A couple years ago I somehow ended up at Mitzi’s Sister one night for a show. I don’t remember how exactly, but the point is that I got there, and one of the performers was this guy who called himself WOLFCOW. He played an interesting set, and afterwards I talked to him for a bit and he gave me a CD, which was, as I later found out, one of his many, many awesome homemade albums.

This must have been around 2005, 2006, (maybe 2007 (maybe)) and I had just started getting into weirder stuff and Wolf Parade and synths and what not, and the CD he gave me just sounded soooo cool with all the synths, and drum machines, and lo-fi-ness and everything. I looooooved it.

As such, I’m passing on the priceless knowledge of the mysterious and magnificent WOLFCOW to you! Right now he’s offering some of his albums as free downloads off his Myspace. Look into it. ALSO, I hear might be playing a set at a show tomorrow night (Thursday the 29th) at Tiger Bar at like 10ish…

Wolfcow – Wolfgod

DISCO! DISCO! The artist of the week is…

CLASS ACTRESS!!!

Yes, you may remember my mentioning Class Actress in my post about another incredible band on Chris Taylor‘s phenomenal Terrible Records label, Acrylics. Well, Class Actress only has a short five song EP out right now, but I managed to grab a hold of it and it’s siiiiiiick. Over the course of those five tracks she manages to cook up her own little brand of sweet neon dance music that pays tribute to all kinds of cool peeps like New Order, Blondie and every good disco artist eva.

Main song I’d want to talk about is “Journal Of Ardency” (something that is ardent is “characterized by intense emotion” or “glowing or shining like fire” both of which work in the context of the song). Over a tight beat, Elizabeth Harper, the class actress herself, sensually coos a gorgeous, glassy melody, but that’s not the thing that makes this song so killer. It’s those warping synths that go “shwooooo” and just scrub your mind with electricity. Soooooo goood.

The rest of the EP is great, but that one song is just such a mindblower. It’s a testament to the rest of the EP that can still listen to it and not just keep relistening to “Journal…”. Check it.

http://www.myspace.com/elizabethharper

Click here to buy the Class Actress EP off TerribleRecords.com

Lauren Schrieber of No Shame first alerted me about this Montreal band that maybe tried to play garage-rock or something and ended up pissing beautiful rainbows…there might be blood in it…and it might be infected with awesomeness…that’s my interpretation of Parlovr…

Parlovr – Sever My Ties

Apparently one of the guys from Cloud Nothings is in this cool band. It’s like…experimental shit with violins and lots of reverb and a smart indie-punk vibe…and falsetto singing…what’s not to like? You can download the album free off their myspace…it’s says “this week only” but it said that like a month ago also so…it might still be downloadable whenever you read this…

Wombs – Protein Shake

This week’s band of the week is a man I’ve always thought of as a guy who, as he got older, managed to not only retain his hipness, but actually continually become more hip so that now he’s like the coolest person on Earth. The artist of the week is…

LCD SOUNDSYSTEM!!!

James Murphy, the man behind LCD Soundsystem, is something of an idol to me. He managed to set up a successful and highly influential record label – DFA Records, home to Hot Chip, The Juan Maclean, Hercules and the Love Affair, among many other great acts – and at the same time achieve critical and a relative degree of commercial success with LCD Soundsystem. If I could basically get to the same place as him by the time I’m 40, I’d be like, “mission accomplished.”

Hopefully you already know and love the music of LCD Soundsystem and you know that it’s dance rock spearheaded by Murphy‘s jaded, too-hip-to-care persona. Said persona is of course the reason why LCD Soundsystem is so great – no other dance rock act (and few acts in general, really) has such a distinguishable frontman. And the music of course is phenomenal, divisible by cynical rockers (“North Americans”, “Losing My Edge” and “Drunk Girls”) and poignant personal songs that are still kind of cynical and funny (“Someone Great”, “All My Friend”, “All I Want”).

Listening to an LCD Soundsystem album, depending on your record collection, can also become a game of spot-the-cop, as Murphy‘s influence for certain songs can be easily traced to another song that he’s kind of using as a starting point. For (a well-known) example, “North American Scum” is a sly take on Pete Shelley‘s “Homosapiens”. Elsewhere, “Get Innocuous” is totally his take on Remain In Light and “Somebody’s Calling Me” is rippin on Iggy Pop‘s “Night Clubbing”. Can you spot any others?

Anyways, I’m tired, LCD Soundsystem rocks, new album is at least as good as Sound Of Silver if not better so check it mofos.

http://www.myspace.com/lcdsoundsystem

Pitchfork turned me onto this “space-gospel” artist from the UK when they posted his song “Have A Heart” on the Forkcast. I got in touch with him and he hit me up with his soon-to-be released EP One. No idea why Pitchfork didn’t post the second and most obvious stand out track, the gorgeous epic “Time”, which is actually shorter than “Have A Heart” at 4:13 vs. 7:13. Anyways, I’ve posted it so check it out and just drift in it. You can also preorder the guy’s EP here.

Lonely Galaxy – Timehttp://www.myspace.com/lonelygalaxy

Despite the fact I’ve never really gotten into King Kahn, I’ve been digging his side-kick Mark Sultan‘s latest album $ (that’s the album title). It’s pretty much what you’d expect: colorful fuzz-pop that takes notes from both early 60s doo-wop rock as well as Nuggets-style garage/psych. Gooooood stuff.

Mark Sultan – Misery Upon Us

I was supposed to write about this band about a million years ago but I got hit up with their new album right after I decided to discontinue Grubtunes as a Toronto-centric blog. But some time’s past and they’re still a kick-ass band so here we go.

The incomparable Brent Randall is at the fore of this classic psych-rock revivalist band. No longer writing Burt Bacharach-esque numbers ripe for orchestral treatment as he did on his last album, We Were Strangers In Paddington Green, on his latest album Sage, Randal cranks up the groove and drops down the fidelity. With stolen British charm (Randal‘s from Halifax) and an incredible knack for hooks and sounds that sound ripped straight out of 1968, The Pinecones will make anyone who’s been waiting for a band to combine The Zombies, The Pretty Things, The Monkees and The Piper at the Gates of Dawn into one awesome sound wet their pants with glee.

The Pinecones – Tea Tonight