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The Dancing Thumb (aka: music recommendations)

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Damn, Seasick Steve is awesome. Been looking for some decent new blues. Thanks for the tip, man.

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seasick steve DOES rock! i've been struggling with oppenheimer, grand pocket orchestra and mclusky obsessions myself lately.

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Have just discovered Korruptor

That podcast you linked is fucking awesome, I have been having an excellent Wednesday afternoon as a result. Thank you :):tup:

I've recently discovered

I've not tried him yet, but my housemates rave about him. One even passed up Portishead to see him on a different stage last December.

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That podcast you linked is fucking awesome, I have been having an excellent Wednesday afternoon as a result. Thank you :):tup:

Marek, look!!! :woohoo::clap:

If you enjoyed that one, you might like to dig into the archives and try DJ Pena's contribution too.

NB: Marek's the only other person I know who likes Progressive House.

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Aha :)

House, techno, dance, breaks, drum and bass, a spot of gabba and dubstep too.

I went to see the Plump DJs at Stealth recently, and there was one room of techno and one of breaks - best night I've ever had in a club :D

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Been listening to Crystal Castles lately

http://www.myspace.com/crystalcastles

Debut album comes out Tuesday! It's like hipster indie from Toronto (we've had a good scene the last few years!) crossed with Chiptunes. I described them recently as "The Knife meets 047, but less Swedish" (and if you don't know who 047 then you are missing out on one of the best chiptune albums). Very good stuff :tup: :tup:

Actually, in general, I've been listening to a lot of chiptunes lately. Been that kind of mood. http://www.vimeo.com/649115 <- seriously rocked my shit like a Vic Viper.

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They're pretty good :)

The Lost Levels might be worth checking out too. They have a wussier sound, but have done some 8bit stuff too. The New Early Sheets and Endboss are probably the most gamey there.

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First off: Wrestle! I like prog house too! :shifty:

Also: The presidents of the united states of america have a new cd out! You can hear it in full here

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They're pretty good :)

The Lost Levels might be worth checking out too. They have a wussier sound, but have done some 8bit stuff too. The New Early Sheets and Endboss are probably the most gamey there.

Wow. A+. I have the guilty feeling that my musical tastes are slightly divergent from the rest of the Thumbs community. I'm very much a indie/quirky-rock guy, and I have the feeling theres a lot of techno/trance love here.

That said, I love the Lost Levels. I might get the CD.

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No, I'm definitely indie/quirky as well, which is one of the main reasons I've stayed out of all the techno conversation. Don't worry, you're not alone. What I listen to is largely Western Canadian indie rock, as I work downstairs from one of the main indie venues in the city and I get to drop in on a lot of amazing shows after my shifts end. Usually end up with a new band discovered every 2 or 3 weeks that I'm in love with, often from within a 6 hour drive of my house. That said, I'm also heavy into blues and punk (origin sort of punk. 70s and 80s sort of stuff.) and occasionally listen to Leonard Cohen and/or Tom Waits when the mood strikes, as they're just fucking great.

Here's some links to indie/quirky stuff I've been listening to over the past month or so to help balance out all the techno/trance links that have been posted.

Beija Flor: From my hometown, so I see them often enough. Just put out their second album "The American" in January, although I still prefer their debut "The Quiet One And The Lonely One." All the tracks you can hear on their Myspace page are from "The American" though, so you gotta take what you can get. Listen to "Life of a Salesman" or "The Birds" for some of their best on that album.

Run Chico Run: A two piece from Victoria. They each will typically play 2 instruments at once when performing live, meaning yes a two piece can actually sound like that without sampling. A friend introduced me to them about two years ago, and I haven't missed one of their Calgary shows since. Give a listen to "Smitten" or, if you can find it, "Jacques and Madeline."

: Victoria again. First time I saw them, they were opening for another amazing band called Frog Eyes (give a listen to "The Oscillator's Hum"), which was founded by Sunset Rubdown's vocalist Spencer Krug before he left to start a new project. They're now bigger than Frog Eyes, but I recommend both. Sorry about the shitty youtube link for these guys, but it was the best I could find and I love that song.

