Richard In Your Mind – ‘I Will’ (mp3)

I won’t go on about these guys too much. Mostly  because you’ve already read about them this past fortnight on account of the impending release of their latest, SPOD-produced album ‘My Volcano’ (artwork above). ‘I Will’ is a departure from the cut-n-paste experiments of their Summertime EP. If those songs were an Australian answer to ‘chillwave,’ then ‘I Will’ leans closer to Australian ‘blisswave’ (see, they’re relevant). Chilled atmosphere, beach, harmonies, melodies, old-school vibe, guitars etc etc. Apparently SPOD’s production flourishes peek out more on other tracks, but ‘I Will’ is pretty straight-up introduction to what will probably be a great album.

www.myspace.com/richardinyourmind

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Big Scary – ‘Autumn’ (mp3)

I don’t handle sentimental, saccharine songs well. ‘Autumn’ is one of them. Jonathan Boulet’s ‘Community Service Announcement‘ had the same effect last year. They all begin with a small waver of nostalgic piano, and stir you up with rousing irredescent beats. Then at the pivotal moment, they break into glorious, elevating Arcade Fire-type melodies, spilling out a plethora of maudlin hues that poke and prod at all your memories of good times, shit breakups and old friends – turning you into a pathetic blabbering mess. Then again, I’m a walking emotional disaster. You’ll probably think just it’s a reasonably good song.

Big Scary have been around for quite a few years now. Although the living room fuzz of their older tracks are equally as likable, their newer and somewhat mellower approach has received a bit more buzz around town lately. Their track ‘Autumn’ is currently featuring in TV spots for the Victorian government’s volunteer campaign.

Deriving inspiration from the sensory experiences of nature, Big Scary are bringing out four offerings that will be released in seasonal installments – ‘Autumn’, ‘Winter’, ‘Spring‘ and ‘Summer’. The movements from each of these EPs will feature on the ‘Four Seasons Compilation’, due for release in January 2011.
You’ll be definitely hearing a lot more from these guys.

www.bigscary.net

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Tiger Choir – ‘Shotgun’ (mp3)

I really dig Tiger Choir’s self-titled EP. It’s well produced, inventive, catchy, and energetic and fuck. But I know some people are going to slander it because, at times, they sound a lot like Animal Collective – and people love to slander both Animal Collective and Australian bands who sound like popular international indie bands. I’m addressing this hate only to anticipate it rather than give credence to it. Calling Tiger Choir a ‘wannabe AC’ is fairly reductive when you consider that this EP contains five high quality and stylistically diverse tracks, most of which don’t sound anything like AC.

With that said, above is third track ‘Shotgun,’ probably the most AC-esque track on offer. With its strained, reverbed vocals, 6/8 time signature and a sneaky 3/4 beat dropping in halfway through, this could easily slip onto Animal Collective’s Feels. (That’s a good thing by the way. Feels is one of the best albums of the last decade IMO).

I know it sounds like I’m feeding into the comparison that I earlier labeled reductive. The fact is 1) I don’t necessarily think it’s bad to be compared to Animal Collective – even now that hipsters everywhere have had to disown them because Channel V picked up on ‘My Girls’, and 2) ‘Shotgun’ is just 20% of the songs on their EP. The rest doesn’t sound like this. I chose ‘Shotgun’ because it’s theor best track regardless of who it’s compared to.

Go ahead and listen for yourself, and check out the rest of the EP. It’s really great, and I’ll likely post something else from it in the near future.

www.myspace.com/tigerchoir

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Hey!

We just started a new facebook page…. ‘Like’ us here: www.facebook.com/whothehell.net

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