Date Released: November 24, 2008
Album Genre: Electro, House
Album Rating: 8/10
Sounds Like: Daft Punk, Soulwax, Busy P, MSTRKRFT

Semi-album review for you, not really. The show I mentioned before in Montreal, which technically was part of Justice‘s tour was kind of different. You can’t really consider this a “new album”, at least not completely, but more as a mixtape cause it’s obviously a recording from their live show. So don’t get overly excited for new material, but more refined material of their previous tracks. Kind of like Daft Punk’s Alive 2007. A documentary DVD is also out which I’ve mentioned before.

This album was phenomenal and is well worth it. A new take on their best tracks, kind of in order of their debut album. The show obviously starting with Genesis. Most epic entrance ever, I thought the same when I initially heard their studio album. Phantom Part 1.5 was amazing, I couldn’t ask for more. It’s a loop of a mid part of the Phantom beat, I guess both parts 1 and 2 have the same idea, but it had this freaky Dracula-esque beat half way through which caught me off guard in a good way. They really love the D.A.N.C.E rehearsal version which took up most of that track, in part 2 they got the beat from MSTRKRFT which continues on into DVNO. I could not believe One Minute To Midnight. It was such a little change too, the repetition beat, but it works so well. The end of the track sends shivers up my spine. The Party sounds completely different, I have no idea where they sampled that beat but I’d like to know. Stress sounded way better, I think they sampled a bit from the Auto remix of the song. I definitely heard parts of the Soulwax remix in the Phantom Part 2 track. I can’t even imagine being there when they pulled out with their encore with the piano track of We Are Your Friends followed by Soulwax and SoKo? I don’t even know, they must’ve went wild by then. No, I’m not providing download links at the moment to any of the tracks unless I get permission from Justice.

1. Intro
2. Genesis
3. Phantom Part 1
4. Phantom Part 1.5
5. D.A.N.C.E.
6. D.A.N.C.E. Part 2
7. DVNO
8. Waters Of Nazareth
9. One Minute To Midnight
10. Tthhee Ppaarrttyy
11. Let There Be Lite
12. Stress
13. We Are Your Friends (Reprises)
14. Waters Of Nazareth
15. Phantom Part 2
16. Encore
17. NY Excuse (Soulwax/Justice Remix)
18. Justice X Metallica

Justice – Phantom Part 1.5

Justice – D.A.N.C.E. Part 2

Justice – One Minute To Midnight

Justice – We Are Your Friends (Reprise)

Buy it here! Support Justice cause they need booze.
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Date Released: April 22, 2008
Album Genre: Indie Rock, Indie, Garage Rock
Album Rating: 6/10
Sounds Like: We Are Scientists, Bloc Party, Wolf Parade

So I waited for more than a year for their debut album, one thing I can say is they didn’t change much, although they changed enough to be noticeable. I was slightly scared they’d completely change their style to appeal to a larger audience. Although please change a tiny bit for your next album. If you listened to any Tokyo Police Club beforehand, this album is very much true to them and there isn’t really any other way I can describe it. It’s reminiscent of the Canadian indie rock scene in their own way really. I had no choice but to give it an average rating because I was simply expecting a bit more. To be honest, I actually preferred their A Lesson In Crime EP which they released a year earlier.

Tessellate, Your English Is Good, or Sixties Remake probably would’ve been better choices to use as an intro to the album. It’s almost a cross between the tracks in their EP and this album. All three tracks are definitely more attractive, upbeat, and just aren’t as bland as Centennial. Actually the first four tracks of this album were rather bland and similar to each other. I didn’t even know I was five tracks into the album when I reached Tessellate. But after this point, everything changed pretty quickly to my liking. The Harrowing Adventures Of… and Nursey Academy had a completely different feel, something needed. Your English Is Good might be my favorite track from this album, with Tessellate at a close second. This album reminds me of winter for some strange reason, which is probably why I waited till now to write about it.

