Okay, so it's certainly been a while since I last updated my muxtape... May.

I've been using the site since that time however, listening to others, finding new music, and following links...just not updating my own. I've had ideas though, playlists and tracks i've wanted to put up but then changed my mind later. As with Last.fm, I think I may me subconsciously afraid of music snobbery. It's silly I know, but i'm weird like that. All the same, the good news is that i've finally gotten round to updating the tracklisting!

Some are songs i've been enjoying for a few months now, others are regular favourites, and some are by entirely new artists that I wouldn't have known about a few months previously. It is rock, it is dance, it is instrumental and It's a mash-up of all these things, and of the playlists I tried to make over the summer and yet never upload. If you think there's a problem with the pacing or song order, well, that's probably the reason why... oh, and there's twelve songs too, instead of the ten that I'm used to.

August : [Stream Here]

• Alamos- Number Cruncher
• The National- Mistaken By Strangers
• Radiohead- Treefingers
• Arcade Fire- Black Wave / Bad Vibrations
• Innerpartysystem- Heart of Fire
• Boys Noize- & Down
• Royksopp- Someone Like Me
• ...Trail of Dead- Another Morning Stoner
• Swervedriver- Duel
• Motorcycle- As The Rush Comes
• Team Sleep- Princeton Review
• Nine Inch Nails- Lights In The Sky

I'll try and get it updated again in a month's time, promise. If not, you can certainly expect to see another update towards November. Just in time for Christmas either way...

The Nominations for the 2008 Nationwide Mercury Music Prize have just been announced. I'm either getting older or further detached from the current happenings of music however, because there's even less acts that I recognise this year than usual. But that's a good thing- The Arctic Monkeys winning in 2006 was complete nonsense. That said, the Arctic's frontman is still there in some capacity this year thanks to a nomination for his side project, whoever they are, it doesn't matter.

There's a few acts nominated though that I predicted, as both Estelle and Adele are on the list. Portishead's album Third is bizarrely left off, while Radiohead are thankfuly inevitably there. In Rainbows is a great album, and my favourite from last year, and I think it'll be the one that wins the prize. It's the obvious choice at any rate. The full list of nominess for the 2008 prize is below.

• Adele - '19'
• British Sea Power - 'Do You Like Rock Music?'
• Burial - 'Untrue'
• Elbow - 'The Seldom Seen Kid'
• Estelle - 'Shine'
• The Last Shadow Puppets - 'The Age Of The Understatement'
• Laura Marling - 'Alas I Cannot Swim'
• Neon Neon - 'Stainless Style'
• Portico Quartet - 'Knee-Deep In The North Sea'
• Robert Plant And Alison Krauss – 'Raising Sand'
• Radiohead - 'In Rainbows'
• Rachel Unthank And The Winterset – 'The Bairns'

 Now to play catch-up and try and listen to the ones I haven't heard...

I wrote a little about Muxtape last month- new site, upload twelve songs and share, internet excitement all round- and with the site still online (and thankfully seemingly devoid of any legal rambling), I've decided to update the songs to keep the page fresh.

 

There's no artist or band continuations, but again, the current line-up is once again a list of 'songs I like at the moment', rather than being focussed on something specific like genre or a letter of the alphabet, though those mixtapes may be coming eventually. That said, there's one or two more elusive acts listed this month that last- if you listen to the playlist and discover someone new anyway then that's great, I guess the site really works.

Here's the May listing: [Stream Here]

1. Jane's Addiction - True Nature
2. Hell is for Heroes - Kamichi
3. Nshwa - By Your Side
4. The Longcut - Holy Funk
5. Radio 4- Enemies Like This
6. Röyksopp - Sparks
7. Sufjan Stevens - All the Trees of the Field Will clap Their Hands
8. Computerman - Spies on You
9. Portishead - The Rip
10. ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead - So Divided

Muxtape Post and April listing

 

Muxtape is the new thing. Like Flickr, Digg, Facebook and Twitter before it, it's the new site that everybody seems to be buzzing about. It's loosely similar to Last.fm in that at it's centre is a fan population of music love, but muxtape makes things altogether more simple and minimalistic. From you're music folder on your hard drive you're allowed to upload 12 songs (under 10mb each), put them together, and link them to everyone else for them to stream- a digital revolution of the physical mixtape.

 

The idea's fun, and it's execution is even better- you can leave your questions behind, because you won't be needing to ask any. Small niggles arise in the fact that the site currently only accepts the mp3 file format-if you've got your entire music library on something like Windows Media or ITunes, obviously you're going to run into some problems until -if- the site allows their respective file types. But that aside, it's still relatively easy to get those songs into mp3s for uploading.

