Antikewl Daily » Music

Nirvana vs Rick Astley

Trevor May — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 19:19:03 +0000

Normal service will resume shortly. In the mean time, here’s a Rick Astley/Nirvana mashup by German DJ, DJ Morgoth. (via Douglas Coupland)

The Beatles Rock Band intro by Pete Candeland

Trevor May — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 18:11:58 +0000

Harmonix have just released this superb animated game intro video / trailer for the The Beatles Rock Band game due to be released in September. It’s directed by Pete Candeland who’s most well known for the numerous videos produced with Jamie Hewlett for Gorillaz. Have a look at his portfolio over at the Passion Pictures website.

A new gameplay video was also released and is available to view and download from the game’s website.

Star Wars Imperial March Performed with a Tesla Coil

Trevor May — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 21:16:07 +0000

The folks at ArcAttack use Tesla coils to “produce an electrical arc similar to a continuous lightning bolt which put out a crisply distorted square wave sound reminiscent of the early days of synthesizers.”

Here’s one, with another guy wearing a “Faraday Suit” to conduct electricity away from the coil, performing the Imperial March theme from Star Wars! Check out more videos on their site.

2008: A year in music

Trevor May — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 14:53:18 +0000

It’s that time of year again. My annual look back, through the powers of last.fm, at what I’d been listening to the previous year. Here’s the top 20 for 2008:

1. Ladytron
2. Beastie Boys
3. Hot Chip
4. Crystal Castles
5. Broken Social Scene
6. M83
7. Architecture in Helsinki
8. Midnight Juggernauts
9= She & Him
9= Wolf Parade
11= The Kills
11= Modest Mouse
13. Rilo Kiley
14. Cornelius
15. Justice
16. The Young Knives
17. MGMT
18= Soulwax
18= The Rakes
20= Blood Red Shoes
20= Man or Astro-man?

A couple of old favourites in there like Man or Astro-man? and Cornelius and no sign of last year’s number one, The Fiery Furnaces. You’ll find them right down at number 30! Had I discovered TV on the Radio’s new album a bit earlier I’m certain that you’d would also see them placed quite high on the list. I’ll bet they’ll be up there in 2009’s roundup.

It looks like DoCopenhagen has died so I guess we won’t be seeing any more top music videos. Here’s Pitchforks’ Top 40 music videos for 2008.

Finally, for the nostalgic, here’s 2007 and 2006.

MGMT’s Electric Feel performed by animatronic animals

Trevor May — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 23:50:33 +0000

The Rock-afire Explosion were an animatronic band comprised of anthropomorphic animals that played in Showbiz Pizza Place restaurants in the USA through the 1980s. After closing down many of these setups found their way to enthusiasts. Here’s one such setup, performing MGMT’s Electric Feel.

Perhaps even more obscurely, a documentary is currently being produced about car-salesman Chris Thrash, a guy who recently purchased the rights to Rock-afire Explosion with an aim to resurrect them and the Showbiz Pizza Place. (via Penny Arcade)

Lightspeed Champion perform Star Wars theme

Trevor May — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 22:49:48 +0000

Ex-Test Icicle Lightspeed Champion performed their track Galaxy of Lost Souls in full Star Wars garb at this week’s NME Awards show. Unfortunately I couldn’t find a video of it online anywhere but did instead stumble across this gem. Lightspeed Chamption performing the Imperial March and Star Wars theme. Lovely.

Update: There’s now a video of them performing at the NME Awards on YouTube. Enjoy.

RCRD LBL

Trevor May — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 18:23:15 +0000

I had read about this some time before Christmas, but hadn’t checked it out until today. RCRD LBL is an online network of record labels by Engadet/Gizmodo co-founder Peter Rojas and Josh Deutsch from Downtown Records… which sort of poses as a kind of blog thing.

A lot of the music is free to download as DRM-free 196kbps MP3s and bands are paid through the website’s sponsorship. You’re welcome to download anything you like from the site and use it in any non-commercial way you want under a Creative Commons license.

The whole thing is stuffed full of RSS feeds to allow you to follow pretty much anything you’re interested in following and Ivan Pope will love that they have whole bunch of widgets to grab, like this little fella (which, uh, sadly seems to break with the Antikewl Daily stylesheet. Oops! Hopefully they’ll fix that at some point!)…

It’s always interesting to see new distribution ideas in the twisted and scary world of the music industry and I’ll definitely be keeping my eye on this one to see how it pans out. (via Wired)

Mike Long dances every day, for you

Trevor May — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 19:20:40 +0000

“There aren’t enough Youtube video re-posts around here,” you say? Here’s another one.