Tokyo Police Club – Tessellate

Tokyo Police Club – Your English Is Good

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Date Released: April 11, 2008
Album Genre: Indie, Indie Rock, Alternative
Album Rating: 7/10
Sounds Like: The Unicorns, Wolf Parade

The Islands, a Canadian indie band from Montreal instantly caught my attention when I initially heard them. Actually, the first time I heard them they were The Unicorns and their debut album as the Islands was basically a fourth album to The Unicorns. This album has a completely different feel from their past style, almost a more refined and studio produced guitar rock sound. But it still includes the “jam session” feel they always had, so they haven’t lost themselves. Similar to how I felt with The Strokes third album First Impressions of Earth, I really had to get used to this album. At first I can’t say I liked it much but I really grew to love it. So give it a chance.

Their signature song to their new style I guess, The Arm was a good start to the album. Instantly you can hear it’s more refined and concentrated on a more guitar rock style, but part way through the song you’ll still hear remnants of their old style. It sounds like it should be part of the soundtrack of a modern Western. A similar sound with J’aime Vous Voire Quitter though swaying towards indie pop. I actually didn’t mind the slower songs in this album like Pieces of You, Creeper, and Kids Don’t Know Shit, which is quite a surprise. Mostly because they weren’t plainly slow, but had variety within the track. The next few songs after number eight took a very different turn in style. I felt In the Rushes was quite the unique song, I’m not sure if it was the violin plucking or completely different sound and rhythm, but I really liked it. We Swim completely reminded me of Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven. It really doesn’t sound like it at all, but I constantly hear it when I listen to this song. The last three songs sound almost like they were recorded during a jam session, not that I’d call them disorganized, but it’s a nice slow end to the album.

Islands – The Arm

Islands – In The Rushes

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Date Released: October 4, 2008
Album Genre: Electronic, Pop, Synthpop
Album Rating: 6/10
Sounds Like: David Bowie

I first heard Walking on a Dream by Empire of the Sun and instantly loved it. Though I was really hoping the rest of the album would’ve sounded like that track it was very different. I actually think that’s a quality in any band’s debut album which is good. Hopefully they choose the right path to take when they define their style. The band consists of Luke Steele of The Sleepy Jackson and Nick Littlemore of Pnau, I’m sure you’ve heard of Pnau before. Steele’s vocals vaguely reminds me of David Bowie. Similar to the Walter Meego album review I posted, I was a bit disappointed with the slower songs in the album but that’s my personal taste. If you like the slower pop songs, you’d probably like most of this album.

There were also two instrumental ballades Delta Bay and Country. I actually liked Country which was surprisingly out of place, but it was nice to listen to. Standing on the Shore, Walking on a Dream, and Half Mast all have the electro sound which I love. The album really moves away from that style after these tracks. We Are The People and Tiger By My Side had more of an “indie garage band” sound which reminded me more of The Kooks. I decided to include one track of each type, I’ve already posted their song Walking on a Dream in a previous post if you want to check it out.

1. Standing on the Shore (4/5)
2. Walking on a Dream (5/5)
3. Half Mast (4/5)
4. We Are the People (5/5)
5. Delta Bay (2/5)
6. Country (4/5)
7. The World (2/5)
8. Swordfish Hotkiss Nite (2/5)
9. Tiger By My Side (5/5)
10. Without You (3/5)

Empire of the Sun – Half Mast

Empire of the Sun – We Are The People

Maybe next time they’ll make it easier to buy the album.
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Date Released: May 27, 2008
Album Genre: Electronic, Pop, Synthpop
Album Rating: 7/10
Sounds Like: Sam Sparro, Cut Copy, Chromeo

I mentioned before I’d post more of Walter Meego. Not a single person, this duo consists of Justin Sconza the vocals/guitar and Colin Yarck, where both of them do keyboards. Well, this album has it’s strengths and weaknesses, and completely by preference. There were some songs I couldn’t get enough of, then there were others which I skipped over. That is the main reason this album got a ’7′ and I think if you like soft synthpop, you’d probably give this an album an eight instead. There were two types of songs; the fast paced very electro songs and then the slow pop songs. I guess they were really going for variety in this album, being their first true debut album, it was probably a good idea to test the water.

