Feature: Keep Shelly in Athens

Keep Shelly in Athens made its first blissful mark on our frequencies sometime last summer, and since then, amidst a great shower of remixes and original material, this Balaeric clan of magic-makers have held an unforeseeably potent sway on our headphones. Not that they need more touting--physical copies of their releases are selling out, as they should be--but Keep Shelly in Athens has a unique dreamscape of a sound that is so singularly satisfying that it can't go without note on this humble blog. Self-described as "downtempo/ electronica," tracks from the Athenians' In Love with Dusk 12" EP (Forest Family Records, U.S.) began circulating around the blogosphere in mid-June; cuts like "Cremona Memories" and "Running Out of You" could be heard beaming sweet waves of ecstasy out of speakers everywhere:

Cremona Memories by Keep Shelly in Athens

Running Out Of You by Keep Shelly in Athens



Hot on those heels was their excellent mixtape for Warmer Climes, a half hour plus of nocturnal serenades interspersed with the sounds of celebration drifting in from a  beach party.

Warmer Climes Mixtape #278 tracklist:

1. Chicane- Overture
2. Star Slinger- Elizabeth Fraser
3. Memoryhouse- Heirloom
4. Zola Jesus- Trust Me
5. Balam Acab- See Birds
6. SLEEP OVER- Outer Limits
7. Prize- Rumours
8. Body Language- You Can
9. CSD vs. Toro y Moi- Teach Me How to Dougie
10.Keep Shelly in Athens- Running Out of You



Their most recent release, Hauntin' Me (Transparent Records, U.K.), came out in late February, with an accompanying video. A slow building, romantic storm that carries us into the odd euphoria that being love-haunted can induce, "Hauntin' Me" lives up to its name without a doubt. Don't miss "Song to Cheer You Up," either:

Keep Shelly in Athens - Hauntin' Me by Keep Shelly in Athens

Keep Shelly in Athens - Song To Cheer You Up by TransparentRecs



Like most electronic-leaning acts with strong original material, Keep Shelly in Athens do a good deal of remixing, and they've been remixed themselves by a parade of accomplished bedfellows. The following are just a few of our favorites from both the remixed and remixing categories:

Solar Bears - Cub (Keep Shelly in Athens remix) by Keep Shelly in Athens

Porcelain Raft - Tip Of Your Tongue (Keep Shelly in Athens remix) by Keep Shelly in Athens


Keep Shelly In Athens - Running Out Of You (Memory Tapes Remix)

Visit Keep Shelly in Athens on their myspace, peruse their Blogspot, twat them on Twitter, scope them out on Soundcloud. We'll be hounding them, and we think you should too.

Purity Ring: "Ungirthed (Christian AIDS remix)

Purity Ring's "Ungirthed" has been out in the sonic stratosphere for some time now, the undiminished addictiveness of Megan James' "ears ringing, teeth clicking" vocal hook still as smooth and fresh as when it first dropped. Purity Ring is, from what we've gathered, a side project of hyper-pop, chiptune-lover Gobble Gobble, whose "Lawn Knife" and "Wrinklecarver" cuts from 2010 gathered a huge amount of blog play:

Latest tracks by PURITY RING

Gobble Gobble - Lawn Knives by Electrocorp.fr

Gobble Gobble - Wrinklecarver by nmcollins

 

This remix comes via Bandcamp-signee Christian AIDS, an anonymous Manchester crew who like to put listeners in earshot of spectral divas howling through ghostly dancefloor delirium. For reference, check out "Fever" below:

Purity Ring - Ungirthed (Christian AIDS remix) by GammaRay (Semiotics)

Fever by christianAIDS

And the video for "Scum":

Just a number 05272011- "He Didn't Want a Love Song," "The Pain"

