On May 25th anticon will release Tom Fec of Black Moth Super Rainbow aka TOBACCO’s second solo record, Maniac Meat. The follow up to 2008’s Fucked Up Friends which featured Aesop Rock among others, the sophomore effort will feature Beck on two tracks, “Fresh Hex” and “Grape Aerosmith”. Mark your calendars. Download the IODA SXSW Opening Day Bash Sampler 2010 here to get your hands on a track off of TOBACCO’s debut and check out the full track list for Maniac Meat over on Pitchfork.
New TOBACCO Record Out in May on Anticon Featuring Beck
February 19th, 2010 View Comments
IODAcast 066: Alan Lomax in Haiti Special
February 19th, 2010 View CommentsListen at IODAcast.com or on iTunes and download the tracks to go below:
IODAcast 066 features an interview with David Katznelson on the Alan Lomax in Haiti box set. David Katznelson, founder of Birdman Records and Harte Recordings and former A&R V.P. at Warner Music, came by the pod recently to highlight songs on the 10 disc box set released on Harte Recordings in November of 2009 after many years of work and preparation. To learn more about the box set TheHaitiBox.blogspot.com. Please note that not all tracks featured in the episode are available for free download.
“The rustic nature of early Haitian music can best be heard on the magnificent 10-CD Alan Lomax in Haiti: Recordings for the Library of Congress, a collection of wonderfully evocative recordings made in 1936 and 1937 of vodou and church ceremonies, Boy Scouts singing plaintive folk songs, and stately clarinet-led orchestras learning how to swing.” -Peter Shapiro, Daily Swarm
Surprise Jazz
“Instrumental Merengue” (mp3)
Drummers of the Sosyete boumba
“Drumming – 3 Drums of the Sosyete Boumba” (mp3)
Ago’s Bal Band
“Demonstration of the Tuning of the Malinoumbas” (mp3)
from “Alan Lomax in Haiti”
(Harte Recordings)
Buy at TheHaitiBox.blogspot.com
Buy at iTunes Music Store
Buy at Amazon MP3
More On This Album
J. Tillman’s “Year in the Kingdom” NPR Song of the Day
February 19th, 2010 View CommentsNPR picked up on the Fleet Foxes’ drummer and proliferate solo musician, J. Tillman, for Friday, February 19th’s Song of the Day. “Year in the Kingdom”, the title track off of Tillman’s sixth solo record came out on Western Vinyl
“…here’s hoping Tillman’s tenure in that band will shed a brighter spotlight on his own beautiful brand of gentle, pastoral folk. Tillman’s latest album, Year in the Kingdom, is a regal, autumnal affair. The title track perfectly exemplifies what Tillman has to offer: It’s a hushed and respectful hymn for a modern age in which doubt and spirituality coexist under uneasy, overwhelming and ultimately humbling terms.” -Barbara Mitchell, NPR
Download the Free IODA SXSW Opening Day Bash Sampler
February 18th, 2010 View CommentsHop on over to http://iodasxsw.com to check out our line-up for the 6th annual IODA SXSW Opening Day Bash and grab a track from each band performing!
01. Les Shelleys – “The World is Waiting for the Sunrise” (Courtesy of Fat Cat)
02. A Sunny Day in Glasgow – “Shy” (Courtesy of Mis Ojos Discos)
03. Zeus - “Marching Through Your Head” (Courtesy of Arts & Crafts)
04. Summer Cats – “Let’s Go” (Courtesy of Slumberland)
05. TOBACCO- “Truck Sweat” (Courtesy of anticon)
06. The Terror Pigeon Dance Revolt! - “Ride Frindship” (Courtesy of Luaka Bop)
07. Carsick Cars – “Zhong Nan Hai” (Courtesy of Maybe Mars Music)
08. Bear in Heaven – “Wholehearted Mess” (Courtesy of Hometapes)
09. Sleepy Sun – “Sandstorm Woman” (Courtesy of ATP Recordings)
Just Encoded: Ali Farka Touré, Toumani Diabaté, Balmorhea, Texas Tornadoes
February 18th, 2010 View Comments
Check out some free tracks from releases that have yet to be released!
Ali Farka Toure, Toumani Diabate
“Sabu Yerkoy” (mp3)
from “Ali & Toumani”
(World Circuit)
Release Date: 2/22/10
More On This Album
Description: Recorded over three afternoons at Livingston Studios, London, in 2005, with contributions from Orlando ‘Cachaíto’ López on bass, ‘Ali & Toumani’ is Ali Farka Touré and Toumani Diabaté’s second and final album together. Produced by Nick Gold and beautifully recorded by Jerry Boys, this is the successor to the GRAMMY winning ‘In the Heart of the Moon’ and the last album recorded by both Ali Farka Touré and Cachaíto López. “I believe this album to be stronger and wiser, better than ‘In The Heart’”- Toumani Diabaté
Balmorhea
“Bowsprit” (mp3)
from “Constellations”
(Western Vinyl)
Release Date: 2/23/10
More On This Album
Description: Balmorhea’s previous album explored the freedom and isolation of settlers learning to live on an untamed frontier. By contrast, their new album Constellations shifts our focus to the cosmos and beyond, meditating solemnly on the mystical and metaphysical.
