Pavement Announce Best of Tracklisting

That tracklisting for Pavement's new retrospective 'Quarantine the Past' is in.  The album, which is released by Domino on 8th March, features a generous twenty three tracks with pretty much all you'd expect present and correct.

Pavement - 'Quarantine the Past (The Best of Pavement)'
1. 'Gold Soundz'
2. 'Frontwards'
3. 'Mellow Jazz Docent'
4. 'Stereo'
5. 'In The Mouth A Desert'
6. 'Two States'
7. 'Cut Your Hair'
8. 'Shady Lane / J vs. S'
9. 'Here'
10. 'Unfair'
11. 'Grounded'
12. 'Summer Babe (Winter Version)'
13. 'Range Life'
14. 'Date w/ IKEA'
15. 'Debris Slide'
16. 'Shoot The Singer (1 Sick Verse)'
17. 'Spit On A Stranger'
18. 'Heaven Is A Truck'
19. 'Trigger Cut / Wounded-Kite At :17'
20. 'Embassy Row'
21. 'Box Elder'
22. 'Unseen Power Of The Picket Fence'
23. 'Fight This Generation'

Video: Ocelot - Our Time

How To Get Ahead In The Music Industry - A&R Edition

Is this what the inner-sanctum of the music industry is really like? Yes and no.

Brilliant slice of juvenile pisstaking here from Louis Gaston of The Streetlife DJs - check the comments section below for a few comments from popular DJs.

But just remember - it's on spec, yeah? And if you get offended there's probably something wrong with the way you do 'business'...

Where's My Tie?

I'm sure you've probably seen all of these around London and the rest of the UK, but if not, check out this Holy Moly article, and this website, where you can *ahem* amend David Cameron's totally fucking nausiating poster campaign.

It made me laugh, mainly because it makes an insincere moron look even more stupid. Simple really.

Make yours here.

The Gorillaz Are Back - Check Out This Cool Little Widget

The Gorillaz return after a long hiatus this March with their new album, and as is increasingly the norm these days, there is a pretty slick social media campaign going on to promote it.

I love this sort of shit - I love it when bands and labels actually make an effort to do something interesting, something different with an album release. Maybe I'm just a major label shill, but I'd rather have some big and brassy campaign like this, with plenty of interesting twists and turns, than another fucking email saying that some dreadful dance-rock outfit is playing at The Slug and Lettuce, who have been signed by some fart-sniffing bedroom indie label. But I digress...

Here's the tracklist for y'all:

Plastic Beach (2010)

1. Orchestral Intro (featuring Sinfonia ViVA)

2. Welcome To The World Of The Plastic Beach (feat. Snoop Dogg and Hypnotic Brass Ensemble)

3. White Flag (feat. Kano, Bashy and The National Orchestra For Arabic Music)

4. Rhinestone Eyes

5. Stylo (feat. Bobby Womack and Mos Def)

6. Superfast Jellyfish (feat. Gruff Rhys and De La Soul)

7. Empire Ants (feat. Little Dragon)

8. Glitter Freeze (feat. Mark E Smith)

9. Some Kind Of Nature (feat. Lou Reed)

10. On Melancholy Hill

11. Broken

12. Sweepstakes (feat. Mos Def & Hypnotic Brass Ensemble)

13. Plastic Beach (feat. Mick Jones & Paul Simonon)

14. To Binge (feat. Little Dragon)

15. Cloud Of Unknowing (feat. Bobby Womack and Sinfonia ViVA)

16. Pirate Jet

You can follow Murdoc on Twitter here.

And you can pick up a neat little Gorillaz widget here. No doubt it's going to have a host of neat little features popping up on it over the next month, including the eagerly-awaited video for the single 'Stylo', and a few podcasts.

Enjoy!

Not so Smashing Pumpkins

The Smashing Pumpkins have released the second song, 'Widow Wake My Mind', from the 44 track album Teargarden By Kaleidyscope. News of a new Pumpkins release is fast becoming more nerve-wracking than playing Russian roulette in the middle of a particularly bad acid trip.

