First heard about the Northern Irish act called Gunstar when I downloaded The Dream Machine (from Fried My Little Brain) which was blogged at a lot of places around the sphere. It’s not a surprise, the guy making the music supposed to be only 20 and he brings the vibe of many nu-electro artists like GRUM and Neo Tokyo from the UK and among them his sound might be the closest to Russ Chimes and Valerie’s 80s fetish and fascination with video games and sci-fi. On the other hand, the tracks bang hard. Sometimes he builds the songs on Sebastian-esque machine noises and stuff. His sound can be bass-heavy but he never crosses to the fidget territory. Or maybe he does. Nevermind, he’s still more similar to South Central than to the Crookers. He certainly is capable of creating heavy and hypnotizing beats and the synth-sounds are a perfect fit. (Idea for new category ’space banger’.) Here are 4 tracks I love. Dream Machine and the ambient-like The Lonely Cloud (featuring Silvercord) have beauty, the others are tension-building dancefloor-destroyers. Give him some love on myspace and follow him on Twitter!

Gunstar - The Dream Machine [mediafire] // [ysi]

Gunstar - Death Star Disco [mediafire] // [ysi]

Gunstar - Idee Fixe [mediafire] // [ysi]

Gunstar and Silvercord - The Lonely Cloud [mediafire] // [ysi]

Actually, I’m following BBYYY through Bigstereo it seems. They were off the radar for some time and didn’t create much blog hype since Fuck Friend but they are back now with a new single and video. The new single is really heavy in the bass and beat areas and the vocals are kinda sick…like The Knife and stuff. It sounds like it could’ve emerged from the 70s New York underground. So bow down to the dark disco of BBYYY once again.

Bitchee Bitchee Ya Ya Ya - Super Rick [mediafire] // [ysi]

Woah. Even if he’s been super creepy for years… i don’t know if anything could mark the end of an era like michael going down. Not even sure if it’s true, though it looks fairly certain right now. I’m pretty sure Thriller on LP was literally the only album i listened to for over 2 years as a grade schooler. I simply didn’t have interest in anything else.

Anyhow, if he hasn’t pulled through, here’s hoping he’s in the sky somewhere, drinking a diet pepsi from a rhinestone glove, and using the other hand to give himself the crotch grab of a lifetime.

<3 MJ

Michael Jackson - Wanna Be Startin’ Something [mediafire] // [ysi]

Truly one of the nicest guys the party/music biz, Kap10Kurt (shown below at his Kunk gig here last October) has recently dropped an edit of Teenage Suicide by the fast-out-of-the-block Aussies, Clubfeet. The smooth original would be pretty tough to muck up — only question is which direction to take it — Kap hangs on to much of the ‘chilling at sunrise’ feel while making the beat more robust in alternating waves. Alltogether, yet another track for the ever expanding outdoor summer tracklist…

Follow Kap’s escapades over at his meinspace and use a Bruno accent while you read the blog entries for extra satisfaction!

Clubfeet - Teenage Suicide (Kap10Kurt remix) [mediafire]  // [ysi]

So let’s follow up Cigi’s hate post with a like post. Really like the new-ish direction the latest Burns inbox-hitter takes. A bit less on the mental tip as with some previous tracks, a bit more on the warm cozy house-y footstomper, with some 80s (what else) flair. Actually i think it would blend pretty seamlessly with party tracks that were coming out in that turn of the millenium era (ie. Modjo, Spiller, etc)… and that’s a positive.

These days Burns is making the European club rounds, including a recent one with friends of Kunk, Caravan Disco, last month with Russ Chimes. His Turb EP is available on beatport.

Burns - Heartbeats [mediafire] // [ysi]

Here I go with another bitching post. I know these oppinions won’t appeal to many people out there but I kindly ask them not to read it and get upset, just download the songs they are fond of. Many of the records of 2009 are brilliant, there are some good ones, mediocres and there are really bad ones. This post is dedicated to this last category.

