I love mashups when they do something really simple and really smart. Tim Bowman’s clear little mashup takes the technology behind Last.fm to recommend a whole load of videos for you to watch from You Tube. You simply type in an artist or a last.fm username and you get an instant video channel, rather than just listening to a a bunch of audio clips! It works pretty well, in the example (below) I put in 70’s UK art-punks Wire and got 70’s US art-punks Per Ubu! If you want to see what I’d recommend just type in nickwatt into the search box! Go check it out here

The weather’s been foul, the music’s been great. So dive on in!

ALBUMS OF THE MONTH:
Portishead - Third
White Williams - Smoke

Where do you go next when you seemingly can’t escape front the fact you’re your début album produced one of defining moment of a genre of music you hate - Trip Hop. You wait three years, then release one of the darkest and most suffocating records records ever made. Then you do virtually nothing for the best part of 11 years. Anyone expecting to find Portishead in the same place we left them in is for a big surprise. The filmic quality of their music may still remains, while the folkie tones of Beth Gibbons solo album with Rustin’ Man are added into the mix. But they haven’t stopped their, taking ideas from dark stoner metal, krautrock, weird 60s Psychedelia and Folk and Joe Meek records. The opener, Silence, sets the scene, starting with a metronomic Krautrock rhythm (no breakbeats on this album), with a guitar line straight from Metal Box era PIL, then Beth’s vocals come in…

Tempted in our minds
Tormented inside lie
Wounded and afraid
Inside my head
Falling through changes

So no change when it comes to the foreboding tone of the lyrics, but musically this album twists and turns. The single Machine Gun pitches the vocals against a barrage of drums machines and electronic distortion, while We Carry On pays homage to late 60s electronic duo Silver Apples. It’s hard to believe that they could make a record that is darker and bleaker than it’s predecessors, yet make it even more engrossing. This is definitely album of the year territory. (more…)

At citizensound we enjoy listening to all sorts of music, so we decided to share some of our current favourites with you for our special Venice Festival of Media podcast. You can find out more about our panel at the event here.

All these acts are either unsigned, or with small independent labels from across the world. The podcast includes artists form the UK, US, Canada, Australia, Brazil, France, Belgium, Spain, Germany, Sweden, of course the home nation of the event Italy…

To listen now:

To download the podcast:

You can find out the track listing click (more…)

After a great January of great new albums, I was expecting a pretty quiet period up to Easter. How wrong could I be. As always, only a few of this month’s music recommendations come from anywhere near what you might call the mainstream. But hey that’s what this column is for, helping you discover some of those rare musical nuggets buried in a miasma of mediocrity.

ALBUMS OF THE MONTH:
Sian Alice Group – 59.99
White Rabbits - Fort Nightly

The Sian Alice Group have one of the worst band names ever. But their debut album 59.99 (the time it takes to listen to the record) is anything but dull and predictable. Their music mixes pop melodies with improvisation to create music of epic proportions, not dissimilar to the best of Spiritualized or My Bloody Valentine. While, the band claim inspiration from Jeff Mills’ Detroit techno, the soundtracks of Angelo Badalamenti, and the minimalism of Steve Reich. Although London-based, they are signed to a small US label, which may suggest why the British music press have been particularly slow on the uptake (although they did play an NME showcase gig at SXSW recently). You can listen to some of their music here.

If you want to put a bet on the next US indie to break through Arcade Fire-style, then the 10-1 favourites are White Rabbits. Their début album has just got its UK release via the label responsible for Coldplay and Keane’s earliest output. The album garnered rave reviews in the US on it’s release last year, and deservedly so. Opener ‘Kid On My Shoulder’ bounds alone on a two-note keyboard riff, then grabs you by shoulders and drags you along, as it gallops towards the finale. While ‘March Of The Camels’ sounds like some bastard-son offspring of the Specials ‘Ghost Town’.

(more…)

This month sees the arrival of the first citizensound podcast. We decided that we wanted to share with you some of the vast array of music, from every genre imaginable, that makes up citizensound’s combined record collection of some 25,000 albums and singles. Our aim is to expose you to some great new music, including some of the best unsigned music around, but also some classic gems that you may not have heard before from times gone by. It will also give you the chance to hear some of the music we’ve been sounding off about in the ‘Stuff We Like’ section of our website, and we might even sneak in a few tracks that would make a great soundtrack for the odd advert or seven.

