Steve GullickIt’s a bit strange to get into a band with what turns out to be a stylistic outlier, but that’s apparently what happened with me and Hot Chip. I liked bits of their first three albums but wouldn’t have counted myself a fan until 2010’s One Life Stand brought me into the fold with its more soulful angle on the distinctive Hot Chip sound. It was only relatively different from its predecessors – the Londoner’s template of cerebral, slightly nebbish, yet eminently danceable electro-pop was wholly intact – but with a more emotional dimension than they’d previously explored. Some didn’t like it as much; I liked it more.

So yeah, the “return to form” comments that have accompanied their just-released In Our Heads got my back up a little bit; who said that Hot Chip needed to return to any particular form? Why couldn’t they simply forge ahead in a new direction? And then I spent a little time with Heads and decided that maybe it wasn’t so important where it went on the plot of their creative trajectory – it’s a good record that manages to maintain much of the songwriting growth evidenced in One Life Stand, just folded back into their old sound, and more importantly, I didn’t like them any less for it.

Indeed, it’s hard to get off on the wrong foot with an opener as strong as “Motion Sickness” and while Heads is largely Hot Chip by numbers (I spent a little while clicking through my iTunes to try and find which of their older songs the opening of “Let Me Be Him” is a carbon copy of and while I didn’t find it, I know it’s out there), that still means it’s an upbeat collection of dancefloor-ready tunes with the requisite number of ballads and epics. If there’s a downside to this, it’s that there’s not much on Heads likely to elicit the same sort of strong reactions – positive or negative – that Life did, nor is there much for their next record to react against. Maybe the best thing about Heads – besides giving us “Night & Day” and “Flutes” – is that odds are by the time Hot Chip returns to the studio, they’ll be creatively restless enough again to try something new.

Hot Chip are in town at the Sound Academy next Sunday night, July 15, and courtesy of Collective Concerts, I’ve got a pair of passes to give away for the show. To enter, email me at contests AT chromewaves.net with “I want Hot Chip” in the subject line and your full name in the body and have that in to me before midnight, July 12.

There’s features on the band at Loud & Quiet, Clash, The Star-Tribune, Prefix, The Sydney Morning Herald, and The Japan Times.

Video: Hot Chip – “Night & Day”
Video: Hot Chip – “Flutes”

It’s not another “Country House” or “Coffee & TV”, but the studio performance that Blur have released as a video for their new single is still alright.

Video: Blur – “Under The Westway”

Neil Halstead has gotten in the Wimbledon spirit and released a tennis-themed tune which will be available as a bonus 7″ for those who buy his new solo record Palindrome Hunches at independent retailers when it goes on sale on September 11. It’s available to stream now.

Stream: Neil Halstead – “Tennis For Dennis”

The Line Of Best Fit The Quietus talk to Cate Le Bon, who kicks off her Fall North American tour at The Rivoli on September 18. Her Cyrk II is out August 20.

Wonderland has an interview with Still Corners.

DIY talks to Foals keyboardist Edwin Congreave about their new Tapes mixtape thing.

V Magazine gathers together Grimes, Charli XCX, and Sky Ferreira for a photoshoot and some career advice from Genesis P-Orridge, Geri Halliwell, and Elton John respectively. Grimes is at Fort York this coming Friday, July 13, and Chari XCX there on August 4.

Ladyhawke’s press circuit in support of Anxiety has hit Australia, as evidenced by feature pieces in FasterLouder, The Maitland Mercury, The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald, Loud & Quiet, and The Canberra Times.

Tame Impala has revealed details of their new record, to be entitled Lonerism and out in October. Hit up Pitchfork for details and to download the first sample MP3 in exchange for an email address.

Frank YangThe city’s music critics had to be a little disappointed upon arriving at the Phoenix on Sunday night and seeing signs informing them that Chicago’s Yawn had cancelled their appearance because of car trouble in Montreal – after all, had their set been anything less than impressive, the review would have written itself. But the opportunity to be simultaneously succinct and lazy still presented itself with London’s Yuck, not that it was needed.

