Album of the Month, Featured, Headline, International music

Album Of The Month: The Left Banke – Walk Away Renee / Pretty Ballerina

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The Left Banke: Walk Away Renee / Pretty Ballerina

Well actually this is the album of the month of february 1967, but Sundazed finally reissued it and they deserve one of those onechord.net’s imaginary culture awards for doing so. It’s been extremely difficult to find The Left Banke material, because paying 50€ for an out of print CD compilation didn’t seem that inviting even though The Left Banke has been a huge favourite of mine for a long time. But now the wait is over and I’ve been finally able to buy physical copies of the first two The Left Banke albums.

Both Walk Away Renee / Pretty Ballerina and The Left Banke Too are brilliant, but if I have to choose just one as the Album Of The Month, I have to go with the debut. The album contains incredible amount of perfect pop songs. Pretty Ballerina, She May Call You Up Tonight, Walk Away Renee, I’ve Got Something On My Mind, Let Go Of You Girl, I Haven’t Got The Nerve… ah these are all classics and every pop songwriter would be happy to have written even just one of them. It’s just perfect baroque pop with great harmonies and beautiful arrangements and The Left Banke should be regarded as one of the greatest pop groups of the sixties.

For example, check out the first two songs from their debut album below. They could have pretty much retired after writing those and they still would have left a mark in the history of pop music.

Pretty Ballerina

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rzeGqqethE]

She May You Call Up Tonight

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ag4EV9iyS0]

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Featured, Finnish music, Headline, News

News: The New Tigers

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The New Tigers is an excellent fuzzy pop group that was recently signed to Nick Triani’s new label, Soliti. Their debut album is scheduled to be released on 21st of september, but you can already download the first outtake from the upcoming album. Pocketful Of Sand lasts eight minutes, which according to onechord.net’s unofficial rule book is at least five minutes too much. But I suppose this tune must be one of those exceptions to the rule, because I enjoyed each and every second of it. A wonderful song. I’m looking forward to the album. The press release namedrops Yo La Tengo and Galaxie 500, if you want to get some kind of idea before hitting that play button below.

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/19728977″]
 
The New Tigers at Facebook
The New Tigers at Soliti

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International music, News

Brown Bird – Salt For Salt

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Brown Bird duo from Rhode Island is getting prepared to release a new album Salt For Salt. The album will hit the stores and your heart in october, but the first single Fingers To The Bone is already available. In general, their dark folk might seem a bit scary for a pop fan at first, but in the end the quality of the songs won my heart over. Fingers To The Bone is such a great song. I’m looking forward to the album.

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/18674509″]
 
Brown Bird Website

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International music, News

Sloan – The Double Cross

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The name of this blog/website already shows that I love Sloan. One Chord To Another is a classic Sloan album. Therefore it’s an amazing disgrace that I still haven’t reviewed their latest album The Double Cross. And I still don’t do much more than just say that the new album came out in may, it’s once again awesome and close to full amount of hearts. This amazing Canadian power pop / indie rock quartet is currently celebrating their 20th anniversary. Hopefully they stick around for another 20 years, because they are still one of the best bands around. This is a song called Unkind from the new album.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6JqLk66oSY]

Sloan Website

That’s all for now, but hopefully a full review later on. Perhaps I should do some kind of Sloan special now when onechord.net is celebrating 10 year anniversary. Something like One Chord to Another reviews One Chord To Another and The Double Cross.

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