Dirty Projectors - Bitte Orca

I hate this album very much. This is like if The Knife played world music. I’ve tried to listen to a couple of their previous albums and I didn’t succeed but it never annoyed me this much. Of course, the hype is part of it but there are some traits inherent in the music like the vocals and the super-irritating manner of singing, the various instruments combined in an awfully intellectual way, the whole ‘we are very NYC but deeply sensitive and indie and we don’t wanna be popular we just open up a bit’-attitude that kill me. And it’s not like I’m coming from an Ed Banger direction or something, I listen to music like this but this is just an amazing example how to gather together everything that can suck: R’n'B + Björk anyone? No thanks. Dirty Projectors might create an exciting new whatever but I for one don’t need to be excited this way. Why can’t they play some untraditional lo-fi rock music? Or something that feels real?

Dirty Projectors - Temecula Sunrise [mediafire] // [ysi]

Grizzly Bear - Veckatimest

Oh yeah, Grizzly Bear’s Veckatimest is another instance of a band that gained an underground hero status via mediums like Pitchfork. I never liked them. However, I tried to listen to the album without prejudice and I didn’t succeed. I had to tell myself I was right from the beginning. I can’t like something that makes you overthink an otherwise simple folk-tradition. Folk, remember, nomen est omen. Now, Grizzly Bear is pop, ok, they have nice acoustic indie stuff, I bet the lyrics are moving and interesting, etc but one just can’t ignore all the mannerism that dominates the sound. It’s utterly powerless and therefore a failure. You can propose that this is art or art pop or whatever but still, something’s missing. Something is lost between the jingles, circus drums, ‘aaahhh-ahhhh’s and the struggle for being ‘proper’. There are much better way to engage in intellectual activities than this record but I’ll definetly mention it if I’m gonna write a 100 page book on the metaphysics and tragedy of folk pop.

Grizzly Bear - Two Weeks [mediafire] // [ysi]

Tiga - Ciao!

Every dance-freaks favourite Canadian gay-guy, Tiga, is back with Ciao! to light up the dancefloor, discoballs of 2k9. Utter failure. The album is full of heavy moments, sexyness, fashion-allusions (might be popular on the catwalks this year) and other meaningless glamorous projections. So empty and pointless. Despite that Soulwax polished it up a bit, it still feels outdated which is especially embarassing when it comes to this highlife-fashion-blabla atmosphere. Tiga’s electro is unable to compensate for this. There are no really banging tunes neither nice soft ones in the La Roux or Little Boots way. There are many annoying experimental noise-parts instead which might work on a dancefloor full of people on different kinds of drugs but nearly everything works there, doesn’t it? I’m not saying this album is the worst album ever but it’s definetly worse than Sexor and I’ll never listen to it at home and I seriously doubt that it’ll force any moves out of me in a club. Ps. very-very bad album title and Sex O’Clock? WTF?

Tiga - Luxury [mediafire] // [ysi]

Wavves - Wavvves

Back to the indie-division, Wavves is a relatively new band and one of the ‘hottest’ upcoming bands. On the other hand, the music again falls under the irritatingly over-thought label. I love noise, seriously, but this version that this 22-year old ‘genius’ developed makes me wanna jump out on the window. Ironic art and uncomprehensible music-structures, yeah. Great. What should I do with it? Study it for the rest of my life? Or stand in the crowd at a gig, perfectly still while watching how the process of artistic creation happens live? Btw about live, I felt myself totally justified when I read about the events of the Barcelona show. Sure, I know the explanation, he is too young for success, drugs and playing before thousands of people. Who cares? Wavves’ music is very slow-paced, so slow paced that I am…pardon…’so bored’ I could die. The suffering over-effected vocals and distorted guitars don’t add anything to the effect either, this is again an instance of powerless songcraft that tries to hard to be something special.

Wavves - So Bored [mediafire] // [ysi]

And don’t get me started on the new Placebo…

It’s long overdue for us to give some shouts over to the Binary crew’s efforts of late. Especially since they’re doing the party thang with former Kunk guest Thieves Like Us, this weekend. Exciting! They’ve also just released the Nightwaves Dreamwave Hour 2 (go pick it up here at Massive Stereo) with a whole bunch of new goodies. Exciting x2 Most readers of this blog should be pretty familiar with Binary — they’re the LA-based assembly of artists who have taken loving inspiration from the Valerie guys.