So let’s get down to volume one of It All Ads Up…

To listen:

To download the podcast:

For those of you who are PC users, or are not iTunes users, the MP3 version can be downloaded by right clicking your mouse, here

You can find out the track listing by clicking (more…)

The music release schedules at this time of year is more likely to compound S.A.D.(Seasonal Affective Disorder) amongst music fans, than alleviate them. Traditionally this is not a good month for music junkies in need of a fix. All the ‘BIG’ albums came out pre-Xmas, so all we are left with were a few straggly turkeys that labels didn’t dare chuck out into the market last November, worried that they would sink without trace. But come January nothing much happens, so those very same turkeys get a chance to be released into the shops, in the hope that a starved music public may be suckered into buying them. And what could have turned into very poor sales and a pretty embarrassing chart placing, ends up looking half decent! And don’t tell me this cynical ploy doesn’t happen. Does anyone remember the less than inspiring First Impressions Of Earth by The Strokes? Thought not! It was released on the 2nd January 2006, and pretty quickly sank without trace. Even the music press, who hate January just as much as the rest of us because they have nothing new to write about, couldn’t find it in their hearts to say anything particularly nice about it. But good citizens, something has changed!

January 2008 has already seen an inordinate number of great records appearing on the shelves of your favourite music emporium. The pick of the crop include These New Puritans, Vampire Weekend, One More Grain, Michael Dracula, Cat Power, Thao, The Chromatics, Glass Candy, British Sea Power, The Dynamics, and Black Mountain. Agreed none of them are exactly household names, but all of them have made cracking albums. (more…)

I saw Tawiah at the Gilles Peterson Worldwide Awards last week at Cargo in London. She completely blew me away. She has everything. A great band, well crafted songs, an amazing presence on stage, confidence unlimited (for a second performance no less!) and a voice that drifts from Carmun Lundy to reggae, back to Jill Scott and then to dubstep with Radiohead thrown in. This girl is London Town, but deserves to go global.

Whether you are still unconvinced about the power of popular music, you like smart ex-NME journalists talking about the music dialectic, or you simply love great pop TV - you must check out arts critic and author, Paul Morley's excellent documentary on BBC 4 last night. He explores and celebrates the beauty and mystery of three-minute pop single.

BBC4 are currently running an excellent season of programmes on pop music, including the excellent Pop Britannia series (Friday's at 10pm). You  can Watch Morley's excellent documentary and some of the other excellent programmes in the series on the BBC iPlayer online for the next 7 days.

This is the album cover of the most recent release from Andrew Bird. To me this is such an arresting image. It stopped me in the shop. I had to pick up the CD and find out about the artist. This is an example where the power of the visual can make a difference.

Special Mention for Sigur Ros Heima, I love this band. And now they have created a beautiful film to complement their images that their music conjures up in our minds. They toured their home country Iceland, playing free low key concerts in the farthest corners of the breathtaking country. The landscape is as much the star of this film as is the music

citizen bay shares his faves from 2007…

1. Jose James – a 29 year old from New York, who deserves as wide an audience as possible. He also has my vote for single of the year, the joyous Equinox/Resolution 10 inch that came out in the summer.

Anyone brave enough to put words to John Coltrane needs to be listened to. When I got hold of this 10inch, it just sat on the turntable playing again and again. He has an album coming out very soon. I have heard some tracks already (go to his myspace page for a listen… He has a track called Winter Wind. It is a future classic. For the time being I will make do with Equinox/Resolution).

Expect the term Urban Jazz get used a lot when his name is mentioned. Also expect the urban scene to be mixing things up with him…see him live and you will know what I mean…

Jazz dead? Yeah right…

2. Akron/Family - Grown to love this band since I heard Gone Beyond.

3. Old Romantic Killer Band - Saw them at In The City, and love their music, their look and live set. They make a heap of noise for a two piece too… Girl You Have All The Fun and Lovers Pass are my faves from them right now. Not played a lot of gigs. This two piece blues rock band play really loud. Harry can really sing, while he (guitar) and Bunse (drums) are tight tight tight. Go see them or at least go to their myspace and check them out…

4. That great Record Cover Art is not dead.

5. The Voices of Harlem - Found this single in a French ‘vide grenier' (like a car boot sale, but it translates as ‘empty attic’). What a tune. The 20-member strong Voices Of East Harlem formed in the late 60s, inspired by groups like The Staple Singers and the social and political struggles of the day.
Originally a local choir, put together by the East Harlem Youth Federation Association, the group were signed to the Elektra label. After supporting Jimi Hendrix in 1970, their debut album 'Right On Be Free' was recorded at his Electric Ladyland studio.