Fuck Buttons are back, new album, on tour.

London based experimental two piece Fuck Buttons have released the first scratch of new material from their upcoming second album the Tarot Sport LP - the eagerly anticipated follow-up to 2008's brilliantly received assembly of drones Street Horrrsing. Recorded with legendary producer Andrew Weatherall, the band are already calling the product of their time in the studio 'the most exciting document' they've produced thus far, and have released a shortened version of the lead title for our eager ears to hear.

Surf Solar is some of the most cutting material Fuck Buttons have churned up since that hard hitting remix of Fever Ray they did last year. In a cut down, single-size version measuring up at around 3 and a half minutes, Surf Solar drives forward at break-neck speeds - a searing sonic landscape of crackling samples, glitch percussion and whirring synthesized effects. The result is an electronic web of shoegazing melody lines and rattling, tribal rhythms.

The full album will be heading our way for October 12th, following a full UK tour in September with friends, the 'tropical thrash' band Zun Zun Egui.

Fuck Buttons - Surf Solar (Edit)

SEPTEMBER
17th – Leeds, Brudenell Social Club
18th – Sheffield, The Corporation
19th – Oxford, The Cellar
20th – Manchester, Deaf Institute
21st – Nottingham, Bodega
22nd – Birmingham, Hare & Hounds
23rd – Newcastle, The Other Room
24th – Glasgow, Stereo
25th – Lancaster, The Storey
26th – Bristol, Colston Hall (as part of Geoff Barrow’s Invada Invasion event)
27th – Brighton, Audio

Dark Sparks - 2009 Demo REVIEW

Dark Sparks are a reformed and adjusted indie rock band from Sheffield who, with the boost of a new line-up on top of already garnered success in autumn 2008, are looking to take their infectious mix of darkened 80s post-punk and contemporary British indie rock to even wider audiences than they managed last year. In their relatively brief time together as a band (they only formed in January 2007) they've toured and written extensively, and played a prominent selection of support slots with the likes of The Enemy, Boy Kill Boy, The Whip, The Courteeners, Air Traffic, Blood Red Shoes, The Subways and The Rumble Strips to name but a few.

They've added a keyboard, a new drummer and an extra guitar to the line-up in the early part of 2009, putting in heavy practice to hone their emotive sound further into a tighter and more precise execution. Dark Sparks' schizophrenic musical structures - ranging from creepy fingerpicked acoustics to screeching overdrives - scream echoes of Biffy Clyro, but the unsettling calmness in Leigh Greenwood's vocals put Dark Sparks' sound closer to that of Placebo.

The band, made up of Leigh and Adam Greenwood, Steve Charlton, Simon Green and Nicky Sykes, are determined that all their music be made available for free (you can download any of their tracks for free at their website), and their latest two track EP is no exception. Demo opener We Are Just Flies begins as a calculated vocal over a sinister fingerpick, which slowly but surely leads into a crashing rhythm guitar and squealing lead line. The whole effect is not far from some of those classic solos from Radiohead's Bends and Bloc Party's Silent Alarm. Dark Sparks' style owes a lot to their contemporaries, but as with any new band which deserves respect, they draw their influences into something wider, creating music new and exciting, and very loud.

The second track on the EP, Crying In The Spotlight, is where the 80s influence really shines through. A slow and haunting, synthy guitar line to begin is quickly joined by the disturbing first line of "Sex inside a darkened room, blinded by the purple moon." Soon enough the newly-wedded pair of guitars take over; and what begins a cold and downbeat track transforms itself into a 3 minute burst of energy, propelled forward by aggressive percussion and a screaming Bloc Party wall of overdrive.

The whole effect of Dark Sparks' music is adrenaline pumping to say the least; it's no wonder following their ecletic selection of support slots that NME called them 'Ace' in it's radar section and Steve Lamacq made Into The Dark his track of the week. Fellow 2008 track Red Skies made its way onto German National Radio, a fantastic location to break into on the indie rock scene. Previous success combined with a reshuffle the band sees as a 'natural progression' can only provide proof of further successes for a band with so much gig experience already tucked under it's live performance belt.

Dark Sparks and their self-promotion are proof that bands don't need a record label to garner a (as channel 4 teletext called it) 'slaving fanbase' of their own. Dark Sparks intend to set about the year excessively gigging and recording, and building their reputation the good 'old fashioned' way, by playing their hearts out every night. If they keep this up, Dark Sparks are surely a UK band with great things to come.

