Four Tet‘s new album is out – I expected to take a few listens to get into it, but I’m right there already. The opening track, Angel Echoes, is the perfect way to wind you into it. If I could make this my morning alarm I think every day would start right.

Sometimes the best music is found down the bottom of a deep link-well. Tearist however I stumbled directly into when Jo sent their Myspace to me. I had to reverse-engineer my way out of the well to find out a little about them though – and it turns out the awesome Pictureplane picked them in [Read the Rest...]

I’ve been holding off posting about Hideous Men till now as I wanted to get a copy of their album – and as this required emailing the band directly a few weeks of procrastination were needed first. It was worth the wait – though I have listened to the EP’s tracks on their Myspace a [Read the Rest...]

Subpop, the best record label with a black and white logo, have released their 2010 sampler album which has a well-decent selection of their artists. Of the two dozen tracks my picks would be, 1 – “Girls FM” by Happy Birthday 3 – “Jail La La” by Dum Dum Girls 12 – “You’re a Target” [Read the Rest...]

Robyn dropped the perfect pop album in 2005 – and we’re still waiting for a followup. So anything she even guests on in the meanwhile helps bide the time. This live performance of a Staygold track at the Swedish music awards is a delightfully none-too-subtle ode to “backseat love” – with both Robyn and a [Read the Rest...]

The Laneway Festival has released the Auckland day’s timetable. And announced that the rumoured secret guest is Chris Knox. It’s great to know he is recovering well enough from his 2009 stroke to play. Of the 18 acts playing there aren’t any I am dreading (unlike the BDO where the specter of being surrounded by [Read the Rest...]

On Thursday night at Mightymighty we caught Melbourne’s Ouch My Face with support from locals Rifle and Thought Creature. We walked in toward the end of Rifle’s set so I only caught a couple of tunes. I like what I heard though so I’ll be turning up earlier if I notice them supporting anyone else. [Read the Rest...]

Einstein Music Journal have dropped posts on Pearl Harbour a couple of times recently. The last one compelled me to order their latest EP, “Wish We Were Here” which is available on CD-R (via Paypal) only. You can hear more from the ethereally-edged sisters (Piper and Skylar) on their Myspace page or listen to the [Read the Rest...]

Neko Case is in town for two nights. We caught her on the first night after an Australian tour. Luckily the city turned on a decent-ish couple of days so we weren’t entirely embarrassed by the weather. Actually, from the number of references to ozzie sweat moustaches during her set, I think they were fairly [Read the Rest...]

A double bill of The Books and Camera Obscura seemed pretty good on paper. I wasn’t a huge fan of either band but had heard enough of both to figure at least one of them would be good live and justify the weeknight out. The highlight of this show was the punctuality of the bands. [Read the Rest...]