i am also in love with a man called john jagos

john jagos (aka brothertiger), if you are reading this i am totally available for dates for the next month and a half. just saying. this time i actually really am in love even though we've never met. the combination of his musical abilities and his facial features have lead me to this conclusion. he's also originally from ohio, so i feel like i would totally "get" him and stuff.

okay so moving on from reasons why brothertiger is a dreamboat, he makes lovely dreampop-chillwave-synthelectro-etc. (apparently this is the only kind of music i'm listening to these days) tunes which are excellent for surviving summer. if i were you i would download vision tunnels, and in the meantime i'd advise checking out these tracks:

i am in love with a man called randolph chabot

okay, i might not really be in love with HIM (or maybe i am, i'd have to meet him to know for sure), but i am definitely in love with his alter-ego deastro's music to the point that i want to shout it from the rooftops. but really though. he's like a weird hybrid of everything that is good about ariel pink and washed out but with a little electro flare that reminds me of mux mool and even sometimes mgmt's first record (you know, minus the douchebag super fans). i don't even know if that makes any sense to you or in general, so you should probably just give him a listen and decide for yourself. here are three of my favourite tracks off his ep called mind altar, which you should definitely definitely download if you've got a minute. and sorry that these youtube videos are the opposite of aesthetically pleasing. i had limited options:

shugo tokumaru

shugo's a new favorite of mine. definitely check him out here for an amazing japantastic indie folktronica experience. his musical habilidades have reinforced my love for all things japanese. i'm pretty depressed i missed his 2008 north american tour, but even if i'd known about him then, i'd have been in south america. so i guess it was a lost cause from the start. shugo, should i just come to you? okay cool. see you in tokyo. here are some trax:

alaska

parachute

green rain

rum hee

clocca

future umbrella

yippee, yppah.

yppah is this guy named joe corrales. his music is awesome rocktronica shoegaze that you should definitely give a listen (especially gumball machine weekend...):

gumball machine weekend
shutter speed
son saves the rest

and this little remix of lady sovereign...
love me or hate me

Navajo Bixby

likelikelike. let's listen to navajo bixby and have mad fun times, okay? okay. it's like the soundtrack to my life if i lived on a secret island that no one knew about. here are some trax para vos:

many ways
moonlighting

salem al fakir

my inner conscience often tells me to avoid the whole michael buble wannabe frank sinatra genre...it creeps me out and reminds me of my mother and i don't particularly enjoy either of those things when i'm listening to music. i am not, however, opposed to a little modern take on jazz/soul/funk here and there, which i find to be the antithesis of the toolishness that is michael buble and his counterparts. (okay, the two genres aren't really connected, i just felt like hating on michael buble...) so this leads me to my point, which is that salem al fakir, an award winning swedish musician, is, in the words of tony the tiger, grrrrrrreat. while i can't pigeon-hole him into any one genre, i assure you he's really good. here are some trax, check em out:

good song
it's true
this is who i am
thank you

aaaand if you're looking for a little electro, sebastian ingrosso and axwell do a great remix of it's true here.

no kids allowed

no kids is fast becoming one of my new favourite (british spelling, fancy i know...) bands. they do some charming little pop beatz...they kind of remind me of architecture in helsinki, or perhaps even yacht a little bit. either way, they're worth a listen. here are some tracks below:

i love the weekend
the beaches all closed
for halloween
bluster in the air

step off, betch

so i am still totally completely mayjah-mayjah-mayjahly obsessed with this track by blatta & inesha featuring one of my all-time faves (at the moment, anyway) congorock. this song reminds me of if robots lived in the jungle in outer space. so if you think you might not like that scenario so much, perhaps you should skip this jam. but i still am absolutely gaga for it.

real estate is real good

here's a lovely little band i've just discovered that sounds very much like something i would listen to during an epic roadtrip through the american southwest. which i haven't exactly done, and haven't exactly made plans to do, but is definitely something i dream about doing. want to come on the almost sort of yet to be planned imaginary adventure? anyways, here are some tuneskies for you to mellow out to...very reminiscent of some of yo la tengo's stuff, like maybe nowhere near or green arrow.

