Love these Munch Munch images by James Swatton
MUNCH MUNCH *Release ‘Cyclorama / Of The Body’ 7” via Fear & Records 18th January 2010.
*Download available now from munchmunch.bandcamp.com
*Debut album released spring 2010.
The first fruits from the debut album by Bristol and London’s Munch Munch see the light in 2010. Punchy, infectious, immensely rich and varied, ‘Cyclorama’ and ‘Of the Body’ will be released on Fear and Records as a 7” on January 18th 2010. Both tracks are taken from the forthcoming debut Munch Munch longplayer due for release on Tomlab records later in the year.
Already feted by the likes of 20 Jazz Funk Greats and Wire mag, too many bands have been named checked as a Munch Munch’s influences, none of which have managed to capture their inventive and intoxicating sound.
Munch Munch are infamous for their exciting and unpredictable live set, and their frenzied instrument swapping. This new single presents a more focused and ambitious side of the band, while losing any of the energy. Recorded in Cellars and at their home sporadically during 2009, and co-produced by James Rutledge and the band, these tracks tangle sweet, sensual melodies into polyrhythmic explosions. It’s a glimpse into the dark side of today’s pop music.
Munch Munch’s core members are Richard Manber and Tom Carell, who write and record all their songs together. While attending a Deerhoof show in the early years they met friends Jack O’Connors and Sarah-Louise Renwick and enlisted them to form the live band. Since then the band have played with and toured the UK and Europe with the likes of Clues, Why?, Dirty Projectors, No Age, Late Of the Pier and Ponytail.
After a couple of self-released CDR and split 7” releases, munch munch released their own (now sold out) ‘Wedding’ EP on Tomlab, picking up rave reviews from Wire, Plan B, and Drowned in Sound.
www.fearandrecords.com
www.myspace.com/munchmunchmusic
www.munchmunch.bandcamp.com
Munch Munch on the worlds best blog. FACT.
And they wrote these rather fine words:
“And what is Cyclorama?
Perhaps the last 20JFG pop hit of the year, an exhilarating sleigh ride down pixelated hills- think 3D Mario Kart if Shigeru Miyamoto was into the United States of America, a odyssey of progressive verticality dodging glittering pines and befuddled badgers, unexpected drop down a cliff, inertia propels us into the pure air for a moment of perfect quiet when we stare at the vast vistas of the psychedelic snow country these guys have lovingly drawn for us, but gravity rules here too, or so she thinks that uppity bitch, because as we start precipitating into the vertigo vortex, a slender unicorn picks us up and sends us soaring into the sky to the sounds of a perfect melody, pastoral scene of absolute euphoria decorating a t-shirt we wear under our skin and shines into our eyes.”
Read the full post (and hey while you’re at it, go download the other tracks)
Rich Hughes from The Lines Of Best Fit. One of our absolute favourite music sites right now and recently the runners up in the Record Of The Day Awards for best digital publication - which is justly deserved, for their friendly communications, high standards of editorial and lack of musical snobbery.
Top 5:
1. The XX - XX
2. Jim O’Rourke - The Visitor
3. Japandroids - Post-nothing
4. Fever Ray - Fever Ray
5. Do Make Say Think - Other Truths
My pick for next year: It’s a split decision between Joy Orbison and Frankie and the Heartstrings!
You can read more from Rich at thelineofbestfit.com and on his twitter
We’ve been asking all our favourite people we work with to tell us in 5 points what they’ve thought of the year. Some have opted for a more personal approach, others have kept it strictly musical. Here we have Mr Tony Poland of extraordinary music blog and cultural filter, DJ genius and all round word boffin, Slutty Fringe to kick things off:
1) 800 people turning up to Slutty Fringe @ Cargo on Jan 2nd
2) Getting fcked on Jagermeister and weed and dancing on stage to Drop The Lime at Club Nasti, Barcelona.
3) Dixon edit of Lykke Li
4) Mario Testino getting told to jog on
5) FINALLY working out the loop function on CDJs
Notes. We cannot condone Mr Polands use of ‘weed’ or indeed ‘alcohol’. Read more from Tony Poland at Sluttyfringe.com and or/and on his twitter
SEBASTIEN TELLIER ‘L’AMOUR ET LA VIOLENCE / FINGERS OF STEEL” EP | Released DECEMBER 14TH 2009 on Lucky Number
Sebastien Tellier, the unique voice of modern French electronic-edged pop, and the undisputed coolest man in music returns with the final single from his acclaimed album ‘Sexuality’. A split release showcasing outstanding re-workings of Tellier’s originals by two of today’s hottest and most talented artist/producers Floating Points and Penguin Prison.
