by Andrew Sacher

Though the attention being paid to futuristic R&B has been more prevalent than ever in the past two years, it's also been interesting to look back on the ways the sound did exist in years prior. And even more exciting to see some of those artists making comebacks. Miguel's Kaleidoscope Dream was one of last year's better albums, but I'd be lying if I said it didn't tempt me to dust off my copy of FutureSex/LoveSounds. And only a few months after doing that? Boom: The 20/20 Experience. Another thing I went back to last year was Cassie's only album -- her 2006 self titled debut -- specifically it's opening track/huge hit, "Me & U." The thick bass and airy vocals of that track are way more similar to the post-Weeknd world of R&B than I remembered, and it more than holds up.

Cassie had been dropping some singles here and there since her '06 album, but almost seven years later, there was still no sign of another full length release. However, like JT did in March, Cassie ended her lengthy absence last week with the release of her free mixtape, RockaByeBaby. It might be "just a mixtape" (whatever that really means at this point anyway), but RockaByeBaby serves as a worthy followup to Cassie, and as a whole release, it might even be better. The album is stacked with guest appearances (Jeremih, Pusha T, Fabolous, Meek Mill, Too $hort, and others) and the producers are no slackers here either (Mike Will Made It, Young Chop, and more), but it's not over-saturated with guests. Even the verses from some of the weaker rappers (Wiz Khalifa) work pretty well here. And some of the samples used are noticeably big songs (Kendrick Lamar's "m.A.A.d City," Tyga's "Do My Dance"), which can be a turnoff, but she uses them well.

Overall, the thing really feels like an album. Too often with mixtapes I find myself filtering through 20-something songs for the 10 good ones, but RockaByeBaby has no fat to trim. Its 13 tracks (12, not including the intro) clock in at 37 minutes, and they're all strong. The collaboration with Jeremih, "Sound of Love," is an early standout, with both singers bouncing off of each other really nicely. A little surprisingly, Fabolous' guest verse on "I Love It" is actually one of the most memorable moments of the album. And the chorus of "Paradise" (with its "pair of dice" pun) is one you'll find yourself humming after the album ends.

Download RockaByeBaby for free over at DatPiff and stream it in its entirety below...

Continue reading "listen to Cassie's comeback mixtape, 'RockaByeBaby'"

by Andrew Sacher

As mentioned, producer Shlohmo and singer Jeremih teamed up for one of Yours Truly's "Songs From Scratch" Sessions to record the song "Bo Peep (Do U Right)." The song is out now, and hearing Jeremih croon over Shlohmo's masterful production is up there with the best material on Jeremih's Late NIghts Mixtape. And with this track plus the one Shlohmo did with How to Dress Well on the Laid Out EP, Shlohmo's been looking like one of the best R&B producers lately.

Listen to the song below...

Continue reading "stream new Shlohmo / Jeremih collaboration"

Empress Of @ Glasslands, December 2012 (more by Robert Altman)

Paws

* Thiefs @ Joe's Pub
* Harold Night @ UCB
* Leni Stern @ Barbes
* The Chives @ The Stone
* Ashley Paul @ The Stone
* Tanya Tagaq @ Joe's Pub
* Slavic Soul Party @ Barbes
* Marsha Ambrosius @ S.O.B.'s
* Empress Of, Brazo @ Pianos
* The Enso String Quartet @ Barbes
* Boxed Wine, The Kickback @ Maxwell's
* PAWS, Dinowalrus, Ovlov @ Glasslands
* Corn Mo, Bonaparte, Judy Kang @ Pianos
* Marcia Ball, Cindy Cashdollar @ City Winery
* Preservation Hall Jazz Band @ McKittrick Hotel
* The Allman Brothers Band @ Beacon Theatre
* Spires, Zula, Many Mansions @ Death By Audio
* Delta Rae, ZZ Ward, Martin Harley @ Irving Plaza
* Rony's Insomnia, Amy Regan @ The Living Room
* Screen Eyed Baby Ice, Miles Pflanz @ Muchmore's
* Workout, Slam Donahue, Nicos Gun @ Brooklyn Bowl
* The Postelles, Arkells, Ambassadors @ Santos Party House
* Lenorable, Silent Drape Runners, Pleasure Curses @ Cake Shop
* Mail The Horse, Wolf, Goat, The Chickenhawks @ Grand Victory
* Motive, Spirit Animal, Starlight Girls, Indigo Wild @ Mercury Lounge
* pow wow!, Yoni Gordon, Rare Monk, Mount Sharp @ Cameo Gallery
* Peter Mulvey, Jeffrey Foucault, Marc Carroll @ Rockwood Music Hall
* The Academics, Slow Dance Chubby, Anna Rose, Sonic Cult @ Arlene's Grocery
* Coolzey, Raashan Ahmad, Schaffer the Darklord, Philly Moves @ Knitting Factory
* Delicate Steve, Total Slacker, Celestial Shore, Jason Bartell (of Fang Island) @ 285 Kent
* Daniel in The Dark, Daniel Mustard, Kevin Rath, Brad Cole, Nathyn Knott @ Bowery Electric
* Dave Hill, llana Glazer and Abbi Jacobson, Michael Gottwald (producer of Beasts of the Southern Wild), Hilly Eye @ UCBEast

BrooklynVegan and Gorilla Vs. Bear are presenting an early show with Empress of tonight at Pianos. Tickets ($5) are still available.

