There’s some great downloads in this set from How to Dress Well & TALA, Island Apollo, Kid Creme, Passenger Peru, Simian Ghost and Tropics. In the Soundcloud section after the jump, stream songs from Andy Butler, Calexico, Diet Cig, Glen Hansard, Mikal Cronin, Mount Eerie, Slutever, Torres and more.
How to Dress Well & TALA – The One (HTDW Version)
Passenger Peru – The Best Way to Drown
signal:noise & Jay Fay – Trunk
Simian Ghost – Echoes of Songs (For Trish Keenan)
Hope your weekend was great! Highlights of today’s Pick Your Poison include tracks from The American Spirit, Aphex Twin, Ki: Theory, La Bete Blooms, Radio Birds and WOOF. In the Soundcloud section after the jump, stream songs from Body Language, Hurry, Kate Tempest, King Woman, Marriages, Sarah Bethe Nelson and Vetiver. A.G. Cook also does a killer remix of the new Charli XCX (ft. Rita Ora) single, and Shigeto remixes a track from Hundred Waters.
The American Spirit – Wait For the Night
Aphex Twin – Diskat ALL Prepared1mixed [snr2mix]
Natasha Kmeto – The Only Time (Nine Inch Nails cover)
Every Friday, instead of sharing downloads and Soundcloud streams, we take a quick look back at the many other music-related things that happened this week in a segment that’s appropriately called “This Week in Music.” If there was a great or noteworthy music video that was released, it’ll be featured here. If an artist gave a particularly noteworthy interview, that might pop up in the links below. The same goes for interesting articles related to music, documentaries about bands, and just generally whatever might strike my fancy. If you’ve got something fun or important related to an artist that you think should be mentioned here, shoot me an email! All the information you need is in the sidebar on the right. So here’s this week’s wrap-up. Click the links below, and you’ll be off!
YouTube Audio Stream: Burial – Temple Sleeper
Music Video: Ex Hex – Don’t Wanna Lose
Stream an 80-minute set from Panda Bear, recorded last May at Brooklyn’s Warsaw
Music Video: Interpol – Everything Is Wrong
Jack White is getting his own Topps baseball card
Music Video: Viet Cong – Silhouettes
Music Video: The Weeknd – Earned It (NSFW)
Watch an interview between Sleater-Kinney and the girls of Broad City
Music Video: Charli XCX ft. Rita Ora – Doing It
Some delightful downloads in this set of music come from Dan Deacon, Grand Lake Islands, Joey Bada$$, Taylor Locke, Tep No and Valise. In the Soundcloud section after the jump, stream songs from Ava Luna, The Babies, Daniel Rossen, Elliot Moss, Marching Church, The Mountain Goats, Quarterbacks, Ron Flieger and The Sonics.
Annalibera – Black Cat White Cat
Dan Deacon – Feel the Lightning
The Fraidies – Never Love Again (It’s Doubtful)
Hidden in the Sun – San Francisco Blues
Joey Bada$$ – Born Day (AquariUS)
Little Daylight – Be Long (Twice As Nice Remix)
Mackenzie Shivers – Orphan Song
Taylor Locke – Time Stands Still
It seems like I say this every year, but there’s absolutely no way that the Class of 2015 will be able to top the Class of 2014 in terms of overall success. If you’re looking at statistics and equations, it’s pretty much a mathematical impossibility. And you know what? That’s perfectly okay. In fact, I’ve gone out of my way to select artists for this year’s class who will probably not catapult to the top of the charts and get nominated for copious amounts of Grammys. It’s never been a popularity contest, even if some of the artists have become massively popular anyways. The goal of the “Class of…” project is to shine a light onto bands and musicians who are deserving and likely to receive strong raises in their profiles over the course of any given calendar year. The expectation is that they have the talent and promise to do great things, of course whether or not they actually accomplish them is another matter entirely, as a few have turned out to be duds or late bloomers. Either way, all of the 10 artists named are kept under careful watch by yours truly, and you’ll be able to find out about their latest and greatest happenings for the next 12 months right here on the site with periodic updates as to their progress.
I’m tremendously excited to reveal the Class of 2015 below. While the goal is to offer up a diverse array of talents across many different genres, I couldn’t help but notice a small theme with a majority of this year’s class. Should projections prove true, 2015 will be a big year for 70’s style folk singer-songwriters. If David Bowie’s glam rock era helped define 2014’s main sound, the intimate and personal songs of Nick Drake and Harry Nilsson may be where we’re headed next. I mean, if Sufjan Stevens can pop his head up from wherever he’s been hiding to announce a new album that’s a “return to his folk roots,” then like the groundhog it must be a signal of things to come. Rest assured though that everything below is not exclusively for bedroom headphone listening. So without further ado, let’s jump right in and meet the Class of 2015!
