Encyclopedia of Adds

STS9 - Ad Explorata

STS9 already has a tremendous fan base, but the new album is perhaps more accessible than the band’s previous efforts. Peaceblaster is, of course, dense with the Eno-esque layering of live and electronic instruments that STS9 is known for—the chords and samples swirling atop the pulsing bass and drums. But between the beats there is a distinctly human element absent from past records. Brown, Murphy, and Lerner even sing occasionally, adding voices to the sonic stew for the first time.

Head For The Hills - S/T

Rooted in the tradition of bluegrass, the music of Head for the Hills is a vibrant mixture of homegrown compositions, traditional harmonies, and an innovative approach to improvisation. The group’s lyrical nature and songwriting seems to evoke reminiscent feelings of inspiration. In the live setting, Head for the Hills can venture into a myriad of musical styles and sonic landscapes that caters to a boundless array of listeners.
A noted cast of talented personalities joined forces with Head for the Hills, producer Drew Emmitt (Leftover Salmon), audiophile engineer Gus Skinas (Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, George Harrison) and mixed by 2009 Grammy Winner Vance Powell (Willie Nelson, The Raconteurs, Jack White). The album features special guests: Drew Emmitt, Billy Nershi (String Cheese Incident), Anders Beck (Greensky Bluegrass), Kyle James Hauser (Gregory Allan Isakov) and James Thomas.

Boy Genius - Staggering

Jason Korenkiewicz began writing songs in 2006 for a two-man acoustic project tentatively called Boy Genius. One night at a party someone declared them ‘neither boys, nor geniuses’ and the name was solidified.
Over the course of Staggering ’s 38.5 minutes, the mix of jubilant pop songs, anthemic rock numbers and more subdued compositions are fleshed out with field recordings, tape loops, organs, fuzz, feedback, layered vocal harmonies, trumpet, timpani, glockenspiel and pretty much everything else imaginable. The result is an album that sounds wholly new, but would also feel right at home in the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s or 2000s. Staggering further demonstrates why Indie MP3 called Boy Genius “a quintessential American college radio band.”

Vieux Farka Touré - Fondo Remixes - Six Degrees (DIGITAL ONLY)

Vieux Farka Touré’s career in music would never have happened, if his illustrious parent had his way. Ali felt that the music business was a harsh place to work. But young Vieux found a mentor in Toumani Diabate, and his own guitar skills eventually convinced the elder Farka Touré that a second generation of family musicians was inevitable. This is music from a contemporary Africa – urban, sophisticated, globally connected but deeply proud of its ancient heritage. This is the old/new Africa that Vieux represents. Fondo is the music of an Africa that rocks, and yet still hears the camel’s tread in the sand.
Here his songs get the remix treatment from many artists you know and love including Ancient Astronauts, J-Boogie, Brownout and Biggabush.

David Starfire - Bollywood Bass - Six Degrees

David Starfire is one of those artists – the kind that every musician secretly wishes he could be: a fluent player of multiple instruments; a DJ who has gigged at Coachella, Burning Man, Shambhala, Love Parade, Winter Music Conference and other A-list festivals; a songwriter who has collaborated with the likes of FreQ Nasty, MC 900 Ft Jesus, Wire Train, and American Music Club; a soundtrack artist who has been called upon by Fox, ESPN2, Fox Sports, MTV, and HBO.
On Bollyhood Bass, you’ll hear the spirit of David Starfire’s native region and Creole heritage mostly in the gutbucket funk that animates nearly every track – as well as in the hip hop elements that he has distributed generously throughout the program. “The Beat,” for example, features a charmingly squidgy synthesizer bass, rolling dhol drum, and sharp-tongued rapping courtesy of guest MC with vocals by iCatching. “Shout It Out” prominently features some very fine beatboxing (by Lynx) alongside an acoustic guitar-driven groove and even more rapping, all of it leavened by various Asian flavors. Other Caribbean influences are audible throughout the album as well: on “Baghdad,” the slow and trip-hoppy beat is interwoven with explicitly dubwise reverb and echo effects and punctuated by Jamaica-inflected vocal samples; “Load” piles on layers of science fiction dub effects as well, this time juxtaposed with keening Asian vocals.

