Ellie Goulding & Starsmith cover Passion Pit…

Speaking of Passion Pit, Ellie Goulding’s posted an excellent cover of the band’s initial attention-grabber Sleepyhead.  It has herself and Neon Gold buddy/producer Starsmith providing the vocals, the latter singing for the first-ever time!  And it’s excellent – Starsmith re-wires the bouncy beats nice and minimally, while Ellie’s even sings the samples Passion Pit borrowed from Mary O’Hara’s Oro Mo Bhaidin, which I think’s pretty impressive.  This is clearly a considered, loving makeover, rather than a bland re-make for promotion’s sake.  See what you think, though – it’s below to download.

Update: Ellie’s single/album coming soon
In other Ellie news, after signing for Polydor about three weeks ago, she’s now poised to release her first single soon, with an album following by “late spring”.

Ellie Goulding on MySpace

MP3:
Ellie Goulding + Starsmith – Sleepyhead (zSHARE)

Passion Pit – extra live date at Koko added

Good news for all new Passion Pit fans: the high-jinks electro-rockers have added an extra date at Koko in October.  That’s on Wednesday 28 October; the existing date, on Tuesday 27, has long sold out.

Koko’s an excellent arbiter for the success of Michael Angelakos and co.  Late last year they played the Mornington Crescent venue as second support (behind Esser) for Black Kids.  They were little-known then, playing the first few songs to a crowd of tens rather than hundred.  But the quality was evident, as the floor was completely filled with impressed eavesdroppers half-an-hour later.  The four musicians might look a bit geeky and gangly, but whoa, do they know how to make a tune!

Fast forward a year – with debut EP Chunk of Change followed by full-lengther Manners, and a rollicking, BBC-broadcast Glastonbury set seen by oodles of armchair viewers hurriedly scrambling for a Post-It pad – and Passion Pit are now headline material at Koko.  It’s richly deserved.

Live dates:
Tues 27 Oct – Koko (sold out)
Wed 28 Oct – Koko (typically flowery and self-fond preview by a Koko writer, and tickets available, here)

Passion Pit on MySpace

MP3
Passion Pit – Moths Wings (zSHARE)

Buy Manners here (Amazon)

Rainbow Arabia – a postscript – live in London in autumn

Since I wrote that last post, Danny from Rainbow Arabia has told me that the duo plan to be back in London in “October or November”.  Good news indeed – I’ll post the dates here the moment I have ‘em.

Live in London – The XX (but be quick, tickets limited!)

Writing this in a total hurry as I’m so mean’t to be packing for my festival weekend, but it’s urgent so…

The XX have announced two exclusive London gigs, on August 17th and 18th, at Hoxton Hall.  That, not uncoincedentally, is also the week they’ll release our debut album.  It’s a postage stamp-sized venue and as such tickets are selling out quicker than you can ask “who are The XX?”  The answer being a four-piece band proffering very cool, minimalist pop, slow and smooth, and with lovely rhythms and refrains to burn. 

Live dates
Mon 17 August – Hoxton Hall (buy tickets here)
Tues 18 August – Hoxton Hall (buy tickets here)

The XX on MySpace

MP3:
The XX – Crystalised (zSHARE)

Happy weekend everyone – have a good one and see you next week… Richard

Saturday 25 July in London: Au Revoir Simone and Kissy Sell Out

If you’ve no plans in London this Saturday yet, there’s plenty of good stuff happening.

Firstly, Brooklyn electro popsters and Moshi Moshi starlets Au Revoir Simone are playing at Proud Galleries.  More inclined to the reflective, dreamy side of the genre than rip-up-the-carpet merchants like Passion Pit, ARS offer mellow, delicious grooves and – guys only – three lots of very pleasant eye candy to boot.  They sold out the Bush Hall earlier this year, and have since seen the single All Or Nothing be greeted with nothing short of reverie in blogland.  Their songs are absurdly catchy; you’ll be nothing like the mares used to in the old horse hospital. Supporting are hotly-tipped Scandi noise-sters Those Dancing Days, who I admit to knowing not a lot about.  Proud’s never the cheapest night out, but this one’s reasonable: put your name down on this Facebook page and arrive before 10pm and the show will cost a mere £6.

