International music, News

Elephant Micah – Louder Than Thou

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New Elephant Micah album Louder Than Thou is out and available. Ok, you have to wait a few more weeks for the vinyl, but digital album is already available as name-your-price download. I need to decide whether to buy the vinyl or pay something for the download. I feel way too guilty to just enjoy this beautiful record for free. Elephant Micah is magnificent and has released several lo-fi folk masterpieces. If you are into people like Mark Kozelek and Jason Molina, you really should be listening to Elephant Micah as well. Louder Than Thou isn’t his easiest album to approach. At least for me, because I’m not used to spend my afternoons with 6-7 minute long folk songs. However, this guy is such a talent that he can sell a long experimental folk tune to a fan of simple pop songs. This one below is the first single If I Were a Surfer. listen to the rest of the album by hitting that bandcamp link. And do check out his amazing back catalogue.

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/26585762″ iframe=”true” /]
 

Elephant Micah Website
Product of Palmyra at bandcamp

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International music, Video of the Day

Video of the Day #84: Sassparilla

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I’ve been listening to the new Sassparilla album The Darndest Thing quite a lot during the last few weeks. This Portland-based group has created a pretty damn good americana album. This might not be the greatest video you’ll ever see, but I really like this song My First Lover and it’s not even my biggest favourite on the album. Beautifully crafted dark atmospheres.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2G5ZbmrxtA]

Sassparilla Website

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International music, News, Power Pop

Cirrone – Uplands Park Road

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Cirrone from Italy was a big hit in the power pop world last year and most of my favourite power pop blogs featured Cirrone’s Uplands Park Road album on their year-end lists. For example the wonderful Powerpopaholic.com rated is as the best album of the year 2011. This beauty of an album has been playing in my headphones for the last week or so and I can fully agree with all of my favourite blogs. This is one hell of a classic power pop album. A bit of 70’s power pop like Badfinger or Blue and a bit of 90’s power pop things and a whole lot of catchy pop songs. Varies from great rockin’ pop songs to beautiful pop ballads and everything works. This album is again a perfect reminder that (power) pop music is still the sweetest form of art as far as I’m concerned. Simple things are often the greatest and I think Uplands Park Road would have hit my top 10 albums of the year list, if I had heard it in time. This has so many amazing pop songs that it’s almost ridiculous. I could just pick any song, but let’s go with the opener Here Is My Song. Listen to the whole album on their bandcamp.

Cirrone at Bandcamp

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International music, News

Hall of Ghosts – A Random Quiet

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Hall of Ghosts – A Random Quiet

This is not officially out until march, but I got a digital promo which I’ve been enjoying lately. Hall of Ghosts is a new project from Additional Moog’s Jim Williams. I can’t say I know too much about Additional Moog except that it was a highly respected UK alt-country band. I remember that I red good things about the debut back in 2007 and that I really liked the songs I listened to back then. Anyway, now I finally can properly introduce my heart to Jim Williams songs and it seems like they get along well together. This is obviously the kind of stuff that I enjoy. Think of The Jayhawks and Grand Drive. Think of beautiful americana / folk rock with pop sensibility and sweet melodies. What a lovely record. This is Giant Water.

Hall Of Ghosts Website

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