Mike Long, a self-proclaimed “social rocktivist”, plans to perform once dance a day around the world and post each video up on YouTube for the next two years. I can’t think of a better idea. (via It’s Nice That)

Normal service will resume shortly.

Cornelius Count Five Six on Yo Gabba Gabba

Trevor May — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 13:25:31 +0000

With a slight danger of AKD becoming a YouTube video dumping ground, here’s a clip of Cornelius performing Count Five or Six live on hipster kids TV show Yo Gabba Gabba.

There’s a higher quality version of the video over at Jezebel.

Top ten albums of 2007

Trevor May — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 12:36:11 +0000

To conclude my end-of-2007 music post trilogy (well, 2.5-ogy) I intended to do a top ten albums of the year. I wrote a list, but it was too long. I pulled a few out… it was still too long. So I gave up on the top ten idea.

Here’s a bunch of albums I liked in 2007 in no particular order. There’s more than ten, and I probably missed some really good ones.

The Fiery Furnaces
Widow City
Thrill Jockey Records
thefieryfurnaces.com
myspace.com/thefieryfurnaces
Ex-Guru music video
Fabchannel: Live show video

Modest Mouse
We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank
Epic
modestmouse.com
myspace.com/modestmouse

Kings of Leon
Because of the Times
Hand Me Down
kingsofleon.com
myspace.com/kingsofleon

The National
Boxer
Beggars Banquet
americanmary.com
myspace.com/thenational

Battles
Mirrored
Warp
myspace.com/battlestheband

Justice
†
Ed Banger
myspace.com/etjusticepourtous

Arcade Fire
Neon Bible
Rough Trade
www.arcadefire.com
myspace.com/arcadefireofficial

The Go! Team
Proof of Youth
Memphis Industries/Sub Pop
www.thegoteam.co.uk
myspace.com/thegoteam

New Young Pony Club
Fantastic Playroom
Modular
wearepony.com
myspace.com/newyoungponyclub

!!!
Myth Takes
Warp
chkchkchk.net
myspace.com/chkchkchk

Of Montreal
Hissing Fauna, are you the Destroyer?
Polyvinyl
ofmontreal.net
myspace.com/ofmontreal

Simian Mobile Disco
Attack Decay Sustain Release
Wichita
simianmobiledisco.co.uk
myspace.com/simianmobiledisco

What have I missed?

2007: A year in music

Trevor May — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 17:34:33 +0000

In what’s now becoming an annual tradition, here’s what last.fm considers my top 20 most listened to artists of 2007. Some serious surprises in there. I’ve listened to a lot of music this year and some of these I hardly remember hearing at all.

1. The Fiery Furnaces
2. Beastie Boys
3. New Young Pony Club
4. Kings of Leon
5. !!!
6. The Go! Team
7. Cansei de Ser Sexy
8. Broken Social Scene
9. Prefuse 73
10. Hot Chip
11. Death From Above 1979
12. The Arcade Fire
13. Ratatat
14. Four Tet
15. Klaxons
16. Ikara Colt
17= Man or Astro-man?
17= Disney
19= Django Reinhardt
19= Justice
19= MSTRKRFT

Massive oddities include Disney (playing the Musical History of Disneyland just once accounts for 65 tracks!) and Django Reinhardt (his haunting version of La Mer/Beyond the Sea from Bioshock made me search out more by this Jazz great. More Bioshock soundtrack tips here, incidentally).

Some old favourites like Man or Astro-man? and Ikara Colt have re-entered as well, thanks to iPod shuffle.

Haunted Mansion/Bela Lugosi’s Dead mashup

Trevor May — Sat, 27 Oct 2007 21:38:00 +0000

Haunted Mansion/Bela Lugosi’s Dead: A superb mashup of the Ghost Host narration from Disneyland’s Haunted Mansion and Bauhaus’ Bela Lugosi’s Dead.

Apple announce the iPod touch

Trevor May — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 19:23:31 +0000

Apple have just announced, as many have predicted, the iPod Touch. Basically an iPhone without the phone. It comes in 8Gb and 16Gb flavours (which is far too small a capacity for me to even consider buying — I have enough trouble with 60Gb!) and has built-in wifi for browsing the web and spending your hard-earned cash at iTunes while you wait for your delayed train (or while at their new friend Starbucks’ place). Still, it looks cool.

Also announced:

An all-metal 160Gb iPod classic
A chubby new 8 or 16Gb iPod nano (with coverflow and video playback)
iPod nano in new colours
and a cheaper 8Gb iPhone (no 4Gb, it seems)

If you want more geekery, Engadget have a hands-on with both the iPod nano and iPod touch.

