New Strokes Videos

Check out some new Strokes videos below including a peformance on SNL, the video for ‘Undercover of Darkness’, ‘You’re So Right’ and 30 second previews of songs from ‘Angles’.

Big Boi – ‘For Your Sorrows’

Outkast may have been absent for almost half the decade but when they were active they put out two of the best albums of the last ten years. Stankonia is arguably the definitive hip hop album of the 21st century, featuring the classic ‘Ms Jackson’ and ‘BOB’. It’s follow up was the crazy and unpredictable ‘Speakerboxxx/The Love Below’ – essentially two solo albums sold as an Outkast album. Both records still sound unbelievable today. Although we may be waiting a while for a new Outkast record we should expect a new Big Boi solo album soon – although it has been in the works for absolutely ages.

The fantastically titled ‘Sir Lucious Left Foot: The Son of Chico Dusty’ has been close to release for what seems like years and a few songs have been leaked or been previewed including ‘Royal Flush’, ‘Ringtone’ and now ‘For Your Sorrows’ and ‘Shine Blockas’. The songs are certainly classic Big Boi in style if not quite content, they lack a certain magic Andre may have added. It seems like the album may finally be close to release with more news and songs being released every few weeks and when we finally get a release date you can guarentee that this will be one highly anticipated album.

Best Coast

Best Coast are the fuzzy surf pop band from Bethany Consentino of Pocahaunted, and they are seriously fun. It’s hard to say much more about the group as seriously little information is available and their debut ep appears to be sold out . What I do know, is that they are a great little pop group with some seriously catchy melodies and a charming aesthetic.

Their myspace has some great songs including the delightful beach boys sounding ‘Over the Ocean’ and the lo fi joy of ‘Sun Was High’. Most of the songs have a relaxed summer vibe which makes it slightly annoying that I’ve only just found out about them. They have a 7 inch out now which may or may not be sold out (more confusion!) but here is the info and a music video.

http://artfag.us/bestcoast/

Vampire Weekend – Contra!

For the last week or so I’ve been spotting an advert that seems to be everywhere – a Polaroid of a woman in a yellow polo shirt. No text, just a photo. When you click the photo it takes you to a website with the picture maximised but no other information. Until now. That is because the Polaroid has been revealed to be the cover of the new Vampire Weekend record. Not only was this a great advertising move by the band and XL (although the album is still months away) but it’s a great photo that fits in nicely to VW’s continuity.

This was not the only bit of Vampire weekend news today as now when you click on the advert it takes you to VW’s homepage which gives us yet more details of the album. The album is called ‘Contra’ and it will be released on January 11th in the UK, a lot later than expected. Below is the tracklisting…

01 Horchata
02 White Sky
03 Holiday
04 California English
05 Taxi Cab
06 Run
07 Cousins
08 Giving Up the Gun
09 Diplomat’s Son
10 I Think Ur a Contra

I’ve already heard live versions or demos of 4 tracks and if these are anything to go by then I wouldn’t expect a huge change from the band’s previous stuff. ‘Cousins’ sounded a bit like ‘Bryn’ from their debut and Run was like ‘Blake’s got a new Face’. ‘White Sky’ sounds most interesting of the tracks I’ve heard and shows a development from the more sophisticated end of ‘Vampire Weekend’. I certainly can’t wait to hear ‘Contra’ in full this Winter.

New Radiohead e.p?

The question on everyones lips at the moment is what will be Radiohead’s new move? We know they are playing Reading and Leeds in two weeks time, and they have more European shows before theb But the big buzz is around the new songs that have leaked in the last few weeks. First we had a preview of a new song at Lattitude; It was an acoustic number and though hardly a classic it was a nice surprise. Then came a tribute to the late Harry Patch that was built around a stunning score written by Johnny.  This was an offical track released to raise money for charity – what wasn’t official was the leaking of ‘These are my twisted words’ . The track (that would have sat comfortably on Kid A or In Rainbows) got good reviews when it previewed last week and now it could be joined by an official EP if internet rumours are to be believed. The likes of NME and Pitchfork media are reporting that a new E.P called ‘Wall of Ice’ is going to be released on 17th August online. Of course Radiohead aren’t new to springing things on us (see In Rainbows) and last year Bloc party rush released their new album before thier Leeds performance, so this isn’t as crazy as it may seem. More Radiohead is only a good thing, so fingers crossed that this is all true!