1998: mutant swinger from Mars landed and Jack White had a bowl cut!

Going around the blogs today is footage of Mutant Swinger From Mars - a scifi spoof filmed in 1998, but screening for the first time at the San Diego Comic Con next month.

Making a cameo in it is a young Jack White looking very different to how he does today. Wouldn't have picked it if someone didn't point it out to me!



More details over at Pitchfork.

The Horrors Glastonbury photo diary

The Guardian asked The Horrors to document their time at this year's Glastonbury in a photo diary. The band provided some beautifully arty shots, but somewhat baffled by them, The Guardian contributed captions of their own.



Click here to see the rest.

Love of Diagrams launch 7" in Melbourne and Sydney

Last month we blogged a taster of Love Of Diagrams forthcoming album Nowhere Forever.

The track Forever will be launched as a 7" in Melbourne this weekend, and Sydney next weekend.

Be sure to catch the shows to hear more from the band's forthcoming new record Nowhere Forever.

Melbourne: Sat July 4th at The Tote w. The Twerps and Chris Smith
Sydney: Fri July 10th at Spectrum w. Songs

Discovery album out July 10, stream it now on nme

The Discovery album is out in just over a week. We blogged a couple of tracks a month ago but you can now listen to the whole thing over at NME.

Discovery is the recording project of Rostam Batmanglij and Wes Miles, friends who began recording together in the summer of 2005. One year later they had committed themselves to their respective bands, Vampire Weekend and Ra Ra Riot, but nonetheless continued to record together when they both found themselves in the same city.

The project is many things: it’s partly an attempt to realize Wes’s concept of a band where everyone plays synthesizers, and of Rostam’s concept for an album where handclaps keep the backbeat instead of snares drums. It’s an embrace and also a commentary on the pop music of the past decade, of booming 808 bass and jittery sixteenth note high-hats; Elements of European electronic dance music skittering in double-time over steady R&B.

If soul music is secularized, sexualized gospel, Discovery is an attempt to see if soul music can survive being plasticized, roboticized, quantized, chopped, and finally, screwed. The album features Rostam and Wes each singing half the songs and guest vocals from Vampire Weekend’s Ezra Koenig (on ‘Carby’) and Dirty Projectors’ Angel Deradoorian (‘I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend’)

The tracklist for ‘LP’ is:


You can read an interview they did with Pitchfork here.

Discovery is out July 10 through XL/ Remote Control.

Looking for mp3s?
Check out our free mp3 download page here!

New Elvis Perkins In Dearland video Chains, Chains, Chains

Check out the video for "Chains, Chains, Chains" off the self-titled Elvis Perkins In Dearland album.



Elvis Perkins In Dearland is out now through XL/ Remote Control.

MIA wins Best Female Hip Hop Artist at BET Awards

The BET (Black Entertainment) Awards were featured on news bulletins all across the world last night, with the star studded homage to Michael Jackson and the appearances from Janet and Joe Jackson.

But what you didn't hear is that M.I.A. won the Best Female Hip Hop Artist award on the night. Congrats Maya!

St Vincent rocks it on Letterman

Here is the inimitable St Vincent ROCKING IT OUT on Marrow on Letterman earlier this week, full brass section in tow.

Very impressive!



Can someone please bring St Vincent BAND out here? PLEASE?

Actor is out now through 4ad. Get it already.

New God Help The Girl mp3 Mary's Market

Here's a new God Help The Girl track:

Mary's Market [mp3]

You won't find it on the album. It was recorded a month ago, and promptly put up on the band's website just days after capturing it. It is the b-side to the Funny Little Frog 7" that you can only get by signing up for the subscription.

God Help The Girl is out now through Rough Trade/ Remote Control.

Pixies Do Doolittle live

Following the release of their Minotaur boxset and to celebrate the 20th anniversary of their seminal album Doolittle, the band will be playing a string of European shows where they will "play all the songs that feature on the album and its related b-sides at the shows" [nme].

The lucky northern hemisphere buggers get to see them do it in October. Dates are on Pitchfork.

New DJ mix from Friendly Fires

Can't wait for Friendly Fires to get down here to play their sold out debut tour of Australia?

Neither can we!

In the meantime though, we can all warm up to the DJ set they recently dropped for BBC Radio 1's 'Essential Mix'

"Two hours of techno, deep house and post punk from the band who know their way round a DJ Booth as much as they do a festival stage."



