EXCLUSIVE NEW DOWNLOAD: Kathryn Williams And Neil MacCool - Come With Me
(Neil Le Flohic)
Whether celebrating Easter, Passover or the arrival of Spring (read: hay fever), you are probably spending time with your family this weekend. (On a tangential note, did you hear Obama hosted a passover dinner this Thurs?) For such family chill sessions, you'll appreciate this track "Come With Me" from the album Two by Mercury Prize nominee Kathryn Williams and guitarist/vocalist Neil MacCool (the son of Ewan MacCool). It is lazy, bluegrass-tinged blues with sweet, folk whispers.
Sounds Like: Angus and Julia Stone, Belle And Sebastien
DOWNLOAD: Joey Ryan - As It Must Be + 3 others
Joey Ryan is a modern troubadour—growing up on a steady diet of Dylan and his contemporaries, he decided to play music instead of going to grad school, and we’re better off for it. His classic singer-songwriter style guitar picking is quite refreshing, and each song possesses a smattering of something to make it sparkle, whether it be a little bit of organ on “Honest Man” or lush strings on “As It Must Be”. We picture the Los Angeles that Joey Ryan inhabits not like the city we’ve visited before, but more like the dreamland crafted by the works of Brian Wilson and The Mamas and the Papas.
We have a download from Joey of “As It Must Be”, and some pretty awesome streams to compliment it. Dreamy.
Sounds like: Iron and Wine, Bob Dylan, Donovan
Download: Joey Ryan - As It Must Be
Stream: Joey Ryan - Island Rain
DOWNLOAD: Bill Patton - Dirty Woman + The Devil Went Down to Georgetown + She Loves You
Bill Patton refers to himself as a SBSS, a sad-bastard singer-songwriter. While normally that might throw flags like "whiny" and "introspective," think more of the Simon Joyner and Daniel Johnston end of the SBSS spectrum. On Gets It On, Patton balances the beautiful and hilarious, the delicate and the sinister with such dexterity it's hard to believe this is just his first album.
Trying to pick songs to offer from Gets It On is tricky cause they're all so goddamned special. "Dirty Woman" seems like a classic SBSS tune, until he throws in the line, "I like a waitress, I'm a sucker/But you can't tell me you wouldn't fuck her." Now that's the kind of bastard I want to have a Jameson with. "The Devil Went Down to Georgetown," takes the classic spooky gothic country tale, laces it with banjo plucking, grand slide guitar gestures and harmonies so dense you'd need a torch to find your way out. And then there are the ever-surprising covers that Patton takes and makes his own on Gets It On. There's no joyous "Yeah Yeah Yeah!" in this version of "She Loves You." In fact, Patton takes one of the most well known Beatles songs and obscures it behind a curtain of pain so delicate it almost breaks your heart when he sings, "She said you hurt her so/She almost lost her mind." This is a man who knows what he's doing and it takes more than one listen to get to the depths of this Sad Bastard's records.
Sounds Like: Simon Joyner, Daniel Johnston, Edward Bostich, Cass McCombs, Band of Horses
Download: Bill Patton - Dirty Woman
Download: Bill Patton - The Devil Went Down to Georgetown
EXCLUSIVE DOWNLOAD: Purse Snatchers - Lazy Dominoes
We finally have a new, exclusive Purse Snatchers single for you guys, after the success of their previous song “Christmas Lights”. Purse Snatchers is the bedroom project of Doug Marvin from our very favorite NYC indie band, Dirty on Purpose, aided by his wife Annie Hart of Au Revoir Simone. That’s Brooklyn royalty right there. We’ve been impatiently waiting for a new track from the duo, so we’re pretty excited to bring to you “Lazy Dominoes”, a very Belle & Sebastian-y acoustic ballad about, what else, love, relationships, and longing. It seems as if Purse Snatchers write songs like this every day, so make sure to check back here for their latest tunes.
Purse Snatchers will be performing songs from their debut album (out on Our Secret Record Label), To Feet Of Snow, at their first ever live show at Death by Audio in Brooklyn on June 18th. It's sure to be indie-pop history, so make sure to be there!