Dark Sparks - We Are Just Flies
Dark Sparks - Crying In The Spotlight

The Big Pink offer free download and confirm album details!

Milo Cordell and Robbie Furze, also known as the pair behind shoegazy electro band The Big Pink (who you can read about here), have confirmed the date, and the full details behind their forthcoming debut album, set to be released on 4ad records September 14th. This will sit comfortably between a series of summer UK festival dates and a full UK tour scheduled for October.

The album, entitled A Brief History Of Love, will feature previous singles Too Young To Love, Crystal Visions and the stunning Velvet (video below). The track Stop The World will not feature. All the tracks with the exception of Velvet were mixed by New Order and Muse producer Rich Costey in his New York studio. Velvet was produced by Yeah Yeah Yeahs and My Bloody Valentine producer, the shoegaze pioneer Alan Moulder.



You can download the new single Dominoes for free on this link.

Crystal Visions
Too Young To Love
Dominos
Love In Vain
At War With The Sun
Velvet
Golden Pendulum
Frisk
A Brief History Of Love
Tonight
Countbackwards From Ten

The Big Pink's festival appearances and details of the headlining UK tour are listed below:

August:
1st – Field Day, London
28th – Reading Festival
30th – Leeds Festival
September:
4th – Electric Picnic, Stradbally
11th – Bestival, Isle of Wight
14th - ALBUM RELEASE

October:
8th – Wedgewood Rooms, Portsmouth
9th – Digital, Brighton
10th – Academy, Oxford
14th – King Tuts, Glasgow
17th – The Duchess, York
18th – Cockpit, Leeds
20th – O2 Academy, Liverpool
21st – Academy, Manchester
22nd – Electric Ballroom, London

Magic Wands - Magic, Love and Dreams EP

Magic Wands are a new and heavily buzzed boy/girl due based just out of L.A. Their well-deserved rise to mainstream attention is being propelled almost exclusively by the force of their one part dream pop, one part blues rock single 'Black Magic'. This track is seriously addictive, with a luscious, bluesy, overdriven riff artists as diverse as White Stripes and Michael Jackson will be kicking themselves for not coming up with. Its clear from the outset why Magic Wands have already come straight off the back of US tour support slots with some of the biggest bands in the business - The Kills, The Raconteurs and The Horrors. Magic Wands sound like MGMT making music for a Quentin Tarantino movie, and they pull off their classic Ray-Ban Wayfarers and cut off jeans style in every sense, with the smooth vocals of Alison Mosshart's Kills placed between interludes of bluesy, turn of the century, garage rock revival.

Chris and Dexy Valentine have been writing music since 2007, after their 2000 mile-apart phone conversations over that summer began to yield some results. Chris is from Nashville and Dexy from L.A, and although they spoke briefly at a show in L.A in 2006, they wouldn't speak again for an entire year. It was later on, when Chris, by coincidence, had been playing Dexy's song on repeat from myspace, that their contact would be reinstated.



They released their single 'Teenage Love' (watch the video above) for free on Valentine's day '08, and began to record songs for their EP and tour in summer of that year. The EP 'Magic, Love and Dreams', recorded in John Hill's (Lykke Li, Santigold) New York Studio, using Prince's drum machine, is living proof that Magic Wands were making My Bloody Valentine inspired music since well before the current shoegaze revival The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart appear to be spearheading.

The EP was released, after springtime touring with The Virgins and Black Kids, on July 6th on Bright Antenna (US, Japan) and Young and Lost Club in the UK, in anticipation of an album for September time. Warrior (in the video below) will be the next UK single, and is being offered as a free download upon buying the Magic, Love and Dreams EP on Itunes.



You can pick up a free download of 'Black Magic' below, or purchase the EP on Itunes.

Magic Wands - Black Magic

The Octopus Project - Golden Beds EP REVIEW

The Octopus Project are an electronica/post-rock band formed in 1999 in Austin, Texas. They make experimental pop music with elements taken from rock, indietronica, post-punk and post-rock. It is quite difficult to categorize their music down into any single genre. The new EP presents the listener with exactly the same non-problems.

