pick a piper: all her colours.

Long story short: I’ve been waiting three years for Pick A Piper to release a full length album. And my dreams are coming true.

I first wrote about Pick A Piper three years ago, and since then they’ve maintained a justifiable position of glory in my regular iTunes rotation. Created by Caribou’s Brad Weber, he oversees the highly collaborative outputs of Pick A Piper with friends like Angus Fraser, Dan Roberts and Ruby Suns’ Ryan McPhun. The first glimpse into the new record came two months ago with the release of Weber and McPhun’s track “Lucid in Fjords.”

 

Then the gifts kept coming, and three weeks ago they announced their first full-length LP “All Her Colours.” I mean, c’mon: the album has “colours” in the title. It’s like they’re doing this just for me! Though I fell in love with Pick A Piper because of their randomly complex beats and use of eclectic organic sound-makers (find me anything as dance-worthy that also has a glockenspiel in it, I dare you…), Weber has a deft ear and his recent shift to more production-based, synthetic sounds has only served to make the new tracks even more exciting. He’s playing again with one of my favourite themes in all of art – the digital organic – and here he creates, twists, delays and reverbs lines of aural magic that, though digital, sound like they were first formed in nature. The kind of fantastical magical nature you usually only to get to visit while dreaming or high or both.

I’ve waited to post about the new record hoping we’d get a video to promote the release, and today, oh happy day, they delivered a visual just as complex and interesting as their music. Directed and animated by Matt Yarrington and Sara Winters, the video for the album’s title track “All Her Colours” (with fellow Caribou member John Schmersal on vocals) is the perfect animated trip. Any video with a heroine who mixes her own potion in a blanket fort in the park and ends up riding prisms through outer space is right up my alley. I already loved the video, but I loved it more after reading some of Yarrington’s background for the vid as told to MTV Hive: “It is intended to portray color and light itself, personified as a female human and broken into a collection of archetypal aspects of the ‘oneself,’” he says. “Each color is like a vital center of the whole. The shadow character is the negative aspects of a ‘Macrocosmic Oversoul,’ who, in an effort to harness the power of light and wreak havoc, has trapped ‘White Light’ in a prism and refracted her into the individual colors of the visible spectrum.” 

So, basically, I love Yarrington as much as Weber now.

“All Her Colours” is out on Mint Records on April 2 and is up for digital/vinyl pre-order now.

london grammar: hey now.

2013 is only a few hours old and already it’s brought my favourite song of 2013. Funny how that works. I am riding tonight’s festivities into my bed and listening to one track, over and over, and it’s making my (new) year.

Out of nowhere comes “Hey Now”, the debut single from a enigmatic London-based trio London Grammar. I’m pretty good at the internet, but that’s all I can discover about them. Their YouTube has one video (a still of this one cover image over “Hey Now”), their Facebook says that they’re “recording”, and their Twitter basically says that… they’re recording. (Also, they tweeted at Sound of Arrows, so that’s a wonderfully good sign.) I’m complaining about none of this, because if they’re creating anything nearly as mystery-filled and infinitely listenable as “Hey Now” I am in desperate, desperate need of whatever it is. London Grammar… teach me music with words I don’t even know yet.

feist + martin de thurah: the bad in each other.

I first fell in love with Danish director Martin de Thurah after his disturbingly glorious video for Fever Ray’s “When I Grow Up.” His gritty, realistic hand-held style is a perfect match for the dark undertones in Feist’s “The Bad In Each Other.” It’s a marriage made in video heaven.

matthew dear + morgan beringer: in the middle (i met you there).

The stable of amazing musicians on Ghostly International’s roster never fails to impress, and along with the audio they’ve also promoted their artists with consistently beautiful videos.

Their latest, directed by Morgan Beringer and promoting Matthew Dear’s Headcage EP, is a gorgeous, metallic, slithering, opalescent mess of wonderful goo.

 

The only thing that kinda bums me out is that it reminds me a bit too much of Robert Seidel’s legendary 2006 masterpiece for Zero 7’s Futures.

fla + the freaks: the loner.

I’ve been waiting for this. A short while ago I posted about the trailer for this little gem. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but something about it resonated with me. I’m more than happy to report that the full-length video is just as exquisitely realized and heart-achingly simple as I’d hoped.

Directed and animated by FLA, I was blown away by the use of variety of perspectives and the amount of detail. I’ve watched again and again,  each time seeing new things and each time feeling a little more filled with a wonderful yearning.  At the end of the day, what a truly remarkable thing it would be to have someone (or some small pink monster-dog thing) fight to love you despite all your faults. To me, The Loner is about the power of realizing you need something when you want it the least and the possibility inside us all to turn around one day and decide to become, in small steps, a better version of yourself. I actually gasped at one point, which is how you know it’s damn good. When it was over I realized how much I didn’t want it to end, which I think it some of the highest praise I can give.

quick + dirty #2: red song, camouflar, we float and bad choices.

