In 1999 Blank-Wave Arcade was a great underground hit. Not that I personally have this experience cause I was only 16 and listening to Nirvana back then. Same thing with Danse Macabre. In 2001 was huge and it was dominant in the club scene but who cared I was into Radiohead and Refused. I think I first heard The Faint around 2002-3 when disco-punk was popular here. Radio 4, House of Jealous Lovers, early !!! It was definetly fun. But as you know, it wasn’t supposed to last. The Rapture and !!! have made a successful career since then and after 4 years The Faint gives it a shot.

The Faint’s next album entitled Fasciinatiion is gonna come out on the 5th of August on their label: blank.wav (they left Saddle Creek). The first single The Geeks were Right is flying around on the internet for a couple weeks now and there are a some remixes for it. First the super-hip Boys Noize vs D.I.M. In my extermely humble opinion this remix sucks badly. Like the German guys just have a pattern named ‘how to make very cool and bass-driven weird-synth club-anthems’ and just forced it upon the song (okay, nice work on the vocals but that’s the least). On the other hand, the Does It Offend You, Yeah? one bangs like hell. It’s banger but a good, powerful one. The third song is another preview from the album Mirror Error. I haven’t decided about the album yet, it’s not nearly as good as the last Rapture or !!! but maybe it’s not that outdated.

The Faint - The Geeks Were Right (Boys Noize vs D.I.M remix) [zshare] // The Faint - The Geeks Were Right (Boys Noize vs D.I.M remix) [fileden]

The Faint - The Geeks Were Right (Does It Offend You, Yeah? remix) [zshare] // The Faint - The Geeks Were Right (Does It Offend You, Yeah? remix) [fileden]

The Faint - Mirror Error [zshare] // The Faint - Mirror Error [fileden]

English band, Friendly Fires is like Foals for me. They are like the 2007 NME favourites with a couple really cool singles (video for Paris and On Board) and with a lot of people anticipating the album. Even musically they are a bit similar: the progressive indie rock injected with disco and electronica. The difference is that Foals are more on the heavier post-punk end of the scale and Friendly Fires are more elegant and relaxed like Hot Chip and LCD Soundsystem. The Foals album is awesome and totally lives up to the high expectations. The full-lenght of Friendly Fires is gonna arrive on the 1st of September this year. You could’ve already heard Jump in the Pool at Bigstereo which is such a cool song, it sounds like reaching out for the stars but being stuck in the stratosphere between scary chemical processes and stuff. Here’s another track from the upcoming album and it proves that its worth to wait for it. It’s gonna come out on XL Recordings (besides Vampire Weekend, Ratatat, etc).

Friendly Fires - White Diamonds [zshare]  // Friendly Fires - White Diamonds [ysi]  // Friendly Fires - White Diamonds [fileden]

New Adeyhawke material. Yay! Well, maybe not so new but I’ve been out of it for a couple days but here we are with the latest of the latest Valerie act.

Adeyhawke is a representative of the Valerie sound from the UK like Futurecop! He’s from Dublin. You might know him from our previous posts. Remixed Anoraak and Hail Social (we haven’t yet posted this latter one so I’ll make up for the mistake).

I guess you can imagine the sound by now. 80s of course, synths of course, sci-fi romance of course. New song Gigavolt Angel is like a troubadour robot singing its courtly love to a muse, an angel made of the heaviest lightning. Thanks to DiscoDust.

Adeyhawke - Gigavolt Angel [zshare] // Adeyhawke - Gigavolt Angel [ysi]

Hail Social - No Paradise (Adeyhawke remix) [zshare] // Hail Social - No Paradise (Adeyhawke remix) [ysi]

Normally known for his keen remixing catalog, DatA’s upcoming original EP is gonna rock, full stop if the initial single is any indication. I don’t think it’s a stretch to speculate that this ends up on all those ’super duper tracks of ‘08 blabla’ toplists and turns the corner for the Frenchman. As if we needed another Frenchman occupying that space. Well, it’s okay, really.