Forever is probably one of my favorite songs from this album, the first I heard from Walter Meego. It’s got the right mix of electro and pop. I loved Girls, something about how this song was made. Even before I listened to this song, I could sing along to it. If anything, it was a very natural song as synth as it was. I had this song stuck in my head the whole day, one of their catchier songs for sure. Somewhat similar to the two songs, Wanna Be a Star took a similar approach except it’s almost completely pop. As the album goes on, it changes a bit, somewhat more towards electro and also slow tempo pop songs. Lost is an instrumental track that I really liked, a sign that this album was taking a different turn. Letting Go reminds me of Chromeo. Out of all the slow songs which I mostly gave 2-3, Baby Please is the only one I liked. It’s only slow for a bit as well. I included Girls and Wanna Be a Star for you to get a taste of Walter Meego. My favorite song Forever has already been posted in a previous post. Overall the album was enjoyable, it could have done without the slow tracks.

Walter Meego – Girls

Walter Meego – Wanna Be a Star

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Album Genre: Electro, Pop, Indie

Hailing from Los Angeles, Uh Huh Her is an electro-pop duo made up of Camila Grey and Leisha Hailey of Murmur fame. Their 2nd release, Common Reaction, is out now and they’ll be supporting it with a North American Tour that kicks off on October 17th in California.

Laced with an eclectic mix of songs, Common Reaction is accessible by even the most difficult to please of music enthusiasts. The girls merge ambient synths with bass lines that snap and sultry vocals with heart pounding beats with ease. This is an album you can sing and dance to.

It’s so much fun to be able to start with a drum track and literally build something out of nothing. I’m really drawn to layering instruments and seeing how they all relate to one another. - Camila Grey

The girls play multiple instruments, which enables them to layer each song with distinct signature style. Though they didn’t set out to write pop songs, these tracks are undeniably catchy and one can’t help but to be reeled in by their melodic qualities. Grey, who is no stranger to the studio, lends her producing talent to the album as well. It is obvious that each track is carefully crafted and perfected and yet there is an organic feel and flow to the record that is both humble and inviting.

“Not A Love Song” is the first single off the record and can easily be spun in clubs, “Covered” is more of a layered rock song with Grey and Hailey’s super smooth vocals overlapping each other and “Explode” is melodic with a consistent twisting synth line.

Definitely a plethora of tracks that would make for awesome remixes. Have a listen . . .

1. Not A Love Song
2. Explode
3. Wait Another Day
4. Common Reaction
5. Say So
6. Covered
7. Everyone
8. Away From Here
9. So Long
10. Dance With Me
11. Dreamer

Uh Huh Her – Not A Love Song

Uh Huh Her – Explode

Uh Huh Her – Covered

Buy Uh Huh Her’s Common Reaction here . . .
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aubreyarenas

If you didn’t know, a devote Daft Punk fan Mathieu decided to put together a fan video of Daft Punk’s live show in Palais Omnisports Bercy, Paris. It’s old news. Definitely one of the biggest and best tributes by a fan in my opinion to Daft Punk. Twenty thousand people showed up to this show! I went to see this show back in Summer ’07 in Toronto and it was definitely one of the most epic shows I’ve ever seen. They really know how to build their fans up, especially the fact that they hadn’t toured in ten years.

Anyways, this is a little bit of a side post away from posting tracks all the time, though kind of a mix with the album review posts. This fan video came and passed on theworldisdaft.com, and since then it’s been spread through Youtube and bittorrent. And yes, it’s completely legal before people start gasping that I posted a torrent from The Pirate Bay. Right? Oh no, well this gray area will be solved soon. Not surprisingly Daft Punk loved it, quite the different reaction that Prince would’ve had. I love how they still know that music isn’t elitism but the experience which should be shared.