Sounds like: Belle & Sebastian, The Magnetic Fields, Dirty on Purpose
VIDEO THRWBCK: Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin - 69 Année Erotique (1969)
There's nothing you can really say about Gainsbourg other than he was an absolute master at everything he did--the culmination of his talents is arguably his 1969 record Jane Birkin/Serge Gainsbourg (also know as Je T'aime... Moi Non Plus) which was a collection of duets and solo material with his then girlfriend (and future wife, also mother of Charlotte Gainsbourg) Jane Birkin. It's hard to pick a favorite track from the record, but if push came to shove we would have to go with the salacious "69 Année Erotique". If Jane got any more breathy she'd need an oxygen tank.
VIDEO THRWBCK: Cat Power - Cross Bones Style (1998)
With all the rainy days NYC has been having lately, we've turned our daily listening interests to our favorite miserablist albums, and of course right at the top of the list is Cat Power's 1998 exercise in feeling like shit, Moonpix. While being an astonishing piece of work by one of our favorite singer songwriters of all time, it's hard to listen to the record in its entirety without wanting to throw yourself under the wheels of the nearest bus directly afterward. If you can believe it, "Cross Bones Style" is probably the lightest track on the record, and it's a beautiful, haunting song (what "unbelievable things" exactly is she referring to?). Enjoy the video above.
DOWNLOAD: Peter von Poehl - Going to Where the Tea Trees Are
We typically have something of a love/hate relationship with saxophones—i.e. we love the Specials and hate Sade. So when the sax solo hits about three-quarters through “Going to Where the Tea Trees Are” by Swedish singer songwriter Peter von Poehl, we had an initial split-second of “Oh God why”, until we totally got into it, because the song is an amazing pop ballad that takes its brass very, very seriously. The SEEN RCRD LBL blog has an MP3 of “Going to Where…” as well as some video and other useful links from Peter.
Sounds like: Jeff Buckley, Elliot Smith, Jose Gonzalez
Download: Peter von Poehl - Going to Where the Tea Trees Are
Download: Peter von Poehl
Swedish singer-songwriter Peter von Poehl creates illuminated dreamscapes with his music. His forthcoming album (to be released June 10 in North America) "Going To Where The Tea Trees Are" boasts inspired arrangements using guitar, piano harmonies, sax, and Peter's unmistakable falsetto that don't really sound like anything else you've heard before. He's garnered a lot of airplay and buzz in France, and we're thinking his stuffs will translate well on this side of the pond as well. If his latest video for the song "Story Of The Impossible" is any indication (reminds us of a Grand Theft Auto game gone warm & fuzzy on LSD), we'll be hearing and seeing a lot more of PvP in the coming months.
The good folks at World's Fair have given you a free mp3 download of the title track from the album "Going To Where The Tea Trees Are", so check it.
Download: Peter von Poehl - Going To Where The Tea Trees Are
DOWNLOAD: Benny Strange - Askewed
David Avram Brown, a.k.a. Los Angeles-based singer songwriter Benny Strange, compares the process of making music to a “cathartic outlet essential to both emotional and spiritual survival”, which may be true for most artists, but it’s a statement David really takes to heart--after all, this is a man who hitch-hiked from New York to LA because it seemed "necessary at the time". His music has followed him all around the word (from NYC, to LA to Maui) and the tracks we’re releasing today, “Sifting” and “Askewed” off of his new EP When Continents Collide have a certain wise-beyond-their-years quality to them. The subtle piano riff on “Askewed” reminds us of Ben Folds (pre-being annoying) where as the poppy keyboard line and lyrics on “Sifting” is like a slowed down version of ‘90s alt-pop legends the Rentals. It’s lovable stuff.
Sounds like: Ben Folds, Rufus Wainwright, Belle & Sebastian
Download: Benny Strange - Askewed
Stream: Benny Strange - Sifting
VIDEO: Marco Solo - Your Ghost
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