Quick + Dirty is back with a hot list of videos I think you need to see…

suuns: red song.

galaxie + mathieu cyr: camouflar.

my first earthquake + satan’s pearl horses: we float.

shout out out out out + a.j. bond + chris von szombathy: bad choices.

friendly fires + david lewandowski: hurting.

Friendly Fires are a reliable go-to, a steady member of a stable of cherished artists who I know will deliver how I like it each and every time. “Kiss of Life” is one of my have tracks ever, and it’s Chris Cottam-directed video makes me want to dance. While waving palm fronds around. I knew the Fires and I were on the same wavelength when they chose an image from Sølve Sundsbø’s Perroquet series as the cover for their 2011 album Pala (which, not to brag, but I totally blogged about back in 2008), so I knew we had the same taste in photography. Having the same taste in photography is like taking the carpool lane right into my heart. Click here to once again ogle its gorgeousness.

Today’s video for “Hurting” – the third single from Pala – is no visual disappointment. Sure, we’ve got a hot hipster broad/love interest with a disturbingly elastic neck, but the real draw here is lead singer Ed Macfarlane limping through his love and throwing his boogie down in an attempt (much like the mating dance of birds, which leads us back to parrots – I’m seeing a synergy here!) too woo her. And by “woo”, I mean “prove cool enough for,” because she kinda looks like a bitch. Which is really to say, if Ed Macfarlane wanted to dance with me, I wouldn’t say no.

There’s an easy urban whimsy going on here; it’s sunset-lit, street-wise and dance-y. And if you’re wondering why that cube is so next level good, look no further that director David Lewandowski, who, in case you don’t know, worked on a little piece of mind-altering, visual magnum opus/digital genius I like to call Tron: Legacy. (Say what you want about the plot, the 3D animation was without peer.) Click here to see some highly-detailed posts and videos about his work for that film.

+ via Antville

sticky monster lab: the loner teaser.

As Mrs. Peacock said during the dinner party in Clue, “I mean, I have absolutely no idea what we’re doing here. Or what I’m doing here, or what this place is about, but I am determined to enjoy myself. And I’m very intrigued, and, oh my, this soup’s delicious, isn’t it?”

So, soup aside, we find ourselves watching Sticky Monster Lab’s trailer for a “new animation and compilation album” called The Loaner. Much like Mrs. Peacock (and you’d be surprised how often I find myself genuinely thinking that), I’m very intrigued.

I’ve been a fan of designer toys and monster for as long as I can remember, and here they are: animated, in a digital world, living their lives. The ultra-digitized animation style is one of my favourites, and when it’s done as well as this I get giddy. These monsters are on point.

Alright, The Longe, I’m not sure what’s happening yet, but your teaser is triumphant. Consider me teased! I anxiously await the end of November 2011, when all will be revealed.

Also, I’m not sure who the loner’s little pink animal friend is, but it reminds me of that episode of Futurama where Fry finds out the dog he thought forgot about him spent the rest of his life waiting for him to come get him. It’s called “Jurassic Bark,” and if you want to weep until all your innocence is lost, I suggest you go watch it.

the sound of arrows: wonders.

Swedish 80s dream-pop duo The Sound of Arrows just tweeted the link to their latest video. “Wonders”, fresh of their just-released, highly-buzzed about debut full length album “Voyage,” delivers everything we’ve already come to crave from them. Long story short, they sound like unicorns playing synths riding through space dust, on their way to watch The Neverending Story with David Bowie. While drinking Crystal Pepsi… sitting on a couch made of clouds and dollar-store laser beams. Walkin’ on sunshine, and don’t it feel good.

I’ve had a mild to mildly unhealthy obsession with them since falling crazy in love with their video for “M.A.G.I.C.”

And, um, no big deal, but I’m now tweeting with them about the video. Day = made. Oh, and if you’re looking for me, I’ll be busy being friends with them now. Stefan and Oskar are stand-up gentlemen.

glasser: ring.

Never underestimate the power of good cover art. I might have passed over Glasser if I hadn’t been stopped dead in my tracks by the gorgeous cover, below, to her upcoming debut album “Ring.” And that would have totally been my loss, because Glasser is basically now my favourite new thing.

The home-project pseudonym of “one-woman orchestra” Cameron Mesirow, Glasser first got some buzz after releasing her debut EP “Apply” in May 2009. Recorded in Garage Band, she clearly showed right out of the gate a natural ability to make the rough edges endearing.

But “Home”, the recently-released first single from “Ring”, is what really got me excited. The audio evolution from her EP seems so natural and the imperfect wooden percussion; swelling synth chorus; swooping strings; and dreamy, chanty call of Glasser’s voice has been on heavy rotation in my brain since I first heard it. Like siren song, I can’t shake it. And that’s a good thing.

“Ring” comes out Sept. 28 from True Panther. Pre-order here.

Here are two grainy, misty, analog-feeling vids for two tracks from her EP “Apply”:

“Apply” directed by Jacinto Astiazarán

“Tremel” directed by Sarah Enid Hagey

Via Pitchfork.