Users
DOWNLOAD: Mirage - Let's Kiss
Five years later, the disco is still icy. Italians Do It Better (and production mastermind Johnny Jewel) are finally releasing After Dark 2 on May 17 and this Mirage record, "Let's Kiss," leads the way with glacial funk about falling in love on the run. "Go like a record lady" through a chilly vocoder is an old trick, but there's no need to obscure a frozen feeling.
DOWNLOAD: Friendzone - Always
On "Always," Friendzone continues pushing their flighty button-mashing to new heights. It's like a sample funhouse filled with kaleidoscopes, a clattering beat underneath and eventual key-horn melody to make the proceedings appropriately operatic.
DOWNLOAD: Wise Blood - Universe Is Blessed
.jpg)
On "Universe Is Blessed," Wise Blood twists symphonic samples into a bouncy, torch-song ode to drinking and life. For something that seems so electronic and beat-based, there's a palpable sense of atmosphere, melody and space on this one.
STREAM: Lust For Youth - Breaking Silence
Long shrouded in the dust of industrial pop, there was always a chance that Lust For Youth would clean it all up. On "Breaking Silence," Hannes Norrvide not only appears freshly scrubbed, but takes an airier route that trades the aggression and confusion for something a little closer to a distinct sonic heaven.
STREAM: Thundercat - Oh Sheit It's X
On "Oh Sheit It's X," Thundercat engages with Mono/Poly and Flying Lotus to unleash some druggy, space-laced funk for the future. It's all about abandon with an ecstatically bonkers bassline, falsetto lyrics about release and synth parts that feel like being massaged with magical dust.
STREAM: Say Lou Lou - Fool Of Me (feat. Chet Faker)
Subtle and powerful, a push and pull of impulse and emotion, "Fool Of Me" is an alienated, dreamy duet for the 21st century from Say Lou Lou and Chet Faker. As always, relationship problems rest front-and-center, but it's the vocal weaponry and pinpoint production causing the drama here. This one is from the Julian EP – out today from our big brother label Downtown Records.
STREAM: Small Black - No Stranger
By the end of the year, Small Black shows are going to have entire crowds of people making out with each other and I don't even hate that. On "No Stranger," they practice open-hearted indie-pop that's more New Order and U2 than dudes in a bedroom. The crisp production highlights superior songwriting and production skills, as well as a real knack for melodies that will make you want to feel emotions and things. May 14 on Jagjaguwar!
STREAM: Soft Metals - Tell Me
On "Tell Me,' it's still a cold, cold world for Soft Metals as cloudy vocals drift over an analog house beat and metallic, eternally-delayed synthesizer swirls. The Los Angeles duo does what they do well – intergalactic crime driving music for both past and future. Hear more when their new one, Lenses, drops on Captured Tracks July 16.
STREAM: Jaguar Ma - Man I Need // Exercise (White Label Version)
Following their sampledelic "The Throw," Jaguar Ma returns with another endlessly danceable psychedelic voyage. Happy Mondays, Primal Scream, even the Chemical Bros come to mind, but really it just makes me want to do ecstasy for the first time since I almost married my college girlfriend because her hair was magic.
DOWNLOAD: CREEP - Introduction (feat. Planningtorock)
From the ashes of a fake genre long forgotten, CREEP continues their rise to electronic, gothy pop glory on "Introduction." With an assist from frequent collaborator Planningtorock, this track serves its title well, immersing the listener into a gloomy, operatic world of swelling synths, ghostly call-backs and skewed dance dynamics.