There's no better way to try it out than actually create one of your own. I made a playlist earlier today with ten songs all of the rather loose theme of 'songs I like at the moment', but for compilations of a certain genre the site feels it was made for that kind of thing, and presumably i'll be following with those following compilations in the coming weeks/months/years. For now though, here's what i've got:

1. Rilo Kiley- Spectacular Views
2. Band of Horses- Is There A Ghost
3. Bat For Lashes- Bat's Mouth
4. Union of Knives- I Decline
5. LCD Soundsystem- All My Friends
6. Damien Rice- Delicate
7. Yeah Yeah Yeahs- Mysteries
8. Arcade Fire- Une Année Sans Lumiére
9. The Chemical Brothers/Flaming Lips- The Golden Path
10. The Secret Machines- It's A Bad Wind That Don't Blow Someone Some Good 

You can stream 'The RichardAM Muxtape' here, and i'll be changing it in a few weeks time- so go give it a listen!

 

Returning from her shopping jaunt this past weekend, my sister brought me home two CDs- the second full-length offerings of Rilo Kiley and Band of Horses, The Execution of all Things and Cease to Begin respectively. Great, two bands that I absolutely love and records i've been meaning to buy for ages now, except, a week later, i've yet to listen to them.

It's not that i'm excited or don't have time either (trust me, of the latter, I have loads) it's just that recently i've had the problematic issue of not wanting to listen to music, at least in the conventional sense. For weeks, my CD player has gone unused and treated without any love. But I love music, and it's one of those things i'm incredibly passionate about. The problem nowadays is that while I may buy so much as five CDs at once, most will only be spun the once, during which it'll be getting imported onto my computer. From there it'll be listened to infinitely, while it's physical counterpart will merely sit on the shelf with all those other CDs I no longer spin, slowly gathering dust.

But it's a problem. I'm too much of a worried consumer to buy purely the digital versions of the album, and i'd still rather buy the CD in the first instance if only out of habit, whatever, i'm old-fashioned like that, i'm a purist. While it's great that digital media is finally getting publicly and socially accepted, the problem for me at least is that i'm under the belief that if I go that way I own nothing- i'm feeble in that, if it doesn't exist physically, it doesn't exist at all. Given the choice, i'd probably buy all the Xbox Live Arcade titles in box form if Microsoft would allow me, but I know that out of looking at a shelf full of CDs and a 'My Music Folder' which one I find more reassuring and pleased to own. Another factoring issue is probably i'm usually nearer to the computer than a CD player, and even going somewhere else now it's gotten to the stage where it's probably easier bringing a USB stick with you than an actual CD. After all, everyone has a computer now, right? If not why the continual option of cheaper downloadable music?

The fact that downloads are now considered as music sales within the official charts is at it's simplest level indication that this phase is only just beginning, with movies, TV shows and games presumably due for the same success in the coming years. It may be better for the environment and cheaper for all involved, but do we really have to move on so quickly?

Some of us aren't ready.

 

Released between the studio albums of the self-titled debut in 2005 and Sound of Silver in 2007 -easily one of my favourite records of the last year-45:33 is at it's simplest level forty-five minutes of continual sound from everyone's favourite indie-dance outfit, LCD Soundsystem.

Advertised and released originally in the Fall of 2006 as a soundtrack to accompanying jogging and all that nonsense, the EP was commissioned by Nike to "to reward and push at good intervals of a run". Umm, whatever. Originally the soundtrack was only available to download from iTunes, but last November was given a re-release on CD through Death From Above. While theoretically one complete piece of music, here it's separated into a tracklisting, that still works, if not more so. While producer James Murphy would later admit that the jogging aspect was a lie and he merely wanted to create such a lengthy piece of music, it's not that difficult to imagine it being used in regards to it's original purpose.

45:33 begins with a slow-building introduction, slowly building up pace before simultaneously transitioning into the next track or section, a smooth soulful piano groove, sprinkled with the lyrical pacing you've come to expect -and heard in the future release-from the band. What follows is the pure instrumental of an old friend, Someone Great. If you're listening to this after Sound of Silver it's somewhat alarming, but hearing the sample here devoid of the vocals you've become so accustomed to gives it new light, and after some repeated listening, I think I prefer it to the final version of the song. But movement is constant, and while lasting longer than it's finished-with-vocals counterpart, 45:33 continues, into something so psychedelically driven, and fused with 80s brass. From there it's robotic voicework and a relentless ongoing beat that drives forward, the penultimate push before that big soft eight-minute comedown.

