first impressions...

The Perceptionists - Black Dialogue
Bit worried by the first two songs on this CD from hip-hop 'supergroup' The Perceptionists, they were a bit too "look at us, we rap better than you" for my tastes. Fortunatly El-P comes along on track 3 with some really sick beats and the rest of the album settles down into more political and personal fueled lyrics. Plus they do a luurve song, and Darth Phil is a sucker for those.

MP3: love letters

Angels of Light - The Angels of Light sing "Other People"
The Angels of Light remind me of Sophia, both groups are contain a collective of musicians lead by a frontman who has a past involving a well respected yet very noisy band - Robin Proper-Sheppard with The God Machine, and Michael Gira with The Swans - and both of these frontmen have now eschued there noisy past for quieter almost folk music influenced tunes. However Michael Gira was always the nastier one, his songs deal with the darker side of human nature - case in point Michael's White Hands on this CD, I wonder which twisted fallen superstar this could be about. Still this is possibly the most accesible work he's done, hopefully more people will be tempted to listen to him now. Oh, and his backing band on this CD definitely merit attention, he wasn't wrong taking Devandra Banhart under his wings and he's not wrong with Akron/Family.

MP3: My Sister Said

Out Hud - Let Us Never Speak Of It Again
I like this, I want to go to clubs that play this sort of dance music. It wears its 80's influences firmly on its sleeve, has the sort of tempo that doesn't require drugs to appreciate fully, perfect music for sunny spring time weather.

MP3: It's for You