Musically Amusing

October 30, 2013 · 11:25 am

New Mixtape From Escort

Over the past few months, NYC’s Escort have shared two highly anticipated new singles, “Barbarians” and “Cabaret,” following the release of their critically acclaimed self-titled debut album. In celebration of the band’s US tour (and first live gig in Detroit), the band has shared the “Gov’t Shutdown Throwdown” Mixtape. Featuring Italo oddities, forgotten midwest house classics, their favorite Ron Hardy edit and an exclusive preview of “All Night People” by Funn City (1^st release on Darshan Jesrani’s brand new Startree imprint!) the “Gov’t Shutdown Throwdown” Mixtape premiered with VICE’s Noisey and is available HERE.

Stream: Escort – Gov’t Shutdown Throwdown Mixtape

Founded by Eugene Cho & Dan Balis and fronted by the powerful vocals of Adeline Michèle, Escort makes music that pays homage to the classics while remaining fresh and modern. The Cabaret & Barbarians singles are out now via Escort Records and fans will have new chances to catch their spectacular live show as they hit the road with JC Brooks and the Uptown Sound this fall!

Tour Dates:

* = w/ JC Brooks and the Uptown Sound
11/10: Miami, FL @ Friends of Nature Festival
11/14: Pittsburgh, PA @ Rex Theatre
11/15: Ferndale, MI @ The Magic Bag *
11/16: Chicago, IL @ Metro *
11/17: Minneapolis, MN @ Triple Rock Social Club *
11/18: Madison, WI @ The Majestic Theatre *
11/20: Philadelphia, PA @ Theatre of Living Arts *
11/21: Boston, MA @ Brighton Music Hall *
11/22: Washington, DC @ Black Cat DC *
11/23: Brooklyn, NY @ The Bell House *
12/4: London, UK @ Queen of Hoxton
12/6: Rennes, FR @ Trans Musicales
12/7: Rennes, FR @ Trans Musicales
12/8: Dublin, IR @ Bodytonic

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Tagged as dance, Escort, Gov't Shutdown Throwdown, mixtape, stream, tour dates

October 30, 2013 · 11:13 am

Little Ghxst

Little Ghxst has been hard at work getting his tricks and treats in order for this Halloween! There will be a special animated video tomorrow on Halloween day but he wanted to give you something in time for Mischief Night first.

Watch the hypnotic “Ghxst” video replete with vintage Halloween imagery now. Little Ghxst has had some previous releases under a different name but has chosen to stay anonymous…for now!

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Tagged as anonymous, Ghxst, Halloween, Little Ghxst, Mischief Night, video

October 30, 2013 · 11:00 am

Video: Pompeya – “Power” + album details

Last month I posted the video for “Slaver” from the band Pompeya. Now, the US full-length debut is available! Tropical is an ode to 70s disco and 80s new wave in a sound that is pop music in its finest form. The Moscow-based group has seen “Power”, “90”, and “Slaver” as the record’s first singles, each accompanied by all new music videos. The LP will be paired with a remix EP, which features contributions from Psychemagik, Fred Falke, Jimmy Edgar, and more. The official Remix EP will be included as a free download for those that purchase the 12” special edition double vinyl, and will be released officially in December 2013.

Purchase limited edition double 12” vinyl LP

Pompeya – Tropical
Catalog ID: NS107

Watch the video for “Power”

Video: Pompeya – “Slaver” (musicallyamusing.com)

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Filed under Awesome, new albums, Newest Love, remixes, video

Tagged as Fred Falke, Jimmy Edgar, new album, Pompeya, Power, remixes, Slaver, Tropical, video

October 29, 2013 · 11:42 am

Chromeo – “Sexy Socialite”

Check out another new track from Chromeo’s highly anticipated release, White Women. Dave 1 and P-Thugg follow up the infectious “Over Your Shoulder” with a 6 minute funk odyssey called “Sexy Socialite” (which they’ll be performing TONIGHT with special guest on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon). MIGHT just be my new favorite!

