A Paler Shade of White

Couldn't get an interesting (though also wrong & a bit dubious in parts) New Yorker blog on "How indie rock lost its soul" to appear in our 'Worth Reading' section, so read it here.

For what it's worth, I hear lots of black influence - thankfully - in much of what LMYE deals in (naturally enough, since you could define that space, as Eno said somewhere about his original inspirations, as music with Steve Reich & Tony Allen as its main forebears).

Sure, "the lassitude and monotony that so many indie acts seem to confuse with authenticity and significance" is & long has been a recognisable side of the indie rock world. But there's plenty else around outside the mainstream, thank God (hasn't the author ever heard of electronica, IDM, post-rock?).

&, rightly, black musicians wouldn't thank you for the assumption that the indie ethos isn't available to them because of the piece's banal reduction that indie = white.

More importantly, terms like 'segregation' & 'miscegenation' don't need throwing around so lightly - there's a bit more at stake than whether Arcade Fire should loosen up & feel the funk...

Resistance is futile...

Tortoise & Spring Heel Jack in one 15-minute extravaganza (Reference resistance gate)? What's not to like?!

Something for September...

If the idea of three German lap-toppers collaborating on improvised music sounds like your idea of an inner circle of Dante's Inferno, think again. There may be chin-stroking, there may be over-earnest philosophising in the background & there may be a very dodgy title. But September Collective's All the Birds Were Anarchists is a delight - pretty but not cute, alive with ideas & noises, rich in mood & clicky, shuffling texture. So check it out & buy a copy for a friend.

Try the lovely Das Meer.

Good review by eMusic here, by the way...

Thirtysixtwentyfive

Having had Adem & Fridge, it'd be downright rude not to complete the set with something of Kieran's. Try his delicious Thirtysixtwentyfive...

Now get out & buy some Four Tet, or the collaboration with Steve Reid, or the great new Fridge (or the pretty damn great older Fridge). Thank you.

Adem - mmmmm

Something suitably titled to get myself going here - Adem's lovely, clunky yet prettily harmonic 'Launch Yourself'.

I know very little about Adem. But I suspect him of being part - a short-haired intense bass-twanging part rather than a wild-haired Kieran Hebden intense part - of the Fridge/Four Tet Putney massive. There's somewhat more at www.adem.tv & probably on myspace too...

Anyway, LY is from last year's 'Love And Other Planets', which you should obviously buy. Immediately.