BLNRB - Welcome to the Madhouse!
(CD/Digital) Out | Here Records OH019, 2011-07-07

From early 2009 to 2011, three bands from the world-renowned Berlin electronic music scene and some of the best bands and musicians from Nairobi engaged in an intense music project. Two studios were established in a townhouse in Nairobi, where all BLNRB artists worked, performed and lived together. After concerts in Nairobi and Berlin, the long awaited CD is out! The album features 18 original recordings - as diverse as the more than 20 artists involved. This album bridges the gap and opens a path into a new global clubsound. It is about digging deep into the local Berlin and Nairobi music scenes, building a new urban sound together with some amazing talents from the next generation of African musicians. Featuring: Jahcoozi, Teichmann, Modeselektor, Ukoo Flani, Mr. Abbas, Kimya, Lon'Jon, Michel Ongaro, Radi, Nazizi and Just A Band, the album is released on Outhere Records and available in music stores as well as iTunes and Amazon. Soon it will also be available in Kenya!

Lanu - Fall feat. Megan Washington
(Digital single) Tru Thoughts TRUDD028, 2011-08-15

Fall featuring Megan Washington is the 2nd single to be lifted from the new Lanu album, Her 12 Faces released on Tru Thoughts Records. Lance Ferguson a.k.a. Lanu is the producer and guitarist of The Bamboos, Kylie Auldist, Cookin' On 3 Burners, Randa & The Soul Kingdom...

Tom Eno - Country
(Digital) Jack To Phono JTP-024D, 2011-08-08

Country is the new single from Tom Eno and follows a string of releases and remixes for artists including The Seal Cub Clubbing Club, Renegades of Jazz, Mr Confuse and Cookshop Records. The track was written last summer whilst rehearsing in a barn in deepest Hampshire, and is the first track from the new second long player Jackknife, featuring Mr James Bright solely on vocals and new band member Will Benger on drums. Hailing from downtown Winchester, Tom's distinctive playing style blends classical Spanish and jazz guitar, drawing inspiration from jazz masters Charlie Byrd and Django Reinhardt as well as classical guitarists and composers such as Segovia and Villa-Lobos. His sound has been turning heads with hefty praise from heavyweight DJs & tastemakers alike including BBC Radio 1's Rob Da Bank and Hôtel Costes, who featured his track Tijuana on one of their compilations.

Grey Reverend - Of The Days
(CD/Download) Motion Audio MOCD004/MODNL004, 2011-07-11

The latest artist to be championed by Jason Swinscoe's Motion Audio imprint will be familiar to fans of The Cinematic Orchestra. Brooklyn-based L.D. Brown aka Grey Reverend met Swinscoe shortly after the Cinematics main-man relocated to NYC and started going to the coffee shop run by Brown's sister for his hot caffeinated beverages. When Swinscoe heard some of Brown's material he was impressed by it and they met up. Eventually, he asked the Reverend to supply a cover version of To Build A Home. Swinscoe liked the resulting "mix" so much that Grey Reverend began to tour with TCO, singing with them and performing his own material in support. Now, four years on, Brown releases his first album, Of The Days, with Swinscoe's new label. Brown performs his songs primarily as a soloist, using acoustic guitar and voice to convey his music to his audience. The devilish detail within the songs create flashes of allegory in which familiar sentiments simultaneously comfort and unnerve the senses. Compelling and positively ambiguous, with reverence for the grey, undefined areas of style, his songs are unconcerned with musical or social expectations. They sit completely outside of time and fashion, the beauty and simplicity of his voice enough to carry them.

Pop Levi - Motorcycle 666 / Rock Solid
(Digital Single) Counter Records COUNTDNL037, 2011-07-04

Recently anointed by NME as a true cult hero, injecting some much needed fun into the boring world of rock, the one and only Pop Levi returns with a new single, a new band and a whole new life. Having scrapped release plans for his now-much-bootlegged Smack Musick album, Pop Levi returns from outer/inner space with this crazed fuzz-fest of a Double A-side Single. Once again based in the UK after a long sojourn in California, Pop continues to make outlandish, Marc Bolan-influenced blues, stringing sexual innuendo and, more often, outtuendo togther like a man counting his girl's anal beads (she has a lot). Recorded in a mountain-top converted barn in Norway, with accompanying video directed by William Overby, Motorcycle 666 is "about a girl that's a bike that's had her soul stolen by Lucifer". Frrrreaky. Rock Solid, already featured as a Track Of The Week in NME, was recorded at Pop's infamous White Arc studio in Los Angeles. Classic hand-clapped sex'n'rock'n'roll re-booted for the 21st century, the song features Levi's most outrageous vocal performance to date. Killer-lightning guitars, spastic bass and the most psychedelic bridge since Prince ate the spirit of Hendrix. Both ahead of his time and out of time, Pop Levi is ready to finally reap the plaudits for his unique, twisted rock vision.