23 yr old Sam Shepherd, aka Floating Points, a neuroscientist by day, continues to stretch sound in his unique post-dubstep modern classical style. Already acclaimed by cutting edge DJ’s from Radio 1,1Xtra and Rinse FM his recent releases via the Eglo, Planet Mu and R2 labels have all been essential purchases. For his, a quite breathtaking and beautiful, mix of ‘L’amour Et La Violence’ Floating Points fuses waves of analogue synths, simmering sub bass and Tellier’s intimate vocals for the ultimate textural cocktail of a dance music experience. It is very special indeed and adds further to the growing acclaim for his work.
In it’s original form, ‘L’Amour Et La Violence’, is perhaps the simplest song on the album, it’s solo piano only containing a smouldering splash of electronic augmentation, while Tellier’s voice is at its most honest and vulnerable; ‘Tell me what you think, about my life, about my childhood, I like love and violence too’. It has been widely described as Sebastien’s true follow up to his seminal release ‘La Ritournelle’. The video for the original has been shot and directed by Roman Coppola, ‘at home with Sebastien’, to set-off the album’s most sensitive mood-setting classic.
Native New Yorker Chris Glover, aka Penguin Prison, has recently delivered a sterling remix of Golden Silvers’ ‘True Romance’ and his sublimely effortless disco-fication of Marina & the Diamonds’ ‘I Am Not a Robot’, together with his own Penguin Prison material, is currently sustaining excitement in that frequently fickle world of A&R. Further reason why can be heard in his complete reworking of Tellier’s neo-romantic Kubrickian fantasy ‘Fingers Of Steel’. Assimilating a perfect brew of down-town funk hybrids his unique re-imagining features Penguin Prison himself on lead vocals, crooning a blue-eyed cover, whilst Tellier steps up solely to sing his own BV’s on the chorus. It’s a swirl of space-funk with added pop appeal, a Talking Heads-Tom Tom Club mélange of the highest funk factor.
All in all, we think you’d be hard pushed to point to a more impressive pair of remixes released throughout this year and that’s the beauty of Sebastien Tellier - on top of his game whether it’s his own work or other artist’s interpretations.
The EP will be available as a twelve inch vinyl and digital download on Monday 14th December.
‘SEXUALITY’ IS OUT NOW ON LUCKY NUMBER
‘One of the best artists in the world right now’ OMM
‘Aural Viagra’ MOJO
‘Achingly Romantic’ Q
‘Monsieur Tellier continues to pervert the very nature of pop music’ DAZED
www.myspace.com/sebastientellier
www.myspace.com/luckynumbermusic
Download a sample of the floating Points mix over at Fact Magazine
DARWIN DEEZ | DEBUT SINGLE “CONSTELLATIONS/ THE COMA SONG” | limited 7” Vinyl and Download on Lucky Number on December 7
The New Yorker everyone seems to be talking about “His mission has two parts: to be weird, and to entertain you. Part one is in place, part two is imminent” – NME
Not many people can start a song by cribbing “Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star” as the opening line and get away with it, but then again, Darwin Deez has always been nothing less than utterly original. From his unorthodox beginnings as a child of Baba Lovers (followers of Avatar Meher Baba, like Pete Townshend) to fleeing Wesleyan University to start a band in New York City, to his method of playing a 4-string electric guitar in his own invented, secret tuning, nothing about Mr Deez can be described as remotely conventional. His live sets, for instance, feature original songs intercut with harsh electronic noise and spontaneous bouts of synchronised dancing to custom pop mash-ups.
Cryptically described on his website as “happy music for sad people/ white music for black people”, Darwin’s particular strain of music is located at the crossroads of the wittily ironic and warmly inclusive – effortlessly infectious songs with a deadpan sense of humour; or Arthur Russell when he lived in the East Village, but with an even more accentuated penchant for droll wordplay, as well as one for spontaneous tap dancing. This self-professed hipster may ooze arch, off-kilter cool, but at the same time there is a deep, reverential love of the big, bold strokes of the perfect pop song, as showcased on this, his debut single.