While the formula is undoubtedly unconventional and the premise baffling, 45:33 provides far more than an exercise soundtrack. First and foremost it is music, and as a means of experimentation between two very defined albums, a play on expectations and past assumptions. It is fresh, exciting, and perhaps, somewhat appropriately, energetic throughout.

The nominees for the upcoming 2008 Brit Awards have been revealed tonight.

As ever it's the usual line-up of tat and UK trash, in an awards ceremony that becomes ever more irrelevant with every passing year. That said, despite the usual annual musical fads and scenes there are some nominations that are exactly spot-on.

The first of which and mostly deserved is the inclusion of Bat for Lashes in British Breakthrough and Female Solo, and although they continue to creep more into the public eye with every month, the two nominations for Klaxons seem somewhat appropriate too. Casting away my stereotypical genre fan persona for a minute or two, i'm glad Take That and Girls Aloud got nominations each as well, two of the few remaining pop bands that actually exist nowadays. 'Course, it's still full of rubbish, but given the awards' placing in society that pretty much a given- with the past year being full of musical irritation from both Kate Nash and Mika it would've been more surprising if they hadn't been included.

Brit Awards 2008 nominees
*who I would like to win *who I predict will win

British Male Solo Artist
Jamie T
Mark Ronson
Mika
Newton Faulkner
Richard Hawley

British Female Solo Artist
Bat For Lashes
Kate Nash
KT Tunstall
Leona Lewis
PJ Harvey

British Group
Arctic Monkeys
Editors
Girls Aloud
Kaiser Chiefs
Take That

British Album
Arctic Monkeys - Favourite Worst Nightmare
Leona Lewis - Spirit
Mark Ronson - Version
Mika - Life In Cartoon Motion
Take That - Beautiful World

British Breakthrough Act
Bat For Lashes
Kate Nash
Klaxons
Leona Lewis
Mika

British Live Act
Arctic Monkeys
Kaiser Chiefs
Klaxons
Muse
Take That

British Single
Leona Lewis - 'Bleeding Love'
Mika - 'Grace Kelly'
Take That - 'Shine'
Kaiser Chiefs - 'Ruby'
Sugababes - 'About You Now'
Mark Ronson ft. Amy Winehouse - 'Valerie'
Kate Nash - 'Foundations'
The Hoosiers - 'Worried About Ray'
James Blunt - '1973'
Mutya Buena - 'Real Girl'

International Male Solo Artist
Bruce Springsteen
Kanye West
Michael Bublé
Rufus Wainwright
Timbaland

International Female Solo Artist
Alicia Keys
Bjork
Feist
Kylie Minogue
Rihanna

International Group
Arcade Fire
Eagles
Foo Fighters
Kings of Leon
White Stripes

International Album
Arcade Fire - Neon Bible
Eagles - Long Road out of Eden
Foo Fighters - Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace
Kings of Leon - Because of the Times
Kylie Minogue - X

The winners are announced on the 20th of February.

It's December, and that can only mean two things. One, is the constant reminder that Santa Claus Is Coming to Town, and two, is that if you're a blogger, it's a time for multiple wrap-up posts of the previous twelve months of events, posts and subject matter.

So here we are, with my three favourite albums of the year to start us off. Certainly it's more conventional to knock out ten or even five, but my indecisive nature kinda limits me somewhat, and besides, anything more than a top three is filler anyway, right?


LCD Soundsystem- Sound of Silver
Building on the success and core sound of the self-titled debut release, Sound of Silver is a follow-up with substance. Instrumentals of the previous album are given the backseat to make space for altogether more anthemic tracks, with sophomore single All My Friends being an obvious example. Someone Great follows a similar foundation, but that's not to say that the instrumental doesn't make an appearance or two throughout the album. Opening track Get Innocuous!- a cool seven minutes of synth pop (and possible the song of the year as far as i'm concerned)-helps provide what would otherwise seem like a long forgotten element of the band's sound, while the title-track also helps reinforce this. Punk is also given less record time for something altogether more chillout, but despite this, the band continue to merge indie and dance sub-genres to obvious success like no others can. Certainly this emphasis on new sounds to begin may seem a little alienating to those who fell in love with that previous recording, but the band's willingness to adapt, re-create and mature is an attitude only to be applauded and not faulted.

