Found Sounds

Here are some great soulful sounds that I've found on my travels around the digital superhighway.

Git Beats

Genre: Hip Hop / Soul / Experimental
From: New York United States

Git Beats music with a message kicks it old school while soundtracking the future.

Go Try

MP3 - Git Beats Featuring Ladybug of Digable Planets - America

MP3 - Git Beats - Saxxy

Published with permission

Go Visit

Git Beats - Myspace

Omega One

Genre: Indie / Psychedelic / Hip Hop

From: New York United States

Omega One is the point at which hip hop and psychedelia meets, where gangsta rap meets love 'n peace man, where Crompton meets San Francisco, where bling meets flowers. As good for you as omega 3 but not as fishy.

Go Try

MP3 - Omega One - Sex Panther Suite

MP3 - Lodeck & Omega One - Understand U

Published with permission

Go Visit

Omega One - Myspace

Happy Christmas From Glasvegas

They say it get's earlier and earlier each year. Well it's true. The first mention of christmas on the Devil's blog this year is about three weeks earlier than last year. But I doubt there'll be many complaints because it's a Glasvegas video of a track from their Christmas EP which will be coming out in the UK in December.

Happy christmas one and all.

Go View

Glasvegas

Please Come Back Home

More Self Harming With...

Cut Off Your Hands
Genre: Powerpop / Punk / Pop
From: New Zealand

New Zealand new wavers Cut Off Your Hands are set to release their debut LP, 'You And I' on January 20th. The record will be released via Frenchkiss Records, the home to Les Savy Fav, The Dodos and Passion Pit.

Like the band's sophomore EP, Blue on Blue, You and I was produced by Suede's Bernard Butler, and features the bouncey, razor-sharp rock that’s been winning over fans since the 2006 release of the band’s self-titled debut EP.

Check out two tracks from the new album, the frantic video for 'Expectations', and the MP3 of 'Happy As Can Be', below.

Fresh off a string of successful CMJ shows, the band is currently touring Europe and Australia, before they’re slated to return to the US in 2009.

MP3 - Cut Off Your Hands - Happy As Can Be
Published with permission

Go Visit

Cut Off Your Hands - Myspace // Blog

Go View

Cut Off Your Hands
Expectations

I'll Get My Coat

Bromheads Jacket
Genre: Punk / Rock
From: United Kingdom

When they released their first album, the underrated 'Dits From The Commuter Belt', Bromheads Jacket were written off by lazy journalists as a group of bandwagon jumping Arctic Monkeys wannabes simply because they hail from Sheffield and sing (sang?) about the life of suburban late-teens in colloquial accents.

With their latest album, 'On The Brain' The Bromheads have, to their credit, given those journalists the finger (or possibly two). They've built on their impressive debut, improving their sound with a wider variety of instruments, including kazoos, recorders and vintage organs, to supplement their psych-punk guitar attack. From the contagious indie pop of 'Turn Me On' to the gently melodic 'Promises Promises' via the pedal to the metal garage punk of 'JFK vs USA' this is the sound of a band shaking off their inhibitions and pleasing themselves.

Where the first album drew the predictable Arctic Monkeys comparisons 'On The Brain' is closer in spirit to freakbeat surf punkers The Barracudas and the garage proto-punk of the Flaming Groovies than their simian brothers.

Go Try

MP3 - Bromheads Jacket - Turn Me On
MP3 - Bromheads Jacket - JFK vs USA
Published with permission

Go Buy









Bromheads Jacket 'On The Brain' from Amazon

Go Visit

Bromheads Jacket - Myspace // Website

Go View

Bromheads Jacket
What If's And Maybe's




If you like this you'll love Bromhead's Jacket's new album...

MP3 - The Flaming Groovies - Teenage Head
MP3 - The Flaming Groovies - When I Heard Your Name
Linked from the Flaming Groovies website

Buy The Flaming Groovies 'Flamingo' from Amazon

Dawn Breaks Over New Jersey...

Waking Lights

Genre: Folk Rock / Indie
From: Northern, New Jersey United States

Waking Lights is a musical convergence of sorts, a band borne of circumstance when singer/songwriter Matthew Maroulakos flew out of Burbank airport for the last time, returning to his hometown on the east coast. He came armed with a little black book containing a whole lot of words. Once at home in Northern New Jersey, Matthew began rehearsing with upright and electric bassist Kyle McCammon, who had just returned from honing his skills at a conservatory in Holland. Their mutual friend, percussionist Dana LaMarca, had stayed local to study classical percussion and new music while the other two were away. With all three members in the same state, they quickly enlisted Tommy Maroulakos on piano/keyboards, cellist/female vocalist Jodi Mozeika, and sultry violinist Nicole Scorsone.

The nascent sextet immediately hit upon a compelling and unique sound that at times could be called an English-language Sigur Ros, at others a more orchestral Smashing Pumpkins (when Billy Corgan was at his ballad-penning best.) The band began performing throughout the tri-state area including such venues as New York's Knitting Factory, Paul Colby’s Bitter End, Maxwell's in Hoboken, and Asbury Park's infamous Stone Pony. Soon the band was touring frequently throughout the east coast.

