A Weather Cove

The debut album from this Portland-based indie-folk quintet is something of a battlefield–climbing the impossible mountain versus sleeping in a valley, lying next to a lover instead of cutting all ties, and buckling under the weight of emotional entropy rather than holding oneself together. Musically, the songs echo this tug-of-war, with lines like “The same waves that make you right will make you decay” set against haunting organs, softened drums, and minor guitar chords that spin in 10 directions at once, yet still seem understated. Perhaps the most moving element of Cove is the way vocalist Aaron Gerber sings about these issues in an almost monotone voice, suggesting a resignation to the struggles at hand.

Shy Child “Astronaut”

Formerly of the band El Guapo (which eventually became Supersystem), New York-based duo Nate Smith and Pete Cafarella joined forces as Shy Child in 2006. The two will unveil their Noise Won’t Stop album for first time in North America this May, thanks to the good folks at Kill Rock Stars. Produced by Chris Zane (known for his work with Les Savy Fav), the album blends, keyboards, guitars, electro, and punk together, and features Spank Rock on one track.

Shy Child – Astronaut

Crystal Castles Crystal Castles

Like She-Ra and unicorns, it’s best to think of Crystal Castles as an imaginary force. While there are two presumably real people in the Toronto-based “band” (Ethan Kath produces, Alice Glass sings), almost everything about them personally–including their names, their past, and how they came to be–is fabricated. That ambiguity might be a cheap press stunt, but the alternate, optimistic read is that Kath’s and Glass’ personal details don’t matter anyway. This isn’t music made by humans, but characters–the kind found in grainy fantasy cartoons and garage-sale videogames. If you can buy into that world, this is an album that flirts with brilliance.

For anyone following Crystal Castles’ blog-splattered exploits, nothing on the band’s self-titled debut will be a huge shock. The majority of the tracks, notably “Untrust Us,” “Good Time,” and “Alice Practice,” have been floating around for at least a year now, with newer material like “Through the Hosiery” and “Reckless” not exactly breaking free from the established template. That is to say, there’s a very specific, simple formula at work on this record, one that–aside from the final, tacked-on shoegazer cut “Tell Me What to Swallow”–is never strayed from.

Any kid raised on ’80s videogames is no doubt familiar with the sound of Crystal Castles. The kick/snare thud and crack of early industrial makes up at least 90 percent of the drum work, with the melody filled in by whirrs and beeps straight out of the underwater levels of Super Mario Brothers. The production is bit-crushed and pixilated, though not in a cold and murky way–the low-key “Magic Spells” is full of warm, ghostly melancholy, like the end-credit music for an imaginary Nintendo game.

Filtered through the same pixilation effects, Glass’ vocals run the gamut between unintelligible textures and screamed-out chants. As catchy and strange as the beats are by themselves, it’s Glass’ presence that really plays up the imaginary aspect of Crystal Castles’ persona: Her shifts between a voice trapped in the game and her cartoonish, exaggerated emotion make her seem more like a walking sample than a real person.

The other strange presence on this record is the ghost of electroclash. Maybe not the coolest touchstone to throw around at this point, but it’s definitely present: “Air War” has more than a passing resemblance to Adult.’s “Nite Life,” and “Knights” could just as easily find itself next to Kittenz and Thee Glitz-era Felix da Housecat. A lot of that has to do with Kath’s reliance on octave-jumping basslines, big synth-string choruses, and pop-music structures, which definitely isn’t a bad thing. It’s just funny to think of a whole new generation of kids that has never heard Fischerspooner.

By the close of the album, there’s a sense that too much of a good thing ends up being pretty damn samey, but it’s that narrow scope that also happens to be Crystal Castles’ greatest strength. Step out of the 8-bit confines, and there’d be no illusion; the concept would come off like a gimmick. And while that may limit the scope of what the band can do in the future, maybe that’s for the best. It’s not like we don’t keep going back to those old Nintendo games, anyway.

Joe Higgs Life of Contradiction

Dubbed the Father of Reggae by Jimmy Cliff, Joe Higgs had a profound influence on artists like Bob Marley and The Wailers, whom he mentored in Trenchtown in Kingston. He even wrote Peter Tosh’s seminal “Steppin’ Razor.” His 1975 debut album is one of those lost classics that somehow eluded mass acclaim, but hopefully this reissue will change that. Included here are remakes of hits Higgs recorded in the early ’60s, like “Come on Home” as well as “Life of Contradiction,” which sounds as fresh today as it did when it was originally recorded in 1972. Higgs passed away in 1999, but his spirit lives on in his beautiful melodies and hopeful messages captured best here on his signature song “There’s a Reward.”

