This Is Book’s Music

Haven’t heard about any cool bands from Eugene, Oregon? May I suggest The Whiskey Spots. If you like what you see and hear, vote for them in The Next Big Thing: Eugene contest.

Couraeous is what I’d call the sound of Clogs, who may do just that with their music and keep it in your head where it needs to be. “Last Song” is dreamy and eerie, and will probably do what it wanted to do.

The song is the title track for the band’s new 3-song EP.

His name is Ducktails. No, he was not born with this name, but close chums will know him as Matthew Mondanile. His bio states that he’s part of a “hypnagogic pop” movement, which may very well be a one-man movement, but still, he’s part of something. What is this “hypnagogic pop” movement? I go back to the bio because I’m too lazy to come up with something like “Ducktails attempts to realize a shared cultural memory and nostalgia through various genres, drone, psych, music concrete, etc.” This is where I come in and say “the keyword here is etc., for that means he’s open to doing more than what was assigned.” See how that works? I take from the bio and add my own thing, it’s a nice blend, not unlike the music of Ducktails. See how that… nevermind.

Ducktails III: Arcade Dynamics will be released by Woodsist in the fall, and he’ll be in the middle of a string of shows in support of it. You’ll be able to catch him here:

12 Aug: Brooklyn, NY – Glasslands Gallery &
14 Aug: Brooklyn, NY – Shea Stadium / Underwater Peoples Showcase
22 Aug: Chicago, IL – Neon Marshmalow Festival
25 Aug: New York, NY – Cake Shop *
09 Sept: Abattoir D’amis KRAAK, Ghent, Belgium
10 Sept: Zaal 100, Amsterdam, Holland !
11 Sept: Madame Claude, Berlin, Germany !
12 Sept: Festival of Endless Gratitude, Copenhagen, Denmark !
13 Sept: Voxhall, Aarhus, Denmark !
14 Sept: singsang-studion, Malmö, Sweden !
15 Sept: Utmarken, Göteborg, Sweden !
16 Sept: Stockholm, Sweden !
17 Sept: Turku, Finland !
18 Sept: lal lal lal festival, Helsinki,Finland !
19 Sept: lal lal lal festival, Helsinki, Finland !
20 Sept: The Prince Albert, Brighton, UK!
21 Sept: Brudenell Social Club, Leeds, UK!
22 Sept: Trof NQ, Manchester, UK!
23 Sept: The Nest, London, UK!
24 Sept: The Cube, Bristol, UK!
26 Sept: Athens, Greece !
27 Sept: Arka Onda Istanbul, Turkey!
28 Sept: Milan, Italy!
29 Sept: Geneve, Suisse!
09 Oct: Chapel Hill, NC – Cat’s Cradle &^
12 Oct: Washington, DC – 9:30 Club &^

! with Dolphins Into The Future
& with Deerhunter
^ with Casino Versus Japan
* with Tennisand Family Portrait

The description for this video by Krackatoa is sad:
The whole Hikikomori cartoon project was inspired by a BBC documentary in 2002 looking at how estimated 1 million young japanese people withdraw from society and stay in their rooms for years without venturing outside. They just play computer games at night and sleep all day and feel abandoned in the company driven society.

It’s older, but worth taking a look at, as I believe we are living in a generation of people who live this way. It seems Krackatoa had a sense of what things would become in the new century.

Farfara are a part of the new generation of pop, and when you watch this video, you can sense that they’re doing pop right. The video was directed by Etkin Çekin.

Her album is due out on August 10th, so consider this song a preview of Kathryn Calder‘s Are You My Mother?. It’s animated, it’s music, it’s fun.

The Portland Cello Project have just release their new album Thousand Words (Sad Rabbit Music), and here is the first video from it.

The Swedish Legal System are a trio that may or may not be from Sweden, since their bio says they are “from Sweden where it counts”. Interpret this as you must, but the band recently covered Carly Simon‘s hit song “You’re So Vain” and created a video for it outside of Seattle’s Lusty Lady, a strip club/theater that closed down after decades of being in business. Many songs and stories have been written about the events that have happened behind The Lusty Lady’s closed doors, even a small handful of books, and as the club was coming to a close, The Swedish Legal System felt it was more than appropriate to shoot their musky loins between their cavernous space.

If you want to hear more, here are the band’s cover of Lady Gaga‘s “Bad Romance”.

Lo-fi is the now-fi, which absolutely makes no sense until you see the video, which will lead you to say “what’s a now-fi?” In other words, lo-fi/low-budget is now the cool thing to do after years of seeing videos that were too professional looking, there are no rules. Quadron understand this and go out of their way to make “Slippin’” into something that isn’t slipping by any means.

Seattle’s KEXP 90.3 had Quadron do a live performance on the air on June 15th, and you can take a listen to their set in full (23.3mb), or stream the songs individually.

When you bring two lords together, you can’t help but wipe your feet in front of the House of Lords, and nobody was really sure if these two guys were from there.

Anyway, Tobacco + Beck = one of two released collaborations found on ‘Bacco’s latest album Maniac Meat (Anticon). Now it’s in visual form, feel the firmness of the sights.