Selections from Sufjan Stevens’ electronic album “Enjoy Your Rabbit” are featured in a new ballet by up-and-coming choreographer Justin Peck. “Year of the Rabbit” will premiere Oct. 5 at New York City Ballet, programmed with new works by Benjamin Millepied (“Black Swan”) and Christopher Wheeldon (The Royal Ballet, Bolshoi Ballet). Conductor and arranger Michael Atkinson has expanded the quartet adaptations of this music from Osso’s “Run Rabbit Run” for string orchestra. Selections for this non-narrative ballet for 18 dancers will include Year of the Ox, Rabbit, Tiger, Rooster, Dragon Boar, and The Lord. There will be two matinees on Oct. 6 & 7 and a final evening performance on Oct. 13. The ballet will also appear in the winter season next year (January 29 & 30 and February 1 & 2). Tickets are available from the NY City Ballet website.

Sufjan also joins Peck and Aktinson for the Guggenheim’s Works & Process series on Sept. 23 & 24 (at 7:30) in the Guggenheim Theater, where a string quartet will play excerpts from the ballet, with principal dancers performing. Participants will also discuss the odd evolution of Sufjan’s electronic hobby project- composed and recorded in an apartment closet- from the drum machine to the ballet theater. Tickets are no longer available for this event (the theater only seats 285) but the Guggenheim website has a link for live streaming.

You can read about Justin’s previous ballet “In Creases” from the New York Times review here, and learn more about this young dancer/choreographer’s work with the city ballet here has a link for live streaming.

Not sure if you noticed, but we here at Asthmatic Kitty really value songwriting. It's a craft and art all at once; it takes time, practice, and a spark of something special. And that is something Raymond Raposa - aka Raymond Byron - has in spades. It really shows in his latest project, entitled Little Death Shaker, from band Raymond Byron & the White Freighter. The record is out today.

You'll remember Ray from Castanets, who carved out a rugged slice of American folk rock from independent music in the 2000s by releasing a series of records replete with some of the best-written songs we've ever heard.

Little Death Shaker is no exception. Here though, the music sheds its avant-country for something a little more roadhouse blues. It's more what you'd be turning up in the parking light of the bar, Bud Light blues casting an eerie 3am glow on the cracked pavement. And we love it.

The record is available in a number of ways. Pick your poison here.

Drunk is the New Sober/Stupid is the New Dumb, the latest recording from New Jersey duo Dots Will Echo, releases today. The fruit of three days’ labor, the 23-track album serves up a mix of garage rock, post-punk, and power pop-infused tracks. It features a smattering of instruments, from guitar to glockenspiel to autoharp.

For a brief Dots Will Echo history and interview with singer/songwriter Nick Berry, read the recent article on Ourstage.com.

Stream the album below, read their intriguing story (warning: it involves both the divine and the absurd) then order a copy over here.  

On one hand, you have lush, verdant-voiced Julianna Barwick, whose AK-release The Magic Place garnered a slot on the BBC’s list of top 2011 albums.

On the other, there’s AK artist Roberto Carlos Lange, AKA Helado Negro, the Latin-influenced kinetic sound sculptor who’s collaborated with the likes of David Ellis and Prefuse 73.

Bring the pair together and you get OMBRE, whose anticipated debut release Believe You Me is out today. The ten track album meshes Barwick’s ambient, angelic vocals with Helado Negro’s warm-hearted, urban psyche folk. The labelmates sparked a friendship after touring together in 2010 and opted to give recording a go at Helado Negro’s studio Island Universe Space. After kicking around riffs and vocal snippets, OMBRE began laying down tracks.

The result? Believe You Me, spanning from bare-boned space melodies to indulgent, infectious soundscapes. The recording is a series of connected dots carved out of seemingly contrasting musical styles resulting in something altogether fresh and new.

The BBC says of Believe You Me, “Sultry summer nights following somnolent summer days, you’ve just found your new soundtrack.” Best order a copy now - do so by clicking here. September is coming soon.

AK: Hey Shannon, how come the Great Northwest has kept you under its wing for the past 13 years?
SS: What's kept me in the area so long is my family, mostly. After I moved here, my sisters and mom followed, so I got really lucky. I get to live in an amazing place AND have family close by. And now I have a band that's committed to me and is awesome, and I have some dear friends. Also, I love that the music scene is so vibrant. I can collaborate with a lot of wonderful people right here at home.