Second Life Secondfest Roundup

Trevor May — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 21:03:00 +0000

Aleks has a round-up of Secondfest, the Second Life virtual festival that happened over the weekend. Related posts:Second Life while you “work”Why Second Life will never go mainstreamI finally downloaded Second Life the other day. Oh dear. Related posts:

Ironlight River, Earthlights Through A Wind Coloured Glass

Trevor May — Wed, 23 May 2007 15:28:43 +0000

Musician and friend Andy Fosberry, the guy behind Ironlight River, has just (well, a couple of weeks ago!) released his very first EP, “Earthlights Through A Wind Coloured Glass”. Check out the tracks for yourself on his myspace page.

Then buy a copy for yourself from iTunes! Also available on eMusic and Rhapsody

Update: You can now also buy a real life physical CD version via Made to Order Records for a very reasonable £3.

Jarvis Cocker’s “Don’t Let Him Waste Your Time”

Trevor May — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 17:19:14 +0000

A fantastic video for “Don’t Let Him Waste Your Time” by Jarvis Cocker.

No related posts.

Free Classical MP3 tracks from Classic FM

Trevor May — Wed, 10 Jan 2007 19:51:40 +0000

Classic FM are currently offering a free 14 day trial of their music download service where you can download up to 35 MP3s for nothing. Related posts:RCRD LBLRead “Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom” for freeBrighton to Install Free City-wide Wifi Related posts:

2006: A year in music

Trevor May — Sat, 06 Jan 2007 19:56:29 +0000

Here’s my top 20 artists of 2006 according to play counts from last.fm. It’s not entirely representative because it doesn’t record tracks played on my iPod, or in the lounge at home, but interesting(ish) none the less!

1 Broken Social Scene
2 Wolf Parade
3 Be Your Own Pet
3 Rilo Kiley
5 Ikara Colt
6 The Fiery Furnaces
7 Beastie Boys
8 Nada Surf
9 Interpol
10 Editors
11 The Duke Spirit
12 Buzzcocks
13 Arctic Monkeys
13 The Arcade Fire
15 Man or Astro-man?
16 Mindless Self Indulgence
17 The Jam
18 We Are Scientists
19 Boards of Canada
20 Sunset Rubdown
20 Howling Bells
20 Kings of Convenience

It’s Christmas! Time for some Christmas music!

Trevor May — Sat, 23 Dec 2006 15:36:41 +0000

Here we are again at the only time of year where you can get away with playing cheesy shmaltz without friends and family questioning your taste/sanity/sexuality. What, you have no Bing Crosby lying around at home? Don’t worry, there’s a solution.

I really should have mentioned Pandora before because it’s a fantastic way of finding new music or listening to the kind of music you like when you don’t have your collection to hand. This, of course, means you have endless access to as much Bing, Nat, Louis and, uh, Regis Philbin as you can possibly handle this holiday season. Here’s the trick from lifehacker.com:

Think of someone you’d like to hear some holiday cheer from, say, Bing Crosby. Tell Pandora you want to create a new station, but instead of just writing in the artist’s name, type in “Bing Crosby (holiday)”.

If you really want to show everyone what a Christmas mood you’re in, you can log your Pandora plays to your last.fm profile with the ingeniously named pandora.fm.

Go now, and enjoy that endless Christmas crooning!

iTunes 7: It’s a bit buggy isn’t it?

Trevor May — Fri, 15 Sep 2006 09:04:55 +0000

Engadget has a little article on the glitches within the newly released iTunes 7. I have, so far, only encountered a couple:

Firstly, scratchy playback. This I managed to fix by opening up Quicktime preferences and turning off safe mode, which had inexplicably turned itself on after upgrading.

Secondly, and more annoyingly, I store some of my older music tracks on an external network drive. When I used to fire up iTunes 6 with my iPod installed and had forgotten to turn the drive on, iTunes would happily skip those tracks. They’d still be listed in iTunes and on my iPod, but they just wouldn’t update. Which was all good.

Now, with v7, if I want start iTunes with my iPod connected I have to make sure I’ve started up my network drive, opened the drive in Windows Explorer and then start iTunes… or it’ll just hang using 100% CPU. I have to then force quit the application and the helper before starting it up again.

I hope they fix that bug soon!

The Waitresses: I know what boys like

Trevor May — Mon, 28 Aug 2006 10:56:59 +0000

For some reason I’ve had this friggin’ song in my head for weeks. The Waitresses were a bit of a one-hit wonder (two, of course, if you count Christmas Wrapping) and this video, even by the 80s standards, is pretty damn awful!