Those with more left in the tank, or a hankering for much more intensity are directed further eastwards, to The Count & Sinden’s one-off Warehouse Party, at the occasionally-used Scrutton St Warehouse.  A curious venue this: generally shadowy and shut, every now and again it throws a night and fills to the rafters and beyond.  The Count & Sinden are rave veterans, and responsible for the popular Mega, Mega, Mega night at On The Rocks up Kingsland Road; but for me, the real reason to go is to make shapes to the seductive sounds of fellow DJs Kissy Sell Out, who’s so-far magnificent output includes the dastardly remix of Sugababes’ About You Now available below.

Au Revoir Simone on MySpace
Those Dancing Days on MySpace
The Count & Sinden on MySpace
Kissy Sell Out on MySpace

MP3s:
Au Revoir Simone – All Or Nothing (zSHARE)
Sugababes – About You Now (Kissy Sell Out remix) (zSHARE)

New Rainbow Arabia song + EP out

Rainbow Arabia have celebrated the release of their new EP, Kabukimono, by putting a new track up on MySpace – Harlem Sunrise.  It’s a real good’un – more catchy and upbeat than some RA tracks, and blessed with an addictive, recurrent guitar riff. 

If you’ve never come across them, Rainbow Arabia are the gorgeous Tiffany Preston, singing, guitarring and percussioning, and Danny Preston, her (damn!) husband who mans the keyboards and has never knowingly stopped dancing on the spot or not been wearing a bowler hat.  The aforementioned EP name typifies their worldly pretensions and huge range of influences, all of which makes genre-lising them a tad tricky. There are definite elements of jazz and funk though, and hints of the more experimental edges of lounge music, a la Nancy Wilson. I saw them play live at the MacBeth earlier this year and they were excellent: theirs is not so much a sound you dance manically do, as tap your feet, gently bop whatever booty is available to you, and mist your eyes in admiration.

That is, until Holiday in Congo, normally (I believe) the last song, and a real giddy-up, unbutton-that-top-collar anthem.  My friend, flatmate and co-musical adventurer Richard (another one) observed that this was the second best-ever song he’d ever heard about the Congo (behind the Um Bongo theme tune, but beating all instrumental music from the Crichton book-based gorilla film).

Rainbow Arabia on MySpace

MP3:
Rainbow Arabia – Holiday in Congo (zSHARE)

Buy the Kabukimono EP here (Amazon)

Live in London: J Tillman

If the name sounds vaguely familiar, then there’s a reason: J Tillman’s a.k.a the Fleet Foxes’ drummer.  Away from the band he has a distinguised catalogue of solo work – acoustic guitar songs (with sometime piano and violins) so beautiful that they could charm cats down from trees, halt wars and heal the most broken of hearts. Stuff like this is precisely why God put hairs on the back of our necks: it sure wasn’t for aesthetic reasons, after all.  While he’s just as hirsute, Tillman’s voice is more baleful and glum than those of his band-mates, and his songs are slowly and less glorious set-pieces than transcendental melodies, the type that will dissolve into meaningless powder if you work them too hard.  The best policy is to sit back, dim the lights, close your eyes and be glad that there’s a sound for your sorrow.

J Tillman’s playing at the Relentless Garage, the new name for The Garage, up in  Highbury & Islington.  He’s a big-name draw and I’d expect the show to sell out quick, especially given the Fleet Foxes’ popularity.   For non-Londoners, there are subsequent shows at Manchester, Leicester and Glasgow.  Deets on the MySpace page linked below.

Live date
Weds 7 Oct – The Relentless Garage (buy tickets here)

J Tillman on MySpace

MP3
J Tillman – When I Light Your Darkened Door (zSHARE)

Buy J Tillman EPs here (Sonic Boom Records)

Beanos – my favourite-ever record store is closing

A Croydon quality that likely inspired the new local crop - Skream, GoldieLocks, Lele et al – is the abundance of well-stocked, expert and independent music shops in the town centre. Or rather, was the abundance of well-stocked, expert and independent music shops in the town centre.  For, a classic sign of the times, they’ve been steadily disappearing.  And now, after a long, exaggerated fight, Beanos, the best and biggest of them all, and perhaps the last decent survivor, is itself heading off to the big record shop in the sky.  It sure must be getting crowded up there…

When I was a real young’un, Beanos – a second-hand musical swap shop – was located in a narrow building on Surrey Street Market, thousands upon thousands of records crammed into three storeys of claustrophobic, charming chaos.  There I picked up my first albums – by the Levellers and Carter USM – and came to understand the wondrous feeling that comes with browsing boxes of discs or vinyl… flicking faster and faster with your forefinger, brain rapidly relaying ‘no’s and the occasional ‘whoa hold on a second’, and wallet registering a deep, easily-ignored objection on financial grounds.  Overhead a song plays, then another; people brush past or stand next to you, there one hour, gone the next; and slowly, ever so slowly, you build up a pile of choice musical goods to take home and make mixtapes from.