For those familiar with previous work, like the awesome remix of Aerious Light, you’ll recognize the inclusion of those lovely building synths that’s by now a DatA trademark. Extra bonus points for having a guitar solo! How many songs these days have a guitar solo!?

“We could never be friends, I love you until the end”… the refrain seems to get straight to the heart of so many matters of the heart.

DatA - Rapture [zshare] //DatA - Rapture [ysi] //DatA - Rapture [fileden]

I’ve been thinking in the past weeks/months about origins… about why the whole outer space - tron - 80s sci fi aesthetic has taken hold lately. Both in terms of visual and in sound. I think like most trends it’s rooted in some sort of nostalgia — which begs the question: nostalgia for whom? Given the fact that one needs at least a few years in the rear view mirror to fully appreciate nostalgia (i.e. tough for a 17 year old to properly grasp the idea of reminiscing); while at the same time, given that the 50-something and above crowd is not exactly at the center of the internet-based creative classes — it suggests to me that its those in roughly their late 20s and early 30s are driving aesthetic trends.

Now, this would mean we’d have a entire demographic slice who grew up watching either the first run, or many follow up runs, of Carl Sagan’s epic, Cosmos, originally aired in 1980 — who currently dominate musical taste (at least in blogga land). To be fair, i’m not sure how many out there were budding nerdlings as i was, with a mother who would let me stay up one night a week, specifically to watch that program… however i have a sneaking suspicion that its soundtrack, produced by Vangelis, is now at the root of so much of what we see today. All hail the epic laid back yet dancy space synths! I, for one, couldn’t be happier to see this period come, short as it ultimatel

Vangelis - Pulstar [zshare] // Vangelis - Pulstar [ysi] // Vangelis - Pulstar [fileden]

Okay, so I promised myself that I’m not gonna blog Sebastien Tellier remixed by Boys Noize. Instead of not blogging I found this re-edit of Das Pop’s Underground. This song was in the mix Justice almost made for Fabric. Actually, I could witness a rare situation: when a remix made a bad song ok-coolish.

You know Das Pop, right? Belgian band with cheesy indie pop tunes who had their previous single, Fool for Love remixed by SebastiAn, Yuksek, Brodinski and Aeroplane. Quite a buzz. For this latest single there’s gonna be a remix thingy with Kid Gloves and Busy P. My favourite is made by Van She. Oh yeah. Australia in da house. Actually, they made two remixes for the song: a club and a dub one. The club is cooler and less robot-like banging. Brilliant stuff from Van She after the awesome Strangers (video).

Das Pop - Underground (Van She Club Mix) [zshare] // Das Pop - Underground (Van She Club Mix) [ysi]

Trash Yourself is a duo from NYC who came together in Oklahoma who recently passed on some of their shizz our way. They make dirty-sexy electro stuff. Somehow it reminds me of the golden days of electroclash. Of course, it’s totally up-to-date. The duo is John Bourke who is a dj/producer/multi-instrumentalist and Heidi Cannon (what a name) who provides the vocals. In spite of the name she’s so cute, she was shocked to be in NYLON Magazine. The music is not just sexy, it’s about sex. And that’s cool. You know, you need this kind of tension in pop culture because artsy pop culture must be reminded sometimes that at a very basic level people go to clubs and listen to music so they can make out with each other more comfortably and not in weird silence.

The collaboration with The Toxic Avenger is a long-time Kunk-favourite. The remake of Song 2 is a risky task but they made it so heavy and cool with even keeping a bit of the original punkyness and britpop sound that this bought me at the first listen.

Their own stuff, the song Touch is like superblogged and has some remixes. Of course what I said above stands here, the lyrics are like about touching, licking, fucking, etc. Very nice carnal themes haha. My favourite remix is made by Sick Boy from Amsterdam. I didn’t really know anything about him but check out his myspace, he made a a remix for RATM’s Bulls on Parade with DJ Kue.

