Daniel Land & the Modern Painters - Love Songs For The Chemical Generation (2009)

Last year's "Love Songs For The Chemical Generation" took a couple spins to sink in, but I now consider it to be among my favorite shoegaze albums of all time, right next to Nowhere, Souvlaki, and of course, Loveless. This is a criminally overlooked album with very little acclaim or publicity, which I find baffling because it completely floors me, especially on tracks like "Off Your Face Again" and the sublime "Run Silent, Run Deep". I even went all over the hottest record stores in London searching for it, from Rough Trade to Sister Ray to the HMV that claims to be the world's largest, and not a single employee had even heard of it. The album isn't available in the states, and the band has never done a show here either. But this is the music delivery service, so that is hardly an obstacle for us.

Holla back.

Mice Parade - What It Means To Be Left-Handed (2010)

Mice Parade released a new album last week. If you haven't yet, check out his previous self-titled album. It is fantastic. That said, from what I've heard of this one, I think I'm going to love it just as much. It's pretty basic indie rock with a slight tropical island feel (somewhere between Aloha and Plants & Animals), but it still manages to somehow be catchy as all hell.


LEESTEN TO DAH MOOZEEK!

The Titan Courageous - Miscellaneous Discography (2009)

I totally forgot about these guys until today. I played them on my radio show last year, of which probably only two people listened to at most, so I figured I'd throw them on here to give them a little more attention. Hearing them today brought back memories of trudging through the snow across the bridge over the river of the barren wastelands of Eau Claire, Wisconsin.

Hailing all the way from Denver, The Titan Courageous are a (now on hiatus) progressive rock group that fit somewhere between Coheed & Cambria and The Mars Volta. They released all of their songs for free one at a time, with big gaps in between each release. There are only five total tracks, but these are five of the most well-crafted songs put to...internet. I like the fact that they only made a couple tracks in their whole time span, though. It seems better to have a handful of topnotch songs over one record with a bunch of filler.

But I've already said too much. I went ahead and put all their songs into one .rar file just for you, so here you go.

Archive - Take My Head (1999)

While meandering through the interwebs, I happened upon a video. While this video proved to be pretty damn cool, I found the background song to be just as awesome. So after a little browsing, I found out it was the opening track to Archive's Take My Head. It's some reasonable trip-hop, and I think it's worthy of posting on here to change things up a bit from all the indie rock that's been getting posted lately.

Trip it out.

Total Babe - Heatwave EP (2009)

Total Babe were the second of two openers for Jeremy Messersmith when he played in Minneapolis on the 18th. When they first started, I was doubting their talent, but after a couple songs I was liking them just fine. They're a talented group of young kids playing catchy songs. As for their style/genre, others giving them praise have dubbed them indie-pop, which seems pretty accurate.

For 5 bucks, I figured I'd grab the EP and see how it was. I like it better than I liked them live, but that's not to say they were bad live. The main difference is that now you can understand the vocalist, and she's actually pretty good.

Well anyway, check it out. It's worth your time.

Jean Baudin - Solace (2008)

I literally just heard about this guy today. This man is amazing. Why? He made an album composed entirely of him playing an 11-string bass. Not only that, but he made it sound good! It's full of ambient tracks that I can't even begin to comprehend how to play. Just do yourself a favor and listen to this craziness.

Slappa da bass

Broken Social Scene - Lo-Fi For The Dividing Nights (2010)

Broken Social Scene is a damn fine indie rock super-group. They released a new album this past year, and it was...alright. They also just released a new EP that I guess is supposed to be a tag-along to this new album. It's actually pretty different, despite having been recorded at the same time. Most of the songs I've heard so far are actually instrumental. I just started listening to it, though, so I'm not even sure if there's a drastic change halfway through that I'm totally clueless about. But I'm really digging it so i figured you guys would wanna have a listen too.

Try it out.

Fiona Apple - Tidal (1996)

Fiona Apple's Tidal, a 1996 release. Along with Alanis Morisette, t.A.T.u, and Emiliana Torrini, this was the soundtrack of my dad's car. And that is a cool car.

Try before you buy. Twitch before you bitch. Apply before you die. Convey before you play. Get... diagnosed before you post.

-Kevin

Junip - Fields (2010)

Junip is the side project of my favorite folk artist Jose Gonzalez, consisting of some of his other friends rather than just him on guitar. While Junip is a bit of a departure from his typical lo-fi acoustic endeavors, the group still has a soothing folk feel that's just as good as anything Gonzalez has released previously. This past year, the band released an EP and now have finally released their first full length album. From what I've heard so far, I'm impressed. The song "Rope & Summit" makes this whole album worth checking out.

So check it out.