Anyone with any interest in the band will be well aware of the massive limitations of Zeitgeist, and the first release from Teargarden... 'Song For A Sun' is absolutely diabolical, something akin to Phil Collins attempting to rip off Led Zeppelin. So what of the new song? Well, the good news is its not terrible, but on the other hand, the best thing you could say for it is that sounds like a very mediocre B-side from the Gish era. ‘Widow Wake My Mind’ is faintly psychedelic, with a decent approximation of the SP knack for a triumphant solo. The piano break in the bridge and lyric about “crawling into my heart” are a bit cringe-worthy, and the track is undeniably lightweight, but overall it’s not bad- and almost certainly better than anything from Zeitgeist.

Musicians like Billy Corgan inspire a particular kind of hero-worship among their fan base, the longer the career; the more this effect is amplified. When a band has such an excellent catalogue of albums stretching over the length of time the Pumpkins do, the albums become more than great pieces of art, they become soundtracks to the fans formative years. They become a trusted friend- always on hand to celebrate the highs and sympathise with the lows. So when the inevitable decline happens, to the long-time fan it feels like more than a band releasing a bad record; it feels like a slap in the face to the band’s legacy, to the fan’s very memories. No-one expects artists to go on making wonderful music forever, but when things do start to go downhill, the clamour for them to bow out gracefully becomes intense.

The plan for Teargarden By Kaleidyscope is to release every one of the 44 songs online for free as it is written, with a physcial boxset to buy when all the tracks have been released, so its seems obvious that Billy Corgan is not willing to fade into the night anytime soon. And, being honest, we shouldn’t really expect him to, its entirely unfair to want someone to just stop make making music because it doesn’t live up to an existing fanbase’s expectations, but the frustration at one member (Corgan) putting out shonky material under the Pumpkins banner with none of the other original members involved is much easier to sympathise with. Having used Zwan and his own name to release music in the past (both of which were considerably better than the current Pumpkins material) why has he now decided that he can justify being the sole proprietor of the Pumpkins legacy?

Sadly, this kind of ego-driven behaviour rarely works out well in a musical sense. There are countless examples of the singer of a much-loved band going on to make highly dubious musical decisions without the input of any of the band’s original members; Axl Rose’s Chinese Democracy debacle being one recent instance that springs painfully to mind. The Smashing Pumpkins haven’t yet plumbed those depths, and despite myself I can’t help but like ‘Widow Wake My Mind’ a little bit. With 42 songs from Teargarden By Kaleidyscope still to go, it may even turn out to be an excellent album, stranger things have happened. The part of me that treasures Gish, Siamese Dream and Mellon Collie & The Infinite Sadness however, fears that the best days of Billy Corgan, and The Smashing Pumpkins, are long gone.

Free Downloads From Feeder Side Project!

I've always had a soft spot for indie rockers Feeder, with 'Buck Rogers' and 'Insomnia' in particular being two tracks that managed to fill my adolescent years with plenty of air guitar moments at indie discos. That sounds naff, doesn't it - but you get the point.

Anyway.

Have some big, power-chord magic on us, courtesy of Grant and Taka's new side project, Renegades!

Download 'Renegades' and 'Sentimental here now, for free! Gratis! Nowt!

Free Download - Ocelot 'Our Time (Bird Peterson Remix)'

Coming to you loud and clear from the wilds of Texas and, er, Leeds, Ocelot are James Welsh and Cory Kilduff, and they are pretty fucking good.

The duo first met when Jimmy – from Leeds - was in Texas on a BMX holiday with friends and hooked up with Cory and his hardcore band The Rise. On his return to the UK Jimmy started sending Cory remixes of The Rise tracks via iChat and after the band had toured the UK, with Jimmy acting as tour manager, they asked him to become a full time electronic member of the band.

When The Rise ceased to be, Jimmy and Cory continued to make music over the Internet, from Leeds to Austin. These new tunes, while influenced by their more technical rock background, would take a more electro-pop, house and techno direction - Ocelot was born.

Ocelot first came to prominence for their remixes, with several high profile re-rubs to their credit: Muse Knights of Cydonia, Royksopp Girl & The Robot, Dragonette Competition, The Killers Human and Robyn Be Mine, amongst them.

They’ve had notable props from Franki Chan’s IHEARTCOMIX label ,that rose to prominence during the blog house surge – on of the premier labels in West Coast electro in 2008/09.

Now signed to legendary dance label Wall Of Sound in the UK, Ocelot will release their debut long player in early 2010.

Download 'Our Time (Bird Peterson Remix)' here now!