Nightwaves’ Invincible has been around for a while but this mix by Canada’s Snow Picnic is pretty stellar, and is included in their latest compilation. Keenhouse has also fairly recently made an already beautiful song by College (previous Kunk posts on College) — that much more so — drives through the smog filled LA-basin won’t be quite as annoying provided this smoothness is rocking the speakers.

This crew has been pretty active so expect to see more collabs on the horizon with Valerie and perhaps someday a trip out to Europe-land. Hope so!

Nightwaves - Invincible (Snow Picnic Remix) [mediafire] // [ysi]

College - I Think About It (Keenhouse Remix) [mediafire] // [ysi]

You might not know Norbert Kristof. He is Hungary’s #1 indie singer-songwriter. Ok, I know the this description doesn’t amount to high praise. He has tried to perform under different monikers with different bands but the most enduring is the solo stuff he does under his own name. This might be an indication of something. The unique and instantly recognizable sound of Norbi’s music should be appreciated. You could call him ‘emo’ because literally, he doesn’t make an effort to distance himself from the strenght basic emotions of love, hate, sadness, melancholy… You can either accuse him of being fake-naive for not equipping irony or you can accept it as a genuine expression of his soul or whatever. Either-or. This is ideology. What remains is the music. His influences include Smashing Pumpkins, Nirvana, Sonic Youth, Explosions in the Sky, Sufjan Stevens and The Cure. And some cheesy popcultural stuff of the 80s and 90s. He usually records his music with Gergo, drummer of The Moog. Norbi’s sound is complex, it’s full of heavy guitars, sometimes they jingle, sometimes they break out like a tornado and sometimes they feel like they can cut you. There are experiments with sounds, effects and synths. The beauty of the melodies is undeniable, as is the film-like atmosphere of the songs. The main deal, the vocals totally support this: many-many types of storytelling voices emerge and fade away, all sounding in the foggy landscape of ‘the world of never’. These many shades were a struggle to develop but Norbi’s latest album is the strange senseless-making sense The World of Never We Are Forever is a major step. It’s a touching and insteresting trip: you can follow him through childhood, girls, hearts, hard times and happier moments…all gathered together for the intimate and personal music. This is it’s biggest strenght and weakness: strenght, because you rarely see someone with a capability to capture/create personal stuff this effectively. Weakness on the other hand, not because of some requirement of ‘distance’ or whatever but because it tries to impress too hard. Personal stuff is not for impressing a girl or an audience. You can choose to project a personal image but then you can’t appear to be aiming at a personal goal or the music and the personal atmosphere become just means to a not-too-unpredictable end and the listeners will feel like watching a reality show. I guess the music is still too selfish or something. Give Norbi some love on myspace and anyway you can download the whole album there. I just share the opening and hit-like song here. Strarting synth is amazing.

Norbert Kristof - Birth of a Railway Station [mediafire] // [ysi]

Fair enough, the original act might require a code orange kitsch alert, or at least i haven’t had time to digest the package that is AvianX (Russian now based in the US), but this mix of Dark Circles by the French Kolt 13 which landed in our inbox is kinda bad-ass. At least, it reminds me of east-Berlin partying in the mid-90s (fuck i’m old) during that period of time in certain circles when wave/industrial/pop/goth kinda was blending together. As long as you have your cheese-meter turned a bit down and ‘east euro anthem style radar’ on high for the evening, this could work for you.

Avian X - Dark Circles (Kolt 13 Remix) [mediafire] // [ysi]

Tesla Boy as many of you know is making love-y synth-y magic from the wild wild east better known as the USSR Russia. They’ve played with the Valerie crew previously, and will once again at their party at Cargo in London this weekend. Goes without saying Kunkers wish they were on hand for that one. Anyhow, the Tesla Boys are working hard and have been picked up on quite a few blogs of late… the real life gigs will certainly follow (in addition to what they’ve already lined up). In this instance, Spirit of the Night has been revved up to a poppy electric footloose single, ready for when the top is down and the stars are out.

Bestrack is outta whereelse (France) and had a nice hit with their GRUM remix not too long ago.  But i’m really digging this one — a happy summer hit is on their hands. But perhaps i’m biased as a petit summer Moscow/St.Petersburg jaunt may be on the cards for me this August, fingers crossed!

Tesla Boy - Spirit of the Night (Bestrack Remix) [mediafire] // [ysi]