Been around for a few days now, but here's the first taste of what hotly-tipped noiseniks Sleigh Bells' debut album might sound like:

Tell 'Em

D'you like it? Seems to retain the ear-battering effect of their primitive demos, which can only be a good thing.
The song will appear on Treats, set to be released on May 11th on N.E.E.T., the label set up by M.I.A, as previously mentioned.
Here's the Myspace

Swim

I chatted about Caribou before, but the release of Dan Snaith's latest album, Swim, warrants further attention. I won't bother going into too great a depth, but rest assured it's worth checking out, providing an ideal companion piece to Four Tet's There Is Love in You, with its similar blendng of musical genres, from techno to krautrock, but differing from Kieran Hebden's project in its greater emphasis upon vocals and lyrics, developing themes revolving in particular around love; both lost and found. The result is a heady concoction of evocative electronica that marks a new direction from previous Caribou output, whilst retaining the hallmarks and qualities that made Dan Snaith such a distinctive musician to begin with.

Born free- but it may not end that way

Q. Is the new M.I.A. video, directed by Romain Gavras, pointlessly violent?

A. No.

M.I.A, Born Free from ROMAIN-GAVRAS on Vimeo.

The almost-nine minute long video to the Sri Lankan stars most recent song, one which features a prominently looped sample of Suicide's Ghost Rider, shows scenes of police brutality, naked flesh, lots of explosions and a suitably bloody ending. Showing a succession of police raids and the deportation of a bunch of ginger teenagers to some kind of death camp, where they must run through a minefield, goes straight for the jugular in its efforts to get its point across. The point is clearly one about oppression, brutality and violence in the world, and in particular that aimed at particular groups of people, reflecting both the troubles of M.I.A.'s homeland, as well as the lyrics of the original Suicide song, "America, America is killing its kids". The fact that it was also made by Gavras, who shot this notorious video for Justice, also helps to explain the ultra-violent social commentary of this "promo" (I don't see it getting played, unedited, on MTV anytime soon).
As well as making apt political and humanitarian points, the video suits the menacing groove of the track's sampled backing, as well as M.I.A.'s snotty, punky vocals, and her assertion that she was "Born Free"- which is also the title of the track as I have forgetfully neglected to mention.
It's a far-cry from the lazy, slacker vibes of breakthrough hit Paper Planes, although Maya's predilection for sampling classic bands seems to have remained. The grittier, more lo-fi approach to the recording is also perhaps the result of getting into Sleigh Bells, recent signees to her N.E.E.T. label, whose sound is not too dissimilar in it's brutal fuzzed-out approach.
Born Free will probably be appearing on M.I.A.'s third album, which is as yet untitled, due out on June 29th in the USA, not sure about the UK release date.

I like short shorts

As wiser men than me once said, it's "summer, summer, summer tiiiiiime" (hats off to you Jazzy Jeff and The Fresh Prince). Stop me if I'm getting a little ahead of myself here, it is only April after all, but it does feel like summer in all but name. My exams are over for another year, I wore shorts for the first time of 2010 (subjecting my skinny legs to the sun was traumatic for them), yesterday was also the first cricket game of the season and it don't get much summer-ier than that folks. Here's a short guide to summer, with some musical accompaniment to provide this post with some kind of justification.

To quench your thirst for cricket-related popular music (don't lie, everybody has such a thirst), look no further than The Duckworth Lewis Method, a recent project involving The Divine Comedy's Neil Hannon.

No media represents summer more than the humble polaroid, turning anything it touches into a hazy, lazy summery paradise, transporting you to what my friends and I call 'polaroid world' (snappy, i know). So sit back and let Ted Leo take you to your very own polaroid world (so corny).

Another reason behind my summery disposition is the fact that I have, this very night, booked my summer holiday flights, which include a Stockholm stop-over, home of all the best tropical pop (and beautiful blond babes, obv). A summer soundtrack of Air France and the gang (maybe not Fever Ray so much...) surely beckons.

Personally, I'm hoping for a summer filled with sun, friends and short shorts, a little something like this in fact.

...into the exam room

I'm currently in the middle of some pretty sweet exams, so thought I'd share the pleasure with a little selection of songs.

1. LCD Soundsystem- Tribulations
2. Justice- Stress
3. Belle & Sebastian- Wrapped up in Books
4. The Concretes- Lonely as Can Be
5. Art Brut- I Will Survive*

A fitfully depressing mix I feel. When it came to exams, my old history teacher used to tell us that before you could listen to the Andrew WK A-side, Party Hard, you had to first listen to the B-side, Work Hard. I think he made it up, or it was on some really limited edition vinyl somewhere...

*i put very little effort into choosing these songs, and they were done purely on the merits of their titles, rather than any lyrical content. But you can still listen to and enjoy them. I'll let ya do that.

Yeah it is

It's sadly only too easy to imagine the lead single, Drunk Girls, off of LCD Soundsystem's latest (and possibly last?) album soundtracking "hilarious" frat-boy parties in sub-American Pie (and that's pretty low) films. The irony, the wit and the cynicism that runs through all that James Murphy does will be overlooked for the simple match up of lyric with picture, which, as well as being simplistic, is misleading in that the single is not representative of the album as a whole, being very much an anomaly with its raucous, catchy, shouted vocal line. By contrast the rest of the album is a far more restrained, melancholic affair that rails against hipsters ("talking like a jerk, except you really are a jerk"- ouch), the music industry ("you wanted a hit, well maybe we don't do hits") and life in general. If Drunk Girls corresponds with North American Scum from the incredible Sound of Silver album, then the rest of the new tracks continue in a vein similar to songs such as Someone Great, All My Friends and New York I Love You. Comparisons have been made with everyone from Iggy Pop to Lou Reed to Talking Heads, but the beats remain great; familiar handclaps, squelchy synths and funky bass-lines. Murphy's louche spoken-word pieces such as on opener Dance Yrself Clean, or impassioned sung vocals on closer Home, which is an easy highlight of the album, continue to impress, although is it just me who thinks his singing voice sounds a little like Casiotone For The Painfully Alone at times?

What LCD does so well, and what makes them a great (and i truly mean that) act, is that they temper their cynicism, wit and irony with an unparalleled sense of sensitivity and sensibility. Its this that made tracks such as All My Friend so amazing, lending them a tenderness that many other bands would have been unable to inject, and which sets them apart from the New York hipsters they send up in their songs, most notably on their breakout Losing My Edge, still a classic to this day.
Perhaps it's for the best that LCD are calling it a day, leaving on an undoubted high, before descending into self-parody and losing what made them so special.

LCD Soundsystem are currently touring the UK and Europe, and you can listen to the album in full being streamed on the DFA website.
Here's a song for you to download though - Home

Atoms for Joy

At last night's Oakland gig, Thom Yorke and his new band the Atoms for Peace, treated the crowd to a second encore consisting of the Joy Division classic, Love Will Tear Us Apart- everyone's favourite alternative love song. The cover is commendable for it's no-messin' approach, adding little to the original, perhaps the best approach to tackling the nigh-on-perfect-already Joy Division. Yorke's vocals are also of interest, seemingly plummeting new depths in their Curtis-mimicking, a far cry from his usual falsetto.
It's this kind of thing that just makes me kick myself even harder over this missed opportunity.
First read about this over at Stereogum.