The lead single from the 5-track EP, entitled Wet Gold, is stunning. A fast paced percussive track with disorientating electronic effects throughout; this song sounds like Black Moth Super Rainbow crossed with the muffled vocals of Metric. It is not like The Octopus Project to deal with vocals in their songs (the last time they did this was the song 'Queen' on October 2007's 'Hello, Avalanche.') but they pull the surprise inclusion off by having the dubbed down vocals as very much a part of the background of the music.

Moon Boil is again upbeat, with overdriven guitars and jarring bassline, and it is only the background noise and key changes that prevent this from being a fairly standard garage rock song. The song is short at only 2:28, but three times a clear blues rock influence is unleashed in the breakdown. Between these lie overdriven jazz chords and at times very muffled background vocals and effects.

The third track Rorol is more worthy of the title of Moon Boil than the Moon Boil itself. Sounding like a musical journey to space, with spacey loops Jean-Jacques Perrey would be proud of sitting comfortably above a low double drone of a bassline, this track is weird, ambient, psychedelic and ultimately a bit pointless. It's nice enough to have on, but leaves you wondering what just happened? Rorol is a six minute stroke of weirdness in the middle of an otherwise solid EP.

Wood Trumpet, track 4 is grand, and begins the Golden Beds descent into chiptune. I can't help but draw an immediate comparison to 8bitpeoples such as Anamanaguchi (who's Power Supply you can ZIP here) when i listen to this. I suppose it's just bands like this who we really have to call ecletic. Track 5, wittily entitled 'Half A Nice Day' is almost Crystal Castles its so electro. If i've ever seen a candidate for linkage to the last.fm group 'Im so electronic i shit bits', it's this song. It all comes together quite nicely in the end, for a song which starts out quite minimalistic, it ends with gitches from all angles and nicely complementing riffs to finish.

The whole EP lasts 19 minutes and 5 tracks, and the Glockenspiel features heavily throughout. Now that the latest Lost series has just ended, and the band have a spare 8 months they decided to visit the studio once again this autumn and start recording for a new album, then take their new material on a US tour. Tours and albums are good news for a fan of any band, so it's good news all round for fans of The Octopus Project, especially since the new EP is fantastic. When it comes out on July 28th, i advise you to buy it, along with whatever they release as a product of their studio booking this Autumn.

You can stream the EP here, and the song Wet Gold is available as a free promo.
Enjoy!

The Octopus Project - Wet Gold

US Tour 2009

07/19 - Austin, TX @ Austin Fashion Awards
07/24 - St. Louis, MO @ Luminary
07/25 - Chicago, IL @ Bottom Lounge
07/26 - Cleveland, OH @ Grog Shop
07/28 - Toronto, ON @ Lee's Palace
07/29 - Montreal, QC @ Il Motore
07/30 - Boston, MA @ TT the Bears
07/31 - Providence, RI @ Jerky's Music Hall
08/02 - New York, NY @ Mercury Lounge
08/03 - Philadelphia, PA @ Kung Fu Necktie
08/04 - Baltimore, MD @ Ottobar
08/05 - Chapel Hill, NC @ Cat's Cradle
08/06 - Atlanta, GA @ Starbar
08/07 - New Orleans, LA @ One Eyed Jack's
08/08 - Houston, TX @ Free Press Summer Fest
08/13 - Tucson, AZ @ Plush
08/14 - Los Angeles, CA @ Troubadour
08/15 - San Francisco, CA @ Bottom of the Hill
08/17 - Portland, OR @ Doug Fir
08/18 - Seattle, WA @ Chop Suey
08/21 - Salt Lake City, UT @ Urban Lounge
08/22 - Denver, CO @ Larimer Lounge

6 Day Riot

6 Day Riot are an ecletic London based folk pop band quickly gathering momentum and garnering increasing industry attention after just five years of music making. Their latest album, 6 Day Riot Have A Plan, came out on July 6th of 2009, and was hotly tipped this January by The Times in their Top Ten Picks for 2009. They play a whole host of folk instruments including ukulele, tenor guitar, double bass, accordions, trumpets, and electric and acoustic guitars. The result is a punchy indie pop sound slightly reminiscent of Vampire Weekend, Foals, in places Ra Ra Riot and even a slightly less distant Arcade Fire. Word magazine called them "a great big, bouncy, cynic-defying barrel of fun."

