Caught in the Net: Twin Shadow rings the changes
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Your support makes all the difference.Last week George Lewis Jr, the man behind the new-wave inclined, electro-pop act Twin Shadow, dropped out a new track called "Changes".
The one-off single – following last year's fine Forget LP – is a stomping electro number with some yearning vocals. It's also an update of a track called "Circus is Gone" by a band he found "while looking for rare music on YouTube" called Bagarre – "some weird Italo disco stuff with an Asian/English singer," Lewis Jr explains on his site twinshadow.net, where the track is a free MP3. He adds, "I thought I would take two days with Twin Shadow keyboardist Wynne Bennett, to lock ourselves up in a studio, eat lots of good Mexican food and experiment with updating this great song. This is what we came up with... They call it 'Circus Is Gone', I call it 'Changes'." Either way it's pretty good.
Shabazz Palaces are demystified
The San Francisco-based site Yourstru.ly has been a darling of the online indie music scene in recent years; it's one of several sites making beautifully shot music videos. A recent clip highlights their efforts nicely, featuring the mysterious Shabazz Palaces, the Seattle- based, experimental rap group, who are somewhat demystified as they perform their menacing electro-rap track "The King's New Clothes Were Made by His Own Hands". Watch it at ind.pn/nLxm2w.
Not a waste of time
At the start of the week a tweet emanated from the official account of the Jesus and Mary Chain (@TheMaryChain), offering a new track by front man Jim Reid. Called "Black and Blues", the track was posted on Reid's Soundcloud page at ind.pn/ntP6Rm, with the introduction, "What I've been wasting my time with lately." This appears to be Reid's first solo effort since 2006 and finds him sticking to familiar terrain, albeit with the guitar reverb turned down somewhat – and it's good to hear Reid's distinctive drawled vocals. Not exactly a great new leap, but rather nice and certainly no waste of time.
Spin city
To mark the dance music themed October issue of Spin, the US magazine has launched a dance remix app for iPhones. It comes with access to tracks by various artists featured in the issue including Digitalism, Tiesto & Hardwell and Pallers. The app breaks the stems of the tracks into various elements – blips, bass, drums and so on – and visualises them with circles that can be dragged around the screen to chop up and rearrange the track while you can also move and manipulate the audio channels. It's free through the App Store at ind.pn/q4kKkT. Spin is inviting people to share their efforts on Facebook and Twitter – there's even a competition for the best one, although it's only open to US residents.
l.ryan@independent.co.uk
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