I saw the quartet back at SXSW, where they were one of the festival’s buzz bands thanks to the made-in-a-world-where-Bandwagonesque-trumped-Nevermind melodic fuzz pop of their self-titled debut and, perhaps looking a little too firmly through the lens of a photographer, wasn’t impressed. For an outfit riding a surge of interest that most bands would give a limb for, they seemed exceedingly bored with the whole thing – and this was on the very first night of a week packed with shows. But that didn’t give them enough credit for how they sounded, which was pretty great – any perceived indifference didn’t apply to their playing, which mitigated any disappointment in their lack of stage diving.

In any case, it seems that the time on the road has done the band a lot of good in pretty much every department. They still seem to have a running contest amongst themselves to see who can look the most expressionless but there were a few earnest if awkward attempts at audience banter and in performance, they weren’t inanimate, allowing themselves to bob up and down with the beat or wander around the stage – singer Daniel Blumberg even contributing a few convincing screams where called for. Musically, the songs have evolved some from their recorded versions, incorporating extended musical segues or in the case of set closer “Rubber”, devolving into a sludgy dirge (meant in a mostly positive sense). But it’s the songs that are Yuck’s greatest strengths, so filled with hooks and melodies that owe much to the ’90s but are also timelessly pop. And unlike some of their distortion pedal fetishist contemporaries who use the noise to bury rather than buoy, Yuck sound almost hi-fi in their sonic clarity. Almost. But still plenty fuzzy.

Australian headliners Tame Impala also know their way around a pedalboard, as evidenced by last year’s psych-rock standout debut Innerspeaker, but clarity is not at the top of their mission statement. In wrapping frontman Kevin Parker’s voice in a distinctive echo-reverb, they effectively conjure up the ghosts of Barrett-era Pink Floyd but grafted onto big guitar and synth riffs and propelled by massive, grooving rhythms, Tame Impala are very much their own beast. Most importantly, though, they brings songs to the table – something that’s too often overlooked by acts in this particular niche of rock’n’roll, more concerned they are with sonic mayhem than actual substance. But armed with well-crafted, melodic and memorable songs, Tame Impala are the complete psych-rock package and even with just one album to their name, they set the standard.

And they put on a pretty terrific show, too. Their hour-fifteen long, encore-less set showcased their ability to marry hooks with grooves and jam without sounding jammy, always keeping focus and never losing the plot. A particular highlight was their cover of Massive Attack’s “Angel”, which introduced some darkness to their sound by maintaining the mystery and menace of the original. I’m also used to bands of their ilk performing in the dark and aloofly preferring to let their music speak for them and while they hardly busted out a light show, the oscilloscope on acid projected behind them offered some extra visual interest. The set was also punctuated with friendly banter, though it got a touch odd when they announced that Osama Bin Laden had been killed (to confused applause) and dedicated buoyant instrumental “Jeremy’s Storm” to him, which they apologized for afterwards, lest anyone think it was in tribute. An odd and memorable moment in a show that was plenty memorable enough already.

Exclaim and NOW have reviews of the show and The Globe & Mail an interview with Tame Impala. The Boston Herald and Philly.com have features on Yuck.

Photos: Tame Impala, Yuck @ The Phoenix – May 1, 2011
MP3: Tame Impala – “Runway, Houses, City, Clouds”
MP3: Yuck – “Get Away”
MP3: Yuck – “Georgia”
MP3: Yuck – “Automatic”
MP3: Yuck – “Daughter”
MP3: Yuck – “Coconut Bible”
Video: Tame Impala – “Expectation”
Video: Tame Impala – “Lucidity”
Video: Tame Impala – “Solitude Is Bliss”
Video: Yuck – “Get Away”
Video: Yuck – “Holing Out”

An Horse have just released their second album Walls and will be playing a free in-store at Criminal Records on May 15 at a time TBD in advance of their show at Mod Club the following evening opening up for Manchester Orchestra.

Video: An Horse – “Dressed Sharply”

Their commitments opening up for Foals completed as of this past weekend, Kiwis The Naked & Famous have set their own headlining date at Lee’s Palace for August 9, tickets $15 in advance. Blast has an interview with the band.

Video: The Naked & Famous – “Girls Like You”

Australia’s Sia and Denmark’s Oh Land are teaming up for a tour that brings them to The Phoenix on July 24, tickets $24.50 in advance. Sia’s latest We Are Born came out last year while Oh Land’s self-titled debut came out in March. The Los Angeles Times talks to Oh Land’s Nanna Øland Fabricius about her work.

