We're big fans of folk guitarist Jose Gonzalez here at RCRD LBL, and we're very, very excited to bring to you an exclusive, unreleased song from his side project: ethereal folk rockers Junip. Jose created Junip in the late '90s with his best friends Tobias Winterkorn (organs) and Elias Araya (drums), after he had spent his formative years in various Swedish hardcore bands. If you find it hard to imagine the mild-mannered, acoustic hero in a hardcore setting, it's not much of a stretch: Junip's songs have the emotional heft of any Black Flag or Minor Threat song, only channeled through organs and acoustic guitars. The band is currently recording an album in Sweden, so be sure to check back for more details as they emerge. Enjoy!
We'd like to take a moment to introduce you to one of our partner labels, Ghostly International. They are a label with fantastic taste (obvs, that's why we wanted to partner with them) and, as we've discovered from their blog, a tremendous work ethic. Expect a RCRD LBL-exclusive from them very time soon, but for now, be sure to check out the link they provided to a killer DJ set by Tim Goldsworthy from their joint Halloween party with the DFA. It's always great to see friends working together, especially when those friends all happen to put out awesome records.
Our buds at Modular just made our morning a lot brighter by offering up a download of the Soft Lightes' lo fi synth-phony "The Microwave Song" last night. Thanks for the Friday cheer guys!
And for those of you who are not yet familiar with the Soft Lightes, their album title (above) should spell it out. They're all about being happy—and super poppy. Turns out they are pretty cool too!
One of the coolest parts about having all of our partner labels blogging on RCRD LBL is that we're able to get a really interesting mix of perspectives across our network. In the case of Bay Area dance label dirtybird, we thought it'd be an interesting proposition to see how their intelligent (and totally FUN) take on dance music (aka vinyl culture) would translate to a totally digital format. We could go on about the great 12" singles they've been dropping lately, but we thought you should get the info straight from the bird's mouth. Check their blog for a quick history on the label and check back soon for some hot tunes courtesy of Mr VonStroke and company.
Last week, one of our favorite bands played a glorious show at the Society for Ethical Culture in NYC. If you can imagine high ceilings, shimmering vocal harmonies and a four-piece band creating the sounds of an entire orchestra, that was the Grizzly Bear show that we were lucky enough to catch. The set was great front to back, but what really sealed the deal was their encore, a cover of the Crystals' "He Hit Me (And It Felt Like A Kiss)"— just released on their Friend EP. It's up for grabs at the Warp blog right now, so hit them up.
For our next RCRD LBL-exclusive track, we wanted to mellow out the vibes a tad and share a psych-tinged tune that's been getting lots of late night spins here at RCRD LBL HQ, Kings & Queens' "Celebrate". In the words of their close friend, the artist Tahiti Pehrson: "'Celebrate' is a track that explores the lesser-known nuances of the word. To make known publicly; proclaim; solemnize. Painted in wash of morphinic richness the track floats down stream slowing in swells occasionally to smell the roses." There must be something weird in the water out in their hometown of Nevada City, California, but we must say it does make for some lovely music.
Oh, and if you are keeping tabs, Rich Good, the band's front man, used to play with Joanna Newsom in the shag rock group the Pleased. Bonus!
Rarely does a band personify their name quite like Meanest Man Contest does: their music literally sounds like two dudes trying to out-piss each other off with their sharp tongues and snazzy rhymes. In real life, we're sure Quarterbar and Eric Steuer are the bestest of friends, being old college roommates and all. The duo started out making loads of bedroom beats on a busted 4-track and created the Santa Barbara rap crew mic.edu in their spare time. How's that for extracurricular activities? Check out "Partially Smart", their electro-tinged ode to the joys of living on the hipster fringe and keep an eye out for more RCRD LBL-exclusive songs to drop later this semester,er,year.
We're very excited to be premiering NYC-based DJ/producer Jacques Renault's brand new RCRD LBL-exclusive track "Magic Games" today. Jacques Renault is one of the forerunners of an amazing new disco/edit scene that's popped up over the past few years and one is known by many (hopefully more after this) as of the city's most flavorful party rockers. Along with DJs/remixers such as Prince Language, Douglas Lee, and Marcos Cabral (his partner in crime in the super DJ-duo Runaway), Jacques has been packing the clubs and keeping the kids out past their bedtimes. Who needs sleep when you can have disco heat?
As it turns out, there is some justice in this world, because some greater force has allowed the holy union of Spank Rock and Mos Def to trade verses on a Benny Blanco remix of Justice's dancefloor smash hit "D.A.N.C.E.".
"D.A.N.C.E." is easily the most memorable club track of 2007, Spank Rock is the hottest, most-acclaimed hip hop collective in the game, and we're pretty sure Mos Def is this year's front runner for the Nobel Freshness Prize. We hope this track will make your day a little bit better. And with that, enjoy.
So you've probably followed a link or something and wanted to see what's up.
Well, we'd like to welcome you to RCRD LBL, a brand new music site where all of the downloads are both free AND legal. In a world where many people get their music for free, we wanted to create a site where bands we loved could put their music out there for free AND get paid for it. RCRD LBL is a new model and an experiment, putting great music out there for free and with absolutely no DRM. We hope you enjoy the music and support what we're doing by making RCRD LBL part of your daily music diet.
In some ways we're a music blog, written by people who want to bring you cool new music day in, day out. In other ways, we're a record label, championing, signing and partnering with bands we believe in. We'll have tons of exclusive tracks from everyone from Mos Def to Switch to Dirty on Purpose to Cold War Kids, but we're also working with an amazing roster of partner labels (see below) who will also be blogging and giving away music on the site. And since we're a blog, we'll also be pointing you to best of what else is out there on the web.
We're kicking things off today with a slate of amazing new tracks from Justice (featuring Spank Rock and Mos Def!!!), Jacques Renault, Bad Veins, Meanest Man Contest and Kings & Queens and in the days and weeks to come you'll be able to hit us up for exclusive new music from Junip (featuring Jose Gonzalez), Tokyo Police Club, Switch, Ra Ra Riot, The Champain Era, Apes and Androids, Dirty On Purpose, Professor Murder, Sam Champion and many, many more.
All of our downloads are free and legal, but we'd ask that you not rehost the tracks on your site or use them in any way that might be considered commercial. Since this is an ad-supported venture the best way to support what we're doing is to visit the site on a regular basis and/or to embed one of our widgets on your blog (you may have noticed the little modules on the right). The whole point behind the widgets is that we want to make it easy to grab any element of the site, from streaming music and tour dates, to photos and videos, and embed it in your own site or on your OS X Dashboard. We'll be adding compatibility with more platforms soon.
We'd also like to encourage you to register and create a My RCRD LBL user account. You don't have to log-in to download music, but you do need to register to post comments, and you can also use your My RCRD LBL account to create customized RSS feeds featuring just the artists and labels you're interested in.
And if you do the RSS thing, you can grab our feed here.
Everything's free, everything's open, and everything's yours: we hope you enjoy.
Cheers,
RCRD LBL
P.S. - If you're a band or label that's interested in working with us, hit us up at aandr AT rcrdlbl.com (Please NO MP3 attachments, just links!). If you find any bugs or have any problems with the site, email us at webmaster AT rcrdlbl.com. And if you have any other questions, you can reach us at info AT rcrdlbl.com.
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