Both this video and the song itself offer a really powerful look at commonly adopted stereotypes associated with young black men. It’s a bit dated in some respects, but there is an eerie omnipresence about the messages it contains. Sometimes it’s good to wonder just how far we’ve really come.

With regards to the music, Living Colour’s Vernon Reid remains one of the most impressive and skillful guitarists ever to adopt the instrument. Behind the breakbeats, you can find evidence of his mastery all through this song.

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Big ups to Brad for the hookup. Butternut Reduction!

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Little Rock’s finest, the one and only American Princes, are back at the wheel again in a couple of weeks. Their new release, Other People drops on Yep Roc on April 15th. We’re looking forward to hearing this one. This single and video are good indications that it’s another strong release from one of the most promising young American rock bands out there.

American Princes - Real Love

But Wait! There’s A Contest! And tour dates! — More Info After The Jump –

From the press release:

Also, in celebration of the release, Yep Roc is posting a new song stream each day on their Myspace page’s blog (http://myspace.com/yeproc) and asking listeners to post their responses to the song in the form of pictures, poems, videos, or whatever they can think of! The contest began April 1 and will run until the April 15 street date. Enter to win tickets to a show or a signed personalized poster. Each day will have a new winner, and one grand prize winner will be announced at the end of the contest. So check it out, and tell your friends!

Go check out the contest and the info on their MySpace page — http://myspace.com/americanprinces

American Princes on tour

4/12 – Little Rock – The Rev Room
4/15 – Chapel Hill – Local 506
4/16 – Covington – Mad Hatter – w/Lucero
4/17 – Pittsburgh – Mr. Small’s – w/Lucero
4/18 – Buffalo – Mohawk Place – w/Lucero
4/19 – Hoboken – Maxwell’s – w/House & Parrish
4/22 – New York – Mercury Lounge – w/Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin
4/23 – Scranton – Test Pattern – w/The Sw!ms
4/24 – Detroit – Small’s
4/25 – Grand Rapids – The Intersection – w/Lucero
4/26 – Minneapolis – Hexagon Bar
4/27 – Des Moines – Vaudeville Mews
4/28 – Omaha – The Slowdown
4/30 – Columbia – Mojo’s

5/1 – Kansas City – Davey’s Uptown
5/2 – Wichita – Kirby’s Beer Store
5/3 – Fayetteville – George’s (in the Lounge)
5/10 – Little Rock – Rock n’ Roar
5/14 – Austin – Stubb’s – w/Northern State
5/15 – Dallas – The Prophet Bar – w/Northern State
5/16 – Houston – Warehouse Live – w/Northern State
5/17 – Baton Rouge – Spanish Moon – w/Northern State
5/20 – Birmingham – w/Northern State
5/21 – Atlanta – The Earl – w/Northern State
5/22 – Chapel Hill – Local 506 – w/Northern State
5/23 – Baltimore – Ottobar – w/Northern State

Pre-Order Other People from Yep Roc by clicking here or you can purchase digital singles/CD from Amazon by clicking here.

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Aimee Mann - Thirty One Today

Aimee Mann On Tour

June 2 Los Angeles, CA Largo
June 6 Anaheim, CA House of Blues
June 10 Los Angeles, CA Largo
June 12 Minneapolis, MN Minneapolis Zoo
June 13 Milwaukee WI Pabst Theater
June 15 Manchester, TN Bonnaroo Music Festival

July 9 Boulder, CO Chautauqua Auditorium
July 11 Denver, CO Denver Botanical Gardens
July 12 Park City, UT Deer Valley Resort
July 14 Saratoga, CA Mountain Winery
July 15 Rosebud, OR Stewart Park
July 16 Seattle, WA Seattle Zoo
July 24 Calgary, Alberta Calgary Music Festival

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To celebrate this week’s single release (we still have those in England) Radiohead have broken up the song ‘Nude’ into pieces for you to remix.

For those of you who enjoy this sort of thing, you can buy the separate components or ’stems’ (bass, voice, guitar, strings/FX and drums) and remix your own version of the song. You can do this by adding your own beats and instrumentation or just remixing the original parts. More information here: http://www.radioheadremix.com/information/

You can buy the stems here: http://www.radioheadremix.com/buy/

You can upload your finished mixes here http://www.radioheadremix.com and be judged and even voted on by ‘the public’.

You can also create a widget allowing votes from your own website, Facebook or MySpace page to be sent through too.