AK: Can you list a few favorite collaborators from the local scene? 
SS: I loved singing with Galen Disston (of Pickwick) on my new album. I loved doing a duet with Gregory Paul for the Seven Swans Reimagined compilation. I love just getting together with my pal Lindsay Fuller and passing the guitar back and forth. It's so good to play music with friends. Of course, I can't say enough about my band. Those guys blow my head off. They are such good musicians, I am more and more apt to put my guitar down and let them carry the arrangements. We have pancakes every Saturday and then play music together.

AK: How does living in the city affect your songwriting/music? 
SS: Living in the city has been really difficult in some ways, like cost of living--I'm always fighting to get the bills paid. And that affects my songwriting in a painful way, because I don't have a lot of time to write songs. But it's also been exciting to see what other songwriters and musicians are doing up-close. I've been inspired and influenced by the music going on around me. There's a lot of creativity and joy. This is a place with tons of natural beauty. It tends to quiet me when I pay attention to it. And if there's any quiet in the music, it comes from that same place. My latest record is a little noisier than my previous. I think I'm giving in to the urban climate and the pace of life, and letting some of that meditative quiet go. I need to get to the mountains.

Flash round. Tell us your favorite Seattle…

Neighborhood: My favorite neighborhood is Wedgwood--it's quiet and humble. I've mostly lived there since I moved to Seattle.

Restaurant: I like to eat at Third Place Pub with my daughter. We get the fries and the hummus plate and pick out a game (always with missing pieces) to play at our table.

Farmers market: I like the West Seattle farmers market, because there's good coffee and thrift stores and the beach right close by. You can make a day trip out of it.

Music venue: My fave venue is the Triple Door. You can order a cocktail and awesome food at your table while watching the music! I love that. I don't know how the performers feel about all those noisy forks, but I'll find out on August 28 when I play there for the first time! Stephens’ latest release Pull it Together is available here. 

Pitchfork is asking readers to choose favorite albums from the past 15 years for The People’s List. That starts the year Beck released Odelay and ends last year, when (ahem) My Brightest Diamond released All Things Will Unwind. While you can write in any Asthmatic Kitty release, Pitchfork staff picks are pre-listed to make the process simple. To vote, submit your selections before midnight on August 17.

We’re already preparing to dominate next year’s readers’ poll. People of Indianapolis, brace yourselves.

Pepe Deluxé has released the video version of "Go Supersonic" and it's everything we hoped: informative, colorful, and WHAT THE HECK IS THAT INCREDIBLE MACHINE?

As if you're not already a winner, you can win a Queen of the Wave deluxe edition from Pepe by emailing info at catskillsrecords dot com and letting them know what is the sealed section number 9 of the Nexus.

Also! Download the entire Go Supersonic EP for free by clicking here!

Nick Berry and Kurt Biroc make music prolifically while keeping day jobs. The duo that form the New Jersey-based band Dots Will Echo move back and forth between the half-lit world of kicking around ideas, dreaming up sounds, and playing riffs in a garage to the office-lit reality of finishing a project, checking a box off a to do list, and turning out the lights. Dots Will Echo’s debut release Drunk is the New Sober/Stupid is the New Dumb is available August 21st on Asthmatic Kitty. Recorded over the course of three days, the album ranges from perfectly impulsive to transcendent.

Berry and Biroc work together (Biroc is Berry’s boss) and make music as Dots Will Echo on their off hours. Berry plays everything from Andean charango to hammered dulcimer and Biroc plays drums on the album. The duo tease out irregular, tattered post punk-infused pop hooks that move between capricious and infectious. “I meant this to be a very raw recording, capturing the way we sound live,” says Berry. He describes Dots Will Echo’s sound as, “A little bit The Incredible String Band, a little bit AC/DC. A little bit Nick Drake, a little bit Cheap Trick.”

Before forming Dots Will Echo in 2004, Berry played with the power pop trio DWE Mk I, recording a single that made it to No. 4 on Sweden’s rock charts. In 2001, Berry contributed to the Will Ackerman track “Fear Not, Mary.” The song appeared on Ackerman’s Grammy nominated album Hearing Voices.

