Rockfeedback Live is proud to present 'Sunsets' a one off summer party featuring live performances from Active Child, The Invisible, Hospitality and NZCA/Lines. The show is taking place at one our favourite venues, London's Village Underground, and will have live visuals from Kev I Ching and Fay Savages. As well as these musical and visual joys we're also hooking up a BBQ for proper summer vibes. For Pat Grossi of Active Child, the last two years have been nothing short of enriching. Musically, Pat has worked within and appropriated a number of styles into his sound, from ...

by Elliott Sharp • February 2012 One of the great joys of being a fan of Earth is patiently watching the band evolve. The most radical shift was between 1993’s Earth 2: Special Low Frequency Version and 2005’s Hex; Or Printing In The Infernal Method , as founder Dylan Carlson took the band, without any warning (save for more than a decade of relative inactivity), from drone/doom-metal to Southwestern-twang terrain. The two records that followed, 2008’s The Bees Made Honey In The Lion’s Skull and 2011’s Angels Of Darkness, Demons Of Light I , saw Earth working ...

From the doleful yet somehow somewhat celebratory initial notes shed from Dylan R. Carlson's mourning guitar onwards, Angels Of Darkness, Demons Of Light II, the second record to be released from the recording sessions of the same name at the local Avast! Recording Co. is a dirgeful affair, and a superbly gruelling, if typically lugubrious one at that. So emotive and consequently so involving, mere moments into opener Sigil of Brass you're left exasperatedly awaiting some austere voiceover to earnestly utter something along the quintessentially contrived lines of: "Nothing could prepare me for what was to come..." However ...

Every other Thursday, Pop Addict presents infectious tunes from contemporary musicians across indie rock, pop, folk, electronica, and more. Hospitality: Hospitality (Merge, 1/31/12) Hospitality: "Friends of Friends" When Brooklyn's Hospitality surfaced in 2008 with a six-song EP produced by Karl Blau, there was, naturally, immediate blogosphere buzz surrounding the band. Its poppy, minimalist sensibility catered [...]

Led by founding guitarist Dylan Carlson, the current iteration of Seattle drone legends Earth is releasing Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light II on February 14 via Southern Lord . As the title and Stacey Rozich artwork suggest, the laid-back, ambling five-song collection's the continuation of 2011's Darkness, Demons of Light I : It was recorded during the same two-week session and extends the other album's improvisational desert-noir folk ramblings. Like last time, Carlson's joined by Adrienne Davies on drums/percussion, cellist Lori Goldston, and K Records-regular Karl Blau on bass. Take a listen to the whole thing ...

by TMT Staff • December 2011 Our Favorite 50 Albums of 2011 list reflects a multiplicity of trends. Yes, it continues our own trend toward the esoteric (Hype Williams), the difficult (Tiziana Bertoncini & Thomas Lehn), and the overlooked (KWJAZ), but it also trends toward an embrace of transition in a time of sensory abundance, a time when nostalgia and memory have become aestheticized, a time when the very process of music-making has become increasingly audible and our valuation of it increasingly suspect. Trends are often equated with homogenization, superficiality, conformity, and reification, written off by those uncomfortable with change, people too afraid to commit in fear of sinking with a trend once it reaches its inevitable conclusion. But in 2011, all trends demanded critical ears, not only because they hinged on the same impulse that increased awareness and impact for marginalized voices — which, outside the music world, manifested in political occupations and revolutions before we even realized it — but also because trends are as ephemeral as our values of them, coming and going, twisting away from logic and producing ruptures and permutations that disrupt preconceived notions and turn over values we’ve internalized as given. Pessimists might dismiss this embrace as a capitulation to the rhythm of capitalism, symptomatic of a consumer culture whose signifiers are pretty much dead weight in the context of a sanctified modernism. But optimists see this sensory explosion as simply more potential breaking points, increased opportunities to partake in both demystification (Tom Waits) and deconstruction (Bill Orcutt), democratization (Oneohtrix Point Never) and myth-making (Liturgy); more chances to extract new value from traditions (Rafael Toral) and elevate kitsch from the dumpsters (James Ferraro); to prove wrong those who prematurely announced their death two years ago (Lil B, Shabazz Palaces, Death Grips, etc.); to uncover new constructions of the mind (The Caretaker), body (Colin Stetson, DJ Diamond), and spirit (A Winged Victory For The Sullen, Grouper); to find new mediums (The Flaming Lips), temporal ...

