The XLR8R Office Top Ten Album Picks, March 12

VariousBody Language Vol. 4: DJ DixonGet Physical
As a follow-up to Jesse Rose’s last installment for the Body Language series, Volume 4 finds DJ Dixon exploring the mellower side of house with moody tracks from Chromatics, Thom Yorke, and Tracey Thorn. The end result is a poppy, synth-heavy groove collection that shows Get Physical still at the top of its game.

My Life With the Thrill Kill CultThe Filthiest Show in TownRyko
If one band has changed its musical identity over the years, it’s the Thrill Kill Cult. From its transformation from industrial-goth mainstays to proto-pop weirdos, the band finds itself reformed as a funky disco troupe on The Filthiest Show in Town. Whilenot for everyone, the Thrill Kill Cult is all creative ambition, all the time.

LodenValeenHopeMush
Mush has just unleashed a one-man production machine. Drawing inspiration from the Brussels and Amsterdam scenes, Loden showcases an affinity for My Bloody Valentine and Air with a dynamic melding of feedback, lush pads, and mid-tempo percussion. Keep your eyes on this dude.

Ben MonoHit the BitCompost
Munich’s Ben Mono has fine-tuned his dark electro anthems to a T. Featuring a different guest artist on each track, Hit the Bit is as much hip-hop as it is house. There’s no contesting Mono’s position as a production monolith.

Rich BoyS/TInterscope
Mobile, Alabama is officially on the map. Rich Boy is the backwoods MC responsible for the already classic ode to the almighty Cadillac “Throw Some D’s,” and a plethora of hits on his debut full-length. This is seriously gangsta shit.

VariousJunior Boys: Dead Horse EPDomino
The Dead Horse EP is one unique remix collection. With reinterpretations from Hot Chip, Kode 9, Marsen Jules, Carl Craig, and Ten Snake, you know that this is gonna be diverse. Whether or not you’re a Junior Boys die hard, there is something for everyone in this little treat from Domino.

Richie SpiceIn the Streets to AfricaVP
In the Streets to Africa is a solid collection of uplifting reggae tunes. Richie Spice’s first endeavor since 2004’s breakthrough single “Earth A Run Red,” the new album is a crisply produced homage to the motherland.

Destructo Swarmbots Clear LightPublic Guilt
Noise comes in all textures and tones, but there’s something truly unique about Destructo Swarmbots’ experimentation. Somewhere between the creaking ambiance of Larsen and the incessantly clipping Xela, Destructor Swarmbots will ruin your life.

Mice ParadeS/TFat Cat
Mice Parade founder Adam Pierce must have had a vision in his sleep. After moving from NYC to a wooded country near Bear Mountain, Pierce crafted this pastoral album of massive proportions. This self-titled collection of hymns, based around minimal guitar arrangements, soft vocal howling, and lo-fi drums, has us pumped for more.

CopyHair GuitarAudio Dregs
Like tripsters Delia Gonzalez and Gavin Russom teaming up with Timbaland, Copy creates soundscapes that could find a home at a new-age gathering as well as the club. It’s 8-bit, dance-worthy, and highly recommended.

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Video: Kid Koala “Floor Kids”

On the video for his new track, “Floor Kids,” master of all things quirky Kid Koala, along with the drawing skills of animator Jonathan Ng, shows us what happens when a b-boy dance-off goes awry. Makes us wonder if those two weren’t personally hashing out that choreography during the creation process of the video.

See “Floor Kids” now, at XLR8R’s Video Section.

Domu’s Musical Marriage

He’s been called a lot of things in his varied broken beat/house/drum & bass music career: Sonar Circle, Umod, Rima, Chaka Domu, and just plain Domu. One thing the artist known as Dominick Stanton hasn’t been called until now: hitched! Stanton tied the knot recently, and celebrated like any good electronic musician by launching a new label and releasing a digital EP.

TrebleO is now the home for all things Domu on the Net, and he’s sharing the space with a roster of new artists, including vocalist Nicola Kramer, and producers Shift, Soza, and Marin.

As for the The Wedding EP, it features two new songs and two classics that have been previously unavailable for download. The EP includes a little of everything, from tuff’ scattered snares to smooth deep house tracks. The TrebleO online store will continue to offer fans advance downloads (high quality 320kps MP3’s, suitable for MP3 players and computers, as well as club use) of new material months before the other digital shops get it.

And although Stanton began experimenting with broken beats in 1999, his drum & bass side hasn’t been mothballed. Rather, he’s revised his Sonar Circle moniker (a staple of Dego’s Reinforced roster) and has brought forth seven drum & bass tracks for the TrebleO album Unreleased 1996-06. A man known for bringing big tunes, big bass, and big innovation does it again.

