DOWNLOAD: Ancestors - The Ambrose Law
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We're going to be real with you: this Ancestors song is over thirteen minutes long. You might've surmised from the photo that these dudes aren't into brevity, but really you guys this is an almost quarter-hour of swashbuckling, organ-smeared doom riffage. It's a freaking leviathan. In terms of getting the most bang for you download or whatever, this trumps everything else. Should you need more, the album from whence it came is available from Tee Pee.
EXCLUSIVE NEW DOWNLOAD: Cougar - Foil Épée Sabre
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Whoa. We got a hold of a b-side from Cougar’s single “Stay Famous,” and found a calming, instrumental, banjo ditty that made us feel like the world was right again. Understand the Wisconsin five-piece usually blows our ears out, Battles-style. Patriot comes out September 15th and we’re excited and chagrinned—we promise never to pigeonhole a band (however awesome) ever again.
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DOWNLOAD: Lightning Bolt - Colossus
They say with the passage of time comes change, and for Lightning Bolt that means actually playing on a stage. The Providence duo's first LP in four years, Earthly Delights, also comes out October 13 via Load, "Colossus" being the MPfree that's pinballing around. Still can't really decipher what Brian Chippendale is screaming about into that mangy face mic (probably nothing!), but it's seven minutes of free, brain-pulverizing, sounds-like-it-was-recorded-in-a-meat-locker music, so words are rather futile.
EXCLUSIVE NEW DOWNLOAD: Majeure - Timespan (Edit) + Teleforce
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Pittsburgh duo Zombi puts the og in prog, so you might guess at the sound of Majeure, the new solo project from Zombi drummist-synther A.E. Paterra. And you’d be right, but—so? Majeure focuses on the Tron-disco aspect of his main band, and even if he’s obvious in his inspirations, his soon to be released debut, Timespan, is consistently, evocatively powerful. Both this exclusive edit of the title track and “Teleforce” sound like the ’80s futurism they had in the ’70s, perfect for your next all-night drive along the autostrada.
DOWNLOAD: Gyratory System - Cargo Cult
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Why do people hate Mark Ronson so much? The Londoner seems to attract an extraordinary amount of bile for someone whose arrangements are so basically inoffensive. Perhaps Ronson's problem is that his strings are just too heroic, to the extent that at times they appear to come tooting and parping from between Lois Lane's legs. Superman, as we all know, is incredibly boring. Not just the most boring of all superheroes, but probably more boring than 75 per cent of the mortal population, among which lurk Gyratory System, whose strings are anything but heroic - the instrumental quartet's sound is paranoid and pent-up, reassuringly human. For them, strings wriggle and throb like fraying nerves. They'll probably never have to worry about stopping a runaway train or get to gunge-race prime-era Teri Hatcher, but they're infinitely more interesting than Superman and that's what counts.
Sounds Like: Emperor Machine, Talking Heads, Valerio Cosi in a rush
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DOWNLOAD: Cougar - Stay Famous + Mike Ladd Remix
Wisconsin agit-prog quintet Cougar just linked with Ninja Tune's Counter imprint for their new album, Patriot, due out September 1. "Stay Famous" is the first MP3 to surface; a buggy, beastly, three-headed worm of a jam that moves from polite post-rock to what sounds like Fugazi riffs dunked in battery acid. We've also got a line on Mike Ladd's smashed-up remix of the tune, a version we are feeling for its blatant disregard of proper gain levels. Remember kids, distortion can be beautiful. Cougar head out on tour with Maximo Park in September, dates up at their MySpace.
Sounds like: Battles, Mr. Bungle, Japanther
EXCLUSIVE NEW DOWNLOAD: Ghost Society - Love Love & Twisted Mind (featuring Jonas Bjerre)
Hands down, Ghost Society’s “Love Love” is my favorite of the week. Maybe girls flock to certain things. Shiny things, expensive things. Watery vocals and Danish synths and songs that carve a breathy brushstroke, things. This music is the soundtrack for that dream where you’re flying, soaring over mountaintops on a pair of silvery wings. Jonas Bjerre, the ethereal frontman of Mew, leads the second track—“Twisted Mind”—out of the enchanted forest and up into the clouds. If you’re into that kind of thing, you're really into that kind of thing, and you’ll be singing along in your sleep.
Sounds like: Mew, Blue Foundation, all the awesome songs from the Twilight soundtrack (Radiohead's on there!)
DOWNLOAD: Mew - Repeaterbeater
Cosmic Danish rockers Mew are currently on tour in Europe with Nine Inch Nails, where Trent Reznor's been tweeting that they are "so good live it kind of pisses me off." Way to make friends, you guys. The band also have a new album, "No More Stories..." (the title is actually a six line poem we aren't going to print) out August 25th on Columbia, with "Repeaterbeater" being the first, albeit brief, piece we've heard. If it's anything to go by, this will be yet another inimitable album of distracted, rapturous pop that half of our friends won't understand and the other half will adore. If Reznor's tweets are anything to go by, it will be a "grower." Our money is on it just being awesome.
Sounds like: Muse, Nine Inch Nails, The Cooper Temple Clause
DOWNLOAD: BLK JKS - Molalatladi
(Photo: Demonica Orozco)
It's been a minute since we picked up the first BLK JKS 10" (actually, about a year and a half), and at this point the grooves are a little worn down so we're psyched the South African dub-prog quartet announced the release of their debut album. After Robots–out September 8th through Secretly Canadian–was recorded in Bloomington, IN by The Secret Machines' Brandon Curtis and features appearances from the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, who are profiled in the current New Yorker. Hypnotic's burps are all over the dare we say Zappa-ish "Molalatladi," which, according to the minds at P4K, translates to "rainbow." We can't confirm that but it will certainly make you see colors.
Sounds like: Frank Zappa, Sean Kuti & Egypt 80, The Mars Volta
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EXCLUSIVE NEW DOWNLOAD: Maps & Atlases - Pigeon
(Photo: Rachel Buck)
As four friends who met at art school in Chicago, Maps & Atlases are perhaps more accessible than they should be. There's no absence of head-spinning instrumentation, but when you make finger-tapping sound like child's play and also gank Vampire Weekend's summer anthem rulebook, the dense art-rock suspicions fade away fast. Such is the gist of "Pigeon," a demo of sprightly, restrained prog-pop set to be re-recorded this spring for a new album in the fall. That record is currently without a label, but after the recent patch of touring with Pattern Is Movement and some lauded SXSW appearances, don't expect the "unsigned" tag to hang around for too long.
Sounds like: Vampire Weekend, Foals
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