Just A Number 05272011 is the self-effacing, mysterious moniker of some unknown individual, male or female, or perhaps a collective--the point is, nobody knows. It seems that every time we hear a haunted-sounding pop opus, we suspect Karin Dreijer Andersson (the lady behind Fever Ray, and one half of The Knife) of hiding beneath a witch's cloak, donning a new pseudonym under which she will reinvent her signature sounds that have, in her relatively short time, changed the electronic music scene. The high-pitched, moaning vocals on Just A Number 05272011's "He Didn't Want a Love Song," and "The Pain," certainly conjure Fever Ray's spooked atmosphere, but our mystery artist doesn't rest on simply imitating another musician. "He Didn't Want a Love Song" hovers between worlds of dark warbling and cosmic, almost tropical pop--the accompanying, simple video suggests nothing to the viewer, presenting only the nakedness of the song:



He Didn't Want A Love Song from just a number 05272011

Equally as enjoying, if perhaps a more ambitiously pop-driven number, "The Pain" moves from rainy night sky gloom to island vacation with a sudden breeziness that propels the listener with an almost narcotic strength through the cut.

Latest tracks by Just a number 05272011

"The Pain" video:


The Pain from just a number 05272011 on Vimeo.


We'll be keeping track of this slippery, pronoun-resistant artist, and we suggest you do, too. For now, the only message we have from him/her/they is: "we are just a number 05272011"; we'll be waiting for more. 

FaltyDL: You Stand Uncertain LP + Mixtape

These days, it seems like FaltyDL is the hardest-working producer on the scene, pumping out quality offerings one after another, expanding his fan base with a signature, maybe designer sound: a New York-centric vibe, a chaos, a longing--an exacting precision in the architecture of every release. Who the fuck cares about the "structure of the modern dance album"? FaltyDL unapologetically strips the phrase of all its meaning to approach a deconstructive method of production, and from the remaining detritus he pieces together a sound by doing what many producers are afraid of doing: making music soulful. "You Stand Certain" is indeed an opportunity to peer into the soul of a native New Yorker from a very rare and singular perspective.  


March 9th, he dropped the "You Stand Certain" Quietus Mix, which he accompanied with only the shortest and least pretentious of explanations:

"It’s all over the place! It’s exactly the sort of mix I’ve always wanted to do, where you just drop a load of tunes, and genre-wise go all over the place, just play things I love. It’s pretty funny, there are parts of it that are just an interview with Squarepusher on the phone, and I don’t even know where I got that. It’s weird stuff I find in my iTunes; when I come across something like that it’s as comforting to me as, say, a familiar book is to a really dedicated reader. I don’t read that much, I should do more, but I’ll come across an old track and it’ll bring back a lot of memories. It’s kind of an influences mix too. The music I’ve chosen here – there’s a RZA track, some Luke Vibert – it’s all stuff I’ve listened to many times and just love." 


The mix plays like an exercise in the pleasure of the listener: each song, even the two previews from the upcoming LP ("You Stand Uncertain," and "Gospel of Opal"), have a nostalgic quality about them that leads anyone, croak-throated or born talent, to make a fool of themselves singing along, sometimes even to songs they'll realize, perhaps not all at once, that they've never heard. On the other hand, there are some you likely will have heard: Frank Zappa, RZA, Mariah Carey, Brian Eno, and Aphex Twin all get airtime--but the other tracks make you feel like you should have heard them a long time ago. 

  

   

What's more, fast approaching is his full-length, "You Stand Uncertain," out today digitally, and out physically on Planet Mu on March 28th. Preview and pre-order the album in its entirety on FaltyDL's page at Planet Mu; the promotional blurb reads: 

"Although at times it’s anchored in the familiar basslines and rhythm science of uk dance, as heard in his previous material, on this album it’s clear that Drew has been soaking up some of his native city’s musical past such as disco, house and hip hop. With this in mind the album moves at different tempos, the ghosts of dance music past are evoked but never allowed to take over, giving the whole album a decayed, dreamy abstraction that allows for comparisons with the current crop of ‘chillwave’ producers, were it not for the tight drums and basslines."

   
     Tracklist 
   
  
      1. Gospel of Opal (ft. Anneka)
      2. The Pacifist 
      3. Open Space
      4. Brazil (ft. Lily McKenzie)
      5. Eight Eighteen Ten
      6. It's All Good
      7. You Stand Uncertain
      8. Lucky Luciano 
      9. Voyager
     10. Tell Them Stories
     11. Play With My Heart
     12. Waited Patiently (ft. Lily McKenzie) 

Check out the video for "Gospel of Opal," below. 

