Nickodemus
A hot and sweaty dancefloor number just in time for summer. Nickodemus has been ruling the NYC dance music scene since the mid-nineties as a resident DJ at Giant Step up until presently with his work with the Turntables on the Hudson parties. On record, his name is synonymous with sunny grooves and he can always be counted on to bring big-booty-shakin’ bounces. Lately, I’ve been digging his work with Quantic, and his remixes of Billy Holiday, Mexican Institue of Sound, and Ocote Soul Sound. Now he’s ready to drop his sophomore album, Sun People next month on Eighteenth Street Lounge music. Nickodemus touts a cornucopia of world sounds collaborating with artists from all corners of the globe including Mandingo vocalist Ismael Kouyate and New York’s Real Live Show. Nickodemus is to music as TajÃn is to mango. Sprinkle liberally and dig it.
Sun Children (feat. the Real Live Show) [MP3, 5.9MB, 192kbps]
Photons
Photons will be releasing three EP’s this year, the first of which is Glory!, out tomorrow via Insound.com. “Where Were You Last Night” continues the raucous party, still with bassoon.
Original Post Oct 20, 2008:
In trying to figure out what to write about San Francisco’s Photons, I had several paths in mind. Working in the musical history of the city by the Bay, or coming up with something witty about their eclectic pop. Then I remembered the line from the top of their Myspace page that says all you need to know before downloading and listening: “Now with Bassoon!”
Neil Halstead “Elevenses” Video + Tour
Irving
You’d think i’d break five months of silence with some yet-to-be-released, white-label, promo-only B-side REEEEEmix… No. It’s a Los Angeles band that hasn’t put out a record since 2006. But hey, it’s new to me (discovered via Pandora of all places). Irving serve up carefree pop in a variety of flavors – thanks in part to the fact there are five songwriters in the group. My personal favorite is “I Can’t Fall in Love,” which I can’t seem to listen to less than twice in a row.
Superchunk
Paul Young left a comment on my last 3hive entry — a Julie Doiron re-post — that said, “Yo JC! Paul Young wants to hear about the new Superchunk album.” While I don’t remember Paul speaking of himself in the third person while a student in my class, he is somewhat of a legend in the halls of a certain suburban Detroit public school. And so, it is with much pleasure that I comply with his wishes and dish up a track from what has been maybe the second most important band in my own life. Without Superchunk, I’d be a fraction of the poet I am, and way more boring too. So Paul, I’m glad you’re alive, and thanks for asking. “Misfits & Mistakes,” appropriately titled for both of us, I think, sounds like 1990 all over again, but instead of being the secret bonus track behind “Brand New Love,” it’s new. Leaves in the Gutter, an EP released this month, is the band’s first fresh spin since Paul was in 8th grade. So here you go; let me know what you think, and say hi to Laura for me.
New Masthead and Logo
Bliss
Guilty pleasure confession time. Culture Club. It was Chuck Davis in my Sophomore health class who told me that that one girl was actually a boy. Chuck knew these kinds of things. Chuck could draw the Adam and the Ants logo better than I ever could, so I trusted him, his judgment. So when he told me Boy George could sing I believed him. And he was right. While I rarely listen to Culture Club anymore and the thrill of freaking out my parents by listening to a band with a flamboyant homosexual singer has likewise faded, Boy George’s voice hasn’t. His soulfulness remains timeless. Props to these Danes for dragging him out of the tabloids and into this chilled out Morricone-esque duet.
Dan Deacon
Sean,
There is no way you haven’t heard of Dan Deacon. And if you haven’t, well, get on it! And if you have, well… get on it! For God’s sake!
–Geena (via email), College Station, TX
P.S. This video brings me so much joy I can’t comprehend it.
Geena,
Yes, I am familiar with Dan Deacon. We are failing in our mission to share the sharing for not having reviewed him sooner. Thanks for the swift kick to the head. A tragic wrong finally made right.
-Sean
William Fitzsimmons
I haven’t decided if William Fitzsimmons is a bastard with an irritating beard, or the undiscovered perfect boyfriend I missed sitting in the back of my most boring college class. Perhaps he’s both, and maybe I dated his evil angelic twin. Joseph, the boy who knew he’d never fight with his true love; the artist who was so sure he’d leave his young family in the dark of night.
Fitzsimmons’ most recent album, “The Sparrow and the Crow†is about divorce. His divorce, but I’m certain any divorcee could glean some ah-ha from listening. Call it music to listen to once you’ve accepted what has happened, comfortable with it or not. With a Master’s Degree in mental health you have to hope he’s got solid ideas about the delicacy of marriage. The joy that aches.
If You Would Come Back Home is officially on repeat in my head, rarely interrupted for a week. It’s a nice sunshine melancholy soundtrack to the spectacularly mundane everyday stuff. He understands what took me so long to see, good writing is not about the fanciest words, it’s about the perfect arrangement of the most simple words.
(by our friend Emily M.)