New Music: Wild Nothing- A Dancing Shell + Music Video

Jack Tatum and his dream pop project Wild Nothing announced today that he will release a quick turnaround follow up to the excellent Nocturne album. The seven song EP will be titled Empty Estate and will come out May 14th via Bella Union/Captured Tracks.

The first track from the EP, "A Dancing Shell", comes accompanied by a music video that features odd geometric shaped people strolling down the street. Listen and watch below:

For fans of Talking Heads, Neon Indian.

New Music: The Strokes- All The Time + Other Recent Releases and Music News

"All The Time" is the second track to be released from the upcoming new Strokes' album Comedown Machine. While the synth heavy a-Ha-like first song from the LP, "One Way Trigger", was a bit of a head scratcher, the second track is a garage pop/indie rock barn burner that recreates the sound of their debut album. Now that's more like it!! Listen below:

Comedown Machine is out March 26th via RCA.




Other Goings Ons From The Week That Was:

Wild Nothing shared a new video for the track "Only Heather" from his great 2012 release Nocturne. Watch the video of a guy walking down the street with a large sword impaled through his body.

Wild Nothing- Only Heather

Foals came out with a video for the song "Milk and Black Spiders" taken from their awesome new album Holy Fire. The video features the band rehearsing and we get to spy on them through CCTV.

Foals- Milk and Black Spiders

Celebrity cameo of the week goes to Passion Pit for their new video for the track "Carried Away" from Gossamer. Sophia Bush from the TV show One Tree Hill guest stars.

Passion Pit- Carried Away

Darkwave band Black Marble have shared a new video for A Great Design off their 2012 album A Different Arrangement. Watch as a kidnapping goes wrong...errr... right.

Black Marble- A Great Design

Legendary folk punk troubadour Billy Bragg has a new LP coming out on March 19th titled Tooth and Nails. Watch the video for the country-ish "Nobody Knows Anymore":

Billy Bragg- Nobody Knows Anymore

British/New Zealand post punk band The Veils have announced a new album and released the first single "Through The Deep Dark Wood.". The album is titled Time Goes, We Stay and will be out April 23rd. Watch the video for the new track below:

The Veils- Through The Deep Dark Wood

Just because I don't post about hip hop, it doesn't mean I don't appreciate the genre. R.I.P. Tim Dog. The legendary hip hop artist died this week from a seizure.

Tim Dog- Fuck Compton

Finally, watch as guitarist Johnny Marr talks to NME about the The Smiths' classic song "Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now" and performs it for the first time in 25 years.

Music Video: Wild Nothing- Paradise

Wild Nothing has just dropped a new music video for the song Paradise which is a track off of his excellent new album Nocturne. The video stars indie it girl Michelle Williams ( Take This Waltz, Dick) and shows her on an airplane travelling to Niagara Falls. Once in the Honeymoon Capital of the World, the super cute, pixie haired Williams does the usual tourist routine including taking the Maid of the Mist boat tour and viewing the falls from the top of the Skylon Tower. The dream pop track is somewhat modified in the video to allow Williams to do a voiceover reading of a passage from the Iris Murdoch novel A World Child. Watch the super hip video below:

DIIV & Wild Nothing- Live at The Great Hall

When I first heard the song Doused by DIIV, the first thing I thought of was is that it sounded similar to Wild Nothing. It is both fitting that DIIV signed to the same label as Wild Nothing, Captured Tracks, and that the two bands decided to tour together. That tour brought the two groups to The Great Hall in Toronto last Tuesday night.

When I first heard that DIIV and Wild Nothing were playing The Great Hall I had reservations about the sound quality of the show. The last time I was at this venue was in 2010 for Women and Best Coast and the vacuous theatre swallowed up the sound and left it a big echoey mess. Luckily, there were no such sound issues on this night.

First, I need to talk about how fantastic opening band Yacht Club were. Fucked Up member Ben Cook's new side project is pure 80's inspired dance greatness. Cook even acted the part, looking his preppy best, wearing a white polo shirt, rolled up skinny blue jeans and loafers with no socks. The highlight of their set was the cheesy good synth pop single Flash which was featured on this blog earlier this week.

Next up, DIIV took the stage and looked a lot more coherent and clean than the last time I saw them in June. That night lead singer Zachary Cole Smith had disheveled hair, was sporting sweats and looked like he just got out of bed. He probably had a reason to be unkempt because I believe he played with Beach Fossils in New York the day before and rushed up to Toronto for his own gig.

DIIV dived (excuse the pun) right into things with the instrumental track Druun. Their were a few technical problems to start the song but the issues were quickly rectified. The set was similar to the set they played last June at Lee's Palace. The band ripped through most of the songs off of their debut album, Oshin, and also included a cover a Nirvana's Geist B-side classic Bambi Slaughter. The band ended with their must well known song, Doused, which featured a duelling guitar battle between Smith and his childhood buddy, guitarist Andrew Bailey.

Wild Nothing and DIIV might have similar jangle guitar sounds but there are a lot of differences between the two bands. Jack Tatum is a very quiet guy and it sort of comes across in his music. The band started out with the Gemini songs Confirmation and Chinatown which are classic dream pop masterpieces. I have to admit I love Gemini more than Wild Nothing's recently released LP Nocturne which features a lot more synth pop.

The band then preceded to play an hour long set with most of the tracks from the album Nocturne, including the single Paradise, and a few a Golden Haze & Gemini classics. I saw the band play last year and was more enthralled with their performance than on this night. At last year's performance I got lost in Wild Nothing's dream pop shimmering guitar haze while this year I just didn't feel the vibe. That doesn't mean the band weren't good, just a lot different. The crowd didn't help much as there were more than the usual amount of yappers and drunken dancers who always try to ruin everyone else's experience.

New Music: Wild Nothing- Paradise

Jack Tatum bedroom project Wild Nothing returns with Paradise, the second single off of his forthcoming album Nocturne. He has also set up a neat website that tracks the lunar cycle for the next few weeks apparently symbolizing the restlessness that he felt when creating the new album.

The new single is more synth and dance oriented and is a little bit different than his usual jangly guitar dream pop songs. Take a listen to the first two singles Shadow and Paradise via Soundcloud below.

The new Wild Nothing album Nocturne will be available on August 28th in North America via Bella Union and Captured Tracks.

Download: Wild Nothing Paradise




Stream: Shadow