You might want to stick around Pianos and catch theatrical Berlin singer Bonaparte who'll be performing with Corn Mo as well as his "divas."

Scottish indie rockers PAWS make their U.S. debut at Glasslands tonight and tickets are still available. You can also still enter to win a copy of their tour cassette (only 50 made). You can stream their debut album, Cokefloat!, below.

SXSW is a week away. Follow @BVSXSW on Twitter.

Follow @BrooklynVegan on Twitter.
Follow @bvChicago for just Chicago stuff.
Also follow @bvAustin for just Austin stuff.

Be our friend on Facebook too, and BV Austin's friend on Facebook and BV Chicago's friend on Facebook.

Follow BrooklynVegan on instagram.

Grails side project Lilacs & Champagne will return with their second album, Danish & Blue, in April. You can check out the video for first single, "Sweet/Sour," below.

New Zealand's The Phoenix Foundation will release their new album, Fandango, on May 14. You can watch the video to "The Captain" below.

R&B singer Jeremih teamed up with producer Shlohmo (who previously remixed Jeremih's "Fuck U All The Time") for their first official collaboration-- a new song written from scratch for Yours Truly's "Songs From Scratch" sessions. You can watch a video which splices interviews with the two artists and some clips of them in the studio below. The song, titled "Bo Peep," will be made available on March 19.

Shlohmo is on tour now, and will be in NYC on Thursday (3/7) for a show with Rustie and others. His new EP, Laid Out, is also out this week and that can be streamed in its entirety below.

What else?

Continue reading "What's going on Tuesday?"

Cadence Weapon @ MHOW, June 2012 (more by Dominick Mastrangelo)

Some of you may recall that before he became known as Cadence Weapon, Rollie Pemberton spent time as a music critic, having penned a number of reviews for Pitchfork in the early '00s. So chances are he knows his way around making year end lists, and we've got his best of 2012 list right here in this post. While it includes year-end regulars Kendrick Lamar and Jermih (and fellow Canadians Mac DeMarco and TOPS), his top spot is a bit of a surprise.

Rollie's pick for #1 release of 2012 is Captured Tracks' reissues of '80s low-fi indie cult band Cleaners from Venus whose cassette-only Blow Away Your Troubles (1981), On Any Normal Monday (1982), and Midnight Cleaners (1982) saw the light of day via Captured Tracks. The vinyl sold out but you can still get them on CD and digital, and stream them via Spotify.Captured Tracks will reissue Cleaners from Venus' next three albums (1983's The Golden Autumn, 1984's Under Wartime Conditions, and 1985's Songs for a Fallow Land) plus a disc's worth of rarites in February 2013.

Meanwhile, if you haven't heard Cadence Weapon's 2012 Polaris Prize-nominated album, Hope in Dirt City, you can stream that below too. Rollie's Best of 2012 LP list is below...

Continue reading "Cadence Weapon lists his favorite LPs of 2012 which includes Captured Tracks' Cleaners from Venues reissues"

Nite Jewel at LPR in August (more by Toby Tenenbaum)

Nite Jewel (aka Ramona Gonazalez) is a bit of a musical shapeshifter, having previously recorded lo-fi experimental pieces, performed with Linda Perhacs (along with Julia Holter), and performed a Kraftwerk album in its entirety, among other things. Just recently, she recorded a piano cover of Stevie Wonder's "Visions," which you can watch a video of below.

But on this year's One Second of Love, Ramona went for more of an overtly pop approach than her earlier work, and that interest comes across pretty strongly in her top ten songs of 2012 list, which you can check out below. Half of the list is made up of this year's big rap/R&B faves, and it also includes collaborator Julia Holter, Zebra Katz (whose video we just posted), and more.

Check out her full list and the "Visions" video below...

Continue reading "Nite Jewel covered Stevie Wonder, picked her top 10 songs of 2012"

Pitchfork just posted their Honorable Mention Albums of 2012, which they consider "20 records didn't make [their] Top 50 but they're not necessarily just Nos. 51-70." There are some similarities to their Overlooked Records of 2012 list that they posted halfway through the year. It also includes Frankie Rose's Interstellar, which did actually get Best New Music upon its release, unlike the other albums here. And it's got Waxahatchee's American Weekend and Jeremih's Late Nights with Jeremih, neither of which were reviewed throughout the year. Though they did review Waxhatachee (Katie Crutchfield)'s sister Allison's band Swearin', who also makes this list, and who (along with Jeremih) made Pitchfork's Top 100 Tracks list.

Full list below...

Continue reading "A Few Albums That Definitely Didn't Make Pitchfork's Top 50 of 2012"

by Bill Pearis

Pitchfork just posted their much anticipated list of the top 100 tracks of 2012. The #1 slot went to... Grimes! Whether you thought the whole of her album Visions was good or not, it was hard to deny the charms of "Oblivion." (Having that great video didn't hurt either.) Do you think it deserved to top the list? If not then what song should've?

