FINALLY

Pitchfork! You did it!

I've been searching for this goddamn Fever Ray track ever since I saw the vapid, yet annoyingly hot, Little Red Riding Hood trailer. Click here.

Under the Covers Monday {makeup} - Florence + the Machine & Cold War Kids

get 'em, Florence.

Florence + the Machine // Hospital Beds
Cold War Kids // Hospital Beds

Peggy Sue - folk noir bandits

If you're gonna name yourself after one of the most famous songs of the '50's by one of the most famous '50's boys, you're gonna have some guts.

And blues.
And grit.
And woozy laments that feel like being entangled in damp sheets, caught in the throes of remembered heartachey noir dreams.

Formerly Peggy Sue & the Pirates. Then Peggy Sue & the Pictures. Now Peggy Sue, comprised primarily of Rosa Slade and Katy Slade, songs on their Fossils & Other Phantoms have lots of sweet little beginnings that build to ferocious crescendos. Now recording a second album in Bristol, these Brighton, UK lassies have my attention.

i only came here to see you see me ?

flippin' story of my life.

Peggy Sue // Watchman

Wye Oak - the truth about being earnest

If you're Andy Stack of Baltimore-based Wye Oak, and you can play drums with your right-hand and keyboards with your left, you are one badass motherfather. True & livin'. And if you're Jenn Warner, holding down guitars and vocals - you ain't lyin', either.

You'll hear some more earnest folk rock truths with the release of album, Civilian, March 8 - then check them out at Black Cat that Friday.

Oh and I just saw their free download card at Starbucks. People like some honesty with their latte.

**3.8.11 update**

chirgo, mcgaw and mckay will be in attendance at the Black Cat show. huzzah!

Wye Oak // Civilian

Reading Rainbow - take a look, it's in a book

It's good, but a different kind of good. Not the kind of good stored on at least 9 VHS tapes in a familial basement. But it's close.

Philadelphia bf/gf songsters, Sarah Everton and Rob Garcia {green-leaning engineer by day}, throw their own sound of hollow garage psych into the beachcomber bucket. Their second release, Prism Eyes, has a couple rainbow glorious moments. With blastoff fast tracks and some catchy lyrics popped in, they make it easy. Granted - you're not going to do any soul-searching, and listening for too long might make you twist your finger in your ear. {read: caterwauling is not uncommon}. But if you're good with that, RR is full of reverb, skittles and sunshine - so you just feel good listening to it. And that's good. Bueno. Bien. Barf. Levar Burton.

Reading Rainbow // Wasting Time

Trentemøller - teddybear robot

{image by Karen Rosetzky}

Moody March 1.

Anders Trentemøller, a Copenhagen-based Danish producer, was already lauded High Wizard of Electronica by the release of his 2006 Last Resort. Several years and numerous bad-ass remixes later, Trentemøller warmed up his minimal techno sound with 2010's Into The Great Wide Yonder. Go on and cuddle right up to guitar-twang, oxymoronic organic synth and melodic vocals. Admittedly I'd prefer stalking through rain-soaked alleys to this particular soundtrack, but it's all you sugarbear.

Trentemøller // Sycamore Feeling

Loch Lomond - lexicographers

Ritchie Young started Loch Lomond in 2006 as a solo project, with players coming and going in accordance to requirement, summer vacation and what day Easter fell on that year. Currently a six-piece, the Portland, OR band of chamber-folk merrymakers released a fourth album under beloved Tender Loving Empire label. Mixed by Adam Selzer {M Ward}, Tucker Martine {The Decemberists, Laura Veirs}, and Kevin Robinson {Viva Voce} - Little Me Will Start A Storm is a menagerie of fantastic instruments, crafty rhythms and unconventional lyrics. All tied up with the Youngs' zigzagging vocals, zooming from high up in the register rafters down to an alto.

In truth, whenever any band incorporates a musical saw, they've got my vote. I'm a cheap date.

"Wax & Wire" from 2009 Fruit Bats lightly hearkens to the Scottish lochs of their namesake. "Elephant & Little Girls" is the first single off the Feb. 22 release, who's humid, ambient base track of crickets and hush makes me want to stretch out in a backyard. Under a tarp, wearing a down jacket - weather permitting.

Loch Lomond // Wax and Wire
Loch Lomond // Elephants & Little Girls

Lia Ices - the mystic

{photo by Eric Ogden}

Girlcrush alert.

Lia Ices' second effort, Grown Unknown, has the ethereal-chamber pop enchantress in storybooks. Shorter-winded than Joanna Newsom, little tougher than Enya, less quirk than Sia - Ices keeps her lilting, avant vocals anchored with meaty guitar ruminations and fist-pounds of percussion.

