actually, my name's marina

marina and the diamonds has been on my blog to-do list for quite some time now. of all of the female blog-pop acts to emerge over the past year or so (florence and the machine, ellie goulding, etc.), she is actually the one i have highest hopes for in terms of commercial success. could be her voice. could be her looks. i don't know. call it a feeling.

her debut album the family jewels comes out feb. 15 and is preceded by single "hollywood" on february 1. the single is already racking up the club remixes and i figured it was time to have another "clash of the remixes" feature on some of the best. let's dig in...


first up, we have the video for the original for reference:



jaunty and uplifting in spite of the slightly cynical lyrics. a swell starter for the album.

but like marina's past work (see also the wonderful "mowgli's road"), it sparkles even brighter in club-ready form. i don't know what it is about artists and producers that are able to transform her songs into such bangers but i'm not about to start complaining now.

first up is a remix by UK electro-poppers fenech-soler. inverting the verse and chorus over bombastic dance beat, they completely reinvent the track as a fiery floor-filling rager that demands to be blasted at eleven.

oh. my. god. doesn't quite cover it.

you can hear that over at neon gold records.

up next is the juan maclean's version of the track. it's competent but feels rather pedestrian and predictable marina's voice feels too big for the dfa-by-numbers backing track and begs to bust out into something a lot more propulsive and energetic.

this one can be found here courtesy of electronic rumors.

and finally, we've got the most recent take on the song by marina's fellow neon gold upstarts, the mysterious monarchy. it doesn't announce itself as strongly as the fenech-soler version but it has a perfectly lovely disco glide that evokes memories of some of fred falke's better work from the past year. i can't say it yet, but i'm fairly positive that this one will emerge as my favorite of the bunch with more time.

but what do i know? grab this one over at discodust and decide for yourself which of the three is your personal favorite. feel free to let me know in the comments.

and for the sake of symmetry, here's a video for marina's acoustic version of the regional. quite nice, it is:

first impressions: four tet - there is love in you

* this first impression comes courtesy of mr. keiran hebeden himself, who is streaming his gorgeous new album in full at his own website.

we're roughly five years removed from the release of hebeden's last album of new four tet material. such a long hibernation may have been wise if not necessary to distance himself from those pesky "folktronica" labels that kept following him around no matter which musical direction he opted to take after 2001's pause. fortunately, the moment of pause is long over and the future of four tet is here. there is love in you is a sublime slice of ethereal dance-floor bliss...



notes upon first listen:

• "angel echoes" is probably one of the most beautiful things i've heard in recent memory. deceptively repetitive, its looping vocal clips and synth shards keep layering over each other little by little as the song progresses to a positively hypnotic crescendo.
  
• i still think i slightly prefer joy orbison's take* on "love cry." won't hold that against the original though.
• i swear "circling" is a dead ringer for "one for you" by the knife, only with harps in place of xylophones
• speaking of the knife, the vocals that crop up in "sing" sound a lot like karin's
• "plastic people" is a nice reminder that kieran pre-dates axel "the field" wilner by a good few years.
• "she just likes to fight" is the obligatory throwback song, and it's still one of his best.

well played, mr. hebeden, well played. there is love in you comes out this tuesday via domino. there are also a few four tet live dates on the horizon, but alas, none in philly.

*and here, so you can hear what i mean:

cool find of the day: any decent music

i found this cool website called any decent music while pretending to work this afternoon. basically, it's metacritic without all the fluff about film and tv and books and video games.

it compiles reviews of an album from all over the web and calculates the average rating of each. what makes it better is that it allows you to customize your charts based on genre of music, including subgenres like dubstep and synthpop (what? no chillwave yet?). you can also filter by how recentness of release and publication. bonus points to tallying scores from quality, non meta-assimilated websites like the quietus.

even better, it features daily recommendations and rotating playlists courtesy of mixpod, an idea i plan on incorporating into my own site very soon (thanks guys!)

check it out. the site's still fairly newish, having only been active for around 14 months. how else could you explain their top rated albums ever being basseyou kouyate and the new these new puritans. they can't possibly be that good. can they???

memory tapes' first ever live show

dayve hawk made his live debut as memory tapes over the weekend in manchester. yeah i talk about this guy a lot but it's not hard to understand why after checking out this video.

why he wouldn't make make his live debut locally is beyond my comprehension but he's promised a philly date next month so all is right with the world.

thanks to my friend john for pointing to this video over at philebrity.

a few random notes regarding coachella 2010

• the organizers seem like they were really concerned with opening and closing the weekend with a bang, not so much with day two.
• speaking of day two, girls and beach house feel awfully low on the roster for the buzz they've been generating lately.
• john waters hitting the festival circuit? nice.
• karin, what are you doing to me? i had finally made peace with missing my chance to see you in new york and now you're coming out of retirement as fever ray already?
• why does thom yorke now have question marks as part of his solo moniker? is it some kind of built-in disclaimer that he may cancel at the last minute?
• jay-z and lcd may be the best one-two punch in recent festival memory
• they better have something at least as impressive as this line-up for all points west later in the year. seriously, they owe us BAD.
  

feeling without touching

good news and great news from the italians do it better camp this week.

good news: their first release of 2010 is on the way with the 12" for "feeling without touching" by glass candy, featuring 26 minutes of new material. so sweet.

great news: it is confirmed via the italians blog that after two years off, chromatics are back to work on a new record! it's being called "their darkest work yet" and may be ready in time for an autumn release. AWESOME.



as a bonus, chromatics are finally releasing their amazing 2007 lp night drive on vinyl this summer. 'bout damn time.

the next italians do it better label sampler (aka the sequel to after dark) is also nearing completion. it will feature exclusive new tracks from the aforementioned chromatics and glass candy as well mirage, farah, and current PTR fave desire. am i dreaming here?

much to look forward to in the new year already. here's something to whet everyone's italo appetites for now...