Bleed my heart till the stillness wins
by Give me a minor key song anytime. Yup, I’ll take the heartfelt purity of an introspective trawl over any warm and fuzzy major key shimmy. I once asked UK band The Editors why there aren’t more cheerful songs in the world: ‘Three words’, vocalist Tom Smith replied. ‘Shiny Happy People’. He smirked. I grimaced. Enough said.
Listen to Casiotone for the Painfully Alone’s, Don’t They Have Payphones Wherever You Were Last Night.
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Tagged: indie-rock
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Pavement’s Gold Soundz remastered
I want to squeal so badly right now because I just heard the freshly remastered version of Gold Soundz by Pavement. It’s bliss! This re-jigged 1994 single is the opening track of Pavement’s forthcoming best of album, Quarantine The Past.
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Polvo playing free New York show this Friday
Seminal Chapel Hill indie rock act Polvo are ramping up to the release of their album In Prism in early September with a free show at Manhattan’s Seaport Music Festival this Friday night. For a taste of their forthcoming album, check out this track, Beggar’s Bowl, below. Polvo also wrote a Secret Playlist for us.
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There’s an early Split Enz feel about the music of Sydney indie rock band, The Woods Themselves. It’s particularly evident in the double-tracked vocals and the offbeat arrangements that the group employ. So we checked in with frontman Davey Cotsios and asked if the legendary New Zealand outfit were an influence? ‘That’s so insane it’s brilliant! Had you have said Crowded House, then we’d have some real beef. Seriously, I’d find you and punish you. I really do dig Split Enz, but I can’t say I’ve ever had them close in mind, and I’ve never looked to them for guidance. My buddy Danno – he lived below me years back – gave me this Enz record that we found in his mum’s attic. We’d get messed up on Tuesday nights and jam it. That Leaky Boat song was a favourite. We thought we heard the guy across the street beating on his woman one time while we were jamming that Leaky Boat song. We watched the cops arrive and she denied it in tears from the front door. We kicked his motorbike over later. Just to be sure, you know. Bad neighbourhood man’. The Woods Themselves’ album, (C’Mon) Do The Beach Thing, is out now on Understandation through Inertia.
Download their track, Groove Wind
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Also by ZOLTON
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Star Wars Uncut: a fully crowdsourced version of Episode IV
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Filmmaker creates LEGO stop motion to propose to girlfriend
Now, this is one for the ages: back in 2010, Atlanta film-maker Walter Thompson created a jaw-dropping LEGO stop motion to propose to Nealey Dozier, his girlfriend of four years. The video took 22 hours of shooting and some 2,600 pictures to splice together, a small sacrifice to pay for years of happiness together. Right? Right! Oh, and she said yes. Bonus.
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I’ve long been a fan of Brooklyn artist Katy Horan. With a folksy old west, native american aesthetic, Horan creates paintings rich with narrative, like old campfire stories, come to life. Having recently opened her first solo show at the Anno Domini Gallery in San Jose, Horan has created a haunting new body of work filled with abstract lacy patterns and narratives that will most definitely hit your storytime sweet spot.
I read Bill Bryson’s A Short History of Nearly Everything and emerged out the other end even more confused about what really happened than before. So thank you College Humor and Mark Zuckerberg for simplifying what was evidently a most complex period of time. Read more
Oh man, it’s a good thing I’m not living in Tokyo as I’d probably never leave the house. Japanese TV is the best. Want proof? Check out this clip from a prank show called Wake You Up where hapless victims are woken from their slumber in the most … ummm … ruthless of ways.
I’ve been living in Greenpoint Brooklyn for a couple of years now and one of the highlights is brunch on the weekends. After living in Crown Heights for seven years, where your only choices are Tom’s Diner or Popeye’s Fried Chicken, it’s an amazing change of pace. Brooklyn Label is a classic, old Brooklyn style restaurant with a great menu and when you’re a regular, you get seated before the masses. It’s definitely worth the trip to Greenpoint. But beware of the long waits at around 1pm when the hipsters wake up.
Philly indie rock group Dr Dog recently compiled a crackling Secret Playlist for us which included props for songs by Cass McCombs, Thunderclap Newman, and the new time rag star, A.A Bundy, about whose track, Vice Rag, keyboardist Zach Miller wrote: ‘Good enough to be a classic old timey melody, except with more contemporary lyrical vices added. Great guitar playing’. And so it is [yup, the proof's in the audio below]. You can read more about Dr Dog’s favourite songs via the My Secret Playlist website.
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I’ve seen free-jazz spazz outfit Microkingdom many times in their hometown of Baltimore, but their recent gig opening for Skull Defekts was really tight. I found myself head banging to jazz! That hasn’t happened in a while.
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All you nerds should wet yourselves over these Doctor Who costume t-shirts, which feature the outfits of various Doctor Whos. Which one is your favorite?
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Ben Rowe said | 30 September, 2007
I’ve just listened to this album for the first time. It’s beautiful. Glad I’m not the only one who loves depressing music