Drone-metal giants Earth will release part two of Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light on February 14 through Southern Lord . The album was recorded at the same time as  Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light I , which was released in early 2011. Like its prececessor, the album features Earth principal Dylan Carlson and percussionist Adrienne Davies joined by Nirvana cellist Lori Goldston and K Records artist Karl Blau.

Seattle-based sludge masters Earth have announced the upcoming release of Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light II , the follow-up to their last album, Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light I ( TMT Review ), which made it on our mid-year Favorite Albums list . The new album was recorded by Stuart Hallerman at Avast Studios at the same time as the 2011 release and features the same lineup of Dylan Carlson on guitar, Adrienne Davies on drums, Karl Blau on bass, and Lori Goldston on cello, but is said to take the group in “an entirely other direction, recalling sounds of the great ...

As part of the Karl Blau 24-hour song relay (where a Karl Blau song is being covered/played every minute of the day, the world over), we recorded this. It's 2:15pm here in Olympia, Wa. Letters- An Emptiness (Karl Blau cover)

There are a lot of things I love and appreciate about Karl Blau - his overwhelming enthusiasm for life and for people making interesting music, his constant willingness to unapologetically try something different, and (perhaps most of all) how he has contributed a new voice to Northwest music that represents this place so well, but is entirely its own thing. It's not something that reminds one of the stereotyped K Punk aesthetic, the "Seattle sound", or the post-grunge era of NW indie superstardom, but it draws from all that and creates something new and unique that is so much about ...

Hello investor! My friend is American rock independent musician Karl Blau. As a glorious and honorable man, Karl has put out 39 solo albums and has written over 400 songs. These are good songs that you and I can be proud about! Our friend Karl needs help. He has a dream and the dream is to finish his KLAPS project , a 42-part project of audio/video magazine on CD format with songs by him and friends of him. KLAPS stands for Kelp Lunacy Advanced Plagiarism Society, and that is a good name. Karl has only 12 more KLAPS albums to ...

als laura veirs im letzten jahr ihren sohn tennessee zur welt brachte, glaubte ich keinen momente daran, dass sie sich (und wenn auch nur kurzzeitig) aus dem musikgeschäft zurückziehen würde. im november wird ihr neues album erscheinen, der titel gibt vor, worum es geht: "tumble bee: laura veirs sings folk songs for children". raven marching band records und bella union werden das werk veröffentlichen, das fast schon selbstverständlich von ehemann tucker martine produziert wurde und unterstützung und gastauftritte von so bekannten größen erhielt wie coling meloy, jim james, bela fleck, karl blau, basia bulat und brian blade. bei den songs ...

Laura Veirs has announced she'll be releasing a new album this November called Tumble Bee . The twist being that the record is a collection of folk songs for children, featuring early 20th century work to Jimmie Rodger based ballads. Joining Veirs on the record will be The Decemberists’ frontman Colin Meloy, My Morning Jacket’s Jim James and Carl Broemel, Basia Bulat, Bela Fleck, Karl Blau and members of Blind Pilot, plus a few more. The record comes out on November 7th via Bella Union, and will probably be amazing.

Angelo Spencer World Garage [K Records; 2011] by Nathan Shaffer Rating: Angelo Spencer et les Hauts Sommets, World Garage The world garage: in which we store our old itineraries and travel miscellany, our souvenirs and photos, our memories of sights and noises, and all the clutter we can pull together of the geographies that are always forming us after we leave them, again. The high summits: we look out, having arrived and, having to descend, look back and walk. World, or earth: Angelo Spencer defines his sound elsewhere: “Fuzzy, loose, echo, nerdy, desert, mountains, doug-fir, barefoot running.” Add Morocco and ...

Portland’s chief exponents of literary rock, Richmond Fontaine have announced the release of ‘Lost in the Trees’, their new single and first from the upcoming album ‘The High Country’. Produced by John Askew (The Dodos, Karl Blau) ‘Lost in the Trees’ will be released through Trash ...