Listen: Chromeo – “Sexy Socialite”

Chromeo tease ‘Sexy Socialite,’ new single from upcoming ‘White Women’ album (dancingastronaut.com)
New Track: Chromeo – “Over Your Shoulder” (musicallyamusing.com)

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Tagged as Chromeo, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Sexy Socialite, White Women

October 29, 2013 · 11:37 am

Check ‘Em Out: Deep Sea Arcade

Having just completed a blistering run around Australia, DEEP SEA ARCADE blew audiences away with some killer new tracks crafted during their nine-month sojourn to the UK, a preview of next year’s sophomore album.

The band have today dropped a psychedelic visual feast for their new track “Black Cat”, drawing both on footage from their trip and on footage submitted by fans.

The band have spent the best part of the last year soaking up the UK culture and imparting some of their own while working on a slew of new tracks, quickly creating the same buzz in their temporary home of London which lead to them being one of Sydney’s most respected indie acts.

Recorded and mixed by Dan Grech-Margueray (Lana Del Rey, The Vaccines, Howling Bells, The Kooks), Black Cat has proven a worthy followup to their debut album Outlands, which had a worldwide 2012 release through Ivy League Records, with singles heavily supported in Australia by national youth network Triple J and influential community station FBI and in the UK by BBC 1, BBC 6, and XFM.

Aside from a sold out tour Australia’s major cities and a spot on Australia’s prestigious Big Day Out festival, the band have been on the road with Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds, The Charlatans, Girls, Kaiser Chiefs, Cloud Control and Modest Mouse. They have also toured the UK and Europe extensively, including appearances at Barcelona’s Primavera Sound Festival, The Great Escape In Brighton, Liverpool Sound City, Berlin Independent Night, Reeperbahn Festival in Hamburg and sold out shows in London before returning to Australia for their recent welcome home tour… a warmup to what is going to be a huge 2014.

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Tagged as Australia, Big Day Out Festival, Black Cat, Cloud Control, Deep Sea Arcade, Ivy League Records, Kaiser Chiefs, Lana Del Rey, Modest Mouse, Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds, Outlands, Sydney, The Great Escape, video

October 29, 2013 · 11:20 am

Video: Ha Ha Tonka – “Lessons” (Live)

Ha Ha Tonka recently released their highly anticipated fourth full-length album, Lessons, via Bloodshot Records.

The album was recorded at Bright Eyes’ ARC Studios in Omaha, Nebraska and in NYC with producers Dan Molad (Lucius) and The Ryantist. With a sound described as “southern rock meets The Cure” by My Old Kentucky Blog, the band today unveils their captivating live video for album title track, “Lessons.” Check out the entrancing “Lessons” (Live Video) below.

Ha Ha Tonka has become renowned for its authentic, effortless brand of indie-Americana, seamlessly fusing the traditional with modern, contemporary elements. Their track, “Usual Suspects,” was featured in the latest episode of CBS hit series, Criminal Minds.

Ha Ha Tonka: Lessons (Review) (popmatters.com)

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Tagged as Bloodshot Records, Criminal Minds, Ha Ha Tonka, Lessons, live, video

October 29, 2013 · 11:10 am

Walk Off The Earth 2014 Tour Dates

Walk Off The Earth have announced a headlining North American tour to start off 2014. The tour kicks off on Jan 16 in Minneapolis and routes through March 6 in Los Angeles, with Parachute supporting on the run. A full list of North American tour dates is below. Tickets will be available for pre-sale today and will go on sale to the general public on Nov 1. The Canadian band’s lively set incorporates their wildly popular covers with original songs from their Columbia Records debut full length, R.E.V.O., which is available now. R.E.V.O. features the band’s breakout hit single “Red Hands,” which hit #1 on the Adult Alternative radio charts and entered the Top 15 at the Adult Pop radio format. Their follow up single “Gang of Rhythm” is impacting at radio now.

