Those pampered and primped for the glitter ball glam of Allison Goldfrapp’s last two discs (Black Cherry and Supernature) may very well arrive at her latest offering only to find the party slightly kicked. But for long-time followers of the English songstress, Seventh Tree (Mute) offers a distinct feeling that she and partner Will Gregory have come full circle. Cut from the same cloth as her 2000 debut Felt Mountain, Seventh Tree ditches Goldfrapp’s digital disco fame and eases back into the silky smooth compositions of her original solo work. But where Felt Mountain derives mood and mysticism from its’ minimalist approach, Seventh Tree throws its’ gaze in decidedly less exotic directions. The result is an album of much more classic origins. KEEP READING – David Pitz

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Ah springtime…A time of rebirth and rejuvenation…A time to shed winter’s ball and chain in favor of more pastoral possibilities. Ain’t it grand? It is....especially considering this bit of information. Seems the warm weather bug will pack a mighty bite this year, stirring Animal Collective from their post Strawberry Jam hibernation. That mighty chomp will bear down May 6th, and with it, the band will drop the Water Curses EP on the world. Containing four new tracks on CD/12", Water Curses finds Animal Collective “exploring strange new waters”…as if they’ve never plunged into strange new depths before. Check out the track by track descriptions, courtesy of Motormouth, offered after the jump. – David Pitz

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What we have here is the first taste of Rising Down; The Roots’ highly anticipated 10th album. With Rik Cordero rolling tape, Black Thought gets his interrogation on…?uestlove standing by…in this brand new, video treatment of the recently previewed track “75 Bars (Black’s Reconstruction). My oh my…do these dudes have one mighty inconvenient fate in store for one poor sap. You’ve seen Reservoir Dogs, right?

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When the centennial clock reset itself eight years ago REM’s historically rich album output pretty much fluttered down to a crawl. For the band’s diehards, the 21st century has offered only two albums (compare that to the 11 releases REM delivered in the 80’s and 90’s) of original tracks to take stock in; that being Reveal and Around the Sun. But this April Michael Stipe, Peter Buck, and Mike Mills will return with Accelerate; the band’s first album in four years.

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Here is a new weekly video segment we'll be featuring on the site. Baeble's online editor, David Pitz, takes a quick look at some of the news cruising across the wire from the world of independent and emerging music. This week's segment features news on Radiohead, Spoon, Kate Nash, Cat Power, Goldfrapp, and Beach House.

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If you are a firm believer that time and space weighs heavy on a recorded piece of music, check out this quote from The Black Keys’ Patrick Carney:

"The place is covered with dust, it smells like a moldy cabin, and it looks like a haunted house. It was fitting for our first time going into a real studio."

Me thinks the band’s fifth full-length, Attack & Release (Nonesuch) is going to be a winner.

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Here’s a handy case for continuing to keep those pesky, out of date physical copies of music lying around. Maybe, just maybe, one day you’ll have the opportunity to drop those precious, musical mementos down the family tree. Case in point…

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OK City might not seem like the kind of town that would spawn a band quite like Stardeath and the White Dwarfs. Of course taking stock in this performance at the World’s Fair CMJ Showcase reveals plenty that would suggest these acid lovin’ aliens might have a hard time calling anywhere home. Tight and tacky jumpsuits, double kick drums, a seizure inducing light show, a mountain of keyboards, and heady, psychedelic melodies…Stardeath and the White Dwarfs do awfully right by that cosmic namesake of theirs. And speaking of names…you know who else these boys do proud? Uncle Wayne. It seems singer Dennis Coyne can call the Flaming Lips’ iconic leader family. Suddenly, it all starts to make a little more sense, huh? – David Pitz

