The Underground of Happiness

Nice e-mail from Dee Dee of Dum Dum Girls this morning (me and a several thousand others) with details of a new song from the upcoming second album, Only in dreams . Yesterday we had literature courtesy of Handsome Furs in the shape of a William T. Vollmann novel , today it's poetry. I've been doing this a lot lately, but I'm going to reprint the e-mail because it's so far from run-of-the-mill. "Liebe, "Bedroom Eyes," the first proper single off of Only In Dreams, will be released shortly in mp3 format and eventually as a 7" with a dreamy b-side cover. It was the last song I wrote before we holed up in our LA practice space for two weeks before recording. It's a special sort of confusion and frustration brought on by lack of sleep. I remember reading the following poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti as I saw trails and tripped out a bit before the pills finally kicked in. Love within the context of insomnia and separation? Kinda my thing. Th...

In the ongoing project to plough through the summer music mountain at UOH Towers, I came across this gem from Canadian husband and wife duo Handsome Furs , Dan Boeckner and Alexei Perry , a tune which we had on the show a few months back. It's taken from their current album, Sound Kapital , on Sub Pop , their third album which came out at the end of June. I haven't heard the whole album but I'd be surprised if it gets any better than that song, (mostly) electronic music with a kind of renegade, rock 'n roll spirit. Touch of Depeche Mode about it, actually, speaking of renegades. And there's hope for married couples everywhere when you watch this footage from the band's performance at the Capital Hill Block Party festival in Seattle earlier this summer. There's a degree of conviction about them on stage that's very endearing. Plus they seem to enjoy each other's company, which is a good sign in a marriage. Their bio on the Sub Pop website is ...

Just to add fuel to the St Vincent obsession that's been going on around here for the last few weeks, she appeared on the David Letterman Show last night to perform Cruel (that's the video we talked about here the other day ). I know it's not unusual for Letterman to be slightly nonplussed by the musical guests on the show, but in this case he seemed to be genuinely at a loss, confused. Maybe it was the fact that Annie Clark looked like a model, wearing a black party dress, with what looked like a cape trailing behind, while she knocked out complex math-pop guitar riffs that buzzed with a distortion and tension generally absent from your average party dress-wearing model. Or that in elegant, soft-spoken tones, she wondered how the children could be so cruel. Apart from her other, many and varied talents, I think her ability to confound Mr Letterman should also be applauded.

What better way to start a new week than with some new music from Future Islands , from their their new album On the water which is coming out on Thrill Jockey in October. The words "eagerly" and "anticipated" spring to mind and proceed to rub up against each other. Woo-hoo. We thought this last year about their debut album. Future Islands - In evening air (Thrill Jockey) Credit to Grand Snr for mentioning this in dispatches some months back. You could call it electro-pop. Of the highest order. Bracing synth patterns, pounding basslines and insinuating vocals from Sam Herring (who bears an unexpected and uncanny resemblance to early Tom Waits in places). For example, the innovative steel drum sample on Tin man . Repetitive in the best possible way, like all great dance music. Infectious and impossible not to love. *Incidentally, their new EP Undressed is an acoustic affair featuring piano at the core and, with added cello, is equally compelling. This new tune...

Another day, another strange and beautiful chapter to the story of Annie Clark of Dallas, Texas , that is St Vincent . The first official video from her new album Strange mercy just surfaced, directed by Terri Timely . That's actually two people, who I've just learned have made music videos for Joanna Newsom, Darwin Deez and The Little Ones , as well as working with St Vincent a few times before. This particular piece features lots of stately tracking shots and buttoned-up performances, which are spookily at odds with the film's themes of abduction, imprisonment and torture. An average day for St Vincent, says you. Meanwhile, the tune has more of her trademark distorted guitar arpeggios. One memorable shot in the video has her playing a guitar solo in the boot of a car with a sack over her head. Baroque pop is right. There are some nice notes here by Annie Clark about the video shoot, courtesy of The Huffington Post . It was an absolute pleasure working with the Terr...

More new music from the Hidden Shoal label from Perth . It's the lead track from American producer Scott Solter's new release, One river . You may already know Scott's name as one half of experimental pop duo Boxharp (who we are very fond of around here), aswell as producer/recordist/mixer/remixer for the likes of St Vincent, Superchunk, Neon Indian, John Vanderslice and The Mountain Goats , among others. This piece has the air of a serious ambient work, channelling both inner and outer space. Gravitas would be a word. I'll leave it to the label for a more detailed description. 'The Great Cold' Is an invigorating five-minute immersal into one of the seven gorgeous flowing passages that comprise One River. Chilly, gaseous tones swell and recede, all the while shadowed by a ghostly high note. The icy stillness is occasionally punctuated by a discreet found sound, which acts as a kind of pivot point between focus and diffusion. Solter creates an unforgettable a...

We've mentioned Bristol native Rachael Dadd twice in the last few weeks, first in relation to her new single Balloon , and then in advance of her new album . We've had the album, Bite the mountain , on around the UOH cabin for the last couple of weeks now and it really is a wonderful piece of work (It was largely recorded, apparently, while travelling around Japan, and the sleeve cover text reflects this influence.) On the face of it, it's a version of English folk music (the songs generally concern domestic or pastoral situations, with close-at-hand details), but let it sit a bit longer and strands of classical, jazz, world music and even some avant garde tendencies come to the surface. The single Balloon is a tune of uncomplicated beauty about a birth, which has an appropriate sense of wide-eyed wonder at the world. The stop-start piano waltz Moth in the motor begins straightforwardly enough, but goes on to hint at jazz inflections (not unlike the way Nick Drake does),...