Walk Off The Earth were just nominated for a YouTube Music Award in the Response of the Year (best fan remix, parody or response video) category for their cover of Taylor Swift’s “I Knew You Were Trouble”, and have been confirmed to perform at the first ever YouTube Music Awards ceremony next month in NYC alongside Lady Gaga, Arcade Fire, Eminem, Avicii, MIA, and Earl Sweatshirt. The YouTube Music Awards celebrate artists who receive the highest levels of engagement with fans from all over the world, through views, likes, shares, comments, subscriptions and more. The inaugural ceremony will be hosted by actor and musician Jason Schwartzman along with comedian Reggie Watts, with Spike Jonze serving as creative director. Fans can vote at youtube.com/musicawards from now until the live show on November 3 at 6pm ET.

In addition, Walk Off The Earth recently won a CASBY Award at home in Canada, where “Red Hands” has been certified Double Platinum and R.E.V.O. has been certified Gold. In addition to accepting their award for Favourite New Artist, the group performed a short set for the packed crowd at the event. Watch the band perform their new single “Gang of Rhythm” at the award show here.

Walk Off The Earth features multi-instrumentalists Gianni Luminati, Marshall, and Sarah Blackwood on vocals, Taylor on keyboards, and Joel Cassady on drums. WOTE have an incredibly loyal fanbase, with over 1.5 million subscribers to their YouTube channel and over 795k fans on Facebook. The band gained notoriety for their creative multi-million-viewed YouTube videos ranging from a cover of the Weeds theme “Little Boxes” to Taylor Swift’s “I Knew You Were Trouble” to their most well known cover of Gotye’s “Somebody That I Used To Know” with all five band members playing one guitar, which has been viewed over 154 million times. Walk Off The Earth released an album of original songs, R.E.V.O., which stands for the band’s motto Realize Every Victory Outright, on Columbia Records earlier this year. R.E.V.O. features hit single “Red Hands” as well as their newest single “Gang of Rhythm.” Walk Off The Earth have brought their energetic live show around the world, including a well received set at Lollapalooza and sold out headlining shows in cities from NYC and LA to Toronto, Tokyo, Singapore, London, and Paris.

Walk Off The Earth Headlining 2014 Tour

w/special guest Parachute

1/16 Minneapolis, MN Varsity Theater
1/17 Milwaukee, WI The Pabst Theater
1/18 Chicago, IL House of Blues
1/21 Grand Rapids, MI The Intersection
1/22 Indianapolis, IN Deluxe @ Old National Center
1/23 Cleveland, OH House of Blues Cleveland
1/24 London, ON London Music Hall
1/28 Portland, ME State Theatre
1/29 New York, NY Best Buy Theater
1/30 Philadelphia, PA Electric Factory
1/31 Norfolk, VA The NorVa
2/1 Silver Spring, MD The Fillmore – Silver Spring
2/4 Charlotte, NC Amos’ Southend
2/5 Atlanta, GA Buckhead Theatre
2/6 Lake Buena Vista, FL House of Blues
2/7 Ft. Lauderdale, FL Revolution
2/15 Uncasville, CT Wolf Den at Mohegan Sun Resort
2/20 Denver, CO Ogden Theatre
2/21 Salt Lake City, UT In The Venue
2/22 Boise, ID Knitting Factory Concert House
2/23 Spokane, WA Knitting Factory
2/25 Portland, OR Crystal Ballroom
2/26 Seattle, WA Showbox SoDo
2/28 San Francisco, CA The Regency Ballroom
3/4 Anaheim, CA House of Blues
3/5 San Diego, CA House of Blues
3/6 Los Angeles, CA House of Blues

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Tagged as 2014, CASBY Award, Gang of Rhythm, Jason Schwartzman, Parachute, R.E.V.O., Red Hands, Taylor Swift, tour dates, Walk Off The Earth, YouTube, YouTube Music Awards

October 29, 2013 · 10:55 am

Stream: Cut Copy – Free Your Mind

“the spirit of the UK’s second summer of love, circa 1988, evoked the old-fashioned way: a DJ spinning records in Melbourne’s burgeoning underground dance music scene.”
– NPR

“ …the psychedelia of the late ’60s, the raw electronics of early British acid house, and the swirling, sampler-and-guitar creations of the shoegazer stylists My Bloody Valentine.”
– The New York Times

“ …as soulful and wholesome as they are futuristic and danceable.”
– SPIN

Cut Copy have grown from a bedroom project to an international festival staple that never fails to leave thousands enraptured. Each release and tour has invited fans internationally one step closer into their world full of ecstatic peaks broken up by quiet moments of melancholy and beauty. Their vision is clearer than ever before on their fourth studio album, Free Your Mind, released November 5^th via Loma Vista/Modular.