Hope you enjoy it

For those of you who aren’t that way inclined, Nude is also available in its entirety on CD and 7 inch (UK release) at the usual retail outlets.

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Farina’s charisma behind the turntables lies in his ability to integrate styles that aren’t always inherently cohesive. His version of house music blends his famed huge party soundscapes with the intimate “back room” grooves he loves so much. “When making the mix,” Farina says, “I played a sort of fictitious set at fabric on a night that doesn’t exist. Musically, I tried to capture the techy, jackin’ Chicago/SF side of the house spectrum - dubby, chunky tracks. I picked a good variation of underground goodies, a lot of which are unreleased or hopefully not on any other compilations. Tracks that have a good ’shelf life’ but that aren’t proven hits; hidden gems that might go over looked in this fast paced music era.”

Fabric 40: Mark Farina adds another worthwhile chapter to the ongoing legacies of both Fabric and Farina. Attention must be paid.

Frank Solano - The Blues Line (Tommy Largo Remix)

Fabric 40: Mark Farina can be pre-ordered from Amazon By Clicking Here.

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The seaport city of Boston, rich in musical tradition and heritage, has a legacy of turning out notable songwriters and musicians dating back generations. If you’re a follower of that long-standing tradition (or you happen to be one of the lucky ones who live there and get to experience it on a regular basis), you might have occasioned to stumble into places like Club Passim or The Middle East without expectation only to stumble back out deeply impressed with what you’ve just seen. This legacy has given root to Meg Hutchinson, a songwriter whose angelic voice, extraordinary lyricism and powerful delivery keeps us singing long after the music has. Ms. Hutchinson, who instantly won me over at this year’s Folk Alliance Conference, has released a new album entitled Come Up Full on Red House Records this year which, it is to be hoped, will help continue to garner her much-deserved accolades and gain a foothold of new fans.

Coming from a creative writing background helps to bolster the warmth layered throughout these twelve songs. It is a document of a woman who appears to have traveled around herself to become whole again, finding in her footsteps pieces of her personal mystery. It is a journey that this listener was able to relate to on a deep level of consciousness, making a connection in the desire to recover from the disasters laid upon us — the desire to find extraordinary beauty from ordinary things. On “Home”, she gives us reasons to count our many blessings; on the songs “Whole Bird” and “Seeing Stars”, she delights in the ironic dichotomies of what brings people together. Crit Harmon’s production values don’t ever become overbearing; they allow us to listen to and enjoy the songs in the simple way it seems they were always intended to be heard.

With Come Up Full, Ms. Hutchinson has catapulted into an upper echelon of songwriters. Seeing her placed along side names like Shawn Colvin, Natalie Merchant or Patty Griffin seems more than reasonable, ones for whom legacies and longevities seem pre-destined.

In spite of the many accolades laid upon Ms. Hutchinson and her work in this article, the simple fact that I can’t ignore is how drawn into the album I have become and, further, how I hope that others will begin to recognize her singularity as performer and songwriter.

Listen to Meg Hutchinson - “Home”
Listen to Meg Hutchinson - “Seeing Stars”

You can purchase Come Up Full on CD or Digital from Amazon by clicking here.

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I like this track, I love Saddle Creek Records (don’t you?) and I really like Tokyo Police Club. Their new album, Elephant Shell will be out in April. Enjoy this (sadly really low quality rip) (resolved thanks to Side One Track One) MP3 of “In A Cave” from that forthcoming album. Tour Dates after the jump! YAY!