There is certainly nothing bad that springs to mind on listening to their material. It is very difficult to make any criticisms. For catchy, irresistable Noah & The Whale style folk pop music with a positive outlook, it doesn't come much better than this. The female vocal supplied is clean and clear, Lykke Li is a close and obvious comparison. The sunny melodies and quirky riffs the vocals intertwine with, broken up by short orchestral interludes is as beachy a combination as indie pop comes, and spontaneous afrobeat percussion adds another layer of unashamed rawness to the sound.

6 Day Riot are a whole lot of fun, as is the video for 'Run For Your Life' which you can stream below.





They are playing a series of festivals this summer (sadly not Reading) including Truck Festival, Green Man, and Meze in October. They are even supporting their more serious contemporaries Tunng in Regents park this August. You can stream their music, and hopefully even buy the album all through the bands myspace.

In a word, as the Independent On Sunday put it, 6 Day Riot are 'lush.'

New Wild Beasts - Hooting & Howling

Wild Beasts are a Kendal, UK based indie rock band who I saw for the first time last year on tour with Foals at Southampton Guildhall, and despite the repeated warnings from their promotion team at the front entrance that they were 'too weird' for most people, i don't find them that strange at all.

I think the main reason people find Wild Beasts odd is lead singer Hayden Thorpe's crispy clean falsetto voice. He is not afraid to use it to dominate Wild Beast's music. It is very high pitched and combined with the foals-esque ambience which features on the aptly-named new single 'Hooting & Howling', it makes for a chilling experience.

The new track 'Hooting & Howling' builds up beautifully on an uphill slope, and despite sticking to the convention of a verse and chorus structure it never at any point loses its intensity. Although you may not realise from the first minute or so of aimless (and not in a bad way) vocal, this is an incredibly riff driven song, with an incredible riff to go with it. This song really gets under your skin, check out the lovely underwater video below.



The new Wild Beasts album 'Two Dancers' is out on August 3rd, and they are touring the UK through October.

0/07/2009 - CANTERBURY Lounge On The Farm
12/07/2009 - IRELAND Oxygen
18/07/2009 - NR. CHELTENHAM 2000 Trees
19/07/2009 - SUFFOLK Latitude
25/07/2009 - OXFORDSHIRE Truck festival
26/07/2009 - DORSET Camp Bestival
31/07/2009 - STOCKTON-ON-TEES Stockton Riverside Festival
01/08/2009 - LONDON Field Day, Victoria Park
06/08/2009 - LONDON Hoxton Hall *SOLD OUT*
08/08/2009 - ILKLEY Moor Music festival
30/09/2009 - EDINBURGH Cabaret Voltaire
(www.gigsinscotland.com)
01/10/2009 - LEEDS Cockpit (www.lunatickets.co.uk)
02/10/2009 - NOTTINGHAM Bodega (www.alt-tickets.co.uk)
03/10/2009 - BRISTOL Thekla (www.alt-tickets.co.uk)
04/10/2009 - BIRMINGHAM Hare & Hounds
(www.hareandhoundskingsheath.co.uk)
05/10/2009 - BRIGHTON Hanbury Ballroom(www.ticketweb.co.uk)
07/10/2009 - OXFORD Academy 2 (www.o2academyoxford.co.uk)
08/10/2009 - LONDON Garage (www.livenation.co.uk)
09/10/2009 - MANCHESTER Academy 3 (www.ticketline.co.uk)

Billy Mack Collector - Sting Rays REVIEW

Billy Mack Collector are an experimental folk band from Pennsylvania who have come straight off the back of a 3 month US tour into promoting their third album 'Stingrays'. The first line of their myspace sets out their mission statement perfectly.

"Billy Mack Collector come from the mountains of pennsylvania to play in your living room."

Hopefully soon it won't just be living rooms.

They sing songs about 'being awkward' which are put together in the exact sort of way songs about being awkward should be put together - slightly awkwardly. Their music is described by the band as 'operatic cabaret folk trash campfire songs', and this is as accurate a description as you could wish for in under 7 words. Time signatures change frequently and the psychedelic campfire vocals never really reach levels above a murmur, but the whole effect of this is easily satisying enough to warrant listening.