Bun B: Still Trill

The past 12 months have brought a full range of emotions for Bun B. After laying the foundation for Southern rap for the past 15 years, Bun and his longtime partner-in-rhyme Pimp C were finally getting their just props: Their group UGK’s critically lauded double-disc Underground Kingz debuted at #1 in August, while their OutKast collaboration, “International Players Anthem,” bumped worldwide. But on December 4, 2007–just two days before the Port Arthur, TX duo was nominated for a Grammy–Pimp C was found dead in Hollywood’s Mondrian Hotel.

The coroner’s office ruled that Pimp, who was just 33, died from a combination of the prescription-strength cough syrup in his system and sleep apnea.

The two had obvious differences: Pimp C was loud and flamboyant in his delivery and personal habits; like Kool G. Rap’s calmer Southern cousin, Bun B is measured in demeanor and conservative in dress, and known for calculated, machine-gun-like rhymes. Nonetheless, it was easy to imagine these two rapping together forever. When Pimp was incarcerated on assault charges from 2002 to 2005, Bun used his platform as one of rap’s most in-demand guest MCs to insert the mantra “Free Pimp C” into every last appearance.

Fortunately, after Pimp C passed, the still-grieving Bun B already had the answer to “What’s next?” in his back pocket. Recorded primarily last fall (while UGK was also sketching an Underground Kingz follow-up, which Bun says is still on its way), II Trill is the album where Bernard “Bun B” Freeman fully embraces his role as the Ice Cube of the South, or perhaps Nas’ country cousin. Though he has always spiked UGK’s Southern-fried G Funk with wisdom (see the life-affirming “One Day”) and a seething anger (take 1994’s police-brutality treatise “Protect & Serve”), Bun’s 2006 solo debut, Trill, didn’t build on these inclinations the way his highly informed interviews might have led one to hope. On II Trill’s “Get Yo Issue,” however, “Big Dick Cheney” sets his sights on crooked officers, hypocritical politicians, and perverted preachers. “If It Was Up to Me,” with its Junior Reid hook, tackles the environment and gentrification. Lest anyone think that he’s gone soft, “City of Syrup” is a classic Houston anthem, while single “Real Gangster” clocks studio thugs.

“I wanted to bring that old Rap-A-Lot sound back, and recreate the type of records that people like John Bido used to make,” Bun says, referring to the unsung producer behind the Geto Boys’ early classics. Along with Houston beatmakers like Cory Mo and Bigg Tyme, II Trill also features a collaboration with Expensive Taste, the super-group made up of Paul Wall, Skinhead Rob, and Travis Barker (“Travis and I [both] ride Cadillacs so that shit gotta bang in the trunk,” Bun says).

This interview–conducted as Bun returned home to Houston following the Grammys (where “International Player’s Anthem” was nominated for Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group)–came amidst an eventful week which also included the arrival of the coroner’s report on Pimp’s death and Bun’s first live appearance (at Houston’s Warehouse Live) since his partner’s passing.

XLR8R: Did the coroner’s report on Pimp C’s death answer all of your questions?

Bun B: For me, it wasn’t about asking questions. When someone passes away you have to think about what you learned from them, and what should be taken away from it. You look at things like prescription cough syrup being one of the causes, not an overdose but obviously a contributing factor… You have to look at yourself and anything unhealthy you might be doing. When you look at Pimp and a young, talented person like Heath Ledger and take these things into perspective, maybe you just have to be a little more cautious.

When we first tried to do this interview last year, you decided to attend the Jena 6 rally in Louisiana instead of coming to New York. And you’re carving a more topical path on II Trill. Has anything specific spurred you to become more politically minded?

I’m always standing up for my community. The reality is UGK has never had any real light or attention paid to them, so it would seem a lot of what you see us do is new. Prior to [Underground Kingz] I didn’t really have a publicist. There was nobody calling anybody, saying, “Bun’s down here helping these people.” I don’t really do things for [recognition]. It’s not about that. As a human, you’ve gotta keep it one hunnid [percent] and stand up for motherfuckers that can’t stand up for themselves. People stood up for me at various times in my life. If you don’t want to do it when you’re an artist, then don’t. You ain’t always gonna be an artist but you’re always gonna be a human, and there’s always gonna be some fucked-up shit going on to your people. You’re gonna have to take a stand at some point.