Mercury Rev - Deserter's Songs: The Instrumental Edition
(CD) Excelsior Melodies, 2011-06-14

Mercury Rev Deserter's Songs DESERTER'S SONGS has been remixed and remastered in a special Instrumental Edition, accentuating the orchestral cosmic-fantasia of rock in a full 3D cinematic scope! The Deserter's Songs Instrumental Edition will initially be offered on CD and will be available on tour, in fine record shops and online. This will mark the flagship release from Mercury Rev's own label Excelsior Melodies which is preparing to release a number of curiosities, rare exclusives, past catalog treasures and a number of new LP's by up and coming, as yet uncorrupted, uncompromising artists from this particular Universe and specifically this Solar System! So if you've got a great 4-track cassette, made in your bedroom, and are under the mistaken impression no one would ever 'get it'... send it along, after all, that's how we started!

The Death Set - Can You Seen Straight
(Digital Single) Counter Records COUNTDNL043, 2011-06-13

The Death Set return with the latest single from their album Michel Poiccard, Can You Seen Straight , a perfect slice of pop infused punk with a distinctly classic punk feel to it. Nadastrom lead out the remixes. Signed to Switch's Dubsided label and at the forefront of the Moombahton movement, Dave Nada and Matt Nordstrom take the 80s aesthetic in a different direction, reimagining the original as epic Moombahton electro-pop. In demand NYC remixers Designer Drugs take They Come To Get Us and make it sound like a girl group getting off with the Prodigy. Nadus & Steel take the same tune and turn it into crisp trouble-funk New Jersey based Club. The band themselves round out the package with both an extended club version (surely one of the band's longest tracks ever, weighing in at over 5 minutes!) and the original lo-fi punk version.

Fink - Perfect Darkness
(LP/CD/Download) Ninja Tune ZEN170/ZENCD170/ZENDNL170, 2011-06-13

Perfect Darkness is a smouldering, pulsating, and purposeful book of songs. From its emotion-rousing, self-titled opener, to the darkly cinematic Fear Is Like Fire, and the uplifting nostalgia of album closer Berlin Sunrise, the Perfect Darkness LP bristles with tense passion and hypnotic charm. It is in two words, bewitching and addictive. Following three critically-acclaimed albums, this new LP marks the next chapter of an incredible musical journey for the Bristol-born artist. The first and pre-eminent singer-songwriter signed to legendary British label Ninja Tune - after making the transition from world-class club DJ and electronic producer - Fink is also an in-demand collaborator having written for the likes of John Legend, Ximena Sarinana, Amy Winehouse and Professor Green. He has also graced some of the world's most prestigious stages, and with bandmates Guy Whittaker on bass and Tim Thornton on drums, has toured the globe several times over. Up until now Fink has remained in the shadows, working quietly and diligently in the background, but judging by this new record he is set to emerge into the bright lights of long-deserved mass recognition. Perfect Darkness is released June 13th on Ninja Tune.

Fink - Yesterday Was Hard On All Of Us
(Download) Ninja Tune ZENDNLS283, 2011-06-13

Recorded in The Steakhouse studio in LA and produced by Billy Bush, Yesterday Was Hard on All of Us bristles with raw emotion and tense passion underpinned by Fink's distincitve rolling guitar melody and distinctive vocals. Written after a trip to the Spanish city of Toledo, Yesterday Was Hard On All Of Us is a track about difficult crossroads - from a seismic row with a girlfriend, to going through hard times with friends on different paths; a song that anyone and everybody can relate to. Fink's new album Perfect Darkness is released on June 13th on Ninja Tune.

Grayson Capps - The Lost Cause Minstrels
(CD/Download) The Royal Potato Family RPF 1107 , 2011-06-07

Grayson Capps‘ fifth studio album, The Lost Cause Minstrels, is set for release June 7 on Royal Potato Family. The 11-track effort finds the Mobile, Alabama-based singer-songwriter coming of age. This doesn't mean, however, that his often unholy tales of the Southern Gothic have lost any of their sting. Quite the contrary, Capps' Tao-tinged, philosophical reflections-revealed deep inside songs shuddering with spit, stomp and snarl-are as potent as ever. Listen no further than Highway 42, No Definitions and Rock N Roll to hear that Capps cedes no quarter. It's just that this time his bark and bite is more accepting of the unanswered questions mucking up the universe, while country soul textures and gospel harmonies ease the raw edges. The Lost Cause Minstrels is the highly anticipated next chapter from one of the finest Southern troubadours of the day.