Classixx - Hanging Gardens

Not since the days of Babylon has the world experienced a wonder of this magnitude.  No, we're not referring to Vanilla Ice's - "Ice, Ice, Baby", but rather to the new insta-Classixx album - Hanging Gardens. With a steady stream of track releases beginning with "Holding On" in early February, Classixx have been carefully watering a garden of fans, and are ready to bear the fruits of their labor with the album release on May 14.  With a full preview here from our friends at NPR, one can take a tour through a fountain of synthesizers, disco beats, bongos, wind chimes and Nancy Whang vocals (formerly of LCD Soundsystem).  

Don't stop there though, once you've finished, continue through their immaculate selections, a 47 minute session of beautifully crafted songs dating from the 80's through today. 

Do you like bass?  we do.

AM & Shawn Lee - "Two Times"

From Troysnoise to Rolling Stone Premiere, AM & Shawn Lee are finally gaining their due cred.

"Shawn Lee sent me a maddening Sleng Teng Riddim influenced jam and at first I was wondering how on earth I was going to add vocals to it...then it hit me: total 70's soul...we're mixing up the decades with 80's digi-reggae, 70's soul, and haunting Casio keyboards. I added a guitar solo on the end for good measure and the track was done."

Full album release May 7.

AM & Shawn Lee - "Two Times" 

In anticipation of the Le Musique Numerique album release tour, get your tickets now.

Click to read more ...

Hanni El Khatib - "Penny (Classixx remix)"

 

The rare remix makes the troysnoise cut this week. Classixx is on the verge of releasing their debut original cuts and found time to completely transform this original from the knife fights and train wrecks influenced Hanni El Khatib LA-based band.

And while we're at it...

Make it a good weekend.  More classic tracks upcoming tomorrow AND Sunday!

Lord Huron - "Time To Run"

Hometown - La la land

Label - IAMSOUND

First mentioned on Tnoise early last year

New track and video - Lord Huron - "Time To Run"

Goldroom - "Pacific"

"An amalgamation of dreamy synths, emotive vocals, and tropical disco grooves, Goldroom paints the soundscape of summertime in Los Angeles."

So go play this track on repeat and watch the Discovery channel or something.

Goldroom - "Pacific"

Electric Guest - "This Head I Hold"

They're from L.A. and Dangermouse is giving them a stamp of approval by producing their album Mondo, due out April 24.  Peep this track "This Head I Hold" which sounds like Gnarls Barkley meets motown.  If you're in Austin this week catch them at one of their four or five gigs.  Windish Agency (they book bands) has them under contract, the same agency who snagged Foster The People early in the game...

And the much different, 9 minute Troubleman...

Shlohmo - "wen uuu"

On the heels of his critically acclaimed debut full-length Bad Vibes, Shlohmo (Henry Laufer) embarks deeper into darker realms on his latest venture with Friends of Friends Music, the Vacation EP.  Self-described as "night time backyard noises", "Vacation" builds on the aesthetic Shlohmo established with mixes for FACT and FADER, in which broken cassette tapes and warped found sounds melded into melodic beats packed with veiled emotion and latent mysteriousness.

The enigmatic "wen uuu" simultaneously pulls at the heartstrings with a quavering vocal sample while churning forward in a passionate, indisputable groove.

Release date - Feb. 07

12" with remixes including Airhead, Salva, Nicolas Jaar (t-noise favorite) and Groundislava will be out in March.

Vinyl Pre-Order

Unknown Mortal Orchestra - "Bicycle" [video]

UMO was already a top qualifier for top 5 album of the year, and a brand new video for "Bicylce" featuring a gorgeous blonde lighting fireworks, climbing barbwire, and exploding stolen twinkies only helps their cause.  Enjoy.

Dreams - Feelings 4 U

This is Dreams' debut Ep and it's entitled Feelings 4 U.  R&B, soul pop, 80's, new wave, call it whatever you want, I'll say damn attractive.  Jesse Pimenta, hometown of Rio, is a young beatmaker based in LA and is the one given credit for the album. 