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With tracks titles like "This is How We Kiss", and "Written in Heart Signs, Faintly", Throw Me The Statue's latest release, Moonbeams (Secretly Canadian) is infused with plenty of lovey-dovey ethos. Yet, TMTS, conceived by singer-songwriter Scott Reitherman, never even skirts on the cloying and annoying. With punchy accordion playing, 8th beat drumming, and xylophone touches evocative of a child's toy piano, fan-fav "Lolita" tastes like sleep-away camp and sounds the way a teenage romance can only be perceived in hindsight: We don't have the overzealous intensity of a emo track but a genuinely lighthearted and up-tempo pop tune that inevitably explodes into a premature mess of notes and hormones. Reitherman never takes himself too seriously, and that’s what makes the album so cohesive and enjoyable. KEEP READING – Megan Diamondstein

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Bumping this baby back up the blog, but that is just to make sure y'all know the green carpet gets rolled out this week! Teaming up with environmental non profit group Reverb,Jose Gonzalez will add his name to an ever growing list of musicians making efforts to curb the damage traditional touring can inflict on the planet. Getting started this week in Miami, the current tour will be significantly more earth friendly in a variety of ways.

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For fiercely independent San Francisco four piece Birdmonster, determining which label to duck under the sheets with is probably a decision of slightly more importance than say…scribblings of Brown Tooth, Burritos, and Music, Music, Music. No, that fresh label seal on an album matters, and in the case of the band’s follow-up to the much lauded ’06 debut No Midnight, Birdmonster has tapped The FADER Label to handle the album. Slated for a “Q2” release, the yet to be named record was recorded in San Francisco with producer Tom Schick (Ryan Adams, Rufus Wainwright, Norah Jones). And while the band is currently tying up loose ends on the production side of things, Birdmonster will spend all of March previewing much of the material for audiences in the West Coast/Southwest portions of the country. - David Pitz

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When I heard that Dan Deacon would be playing a show around the first week of February at the Whitney, I wanted in. I got my name placed on a guest list and immediately asked if that included a +1. Apparently there would be no need, as Deacon would be playing for free...an exciting development because I could invite a bunch of friends to go with me. That's right...the only thing that went through my mind was that it would cost nothing for me and all my friends. Of course, then what was the guest list for? "Probably to make sure you get in," my editor guessed. "It's probably going to get packed pretty quickly." Oh, right. Everyone likes a free show, and Dan Deacon might have a few more fans than just my intimate group of friends and me.

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Fair weather destinations are all well and good for the vacationing flock. But to locals…and even more so to the children of locals…the allure of their tiny hometown’s summer shacks is certainly a little less obvious. Of course this is an assumption of sorts, but one I’m willing to make after listening to the Martha’s Vineyard bred band The Billionaires, and their debut Really Real For Forever (Too Soon).

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While it might be slightly misleading, I don’t think the aptly titled Blonde Redhead had devious intentions in mind. Having built a sturdy, longtime foundation on the artful bedrock of noisy, resonant guitar drones, and off kilter tunings, Blonde Redhead earned a reputation as a kind of Sonic Youth lite over the years. But on their latest album, 23, the band favored dream pop, a la Zero 7 or Air. In this sun baked show at the McCarren Park Pool, the band leans hard on the hyper hypnotic, and for good reason. August heat waves have a tendency to release a wash of sweat tickling down the forehead and send one into a hazy headed half euphoria. This lounge ready performance for a bulging, half naked Brooklyn crowd is just the kind of intense, dramatic, and squinty eyed moment worth standing in the middle of an empty, concrete bowl on a Sunday afternoon in August for. - David Pitz

In this exciting, 30-minute blitz of footage, Baeble’s Allison Hagendorf takes viewers from the front of the house to the back, in what was truly one of the hottest performances of last summer. - David Pitz

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If ever you've hatched the idea that a lot of contemporary English acts come utterly obsessed with their country’s rock and roll lineage, Brighton’s The Kooks certainly won't offer any kind of evidence to dissuade such a line of thinking. The Beatles, Kinks, and Stones – The Kooks have turned plenty on with their time honored influences. Of course, these boys also bring an irresistible knack for dressing such iconic bits of 60's rock in more modern threads...something that gained them plenty of notoriety when they released Inside In/Inside Out back in '06.