"Daphne" takes inspiration from the Greek myth of a woman who ultimately transforms into a tree - played out in what starts as pastoral bliss before turning to darker energies. Whatever shall become of her? The tale features Justin Vernon, whom I've indirectly posted probably 17'ish times. It's fine, I'll probably change the blog name to "JV4life" by June.
Other standout tracks include "Ice Wine" and "Little Marriage."

Just bought my tickets to see Ices at The Red Palace 3.30.11. Lots of daisy crowns to weave to between now and then.

"Daphne" by Lia Ices from Secretly Jag on Vimeo.

Lia Ices // Daphne

Adele - chanteuse inferno

Since calling for her "Hometown Glory" on 19, Adele has forged her own path amongst the teenyboppers and pill-poppers of the diva scene. With 21, she lunges like a steam locomotive back into the charts with tracks produced by hitmakers Rick Rubin and Paul Epworth. You can hear her resonating vibrato for miles through the fog of "sophomore slump," not a bit of which seems to apply.

Had she made a dance album? Bleached her hair platinum and lost the bouffant? Tried to fit the pop-princess cookiecutter? Chances are this searing album of hearts rippedraw&bleeding that's going to have the lot of us condemning our deserter for lovers and exclaiming I FEEL that wouldn't exist for exorcisms.

Goddamn do I love a breakup album.

A favored peachy track and her gospel affirming performance on the 2011 Brit Awards.



Adele // Set Fire to the Rain

Sea of Bees - ocean's a-buzz

I had been eyeing the hull of the ES boat with thoughts of pulling myself back in for weeks. Stockpiling tracks and chuckling over self-amusing quips that I have, inevitably, all forgotten. Well-enough I did as they never really are as quippy as I'd like them to be once they're a day stale.

The King of Limbs put me up and over, but even before that I have been so entirely swept up in Julie Braenzinger's debut album that I knew I just HAD to start pulling the oars again. Just had to! Gorgeous vocals this side of Bjork over earnest lyrics with a folksy-sad edge. She plays all the instruments. It all sounds so confident. She's probably an alien.

The whole album goes down like a spoonful of lingonberry gelato. You'll probably hear tracks like "Willis" on Parenthood or used over a spot for nappies, but until then.
Until then, you and I can sail in the ES boat on this sea of bees.

Sea of Bees // Marmalade

Under the Covers Monday - curtsying before the Bowie altar

Growing up I wasn't really exposed to the clutched rock legends of my parents' youth. Led Zepp was a high school revelation, I didn't hear a Grateful Dead song until I was in my 20's. Dad insisted upon "modern music," and discarded records as soon as he felt they were obsolete. Holds true with his overall-life mantra; I barely had my extra-long sheets packed for college before Dad tore down the adolescent collage of Abercrombie dudes on my wall {it's a shameful time, but I've moved past it and feel at peace}.

So no, I didn't jump on couch cushions to the chords of "Stairway to Heaven." But I did tell all my stuffed animals where I'd be located while spinning to R.E.M.'s "Losing My Religion" {the corner}. I perfected some odd, jerky fighting robot moves with my little brother to Talking Head's "Burning Down the House." But far, FAR and away my favorite dance routines was to the entire ChangesBowie album. The whole thing=sweaty kid head. I was completely convinced that when Mr. Bowie sang "China Girl," it was meant only for me. I was also convinced that i was asian at heart while growing up in rural, piedmont North Carolina. Can't say.

We Were So Turned On: A Tribute to David Bowie is a treasure chest of covers by independent artists to benefit UK War Child charity. You'll make Ziggy Stardust, now incarnated in my workbuddy betafish, very pleased.

Xu Xu Fang // China Girl
David Bowie // China Girl
Warpaint // Ashes to Ashes
David Bowie // Ashes to Ashes

Radiohead - the Kings of my Limbs

At long last.
After much quiet.
Much anticipation and dreamings and hopefulness and mild disappointment after the elventhousandth time you looked them up since pledging your undying loyalty after you questioned your existence when you heard "How to Disappear Completely" for the first time while driving to Hardee's for a sweet tea. {gasp}

Radiohead's 2011 release, The King of Limbs. Blessed be, the lion flies and I can dance my way down a pulsing neon-aubergine thoroughfare of electronic transcendence right on up and across the brim of Thom Yorke's fedora. We're back in Kid A territory, somebody better drop the bread crumbs so we can find our way back.

Radiohead // Lotus Flower