Texas Tornados
“Who’s to Blame Senorita” (mp3)
from “Esta Bueno”
(Bismeaux Records)
Release Date: 3/2/10
More On This Album
Description: The ultimate Tex-Mex super group is back. Augie Meyers and Flaco Jiménez reunite with the son of Doug Sahm, Shawn Sahm, in a new recording that includes the final work of the legendary Freddy Fender as well as a lost demo from Doug himself. Esta Bueno! (It’s Good!) El mejor grupo Tex Mex está de vuelta. Augie Meyers y Flaco Jiménez juntos una vez más uniendo sus voces con el hijo de Doug Sahm, Shawn Sahm, en un nuevo material discográfico que incluye la última obra del legendario Freddy Fender, así como un demo inédito del desaparecido Doug. Esta Bueno!
Music Video: The Phenomenal Handclap Band – “Baby”
February 18th, 2010 View CommentsDirected by talented British director, Stephen Agnew, the band starts off flaunting around the park in their best fall get-up and then things get a bit darker and bloodier. Check out the band’s brand spanking new video for “Baby” (feat. Tommy Brenneck & Rodrigo Ursaia) below and get a track by the band after the jump:
Maestro Classical Podcast 013: Composers in 2010
February 17th, 2010 View Comments
Listen at MaestroClassical.com or on iTunes and learn about the featured pieces below:
Florent Ghys
“Soli” (mp3)
from “Baroque Tardif: Soli” (Cantaloupe Music)
Buy at iTunes Music Store
Buy at Napster
More On This Album
Album Notes: Cantaloupe Music continues its series of EPs. These are available via digital music services and in a limited edition physical pressing available to members of our subscription-only Cantaloupe Club.
After receiving a traditional French diploma in music, Florent Ghys researched experimental and minimalist music–leading him to Bang on a Can’s Summer Festival at MASS MoCA in 2007. Returned to his hometown in Bordeaux and missing the community he found around the summer festival, Ghys asked himself, “What would I write if I had to write for an ensemble in which I am the only player?”
Ghys says of his process: “The reasons for this schizophrenic question are multiple. Returning to Bordeaux from Paris, I had the feeling of being musically isolated – of being out of tune with my new environment – and I couldn’t stop writing. I was also interested in the idea of breaking the boundary between the composer and the musician. and the feeling I had of sitting in the audience while my music was being played onstage wasn’t, to be honest, all that satisfying.
“I didn’t intend to compose a solo for myself playing the upright bass, nor did I intend to compose a piece for me and a fleet of clones, but I did intend to create a ‘multiple-me’ ensemble.
“I know multi-track recording will never replace live recording, but multi-tracking was an interesting starting point to see if it would change my compositional process while writing strictly for me – after all, the instrumentation for the EP was linked only to the instruments I can actually play. I could have an upright bass, a bass, a guitar, an electric guitar, a voice. I could also use a pianino (a small 6 octaves piano) and hit some dishes in my kitchen.” Baroque Tardif: Soli is the first in a series of three EPs from Florent Ghys.
Olivier Manchon
“Come Back” (mp3)
“Memoires (feat. Gregoire Maret)” (mp3)
from “Orchestre de Chambre Miniature – Volume 1″
(ObliqSound)
Buy at iTunes Music Store
More On This Album
Album Notes:
Olivier Manchon > violin
Hiroko Taguchi > viola
Christopher Hoffman > cello
Alan Hampton > double bass
John Ellis > tenor saxophone (tks 1, 4, 7), bass clarinet (tk 3)
Hideaki Aomori > clarinet (tk 5, 8), bass clarinet (tk 6)
Gregoire Maret > harmonica (tk 2)
Produced by Olivier Manchon.
Description: Orchestre de Chambre Miniature – Volume 1 is the personal project of French violinist and composer Olivier Manchon, better known for his collaborations with indie acts My Brightest Diamond and Sufjan Stevens, and as co-leader of orchestral pop group Clare and the Reasons. With this mini chamber orchestra, Manchon showcases his skills as a gifted composer and arranger, creating a cinematic narrative of jazz and classical music performed on strings and woodwinds. The album also features John Ellis (Charlie Hunter, John Patitucci, Sting) on clarinet and saxophone and Gregoire Maret (Pat Metheny, Herbie Hancock, Marcus Miller) on harmonica.
Featured Artist: Georgia Anne Muldrow, Declaime – “SomeOthaShip”
February 16th, 2010 View Comments
On their latest release Georgia Anne Muldrow and Declaime (Dudley Perkins) bring back the straight up hip-hop. With both artists branching out to the R&B, Soul and Funk genres on several recent releases it’s nice to hear them giving us their signature funky hip-hop flavor. With guest verses and production from the likes of Kool G Rap, Flying Lotus, M.E.D., Oddisee, Big Pooh and Black Milk it’s clear where G & D stand within the underground rap game.
