Many of you may recognize the name Glen Hansard, singer of Irish band The Frames and more recently, star of the movie Once. While I’m only vaguely familiar with The Frames’ material, a couple months ago I actually got his collaboration (from my mom, funnily enough) with Once co-star/pianist Markéta Irglová called The Swell Season and it quickly became one of my favorite albums. The album is an absolutely beautiful blend of quiet piano, guitar and cello interplay and the perfectly complimenting voices of Irglová and Hansard. In addition to being featured at both Coachella and Bonnaroo this year, the song “Falling Slowly” was featured in the movie Once and has been nominated for both an Oscar and a Grammy. While the song unfortunately lost at the Grammys (to “Love You I Do” from Dreamgirls), I’m really hoping that the two artists pick up an Oscar this Sunday, they sure as hell deserve it. If you like The Mountain Goats, Damien Rice, any kind of folksy, mellow stuff, definitely check out the mp3s and tune in on Sunday to see if they take home an Oscar. Enjoy!

From The Swell Season:

“Falling Slowly”

“Drown Out”

“Leave”

Myspace | Amazon | iTunes

Tuesday, February 19th, Bon Iver and Black Mountain will be playing at the Rock and Roll Hotel in DC.

Bon Iver: As you may have seen, I recently wrote a post declaring For Emma, Forever Ago the best album of 2007. There were many great albums that came out last year, a number of which could have easily been considered the “best of ’07,” however, there was something about Justin Vernon’s album that spoke to me–it may have been the story of how the album was produced in complete isolation in a winter cabin in Wisconsin, or maybe it was solely his humbling voice over the gentle strums of his guitar. One things for certain: this album is spectacular. I can’t wait for the Tuesday show and if you have the opportunity to see Bon Iver live, you’d be foolish not to. Other tour dates can be found HERE. You should also check out this new interview Pitchfork did with Justin Vernon, discussing his favorite bands, tv shows, books, etc. For Emma Forever Ago, is being re-released on the jagjaguwar label, and will be available for purchase Tuesday.

Black Mountain: If you like Bon Iver, you will like at least some of Black Mountain’s music. Their album, In The Future, released late January, and is worth your listen. The instrumentals are louder than For Emma, Forever ago, but there are songs that definitely bring Bon Iver to mind, such as “Stay Free.” Perhaps it’s just my taste, but the songs that have a slower tempo seem a lot better to me. I fully acknowledge that there are people out there that only like the grungier songs such as the seventeen minute song, “Bright eyes,” but that’s not generally the music we feature on the site. The guitar on “Wild Wind,” reminds me of Nels Cline on Wilco’s, Sky Blue Sky and sounds really good. Tyrant starts out really intense, but quickly changes directions and is also a really nice song to listen to. I respect Black Mountain’s ability to spice things up and experiment with the tempo throughout In the Future. For me, this show is worth it just to see Bon Iver, but Black Mountain is an added bonus. I can picture Black Mountain being a great band to see live, as well. Since the DC show is the same day as the release of For Emma, Forever Ago, the show will also serve somewhat as an “unofficial” release party.

Both the Black Mountain’s and Bon Iver are signed to jagjaguwar.

For Emma, Forever ago (2007-2008):

Bon Iver – Skinny Love

Site| Amazon Pre-order| Virb (stream full-length)| Myspace

Black Mountain- In The Future (2008):

Black Mountain – Tyrants
Site | iTunes | Amazon

Hey, thanks to anyone who tuned in to the wvau radio show today from 2-4 PM. It was a fun show and I hope if you tuned in, you liked the music you heard. Keep checking the blog all this week for spotlights about some of the bands we played. And to those of you who didn’t tune in, it’s easy, you can listen from anywhere. All you need is a computer; just click the large banner located on the left side of this page and our show should stream in iTunes. We feature a lot of music we post about on the blog in addition to other favorites of ours and even some up and coming DC area bands. So I hope you’ll tune in next weekend if you wanna hear some cool tunes. Even send us an IM at radiowvau if you have a request. Anyway, here is my playlist for the day, Dave’s will be coming soon {UPDATE: David’s playlist added, click “continue reading” to see all}

