So we are going to start a new monday weekly post called "MP3 Mondays" which will be a mess of free music we get in the emails...we used to just delete these since we tend not to post much from out of town bands unless the band is coming to town or they offer a free CD to giveaway to you the readers but we felt a once a week drop would be non-intrusive and provide you with some new listening materials for the week ahead...they will mostly be downloadable MP3s but there may be a few streamers in there so stop your whining before you even get started...dropping this sunday night to start as it will be a no computer monday at the beginning of the day // anyway - you get the drift...
Happy freaking monday!
-MCB Management
Lisa Hannigan, the acclaimed Irish singer whom The New York Times calls “exquisitely ethereal,” confirms her first headlining U.S. tour. Beginning February 11 on the West Coast, the tour includes stops at Los Angeles’s Troubadour on February 21 and New York City’s Highline Ballroom on March 7.
Hannigan’s much anticipated solo debut Sea Sew will be released February 3 on ATO Records. The album is already in frequent rotation at taste-maker radio station KCRW and has earned early praise from The Los Angeles Times, which calls it “charmingly idiosyncratic.”
Hannigan’s chance meeting with acclaimed singer-songwriter Damien Rice led to a long period of collaboration and development. From the outset, Hannigan quickly generated attention for her own vocal performances and spent the subsequent few years touring the world, playing sell-out shows at Radio City Music Hall and the Greek Theatre.
She contributed significantly to Rice’s platinum-selling debut O and critically lauded follow-up 9. Hannigan wrote songs and performed backing vocals with the Frames and Mic Christopher. She also sang with the legendary Herbie Hancock on the song “Don’t Explain” for his Grammy-nominated album Possibilities. Hannigan, along with a talented band of friends—including Tom Osander on drums, Shane Fitzsimons on double bass, Donagh Molloy on trumpet, melodica and glockenspiel, Gavin Glass on piano, Lucy Wilkins on violin and Vyvienne Long on cello—recorded Sea Sew over 14 days in Dublin.
In advance of the album’s release, Hannigan has made available the songs “Lille,” “Sea Song,” “Pistachio” and “I Don’t Know” for streaming via her website.
“I Don’t Know,” the first single off Sea Sew, will be released February 2.
As most of you may already know, The Decemberists are preparing to release their fifth full-length album, The Hazards of Love, on March 24. The album is a 17-song suite that demands to be listened to from start to finish and reveals more with each subsequent play. It is rooted in ancient language and imagery, yet entirely modern and accessible.
The Portland-based quintet of Colin Meloy, Chris Funk, Jenny Conlee, Nate Query and John Moen are eager to share a bit of the new music with fans before street date
The album began when Meloy – long fascinated by the British folk revival of the 1960s – found a copy of revered vocalist Anne Briggs’s 1966 EP, titled The Hazards of Love. Since there was no actual song with the album’s title, he set out to write one, but was soon immersed in something much larger.
The Hazards Of Love tells the tale of a woman named Margaret who is ravaged by a shape-shifting animal; her lover, William; a forest queen; and a cold-blooded, lascivious rake, who recounts with spine-tingling ease how he came “to be living so easy and free” in the aforementioned “The Rake’s Song.” Lavender Diamond's Becky Stark and My Brightest Diamond's Shara Worden deliver the lead vocals for the female characters, while My Morning Jacket's Jim James, Robyn Hitchcock and the Spinanes' Rebecca Gates appear in supporting roles.
The range of sounds reflects the characters’ arcs, from the accordion’s singsong lilt in “Isn’t it a Lovely Night?” to the heavy metal thunder of “The Queen’s Rebuke/The Crossing.”
“There’s an odd bond between the music of the British folk revival and classic metal,” says Meloy. “A natural connection between, like, Fairport Convention and Black Sabbath – of course, Sandy Denny from Fairport even sang with Led Zeppelin on ‘The Battle of Evermore.’ I think there’s a shared sense of narrative and ambience, of moving beyond the first person in your writing. And I thought it would be interesting to mess around with that.”
The Decemberists will tour this spring, playing The Hazards Of Love straight through for the show’s first half and older material for the remainder.
And just the sort of place capable of birthing a band like Said The Whale – smart, elegant indie pop emerging from the spent forces of My Buddy Dave, The Millionaires, and WordsOverMusic. Think of STW as the distillate of Vancouver's natural beauty, the sound of a thousand summers spent lying under a star filled canopy in the middle of a field.
Or, you know, just quality songwriting. From the hearts and minds of Ben Worcester, Tyler Bancroft, and the five-piece band they've assembled under the STW banner, the "nautical indie rock goodness" of Howe Sounds/Taking Abalonia is not to be missed.
A lone date —in Vancouver, of course— is booked for early March at the Biltmore Cabaret.
Check out their new video: The Light Is You
Download "ENTOURAGE" Philadelphia's rapper Rocky Fontaine isn't simply just a star in the making, he's ready to take over the Hip-Hop game with globally success. Like a glue stick, or a cement drip, The Comeback Kid, has strategically attached himself to the successes of the rap game and shows no signs of loosening his grip.
Hip-Hop heavyweight DJ Khaled joined forces with Rocky Fontaine and is proud to be apart his Entourage. With tracks like Goodlife, Best In The City (Maino & Gillie Da Kid), and Once Again It's On ( ft. Beanie Sigel) in heavy rotation, it's easy to see why his mixtape is already being whispered by the industry as one of the best around.
"The concept of the mixtape is Entourage. Right now my life consists of late nights and early flights. Studio sessions with some of the biggest artists and shows all over the country. When I say my life is like Entourage... that's what it is. I'm living my dreams and it's only the first inning. That's why the mixtape is called Entourage: Season 1," Rocky Fontaine said.
Entourage will introduce Rocky Fontaine to a nationwide audience that will fell in love with the music this young gunner is presenting.
"It's an honor for me to be working with one of the biggest DJs out right now. DJ Khaled is obviously a Gate Keeper in the industry right now, so to have him wanna be involved with my project was big for me," Fontaine said about working with DJ Khaled.
And check out the video for "It's Because of People Like You" here
When she’s not moonlighting as back-up singer for acclaimed retro-pop group the Bird and the Bee (Bluenote), Alex Lilly is masterminding the fanciful pop of Obi Best. With the help of a few Los Angeles-based friends and a sensibility that’s been favorably compared to bands such as Stereolab, Her Space Holiday and Au Revoir Simone, Lilly conjures music that’s complex and catchy -- think geometry, double-dutch, and animated spin art.
Obi Best’s debut album, Capades, is a rich tapestry of piano, airy electronica, refined rock and panoramic beats deftly punctuated by bells, chirps and otherworldly sounds. Ranging from melodic and ethereal to rollicking and fun, the album inhabits a lush universe where fantasy and reality live side by side: Tokyo lies just around the block from Stockholm, youth and wisdom hold hands, magic seems to grow on trees. Guiding the tour are Lilly‘s clarion vocals, which call to mind Feist, or Karen Carpenter (with more traction), singing about bygone eras, nasty neighbors, lovers’ covert ancestry, and the inadequacy of language all with disarming frankness.
Obi Best is comprised of synth wizards Bram Inscore (Beck, Peeping Tom, Jem) and John Wood (Inara George, Mike Andrews), drummer Barbara Gruska (Jenny Lewis, Benji Hughes), Alex Lilly on vocals/guitar/keys/g4 and guest back-up vocalists Lisa Tremain (Readers) and Kim Talon (Eagle and Talon).
Check them out here - www.myspace.com/obibest