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The Limiñanas

The Limiñanas | Crystal Anis | 3hive.com

The psychedelic/pop revival continues on with The Limiñanas. This French pop duo, consisting of Marie Limiñana on drums, and Lio Limiñana playing pretty much everything else, including vocal duties (other vocals provided by guests), have their genre pegged. Wearing their Gainsbourg, Velvet Underground, and any of the ye-ye girls of the 60’s influences on their sleeves, they also sound like what I think Stereolab would’ve sounded like had they been around in the 60’s.

The Limiñanas latest album, Crystal Anis, out now on the great Hozac Records, is pop perfection. The hardest part about writing this post was deciding which of the 11 songs to share. For your listening/downloading pleasure, (below) we have the straight forward, fuzzy, and over-before-you-know-it “AF3458”, and the sing-talking, Hammond and bass driven title track “Crystal Anis”. The more I listen to these, the higher this album moves up my favorites of the year list. Give these songs a spin. I know you will enjoy them.

The Limiñanas – AF3458 from Crystal Anis (2012)

The Limiñanas – Crystal Anis from Crystal Anis (2012)

Hozac

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Divine Fits

Divine Fits is a new side project/new band/supergroup made up of Britt Daniel from Spoon, Dan Boeckner from Handsome Furs and Wolf Parade, and Sam Brown from New Bomb Turks. They are releasing their debut album, A Thing Called Divine Fits on August 28, with Merge Records.

Full of throbbing synths, echoed vocals, and driving beats, A Thing Called Divine Fits is very catchy, just what one would expect after reading the bands lineup. Britt and Dan share lead vocal assignments, each singing lead on half of the album’s tracks. The two tracks included below are samples of each singer’s distinctive voices, and how those voices make each of their respective songs sound unique, but flow well with each other as well. “My Love Is Real”, the opening track sung by Dan, has a dark, fuzzy vibe to it. While “Would That Not Be Nice” sounds pretty much like a Spoon song, with a thumping bass line and maracas ushering in Britt’s vocals. Both songs are really good, and will give you a good idea of how great the entire album is.

Divine Fits – My Love Is Real from A Thing Called Divine Fits (2012)

Divine Fits – Would That Not Be Nice from A Thing Called Divine Fits (2012)

Merge Records

Divine Fits

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Fergus and Geronimo

You know that “Whoa! What is this?” reaction you can have when listening to a band or album for the first time? Sometimes it’s not a good reaction, and other times you’ve just been blown away. I had the latter moment last week when I first sat down to listen to Fergus & Geronimo’s new album Funky Was The State of Affairs. This two-piece band from Denton, TX sound like a Devo meets Zappa meets Ween mashup, with a snotty Descendents-like song (“Roman Tick”, below) mixed in here and there. It’s fantastic zaniness! Funky Was The State of Affairs was recently released on Hardly Art, and I highly recommend it. Check out the songs below, if you like them be sure to buy the album. Enjoy.

Fergus & Geronimo – Roman Tick from Funky Was The State of Affairs (2012)

Fergus & Geronimo – No Parties from Funky Was The State of Affairs (2012)

Fergus & Geronimo – Baby Don’t You Cry from Unleam (2011)

Fergus & Geronimo – Powerful Lovin’ from Unleam (2011)

Hardly Art

Fergus & Geronimo

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Holograms

Swedish punk rock…kind of hard to imagine from a country whose top exports have been outfitting the world’s middle class for decades and whose social system is famously egalitarian. But Sweden has its share of factories and, no matter how good your health benefits are, working in a factory sucks. That’s how the Holograms met: going out for drinks after their factory shift. Their brand of working class punk is accented by gravelly basslines and frayed synths (they are Swedish after all). The self-titled debut is packed with chilly, desperate war cries like “ABC City”. If you dig, get your hands on the entire album — it’s one of my top five of 2012 so far.

ABC City from Holograms (2012)

http://capturedtracks.com/

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Redd Kross

15 years since their last studio album, Redd Kross will release their Merge Records debut, Researching The Blues, on August 7. After a few listens to this album it’s hard to believe that it’s been so long, it is tight and has more hooks than a Frazier/Ali fight.