Bat for Lashes- Fur and Gold
Okay, so i'm obviously cheating by including this, but it's undeniable that probably the majority of the sales of this record occured in this year rather than last, when it was originally released in September. Nominated for the Mercury Music Prize 2007 and subsequently the favourite to win, 2007 has easily been the band's rise to exposure in the public eye- an end result somewhat long overdue as this album shows. With vocals from Brit-born Pakistani Natasha Khan, Fur and Gold is an emotional journey of the exotic, stepping aside from a conventional sound into something altogether more romantic and exciting. Straight up, the album was seemingly robbed of the prize, each full listen of it always enchanting and unique, and most importantly, somewhat unconventional throughout. This alone is shown through the pacing of the album and the differences between tracks, in a playlist that is always changing, but always remaining pleasantly surprising. From the frantic and upbeat Prescilla to the softly calming Sad Eyes, the album is a full forty minutes of adventure through sound and song.

Radiohead- In Rainbows
Due for release on traditional CD format at the end of the month, In Rainbows is almost more famous for it's download-only exclusivity and pricing than the the music itself. After all, Radiohead are one of the biggest bands in the world, and allowing fans to download the album for whatever price they want is pure scandal, at least in an industry far too-used to CD releases. But Radiohead are innovators, and stunts like this only reinforce that. The seventh album from a band who's past albums regularly slide into "best album ever" lists, In Rainbows has a lot to live up to, and thankfully, it does. Firstly for me it corrects many of the problems found within it's predecessor, the 2003 release Hail to the Thief. Obviously there's not much change in the band's sound, and still everything sounds very much Radiohead-esque, but the arrangement and pacing of the songs present on this recording make it the success it is, as well as, as ever, the band's continuing urge and emphasis to go further. Simplifying, the sound of this record is typically old, but expectedly fresh.

15 Step captures this ideology perfectly, following on from the beat-happy electronics of 'Thief while still acting as a promise of the remaining tracklisting, moving on, almost perfectly to Bodysnatchers, an evolved combustion of past glories, and certainly, an early highlight on the album. Nude slows things down again before making way for the subsequent Weird Fishes/Arpeggii, an upbeat soft pacing of synth and melody, so perfectly soft and dynamic it's just perfect, with accompanying strings and soft vocals (while mixed with awesome percussion) making for the most luscious musical combination ever imagined. Tracks #5 & 6 bring the intermission-and the piano, and the acoustic- before setting up for the remaining songs on the tracklisting. The soulful, open-ended Reckoner, the comfortable and bouncy House of Cards, and the progressive, moving forward Jigsaw Falling Into Place- the lead single, and, interestingly, the penultimate lead-up track to the big album finale. Videotape. The closing track, and the perfect finale for a great record. Starting slowly it builds up as the minutes pass, going from a mere piano/vox combination, before bringing the drum and the beat, before leaving the same way it entered, simple and easy.

The simple definition of In Rainbows is that yes, it does live up to the hype, and yes, it is another fantastic album from a band already renowned for creating them. It is exciting, sombre, aspirational and cohesively enjoyable. It is, without a shadow of a doubt, the album of 2007.

Bloc Party return on the 19th of next month with a Special Edition re-release of their album from earlier this year, A Weekend In The City, in a package surely only relevant to the hardcore and the fools who missed out first time. As the follow up to the fantastic 2005 debut Silent Alarm, the album differentiates slightly from the band's original sound but still retains some of the elements most associated with the band, including lyrics and more importantly, structure. But as with all re-releases the album also contains a DVD with video and gig footage, and interestingly, the band's newest single recorded especially for it.

As with the lead-single for Weekend last time, new single Flux is an interesting contrast to past Bloc Party singles and indeed tracks, with much more emphasis on 90s euphoric dance than the somewhat expected indie. That's not to say there's no guitars, but this time past traits and characteristics of the band's style are fully manifested into something altogether. As an exposition of overall existing ideas all the same, there's no denying the feeling that Flux feels new- both as a song by the band and indeed, contemporary mainstream music in general. Admittedly it takes a while to get used to, but with a 90s European beat and signature Bloc Party guitar, it's not long before the chorus sinks into appreciation.

The video, directed by Ace Norton, is also something of a departure. With obvious Japanese tendencies and visual drama it could be perhaps best compared to Intergalactic by the Beastie Boys- easily one of the finest music promos of the last decade. It does seem a little out of place compared to the visuals certainly, but as a lead-in single to an upcoming re-release, interest is sure to be piqued.