Beanos later moved a few yards north, to a much bigger building; again three floors, but far wider and more spacious. The staff were friendly, the stock laid-out sensibly and the catalogue impossibly deep and – unlike many second-hand record stores – very current.  There were live performances from local bands.  A small cafe appeared on the top floor.  A sister store selling videos and later DVDs opened two doors distant. Beanos was busy, bright-thinking and seemingly in its zenith.

Ever since years started beginning with twos and not ones, though, Beanos has been fighting a losing battle versus that most common of problems: the internet.  Large record stores it could fight price-wise, but sites like Amazon, with their sheer depth, floor-trailing prices and ease of use, held too many cards.  I’m quite part of the blame, having bought something on Amazon in 30 seconds in favour of journeying to Beanos in the hope they’d have the same record.  Then again, I do always try to visit Beanos when in Croydon; if more for the experience and memories, rather than in search of something specific (although I will buy things).

Less and less people frequent the shop’s magical floors though, and that’s why managing director David has finally called time on a sprawling, drawn-out final sale, and revealed that Beanos will close on 31 August.  True to style, he signed off with The Doors’ immortal line… “This is the End, my friend”.  In replacement will come an indoor market open for Christmas; David promises it will be fabulous; perhaps so, but it sure won’t be Beanos and that makes it a terrific shame.

As the final countdown ticks onward, bargains a plenty remain: everything in Beanos is currently half-price. Bearing in mind how cheap the stuff is in the first place, this is the musical equivalent of getting a fortnight in the Maldives for the cost of three nights at Butlins.  If you have any proximity to Croydon, get down there and experience the magic while there’s still time.

Beanos website
Middle Street, Croydon, Surrey, CR0 1RE
020 8680 1202
It’s a ten-minute walk from East Croydon station, which has 12-minute connections to London Victoria and London Bridge.

Lele[Speaks] and GoldieLocks – the Queens of Croydon

Croydon - not exactly a place drowning in musical heritage.  In the past two decades, the outer London eyesore has produced, well, Dane Bowers and three of the four girls from Eternal. And.. erm… the inexplicably-popular Kate Nash studied at the Brit School, which is kinda near to Croydon?  Slim pickings indeed, and that was about the sorry size of it until 2007… since when Croydon has suddenly become a hotbed for new, innovative music. 

First came dubstep, a fast beat, electronica-heavy sound dreamt up in some of the Cronx’s cooler record shops and iconised in the form of Skream, a now immensely popular and immensely busy dubstep DJ.  At the start of this year, singer and producer Frankmusik burst onto the scene with his retro electro pop. And now two mouthy, streetwise and very talented females (each a fan of the other, indeed) seem set to follow: all hail Lele[Speaks] and GoldieLocks.

Before I talk about them, a few thoughts on Croydon.  I was born and raised there, inly leaving for the bright lights of Central London three years ago, so I feel qualified to speak about the town.  It’s a place with two faces: there are some lovely ‘burbs, areas rich with greenery and posh houses, and there’s fine shopping and great transport links; on the flip side, there are plenty of estates, most fed by a Tramlink system on which it’s very easy to fare-evade, and the Home Office, meaning plenty of foreign refugees wanderinf round with nothing to do and anger to burn. But perhaps the most depressing element of Croydon is the severe lack of musical culture. Unless you want to see Engelbert Humperdinck or Mica Paris, the Fairfield Halls can’t help you for live music.  In nightlife terms, away from the two million bar-clubs peddling boring house music, 80s anthems, R’n'B blandness, cheese classics or flying Stella bottles, it’s a desert out there; you’ve got the Black Sheep bar for dubstep nights, various goth pubs and a few decent DJs in out-of-town dives. With such a scarcity of interesting music on offer, it’s a total frigging wonder that various Croydonians are producing some of today’s most exciting, innovative sounds. 

Lele[Speaks]
20-year-old Lele is as Sowf London as they come; speaking with the classic nasal accent, and bridling with teenage, Lady Sovereign-like attitude. Ordinarily that would be plain annoying, but translated to music it makes for belting songs strongly accented to her Croydon experiences and streetwise smarts. Away from the mike, she helps out with her sister Jackson Kid’s clothing boutique (The Sick Kids); perhaps in exchange, Jackson Kid films Lele’s videos.