The instrumentation is campfire if i ever did hear it - the whole discography of Billy Mack Collector features acoustic bass, flute, marimba, bassoon, clarinet and harmonica, as well as standard acoustic guitars and vocal harmonies. Acoustics are heavy and bassy and vocals are often light and distant. They are passively catchy in a light, casual Clap Your Hands Say Yeah kind of way, but they don't employ oversized, attention grabbing riffs to keep you interested. Billy Mack Collector pretend to be nothing but what they are.

The songs never quite reach stomping Dodo style folk rock riffs although they often sound like they are about to. In a less catchy but more discordial style the acoustics sound like British folk band Tunng, minus the electronics. Self-quoted influences (along with Mindless Self Indulgence, Frank Zappa and The Magnetic Fields) include 'Beirut' and 'Why?', and the lumberous marching melodies of Beirut combined with the murky harmonies of parts of 'Why?' come close to explaining just where Billy Mack Collector got that unique gyspy folk sound from.



Stingrays is a flat stringed freak folk album that fits right in next to Devendra Banhart for days when standard isn't catching your interest. Weighing in at just 31 minutes for 15 tracks, it is as easily accessible as the song titles suggest.

Billy Mack Collector - Genderless
Billy Mack Collector - Flat Ol' Florida
Billy Mack Collector - Fix That, Get Fat.

You can also download Billy Mack's ten song solo album through the myspace.

New Meursault, Nothing Broke EP REVIEW

Meursault are an up and coming electronic folk band based in Edinburgh, UK who have just released their latest effort - the Nothing Broke EP. If you've heard their first album 'Pissing On Bonfires/Kissing With Tongues' this will be the best news you've heard all day.

The new EP takes the quiet and intimate parts of the debut and focusses mainly in and around main man, multi-instrumentalist and vocalist Neil Pennycook. The whole album as a result calms down so to speak. While much of the first album revolved around the full band drum and bass/folk sound, the new one drops most of the harsh electronica and replaces it with extra emphasis on the ukuleles, banjos and acoustics. The first track on the album, eponymous Nothing Broke, is the closest thing electro we get on here. A calmly executed riff with a minor piano behind it sits beneath Pennycook's held notes in a classically Meursault build up and finish. This song builds up beautifully, but never quite reaches the euphoric electronic whirlwind outros Pissing On Bonfires featured so heavily.

Meursault manage to diversify yet again with the next track. Red Candle Bulb is a short interlude compared to the rest of the EP at 2:20, and is shockingly Jose Gonzalez in vocal style. The song is lyrically dense, which is unusual and minor in finish which by this EP's standards, is usual. Love or Limb is another sad song from the band, with vocals few and far between on a folky acoustic track. The Ukulele's and Banjos are out again as is that brilliant backing vocal.

The EP takes a positive turn in the form of double outro track William Henry Miller Pt.1 and 2. The first half is optimistic and played, and really shows off the versatility of Pennycook's Spencer Krug style singing voice. All that pop sensibility the band possessed from the first album come out here; hand claps and folk-soaked melody lines make for a pure folk pop song, coated in a whole load of reverb. It says something about Meursault that the final track on the album is by far the darkest. William Henry Miller pt. 2 is drawn out and painful, and at 4 downbeat songs out of 5 it is representative of the EP. Who knows what direction Meursault will take next, whether it is back to their euphoric mix of electro and folk, or ahead onto their intimately oppressive folk songs.

You can buy the EP or the stunning debut from Song, By Toad records.

Burial & Four Tet - REVIEW

Some dubstep conspiracy theorists claim that Burial (Will Bevan) and Four Tet (Kieran Hebden) are in fact the same person, and this is not unreasonable to believe. They both attended The Elliott School, London (as did three members of Hot Chip) and Burial keeps his identity buried exclusively within the mystery of his music. They both make experimental electronica, each drawing influence from the other, Burial venturing more into ambient dubstep with Four Tet indulging in everything from folktronica to underground dance.

To further excite the conspiracy theorists, Radiohead, who have worked with Burial, listed a post on their blog last year entitled "introducing Kieran 'Burial' Hebden". Four Tet also claims to be one of the few who knows Burial personally as Burial. Surely with such a widely known name of Will Bevan, it would only be a matter of time before his identity was brought to mainstream attention. The fact is, people want to know the face behind the music and the intelligence behind his ambient creations.