Nneka - Concrete Jungle - Yo Mama / Epic

Pop music is a ‘here today, gone tomorrow’ world. But when your heart is as big as your Afro, when your talents stretch from teardrop soul-singing to freestyle rapping, when you’ve got so much to say about so much, then you’re in it for the long haul.
Nneka’s music has a big splash of Bob Marley in the recipe, a measure of Nina Simone and a lick of Erykah Badu. Her US debut, Concrete Jungle, in stores February 2nd, 2010, is an offering of love, hope and optimism dedicated to the people of Warri & the Niger Delta of Nigeria. Holding it all together is the focus of her beautiful voice, located in a place somewhere between yearning and rage.

Pierced Arrows - Descending Shadows - VICE Records

To call Fred Cole a “living legend” is like saying, “Yes, and water is wet.” A true frontiersman without peer, Fred has blazed his own sonic trail for over 45 years (From "Deep Soul Cole" to The Weeds, to The Lollipop Shoppe, to Zipper, to Kingbee, to The Rats, to Dead Moon, to Pierced Arrows), resulting in leaving his own unique, indelible stamp on nearly every genre imaginable. And if he wasn’t directly part of a particular scene or musical aesthetic, you can be damn sure he was at least an influence on it.
The new name seems to evoke the saying “If you cut me, I will bleed.” Not that any of us want to see that literally happen, but Pierced Arrows, just like Fred’s previous bands, bleeds all over their performances and records with such wrought emotion it only took one 45 to prove that the band was the worthy successor to Dead Moon. Ma and Pa Cole’s General Store has reopened for business, producing “rock ’n’ roll that’s rough, ragged, and honest,” as Fred once described their predecessor’s collective output. It’s both a new sound and an inheritor of tradition.
A Pierced Arrows performance is a form of communion. They are there to see you just as much as you are to see them. You are not likely to find them cowering in a backstage corner. Though they are there to work, and work hard, don’t be surprised to find them hanging with friends and fans, checking out the opening act. Fred and Toody have always done it their way. This is their life’s work, and life is just the beginning if you really believe.

Laura Gibson & Ethan Rose - Bridge Carols - Holocene

Bridge Carols, the new project from Portland, OR friends Laura Gibson and Ethan Rose, began as a conversation of mutual appreciation and curiosity - a shared desire to challenge old ways of working. Ethan had mostly distanced his music from words, while Laura had often felt bound by them.
To wit: Steeped in the fingerpick-guitar rudiments of folk music, inspired by the expressionism of classic jazz vocalists, and finding common ground in the minimalism and ear-taunting of the avant garde, Laura Gibson alights on a branch of the music tree that no one else has found (NPR called her last release, Beasts of Seasons, "a quiet masterpiece.") Sound artist and composer Ethan Rose has released recordings, scored films, and created sound installations (upcoming exhibitions include a collaborative installation with glass artist Andy Paiko at the Museum of Contemporary Craft.)
Inspired by Laura's voice, Ethan began building soundscapes, while Laura looked through piles of notebooks, coming across old phrases that never found home in verses or rhymes. As the project developed, Laura began improvising lyrics and wordless vocalizations, stream of consciousness singing that tumbled out of her in long trailing waves. Ethan then took the recorded words and vocalizations from these sessions - cutting them into bits and pieces - rearranging and juxtaposing them against each other to stretch them into new musical poems. These reconstructed lyrical fragments maintained the tone of Laura's original improvisations while allowing new themes and meanings to emerge.
Bridge Carols takes the listener to a place that exists between the notes and behind the words of modern music. This breaking down and rebuilding, cutting down to the core and polishing, results in something truer and more fundamental. It's music that feels intimately familiar, timeless; at its heart, quite natural and human.