There’s some great downloads in this set you won’t want to miss from 8th Grader, Gorgeous Bully, The Last 24, Riva Ridge and Tim Myers. In the Soundcloud section after the jump, stream songs from Bjorn Torske, Carmen Villain, Jose Gonzalez, KOPPS, Marika Hackman, Mew, Santiparro (ft. Will Oldham) and St. Vincent.
Human in Bloom – All the Fish (Live)
The Last 24 – StrangerInMyHead
Love in the Dark – Colorblind Mastermind
Reighnbeau x BK Beats – That Look
The site was “off” for Martin Luther King Day yesterday, but we’re back in style today. Highlights in this set come from Arca, Chromatics, KNTRLR, Lowin and Radical Dads. In the Soundcloud section after the jump, stream songs from Bells Atlas (covering Future Islands), Bils., Cheatahs, Oscar, Sannhet, Sharon Van Etten, Yak and more.
Hollywood Principle – Find Me Out
Matthew O’Neill – Campfire Cook
You’re not going to want to miss downloads in this set from Black Dave, Hanni El Khatib & Freddie Gibbs, Kin Cayo, Project Pablo, Twin Wave and We Do This. In the Soundcloud section after the jump, stream songs from C Duncan, Dinner, In Tall Buildings, Jason Molina (ft. Will Oldham & Alasdair Roberts), Jonathan Emile (ft. Kendrick Lamar), Marika Hackman, Mikky Ekko and Vision Fortune.
Black Dave – Respect the Intellect
Green Sky Accident – Sundrench
Hanni El Khatib & Freddie Gibbs – Satin Black
Irontom – In the Day and the Dark
Misteur Valaire – Known By Sight (Beat Market Remix)
The Velocity Gospel – Sisyphus
It seems like with each new year, the “Class of…” project gets stronger. That’s pretty much by design, though when I first introduced the Class of 2014 I wasn’t so confident it was going to work out. The Class of 2013 had set the bar almost impossibly high, what with now household names like Haim, Chvrches, Little Green Cars and Savages all part of that universe. Yet this past year’s group of 10 artists not only managed to hold their own, but one in particular rode the train to stardom and the third biggest selling record of 2014. And to think that when I made the introduction last Januaryu nobody had any idea who this artist was, to the point where a show was booked for a tiny 350 capacity venue and it took awhile to sell out. I’ll tell you all about that, and recap how the other nine artists in the Class of 2014 did after the jump!
Highlights of this mid-week edition of Pick Your Poison include tracks from Baby Baby, Best Girl Athlete, Paperhaus, Puzzlecut and Warning Light. In the Soundcloud section after the jump, stream songs from Cylinder, Dutch Uncles, Grooms, Inventions, Moonbabies, Moon King, A Place to Bury Strangers and Tsembla.
Death By Icon – Conundrum (Remix)
Pink Feathers ft. SPEAK – The Feeling’s Gone (Eau Claire Remix)
Puzzlecuts – The End Is A Vicious Thing
Sirius Blvck – Tribe Quest (ft. Oreo Jones & DMA)
Don’t miss highlights in this set from Acid Baby Jesus, Chastity Belt, Diamond Rugs, Durante, Low Low Low La La La Love Love Love and Miss Kenichi. In the Soundcloud section after the jump, stream cuts from Django Django, Iron & Wine, Joe Pug, Marika Hackman, Phosphorescent, Wand, Waxahatchee and Years & Years.