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From America’s great white north, Pitchfork is reporting the Twin Cities' finest hip hop export will be making a rather sporting go of it on the road this spring. What’s the occasion for a string of live Atmosphere outings? For one, Slug and Ant will be dropping their brand new recorded effort, When Life Gives You Lemons, You Paint That Shit Gold (Rhymesayers Entertainment) on April 22nd. Sounds all good, right? Sort of more like being handed a nice tall glass of lemonade...am I right? And while we’re asking questions, what color do you suppose we paint that shit? While we ponder such queries, why don’t you take a look at the wealth of additional information provided after the jump.

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Few back stories in recent memory live as much within the art they eventually created than those circumstances that lead Justin Vernon to his father’s hunting cabin in Northern Wisconsin. A dissolved love affair, a broken band, various life changes hell bent on destroying their target…Vernon never meant to record a master stroke when he retreated to a winter of solitude in the North Woods. Rather, his was a quest for a bit of personal peace…one that, true to the unexpected ways in which journeys of the heart tend to manifest themselves, yielded his stunning new album, For Emma, Forever Ago (Jagjaguwar). – KEEP READING – David Pitz

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Austin’s finest took a break. And yes, we’ll admit it…while they were gone, we sort of missed ‘em. So we plowed through their records, we kept their website under a constant kind of surveillance, we reminisced about the performances of old…all but a pointless exercise in killing a little bit of time. And as it turns out, the wait was truly a little bit of time.

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Team work…what a thing! Arctic Monkeys and The Rascals certainly share a common adoration for twitchy, dance driven British rock. Not only that, but if you were to cram the Rascals’ Miles Kane and the Monkeys’ Alex Turner into a vocal booth and have each take a turn on the mic…why, distinguishing between the two would be trickier than taking the Pepsi challenge. So wouldn’t it be something if the two friends hatched a plan to get together and form a band, hereby (most likely) sounding like, well…pretty much just like the groups they call home?

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Last month we dropped some saucy bits of news concerning Dizzee Rascal’s move to the Definitive Jux label…a change in scenery that culminates with the release of the prince of grime’s third album, Maths and English, on April 29th. Today, we bring word that Chief Executive Officer, Mr. El-P, has plans to make the most of such a fitting little partnership, teaming up with Dizzee on the road this spring.

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For fans of Portland’s Blitzen Trapper, there is plenty of reasons to wade into the water on the band’s side of the creek these days. First and foremost, the band has recently bagged themselves a slew of prize winning dates this winter/spring. By the looks of these beauties, the forthcoming trek will be the band’s biggest catch yet.

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Serving up rounds of American rock in the great Southern transition, LA’s Voxhaul Broadcast certainly doesn’t craft the kind of sound one would expect from their particular geographic origins. Orange County has never been a hot bed for dashing cuts of urban twang or a soulful rush of vocals. Yet that is exactly what viewers get in this, Voxhaul Broadcast’s performance at The FADER Sideshow.

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For some, success goes down like sweet nectar, settling the anxious stomach of years of uncertainty and recharging both the malnourished body and soul. For others, however, the supposed happy times never taste as sweet. While certainly not apparent upon first listen, the life and times of Dev Hynes, former guitar twister for the short lived outfit Test Icicles, have apparently not sit so well. Sporting a rather dashing name in Lightspeed Champion, Hynes’ solo debut, Falling Off the Lavender Bridge (Domino) might play like the sonic shedding of his previous party punk ways that he so badly needed. But a closer plunge into the country kissed collection reveals a goofy getuped English kid plainly at odds with the world around him. KEEP READING – David Pitz

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Cat Power’s performance at Terminal 5 was one of those shows you wish you could take a mulligan on. It’s not that it was particularly horrible. Quite the opposite, as there were many moments of brilliance when Chan and her fantastic touring band - Dirty Delta Blues - were locked in offering up tight soul and jazzy grooves. Unfortunately there were just too many hiccups to make the evening memorable for the right reasons – namely the myriad of technical problems that plagued her set.