Over funky electronic chirrups, synths, feedback and crackles, Lele discusses drug addiction, names and shames falling friends (“Rachel was pretty but she’s looking rough now”) in tones of total disdain, prissily stresses her own independence, and paints pictures of pals puking in the street. It all sounds a bit grime, a bit ghetto, and more than a bit catchy. Those qualities are never more evident than in stand-out track Youth Offender, where Lele derides a young rude boy (You’re so dumb, you’re so thick mate) over banging beats which just demand you wave your hands in silly shapes, while giving the hips the shake.

What’s least expected of, and thus most impressive about, Lele are the subtle touches to her tunes.  The softer Horror is underpinned by pretty piano ripples, and even finishes with a ten-second piano solo. Youth Offender’s a tough-talking, badass jam until the chorus… which uses a camp keyboard jingle.  Her style or genre is hard to pin down partly because it takes in so many influences: garage, hip hop, rap, pop, dance… These haven’t much correlation to content either; probably the chirpiest-sounding song is Volcano, and yet its lyrics are all about a drunken local slapper. It’s that very absence of predictability which makes Lele [Speaks] (I’ve no idea about square brackets’ relevance) so exciting, and important-sounding.

GoldieLocks
A few steps further down the road to fame is Lele’s fellow Croydonian, GoldieLocks. She’s older at 24, has three times as many MySpace friends (21,000), collaborates with higher-profile friends (Tinchy Strider and Little Boots) and boasts more strings to her bow – producing and DJing as well as singing.  A quarter Swedish with her three very firm quarters Croydon, GoldieLocks career highlights to date include a publishing contract with Puregroove, and her having several songs featured in the excellent film Adulthood.

GoldieLocks’ sound is different to Lele’s: she’s closer to dubstep and garage, with a slower, purring vocal delivery.  She hasn’t the distinctive accent, either, although I doubt many people will be devastated about that, and it hardly prohibits great music.  In the sumptuous Fuckabout, she drawls laconically like a dreadlocked Dizzee Rascal over thick, lazy-sounding electronica; the faster, fretting Provider is closer to dance and pop, and includes the delicious couplet “I refuse to be a bum / Especially cos I come from Croy-don” as our heroine vows not to be a Cronx cliché.  Too right.

Listening to GoldieLocks, it’s immediately obvious why she’s so far achieved greater fame than Lele. Her numbers have more sheen, more slick and more finesse; they simply sound more professional, each chorus catchy and utterly tight. This presumably is the very same mixing and polish that Lele has told me her songs are yet due.  It’s a mixed blessing, though: while GoldieLocks’ songs might carry a bit more mainstream appeal with their contemporary stylings, and are arguably easier on the ear, they lack the exciting, raw edge, and genuine feel of her fellow Croydonian’s choons.  Perhaps this is why her name is almost the exact anthesis of a Croydon facelift?

I worry the same neutering may affect Lele in future, when her music comes to be studio-lised and readied for Joe Bloggs’ ears; but let’s fervently hope that’s not the case.

GoldieLocks on MySpace
GoldieLocks’ blog
Lele[Speaks] on MySpace
Lele[Speaks]‘ blog

MP3:
GoldieLocks – Fuckabout (zSHARE)
Lele[Speaks] declined to provide any MP3s as her songs are yet to be mixed.  But here’s the all-new video for Volcano: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4y7fkFJfeWY

Video of Passion Pit’s latest single, To Kingdom Come, is released

Late last week Passion Pit released the video for their next single, To Kingdom Come, out on 24 August.  It sees the five dress up as nerdy veteran scientists who set the cartoon world outside on fire.  As for the song itself, well, expect yet another slice of electro-pop perfection, with those same soaring high notes and thrilling choruses.   This one’s a bit faster than The Reeling, and just as infectious.

You can download an MP3 of To Kingdom Come below or, alternatively, settle for Calvin Harris somehow finding a way to improve The Reeling.

Passion Pit – To Kingdom Come video (Vimeo)

Passion Pit on MySpace

MP3
Passion Pit – To Kingdom Come (zSHARE)
Passion Pit – The Reeling (Calvin Harris remix) (zSHARE)

Buy Passion Pit’s album Manners on CD here