These United States – First Sight

Destroyers – Introducing Angels

Lior – I’ll Forget You

James – Laid

Band of Horses – Ode to LRC

Belle and Sebastian – Your Secrets

Aloha – Passengers

Liam Finn – I’ll Be Lightning

Cold War Kids – Hospital Beds

Jon Brion – Didn’t Think It Would Turn Out Bad

Nas- Memory Lane (Sittin’ In Da Park)

Grizzly Bear- Easier

Sun Kil Moon- Somewhere [Version 2]

Glen Hansard & Markéta Irglová- When Your Mind’s Made Up

Cat Power- Speak For Me

Continue reading →

This may be old news to some, but I stumbled across this album a while back, and became instantly obsessed with a number of the cuts… upon many listens, I have come to the conclusion that this album deserves some attention. The jamband/hip-hop collaboration is a great idea, especially when the backing band is Galactic.

Galactic formed in 1994 as a jazz/funk group featuring bass, guitar, drums, sax, harmonica, and the all-nasty hammond organ. They are from New Orleans, which pretty much guarantees that they have some serious skills. I had the opportunity to see their drummer Stanton Moore with his trio at a free jazz fest in my hometown of Iowa City… he blew me away… easily one of the most entertaining drummers I’ve ever seen. He’s made of nasty beats, and this album has lots of those. More importantly, I stumbled across the Bonnaroo fairgrounds last summer into the last 20 minutes of the Galactic show. Needless to say, I desperately wish I could have seen that entire show. They ended with a heavy Kashmir jam (everyone kept covering Zeppelin because John Paul Jones was in the house) while a dozen MCs spit hot fire onto a crowd that was freaking out harder than any other show I saw there. If Galactic comes near you, and they most likely will, get out there and see them. They are touring with various MCs from the album right now, and I guarantee that they will knock your socks off. I missed the Boston show thinking it wouldn’t sell out, and my buddies who went made me exceedingly jealous with their descriptions of the night… don’t let that happen to you.

The album itself features some MCs you probably know, and some you may not… most notable are Lyrics Born, Gift of Gab (from Blackalicious), Mr. Lif (who I saw last night and it inspired me to write this post), Ladybug Mecca, Boots Riley, Juvenile, and the always awesome Chali 2na (from Jurassic 5).

If you like hip-hop, give this a try… If you don’t like hip-hop, give this a try. Its good either way. Great band, great MCs, progressive album. Listen:

From the Corner to the Block (2007):

Galactic – Think Back w/ Chali 2na

Galactic – The Corner w/ Gift of Gab

Galactic – …And I’m Out w/ Mr. Lif

And here’s a pretty sweet video with Boots Riley… They are playing in a music store, and they still bring it. Stanton Moore is so cool.

[youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=G3x14rQ99XI&feature=related[/youtube]

Site|Amazon|iTunes

Chances are, if you’ve been reading any kind of indie blog over the last couple weeks, you’ve heard the name Vampire Weekend. With all the hype surrounding the band, I was sure I was going to be disappointed by their January release Vampire Weekend. But, as much as I hate to subscribe to the whole Pitchfork hype, the album is a solid chunk of music, especially for a debut LP. I don’t know if I really buy the whole “Afrobeat influence” that has been cited as one of the band’s defining characteristics (along with the fact that they’re all from Columbia University, indietastic!) but their music is a mix of Sunset Rubdown or Architecture In Helsinki pop antics (though definitely more subdued), vocal yelps and croons akin to Maps And Atlases, impressive and eclectic drum beats ranging from tribal bongo beats to poppy snare and cymbal combos, and reverb-caked bursts of guitar, organ and bass reminiscent of The Strokes. Take “Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa” for example, an undeniably catchy mix of bouncy guitar and bass, backed by a tribal tom-based drum beat or “I Stand Corrected,” whose echoing piano, volume swells and rhythmic drums never fail to get me tapping my foot. The album has an incredible amount of variation, all while retaining a distinct sound and flow. So check out their debut Vampire Weekend and stay tuned to see if they succumb to the sophomore slump (Bloc Party, anyone?)

“Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa”

“Oxford Comma”

“M79”

Myspace | Official Site | iTunes