The Wedding EPis out now on TrebleO.

Video: Grizzly Bear “Knife”

New York’s four-piece outfit Grizzly Bear had a big 2006. The band’s second album, Yellow House—a collection of sweeping, poignant melodies and gently strummed guitars—topped charts and garnered phrases like “classic in the making.” They’ve come a long way from being a one-man acoustic act accompanied by field recordings and a drum machine. Check out the group’s new video for the song “Knife.”

See it now, along with hundreds of others, at XLR8R‘s Video Section.

Lichens Omns

Lichens’ hymnodic Omns continues multi-instrumentalist Rob Lowe’s quest for enlightenment via improvisation. A minimalist with un-hackneyed sacred leanings, Lowe uses guitar, voice, and myriad effects to achieve a mystical oneness with your (higher) mind. Lichens’ recordings are conduits for others to join him on an ambitious journey to loftier levels of consciousness à la musicians like Terry Riley and Alice Coltrane. Subtler than any freak-folkie, Lichens evokes a sonic purity that could be the foundation of a new religion. Omns‘ spiritual profundity should convert even the staunchest skeptics.

Various Artists Tobias Thomas: Please Please Please

Tobias Thomas has one of the lightest, deftest touches of any techno DJ. On acclaimed mixes like Für Dich and Smallville, he injects the often-predictable techno DJ mix disc with a warm intimacy and crafty narrative arc; he’d rather massage your temples than bang your head. Please Please Please is the German selector’s strangest and best effort yet. Beginning with a trio of weird ambient cuts (two by Pantha Du Prince), Thomas gradually shifts into odd microhouse/minimal techno specimens (highlights are contributions from Villalobos and Kooky Scientist) then U-turns into a three-track denouement of radical pop transformations (clever electro-pop covers of The Smiths and Fleetwood Mac classics). This is the rare mix CD you can put on repeat.

Maximo Park Our Earthly Pleasures

Of the angular, poppy, post-punk bands spawned from England’s Northwest lately, Maximo Park always seemed the likely lads to make it; the band is fluidly able to combine interesting rhythms and sounds with instantly accessible pop hooks. But on A Certain Trigger, Maximo seemed to be holding out on us. Obviously they were: “Our Velocity,” Our Earthly Pleasures‘ first single, is like a speeding, Northern Nirvana-slick production and poppy synths belying fresh, furious rawness. There are other great moments-like the shift from angles to anthem on “A Fortnight’s Time.” Even Pleasures‘ lower points are flecked with specks of greatness.

Mike Hansen At Every Point

Just when you thought that turntablists in the vein of Philip Jeck or Martin Tetrault couldn’t take the experimental form any further, Toronto’s Mike Hansen steps in with At Every Point, a five-part suite of rhythmic panning, jagged aural assaults, and deconstructionist musique concrte. Abstract turntablism has a nasty habit of taking itself too seriously, but that’s not necessarily the case with Hansen; try on the rock-show tribute “Once Held A Lighter High in the Sky,” that mimics crowd cheers while scribbling noisy guitar remnants all about the stratosphere-heady stuff.

Mini Audio Hygiene

Mini might revive the electroclash spirit of ’01, but the Montreal DJ wisely avoids plenty of its “don’ts.” She ditches irony-chic, instead making dirty electro that’s both tuneful and intoxicated. The sputtering, clotted grooves of “Blue Velvet” burn cigarettes on skin, while “This is Now” grinds under a deft Spanish rap. Mini also translates brooding synth-pop into hazy subway atmospherics on “Wagon.” However, rigor mortis-stiff ballads like “Walking” come across as tepid, Ladytron-lite misfires. Nonetheless, Audio Hygiene could’ve enlightened more souls if it came before Larry Tee patented that goddamn Electroclash(tm) word.

Nostalgia 77 Everything Under the Sun

Is this Benedic Lamdin’s best record? Who knows. But does the guy fronting Nostalgia 77 make the trifecta? You betcha. Known for blissful excursions in cosmic-jazz and be-bop with a decidedly hip-hop slant, Lamdin always emphasized the instrumental, but with his two muses, Lizzy Parks and Beth Rowley, he’s learned to let the magic of the voice be his instrument. And grind their vocal axes, these ladies do, putting them on par with the record’s mind-blowing tenor sax and trumpet playing, which not only gives you sketches of Spain but crisp laser copies of Mars too.

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