The band soon joined forces with Kieran Kelly and Lowell Thompson at The Buddy Project in Astoria, Queens (Sufjan Stevens' Illinois and Avalanche) to record the material that they had built up through endless demos and many live performances. After the band felt that they had captured their vision, Kenny Gioia (Bayside, Marcy's Playground, Hall and Oates) mixed the rough tracks and mastering engineer Alan Douches completed the project, which resulted in their independently released debut, Songs For Jo. This six-track EP is an autobiography, set to what some might call an indie/folk rock genre, with eclectic instrumentation, lush arrangements, and yet still maintaining a strong pop sensibility.

Go Try

MP3 - Waking Lights - Sharks

Posted with permission

Go View

Waking Lights - Myspace

What's that ghostly apparition?

that's the spirit
Genre: Indie
From: Ottawa, Canada

that's the spirit is the latest incarnation of Ottawa's Ben Wilson a multi-instrumentalist and well-known staple of the Canadian music scene.

His new album, the ironically titled 'Staying Places', is a musical travelogue with Ben desperately searching for somewhere, anywhere, he can escape the pressures of the 21st century.

It's a quiet, meditative collection of lo-fi space-folk that's as fragile as a piece of old testament parchment and almost as spiritual. Think Yo La Tengo trapped in a spaceship with Mark Linkous and an old copy of National Geographic. The perfect soundtrack to a lonely night with the lights down low dreaming of escape.

Go Try

MP3 - that's the spirit - It's Curtains For You
MP3 - that's the spirit - Now Yr The One
Published with permission

Go Visit

that's the spirit - Myspace // Website

Go View

that's the spirit
The Blue Of Distance



If you like these you'll love that's the spirit...

MP3 - Yo La Tengo - Behind That Locked Door
MP3 - Yo La Tengo - Beanbag Chair
Linked from and freely available at Yo La Tengo's website.

Buy Yo La Tengo 'And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out' from Amazon

And All Because The Lady Loves Milk Tray

The Dark Romantics
Genre: Alternative / Pop / Rock
From: Florida United States

As you may expect from their name Florida's The Dark Romantics are not the shiny happy people of the Disney family. They may hail from the sunshine state but judging by their sound they've spent most of their lives in doors immersed in the stories of Edgar Allen Poe and Mary Shelley, the poems of Emily Dickinson and Sylvia Plath the films of Joel Schumacher (well 8MM, the most depressing film ever) and the music of Tindersticks and Nick Cave.

With ex members of Denison Marrs, The John Ralston Band and The Party People, The Dark Romantics are keeping the glum rock flame alive with their mix of Wall of Voodoo synth, Joy Division desolation and Bauhaus art rock.

The bands sophomore effort, 'Heartbreaker', has recently been released with, unlucky for them but lucky for us, 13 tracks of heartbreaking songs of love and the pain of romance.

It's dark, it's romantic, it's The Dark Romantics.

Go Try



MP3 - The Dark Romantics - Hush Your Mouth
MP3 - The Dark Romantics - Heartbreaker
MP3 - The Dark Romantics - Let's Ride
Published with permission

Go Listen



Go Visit

The Dark Romantics - Myspace // Website
Label - Lujo Records // Lujo Records Myspace

Go View

The Dark Romantics
Let's Ride



If you like these then check out The Dark Romantics...

MP3 - The Party People - Got A Feelin
Freely available for download from PureVolume

MP3 - Wall of Voodoo - Ring of Fire (Johnny Cash Cover)
MP3 - Wall of Voodoo - Call of the West
Freely available for download from Wall of Voodoo.net

Buy Wall of Voodoo 'Call of the West' from Amazon

A Marriage Made In Heaven...

mrandmrsmays
Genre: Alternative / Indie / Punk
From: Austin, Texas United States

There are some things that just go together well. Eggs and bacon (vegetarian bacon that is!), peanut butter and jam (or jelly for the Devil's American readers), milk and biscuits (cookies for the Devil's American readers). One thing I never thought would go well together is The Cure and Riot Grrrl. Well mrandmrsmays have made me see the light. It's a perfect match check out 'Freak On' which starts like a Cure track before morphing into a riot grrlesque chant with some Teardrop Explodes like trumpets as an added bonus. It's another contender for the Devil's end of year top 10 (which is going to be more like a top 50 by Xmas!) .

There's more to mrandmrsmays than Cure/Riot Grrrl mash-ups. Check out the rather groovy 'BO5' which is the sound of Bow Wow Wow at an eastern disco or the lo-fi pained croon of 'Together'.

If variety is the spice of life then mrandmrsmays are spicier than most.

Go Try

MP3 - mrandmrsmays - Freak On

Go Visit

mrandmrsmays - Myspace // Website

Go View

mrandmrsmays
BO5