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DAFT PUNK
Random Access Memories

Daft Punk‘s Random Access Memories was one of the most anticipated albums of not only the year, but maybe even ever. This of course begged the question: does it live up to the hype? The best saying for this is the good old “aim low and you’ll never be disappointed,” which, albeit somewhat demotivational, does allow for a “better than expected” result. The French duo were being very ambitious by creating such a buzz, but can we expect any less from Daft Punk? Maybe not. For everywhere Random Access Memories lacks, there is an equally smooth and velvety groove to combat it. Unfortunately, this creates a very inconsistent album that has too many lull moments for it to be an overall winner in disco music history. The whole album is layered with 70′s funk, reminiscent of those fuzzy guitar solos and sweet licks we all grew up on and this makes it an extremely fun and upbeat type of record that has been filled to the brink with A-list cameos (please see Pharrell Williams, Julian Casablancas, Nile Rodgers, Giorgio Moroder and so on). So, in the end, Daft Punk have delivered an exceptionally well marketed album, which unfortunately has an overall lacklustre feel. It is definitely worth a spin, but worth two spins? It’s up to you.

ARTIST: Daft Punk
TITLE: Random Access Memories
LABEL: Columbia
RELEASE DATE: May 21, 2013
TIME: 1:14:35 min.
WEB: http://www.daftpunk.com/
PURCHASE: price – 9.99$

01. Give Life Back to Music [04:34]
02. The Game of Love [05:22]
03. Giorgio by Moroder [09:05]
04. Within [03:49]
05. Instant Crush [05:38]
06. Lose Yourself to Dance [05:54]
07. Touch [08:19]
08. Get Lucky [06:10]
09. Beyond [04:50]
10. Motherboard [05:42]
11. Fragments of Time [04:40]
12. Doin’ It Right [04:11]
13. Contact [06:21]

PREVIEW: Daft Punk (feat. Julian Casablancas) – Instant Crush

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RS VIDEO OF THE WEEK – #157
REDRUM ALONE – OniricAct Part 3 (il leprotto remix)

ARTIST: Redrum Alone
TITLE: OniricAct Part 3 (il leprotto remix)
ALBUM: De Redrum Remixes
WEB: YouTube

directed by Fab Design

COLD WAR KIDS
Dear Miss Lonelyhearts

Here’s the 4th album from the Long Beach-based indie rockers Cold War Kids. Marking the band’s first new material since the release of 2011′s Mine Is Yours, the album was recorded in their California studio with producer Lars Stalfors (The Mars Volta, Matt & Kim) and it’s the first release to feature former Modest Mouse member Dann Gallucci, who replaced on guitars Jonathan Russell earlier this year. Dear Miss Lonelyhearts maybe doesn’t reach back far enough to the band’s less polished, indie blues-fueled Robbers & Cowards days, but it manages to integrate that sound with hints of the striving-for-stadiums pop-rock Mine Is Yours offered up. In the end it’s a good combination of styles both old and new with synths meeting guitars, semi-dance tracks and undeniably catchy piano-drum combinations. Dear Miss Lonelyhearts marks a more self-aware band: Cold War Kids seem to know where they’ve been and are steadily figuring out where they’re going.

ARTIST: Cold War Kids
TITLE: Dear Miss Lonelyheart
LABEL: Downtown
RELEASE DATE: April 2, 2013
TIME: 36:44 min.
WEB: http://www.coldwarkids.com/
PURCHASE: price – 9.99$

get it here.

RS VIDEO OF THE WEEK – #156
THE KNIFE – A Tooth for an Eye

ARTIST: The Knife
TITLE: A Tooth for an Eye
ALBUM: Shaking the Habitual
WEB: YouTube

directed by Roxy Farhat

ADULT.
The Way Things Fall

It’s been six years since the last full-length output from Detroit’s ADULT., who took a much needed and deserved hiatus, but nevertheless the husband-and-wife electronic team have returned. Adam Lee Miller and Nicola Kuperus survived several cycles of fashion, but their love of electro and kohl-eyed techno-pop is pure, unwavering and indefatigable. The Way Things Fall is filled with spiky electroclash, sparse disco-punk torch songs, pleasant enough in their own right, even if things get better when the going gets weirder: something like like an imaginary meeting of Siouxsie Sioux and Kraftwerk, or The B52s broken down and fed to Arpanet, ora again when Nicola stands her finest, most indolent/insolent vocal performances to a tough chassis of Aux88 style electro-tech.

ARTIST: ADULT.
TITLE: The Way Things Fall
LABEL: Ghostly International
RELEASE DATE: May 14, 2013
TIME: 44:13 min.
WEB: http://www.adultperiod.com/
PURCHASE: price – 9.99$

get it here.

BIBIO
Silver Wilkinson

Stephen Wilkinson seems to occupy his own universe. Using his home studio, the producer is able to craft warped, woozy nuggets of electronic pop music which seem to break rules you hadn’t even considered were capable of being broken. 2011′s full length Mind Bokeh was a fantastic return, and since then Bibio has been busy performing live and playing with his near infinite supply of gadgets. Now the producer is ready to return, with new album Silver Wilkinson: filled with eastern harmonies and highlife influenced guitar lines, this is a wonderful piece of oddball sunshine pop.

