
02/06 - Portland, OR - Holocene
02/07 - Seattle, WA - Chop Suey
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