The first time that I listened to Rei Harakami was back in 2002 with the track “300 ml”, I loved that work and in that moment I just knew that he had enough potencial to make a diference in the music scene. I recently made a reasearch on him and I found out that he teamed up with Akiko Yano, which is a born musician and an extraordinary songwriter that focuses mainly in jazz and pop, she has contributed with other renowned artists like Thomas Dolby, Pat Metheny and Peter Gabriel, among others, she was also married to Ryuichi Sakamoto, whom, I think, was a huge influence in the expansion of her musical knowledge into other directions. In addition to all these, she has been a major star in Japan since she was 21 and she has 24 original albums to date.

The project that they’ve created is called Yanokami and it could be one of the finest electronic music statements of our days. So, I want to share with you the live video of Sayonara, this version is also in English in their MySpace page… but I prefer this one.

Today we’ve brought two excellent and diverse options to listen to and ready to download without those annoying Rapidshare code numbers, (that is if you “Rapidownload” stuff) here they are:

Warm & Scratchy
Thanks to Adult Swim the adult-oriented television programming on Cartoon Network (where the marvelous Robot Chicken series are transmitted) we can easily download Warm & Scratchy a free indie compilation with these new tracks:




01. TV On The Radio (featuring Derek Thomas Ambrosi) - Me-I
02. The Raveonettes - Dead Sound
03. Les Savvy Fav - The Equestrian
04. The Rapture - Crimson Red
05. 120 Days - Justine
06. Broken Social Scene - Canada Vs. America
07. SOUND Team - Color Of The Love You Have
08. The Good, The Bad and The Queen - The Bunting Song (Acoustic Version)
09. The Brother Kite - Half Century
10. Jesu - Silver (Original Beats)
11. Amusement Parks On Fire - Back To Flash
12. Asobi Seksu - Stay Awake
13. Fennesz - Winter
14. Liars - Sunset Rodeo

So what are you waiting for? Go, download it… and thank Adult Swim, nice taste guys!

Andy Compton Mix
Last year the multi talented member of The Rurals made a great mix including some of the best productions of the underground house scene, this year Compton released his new mix “Daddy’s Grooves” with some new and old tracks full of groove and soul.




01. Raw Artistic Soul - Zabb
02. Hold The Onions Dub (J-Jay Remix)
03. Stereo Mutants - What Do I Do Now?
04. Wagon Cookin’ - Mr. Sun
05. Dragonfly - All The Way (5 Beats Mix)
06. Malena Pérez - Confession
07. Suntzu - Black Daylight (Slope Remix)
08. Soul:ID - Believe (Will Reelsoul Vocalmix)
09. Mustafa - Por Causa De Você Menina
10. NU Soul Orchestra - My Brazil
11. The Rurals - Corker (Knedeep Remix)
12. Shaun Escoffery - Let It Go (Sir Piers Dub)
13. Dinga - Queen (Reelsoul Remix)
14. Osunlade - Mamma’s Groove

Download it here

Enjoy the treasure at the end of the rainbow

The Sea and Cake is a magnificent indie-rock band comprised of 4 very talented and notable musicians from the Chicago indie-rock scene:
Archer Prewitt, who is an incredible guitarist and member of the soft-rock band The Coctails.
John McEntire, who is an experimented drummer, he’s also been member of many influential post-rock bands like Gastr Del Sol, Tortoise, Bastro, Stereolab, Cougar, and Trans Am, and, complementing his background, he is a good producer and also a meticulous audio engineer.
Eric Claridge, the bassist who’s also a painter and an illustrator, made, in this effort, an extraordinary collaboration with the arrangements, his bass lines always make a perfect match with the rest of each song, no matter how asymmetrical the melodies will result.
And the leader of the band and the characteristic sweet voice that is portrayed by Sam Prekop, who made two extraordinary solo albums when The Sea and Cake was on reconstruction, in fact, last year we reviewed his debut record which is a listening delight.

This month we’ve chosen Everybody, their last achievement, as Album of The Month for many reasons, one of them is because they blend a lot of colors, in a elegant and organic way, in a single work, they’ve also included a lot seventies music textures like those vintage synths and a little psychedelia, similar but softer than Yo La Tengo’s creations, in addition they re-framed the structure of the songs, previously they have used a very tight and static model, now they’ve created more complex and dynamic tracks, fortunately they’ve evolved and they took chances to make something much more creative and integral. You can feel they have made an incredible connection that sparkled the right bright and balance of every instrument and every effect.

Some insipid reviewers compare Everybody with the previous recordings by Prekop, that’s just false, I agree that some of the songs keep the use of smooth sounds, but I’m sure that one of the main goals of the band was to create something really different and original, in comparison with their previous works, you just have to listen closely. Nevertheless it would be fantastic if Sam Prekop some day ventures in changing his usual vocal stucture that could be a trademark or an obstacle in considering new possibilities, or why not? even looking for a female colaboration like Ivy’s Dominique Durand, she could be a interesting option …for example.

Everybody has to listen to this masterpiece, some critics indicate that is an album for “everybody” and in some cases they even catalogued it as a pop album, I don’t quite think so, it is a rock album as well, and a carefully well-done recording, the only thing that I would object about is the cover, why would anyone that made such a colorful and rich production, choose that grayscale cover? Nevermind.