Tokyo Police Club - In A Cave

TOUR DATES:
Sat-Mar-08, Toronto, ONT, Canadian Independent Music Awards @ Canadian Ballroom
Tue-Mar-18, London, ONT, Call The Office
Wed-Mar-19, Indianapolis, IN, Birdy’s Bar and Grill
Thu-Mar-20, Lawrence, KS, Jackpot Saloon
Fri-Mar-22, Salt Lake City, UT, Kilby Court
Mon-Mar-24, San Francisco, CA, The Independent
Tue-Mar-25, Pomona, CA, The Glass House
Wed-Mar-26, Hollywood, CA, Troubadour *2nd troub show added soon*
Fri-Mar-28, San Diego, CA, Soma
Sat-Mar-29, Tempe, AZ, The Clubhouse
Mon-Mar-31, Houston, TX, Meridian Red Room
Tue-Apr-01, Dallas, TX, House of Blues
Thu-Apr-03, Tallahassee, FL, Club Downunder
Fri-Apr-04, Miami, FL, Studio A
Sat-Apr-05, Orlando, FL, Backbooth
Tue-Apr-08, Nashville, TN, Exit/In
Wed-Apr-09, Cleveland, OH, The Spot
Fri-Apr-18, Ottawa, ONT, Barrymore’s Music Hall
Sat-Apr-19, Montreal, QC, Cabaret du Musee Juste Pour Rire
Sun-Apr-20, New York, NY Bowery Ballroom
Mon-Apr-21, Brooklyn, NY, Music Hall of Williamsburg
Tue-Apr-22, New York, NY Bowery Ballroom
Thu-Apr-24, Boston, MA, Paradise Rock Club
Sat-Apr-26, Northampton, MA, Pearl Street Night Club
Mon-Apr-28, Philadelphia, PA, First Unitarian Church
Tue-Apr-29, Washington, DC, Black Cat
Wed-Apr-30, Buffalo, NY, Big Orbit’s Soundlab
Sun-May-04, Detroit, MI, Magic Stick
Mon-May-05, Chicago, IL, Metro
Tue-May-06, Minneapolis, MN, Varsity Theater
Thu-May-08, Winnipeg, MB, The Garrick
Fri-May-09, Saskatoon, SK, Louis’ Pub
Sat-May-10, Calgary, AB, The Warehouse
Sun-May-11, Calgary, AB, The Warehouse
Mon-May-12, Edmonton, AB, Starlite Room
Wed-May-14, Kelowna, BC, The Habitat
Fri-May-16, Vancouver, BC, The Plaza
Sat-May-17, Victoria, BC, Sugar Nightclub
Sun-May-18, Seattle, WA, Neumos
Mon-May-19, Portland, OR, Hawthorne Theatre
Thu-May-22, Denver, CO, Bluebird
Fri-May-23, Omaha, NE, Slowdown

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This is the pure definition of psychedelic interstellar afro-beat jazz funk, horns, crazy Hammond B-3 keyboards, straight-up junkie rhythms from 1971 banging up the block from outer space to the human race and back again. With guest vocal effects from Karolina, Chaka Moon and Elran Dekel, we get an enhancement to what is already a nearly perfect recording. Furthermore, what I would like to call “the Stanley Turrentine/Ahmad Jamal/Yusef Lateef factor” is all over this joint, a form of high praise that I think is well merited once you get to listen (if you know anything about those cats).

The best part is that while the individual sections of this record are wonderful, it’s much better as a complete work. There’s no filler here, no rush jobs or cutting and pasting — this is some handcrafted, vintage funk/soul shit that will stay with you long after the first listen. So if you are down with the notions and the concepts, then the practice and the performance is here for you to lay your dreams in. Kutiman is set to take on the world, and it’s time you climbed aboard and slid into the groove.

Kutiman - Music Is Ruling My World (featuring Karolina)
Kutiman - No Reason For You (featuring Elran Dekel)

You can purchase Kutiman’s S/T album from Amazon (CD or MP3) by clicking here.

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Rachel Ries - Hands to Water

There was an aching, a deep yearning, a soulful streaming longing in the words and in the refrain of the song and in the harmonies provided by Ariel Bolles, one whose melancholy created an immediate connection with everyone listening. Wiping tears from my face, I became instantly fascinated with who and what I had just heard so that I could share it with you.

Hailing from Chicago by way of South Dakota, Rachel’s intimately and directly powerful songwriting stems from classical training in piano, violin, viola and voice. It’s not quite folk, it’s not quite jazz, it’s not quite bluegrass and it’s not quite swing: it’s a beautiful melding of all these styles into a series of gripping and dramatic songs. With the addition of The Brawny Angels (Ariel Bolles, Alisa Rose and Adam Roszkiewicz), the simple, nuanced frameworks of her songwriting places her in a class of her own: vibrant and soaring one minute, down and diving the next. This represents the highest level of what we’re calling “indie folk” these days, and to hear and watch her is a rare and precious treat. It is as if Patsy Cline and John Prine had a terrific love child who grew up listening to Billie Holiday songs, learned to play and then unleashed their creation on the world.

I would recommend her latest album Without a Bird without reservation, and I hope that like me, hearing this song will have you longing for more. Be on the lookout for a 10″ split featuring Rachel doing country duets with Anais Mitchell on Righteous Babe Records very soon.

You can purchase Without a Bird from CD Baby (CD or MP3) by clicking here.

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