Martina Topley Bird

I was surprised to find these tracks in my in-box. They're quite the weekend treat. As you might imagine I spend a fair amount of time scouring the web for new music and I haven't heard a peep from the Independiente label since DeeJay Punk-Roc's '98 release of Chicken Eye. Obviously I'm not listening closely enough. They're Travis' UK label. OK, so I've got some catching up to do. And besides the occasional David Holmes or Diplo track she sings on, I haven't spent quality time with Ms. Topley-Bird. That's gonna change too. Today. String theorists searching for other dimensions just may find what they're looking for if they'd get strung out on some MTB. Topley-Bird's voice carries me to other worlds, worlds I first discovered listening to Tricky's Maxinquaye where she played the beautifully haunting foil to his gravelly trip-hop hero. Topley-Bird herself is off on her own inter-genre exploration with co-pilot/producer Dangermouse. Whether it's the dusty after hours slow-mo of "Valentine," the playfully seductive "Carnies," or this bumpin' club remix of "Poison" Martina Topley Bird's buttery-rich voice easily lilts your soul enough to keep you just on this side of an out of body experience.

Poison (Van She remix) [MP3, 4.2MB, 128kbps]
Valentine [MP3, 4.9MB, 192kbps]

Buy from iTunes
www.independiente.co.uk
www.martinatopleybird.com

Rench

Nope, I didn't mess up on those genres up there. Rench is a Brooklyn-based producer who mixes old bluegrass and country samples with a standup band that includes slide guitar and fiddle, and he pulls it all together with hip hop beats and splits vocals between country guys and gals and underground emcees from around the way. If your head's about to explode, join the club. The mere thought of it in abstract made me think of those fun but mostly throwaway "crossovers" like Hayseed Dixie and The Gourds' "Gin & Juice." But hey, if Snoop Dogg's gonna show up at the CMT Awards and Clinton and Obama are gonna keep fighting over who really has his or her finger on the pulse of America, we may as well get down to mashups of extreme urban and rural. And you will get down. It doesn't all work, but when Rench hits it, which is done particularly deftly on "Street Soldier" and "Oh Sleeper," you can truly imagine Gangstagrass blasting from Escalades on Flatbush and F-150's in the Appalachians. As for "Come Back to Brooklyn," it won me over by capturing the spirit of my former borough and the downhome hospitality of my new southern environs. It's a toe-tapper and a window-rattler.

Street Soldier (Deep Thoughts) [MP3, 3.1MB, 128kbps]
Oh Sleeper [MP3, 5.2MB, 192kbps]
Theme from Mean Season [MP3, 4.9MB, 192kbps]
Get On It (Deep Thoughts and Kaz Mir) [MP3, 2.9MB, 128kbps]
Come Back to Brooklyn [MP3, 4.6MB, 192kbps]
Download Full Gangstagrass Mix [ZIP, 72MB]

www.renchaudio.com
myspace.com/renchaudio

Rae Davis

I so need this right now. Lately my brain has been swelling at the seams as I work through my first year of teaching (in the face of pending budget cuts that may very well force me into retirement decades too soon), grading (English teachers do too much), and, the really hard part: snowboarding, skateboarding, biking, legoing, and birthday-partying with my kids. Just as I'm about to lie down to sleep (quick usage lesson) I came across this chilly gem. How chill is it you ask? As chill as a stay-cold pillow my friend Mitch talks about developing. I'm gonna cozy up to these beats and deep, bone-shaking bass plucks, and pass out. Like this photo of Mr. Davis himself. You're about to be schooled in the ways of quality downtempo and quality down time courtesy of this up and coming Texan.