The album is now streaming in full at NPR “First Listen” (and available for pre-order via iTunes.)

Free Your Mind was strongly influenced by the two “Summers of Love,” which were birthed from burdening times – Vietnam and 10 years of Thatcher’s reign. Through unprecedented explosions of youth culture, communal elation and celebration, these eras provided a spirit that the band embraced – the need to tear down the walls of perception while creating a fantasy of what the next youth revolution might sound like. The result is a sound of a band that has been sending masses into abandon for years.

Hailed for their energized live show, the band has kicked off an international tour, making stops in LA, Chicago, Austin, Tulsa and more. Fans that aren’t able to catch the band live, can catch them performing on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon on November 19^th.

New Music From Cut Copy (musicallyamusing.com)
Stream/download Spiritualized’s rework of Cut Copy’s ‘Free Your Mind’ (hangout.altsounds.com)

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Tagged as album stream, Cut Copy, Free Your Mind, new album, NPR

October 24, 2013 · 2:28 pm

Newest Love: Nova Heart

“A delightful shock from China ….. a sly variant on Seventies New Wave: a dynamic singer, Helen Feng, who bears a strong vocal resemblance to Blondie’s Debbie Harry, fronting a White Stripes-style rhythm section – male guitarist, wicked female drummer – that threaded loops and programming through heavy blues and dance floor rhythms….. – at once rough and digital… my first best of the fest.” – ROLLING STONE (David Fricke, Senior Editor)

If the music planet these days is inhabited by candy colored pop munchkins, ruby red dance floors, and twerking teddy bears, here comes the Wicked Witch of the East. Staunchly opposed to the oh so technicolored predictable dance tracks that have goo’d and gaga’d the world, a band out of China, yes you heard me, China, has produced an electronic EP finally with a nasty, nasty side to drive fear into the all the denizens of OZ.

This is not for the club, but for the lonely, lonely walk home after a night at the club. It’s music for walking through streets filled with tranny prostitutes (Beautiful Boys) and coming down from lord knows what (My Song 9). As if emerging from the polluted fog of Beijing, Nova Heart gives you garbled transmissions from an enemy satellite, telling you that for every up there is a down, for every pleasure there is a price.

And this message, like an ominous counterpoint, is filled with sex unfulfilled and builds that lead to a slide into oblivion. Dark analog scenes created by Italian cowboy Rodion are filled to the brim with the siren’s call of lead singer Helen Feng that promises both sex and mortality – all at the same time. Deceptive pop melodies that lead you down the road as if setting you up for the kill before they diverge and you drop down that endless well.

Live, Nova Heart is like watching a gathering at a religious service gone dangerously wrong. The world’s most amazing female drummer, ATOM, the size of a munchkin herself, powers through a show that feels like a voodoo ceremony while Helen holds the pulpit like an evangelical preacher shaking and panting as if she´s feeling some spirit possessing her body and asking for your souls. The guitarist (LOOP), sends only the dirtiest warbliest Floyd-like hooks out in crashing waves as the bassist plays distorted grooves that seems some strange baby called industrial funk.

And from the music and the sound they tease at past hours on that ruby dance floor, dancing around aged genres but never landing flat footed in anything predictable. Perhaps only a group coming out of China can dare to make such predictions, the exuberance of the never ending 80’s finally in coda, and all we are left with is an illusion, the afterglow of the ecstasy, and the fear of facing the consequences of our excess. Perhaps it takes a band that lives in a place where the foibles of a self-obsessed world are exaggerated to 1.6 billion degrees to create the come down album of their generation. This is not a political statement as it is more of a moment of contemplation on just how it feels when the party is over. And if you’re lucky, these are the tracks for the after-after party in purgatory.