That was very exciting, because we started out trying to really do something experimental, this show, and a very new, almost experimental thing happened, with people appropriating these images and posting thousands of clips, not just of Coachella but of all the subsequent shows. [...] At the same time, from a video point of view, that’s one of the reasons we decided not to release a DVD, because we felt that the amount of data and video that was online was much more compelling from these different points of view than anything that we could have captured ourselves. -daft punk

Links:
Youtube
PAL
NTSC
FLV
DivX

It’s all clips taken from fans from the concert, some of them shaky of course. But it’s definitely as close as you can get to the real thing without being there. Though if Daft Punk did release a DVD, I’d definitely buy it. Watching some of it sends shivers up my spine. Included three of my favorite tracks.

Date Released: December 4, 2007
Album Genre: French House, Electronic
Album Rating: 9/10
Sounds Like: Justice, The Chemical Brothers, Basement Jaxx, Simian Mobile Disco

I had a hard time giving this album a rating cause I almost felt as though I was rating the show and not the album itself. Anyways, it gets a 9 tentatively, though it’s a very confused rating.

1. Robot Rock / Oh Yeah
2. Touch It / Technologic
3. Television Rules The Nation / Crescendolls
4. Too Long / Steam Machine
5. Around The World / Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger
6. Burnin’ / Too Long
7. Face To Face / Short Circuit
8. One More Time / Aerodynamic
9. Aerodynamic Beats / Gabrielle, Forget About The World
10. Prime Time Of Your Life / Brainwasher / Rollin’ and Scratchin’ / Alive
11. Da Funk / Dadftendirekt
12. Superheroes / Human After All / Rock’n Roll

Daft Punk – Television Rules the Nation / Crescendolls (Live)

Daft Punk – Around the World / Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger (Live)

Daft Punk – Superheroes / Human After All / Rock’n Roll (Live)

Buy Daft Punk’s Alive 2007 here!
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Date Released: July 22, 2008
Album Genre: Indie rock, Alternative, Synth
Album Rating: 6/10
Sounds Like: New Young Pony Club, Bondo do Role, The Teenagers

For all of you who somehow got an early version of this album, it’s not real. If Jager Yoga is an instrumental ballad it’s not real at all. You think CSS would do that? I just want to put it out there for those who made a judgment on the album without listening to the real thing.

First impression? It’s not as bad as people say, it was decent. I think this album will separate the old fans from the new. From their self-titled debut album, they sounded almost dance electro grunge indie. The synth and raw unusual sounds in their first album is why I think they made it so big from the underground into the indie scene. This has been somewhat toned down in their upcoming album Donkey. You could say the sound has been somewhat refined from their debut album. It might be the influence of having an actual large label backing them up this time or the fact that they thought they had to appeal to a larger audience, but I felt as though they shed some of their older synth filled tracks with strange lyrics to replace it with an almost garage indie sound with very little risk taken for any of the tracks. CSS might have to clean up their live act though cause I have a feeling their audience will switch from ecstasy filled dance crazed adolescents to mellow cigarette smoking youth. I have mixed feelings about this album, so I included three tracks so you could make your own decision.

The album starts out with a different sound instantly, you could hear it with Jager Yoga. Much more refined, at times I even thought it was a different band. Followed by the track that CSS leaked themselves, I’m sure most people who have listened to CSS have heard this song. It’s got so much hype alone already I won’t even post it as one of the tracks, one of the best tracks in the album though. Again, the track is more garage indie than what they used to sound like, I don’t think there was any synth in this track. I felt Let’s Ragaee All Night was like a censored version of CSS, with “If you want a friend, we can drink in the afternoon”, the same went for Give Up. It’s like their label told them to tone it down and they agreed. But they decided to spark things up with Left Behind, though I really wish the lyrics were a bit more raw than they are. You’re not married yet Lovefoxxx, still some time to live it out. I felt Beautiful Song was one of the prettier songs of the album, I guess thus the title. Titles don’t always match the songs! How I Became Paranoid sounds somewhat different, can I even place this in the pop genre? I Fly is a great track, it should define what their new style is, simply refined. Back to their roots, Believe Achieve and Air Painter is full of synth chords and familiar vocals but still has what it seems CSS is going towards, it’s the combination of both old and new sounds I think CSS should’ve done throughout the album.

