Apologies for the slow delivery but I had to wait for the dust to settle in the wake of Valar’s EP2 announcement. I call your attention to the new track from Bombay Bicycle Club titled ‘Shuffle’. It’s catchy, it’s accessible and it’s a smashing good time. I get the sense that the pianist was given a brief that went something like “imagine you’re in a piano race where whoever plays the quickest piano rif wins. Can you imagine that buddy!? Can ya!? Got get ‘em champ!” and a hearty pat on the back to bid him do his best.

Bombay Bicycle Club – Shuffle

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You can hear some of their older stuff here and you can download the new single from itunes here.

I don’t want to get you overexcited, especially since you got all worked up watching Save The Last Dance over the weekend but I have big news. Valar have been back “in the studio”. The months between releases have not been kind to me and the release of a few one off tracks on Valar’s bandcamp have been the only things keeping me from regressing into a primordial state of music appreciation ineptitude. There was a moment there when I almost listened to the new Jinja Safari single which would surely have tipped me over the edge.

Anyway, all posturing aside, here’s what’s happened. Valar have given me (so that I could give you) exclusive access to two new tracks from their forthcoming EP2. One is the newest incarnation of Uptight and the other is an entirely new track called Dragon of Doubt which features the guest vocals of Bree from The Middle East. Start one (or both, if you’re a mental) playing then read on.

Valar – Uptight

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Valar – The Dragon of Doubt

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YOU CAN PERSONALLY BE INVOLVED IN THIS RECORD.
These are unmixed, unmastered and for the most part unresolved tracks – and that’s where you come in. The cost of recording was particularly low for Valar but the cost of mixing won’t be so. The coin you spend preordering EP2 will directly contribute to the mixing and mastering of these new recordings. On top of that, those that contribute that little bit extra will be given that little bit extra in return. Click here to see what you’ll get for your buck and how you can help get this record off the ground. I can’t stress how far these recordings are from a final product nor how excited I am for it’s impending release.

The digital silence has been deafening since I last posted and I’ve heard that in the absence of my uninformed cynicism some of you have begun to think for yourselves. I don’t like it and I won’t have it, so without further adieu, here’s is my newest ad hoc opinioning.

I’ve found that the voice of Nils Edenloff can be pretty polarizing but I’m convinced that if you hear the right tracks first you’ll come around. It reminds me of a smoother (though not by much) sounding Jeff Mangum, the vocalist of NMH. it’s not even the chalky vocal lines that won me over though, for me it was all about the production on the drum track.

When Springsteen recorded Darkness on the Edge of Town in ’77 he spent weeks trying to get the drum sound as he wanted it, so that the listener could hear only the reverberation of the drum itself rather than the sound of stick on skin. It’s almost like Rural Alberta have undergone a reverse process in trying to make the drum track sound as, I don’t know, slappy or something, as they possibly can, yet it’s worked a treat.

Whatever the hell went on in the studio, the end product is worthy of the constant attention I’ve given it these past fee weeks. This could end up being one of those records that resonates with me for years.

The Rural Alberta Advantage – Stamp

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The Rural Alberta Advantage – Good Night

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Purchase their 2011 record on iTunes here, on eMusic here or CDWow here.

Here’s to good times and fiddles in old time folk. The two are synonymous by my way of thinking so it’s with a great degree of cordiality that I share with you the Deadly Gentlemen. We all know it’s not 1921 so there’s no need to be the dude who keeps breaking the illusion. Just run with it and make like we’re straight bootlegging some bathtub liquor.

The Deadly Gentlemen – ‘Moonshiner’

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The Deadly Gentlemen – ‘Bullet in my Shoulder’

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You can go to the effort of download every individual song for free if you’re a penny pinching cat like I am or you can be a good guy and spend ten dollars on the full record and download it all at once. I’ll get them some coin later on. For now they can make do with yours. Truly, it’s a cracking record and you can get it over here.

Jeremy Quentin aka Small Houses is all up on my radar like a thing that doesn’t utilise stealth technology. I downloaded ‘North’ from his bandcamp last month and it immediately found it’s way into a playlist titled ‘Song that sound like The Tallest Man on Earth’, previously populated only by Bob Dylan’s back catalogue (dude needs stop cutting TTMOE’s style).

Absent however is the lyrical ingenuity of TTMOE but that’s something that comes with time, I guess. It’s not like the lyrics are vapid rubbish but they don’t make your ears prick up like those of Kristian Matsson. It’s the combination of a smouldering voice and some cracking fingerpicking that drew me in.

Small Houses – ‘North’

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I’m keen to hear what else the Michigan native has in store. His first full length North is currently in the works but for the moment you can pick up the appropriately named Just Before The North EP for a few dollars over here.