What did you want to do with this album?

For lack of a better description, I wanted to get my Cube on.

What about Ice Cube do you respect?

I finally got to meet Cube [when] we did a remix [of Beyonce’s] “Soldier” together, and he was just who I thought he was. That’s something I haven’t really been able to say about a lot of people. I was able to say that about Kool G. Rap, DJ Premier, Lord Jamar. I’ve been fucking with Premier a long time. We never recorded any music together but we’re very good friends. We build on totally different issues. If the only way you build with other artists is as an artist, you ain’t learning shit.

On “Get Yo Issue,” you really go in on cops, politicians, and preachers…

I’m speaking towards the fake preachers, the fake policemen, the fake politicians. Are all of them bad? Of course not. We’d be ignorant to think that just because somebody do a certain thing for a living, they wasn’t no good. Just because he’s a cop don’t make him a bad person. Just because he’s a drug dealer don’t make him a bad person.

What inspired you to write that song?

It was when your man got caught in the bathroom in Minnesota. Senator Larry Craig. That did it. I said, “These motherfuckers are going too far with this.” It’s not just national politicians. We got people representing districts in these cities and they’re not beholden to their constituents. Because people have let this shit go on for so long, these issues are getting out of hand. I’m not trying to stand on no pulpit, by no means… but it’s easy to throw rocks when that sin isn’t associated with you. If everybody held everybody according to the worst shit they’ve ever done, we’d all be hit with rocks.

Has Barack Obama’s success given you more faith in the system?

I don’t want the assumption to be made that I support Obama. I love what Obama represents, and I love also what Hillary represents. The fact that they’re able to realistically run for office is something we should definitely be praising. I want to make sure when I put my support behind someone it is very clear, because I know a lot of people that don’t know too much about this political system are looking for me to help put them in the right direction. In the next four years there has to be improvements made in the inner cities–no ifs, ands, or buts. I’m not gonna stand behind any candidate that isn’t prepared to help us address the shit that directly affects us.

People ask you for advice on things like voting?

In the hood, it’s a reverse-psychology thing. You almost have to trick people into doing shit sometimes. I try to tell people, “That’s why shit’s fucked up here, that’s why you can’t get a job. That’s why the paint’s peeling in [your kids’] classroom. Because you ain’t used the power you got to try and change this shit.” It’s that simple. I haven’t always voted, man. I’m not gonna sit here and act holier than thou. I’ve been disillusioned like other people so I can understand their frustration. All I’ve ever done is give people the game I got. I didn’t [always] have that game.

Why is it that UGK didn’t really tour that much?

UGK used to do probably 120 shows a year, two a night sometimes. It was just in small towns that don’t get any media coverage, like Hazlehurst, Mississippi. There was an infamous club in Lafayette, Louisiana called Strawberry’s that held 2,500 people, ’til five or six in the morning. We were there every other week. People used to come from other states. I’d drive from Port Arthur to see people perform at that club. It was that insane. The whole reason UGK has the following we have in the South is we were the people that went to your town, when nobody else came. Because we were from Port Arthur, Texas–50,000 people. No one ever came to our town, feel me? We felt it was our duty to go to these [places].

You’re going to be touring behind this album, though?

Southern artists don’t tour in the formal sense. We go out and do dates. This is gonna be the first time I’ve ever [done] a genuine tour. UGK was always an organic thing. A lot of that was due to Pimp–if it wasn’t right, it wasn’t happening. Because we represented for people that don’t get second chances, you gotta be real smart and thorough about every decision. Every little decision not only affects our lives but it affects the people that we employ, the people we love, and the people we stand up for. We always tried to be real with people [and they] respected us for being human with them. We did a lot of balling but we made records like “Hi Life,” talking about the conflict of being a street cat and still having faith in God, and wondering how God’s looking upon you based on your actions. That was a reoccurring theme in our songs because that was a reoccurring theme in our life.

You’ve always called UGK country rap, but blues is probably more of an accurate description.

It’s because of our parents. It’s really that simple. We make music with the sensibility of the music we heard growing up.

What was it like to step back on the stage without Pimp?

It was probably the first time I cried on stage.It was just real. But there wasn’t many dry eyes in the room. I’m not the only person that loves Pimp C, and I know it. The crowd goes through it, too, [so] I gotta help them get through this the right way. “One Day” and “Hi Life” are powerful testimonies. I never really understood, until the last couple years, how much those records meant to people. It’s a very, very real thing.