You can check out P4K's entire hot 100 of 2012 below.

Continue reading "Pitchfork's Top 100 Tracks of 2012 (Grimes' "Oblivion" is #1)"

by Bill Pearis

TPOBPAH @ Summerstage 7/7/2012 (more by Chris La Putt)

While The Pains of Being Pure at Heart didn't release an album this year, they have stayed busy touring on the heels of last year's terrific Belong. (They did put out a covers 7" in the UK though which is worth seeking out.) The band play a free hometown show this Friday (12/14) at Brooklyn Night Bazaar with Black Marble, Habibi and Heavens Gate. Doors are at 6 PM with bands starting at 8 PM, and it's all ages. Lines to get in Brooklyn Night Bazaar have been long, but move pretty quickly.

In other TPOBPAH news, singer/guitarist Kip Berman is one of the conspirators behind "Rough Smooch" a new indiepop party that has its debut this Sunday (12/16) at Williamsburg bar Legion. Wear your cutest anorak to this night that features performances by The Hairs, Kissing is a Crime and Grand Resort, plus Kip and WNYU's Maria Sherman on DJ duty. The party is free and starts at 9PM.

And lastly, the Pains were kind enough to send us a year-end music list. The whole band are music obsessives and couldn't whittle the list down to ten, so they sent a list of "some music we thought was cool in 2012." Kip adds, "I'm certain the other PAINS would put Kurt's Ice Choir record Afar on our list, but I think it would make him feel weird and, perhaps, seem nepotistic. But his record is really good, and however you feel about Pains, you should give it a listen." Ice Choir, by the way, play Cameo on December 22 with Cool Angels and Limited (info).

Check out the list below...

Continue reading "The Pains of Being Pure at Heart list 2012 faves (NYC show is this week); Kip Berman throwing "Rough Smooch" party"

by Andrew Sacher

FACT is still one of the best sources for cutting edge electronic music, and I always look forward to their top 50 albums of the year list, which they've just published for 2012. As usual, it doesn't only contain electronic albums.

This year's list has a good deal of indie rap (Haleek Maul, Schoolboy Q, Le1f, Main Attrakionz, Spaceghostpurrp) and it's the only non-metal list I've seen so far with Black Breath's Sentenced to Life (!). And of course, to compliment the dancefloor records, it's got its fair share of electronic-tinged indie pop, forward thinking R&B, and outsider experimental music.

Check out the full list below.

Continue reading "FACT's Top 50 Albums of 2012"

by Andrew Sacher

DOWNLOAD: Jeremih - "Fuck U All The Time" (ft. Natasha Mosley, prod. FKI) (MP3)
DOWNLOAD: Jeremih - "Rated R (The Masterpiece)" (prod. The Futuristics) (MP3)

You probably know Jeremih from his insufferable 2009 R&B hit "Birthday Sex" (hear me out), but if you've been sleeping on his free mixtape, Late Nights with Jeremih (download it HERE), which he dropped this past August, you should probably wake up. Eschewing the radio R&B of that early hit, Jeremih opts for a sound more along the lines of Frank Ocean, The Weeknd, and Miguel that we've really been loving these past couple years. The mixtape is 18 tracks long and it's not without some throways and filler tracks, but the standouts really stand out and if Jeremih keeps up this direction, more great things are to come. The James Blake-leaning minimal R&B of "Fuck U All The Time" is not only the best song on the mixtape, but one of the best R&B songs I've heard all year. It was recently remixed by Shlohmo, but it already had a beat that you could have imagined Shlohmo coming up with. (It was produced by FKI, who worked with Diplo, Flosstradamus, and others on Iggy Azalea's TrapGold mixtape, and who are shaping up to be a solid project team.) Other highlights include knockout track, "Rated R," "Late Nights," and "773 Love," just to name a few of the stronger places to start.

If you're still skeptical because of Jeremih's past, that's totally understandable, but also don't forget that it is possible to make the move from corny mainstream to really interesting music (think Justin Timberlake). And given the time, it actually makes sense. I don't exactly fault him for making such a carbon-copy style radio friendly single in 2009. Miguel, whose new album is one of my favorites of the year, was doing similar things around then, but there weren't many opportunities for (male) R&B singers at the time to do anything but jump on the radio bandwagon. When guys like The Weeknd and Frank Ocean took to the internet to release free music the way they wanted it, and ultimately gained attention from music lovers and hit-seeking suits alike, the doors were opened for others to follow in their path. After two albums with Def Jam (the same label that Frank Ocean was on, who initially wouldn't release Nostalgia/Ultra) it makes sense that he used the free internet album method to reveal the sound he's actually capable of. Now that this is out there, hopefully he'll experience a similar fate to his peers that have taken similar routes and perfect his sound on a concise album.

Meanwhile, you can download a couple of the highlights from the Late Nights mixtape above and stream the whole thing and that Shlohmo remix below.

Continue reading "Jeremih ditches his past on 'Late Nights' mixtape (listen)"