Video: Sia – “Clap Your Hands”
Video: Oh Land – “Son Of A Gun”

Spin reports that Ida Maria is done with album number two and is even sharing a new tune from the record – look for Katla on June 7.

MP3: Ida Maria – “Cherry Red”

Italian radio show Maps has a downloadable radio session from Allo Darlin’, who will be at The El Mocambo on June 11.

MP3: Allo Darlin’ – “If Loneliness Was Art” (live on Maps)

Under The Radar is streaming the whole of the new Wild Beasts record Smother a week ahead of its May 10 release. Interview has an interview.

Stream: Wild Beasts / Smother

Mogwai talk to aux.tv about their plans to release a new EP this Fall, tentatively titled Earth Division. The AV Club also has an interview with Stuart Braithwaite.

Rolling Stone declares Anna Calvi an artist to watch, and you can do just that as a recent show in Paris is available to watch in its entirety at ARTE. It should give you an idea of what you will see – and what I’ll be missing – when she’s at the El Mocambo on May 27.

Pitchfork talks to Stanley Donwood, the artist responsible for the artwork and packaging for Radiohead’s The King Of Limbs.

Aquarium Drunkard chats with Norman Blake of Jonny, who kick off their North American tour with two nights at The Drake Underground on June 3 and 4.

American SongwriterWhen Jeff Mangum, prodigal godhead of that which is largely called indie, gave a rare performance in a Brooklyn loft last December, people freaked out. And reasonably so – the Neutral Milk Hotel-ier had been basically been retired and out of sight for nigh on twelve years, his band having dissolved post-In The Aeroplane Over The Sea and in the intervening years, his legend only grew. So the idea of him suddenly surfacing to play a show probably seemed like a once in a lifetime occurrence.

Except that it wasn’t. My theory at the time was that this was far from a one-off but the start of a return to music for Mangum, who was probably tired of the mythology that had grown around him and wanted to begin the process of deconstructing it, of saying “hey – I’m a guy with a guitar who wrote some songs” and maybe pave the way to being able to write, release and perform some more. And so it really wasn’t a surprise that 2011 started with a trickle of additional live show announcements – first as a special guest at the Portishead-curated I’ll Be Your Mirror at Asbury Park, New Jersey in September, then as curator of the All Tomorrow’s Parties in Somerset, UK in December, and now additional non-festival dates have begun trickling out, and at the moment they begin in Toronto.

Though The Horseshoe played host to a legendary, almost-never-was Neutral Milk Hotel in 1998, Mangum’s return will be in the suitably reverent environs of Trinity-St. Paul’s on August 12 and 13. Tickets are $32.50 and will go on sale as follows: a limited pre-sale of paperless tickets will begin at 10AM on Friday, February 25 with the presale password being made public at the Collective Concerts website on Wednesday, February 23 at 3PM. Presale customers will be allowed to purchase four tickets per order, per customer, per show. Public on sale begins on Saturday, February 26 at noon via usual outlets – Ticketmaster, The Horseshoe, Rotate this and Soundscapes – and purchases will be limited to two per customer.

Exciting news, to be sure, though one wonders what this does to the chances of Mangum showing up with the upcoming Elephant 6 Holiday Surprise Tour which hits The Horseshoe on March 18 – it had been a pretty safe bet that Mangum would show up on at least some of those dates, and he might still. But if you’re not the gambling sort and the guarantee of a night of great tunes from his Elephant 6 compatriots isn’t enough to convince you, then these Trinity shows should be just the ticket. Not that you had much choice since the Holiday Surprise show is sold out anyways.

The Wall Street Journal welcomes Jeff Mangum back from the wilderness with a timeline of his “lost years”.

MP3: Neutral Milk Hotel – “Holland 1945”

From lost legends to exciting newcomers, Australia’s Tame Impala and London’s Yuck are teaming up for a North American tour that includes a stop at The Phoenix in Toronto on May 1, tickets $20. I’m not that familiar with Tame Impala but Yuck, whose wonderfully grungy ’90s power-pop-laden self-titled debut just came out this week and has been on heavy rotation in my ears. Spin thinks Tame Impala will be the next big thing while Spinner has an interview with Yuck.