“Researching The Blues” the album’s title track, included below, kicks things off in a hurry with it’s crashing cymbals and chunky guitar and doesn’t let up for 3 minutes and 53 seconds, leaving you in a puddle of your own sweat and out of breath. Hopefully you won’t destroy your favorite listening device while thrashing about and you can enjoy this song more than once. Enjoy.

Redd Kross – Researching The Blues from Researching The Blues (2012)

Redd Kross

Merge

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Crystal Castles

Crystal Castles have been priming the pump via Facebook and Soundcloud this week. They’ve released a remixed song from each of their albums, a brand new track, “Plague,” and then yesterday they announced dates for their upcoming North American tour. I doubt I’m introducing a new band to many people, since Crystal Castles are somewhat of a household name within the indie music world. Years ago I realized they were more popular than I imagined when kids at Disneyland were pointing out my son’s Crystal Castles t-shirt. Either that or it was Goth-tronica day and no one told me.

The new track is throbbingly ethereal and more atmospheric than their earlier work. NME posted fan footage of the live premiere of the song where they described it as having “a clear ’90s rave influence.” Whatever your take on the song, it’s great to have new Crystal Castles rattling around in my ears with a tour and new album on the horizon.

Crystal Castles – Plague

Crystal Castles – Suffocation

Crystal Castles – Suffocation (HEALTH remix)

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Mean Jeans

Mean Jeans are a pop-punk band out of Portland Oregon. They released their second album, On Mars, back in April on Dirtnap, it is catchy as hell! Full of rad hooks and goofy lyrics, On Mars blows through 36 minutes without really taking any time to breathe. The track below, “Anybody Out There”, they pull out all the stops with xylophone (i’m guessing) at the beginning and “oh-oh-oh’s” throughout. It’s a great punk rock track, and would fit nicely into any summertime playlist. Enjoy.

Mean Jeans – Anybody Out There? from On Mars (2012)

Mean Jeans

Dirtnap

Green Noise

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Cardinal


It’s nice this duo can afford to put out an album every 18 years—that means their third record should hit in 2030. Considering that schedule, this review that comes six months after the release of Hymns is super timely! My snarkiness belies my feelings for this band and record. This is pop just like I like it. It’s definitely comfort music for me considering I geeked out on my parents’ Bee Gees records as a kid (I understand this makes me completely uncool; I’m cool with that). The tracks here are two of the more rocking songs on the album. Don’t let that scare you away. Getting these two purveyors of baroque chamber pop together on record is a rare occurrence and should be savored and appreciated like an eclipse or comet.

For a little history of Cardinal, Richard Davies used to be in a band called The Moles back in the ’80s down in his native Australia. He joined with Eric Matthews here in the states for their self-titled debut, but they split soon after and continued with their own solo efforts. Matthews put out a record on Sub Pop back in ’95 and the opening song “Fanfare” remains one of my favorite songs of that decade. Davies put out at least three solo records and was backed by The Flaming Lips on tour for his first. Davies does vocal duties on most of the songs, but I prefer Eric Matthews’ deeper delivery (“Her”). Though the two together are pretty much magic (“Carbolic Smoke Ball”).

Cardinal – Love Like Rain

Cardinal – Carbolic Smoke Ball

Fire Records

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Cat Power

Sun is the first album of original material Cat Power has released in six years. According to Matador, Chan performed and produced the album all on her own. The album’s release date is set for September 4th, with pre-order options available soon. Below is a track from the new album. Enjoy.

Cat Power – Ruin from Sun (2012)

Cat Power

Matador

Here’s Sean’s original post from 11.6.2005

Cat Power’s been napping. By the time her new album, The Greatest (not a greatest hits record — boy I’m sure her label friends will tire quickly of repeating that mantra), hits stores in January three years will have passed since her last album. Not bad really. The space between her last albums lasted about four years. I should cut her some slack. The wait is always worth it. This time around she taps the Memphis soul scene for her backing musicians, with, among others, Al Green’s boys, Teenie Hodges (who co-wrote “Take Me to the River” with Green) on guitar, and Leroy “Flick” Hodges on bass. Judging from the small sample offered, Chan Marshall may be on her way to creating a timeless work of art.