Empire of the Sun is a relatively new project of PNAU guy Nick Littlemore. Yes, Australia, again. The other guy in EOTS is from The Sleepy Jackson. I known this latter for quite a while now: 2006, Personality was an awesome indie-pop record back then. I think the glam-esque aesthetics come from this side. For EOTS, this means like future-glam or sci-fi glam like…umm…certain parts from The Fifth Element can come to mind, you know, when guys with weird make-up travel on spaceships. Even better, Velvet Goldmine, it’s the story before the movie takes place how Brian Slade was born on a star!

The music is just great. Australian MGMT? Oh, yeah. Everyone loved Walking on a Dream (video). Van She and Sam La More remixed it. I suppose the album’s going to come out this month, titled the same as the single. It’s a bit more psychedelic pop and less electro and stuff. It’s elegant, has an awesome concept, has unity… Actually, it’s a dream-pop/indie-pop record. Seems like this is the other-than-disco line of Australian music that really is on the cutting edge now. I’m thinking of the Van She album. So, to conclude, I really love this record. I don’t like the MGMT, if I have to compare, but I like this. More soulful, better concept and diverse music with unity, very nice stuff. Definetly a must-buy!

Empire of the Sun - Standing on the Shore [zshare] // [ysi]

I suppose post should get shorter around the fifth one/day. The subject this time is the official Delorean remix of Mystery Jets‘ Half in Love with Elizabeth. The single was out on the 25th of August. They say in their email that “it feels more like a version than a remix somehow…We kept the vocals and then just throwed in there many of the things we like in music and probably define our sound as a band: House pianos, epic synths, Bmore breaks, etc. Hope you like it!” and we certainly do. The Mystery Jets album was a really good one this year. They are one of the few London indie-kids who managed to keep it fresh and exciting. Combined with Spanish band, Delorean who made a blog-fire with remixing Love No by The Teenagers (what, is this a fixation with song titles including love?) this new version of the song is just a perfect blend of light electro and indie - they lifeliked it! Haha, no, really it reminds me of Lifelike’s edits. Spain is awesome.

Mystery Jets - Half in Love with Elizabeth (Delorean remix) [zshare] // Mystery Jets - Half in Love with Elizabeth(Delorean remix) [ysi]

The phenomena on the night sky and the band from Canada have many things in common. The fading, blinking, mysterious light, the evoking of feelings that cause uncertainity, etc. Canada is a great country for nice or weird indie pop music (Stars for example share some members with Broken Social Scene) which stays with you for many years. I have a long and gentle loving relationship with this band. Following from the second album Heart to their brilliant album last year In Our Bedroom After the War. The last entry in the relationship-diary is the new EP: Sad Robots. Beautiful and full of strenght the songs are like postapocalyptic whirlwinds sweeping through a lot of empty buildings and leaving some traces of tearful emotions behind. (Attention: there’s a reason for this sentence of symbolism.) They have a pretty website for this new release. Buy it there. I’m gonna share a couple older songs as well, just so you can get into the whole feel. The haunting vocals of Amy Milan, the naive and deeply moving themes, and the monumental waves of instruments washing everything else away into melancholy. Hi, I am Cigi and this is my heart.

Stars - What the Snowman Learned About Love [zshare] // Stars - What the Snowman Learned About Love [ysi]

Stars - Ageless Beauty [zshare] // Stars - Ageless Beauty [ysi]

Stars - The Night Starts Here [zshare] // Stars - The Night Starts Here [ysi]

Stars - A Thread Cut With a Carwing Knife [zshare] // Stars - A Thread Cut With a Carwing Knife [ysi]

Back to Sweden. According to bio, The LK (full name is heavy: ‘The Love of Kevin, Colour, Chaos, and the Sound of K’) is a project of an abstract sound artist, Lindefelt, and a pop visionary songwriter, Fredrik (both of them have their own stuff). The description proves to be quite accurate when we check their album vs. The Snow which their label was kind enough to send us. Minimalistic pop melodies with a very strange atmosphere. Diverse and intense, the record is a melancholic trip through a collection of moods which result sometimes in an alternative dancey disco, pretended happiness and sometimes in post-rockish artsy sound. Childish and noisy, the album is the soundtrack of weird summer days when, at the same time, it feels and doesn’t feel like summer. A cold breeze, rain and other weird things can occupy the ruling place of hot sunwaves.

Give them myspace friendliness, check their video and read the full review on Pitchforkmedia (7.9 rating is high, of course, of course it’s Pitchfork but worth a read) and order it at The Kora Records.

My two favourites are below. Funny, the chorus of the latter reminds me of Toy Soldiers by Martika (you know the sample Eminem used haha…)

The LK - Eurovision (zshare) // The LK - Eurovision (y. s. i.)

The LK - Tandem Bikes (zshare) // The LK - Tandem Bikes (y. s. i.)

Tilly and the Wall is a band from the US who play brilliant indie pop. Want proof? Of Montreal is said to be their American and Cansei de ser Sexy to be their Brazilian sister band. Third album of Tilly and the Wall is gonna come out on the 17th of June (on Team Love, label of Conor Oberst aka Bright Eyes). After Wild Like Children in 2004 and Bottom of Barrels in 2006, two years have passed again and we have O (pre-order). They had a single earlier this year entitled Beat Control (video).

This album is a great follow-up although I’m still not okay with the tap dancer instead of a drummer but you know desperate times-desperate measures. This first song doesn’t have tap dancing only guitars, piano, singing, distortion in the end… Beautifully mellow, perfect for a sad relaxing song. You can’t expect less from a band with at least 3 gorgeous girls. Hot summer night stuff. This time nothing disco more like stars, romantic atmosphere and some tears.

Tilly and the Wall - Tall Tall Glass (zshare) // Tilly and the Wall - Tall Tall Glass (y. s. i.)