Acid Baby Jesus – Ayahuasca Blues
Chastity Belt – Time to Go Home
Dream Circle – School of Life (ft. Johnny Voltik)
Jasmine Jordan – Best I Can (ft. Habit Blcx)
Low Low Low La La La Love Love Love – Burrow
Following up Friday’s post-holidays mega edition of Pick Your Poison, I’m pleased to announce that this segment will continue to be a daily post every Monday through Thursday throughout 2015. While that may be good news for those of you who rely on Pick Your Poison to discover new music, there’s also going to be a slight change in the format of it this year as well. First, in terms of content, there will be less of an emphasis on downloadable mp3s and a greater emphasis on streaming songs. That’s less a decision I want to make and more one that I’ve been forced to, seeing as how I’m starting to have some trouble filling these posts with halfway decent content even though they’re only four days a week. Artists are offering less downloads these days and more Soundcloud or YouTube streams, so that’s the direction this segment will also begin to move towards. Secondly, say goodbye to Pick Your Poison intros. The last couple of years, I’ve been using the opening paragraphs of each edition to talk about something happening in the world of music, to help preview a concert happening in Chicago, to talk about what new albums are being released on any given week, and other things. That ends today. This is the last proper introduction I’ll give for a Pick Your Poison segment in 2015. From here on out, all writing done for this segment will simply list off some of the featured downloads and streams. If you’re looking for show previews, commentary on important music news stories, links to interesting and fun music videos and other quality content, those will still exist on the site, they’re just getting their own separate posts from here on out. As a result, the amount of content being posted on Faronheit will increase a bit. I’m not going to go into what some of the new posts and segments will be about, except to say that the goal will be providing you with things that are unique, fun and engaging. Sound good? Okay then, let’s dig into this Monday edition of Pick Your Poison. Important tracks in this set come from As Lions, Busses, Meaxic, Panda Elliot and Stamping Mill. In the Soundcloud section after the jump, stream songs from Action Bronson, Atelje, Butch Walker, Charli XCX, The Dodos, Future Brown (ft. Tink), iLoveMakonnen and Swervedriver.
Broken Luxury – Bartender (T-Pain cover)
Gorgeous Bully – 2 Broke 2 Old
Mista Bibs & Fabian Dubz – Candy
Hello friends, and welcome to the first edition of Pick Your Poison for 2015! The site has been on vacation all this week following the holidays and Listmas, but since the songs are piling up I thought I’d release a quick batch to you now. Technically speaking, we’ll get back to business as usual on Monday the 12th, which includes the daily editions of Pick Your Poison, plus hopefully some other content such as album reviews, show reviews and the like. The hope is to make some changes and innovations to the site this year, and while I won’t make any outright promises on that, I suppose we’ll deal with that when it comes around. So please enjoy this expanded edition of Pick Your Poison to kick off your weekend, and rest assured there’s more to come! Some key tracks in this set come from A.G. Cook, Brad Reiman, Cara Mitchell, Franklin, Myself When Young and Panda Elliot. In the Soundcloud section after the jump, stream songs from Chief Ghoul, The Courtesans, Diet Cig, The Dough Rollers, The Go! Team, Joey Bada$$, Kyle Cox, Oh Wonder, POP ETC, Ryley Walker, Shady Elders, Teen Daze, Young Ejecta and more.
Brad Reiman – A Vacation From My Mind
Dada Life – Born to Rage (North Korea version)
Diplo – Everyday (Screwed by Rissa Boo)
Diplo – Revolution (Unlike Pluto Remix)
In All Honesty – Hold On to You
Irontom – Feel Good Inc. (Gorillaz cover)
Myself When Young – I Wish I Was
The North Country – The Cross We Bear
Orange Drink – Intergenerational Same-Sex Love Song
Pink Feathers ft. Spencer Ludwig – Can’t Cry These Tears (Garbage cover)
Rec Center & Tracy Shedd – What Are You Doing New Years Eve?
This is it! The final post of 2014 also marks the conclusion of Listmas and specifically this Top 50 Albums of 2014 countdown. It’s been a long road with plenty of bumps and delays along the way, but we’ve finally reached the peak of this imaginary mountain. At this point I’d like to give a special thank you to everyone who read something, clicked on something or downloaded something here at Faronheit over 2014. All of the content that’s posted here is for you to discover and enjoy, and I’m grateful for anyone who visits with that intention. It hasn’t been the best year for the site content-wise, but the hope is to generate more and return to form in 2015. Typically I’d tease a bunch of new features and exciting things in development for next year, but honestly most of that stuff either gains no traction or simply falls off never to be heard from again, so let’s just stick to the mantra of more everything and go from there.
So what can I say about these Top 10 Albums of 2014? Well, like the other entries in this list, there’s plenty of variety in terms of genre and style. It goes from weird to fun to noisy to sexy to relaxing to adventurous and back again. If you’ve been following me on Instagram these last few weeks, you’ve been given access to an early preview of the eclectic Top 5, though I can assure you that #6-10 are as equally exciting and wonderful. And hey, while I wasn’t able to write a lot of album and show reviews this year, some of the ones I did write about make an appearance here. Also worth mentioning: a particular pair of artists who are members of my Class of 2014 had an exceptionally great year, helping to continue to support that program. So I’m not going to spend any extra time talking this up. Please join me past the jump for the big reveal of my absolute favorite albums of the year.
