Did I ever mention that I love Cactus-Mouth? It’s one of the first blogs I ever started following and one of very few I still regularly read (when time and mood swings allow). Ian, besides being one of the nicest people I know, has that rare gift to make you like a song before you even start listening. A few days ago, I don’t remember exactly when, he wrote about Brandon Biondo’s new project Shy Boys. It seemed ages ago since I listened to Walsh or COOLRUNNINGS, Brandon’s other projects, and I remembered they were never really my thing, but I was curious nonetheless. Maybe it was the cover art; maybe i felt a strange connection because i’m a shy boy myself (not really a boy maybe, but hey, who still cares about the gender binary in 2013??). 

Anyways, I woke up the next day and there was a song playing in my head and after my cloudy daydreams had drifted away I realized that it was “Ride”. There’s something reassuring about it, like someone putting an arm around your shoulder and whispering “you’ll be okay”. By now, it has already become one of my favorite songs of this Spring and I can’t wait to hear more.

You can get Ride / Julia on bandcamp, as well as a new track called “Something” that they released yesterday. Do it.

Shy Boys on bandcamp . soundcloud . facebook

Frank Midnite, about whose project BRIGHT FUTURE I have written a couple of times before, is about to release two cassette tapes: FROM EARTH WITH BLOOD, due this Friday, and VIGILANTE THEMES, which will be out this Spring. I wanted to write about both of them, but realized it would be a lot better to let Frank himself say a couple of words. He said he wrote this down really quickly, but I think it’s perfect:

“Vigilante Themes is a cinematic album of droney laboratory concoctions. A combo of super hero and super villain.. creating the vigilante.. or the dark hero. There’s a lot of repetition and drawn out duration in the pieces.. concentrating on tone, mood, and natural progressions. It’s a nod to 70s spy films, blaxploitation films, sci-fi, horror, car chase films, and comic books. The album is experimental so there’s a lot of beat surgery and working with field recordings and experimenting with different techniques… A life soundtrack best for driving, the train, walking through the city or just grooving at home.”

“From Earth With Blood is the first official album and the butterfly to Blue//Black’s cocoon. [It’s] definitely connected to Vigilante Themes, but in a more defeated yet romantic and optimistic sense. These recordings are like answering machine messages.. and bedroom anthems… Everything’s raw, imperfect… and doesn’t really care about the “game” of art.. It’s an album that embraces being Human, being from the Earth, and the emotional suffering and pain that some of us deal with daily… our bleedings.”

Both tapes can be pre-ordered on the Nite Thief bandcamp page.

BRIGHT FUTURE on soundcloud . twitter . facebook . bandcamp

While going through some tracks in my soundcloud stream, I came across “Yeah” by MARCiN SKY, a name that didn’t ring a bell until I found out it was the same person as Cryst▲llized. You might remember his breathtaking track “Yatta”, that caught the attention of one of my favorite blogs one year ago. The tracks I have missed since then are everything as great as the ones before. Go check them out!

MARCiN SKY on soundcloud . facebook