The Weekly Froth #20

Ali Love

Just a little bit later than usual, here’s our weekly look into the blogopshere where we talk about six tracks we found out about in the previous Wednesday-to-Wednesday seven-day period.

Ali Love – Love Harder (Prins Thomas remix)

Spaceness by Prins Thomas of course! Who else? None other than the Lindstrom accomplice turns this rather poppy track into a space disco eight minute lovefest. Hips a flailing on that sweet bass, which keeps on coming and coming. Who needs vocals, right? Well they do come in, first kind of high and on the background, but at the half mark (as in, almost precisely the half mark I reckon) they get a more prominent place. This is after you’ve been seduced for a good four minutes by Prins Thomas and his space disco qualities, and after that you’re so into the song that the vocals offer just a bit of variation in this nine minutes behemoth. Prins Thomas makes it pretty easy to start singing along a bit as well. So if you find yourself singing and dancing like a loon, Prins Thomas is to blame, as this is one seductive remix. … Continue Reading

Clock Opera’s wicked-ace remix of The Phenomenal Handclap Band’s ‘Baby’

Clock Opera

Imagine what happened when the amazing Clock Opera remixed our favourite NYC psychesters The Phenomenal Handclap Band?

Before you find out, here are some words: the turn-of-phrase “baby I could move the world” sounds all manta-esque in this remix, the blips are so perfectly timed, the build just keeps giving (so much that I can picture a crowd under strobe lights screaming for its climax), the disco rhythms are bite-sized and delicious and plague-like, and – wait – the whole thing’s damn fine. A marvel. … Continue Reading

Next event: Muso’s Guide and Broken Glass present… Beyond The Curve

Together with the critically-acclaimed theatre company Broken Glass, we are bringing an all-day programme to The Camden Head (100 Camden High Street) on Sunday 4 April from 3pm, showcasing award-winning poetry, cutting-edge theatre, short film, found-sound DJing, dark theatre cabaret and acclaimed folk-noir.

The day’s hand-picked programme represents the shared ambition to bridge the gap between different types of performance and open up new audiences to an array of diverse talent.

It’s all at The Camden Head, Sunday April 4, from 3pm – late, and Beyond The Curve tickets can be bought from We Got Tickets for £8, or £6 if you’re quick enough. Here’s that link again: http://www.wegottickets.com/event/74842 … Continue Reading

Islet, London Lexington

Islet - image from thisislet.com (the unofficial fansite)

March 5, 2010

I could prepare for writing this review by trawling endlessly, needlessly for track names, photos, and an overview of what the selected few hacks who’ve written about Islet have to say. I did, in fact, and it turns out that more’s been written about their decision – be it because of a lack of recorded material or otherwise – to shun the internet. They have no MySpace, sure, but the fact is that an image-search reveals their appearance, a look at their Last.fm or Songkick page (subject to gig promoters’ efficiency) tells of their upcoming tour-dates and press, just like this, is still filtering through. They’re proof that hometown-phenomena still happen. … Continue Reading

Lisbon’s Youthless cover Wild Beasts for Portugalia

Youthless

Muso’s Guide favourites Youthless are getting a name for themselves over in their home country of Portugal, with radio DJ Henrique Amarro inviting them in for four days on his show, Portugali, to do a series of acoustic covers of some of their favourite songs.

You can hear them from March 8 – 11 at 3pm on Antena 3 and on the station’s podcast after those dates. They’ve also covered The XX’s ‘Islands’, to be aired later in March. Not only is their employment of a synth killer, but their music taste appears to be similar. … Continue Reading

Field Music, London Scala

Field Music

March 3, 2010

Field Music are avant-pop doyens. That sure sounds pretentious but it’s shorthand for “Field Music should be selling out the Royal Festival Hall but audiences’ attention-spans just aren’t big enough to let that happen”. They sell out the Scala no sweat, which marks the well-deserved success of their comeback record Field Music (Measure), but tonight – while a great platform for their instrument-swapping skills, astounding musicianship and general loveliness – lacks magic. … Continue Reading

Los Campesinos! get bigger, play Shepherd’s Bush Empire

Los Campesinos!

How exciting, that Los Campesinos! are now big enough to play Shepherd’s Bush Empire. How brilliant.

And how great that it’s going to be happening! Tickets go on sale Monday 8th March at 9am, hot on the heels of their sold-out Koko show very recently. … Continue Reading

Shearwater, London Scala

Shearwater

February 25, 2010

The Scala is almost its own death knell for anyone fortunate enough to have seen Shearwater play the Union Chapel in ‘09, where the fluidity and sky-scraping power of their repertoire peaked in a setting so perfect it was as if custom-tailored. The audience sat on pews like a dedicated congregation, the stage spot-lit to maximum effect with every movement and sound microscopically audible. … Continue Reading

R. Kelly set to play first UK tour in 8 years

R. Kelly

We’ve just found out that the incredible R.Kelly has announced dates where he’ll hit the UK for the first time since 2002, taking on Manchester, London (twice!) and Wolverhampton.

His first UK shows were at the Hammersmith Apollo way back in 1992, and it’s where he’ll be again come April. It’s a revisiting of his peak, through shows that’ll hopefully blow our minds.

Think about a 20-year career taking in such heights as ‘She’s Got That Vibe’, ‘Bump ‘n’ Grind’, ‘Ignition (Remix) and the frankly barking Trapped In The Closet series and we’re pretty sure you’ll find yourself in a tizz about the whole thing. … Continue Reading

Win a pair of tickets to see Errors at the Scala

Errors

Those lovely folks at Eat Your Own Ears have given us a pair of prize tickets to give away for this fantastic triple-bill of a gig, headlined by post-electro band Errors, formed in Glasgow in 2004. The gig’s on March 4 at the Scala in London, and also features Race Horses and So So Modern.

To win, just answer the following question:

What was the name of Errors’ 2008-released debut album?

a)    It Is Something But It’s Not Like Um, I Haven’t A Clue Mate

b)    It’s Not Something But It Is Like Whatever … Continue Reading