MP3: Yuck – “Rubber”
MP3: Tame Impala – “Runaway, Houses, City, Clouds”

John Vanderslice will take his orchestrally-powered latest White Wilderness on the road this Spring, though it’s unlikely he’ll have an actual orchestra with him – you couldn’t fit one in the Drake Underground, where he’ll be on May 10. You will, however, be able to fit his tourmate Damien Jurado, and Jurado isn’t a small guy.

MP3: John Vanderslice – “The Piano Lesson”
MP3: Damien Jurado – “Gillian Was A Horse”

The Independent talks to Dean Wareham.

Pixies drummer Dave Lovering tells Billboard that the band are contemplating what to do after their run of Doolittle shows – including April 18 and 19 at Massey Hall – are done. Either do the full-album show treatment for another of the records or – horror of horrors – write and record new material.

Buffalo Tom is streaming the whole of their just-released new record Skins, out March 8.

Stream: Buffalo Tom / Skins

I haven’t been keeping track of whether The Flaming Lips have made good on their song-a-month promise, but they have uploaded a 12-part simul-song to YouTube, so that sort of counts I guess.

NPR has got a World Cafe session with Liz Phair.

Also stopping in at NPR’s World Cafe for a coffee and session are Superchunk.

Spinner talks to The Strokes’ Albert Hammond Jr about their new record Angles, out March 22.

The Montreal Gazette and Toronto Star have feature pieces on Interpol.

Pitchfork reports that the new Death Cab For Cutie album Codes & Keys will be released on May 31.

NPR has a World Cafe session and Pitchfork and Crave interview features with The Decemberists.

The Independent Weekly, Paste, Blurt, Prefix, The Wall Street Journal, NBC and Spinner profile Drive-By Truckers, whose new record Go-Go Boots is out next week but streaming now in whole at Spinner.

Stream: Drive-By Truckers – “Go Go Boots”

The Alternate Side has a video session and interview with Iron & Wine.

Will Sheff of Okkervil River blogs about his experience at the Grammy Awards (he was nominated for best liner notes) for Billboard. Their new record I Am Very Far is out May 10. A video of one of the new songs, recorded last month when they played Late Night With Jimmy Fallon, has just been posted online – check it out at Prefix.

Bright Eyes have released a new video from their new record The People’s Key. The Quietus also has an interview with Conor Oberst, who plays The Sound Academy (with his band) on March 13.

Video: Bright Eyes – “Shell Games”

The new DeVotchKa record 100 Lovers is up to stream at NPR in advance of its March 1 release.

Stream: DeVotchKa / 100 Lovers

The San Francisco Examiner and Spinner have interviews with and NYC Taper a live recording from last week of Nicole Atkins; she’s at The Horseshoe on February 26.

Asobi Seksu released their lastest Fluorescence this week and released a new video from it. They also have a chat with Spinner and will be at The Horseshoe on February 27.

Video: Asobi Seksu – “Trails”

NYC Taper has a live recording and Spinner an interview with Wye Oak, whose Civilian is out March 8 and who play The El Mocambo on April 9.

Paste and So Much Silence chat with Michael Benjamin Lerner of Telekinesis. They play The Horseshoe on March 6 and have an in-store at Sonic Boom earlier that afternoon.

Stereogum checks in with Fleet Foxes on the status of their new record Helplessness Blues, out May 3.

Rolling Stone is holding a competition to choose who will grace an upcoming cover – vote Ume.

Frank YangAbout midway through last night’s show at the Horseshoe, Mystery Jets frontman Blaine Harrison mentioned that earlier that day, they’d learned their US visas had fallen through and as such, this show could have been the first, last and only date on their already-short North American tour. Certainly not news any band who had hauled themselves and no small amount of equipment across an ocean would want to hear. But rather than let it dampen their spirits, the English four-piece channeled any frustrations into an impressive show that, if it turned out to be the only one they played, would still mark the tour as a success. Of sorts.