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For the unfortunate soul blessed with a regular non-holiday work week, here’s some music perfectly suited for the ease on in, into Monday. From multi instrumentalist Todd Grutreau, Crushed Stars’ Gossamer Days is a sweet and fragile bit of bedroom pop…though the burning soul flickering away at the center of these starlit cuts is obvious enough.

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The sex driven pulse that seems to carry almost every Ladytron song along has always been a slightly dangerous little addiction. You know, right up there with speeding 10 miles over the limit and slamming triple shots of espresso. Yeah, I know…crazy right? But what isn’t so nutty is the bit of news I’m going to share with you right now. Ladytron will once again tempt our vice ridden souls when they head out on a massive, 31 city tour later this summer. What’s the special occasion? Nothing really…unless of course you’re like us and consider the band’s fourth album kind of a big deal. Slated for a June 3rd release, the Liverpool quartet will release Velocifero on their new home, the Nettwerk Music Group. Get plenty of details after the jump. – David Pitz

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Though the southern gents of Nashville’s Turbo Fruits may be awfully young, their rollicking brand of energetic guitar drivers recently caught the attention of what I imagine are some of the more discriminating ears around. Not everyone can claim Thurston Moore as a mentor…but that is just the case with these boys. Hear just how Turbo Fruits wowed Mr. Moore, in this, their performance at the The FADER Sideshow.

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There should be a warning label adhered the cover of Kelley Stoltz latest offering Circular Sounds (Sub Pop) that reads something along the lines of “May Experience Déjà Vu Upon Listening”. The fourteen tracks are chocked full of the familiar sounds of albums from the late 1960s - which is only fitting considering Mr. Stoltz spends his days a clerk at a second-hand record store. KEEP READING - Jeffrey Greenblatt

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If ever the inner weirdo in you needs a bit of stroking, this latest bit of news may provide just the occasion to let the freak out of the bag. While maybe not technically a super tour per say, the announcement that Philadelphia’s resident pack of nut jobs…better known to you and I as Man Man…are teaming up with Brooklyn’s latest wonder kids, Yeasayer, is sure to please plenty of live music fans this spring.

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Backed by the percussive sputters of Brooklyn duo High Places, Portland’s Adrian Orange certainly exudes an understated spirituality in performance; one that sounds inspired by equal parts blues, dub, and rock. Rarely rising above the CMJ chatter of the The FADER Sideshow, this sporadic and improved performance definitely demands a close lean into the speakers. Once there however, Orange’s originality yields a whole slew of interesting timbres and perplexing lyrics.

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Brandon Summers has had to endure a lot. Following the critical success of The Helio Sequence's third album and Sub Pop premiere Love and Distance, the wear and tear of touring alongside such indie super groups as Blonde Redhead, Modest Mouse, and Kings of Leon, made Summers crack. Literally. The vocalist, half of the dreamy duo, suffered severe damage to his vocal folds, so much so that the fate of Summer's speaking ability, let alone that of the band, came into question. At first, the performer did what any super-cool, super-tortured artist would in his position: drink. A lot. With his guitar gathering dust in the corner, Summers sought the company of two warm gents named Jack (Daniels) and Jim (Beam). Chalk it up to label pressures, band mate Benjamin Weikel's threats of violence or even the unwanted liquor chub, but the singer/guitarist has finally pulled himself out of this self-[dis]satisfied stupor, and is back with a profound new sound on the recent release Keep Your Eyes Ahead (SubPop). KEEP READING - Megan Diamondstein

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With an abundance of recent chatter firing off the festival wires, February, contrary to popular belief, is appearing to be no time to hibernate. Instead, one should already be reserving summer weekends for plenty of sun, sweat, and sound. For those looking to get the season started on a rather epic note, might I suggest scribbling the words Sasquatch! Music Festival at the Gorge on May 24-26 in your planner. That’s because the 7th annual festival is claiming all of Memorial Day weekend for the first time.