beach comber

snow (instrumental)

suburban dogs

fake blues

marina and the diamonds

just discovered marina and the diamonds and think she's fabfabfab. i've been racking my brain trying to pin down who exactly she sounds like, and i suppose you could compare her to kate nash, but then i don't really like comparing artists to one another. very interesting piano-driven alt-pop, though. check her out below, or at her myspace which i've given you the link to above. really digging obsessions, btw.

obsessions

the shampain sleeper

i am not a robot

sunshine in band form

lovelovelove this band dreamdate, which i've just discovered in my quest to put off my work just a bit longer. perhaps you'd like to discover them also! the self-described minimalist pop/rock duo does short and sweet and catchy little tunes, a few of which i will post here. check out their myspace which i posted above. ah, the power of myspace. i'm still a believer.

8 sleeves

go fish

have i told you

how low are you?

rock and roll

david e. sugar is oh so sweet

stumbled upon this fellow during my last beatz and bleepz quest and figured i'd share him with you...here are some links to good trax. just a little 8-bit love.

although you may laugh

party killer

meet me in the middle (remix of sportsday megaphone)

golden skans (remix of klaxons)

to yourself

think. lovely. SMALL. thoughts.

so i know i've already told you about the wonders of SMALL, but seeing as how i'm trapped in the midst of an all-nighter, i figure i'll tell you again. SMALL is great, and can get you through the toughest of times as i'm experiencing right now. american public policy formation is not fun when you have to write a paper about it, especially a paper that doesn't make any sense. but you know what does make sense? these songs, namely comic girl which i've been listening to on repeat:

comic girl
sunshine lover
blueberry boy (hit stream for it to work)

also check out come around and butterfly on the myspace page

uffieuffieuffieuffieuffieofcourse

i liked this uffie interview a lot...minus the creepy australian lady's voice...sounds like lifestyles man. anywayz, uffie is one of my faves, so ch-ch-check her out!

alice glass, i know you!