CSS – Jager Yoga

CSS – I Fly

CSS – Air Painter

Get CSS’s second album Donkey here!

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Date Released: July 22, 2008
Album Genre: Indie Pop, Rock, Synth
Album Rating: 5/10
Sounds Like: Vampire Weekend, MGMT, The Wombats, New Young Pony Club

So Black Kids will be releasing their debut album next week on July 22nd. We’ve heard a lot about them from this part of the scene, with remixes coming from all over including The Twelves and Beige, and we’ve see a bunch of remixes from them as well. My first impression of this album was that it was okay. I really expected more from Black Kids with the singles they’ve released so far. I have a feeling we’ll be hearing a couple of their tracks on the radio either here or in the UK. None of the songs were bad, but at the same time, not many of them really caught my attention. They’ve really landed themselves into an almost groove style which they could very much call it theirs, but I felt like some of the songs sounded the same. I enjoyed listening to this album though, so it’s definitely something you should check out. But don’t overestimate this album, that’s what ruins most albums in my opinion.

The album starts out with Hit The Heatbrakes. It’ll definitely be the style that will help define Black Kids, it sounds everything like what we’ve heard from them so far. Partie Traumatic is a bit more of a surprise, with a couple more sounds from the piano and other instruments, I rather enjoyed this track. I’m sure you’ve heard of both my favorite tracks in this album, Hurricane Jane and I’m Not Going To Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You. Both tracks are fantastic, though I didn’t really listen to the lyrics closely until recently. Kind of confused girl with boy, how typical of me. Sounding somewhat similar is Love Me Already, I don’t know. It’s probably the reason I like it. I Wanna Be Your Limousine had some interesting sounds, that “ohh eeh ohhh ohh” sounds familiar to something else I’ve listened to. Overall it was enjoyable, loads of tracks very much indicative of Black Kids, though some variety would help boost their album up a little.

Black Kids – Partie Traumatic

Black Kids – Hurricane Jane

Black Kids – I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You

Buy Black Kids’ debut album Partie Traumatic here!
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Date Released: July 8, 2008
Album Genre: Alternative Rock, Alternative, Indie
Album Rating: 8/10
Sounds Like: The Flaming Lips, Gorillaz, The White Stripes

So I’ve been hearing a lot about Beck lately with this album and wanted to see what the hype was about. I guess you strangely hear a lot about Beck regardless though. I actually wasn’t planning to write anything about this album but I couldn’t help myself. Seems he’s genre-hopped into almost shoegaze rock, which I actually really like. That’s the feeling I got from a couple of the tracks and ballads he had in this album. Mind you the last time I listened to Beck it was his album Guero where I was more confused with what genre he was going for because before I thought he was British and from the late 70′s from listening to Odelay overplaying The New Pollution. This was before I knew what music really was, so don’t hurt me. Overall the album was great chillout music, as for comparing it to the other Beck albums I feel I’m under qualified to give you that.

I was a bit disappointed that Chan was a bit drowned out in the tracks she was featured in. I guess she did some of the background vocals or “humming”, but I would’ve enjoyed hearing her sing a little more in Orphans or Walls. The “oohhh, aaAahhh” just wasn’t enough. Gamma Ray was a track that I would’ve considered Beck without having to listened to his other stuff. Chemtrails and Modern Guilt would have to be two of my favorite tracks in this album. Chemtrails sparked up images of something like The Flaming Lips, kind of a dazy soft rock. Modern Guilt reminds me of 70′s rock, another track that I’d like to put Beck more as. Almost like a gradual change, the album starts out kind of bass dominated shoegaze and becomes something more almost like The White Stripes towards the end. I couldn’t help but think this with Soul of a Man or Profanity Prayers.

Beck ft. Cat Power – Orphans

Beck – Chemtrails

Beck – Modern Guilt

Buy Beck’s Modern Guilt album here!
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