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It’s seems the world’s greatest mini shaded rapper is making a week of it. Kanye West got things started Sunday evening, scooping up a total of four awards, including Best Rap Album of the Year (never mind Album of the Year alluded him for the third time), at the Grammy’s. At said ceremonies, West, along with robotronic duo Daft Punk sent the crowd into a tizzy with their performance of “Stronger”…only to make ‘em break out the tissues with his touching rendition of Late Registration’s “Hey Mamma” shortly thereafter.

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Oh those darling PR people pushing all the latest news concerning Radiohead around the web. It’s quite cute how they think we’ll snap at the daintiest of details. Given the last press release…one where all that was made available is a list of cities the band would be visiting this summer…I’m thinking I’m not buying into this one. Let’s just go ahead and delete it right now.

But before I do, maybe a small sneak peak might be in order?

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It’s a shame that Def Jux and Mike Ladd didn’t get together before. One of the biggest labels in indie hip-hop decided to release a 4 year-old album several weeks ago. Nostalgiator, originally released in 2004 under the German label !K7 Records, caught itself in a rare category in the days of downloads and the internet: an album that was rarely heard outside of Europe. It couldn’t have come soon enough since Nostalgiator finds Ladd at his most straightforward in terms of hip-hop and electronic music...though the avant-garde jazz side of him isn’t too far behind. KEEP READING - Stephon Johnson

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Here is a new weekly video segment we'll be featuring on the site. Baeble's online editor, David Pitz, takes a quick look at some of the news cruising across the wire from the world of independent and emerging music. This week's segment features news on The Shortlist Award, Bonnaroo, Modest Mouse, Shout Out Louds, British Sea Power, and Michael Jackson.

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It might be a bit of a premature reaction. These things happen whenever one goes tap, tap, tap on the keyboard, formulating ideas and thoughts concerning an album…before said album has even cycled through in full. But premature reactions be damned! These United States’ debut, A Picture of the Three of Us at the Gates to the Garden of Eden arrived only this morning. But plugging into this beauty makes the decision to post immediately a rather easy one.

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Bruises, bumps, scrapes, and bee stings; on her Kill Rock Stars debut, Virginian born songstress Thao braves a bundle when it comes to the rocky ways of twenty something romance. Over the course of We Brave Bee Stings And All, Thao and The Get Down Stay Down traverse a ton of tumultuous terrain. The footing is never sure, and some times (alright, most times) she takes a dive. But resilient and hell bent on feeling something (see those goose bumps on the cover? That is Thao, an emotional machine, feeling something) Thao makes her way down twisted, unsure paths, sprinting blindfolded, plastered smile, all the way. KEEP READING – David Pitz

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For only their second US show to date, much ballyhooed Swedish band I´m from Barcelona brought 20 members plus to McCarren Park for a ruckus Sunday afternoon pool party. And while some might find it easy to argue that the massive band thing is getting a tad overdone, it is hard to deny the fact that every one of Barcelona’s members chip in to help furnish their nifty cheerleading sound, not to mention contribute to the wildly dynamic performance.

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Even before High Places get going, this Brooklyn Duo immediately sparks intrigue with their rather impressive pile of percussive tid bits strewn across The FADER Sideshow stage. Once on their way, High Places aim for high art. Bells, shakers, clicks, and sticks…Rob Barber pounds out plenty to meet the listener’s rhythmic fix. Add both an essence of tropicalia and Mary Pearson’s champagne vocals, and High Places certainly carve out their own little exotic niche within our catalogue. – David Pitz

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Picking up where they left off in 2007, Barsuk Records has announced plans to release the official film score to the motion picture Kurt Cobain: About a Son. Having already handled the film’s official soundtrack back in September – a collection that went rummaging through 80’s underground artists like Bad Brains, Butthole Surfers, Iggy Pop, Melvins, and Mudhoney to name a few – this companion piece features a score penned by Northwest musician/producer Steve Fisk and Death Cab For Cutie’s Benjamin Gibbard.