Review - Radioclit Presents 'Saga Africa'

It's difficult to try and explain how interesting and forward thinking electronic music can be when there are so many moronic records in the charts under the banner. Which is whay it's aways reafreshing to hear something fresh from an act such as Radioclit.

The Saga Africa EP is a Radioclit-helmed compilation of tracks themed around Africa, featuring a few up & coming producers like Douster, Myd & Lazy Flow. It's tribal fidgety madness, and my personal favourite is 'King of Africa' by Douster, which contains a sample you may recognise.

Check it out - I think it's brilliant, I just want to know what you think about it now.

Enjoy...

Free Download - Ali Love 'Love Harder'

Some of you out there may remember Ali Love from his vocals for The Chemical Brothers on their 2007 hit single 'Do It Again'. Some of you may recognise him as the Hackney street urchin who penned the Sigue Sigue Sputnik-meets-The Ramones goodness of his debut single 'K-Hole'. Either way, he's been around a bit, and after a couple of years in the wilds of East London drinking in his first love, the one that his last record label didn't really want to be revealed - his love of electronica and disco. And you can download his new single here, now for FREE!

Hot on the heels of his low-key single release "Diminishing Returns", Ali is back in February with "Love Harder", his first proper single and a scintillating teaser of his brand new album, to be released in spring 2010. Look out for remixes from Prins Thomas, Jaymo & Andy George and Mighty Mouse, but in the meantime, download the extended original mix here now, let us know what you think, and enjoy the Italo house vibes!

Ali Love - Love Harder (Extended Version) by benstroud

BBC Name Top 5 Ones to Watch in 2010

The BBC Sound of 20xx poll has been runniung since 2003 and has successfully predicted some of the biggest names in pop over the coming twelve months on many occasions.  Of course, this mere association and pre-release hype does wonders for a fledgling act, but none can deny that there is the raw talent to back up these claims for the most part.  Well, I guess we won't mention The Bravery or Sadie Ama...

This year's poll result is in, collating the views of over one hundred critics and broadcasters (i.e. the best of whatever was on their desk in December) and the top five looks like this.

1. Ellie Goulding
2. Marina and the Diamonds
3. Delphic
4. Hurts
5. The Drums

So, these are the artists to hit the blogs for now - ensuring your iPod is the one most lauded in February and most criticised come November.

Interestingly the BBC describe winner Ellie Goulding's sound as as "If Kate Bush, Bjork and Stevie Nicks shared a flat in trendy Shoreditch in 2010, this noise would emerge."

Three middle-aged women living in a flat in Shoreditch? Sounds more like a modern, musical pitch on the Golden Girls - now if they can just convince Duffy to join them I think the BBC might have a true winner here.

Serena-Maneesh Return With New Sound

Norweigian psychedelic rock stars Serena-Maneesh have been incredibly quiet since their self-titled debut hit these shores in 2006 backed up with what was, for me anyway, a memorable performance at that year's Reading Festival.  Now they return holding an album five years in the making (and recorded in a cave of all places) with what sounds like a surprisingly new electronic, almost jazz-like sound.  Imagine Muse with no major label obligations, a little more imagination and a total disregard for radio play and you might just be there...

'S-M 2: Abyss in B Minor' is released through their new label, the legendary 4AD, on March 22nd and features eight new tracks including the rather wonderful 'Ayisha Abyss' which the label are offering up as a taster (they're very good like that).

Serena-Maneesh - 'S-M 2: Abyss in B Minor'
1. 'Ayisha Abyss'
2. 'I Just Want to See Your Face'
3. 'Reprobate!'
4. 'Melody for Jaana'
5. 'Blow Yr Brains in the Mourning Rain'
6. 'Honeyjinx'
7. 'D.I.W.S.W.T.T.D.'
8. 'Magdalena (Symphony #8)'

Link: Serena-Maneesh Profile at Culturedeluxe

Panacea Release Free Download EP

This is a bit embarrassingly behind the times, (the thing was actually released in October 2009, civilisations have risen and fell in the blogosophere between then and now), but one of my favourite hip-hop groups have decided to give away their latest EP for free. Panacea's 'Corkscrew Gaps' EP is a collection of rarities, remixes and tracks which didn't fit on to their last couple of albums, and the whole thing is available to download absolutely free.

Anyone who likes conscious & chilled beats with hefty jazz influences should get their digital ass to the link and video below.

http://neosonix.bandcamp.com/album/panacea-corkscrew-gaps-ep