“Constellations” is a nigh-on untouchable mini-pop classic, rolling together ebullient guitar strokes, handclaps, and a childlike sense of awe (“if freckles don’t mean anything, does anything mean anything?”) into a fizzing ball and kicking it high into the air. At once oddball and heartfelt, tender and funny, spiky yet insouciant; Darwin Deez strolls nonchalantly through these contradictory states, humming his own distinctive tune, going his own singular way.
myspace.com/darwindeez // darwindeez.com // luckynumbermusic.com
Some of the UK’s finest indie acts, including Sky Larkin, Slow Club, Los Campesinos!, James Yuill and Dananananakroyd have joined together to release a Christmas single in aid of the RSPCA.
Penned by Bright Light Bright Light’s Rod Thomas and BBC Radio 1 Wales presenter Jen Long – collectively known as HUNKS – the single also features members of Copy Haho, Sound Of Arrows, Airborne Toxic Event and The Venus Stare, not to mention Bright Light Bright Light himself. Out December 14 through Thomas’s own label Self Raising Records, HUNKS & Friends’ ‘The Magic Of Christmas’ is a tongue in cheek pop number that’s not afraid to assert that “Everything’s awesome at Christmas” with blithe cynicism. Buy it for the animal lover in your life.
Forest Fire “Slow Motion”. Filmed live at the Chocolate Bobka Presents show at Union Hall. August 10, 2009.
The watchful eye of a Grandmother looking out on the kids filling her wood paneled basement could conjure a daunting, almost scornful, sentiment. Rather, in the case of Union Hall, it’s homey. Albeit, a creepy sort of home, half dilapidated and populated by rusty steel sewing machines, withering bits of ancient love letters and the dust of cobwebs past and present. It’s no surprise that Forest Fire, whose debut album was recently re-released by Infinite Best, look right at home in the taxidermy laden room. “Slow Motion,” which kicked off the evening, felt even more appropriate in the basement of the Brooklyn bar, where the passing of time is comparable to the pace of a morphine drip, or worse, the amount of time it takes your landlord to fix your leaky ceiling. Either way, its a moment worthy of re-living, if at least in your mind, once or twice before you pass, if only so you can say “ah yes, that was a nice night.”
chocolatebobka.com
myspace.com/fuckforestfire
Filmed by Colin Tarpey & C. Axel
Edited by C. Axel
Stolen from
Forest Fire ‘Survival’ Rough Trade top ten album of the year.
myspace.com/fuckforestfire // FF on Hype Machine
Gold Panda ‘Quitters Raga’ fan video created and edited by Coby Bralts
![Have a read through this interview / feature Make Mine man Manish did with Neu Magazine last week.
Make Mine is a record label inspired by a record store worker from High Wycombe. ‘we started a 7” label called Mustrard Records spurred on by a girl who worked in Scorpion Records’ says Manish Arora. She’d told them how easy it was and decided to give it a go. ‘Turns out it wasn’t easy enough for us to do it well. Mustard records managed three releases, two plays on Radio 1 and a one letter from John Peel’. The current label was born from the ashes of Mustard, 10 years later. ‘I guess Make Mine was born out of stubbornness, old dreams and an obsession with trying to spread the word on new artists regardless if anyone wants to listen’ he says.
Some things haven’t changed. Make Mine still releases 7”, mirroring the designs of countless other little labels. There are downloads too, so is it just a vanity thing? ‘maybe it is a fad’ they laugh. ‘I started buying 7” as they were cheap ana great way to sample new bands. I guess you don’t need them these days but I still feel ‘7” attract a more adventurous and inquisitive music fan. That’s my kind of fan’. But isn’t it a bit elitist? 15 year olds “getting into” independent music aren’t always going to have vinyl decks at hand. Doesn’t it keep the music in a handful of obsessives? ‘Well that’s [the inquisitive music fan] how I romanticise it anyway, it’s better than thinking there’s a bunch of indie elite buying them to sell for a profit on ebay. There’s also DIY aspect to 7’s that appealed to me and may do to others, for instance each Make Mine comes with a wrap around cover with a fold down corner hand folded by me or my wife. Hopefully people appreciate that kinda attention to detail.”