Yesterday's History [MP3, 5.6MB, 192kbps]
This I Dig of You [MP3, 5.6MB, 192kbps]

www.antipop.net

Matthew Dear

Even if you've only listened to my radio show a handful of times, chances are you've heard me play Matthew Dear. His more immediate songs (the ones offered here are such examples) have chameleon-like qualities. They fit so well next to other electronic songs, obviously, but they also segue well with pop songs, new wave tracks, especially the darker ones (like Joy Division), and well, just about any other track I throw them up against. Ironically, Dear's lackadaisical vocal delivery lends a populist air to his minimalist-techno tracks (it's a warmer version of Kraftwerk's robotic vocals) and with every release he gets deliciously close to busting out a crossover hit. When it comes right down to it, I just dig this stuff. Plus, his albums are easily accessible in the KUCI music library, just over my left shoulder, which saves my show from ever embarrassing bouts of dead air.

from Asa Breed: Black Edition (2008):
Neighborhoods [MP3, 4.0MB, 172kbps]
Deserter [MP3, 5.9MB, 205kbps]
Don and Sherri (Hot Chip Version) [MP3, 5.2MB, 166kbps]

from Leave Luck to Heaven (2003):
But for You [MP3, 5.2MB, 189kbps]

Buy from iTunes

www.ghostly.com
www.matthewdear.com

Honey Claws

As most of the music world heads to Austin, Texas this week for the annual South By South West music festival I'm stuck here in my front bedroom doing the virtual bar crawl hunting for something new to listen to and re-living past SXSWs. Honey Claws is just the sort of thing I'd hope to run into at 1 A.M. my feet weary from the walking, my head hurting from all the rocking, but these grooves would buoy me up for another couple hours. These two tracks sound a bit like Nine Inch Nails tempered and mellowed through Beck's beatbox and microphone. The rest of the album will take you on a wild bounce deep into the heart of Austin's freak-hop-tronic scene. Sure, that may just be the Honey Claws' garage but bigger things have blossomed from humbler origins.

SXSW showcase: Wednesday night @ 115 Club.

Villains [MP3, 4.8MB, 256kbps]
July [MP3, 4.8MB, 256kbps]

www.honeyclaws.com
www.myspace.com/honeyclaws

Realistic

Realistic (brainchild of musician/motion graphics designer James Towning) started a la Negativland: whipping up a smirky hodge-podge of everything from self-help tapes to soap operas to classic rock. With Perpetual Memory Loss, Realistic rises to the next level, crafting some outright tuneful (if chaotic) thumpers from layers of sounds and samples. These tracks illustrate the contrast between albums, but don't even represent the best that Realistic has to offer. Stream the whole album here in order to hear the excellent tracks "Music in the Round" and "Amazing Fall."

from Perpetual Memory Loss (2007):
The Camera Track [MP3, 2.7MB, 128kbps]
Snowday Plaything [MP3, 2.7MB, 128kbps]

from Private Moments (2006):
Angel 2000 [MP3, 3.9MB, 160kbps]
Larry Love Said [MP3, 2.8MB, 160kbps]

www.myspace.com
www.illegalart.net

4Hero

Today’s selection is actually a nice bookend to Lisa’s Hello, Blue Roses post yesterday, albeit 4Hero has always been more of a sweeping club fave than an electronic bedroom dweller. Way back in 1999, I took a job in Los Angeles and drove down the very next day in my Chevy Sprint Turbo (yes, turbo), and 4Hero’s Two Pages, which came out a few months before, was about the only cassette I had that would play in my cheapo radio. Unlike the CD release, the promo segregated the darker drum’n’bass onto one cassette and the more chilled-out, string-laden fusion stuff onto another. As the title suggests, one was a great antidote to the other. In the central Utah mountains? Time for Ursula Rucker’s smooth spoken-word over lovely breakbeats and sweeping strings. Trudging the home stretch through the Mojave? Bring on the sci-fi jungle. Since that bygone era when we were all going to be dot-com millionaires, 4Hero has gravitated more and more toward the groove, and “Morning Child” has the feel of both a return to form and a culmination of the form. It also sounds like a lithe and lovely summer song, so perhaps it’ll warm up your new year a few degrees.

Morning Child (Radio Edit) [MP3, 3.3MB, 128kbps]

4hero.co.uk
milanrecords.com