First up were Kingston duo PS I Love You, who had been making noise figuratively and literally since last year (at least) and were gearing up for the October 5 release of their debut Meet Me At The Muster Station. And while I liked the singles that had preceded the full-length, Muster Station felt like a let down because it rebalanced their sound such that their strengths – the big, melodic college rock-vintage guitar heroics – were turned down and their weaknesses – frontman Paul Saulnier’s Mercer/Krug-aping vocals – were turned up. Obviously identifying this as a deficiency is a subjective judgement, but it made the record feel like a wet blanket on my enthusiasm for the band. An enthusiasm that was rekindled by their opening set, which corrected the cosmic balance by burying the vocals and showcasing their musical sides. Saulnier’s ability to evoke the heyday of Superchunk and Dinosaur Jr. (you could argue their heyday is right now, but I digress) with his fretwork can’t be understated, particularly while handling low end via the bass pedals at his feet. The pair produced a great musical energy despite not having much in the way of stage presence and prompted me to give the album another chance which, really, is as much as you could ask for.

And back to Mystery Jets. I’m a relative newcomer to the band, being only really familiar with their latest album Serotonin, but I find it interesting how they were described to me before I actually got to sit down and listen. Terms like “post-Libertines” and “psychedelic” were commonplace and really, they’re all wrong. Temporally-speaking, they did enter the UK musical landscape after messrs Doherty and Barat made their mark, but they hardly share the same laddish/loutish affectations, instead coming across as unabashedly romantic and with little attitude (meant positively) and the psychedelia tag might apply to their fashion sense, but musically they’re pretty straight-ahead Brit-rock, reliant on great melodies, big choruses and just a touch of danceability. Over the course of an hour, they split their set evenly between Serotonin and its predecessor, 2008’s Twenty-One, and gave the respectably-sized crowd something to get boisterous about – which they did, right through to the soaring encore-closer “Dreaming Of Another World”. Any concerns about what would happen to the rest of the tour were set aside in favour of just enjoying the moment. And it’s just as well for at the time of this writing, the first of two New York shows had been cancelled. Good thing they’ve already got plans to return for more North American shows in January – visas permitting.

Chart and Panic Manual also have reviews of the show.

Photos: Mystery Jets, PS I Love You @ The Horseshoe – September 13, 2010
MP3: Mystery Jets – “Dreaming Of Another World”
MP3: Mystery Jets – “Flash A Hungry Smile”
MP3: PS I Love You – “2012”
MP3: PS I Love You – “Butterflies & Boners”
MP3: PS I Love You – “Facelove”
Video: Mystery Jets – “Dreaming Of Another World”
Video: Mystery Jets – “Half In Love With Elizabeth”
Video: Mystery Jets – “Two Doors Down”
Video: Mystery Jets – “Young Love”
Video: Mystery Jets – “Flakes”
Video: Mystery Jets – “The Boy Who Ran Away”
Video: Mystery Jets – “Alas Agnes”
Video: Mystery Jets – “You Can’t Fool Me Dennis”
Video: PS I Love You – “Facelove”
MySpace: Mystery Jets

Fresh off her appearance at the MTV VMAs, Florence & The Machine have released a new video for their contribution to the latest Twilight soundtrack. Florence plays the Sound Academy on November 3.

Video: Florence & The Machine – “Heavy In Your Arms”

Barry Burns of Mogwai talks to Prefix about the band’s new Special Moves/Burning live set and to Clash about working on their new album, which it was just announced would be released on SubPop when it’s done next year instead of their long-time home at Matador.

Bettie Serveert have released a video for the sort-of title track of their new record Pharmacy Of Love. They’re gearing up for their first North American tour in far too long, which includes a September 28 date at the Drake Underground.

Video: Bettie Serveert – “The Pharmacy”

And also with a new video are The Concretes, whose new record WYWH will be out November 8.

Video: The Concretes – “All Day”

Australian psychedelicists Tame Impala have assembled a North American tour that stops in at the Horseshoe on November 24. Skiddle has an interview.

MP3: Tame Impala – “Runaway, Houses, City, Clouds”

Clash has a two–part interview with Alan McGee, former head of Creation Records, on the occasion of the release of the documentary Upside Down: The Story Of Creation Records sometime around the end of the year. It goes without saying that I must see this.

Trailer: Upside Down: The Story Of Creation Records