Thanks Bytor, Steve Gunn is rad. I think this is my favourite thing he has done, beautifully trippy desert jam.

https://soundcloud.com/miemusic/sets...ask-at-huggie/

http://pitchfork.com/news/54441-swan...um-to-be-kind/

oh my, this is dope.

Good track but shit artwork again, worse than The Seer.

that new swans track is grossly underwhelming, not liking this direction at all. same problem I had with some of these tracks when I saw them earlier this year, the more rhythmically-based pieces don't work nearly as well when placed alongside their monolithic ones, and even on their own aren't anything special.

Whoah, whoah.... Are you serious?

Before the Seer even came out; before I'd heard a single note of the album, I saw that artwork and pretty much knew that it was going to blow everything else away that year. I love it.

This new one, though... Much more creepy and unsettling. Norman Rockwell on mescaline.

With them recording the album out in El Paso, I figured images of something deserty......or possibly a continuation / transformation from, The Seer. Perhaps something Chupacabra. However, this artwork is just odd.

I don't know man, it's not something i'm going to pull out and show my friends or want on a t-shirt, it was just fairly nondescript.

I've been jamming on Atlas by Real Estate quite a bit lately.
I know it probably won't even make my top ten by year's end, but it's a likable little album that satisfies enough musical cravings to stay in my CD player.

So far, Pinata by Freddie Gibbs and Madlib is the year's clear front runner. Definitely the year's first classic album, that's for sure

Ok so, I have mixed feelings about Real Estate. They're bland and sad as hell, but I think they're capable of being better. They have the appreciation of indie music, musical ability, and sense of melody to be one of generation's first new "classic" indie acts, carrying on the tradition of Built to Spill and SDRE, but they seem to have been castrated somewhere along the way.

I listened to the album long enough to give it a fair (though mostly bad) review on my fledgling blog. I have not cared to revisit it. Though there were some moments that reminded me of Neil Young, which is ok. And REM without the unique sound and ingenious combination of melancholy and quirk.

Piñata is still growing on me. I definitely like it, but as I said in the Café, I'd prefer more Lib and less Gibb. The production is not dominant. For me, that's a little weird. And God bless Freddie Gibbs, but I've always considered Madlib to be on an entirely different tip than street rap/gangsta shit. So, I'm letting it sink in.

So far my favorite hip hop album is still Schoolboy Q's Oxymoron. Best believe.

Motion Sickness of Time Travel - Ballade For A Snow Moon

Even though this lady is so prolific, I struggle to keep up at times, this release
has been on constant rotation for the last few weeks.

Beautiful ambient music

http://motionsicknessoftimetravel.ba...or-a-snow-moon

I am extremely saddened by the current state of rock-based independent music.

The new album by The War on Drugs is like taking a thousand mg's of Ambian. I've been more inspired by sorting my dirty clothes.

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Severian again.

HTRK's new album is fantastic.

indeed it is, at points it's too close to like sade or some cafe background music tape but their attention to detail on this one is pretty incredible. doesn't have really any of the physicality (by way of bass) which used to make them so special but as their pop record it's awesome. such a sick group.

Yeah I like it too, to me it sounds like trip hop combined with classic warp so the cafe analogy totally fits. But good record!

it's carla, she doesn't do bullshit... it's good.

and THE MOTHERFUCKING BODY. Holy shit so great

I really love that new release by Oneohtrix Point Never, called "Commissions" - recorded for the Record Store Day.

It's nothing grounbreaking, though it kind of nicely fits my recent moods, so I'm tight with it.

Patten's Estoile Naiant is an EXPLOSIVE record. It's not ultra heavy, the beats don't resonate like shotgun blasts, but something about it makes it sound violent as hell when it's not melding Flying Saucer Attack-style dreampop drones with the schizophrenic found sound attacks of FlyLo and madlib.

Musically it references Depeche Mode, Ministry, Portishead, MBV, Massive Attack, and Botany, but it comes out sounding like it's own thing. Grit sprinkled over glimmer. I fucking love it.

I actually wrote a review of the album completely on the fly during my first listen, but I wrote so much that I had to switch over to iPhone voice memo during my drive to and from an appointment. It's a completely impromptu review, and I think I'm going to submit it somewhere, because it's probably the best I've ever written/spoken. I don't intend to change a word, except for correcting the few transcription errors that will just sound like nonsense sentences if I don't.

Anyway, this is definitely one of my two favorite electronic albums of the year, with the other being BLACK LIGHT SPIRAL by UNTOLD.