Pretty Lights & Major Lazer

Concert Photos: Pretty Lights & Major Lazer @ Congress Theater (Chicago, IL)

The palatial Congress Theater in Chicago knows how to throw a New Year’s Eve celebration. Last year, Girl Talk rang in 2010 to a packed house. This year, electronic heavyweights Pretty Lights and the Diplo / DJ Switch collaboration Major Lazer were called upon to soundtrack one of the night’s biggest parties. The DJs (and Lazer’s hype-man Skerrit Bwoy) kept things uptempo, blasting another sold-out crowd with deep bass, hip-hop beats, and turntable theatrics. Photographer Tracy Graham attended the show and captured these great photos.

Pretty Lights & Major Lazer

Iron and Wine

Pop Addict: Iron and Wine’s Kiss Each Other Clean

Every Thursday, Pop Addict presents infectious tunes from contemporary musicians across indie rock, pop, folk, electronica, and more.

Iron and Wine: Kiss Each Other CleanIron and Wine: Kiss Each Other Clean (Warner Bros., 1/25/11)

Iron and Wine: “Walking Far from Home”
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When Iron and Wine made its debut in 2002 with underground sensation The Creek Drank the Cradle, it immediately became apparent that there was something special at hand. The album — anchored by lo-fi acoustic finger-picking set to Sam Beam’s hushed, harmonized vocals — featured no bells and whistles.  It remains a blunt testament of Beam’s humble offerings as a songwriter and the splendor that he can achieve through it.  Today, when listening to the album, you still get the feeling that the songs were written by Beam while he sat on the front porch of a ramshackle home, located on a dirt farm somewhere down south, singing “Upward Over the Mountain” as the late summer sun sets beyond the horizon.

World in Stereo: Josephine Foster & The Victor Herrero Band’s Anda Jaleo

Each week, World in Stereo examines classic and modern world music while striving for a greater appreciation of other cultures.

Josephine Foster & The Victor Herrero Band: Anda Jaleo (Fire Records, 11/2/10)

Josephine Foster & The Victor Herrero Band: “Los Cuarto Muleros”

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“Anda Jaleo” has a long history as a Spanish folk standard; its melody repeatedly transforms and reemerges anew. First recorded in 1931 by poet and dramatist Federico García Lorca and flamenco singer/dancer La Argentinita, it was a popular dance before it was adopted by the Republican Army as a resistance song during the Spanish Civil War.  But under head of state Franciso Franco’s repressive military regime, Lorca’s leftist art was outlawed, including the folk-song collection Las Canciones Populares Españolas, which features “Anda Jaleo” and many others.

The song’s name appears again in avant-folk artist Josephine Foster and husband Victor Herrero’s recent reworking of Lorca’s Las Canciones, a simple and skilled record that shows the songbook’s ability to connect with audiences 80 years later. Along with Herrero’s acoustic band, Anda Jaleo was recorded live in the Grenadine Sierra, capturing a rich, lively mood that stays within the traditional framework of the 1931 original.

Jerseyband

Jerseyband: Outlandish Brass-Metal Orchestrations

Jerseyband: Beast WeddingJerseyband: Beast Wedding (6/11/09)

“The Glad Hand”

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On stage, a costumed septet prepares to unleash a serious sonic force that belies its members’ festooned bodies. An all-male horned frontline of three saxophonists and a trumpeter is adorned in women’s clothing, a red cape, and a spiky foam wig, belting out furious riffs that weave back and forth atop a syncopated, polymetered math-metal foundation.

The trumpeter unleashes a harrowing scream, and the music darts to a quick brass motif reminiscent of The Green Hornet before the all-male rhythm section — a bassist in a dress, a guitarist in a lab coat, and a drummer in a tank top — pounds out down-tuned accompaniment as the saxophones create one giant, unwieldy power chord. After a rapid-fire call and response and a prolonged groove, the horns switch to a somber harmony, which transitions to one final math-rock breakdown.

Morrow vs. Hajduch

Morrow vs. Hajduch: Soom T & Disrupt’s Ode 2 a Carrot

Scott Morrow is ALARM’s music editor. Patrick Hajduch is a very important lawyer. Each week they debate the merits of a different album.

Soom T & Disrupt: Ode 2 a Carrot

Soom T & Disrupt: Ode 2 a Carrot (Jahtari, 1/24/11)

Soom T & Disrupt: “Weed Hawks”
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Hajduch: Happy new year, everybody.

Morrow: Go, competitive sports teams!

Hajduch: Glaswegian MC Soom T has worked with an impressive list of collaborators in her career, including The Orb and DJ Maxximus.  Her distinctive voice has lent personality to lots of great cuts over the years, several of which were produced by Disrupt, who pioneered the “digital laptop reggae” sound of his label, Jahtari.

Now Jahtari expands the collaboration with a 2xLP/CD called Ode 2 a Carrot.  The styles on display are not particularly divergent from what you’d expect: Soom T sings about weed, cops, weed, peace, legalizing weed, and weed over Disrupt’s deft blend of dub reggae, hip hop, and dubstep.  A few of the beats are recycled from previous Disrupt releases, with Soom T’s flow fitting in nicely. Disrupt’s compositions are narcotic, head-notting affairs on their own, so it’s cool to hear them stripped of their dubbed-out sci-fi samples and replaced with double-time, high-energy vocals.