Now Bevan and Hebden, whether they are the same person or not, are releasing collaborative work, and it is a cut above the rest. Burial is known for being highly self critical - he started work on his self titled debut album in 2001 before its 2006 release. He has released one other mercury prize nominee album since then, 2007's Untrue. Forthcoming album 'DJ Kicks' has been repeatedly postponed from an initial reported release date of 23rd June 2008. Four Tet on the other hand is prolific, completing six albums under the alias from 1999 to the present day. His quality control is a little lower, producing a wide range of ecletic releases compared to Burial's specific niche market musicality.

The result of the cross-over is certainly more Burial than Four Tet. The 12" two track release, on Kieran Hebden's label 'Text', featured a completely black sleeve vinyl with no liner notes. No information was given about the release other than the names of the respective artists. The vinyl release features two tracks at 17:55, entitled 'Moth' and 'Wolf Cub'.

Moth is 9 minutes 3 seconds long and features almost a minute of Burial-esque ambience before it begins. What happens after 56 seconds is quite difficult to explain in reference to anything i've ever heard before. The sound here is almost three dimensional, slightly unreal in tone. It is a regular and clearcut tribal ambience which four bars later, combined with a standard but intensely effective dubstep beat makes for an experience not far from hypnosis. It retains every instance of that harsh urban reality which Burial so consistently shows us. Snippets of lost conversation and eery ringing intensify in the background throughout the song on an upwards slope, but at no point does the song lose its originality or its passive mood. Four Tet's influence emerges about half way through, with an almost aquatic sounding riff not far from some of Four Tet's work on 2005's 'Everything Ecstatic', emerging confidently into the forefront of the song, slotting in perfectly around the resilient tribal rhythm.

Wolf Cub weighs in at 8:55. If Burial and Four Tet had a song each, this one would belong to Four Tet. It begins as Moth ends, with an poly-rhythmical aquatic effect and calm ambient background noise. About a minute in emerges the harshest noise of the 12", a glitchy version of the tribal Burial effect on Moth, and by the 5 minute mark this song has become true ambient dubstep. The crackling water effect is joined by a heavy dubstep beat and the song builds on from there. Occasional atmospheric twangs of bass and jarring synths intermittently enter and depart, surrounding the sonic landscape. The song builds on an uphill slope from here on.

This release requires enough insight into it that i'm almost glad for my readers sake that it is only two tracks long. Any news of an album, or an album at all looks highly unlikely, but as Burial and Four Tet fans know, results in this field are unpredictable and surprising. Anything could happen with this collaboration.

If it so turns out that this collaboration really are the same person, then good luck to them, i find it quite difficult to believe they haven't already been diagnosed Schizophrenic.

Burial & Four Tet - Moth
Burial & Four Tet - Wolf Cub

Buy Burial & Four Tet

Marina & The Diamonds

I've fallen victim to yet another female solo artist, this time welsh-born solo artist Marina & The Diamonds. Supposedly the diamonds are her fans rather than her backing band, but the word bears a curious resemblance to her Greek last name Diamandis. She is based in London and has already played slots at Glastonbury festival (which i missed!) and Radio One's Big Weekend. She was recently signed to Neon Gold records.

She's had her fair share of controversy, last year she was noted for throwing an infamous 'girly punch' at a man in the front row who had been fiddling with her keyboard, and then blogging about it. On an angry day last year she wrote a scathing review of Kate Nash and Lily Allen on the same blog (which you can check out here) and her problems with the female celebrity. But nowadays she's over that, having seen for herself the beginnings of her rise to fame.

Her music mirrors this outspoken view on the world, supplying highly critical lyrics through the medium of quirky, Kate Bush inspired piano pop.

"One minute i'm a little sweetheart
and next minute you are an absolute creep."

Marina doesn't just sing the lyrics. I am consistently left with the impression, even from the studio recordings, that these songs are really delivered. Mowgli's road is the closest thing to total anger, but even the most subtle and personal of her releases so far - 'Obsessions' shows a considerable amount of it; Marina uses her songs very much as a way of venting her anger at society in general.

"You say Y-E-S to everything."

It is a very exciting time for female solo artists this summer; rarely have they been more in fashion. Little Boots, La Roux, and Florence & The Machine's albums have lived up to the hype and Marina's as of yet untitled debut album is surely a safe bet to do the same. All details of albums release dates, names and tracklistings, as well as future single releases are very much being kept a secret. Her live shows however are one thing she has no problem opening up about - she's playing Reading & Leeds festivals, Camp Bestival, as well as the NME radar tour through September and October. Marina is definitely one to watch this summer!