Drunk is the New Sober/Stupid is the New Dumb comes in at an epic 23 tracks. The CD was originally slated to be split into two disks. The double LP includes a code to access digital bonus track downloads. Read more about the album here.

Going on five full-length records since 2004, Asthmatic Kitty’s Castanets has given us a wide-lens look at deconstructed Americana. Come September 4th, Castanets’ Ray Raposa will debut a new band, Raymond Byron and the White Freighter, and a brand-new full-length, Little Death Shaker.

Where the ‘Nets trafficked in improv and avant-country gone coal black, Raposa’s new stuff is pure roadhouse blues. Stripped of all noise influences and focusing on straight-up songs, Little Death Shaker is a record evocative of late nights and dusty parking lots, long drives and boozy hookups. This is the work of a dude who’s spent his youth and young manhood on tour and it comes through in both the music and the lyrics. 

One of Little Death Shaker’s real charms is you can close your eyes and see these 13 tracks played live; you can see the drummer leaning over his kit with his brushes, the backup singers standing around the mic, beers in hand, eyes closed, swaying side to side, the lights crisscrossing the stage. In a world of records that bands can’t duplicate live, it’s crazy-refreshing.

Meet Raymond Byron and the White Freighters and their record Little Death Shaker. Here’s to the new.

Helado Negro is opening for Sam Prekop and Archer Prewitt (of The Sea and Cake) at the Mercury Lounge in Manhattan this Saturday June 30, and the New Yorker says you should go:

The mesmerizing act on this bill is Helado Negro, which is one of the stage names of the Florida-born, Brooklyn-based sound artist Roberto Carlos Lange. As Helado Negro, he makes atmospheric songs that take their own weirdness in stride: think a Latin version of freak folk.

Expect tracks from the Brooklyn-based experimental electropop artist’s complete catalog, including the recent “Island Universe Story One” EP. Doors open at 7:30, and tickets are ten bucks. Click here to purchase.

This Sunday, July 1, DM Stith plays a benefit show at Good Luck, his favorite Rochester restaurant. He’ll be backed by orchestration from Eastman School of Music students and members of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra.

The event is being organized by Noncerts Rochester, a charity-based concert series that began in Brooklyn last year. Instruments will be donated to music programs in Rochester public schools with the proceeds.

The evening begins at 7:00 p.m., and h'orderves are included with the price of a ticket. Click here for details.

In other news, DM is hard at work on two new full-length albums. One is under his name, and the other is a collaboration with John Mark Lapham (The Earlies, The Late Cord) under the mysterious moniker The Revival Hour. Look out for details about both releases in the coming months.

Precious Remedies Against Satan’s Devices, the Welcome Wagon’s second album, is out today! The follow-up full length to their 2008 debut, Presbyterian minister Vito Aiuto and his wife Monique present a brand new collection of folk-infused gospel gems.

Precious Remedies was recorded over the course of a work week in an old Brooklyn rectory. The tracks were produced by Alexander Foote and feature musical contributions from friends, including Foote and Sufjan Stevens. Spanning from sweet to transcendent, the record is the perfect summer soundtrack for lazy afternoons and back porch gatherings. 

Above is a fantastically filmed video of a rehearsal of "Remedy," a David Crowder cover. Friends of the Welcome Wagon Alex and Aaron Craig do the honors.

You can help yourself to some Precious Remedies on CD, LP, or MP3 by clicking here.

A beautiful thing happened when Helado Negro and Julianna Barwick first met: they got to know each other. The result, a collaborative band, OMBRE, and a brand-new full-length record, Believe You Me out on August 21st.

OMBRE has released their first single, entitled “Cara Falsa,” and it brilliantly showcases the ambient and programmed electronic side of this record, with a synthy space jam of pure oscillating ascendance,

What else can we expect from Believe You Me? Its ten tracks are very much the sound of two solo artists, each bringing a distinctive style, vibe, and voice to the mix. Recorded as the newly acquainted pair were just becoming friends, OMBRE shows Barwick's clear, high harmonies and church choir sensibilities meld well with Helado Negro's rustic-Latin-psyche-folk meets big-city-blockparty. 

We're excited to bring it to you come August. Until then, enjoy "Cara Falsa" below.