A Few of Our Favorite Things, 2011: Black Lips, Stephen Colbert, Sensitive Bros, Ambient Beats…

The good people over at Friends of Friends Music, in keeping with their founding each-one-teach-one ethos, asked their friends, and friends of friends, to contribute some sort of top ten (ish) music-related list of favorites from the past year. My contribution is below, but visit the FoF site to read entries by folks like Shlohmo, Ernest Gonzales (Mexicans With Guns), Lushlife, Clive Tanaka, Low Limit, TAKE, Garth Trinidad, Shaun Koplow and Jeff Weiss.

Like most folks that’ll contribute to this project, I could do this all day. To limit a “best of” list to ten entries is the cruelest of tortures to a real music geek, but the tradition exists for a reason: namely, to ensure we all get back to work. This isn’t definitive. These are the first ten wonderful music-related things that popped into my head, but considering the breakneck evolutionary pace and exponential expansion of our chosen medium, it seems fitting to shoot from the hip.

1) Destroyer goes Kaputt: There’s absolutely nothing I don’t love immensely about this album. Am I the only one who had an unrealized, unrecognized need to meet the lovechild of Steely Dan and Sade? Aside from Destroyer’s Dan Bejar, perhaps, but at least I know I’m not totally alone.

2) The Black Lips destroy a ballroom: Mere hours after watching Jared Swilley pinwheel a guitar body into the forehead of a grateful fan at Lollapalooza, I found myself thrashing in a chic hotel ballroom to “Bad Kids” while being pelted with TP rolls and complimentary vodka drinks. \\m//  

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News: Tearist! Vice Cooler Helps Orphans, Heart Music Finds the Beat, Mestizo Digs Elliott Smith

Machina Muerte founder Mestizo name-checks Elliott Smith

Quick bloggy bits from around the L.A. underground (and up). Share ’em.

  1. FEATURED: L.A. Rapper Mestizo Name-Checks Elliott Smith*
  2. Heart Music’s Free EP w. Baths, Teen Daze, Light Pollution, more
  3. Vice Cooler’s Rwanda Benefit LP, ft. No Age, Dan Deacon, Gossip
  4. Finally! Listen to Synth-Punks Tearist’s Brand New Track “Headless”

(all stories via West Coast Sound, via L.A. Weekly)

* “Elliott Smith’s death gets a mention — a display of Mestizo’s ability to intertwine classic rap braggadocio with harrowing reality and emotive introspection.

Mayer Hawthorne Hooks Up with Virginia Beat-Maker Nottz, Drops Etched 12-Inch for ‘I Need You’

News: New Abe Vigoda Song, We Are the World Video, Plus Baths, What Laura Says, Big Search

Abe Vigoda, not throwing shade

Quick bloggy bits from around the L.A. underground (and up). Share ’em.

  1. FEATURED: Abe Vigoda Goes All ’80s On New ‘Crush’ LP*
  2. Baths Guest for Fol Chen Record Release at The Echo
  3. We Are the World channel Manson in New Video
  4. ‘Lambhair McDaniel,’ by Devendra Banhart Favorite
  5. Popieluch of Foreign Born and Fool’s Gold as Big Search

(all stories via West Coast Sound, via L.A. Weekly)

* The press release for Crush promises “glassy shards of ‘cold wave’ pop, with synthesisers, sequencers and altogether broodier beats.”

MP3, Groove Edition: Nite Jewel, Asura, Ana Caravelle, Fol Chen, Madlib, Freddie Gibbs

Nite Jewel, amidst balls

We’re getting caught up on two weeks of intense blogging for West Coast Sound, and we now present to you some tasty MP3 and/or streaming works. This is Groove Edition (think “fun-kay”).

  1. FEATURED: Nite Jewel with Teen Inc. for EP, ‘Am I Real?’*
  2. ‘Timber,’ Lush Electronics from Asura and Ana Caravelle
  3. Chamber-Funk Ensemble Fol Chen Drops ‘The Holograms’
  4. James Poyser, Karriem Riggins, Madlib  on ‘Funky Butt’
  5. Arabian Prince and CX Kidtronik in ‘Let’s Hit the Beach’
  6. Freddie Gibbs with ‘Str8 Killa’ EP, Says ‘F*ck the World’
  7. (all stories via West Coast Sound, via LA Weekly)

* “Nite Jewel, keyboard queen Ramona Gonzales, is a quintessential artist of the L.A. underground and has now produced a collaboration with a young group that’s starting to catch buzz, Teen Inc.”

News Roundup: Flying Lotus launches app, collab’s w. Jose James, Fol Chen delivers free EP, Fitz + Tantrums + Dangerbird, Lemon Sun

Flying Lotus, 'Cosmogramma'

Quick bloggy bits from around the L.A. underground (and up). Share ’em.

  1. FEATURED: Augment Reality with Flying Lotus’ Astral Harp*
  2. MP3: Meet Soulster José James, Produced by Flying Lotus
  3. Fol Chen Releases Free EP, Remixes from Baths, Karin Tatoyan
  4. Fitz and the Tantrums Sign to Dangerbird, Tour with Dap-Kings
  5. Video Premiere: Lemon Sun, “Touch the Lightning”
  6. (all stories via West Coast Sound, via LA Weekly)

* The program allows webcam-enabled users enter the album art and bat around those sketchy geometric orbs, which in turn warps the lines emanating outward from the sun-like object. Recommended snack pairing: “A Fish Called Juana” crackers.