March 2010
20 posts
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Upcoming NYC Benefit Show for Chris Knox →
New Zealand musician Chris Knox is a key figure in the development of the Kiwi music scene. Considered somewhat a living legend, Chris has influenced a number of musicians within New Zealand, as well as abroad, and he has been critically acclaimed by the likes of Rolling Stone magazine, New York’s Village Voice, and Billboard. Sadly, in 2009, Chris suffered a series of life-altering strokes. As a...
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Ghosts in the Smoke →
Haunting, ethereal, angelic, dark, surreal, peaceful… these are some of the words that easily describe the musical offerings of the London-based duo, Smoke Fairies. With music that more than fits their name, Jessica Davies and Katherine Blamire deliver music that swirls and drifts like wisps of smoke, and has a certain fey quality. This duo have slowly been making a name for themselves and now,...
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Darkly Dreaming of Mars →
Jen Gloeckner would like to take you on a journey. Not to any place on the physical plane, but rather on a surreal trip through her dreams. The land of sleep is where Gloeckner finds artistic inspiration, and she lays it out for her listeners in a multi-faceted vision. Recorded in an upstairs bedroom converted into a studio, her sophomore album Mouth of Mars is another visit to the moods and...
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Recording Across 5000 Miles →
Jen Olive is a singer/songwriter from Albuquerque who has spent much of her career in relative anonymity. Playing with some bands early on and then releasing some low-key, self-released recordings under different names as a solo artist, she managed to maintain what she calls her “an attachment to anonymity”. However, in mid-2007, a friend suggested she send a CD to Andy Partridge (of XTC fame). He...
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The Darkness - The Hunting Party →
Imagine discovering on your 21st birthday that you are the inheritor of an ancient curse. A curse that has passed down from father to son over the ages, taking the life of the father at the moment of the son’s conception as it moves on. A curse that enables its bearer to fully embrace corruption and evil, or to find redemption through dark means. Jackie Estacado is a man who walks this path,...
LOLCat Overdose →
So… much… kewtness! Overloading!
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Gilded Palace of Sin – Music Giveaway →
Thanks to Howlin Wuelf Media, Battlemouth has two CD copies of The Gilded Palace of Sin’s debut album You Break Our Hearts, We’ll Tear Yours Out to give away. This rock noir album is on a par with Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds and is well worth checking out (read our review for it, includes streaming samples off the album). […]
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The Gilded Palace’s Rock Noir Rebellion →
When I first read a press release that described The Gilded Palace of Sin as “the kind of house band that would play on HBO’s Deadwood”, I was intrigued. For a band to be compared to such a wild and gritty TV series, one immediately assumes the band to be of a fairly dark nature and ambitiously willing to go beyond conventional barriers. Upon listening to their debut album You Break Our Hearts,...
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MV & EE’s Psychedelic Supernova (Battlemouth) →
With a musical collaboration as prolific as MV & EE, it’s somewhat strange not to have heard of them before now. This Vermont pair have worked with a number of artists to accumulate over 30 releases over the past decade, and now bring us their fourth major release Barn Nova under Thurston Moore’s Ecstatic Peace! label. Combining Indian raga-style composition with Appalachian folk and...
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This Is No Substandard Fare (Battlemouth) →
Standard Fare may be named after a sign spotted on a bus, but their effect is anything but pedestrian. Sounding like the perky younger siblings of the Arctic Monkeys, the power trio’s uncomplicated lyrics of life and infectious beats make for a rollicking good time, and now Emma Kupa, Danny How, and Andy Beswick are set to release their debut album. Recorded in six days with an indie aesthetic...
Symphonic Serj Tankian (Battlemouth) →
In mid-March 2009, a one-off special concert was performed at New Zealand’s majestic Auckland Town Hall. At this concert, System of a Down frontman Serj Tankian performed songs from his critically-acclaimed solo debut album Elect the Dead, along with some previously unreleased songs, accompanied by the well-regarded Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra. Thankfully for those unable to be part of the...
Not A Consolation Prize (Battlemouth) →
Every now and then, one comes across an artist that truly reminds you how good simple music can be, and Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter Sharon Van Etten is one of these artists. I came across her music in an odd moment of serendipity, and was immediately taken by the wonderfulness of her work. Recorded under the artist-centric Language of Stone label, Because I Was In Love is her first studio...