well, i guess i still don't technically "know you" know you, but i did get to have a nice little chat with you! and yes, i did take this super photo that you see above. will and i took on chicago for a whirlwind tour of electronica, and i have to say it was probably the best weekend ever. friday we hit up bottom lounge for the crystal castles concert, which was sweaty, terrifying, and amazing, as expected. we met up with some children (when i say children i mean twenty somethings) from madrid and befriended them, dragging them along to the dj set afterwards at sonotheque. after jamming six or seven people into one chicago cab, we were dismayed to find the line was already pretty long to get into the sold out show. we'd decided to go on a whim and didn't think to buy tickets in advance. anyways, eventually our spaniard amigos gave up on hope and peaced out to go to wicker park and salvage a few drinking hours. will and i stayed strong, though, and after about an hour to an hour and a half of waiting in the freezing cold, we were able to get in. the club experience was the polar opposite of what we'd encountered at bottom lounge. first of all, after having been standing in the cold for so long, the heat (if it even existed) was more than bearable. it also seemed like the crowd had filtered out most of the "tougher" crowd and replaced it with docile hipsters looking to groove, not mosh. the ambiance was quite pleasant too. once we'd gotten our drinks, we watched the first dj spin away inside the booth from behind a glass window. i was certain alice glass wouldn't be accompanying ethan to the dj set, and was starting to doubt whether or not he would even show up. however, after about ten minutes my lack of faith was washed away. not only did ethan show up, alice was there with him! they took turns spinning in the booth and played some great jamz. aside from some of their own tracks, they mixed in some vibesquad (i'm sure you'd appreciate that, shae) and lots of other stuff i'd never have imagined they'd throw in considering they claim to hate electro music. alice smoked cigs and chugged pbr like the badass she is while will and i danced up a storm and stared in awe of the dynamic duo. by the end of the set, we still had to close out the tab at the bar, and luckily for us the bartender took an abnormally long time to get it to us. while security cleared out the club of its non-tab-possessing hipsters, we waited patiently and watched alice finally exit and go to the back once there were almost no fans left. i yelled "alice, we love you!" to her as she walked into the back corridor, and she popped her head back out and waved. this would've been plenty of interaction for me, but it gets better. when the tab finally came, we turned around to see that alice had come back out and was chatting it up with some guy i dunno who he was (some kind of dj, drum player, something)...and will took his chances to go say hello. i was freaking out, naturally, and didn't pay much attention to what he was doing while i tried to finish the rest of my pbr (classy). anyways, i walked over and first asked if either of them would like the rest of my beer (i repeat, classy), and when they politely declined i asked if i could shake alice's hand. and i did. and i really don't remember it because i kind of mentally blacked out. but then i brought up the show i saw in argentina and said how security sucked, and THAT was the key to opening the enigma that is alice glass for a real conversation. we talked about that show, and how most people blamed the band for peacing out when really it was security's fault in the first place. she noted that she was glad that i knew the truth, and then proceeded to ask me how i liked argentina in general. really alice? you want MY opinion? so we continued chit-chatting it up when some annoying girl who'd been in front of us in line (and who payed double to get in about ten minutes before us) came up and said to me and will "maybe i'll see you guys at deadmau5 tomorrow!" nice try, sneaky...i know you just want me to include you in the conversation that is somehow miraculously taking place right now. well think again. i shooed her off quickly with help from the security guard, who then turned to me and will and asked alice, "are they with you?" and SHE said, "yes, they're with us". amazing amazing amazing. for being such a mysterious figure in my life for the past year or so, considering she doesn't do interviews and people don't even really know her real age (they THINK 1988 birth year), this is probably the most complete slash accomplished i will feel in life for a while. if you're still reading this right now, i applaud you, because i'm sure it doesn't sound as interesting to everyone else as it does to me (i replay it in my head often), and i'll spare you the details of the rest of the weekend (for now). but i repeat, alice glass, i (kind of) know you!

alela diane

alela diane radio on pandora has been my fall-asleep music recently. it's super folky and i loves it. anyways, alela is super duper and i'm going to put some of my fave tracks of hers up here...i know i've done so already, but it never hurts to give a second listen. check her stuff out if you need a break from popraprocktronica...or whatever it is you like to listen to. ps i think she's really creepy looking but whatever.

the rifle

tatted lace

white diamonds

pieces of string

the pirate's gospel

populous

italian producer populous makes really abstract electronica. check out "man overboard" if you're in the mood to zone. i really like his shirt, by the way...

what are you talkingggah about?

plz enjoy this parody of the hills...it's pretty spot-on. i watched the city last night for like the second time ever. i dunno if anyone else has noticed this, but the hills, laguna beach, all of these shows, spend over half the time with no dialogue, which has been replaced by a "sweet" soundtrack in the background (maybe they really are living up to being 'music' television). we get a lot of shots of street signs and nighttime traffic to fill up a quarter of the show, and then we spend another quarter staring at whitney and her friends staring at each other, looking surprised/angry/annoyed/and/or/sad, for a solid 5-10 minutes at a time. i think they're running out of script ideas. the real question here is, why do i bother to keep watching?

congorockin

check out congorock if you get the chance. awesome. reminiscent of vibesquad a little? like if vibesquad and florian meindl had a music baby. maybe it's just me. favorite track as of now equals step off, but this remix of runark is pretty fab too.

"i like the sun, it's very sunny today"

even though this is a lame reebok sponsored interview, which mainly pushes for the sale of freestyles, i still liked some of the questions they asked. and i liked that it was conducted in french with english subtitles. she sounds super creepy in her interviews spoken in english. anyways, i don't really have any issues with freestyles. in fact, i would like to own a pair or five. but seeing as how i'm poor, that may have to be put on hold. ps, if you're ignorant and don't know what "fringe" is, it's what those crazy brits call bangs. i think i prefer the word fringe to bangs.