Trash Yourself and The Toxic Avenger - Song 2 (Blur cover) [zshare] // Trash Yourself and The Toxic Avenger - Song 2 (Blur cover) [ysi]

Trash Yourself - Touch (Sick Boy remix) [zshare] // Trash Yourself - Touch (Sick Boy remix) [ysi]

…is the name of a hungarian party which used to be drumnbass, now I have no idea what kinda music is on there cause it’s so annoying. On the other hand, Rewind is an awesome project of Buffet Libre DJs. They ask cool artists to cover and remix songs from the 80s. The first part of the project includes Dragonette, Moulinex, The Cloud Room, Frankmusik, Xinobi, CSK OK, Mono4, etc. And our beloved guest Anoraak did a cover of The Romantics. Jump over to Buffet Libre’s site, you can find a long list of artists and interesting q&a with them. Can’t wait for the second part, unbeatable stuff.

I chose to share South Central’s cover. Right, it’s a cover and not a remix. My two main reasons why I chose them were that the song they had chosen to cover is by Big Black which is fucking cool. Secondly the cover is like wow. It’s cruel and evil. Kerosene is a song from 1986, the debut album titled Atomizer. Actually, I - among many others - prefer their second one Songs About Fucking. Big Black was an experimental punk-noise band from the US. Experimental musically and in attitude. Provocative in every way. As South Central puts it: “Big Black were one of the early Punk/new Wave acts to mix electronic beats with Guitars and they had a cool DIY ethic, so it was a logical or natural choice for us.” And since SC would love Kraftwerk to do a version of one of their songs here’s a version of Kraftwerk’s The Model by Big Black. Btw Steve Albini, frontman of Big Black still rocks in Shellac.

South Central - Kerosene (Big Black cover) [zshare] South Central - Kerosene (Big Black cover) [ysi]

Big Black - The Model (Kraftwerk cover) [zshare] Big Black - The Model (Kraftwerk cover) [ysi]

Sweden surely has talent but we’ve only been posting about the weird, alternative, indie band-music stuff. There are heavy electro criminals in the country as well. The Swedish House Maffia. Okay, really awful name but Sebastian Ingrosso and Steve Angelo got together, formed Buy Now! and made a dancefloor-killer house-hymn. If you know a lot about disco then you can find a classic song hidden inside it. According to Missingtoof it was around for the first time in 2005. WTF? 2005? This must be a wormhole-timemachine sick sci-fi thing.

Now, Streetlife DJs (on the right) are cool. They are from London. They made remixes for Cazals, Muse, Michael Jackson to mention a few. They actually edited Body Crash so it’s not that it’s exciting once again and a bit less irritating after 10 listens or so. Give Streetlife some myspace love and check the awesome and many remixes they made.

Buy Now! - Body Crash (Streetlife DJs remix) [zshare] // Buy Now! - Body Crash (Streetlife DJs remix) [ysi]

Yet another out of the Southern hemisphere side of the planet, Miami Horror is the purveyor of bubbly, summery sounds that make one feel like they are playing in water up to their knees. Given their home state is a hot island, one can understand! In recent days a couple of their remixes have been making waves (har, har) and if you’re a MH fan you won’t be disappointed. Remember that song in the late 90s with the kite in the video and that kid? Right, sure you do. Anyhow The Music Sounds Better With You might just sound even better now… or at least just swap out the kite and replace it with a jet ski. FellowAussies the Presets also got hit up with a dependable edit.

Of course Kunk’s all-time fave Miami Horror remix remains their edit of Datarock’s FaFaFa which we ‘podcasted’ about (episode here) a few months back. Totally gave that ‘okay, but not great’ song a breath of life.

In meta convergence news, Miami Horror will actually be partying in Miami this weekend! No word on if they will, or will not, bring the horror.

Props to Discobelle and Southside on the trax.

Stardust - The Music Sounds Better with You (Miami Horror Remix) [zshare] // Stardust - The Music Sounds Better with You (Miami Horror Remix) [ysi]

The Presets - Talk Like That (Miami Horror Remix) [zshare] // The Presets - Talk Like That (Miami Horror Remix) [ysi]