As usual these days, i cannot upload mp3s, but they will soon make a return, i promise.

Animal Collective - The Park Stage (Glastonbury 2009) - LIVE REVIEW

Animal Collective were a band i knew would highlight Glastonbury, and they fulfilled the expectation of every corner of their ecletic turnout with their futuristic mix of 60s harmonies, loop heavy electronica and freak folk.

For three albums their experimental rhythms and their complex, inaccessible ear for a melody has consistently intrigued a small, sophisticated and devoted fanbase, but Merriweather Post Pavilion has taken a definitive step towards wider acceptance. The turnout for the park stage was large and diverse; the foot tappers and idle head nodders were won over and the long term fanbase were sucked in by the whole experience. Any internet based dissatisfaction for an Animal Collective 'betrayal' in the form of their latest release was not at all felt here.

'Peacebone' and 'My Girls': new and old, were best received, even if there was to some extent the feeling that the latter was thrown away early on in the hour long set. The whole show was draped in a green/blue/purple light emanating from the back of the stage, and the physical layout, two mixing desks with guitarist in the centre, left the futuristic 'sci-fi' look of the stage perfectly matching its sounds.

The two tall mixing desks on either side were draped in Merriweather's colourful artwork, and as usual Geologist sported his Orbital style torch on the head. The show as a whole was more like a trippy DJ set that a stage show; songs melted counter-rhythmically into one another using changing tempos and beatmatching synths. The whole sound of this noise pop, neo-psychedelic stage show was intense, grand and played incredibly loud. Loops, synths and tribal vocal lines, climaxing at final song 'Brother Sport' left Glastonbury 2009's crowd in total awe.

Animal Collective - My Girls
Animal Collective - Brother Sport

Buy Merriweather Post Pavilion
images + mp3s coming soon, for the reasons described in the last post!

Bon Iver - The Park Stage (Glastonbury 2009) - LIVE REVIEW

I've never left a musical performance in such stunned silence, and i wasn't the only one. People who see Bon Iver are genuinely affected by him, nearly without exception. There's just something about the intimate delivery of Vernon and the modesty which sees him set up his own pedals beforehand which leaves his crowds with the mutual realisation that they have stumbled upon something quite special.

Bon Iver played two sets at Glastonbury 2009, one on the intimate park stage, tucked away at the back of Glastonbury (which also saw non televised sets from M. Ward, Animal Collective and Tunng & Tinariwen, as well as a special guest slot from The Dead Weather), and also on the other stage to the general public. We were in the third row, standing about 3 - 4 metres from Justin himself. I never predicted before heading down to the front following M.Ward that we would get quite that close.

He played a pitch perfect set, on 6 self-tuned guitars (might i add the sound check was one of the longest i had to sit through the entire weekend, weighing in at 55 minutes) with the album sound recreated perfectly, other bands members chipping in on backing vocals. Hearing Vernon speak calmly between each individual outburst of passionate performance was awe inspiring in itself, as was seeing Vernon oblivious to his incredible worldwide reception. He began the set by simply thanking the crowd for turning up.

He delivered most of the songs from the album, and all of the Blood Bank Ep except Woods (understandably if you've heard the.. complex vocal arrangement) and Brackett, W9 from the Dark Was The Night compilation. Although he finished with Lump Sum, the highpoint of the set was without doubt The Wolves (Act I And II), where audience participation in the outro for 'What might have been lost' led perfectly into screams of appreciation and applause around the packed park area. People were watching from as far back as we could see from the front, the sun had set, and torches and lights showed up against the low-lit onlookers.

Delivery of every song was faultless in every case, the album ambience was created perfectly with what looked like a fairly standard, but slightly heavy on the pedals stage set up. The hour wait we had for the start was worth it when you heard the result of the endless tunings, sounds and effects in set up. If there's one thing anyone takes from this article, i hope that it should be that Bon Iver shows are life changing.

Bon Iver - Brackett, W9

Bon Iver - The Wolves (Act I And II)

mp3s and disposable camera photos will follow, on the two conditions that they come out when i get them developed tomorrow despite the low light, and that i somehow get rid of this virus from my computer.