Hip Love:

VIDEO: Die Antwoord, "Rich Bitch"

From the artists:

"For those who don't know yet, DIE ANTWOORD are a futuristic rap-rave crew from South Africa who represent a fresh new style called ZEF. DIE ANTWOORD crew is made up of zef rap master Ninja, fre$h futuristik rich bitch ¥O-LANDI VI$$ER and the mysterious beat monster DJ HI-TEK."

The "Rich Bitch" video was a long time coming but it came, and boy am I excited it did. Die Antwoord are not shock-jocks, but--it seems--performing artists masquerading as a "futuristic rap-rave crew," and the video above is more than a little evidence in that way. If you need more, check out their massively catchy "Evil Boy" song, and play the video if you're down with erections, rats, video-ho parodies, and so, so much more:

Fever Ray: "The Wolf"

In my days as an intern over at FADER, it occurred to me not only that Fever Ray was an immense pleasure to listen to, but also a commercially viable artist whose manipulations of Grimm's Fairytale ghoulishness, eerie fashion, and icy electronics would someday hit a greater audience. "The Wolf," Fever Ray's contribution to the upcoming "Red Riding Hood" soundtrack, makes it clear: if we were expecting an upbeat, family remake of the children's classic, we'd better shift our expectations. The new tune picks up the elegiac control of Fever Ray's eponymous 2009 effort and cracks it apart. The sparse, rhythmically-disturbing percussions that characterize Karin Dreijer Andersson's music is present as always, but with "Wolf" we hear a more unhinged side of the artist: an almost PJ Harvey-esque howl bellows desperately through the song, like the haunted rattle of night wind in Halloween trees. If that wounded yelp is any indication of how Fever Ray's as-yet-unannounced sophomore LP will sound, an auspicious time is indeed before us.



 Fever Ray - The Wolf


According to IMDB, the soundtrack to "Red Riding Hood" also includes Fever Ray's dark-alley song, "Keep the Streets Empty for Me." The visually stunning video below blows away the pop world's artist-poseurs with plain old-school talent.



And, if the Andersson tracks didn't make it clear enough, stadium-anthem synthsters The Big Pink come in nearly at the soundtrack's close with an atypically spooky little number:



If "Red Riding Hood" proves as excellent as its soundtrack, we may be seeing one more kooky feather in Crazy Face Amanda Seyfried's blockbuster belt. Me and the bf might even be seeing it one of these days. Maybe. I mean, we really probably won't. We sure as hell--on the other hand--will be watching out for this soundtrack's odd, grim gems.

Gang Gang Dance

New York City Experimental troupe Gang Gang Dance, wizards of 2008's Saint Dymphna, have always skewed avant-garde; word on the street is that things have changed, that the band has gone pop, but this 11+ minute rabbit hole of a number should satisfy both electronic and pop fans aplenty. "Glass Jar," the lead cut off their fifth, upcoming LP, Eye Contact, shows off a sound-quality that feels, at times, as if it is materializing like a volatile gas inside a beaker, biding the right time to detonate under pressure. It's an ambitious move to toss a challenging, labyrinth of a song like this out there as the promotional tune--but the giant succeeds stupendously, borne up on great waves of tasteful house, delirious drumming, and of course Lizzi Bougatsos' bury-me-at-sea vocals.





Gang Gang Dance "Glass Jar"

For those of you who haven't been following Gang Gang Dance too much over the years, here's a taste of 2008's Saint Dymphna--the road that got us to "Glass Jar":





Eye Contact is set for a UK release date of May 9th, the U.S. May 10th, their freshman release on the notorious 4AD, home to Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti, Camera Obscura, and Twin Shadow, among others.

Via 4AD: "...Eye Contact features a guest appearance from Alexis Taylor of Hot Chip, whose signature vocals take centre stage on the track ‘Romance Layers.' In advance of the album's release, a limited edition double A side 12" will be released on Monday 4th April.

Gang Gang Dance has also been flagged by indie superstar-darlings, Animal Collective, to play the All Tomorrow's Parties festival they're curating in May--a festival which, this year especially, is shaping up to be a sound feast.