So there you go. Four links to some indie bands from my area that I'm really into. Hope you feel less left out now.

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Beija Flor? Nice name. Went and checked out the link they are very sweet aren't they? Do you know where they found the name from? I can't remember which type of flower it is but it is a Portuguese name (it is like a dandelion or a daisy or something).

Been introduced to a whole load of traditional Balkan music recently and I'm sifting through it as we speak, so far Baba Zula have sparked some interest.

Have been listening to a few tracks off of the Magnolia Soundtrack and also the 28 weeks later OST. The former only has a couple of good singer songwriter bits at the end of the album and the latter is great ambient music but the composer pretty much remixes the the first film's song about 9 times.

I'm also trying not to get too excited but failing to do so as some one just told me that Portishead are going to release another album (apparently that was in the Observer in England and they did a big article on it and stuff). Can't wait.

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I'm also trying not to get too excited but failing to do so as some one just told me that Portishead are going to release another album (apparently that was in the Observer in England and they did a big article on it and stuff). Can't wait.

See previous page. It is very good :shifty:

Thanks for the "Lost Levels" -- they seem alright. Will look into it. I've been nerding out the chiptunes lately. Like, a LOT. "Video game Orchestra" and "Disasterpiece" and "8-bit operators", amongst others.

Also.

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Yes, I do feel much less left out, thank you. :tup:

I've definitely fallen in love with a few Canadian groups, the big ones being The New Pornographers and Moxy Fruvous, for which I have an incredible amount of respect and adoration. If we're talking classics, I'd say my favorite would have to be Bowie, though I'm a Tom Waits fan too (mostly his more recent, Mule Variations onward stuff).

You should check out Tally Hall. They're the one band so far I can honestly say I knew before they really caught their break. My friend and I arranged for them to play at our High School for free a couple years ago, and now they're moving onto a major label. :tup: We even got a mention in their blog :mock: . They define quirky music and are awesome.

Run Chico Run is interesting. I like. Sunset Rubdown is :tup: :tup: .

In the spirit of all these 8-bit bands, I'm sure Cyriak is old news, but I think "no more memory" is great.

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Sorry twmac, but no idea where the name came from. Although I have a friend who DJs for the local campus radio station who knows the guys, so I'll ask her if she knows next chance I get. The New Pornographers are great. Managed to catch on to them while they were still playing the smaller pubs touring Western Canada, it's always fun to get in on the ground floor with something like this.

While we're on the subject of people just picking up big contracts, they're more standard rock than indie, but my buddy Matt is the new(ish) bassist for Hot Little Rocket, who recently got a huge break in their album How to Lose Everything being produced by Steve Albini (producer of Nirvana's In Utero, The Breeders' Pod, and Gogol Bordello's Gypsy Punks Underdog World Strike, among others) and getting a major release. Great album. Pretty much all I listened to for a month or two after it came out last summer. They just got back from playing the SXSW festival in Austin, which is fucking amazing for a little Calgary band.

If you dug Sunset Rubdown, you should also click the link for Frog Eyes and this one for Wolf Parade. All three are different projects from the amazingly talented Spencer Krug.

Tally Hall was pretty good. I dig, and will keep an eye out. Any idea how often they get out to areas where I'd be able to see them? If your location thingy is correct in telling me you're from New York, it's unlikely they get North of the border and damn far West all that often...

One last thing, major props for mentioning Mule Variations, as it's one of the best albums I own. Personally though, I find Waits more consistently stunningly brilliant in the mid 80s, having peaked with my personal favorite album of his, Swordfishtrombones, and to a lesser extent Rain Dogs.

But yeah, the gist of this is to listen to Hot Little Rocket. When the myspace page loaded and I started listening again, I remembered why this was all I listened to for so long. I think I'll be bullying my friends into throwing that CD on a few times tomorrow on the drive to Spokane for a Buckethead/That1Guy show. 11 hours on the road requires music no matter how much you love your friends.