Girl Talk Announces New Album

Greg Gillis, the non-stop touring machine known to his fans as Girl Talk, has finally taken a break from life on the road and is working on a follow-up to 2006’s Night Ripper. The tentatively titled Wild Peace IV: Feed the Animals, Raise the Dead is set for release late spring/early summer ’08, and will be available online through Illegal Art.

Don’t think controversy surrounding the sample-heavy Night Ripper has tamed his taste for borrowing from others. “This album is going to be dense with samples like my previous releases, but I’m trying to give some of the parts more room to breathe,” said Gillis. “The new material definitely has its share of quick cuts, but it’s less dependent on that style.”

Meanwhile, catch Gillis on the road for a few live shows this spring, in some random U.S. cities:

Dates
03/28 Athens, GA: Georgia Theatre
04/04 Morgantown, WV: 123 Pleasant St.
04/25 New Haven, CT: Toads Place
05/02 Richmond, VA: Toads Place/Richmond
05/09 Millvale, PA: Mr. Smalls Theatre
05/23 Chilicothe, IL: Summer Camp
08/08 Jersey City, NJ: All Points West Festival

Photo By Jarrod Curry.

Vaccine Readies New Dubstep Album, Releases Mix on Hotflush

Orange County in Southern California is known for sunshine, beaches, surfers and, um, dubstep? Although the O.C.’s bucolic environs don’t normally conjure bass-bin rattling club tracks, a new producer is out to challenge regional and genre conventions.

This fresh face, whose first name is Christine (last name unknown), produces tracks as Vaccine, with several tunes, including “Wishful Thinking” and “Breathless,” having been released on forward-thinking UK imprint Hotflush Recordings. With an album in the works, Vaccine will also drop a new DJ mix, available as a free download March 31 at Hotflush’s website.

A self-described Skinny Puppy and Portishead fan, Vaccine’s recordings blend jittery electronic elements with gothic ambient nuances and dubstep’s bass-led bottom end. While her mainly male dubstep cohorts’ songs lurch and stomp, Vaccine’s music drifts and shimmers via subtle melodies and echoed vocals. Her constructions aren’t necessarily main floor rave fodder, but rather, comedown music for a 6 a.m. all-back-to-mine.

That’s not to pigeonhole Vaccine as merely a gentile, feminine composer–her tracks can also unleash the demons. But at a time when dubstep’s expansion is marked by dancefloor technicians such as Skream, Benga, and Rusko, artists like Burial, Scuba, or Vaccine expand the music’s possibilities.

Similarly, Vaccine’s HFMX001 selection showcases dubstep’s more leftfield, electronic-tinged tracks. Her own tune, “Fever,” appears in two forms: the crushing half-step original and a previously unheard version, which closes the mix with paranoid synths and claustrophobic drums.

HFMX001 will be available in two formats: 192-kbps MP3 stream, and as a direct download package with artwork and individual 320-kbps MP3 tracks for easy CD burning.

Hotflush Recordings Presents HFMX001–Vaccine Tracklisting
00:00 Scuba “Tell Her”
04:07 Brain “Martial Love”
07:18 Toasty “Angel” (Si Begg remix)
10:43 Vaccine “Fever”
14:07 Clipse feat. Pharrell “Mr. Me Too” (bootleg)
16:30 Si Begg “Hard Like Funk” (Motor City dub)
19:55 TRG & Dub U “Losing Marbles”
23:33 Vaccine “Concussion”
26:44 Ital Tek “Weave”
29:55 Scuba “Hard Boiled”
33:19 Intex Systems “Radium”
35:20 Boxcutter “Infraviolet”
39:24 Vaccine “Wishful Thinking” VIP (ambient mix)
39:36 Esthero “My Torture”
42:35 Boxcutter “Philly”
46:07 Boxcutter “Brood”
49:17 Vaccine “Fever” (high grade mix)

Excepter Debt Dept

The fourth record (and Paw Tracks debut) from Brooklyn’s Excepter is by far the creepiest offering from the experimental performance troupe, and finds the six-piece conditioning its decayed jams of electronic scree and industrial hiss into a scary, yet sexy-sounding beast. Abundant in nihilistic/surrealistic overtones all at once, tracks like “Burgers” and “Any and Every” insert dub and pop sensibilities into the mix, usually centered on a programmed, Whitehouse-style groove mashed with dilating synth bass and choppy beats. Ditto for “Kill People,” a bone-chilling romp of shouting, echoing vocals and pulsating clatter that sounds like an out-pop dance hit from the darkest corner of the universe.

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