ARTIST: Bibio
TITLE: Silver Wilkinson
LABEL: Warp
RELEASE DATE: May 14, 2013
TIME: 48:59 min.
WEB: http://warp.net/records/bibio
PURCHASE: price – 9.99$

01. The First Daffodils [02:57]
02. Dye the Water Green [05:26]
03. Wulf [02:10]
04. Mirroring All [05:39]
05. À Tout à l’Heure [04:10]
06. Sycamore Silhouetting [03:17]
07. You [05:29]
08. Raincoat [04:09]
09. Look at Orion! [07:38]
10. Business Park [05:00]
11. You Won’t Remember… [03:04]

PREVIEW: Bibio – The First Daffodils

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RS VIDEO OF THE WEEK – #155
YEAH YEAH YEAHS – Sacrilege

ARTIST: Yeah Yeah Yeahs
TITLE: Sacrilege
ALBUM: Mosquito
WEB: YouTube

directed by Megaforce

RS VIDEO OF THE WEEK – #154
DAUGHTER – Still

ARTIST: Daughter
TITLE: Still
ALBUM: If You Leave
WEB: YouTube

directed by Iain Forsyth & Jane Pollard

WE ARE WOLVES
La Mort Pop Club

The electro-rock trio We Are Wolves presents a still honest and uncatchable sound: a bit like celestial lightning hitting a sacred mountaintop. Their new album La Mort Pop Club channels indescribable electric fields of postpunk adrenaline. La Mort Pop Club confirms the tight relationship the band has formed with minimalism. It flirts with fuzzy garage-punk riffs, without putting aside their usual analog experimentation and melodic constructions. Emerging from an endless trance, the wolves are back on the prowl. Video games, sports people and others in need of heavy but catchy rock: these guys are here for you.

ARTIST: We Are Wolves
TITLE: La Mort Pop Club
LABEL: Dare to Care
RELEASE DATE: February 26, 2013
TIME: 34:53 min.
WEB: http://www.wearewolves.net/
PURCHASE: price – 10.98$

01. As the Moon Sets [03:17]
02. We Are Made of Fire (sisyphus) [02:50]
03. Night [03:04]
04. Sun [04:43]
05. Angel [02:55]
06. Moving Fast [03:39]
07. Snake in the Sand [03:24]
08. Mirror [02:40]
09. Voices [04:41]
10. Sudden Little Death [03:40]

PREVIEW: We Are Wolves – Mirror

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RS VIDEO OF THE WEEK – #153
SIGUR RÓS – Brennisteinn

ARTIST: Sigur Rós
TITLE: Brennisteinn
ALBUM: Kveikur
WEB: YouTube

directed by Andrew T. Huang

OFELIADORME
Bloodroot

It comes from Italy the strongest answer to one of the likely best album of the year, Daughter‘s If You Leave. OfeliaDorme are a 4-piece from Bologna and we’re sure they’recreate some of the most beautifully dramatic pieces of music you’re going to come across. Bloodroot follows their first full-length release in 2011 titled All Harm Ends Here and it’s an album you won’t hesitate a second to call it hypnotic. Because you won’t help stopping listening to it, that’s the fact. Indie-folk? Spacey-fuzz post-rock? It doesn’t matter.

ARTIST: OfeliaDorme
TITLE: Bloodroots
LABEL: The Prisoner / Audioglobe
RELEASE DATE: March 22, 2013
TIME: 30:07 min.
WEB: http://www.ofeliadorme.it/
PURCHASE: special offer – ONLY 8.91$

01. Last Day, First Day [03:24]
02. Bloodroot [02:29]
03. Magic Ring [02:18]
04. Pumpkin Girl [02:55]
05. Brussels [05:13]
06. Ulysses [03:58]
07. Predictable [03:19]
08. Stuttering Morning [02:23]
09. Otherwise [04:08]

PREVIEW: OfeliaDorme – Ulysses

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RS VIDEO OF THE WEEK – #152
JAMES BLAKE – Retrograde

ARTIST: James Blake
TITLE: Retrograde
ALBUM: Overgrown
WEB: YouTube

directed by Martin de Thurah

RS HOT SPOT – #15
REDRUM ALONE – De Redrum Remixes

Surely you can’t have already forget one of the best album of 2012, Redrum Alone‘s De Redrum Natura. The Italian electronic duo is back with a new really appreciated gift: a collection of a bunch of remixes of their masterpiece. So here we are with De Redrum Remixes, featuring re-works by Clap! Clap!, Mars Solar, Digitalica and many others. We think it should be worth some pennies, but Redrum Alone let you download it for free (through the format “pay with a tweet / facebook share”) on their website. So, hurry up!

verified source.

RS VIDEO OF THE WEEK – #151
LAVA LAVA LOVE – Both

ARTIST: Lava Lava Love
TITLE: Both
ALBUM: Au Printemps
WEB: YouTube

directed by Stefano Piccardo

RS VIDEO OF THE WEEK – #150
VAGUE-À-BONDE – Evolved

ARTIST: Vague-à-Bonde
TITLE: Evolved
ALBUM: 222
WEB: YouTube

directed by Charlie Gerszewski

RS VIDEO OF THE WEEK – #149
FLORENCE & THE MACHINE – Spectrum

ARTIST: Florence & the Machine
TITLE: Spectrum
ALBUM: Ceremonials
WEB: YouTube

directed by David La Chapelle & John Byrne