The time between Christmas and New Year’s is always a dead zone. Very little gets scheduled or happens in the pop culture world during this period unless you’re talking about all the movies the studios release in a last ditch effort to qualify for awards season. The music industry is particularly quiet, with no album releases and no high profile shows. The big holiday bashes are over, and nobody wants to get right back to touring after taking a couple of days off for Christmas and such. Yet in this rather subdued week or so, there’s inevitably a fun little thing or two that pops up on the radar that seems to boast the attitude of, “Why not?” And so it was, on a chilly Saturday night in Chicago that the trio of local bands Wavepool, Minor Characters and Empires gathered together at Lincoln Hall for a show that helped wrap up a successful year for all three acts.
While I didn’t arrive in time for most of Wavepool’s set, I want to give them a quick mention as they were on the bill and deserve a little love and support. They’re a relatively new emo/punk band, but are starting to build a following thanks to some shows around town and a couple of songs released via Bandcamp. The couple of songs I managed to catch upon arriving at Lincoln Hall were quick, hard-hitting and fun. Here’s hoping that bigger and better things are in their future.
Stream and download a pair of songs from Wavepool via Bandcamp
Speaking of bands with a bigger and better future, Minor Characters had a pretty solid 2014 overall. They began it with a Kickstarter campaign to help raise funds to get their debut LP Voir Dire mastered and released, which was quite successful. While I wasn’t able to review it this year, I’ll say this much: it’s a beautifully composed record that grows on you over time. My only real issue with the album is that it fails to fully capture the excitement and intensity with which the band performs these songs in a live setting. I actually saw Minor Characters back in October when they headlined a show at The Hideout for their album release party, and noticed the difference between the recorded and live versions immediately. Simply put, it feels like their music was composed for the stage, and that is where they excel and seem to be most at home. Perhaps that’s also because they’ve been playing most of these songs for years now, but only recently got around to recording them. Their set at Lincoln Hall on Saturday only furthered that assertion, as just about every song teemed with such forceful power and emotion that you couldn’t help but be drawn in. Their vocal harmonies were top notch too, in particular on a song like “Neighbors,” which elevates things to another level. To me, it also says something about a band if the other members sing along with the lead vocalist whether a microphone is in front of them or not. Just like when a die-hard fan does the same thing in the crowd, it shows that you’re passionate about the material. So yes, Minor Characters put on a great show. It’s just a shame they haven’t really been able to do much in the way of touring this year, so other states and venues might have the chance to see them at their best. Maybe that’ll happen in 2015 if we’re lucky.
Buy Voir Dire on vinyl or on iTunes.
Empires did embark on a national tour in 2014, and that was just one of several things that went right for them this year. They released an album called Orphan to solid critical acclaim. They were on Letterman and played Bonnaroo and the Austin City Limits Music Festival, among other places. Their singles “How Good Does It Feel” and “Please Don’t Tell My Lover” received national and international radio airplay. Those are just some highlights that tell you this is definitely a band that’s on their way up to the big leagues. So when you have a year like Empires did, a hometown show is a perfect way to celebrate those many accomplishments and wrap everything up in a nice little bow. The crowd at Lincoln Hall was primed for their performance, and the band was more than happy to deliver a high energy, catalog spanning set that perfectly showcased their strengths. It really was quite thrilling to watch, and a remarkable improvement on the show of theirs I saw back in the spring. An extensive amount of touring will do that to a band, as all the members learn how to best click with one another in service of a song, plus how to extract the most out of every performance. Empires are now a well oiled machine, and lead vocalist Sean Van Vleet is the wild-haired ringleader at the center of it all. He wasn’t just singing the songs, but throwing them out into the universe with the sort of gusto and celebratory nature often reserved for big name stadium bands. Empires may very well get there some day, and the effortless blend between pop and rock on Orphan is definitely a start in that direction. At various points during their set I recalled bands like The National, The Killers and U2, and not just because certain songs sounded similar. It was there in the style, the energy and even a bit in the vocals too. Throwing it all out there with such wild abandon can become a powerful elixir and really work the crowd into a frenzy. Given that they were playing in front of friends, well-wishers and others right here at home, of course things got a bit rowdy. What impressed me most was how many old songs that Empires included throughout the show, including a couple they hadn’t played in years, and how a majority of fans not only expressed excitement at this prospect, but sang along to every word as well. That’s the sort of devotion this band has sustained for several years now, and at this point it’s thrilling to think about how much farther they can go and how much more they can do once 2015 rolls around.
Buy Orphan from iTunes or on CD/vinyl.
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