Tracklisting:
Friendly Fires (DJ Set)

Alexandro Jodorowsky ‘F Machine’ (Soundtrack)
Tony Lionni ‘Found a Place’ (Ostgut Tontrager)
Luke Solomon ‘People, Places, Thoughts and Faces (Ajello ReMix)’ (Rekids)
David Labeij ‘Shakedown’ (Intacto Records)
Just Two Ordinary People ‘Lucky Times (Paul Frick ReMix)’ (spontanMusik)
2000 and One ‘Wan Poku Moro’ (100% Pure)
Pezzner ‘Shasta’ (Physical Graffiti Records)
Mark Broom and Brothers Vibe ‘Mind/Feeling (youANDme Hirsch Edit)’ (Platzhirsch Schallplatten)
Makam ‘New York Hustler’ (Sushitech Purple)
Arto Mwambe ‘Ombala Mbembo’ (Brontosaurus Records)
Michel Cleis ‘La Mezcla’ (Cadenza)
Visti & Meyland ‘Yes Ma'am (Kasper Bjorke Mix)’ (Eskimo)
DOP ‘The Genius of the Crowd’ (Supplement Facts)
STL ‘Something Is Raw’ (Something)
Alec Wizz ‘Drummin (H2O Mix)’ (4th Floor Records)
Liquid Liquid ‘Optimo (Optimo ReMix)’ (Domino)
Silver City ‘Pendulo (Pete Herbert Edit)’ (Deep Freeze Recordings)
Anton Pieete ‘Players’ (Intacto Records)
Harry Axt ‘Crazy’ (Rompecabeza)
Daniele Papini ‘Church of Nonsense’ (Alchemy)
Cajmere ‘Say U Will’ (Cajual Records)
Friendly Fires ‘Jump In The Pool (Wild Geese Mix)’ (XL Recordings)
Photonz ‘No Fear’ (Dissident)
Paul Woolford ‘Pandemonium’ (Intimacy Music)
Kerri Chandler ‘Six Pianos’ (Deeply Rooted House)
Whirlpool Productions ‘From Disco: To Disco’ (ZAC Records)

Friendly Fires self-titled record is out now through XL/ Remote Control.

Looking for mp3s?
Check out our free mp3 download page here!

New Beirut video Concubine

Check out the new video for Concubine from Beirut's March Of The Zapotec/ Holland EP.



March Of The Zapotec/ Holland EP is out now through 4ad/ Remote Control.

More news on White Stripes film

Some more news on that White Stripes film we mentioned a while ago.

The film follows the White Stripes on their 2007 tour of Canada, as they set out to play every territory and province in the country. Not only concert halls in every nook and cranny of the country but spontaneous performances on a fishing boat, youth shelter, city bus and their famed one note concert - many of course captured by fans and uploaded onto Youtube:









The film apparently will be called The White Stripes: Under Great White Northern Lights and will screen at the Toronto International Film Festival in September.

More details over at Pitchfork here and here.

Fender to release Sonic Youth guitars tomorrow

From the Fender site:

"Thurston Moore + Lee Ranaldo. Jazzmaster guitars slung across seminal shoulders. In the hands of both men, the sound of Sonic Youth is the sound of that guitar used as part paintbrush and part cluster bomb. Introducing the new Thurston Moore Jazzmaster and the Lee Ranaldo Jazzmaster guitars from Fender, releasing July 1st.

Lee and Thurston have always heavily modified their Jazzmaster guitars- removing all extraneous controls- simplifying and stripping them back to their essence, leaving just a 3 way switch and a volume knob. In many ways these 2 instruments are similar, yet in almost every major way (pickups, bridges, frets, pickguard) they are totally different. "After playing and slaying Fender Jazzmasterz for the last 20+ years we are totally PSYCHED and HONORED to have our very own signature axes.



"When Fender came to us with an offer to make signature models of our Jazzmaster guitars we jumped at the chance. These are the guitars that have defined the sound of Sonic Youth for more than 20 years. Although we love all guitars, Jazzmasters are the ones we've modified and perfected for our uses over the years. With massive input from our great road crew we've come up with a Thurston Jazzmaster & Lee 'Jazzblaster' that fully reflect the current state of the guitars we play in 2009. In fact, we couldn't wait to get our hands on these axes - the prototypes of our Fender models have already been thrust into action during the recording of our latest album, 'The Eternal', and have already begun to acquire the scrapes and scarz of live performance. These guitars rock Sonic style!"
- Thurston Moore/Lee Ranaldo

The Thurston Moore Fender Jazzmaster and Lee Renaldo Fender Jazzblaster are out tomorrow.

Sonic Youth's The Eternal is out now through Matador/ Remote Control.

New St Vincent videos - live for Lake Fever Sessions

Here is Annie Clarke, aka St Vincent performing 3 tracks acoustically: Actor Out Of Work and The Strangers from her latest album Actor. Plus Oh My God from her debut album Marry Me.

Recorded in Nashville by the Lake Fever Sessions.

St. Vincent "Actor Out Of Work" from Lake Fever Sessions on Vimeo.

St. Vincent "The Strangers" from Lake Fever Sessions on Vimeo.

St. Vincent "Oh My God" from Lake Fever Sessions on Vimeo.

Actor is out now through 4ad/ Remote Control.

New Jenny Lewis video Black Sand

Here is the video for Jenny Lewis' Black Sand from last year's album Acid Tongue:

Black Sand


Acid Tongue is out now through Rough Trade/ Remote Control.