“Georgia Anne Muldrow brims with so much optimism and anxious energy that it barely contains itself… It’s just an enchanting moment from an enormously promising young talent.”- NPR
Dudley Perkins is a veteran to the game, whose voice overflows with bluesy, syncopated veracity. He never hits the notes you expect, rhymes to the cadence you imagined, or sounds like anyone else: Dudley captivates with the unmistakable sound of experience, reaching deeper within our collective conscious than most of us are comfortable with. Dudley breaths a spiritual wind back into the supercool, funked out vibrations of hip-hop.
Georgia Anne Muldrow radiates light into west coast hip-hop. Georgia’s youthful flow is a beguiling mix social revolution and raw street wisdom. Her choruses, a haunting echo of our ancestors’ reality. And her beats, a cosmic exploration of interplanetary funk. Her collaborative efforts over the past few years (Erykah Badu, Mos Def, Madlib) have garnered her a well deserved spotlight.
Georgia Anne Muldrow, Declaime
“Endure (feat. M.E.D. & Rapper Big Pooh) (prod. Georgia Anne Muldrow)” (mp3)
from “SomeOthaShip”
(Mello Music Group)
Buy at iTunes Music Store
More On This Album
Perez Hilton Features Kim Zolciak Remixes!
February 10th, 2010 View Comments 
Artist: Kim Zolciak
Title: Tardy for the Party – THE REMIXES
Label: Ferosh Records
Genre: Dance : Dance
UPC: 844185024167
Territory: World
Release Date: 02.09.10
The Real Housewives of Atlanta cast member Kim Zolciak has teamed up with one of today’s most internationally renowned superstar DJs, Tracy Young to serve up some floor filling mixes of her single “Tardy for the Party.” The original track reached #3 in the iTunes Dance store and has continued to find success all over the world. Tracy Young’s remixes take the track turn it out into three new versions: a formidable radio mix, a hard hitting club pounder, and a deep Dub version. Check out this hot new dance release before you hear it in all the clubs.
Perez Hilton has already picked up on the remixes and loves them! Follow the link for more:
http://perezhilton.com/2010-02-08-forget-about-work-and-the-stress-of-the-week
Grab the Radio Mix here:
Kim Zolciak
“Tardy for the Party” (mp3)
from “Tardy for the Party – THE REMIXES”
(Ferosh Records)
Buy at iTunes Music Store
More On This Album
Featured Artist: Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra
February 10th, 2010 View CommentsBy: Michael Madavi
Artist: Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra
Title: Kollaps Tradixionales
Label: Constellation
Genre: Avantgarde/Experimental : Rock
UPC: 666561006327
Territory: World
Release Date: 02.08.10
After a change of personnel in summer 2008, Montreal’s Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra has emerged renewed and energized. Officially dropping the “Tra-La-La Band’ from its name, the critically-acclaimed Constellation Records group presents their sixth full-length recording, Kollaps Tradixionales. Having shed three members and recruited one (drummer David Payant), SMZ now consists of the (now lone) fried electric guitar and plangent voice of band leader Efrim Menuck (who previously co-founded Godspeed You! Black Emperor ), rammed by a swirling widescreen backdrop of dual violins, courtesy Sophie Trudeau and Jessica Moss, and Thierry Amar’s upright bass work. The group continues to remain dynamic and evolutionary, creating a fantastic new album that pushes their already painstakingly developed sound even further with a newly hardened emphasis on lyrics/vocals and a perfect blend of classical, modern, and otherworldly sounds.
While the violins are now serving up arpeggiated runs and modernist strokes that counterbalance and destabilize the more conventional progressions at the core of any given song or movement, Amar’s steady and fortified bass work serves as a fantastic anchor for the others’ musical wanderings and ensures they never move too far away from the group as a whole while displaying his fluency and alliance with free jazz, improv and out music. Payant’s drum work is tastefully applied, correctly aligning with the others’ patterns, emphasis, and tones; in short, it’s like he’s been here for years. Of course Menuck’s super fuzzy, lunging and swirling guitar is as present as ever, but this time with an even further emphasized vocal role (which he affects almost as heavily). The album is packed into four parts: The introduction, the two part “Metal Bird” section, the “collapse” suite of three tracks, and a pretty-damn-epic closer.
A massive crowd favorite during concerts in recent years, “Metal Bird”, as it has been known to fans from set lists over the past couple of years, is included in full recorded form as the two tracks, “I Built Myself a Metal Bird,” and, “I Fed My Metal Bird The Wings Of Other Metal Birds.” Together, the tracks form one of the most memorable moments on the record. A notably jagged and energetic start fires the song off at a thunderous pace. The violins take diving runs around the track’s edges, helping to expand the song’s panorama and coloring the track with their sweet, velvety voices. The first half builds to a full on war scene in 7/4 time, with Efrim in the middle screaming “dance mother fuckers” like he was firing rounds at your feet till the environment collapses and the song’s second half begins: a deadened, war-torn field peppered with emaciated single notes that faintly ringing out in the first half’s wake. This is some heady stuff.
Fans of Menuck’s work in Godspeed! will find a happy home here, and anyone who enjoys hearing very detailed, epic, vivid musical scenes being painted (say Explosions in the Sky) should definitely give Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra a shot.