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Whoops, that'll teach me not to read through the stuff I missed since I last logged in. That makes me really look forward to the Portishead album then. In fact I might burst... Or disgracefully download it.

The festival for 8bit, is that the one in December in New York? There are a couple now for what i remember.

USK with PicoPicodisco are genius and there is a guy called Motokick who refuses to release albums but was on an 8bit peoples compilation who really rocks.

Yeah miffy, I know there is a Luso connection in Canada so it would be interesting to see how far the influences have spread.

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Managed to catch on to them while they were still playing the smaller pubs touring Western Canada, it's always fun to get in on the ground floor with something like this.

Wow. That must have been spectacular. They strike me as a band that could play a seriously good live show, especially in a small venue.

Personally though, I find Waits more consistently stunningly brilliant in the mid 80s, having peaked with my personal favorite album of his, Swordfishtrombones, and to a lesser extent Rain Dogs.

I may not know enough of Wait's stuff to judge. I own Heart of Saturday Night, Mule Variations, and my dad has Orphans. I've listened to the Beautiful Maladies a couple times through. Maladies definitely represents what I love about Tom Waits, which is how offbeat and utterly dark he can be, and a visit to Wiki tells me that Swordfishtrombones and Rain Dogs are from the same time period, so I'm sure I'd love them. Truth be told, I almost like his spoken-word stuff better than the music. What's He Building in There is definitely one of my favorites.

Hot Little Rocket is good: They rock. They definitely have potential. I'd check them out if they came down to NYC.

Tally Hall may be going on tour again soon. They just re-recorded their first studio album for a bigger label, and they come from Michigan, so I don't think North is going to be a problem.

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Oh man, Tom Waits is so fucking good... Alice & Blood Money are his best work, Real Gone and Mule Variations are great also. Hell, it's all great, Orphans is a bit diluted but there's such pearls there too...

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Truth be told, I almost like his spoken-word stuff better than the music. What's He Building in There is definitely one of my favorites.

Listen to "Frank's Wild Years" off of Swordfishtrombones, it's totally spoken word and pretty dark. Bloody brilliant. Not to be confused with the full album Waits released that is also called Frank's Wild Years.

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Lately I've been listening to Polish progressive rock band Riverside, instrumental post-rock band Pelican, and doom/stoner metal band Electric Wizard. I'm enjoying the last one much more than I thought I ever would (as I don't listen to metal all that much). There's just something about their ridiculously fuzzy sound that appeals to me and makes me smile.

Also, the more I listen to Alice in Chains the more I appreciate their music.

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Listen to "Frank's Wild Years" off of Swordfishtrombones, it's totally spoken word and pretty dark. Bloody brilliant. Not to be confused with the full album Waits released that is also called Frank's Wild Years.

Yes! That's another one of my favorites! It's hilarious. I heard it off Maladies.

"...all Halloween orange and... chim-i-ney red."

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Lately I've been listening to Polish progressive rock band Riverside, instrumental post-rock band Pelican, and doom/stoner metal band Electric Wizard. I'm enjoying the last one much more than I thought I ever would (as I don't listen to metal all that much). There's just something about their ridiculously fuzzy sound that appeals to me and makes me smile.

Also, the more I listen to Alice in Chains the more I appreciate their music.

I used to hate Alice and Chains then a couple of my friends took me on a road trip to Seville, playin gnothing but 'Dirt' by the aforementioned band and I am very much taken by them. I hope you have listened to their Umplugged performance it is both tragic and fantastic. Layne Staley looks like a corpse. Electric Wizard are fantastic too.

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I used to hate Alice and Chains then a couple of my friends took me on a road trip to Seville, playin gnothing but 'Dirt' by the aforementioned band and I am very much taken by them. I hope you have listened to their Umplugged performance it is both tragic and fantastic. Layne Staley looks like a corpse. Electric Wizard are fantastic too.

I actually got to know them through MTV Unplugged. It was very impressive and indeed, tragic.

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I just dug out Unplugged from my CD wallet to give it another listen. Very fond memories have just arisen again.

The fact that he looked so close to death but somehow his voice is still so potent.

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