But Make Mine don’t always do it themselves. They collaborate with other labels, releasing artists that may have released other records elsewhere or go on to do so. In the past they’ve put out The Books, Dent May and everyone’s best friend, Gold Panda. The label doesn’t subscribe to any one style or sound but do they find it difficult not having their ‘own’ artists? “It’s never been a goal to own an artist or their recordings and have them soley associated with Make Mine” says Manish “What’s the point? I’m not trying to make money of the artist, there’s a billion other labels they can go to feel owned. I’d much rather work with, help or support another label than compete with them”.
Read the full interview here](http://1.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_kt7d0s6uDg1qz98nvo1_500.jpg)
Have a read through this interview / feature Make Mine man Manish did with Neu Magazine last week.
Make Mine is a record label inspired by a record store worker from High Wycombe. ‘we started a 7” label called Mustrard Records spurred on by a girl who worked in Scorpion Records’ says Manish Arora. She’d told them how easy it was and decided to give it a go. ‘Turns out it wasn’t easy enough for us to do it well. Mustard records managed three releases, two plays on Radio 1 and a one letter from John Peel’. The current label was born from the ashes of Mustard, 10 years later. ‘I guess Make Mine was born out of stubbornness, old dreams and an obsession with trying to spread the word on new artists regardless if anyone wants to listen’ he says.
Some things haven’t changed. Make Mine still releases 7”, mirroring the designs of countless other little labels. There are downloads too, so is it just a vanity thing? ‘maybe it is a fad’ they laugh. ‘I started buying 7” as they were cheap ana great way to sample new bands. I guess you don’t need them these days but I still feel ‘7” attract a more adventurous and inquisitive music fan. That’s my kind of fan’. But isn’t it a bit elitist? 15 year olds “getting into” independent music aren’t always going to have vinyl decks at hand. Doesn’t it keep the music in a handful of obsessives? ‘Well that’s [the inquisitive music fan] how I romanticise it anyway, it’s better than thinking there’s a bunch of indie elite buying them to sell for a profit on ebay. There’s also DIY aspect to 7’s that appealed to me and may do to others, for instance each Make Mine comes with a wrap around cover with a fold down corner hand folded by me or my wife. Hopefully people appreciate that kinda attention to detail.”
But Make Mine don’t always do it themselves. They collaborate with other labels, releasing artists that may have released other records elsewhere or go on to do so. In the past they’ve put out The Books, Dent May and everyone’s best friend, Gold Panda. The label doesn’t subscribe to any one style or sound but do they find it difficult not having their ‘own’ artists? “It’s never been a goal to own an artist or their recordings and have them soley associated with Make Mine” says Manish “What’s the point? I’m not trying to make money of the artist, there’s a billion other labels they can go to feel owned. I’d much rather work with, help or support another label than compete with them”.
Read the full interview here
Alan Pownall at Puregroove clutching his 7” single last night.
Alan Pownall: Colourful Day released by the Puregroove Label and exclusively for sales via Puregroove.co.uk
It’s a white 7” vinyl in a velvet grey (i guess hand stiched) pouch and a beautiful wee overhanging tag with Alan Pownall in red stitch. Yummy.
Chess Club Records release the new Peggy Sue single on November 23rd 09.
Previous releases on the label include singles by Ex Lovers, Jay Jay Pistolet, White Lies, Mumford & Sons, so Peggy Sue are in good company. The single will be available on limited edition 7” vinyl, don’t expect them to be around for long…
John Kennedy at XFM recently chose ‘Yo Mama’ as his Exposure Hot One and Rob da Bank has invited Peggy Sue to the BBC on Nov 9th to record a session in the legendary Maida Vale studios.
‘Yo Mama’ is the first song to be released from their debut album, ‘Fossils And Other Phantoms’ due early 2010. Recorded in Brooklyn with The Dodos’ producer John Askew at Atlantic Sound Studio and Alex Newport (Death Cab For Cutie, Two Gallants) at Future Shock, the album is a collection of wonderful, dramatic songs in the distinct Peggy Sue style.
Currently touring all over the USA & Canada with Sky Larkin, Peggy Sue charmed NYC with a performance at CMJ recently.
Stream the release over at peggywho.com for a limited time and be sure to sign up to the bands mailing list.
twitter.com/peggysue | myspace.com/peggywho | facebook