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The bad news about The Evening Descends (Dead Oceans), the sophomore release from Oklahoma’s Evangelicals, is that anyone overhearing the music coming from your speakers will ask what you’re listening to with that kind of judgmental tone that makes you feel like you have to defend yourself and your taste. The good news is that once you actually listen to this album, you will have no problem coming up with a good defense. Anything but conventional, The Evening Descends opens like a radio being tuned to a station from another planet. - KEEP READING - Eric Silver

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When the Delgados amicably went their separate directions back in 2005, fans of the band’s sublime pop vision could have only felt as if they lost a rare and special group to hang their hat on. After all, the band did play the part of forerunners to the Scottish pop renaissance…a scene that later blossomed in Glasgow with the likes of Belle and Sebastian and Mogwai. Call them the one time epicenter if you’d like..

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Yak Ballz: Funny flippin’ name for sure. But this Manhattan-born, Queens-bred MC sure sounds mighty serious when it comes down to it. Having released plenty of vinyl since the age of 17, Yak has certainly been killing NY’s indie Hip Hop scene since the mid ‘90s.

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Filmed at The The FADER Sideshow, this performance from experimental noise quartet HEALTH taught us abrasive and course bouts of recorded rock always translates into electrifying live performances. Yet as carried away by the sheer possibilities of their instruments as these Los Angelinos get, there are still recognizable pieces of “song” swirling around underneath all the empowered racket. See if you can find ‘em. – David Pitz

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Conrad Standish, Tom Carlyon and Hugo Cran have made one of the most mature sexual albums in ages, and yet Yes, U (Beggars Banquet) isn’t even about sex. That may seem like backhanded praise, but it isn’t at all. The third album from the Australian trio, who now reside in Berlin, Devastations take advantage of both the space and careful construction within Yes, U to provide a highly sensual, glamorous, and sophisticated, yet ultimately filthy, murky, and claustrophobic kind of vibe. KEEP READING - Stephon Johnson

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“The desire to make great pop, rather than curse the darkness” – it’s a motivation that must have hit like a thunderbolt revelation. For Mat Brook, it seems the times were not always as good as they sound on his Grand Archives self titled album.

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Digging in for a doubleheader of sorts, the legendary Roots crew has announced plans for a two show run on Harlem’s famed Apollo Theater. Kicking off the Heineken New Legends Series, Black Thought, Questlove, and co will play a pair of shows on Friday February 22nd (7:30 and 11:00). Tickets go on sale tomorrow, but you can get in on a pre-sale via telephone going down right now.

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Here is a new weekly video segment we'll be featuring on the site. Baeble's online editor, David Pitz, takes a quick look at some of the news cruising across the wire from the world of independent and emerging music. This week's segment features news on The Shortlist Award, Gnarles Barkley, Destroyer, Phoshphorescent, Hot Chip, Lightspeed Champion, and Kelley Stoltz.

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Minneapolis has it pretty good. Sure, it’s a bit cold up there this time of the year. And well, the Vikings never can seem to seal the deal anytime they flirt with the playoffs. Oh, and then there is that matter concerning the accent…that oft-misunderstood, even more oft-caricatured accent Minnesotans seem to have going on (for the record, I do adore it). But the city can also lay claim to Ben Kyle; and Irish born songwriter who fronts one of its’ best hidden gems, Romantica.

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After many hours of live music, it is always nice when a performer helps an audience wind down for the evening…which is what made this performance from Bradford Cox’ Atlas Sound so very gratifying as it was happening.

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Adding another chapter to the continuing story of indie rock’s archaic march back in time, San Francisco’s Dodos brought their bombastic stomp to Brooklyn Saturday night for a show at Union Pool.

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Though Alberta Cross hail from across the misty Atlantic, this up and coming English group prove their red hot hearts bleed for something a little more North American. With a knick for Southern soul and a knack for blues inoculated guitar jangles, Alberta Sound keep their classic, influences close. The Band, Neil Young, and Leonard Cohen…all can take a little credit in the molding of this band of youngens. Circa fall ’07, this performance from The FADER’s Sideshow surely sums up just why we like Alberta Cross so very much – David Pitz

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