Dreams - "Inlove."

Dreams - "Celebrate Wit Me"

Get all nine tracks for free from their bandcamp.

80's Revival.Wordless L♥ve Songs.Eternal Funk.Dreams.

Suzanne Kraft

 

It's hard to find much about Suzanne Kraft.  Here's one of the few descriptions out there, written by their record label Running Back.

"Freshman" is a random release posted a few months ago while "Morning Come" is off the Green Flash EP.

Travelling from Los Angeles to Portland and back again, Suzanne Kraft’s vinyl debut Green Flash (check out previous efforts here), features four tracks of frenetic sunshine ecstasy. Chill-rave, pill-wave, hypno-disco, Balearic-beats, boogie-grooviness or slow-motion house made by the careless youth of the US-American west coast?

Lovett

This is our second post about Lovett in as many months.  Unsurprisingly the LA band is garnering quite the buzz of late; after watching and listening to the latest projects the talent and pure passion for music and video was obvious.  Their short film Ghost of Old Highways, as feature below with the instruments from the "Ghost of Old Highways" track, is the fourth in a series of colllaborations with film directors. 

"Lovett - The Fear"

"Lovett plays a man pursued by an invading army as he hunts down previous versions of himself amidst the purgatory of a fractured consciousness. The expansive script and film was inspired by the song, which Lovett also used as the basis for an entirely new score, bringing the project full circle.

Shot on location in North Carolina, the film crew was a collection of DIY filmmakers and industry veterans, battling rugged landscapes and unpredictable weather atop a 5,000-foot peak near Cold Mountain to capture a surreal look and tone, conjuring a visual language that exists somewhere between Terrence Malick and Frank Miller."

AM & Shawn Lee - "Somebody Like You"

Celestial Electric is due out Sep. 6th, but a few weeks ago AM & Shawn Lee released another single and video, showing off again why Thievery Corporation added them to their lineup for the current tour across the U.S.  Watch the video and you'll realize how sick these guys are.

Soft Pipes - "Stay Pretty"

Soft Pipes - "Stay Pretty"

Anthony Polcino (pictured left) is the sole creator behind the LA-based Soft Pipes. and "Stay Pretty" is a new release, while "Golden Grace" and "The Boy I've Been" are off the October '10 album When You're Done Here You Get To Go Home.  

Soft Pipes - "Golden Grace"

props to Knox Road

AM & Shawn Lee - "Spin it Around"

Conceived after AM heard Lee's Music And Rhythm album on the radio in LA and reached out to him via email, this fairly new musical collabo between London's Shawn Lee and AM is quickly proving successful. 

AM & Shawn Lee - "Spin It Around"

If you weren't already convinced, AM & Shawn Lee are hittin the road with Thievery Corporation in September and then heading out to play the East Coast, UK, & France.  Chew on this single until their debut album hits stores, Celestial Electric is out Sep. 6th. 

Peep this behind the scenes video look into "building the track" for "Dark into Light" from earlier this year.

Active Child - "Hanging On"

""For Pat Grossi of Active Child, the last two years have been nothing short of enriching. Musically, Pat has worked within and appropriated a number of styles into his sound, from his early days singing with that heavenly voice as a choir boy to his more recent forays into laptop-assisted indie-pop made in his bedroom, best exemplified on 2010’s acclaimed Curtis Lane EP. His sound is so wide-ranging that he's found himself touring with many notable acts of differing genres, including dubstep producer James Blake, dreamy synth-pop of School of Seven Bells, and the indie-rock bands White Lies and White Rabbits." 

Active Child - "Hanging On"

Recently, he's expanded his sonic ambitions, turning the studio into "an instrument for a record that sounds cosmically huge and yet intimate all the same."  You Are All I See is out August 23rd via Vagrant records and "Hanging On" is the second release off the album.