The album “LP” will arrive in the US on July 7th, so mark you calendars!

There are strong elements of both bands (you can really hear Rostam’s harmonies coming in strong); but it’s just a unique and chill sound. You can listen to four tracks off the upcoming album “LP” in the player; so sit back, relax, hit play, and enjoy.

Just listen to it. You’ll love it. The whole album is here for your betterment.

Check out their video for Zero, and below are a few of my favorite tracks. Yeah Yeah Yeahs are going to change the world, I’m sure of it.

Heads Will Roll – awesome upbeat track that demands (bad, in my case) dancing.

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Skeleton – super chill song with an amazing build. Must be listened to very, very loud.

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Hysteric – also, must be listened to loud. Really melodic.

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You must buy it!

The new album truly is really, really good. Listen to the whole thing all the way through as it’s a fairly cohesive album. There are a few cheesy moments, but perhaps that’s due to my preconceived notion that they are, in fact, a cheesy band therefore anything remotely lame is immediately flagged. However, it’s been an album I’ve come back to for a few weeks straight which says something.

While I don’t agree with everything said in this review (I clearly enjoy the album more), this is a good summation of Jar’s most recent history.

Here are a few of my favorite tracks:

Jars of Clay – The Long Fall Back to Earth – Heaven

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Jars of Clay – The Long Fall Back to Earth – Headphones

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Jars of Clay – The Long Fall Back to Earth – Boys (Lesson One)

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You can folow Jars of Clay on Twitter also. Check ‘em out. Also, check out their exceptionally well done site (and don’t mind the cheesey heart stopping looks into the camera, or Charlie’s lady hair).

Absence,

I recently saw them with Copeland at the Rock ‘n Roll Hotel here in DC, and they stole the show. Their music is already pretty big on album; live it was huge. I was impressed perhaps most impressed with the vocalists. There are two front vocalists, and they sounded on key and put together some pretty rich harmonies.

There biggest hit will most likely be Carousel, a fairly melodic track with a rad little guitar riff driving the song. There are a few others that stick out to me as well including Be Healed , Gutter, Last Time, and Are We All Forgotten — a track which just earned Top 5 Editor’s Choice in Rolling Stone. I’ve added those tracks to the music is for lovers mixtape, but the whole album is really worth the purchase.

Check them out:

• Paper Route on YouTube
• Paper Route on Twitter
• Paper Route on Facebook
• Buy Absence

And what would a post be without a video? Here is the official music video for Carousel:

Previously named “Something Like Silas”, the band was signed and decided to rebirth under the name “Future of Forestry” after a C.S. Lewis poem entitled “The Future of Forestry.” Twilight (buy it) marked their first full length album, and it was absolutely excellent making my Top Albums of 2008 (even though it was released in 2006).

Hailing from San Diego, CA, they’re automatically cooler than most of us. But unlike many So Cal bands, their music has substance, soul, and depth. Lyrically provocative, filled with rich harmonies, and a displaying a damn good use of digital delay, it’s just really good stuff.

Their new album, Travel, is actually the first in a four part album series. Sort of like that time your parents decided to give you four small gifts instead of one big one…hopefully this works out better…

Travel will be released on May 5th (yes, Cinco de Mayo) and will contain 6 tracks. Until then, Future of Forestry will be releasing a new track each week on their MySpace page. At the time of writing, there are three tracks up (Traveler’s Song, Colors in Array and This Hour) on their page. Leading up to the album release, you can also download Traveler’s Song from Future of Forestry’s store. Check it out, it’s a rad song:

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And check them out on Twitter.

Fantasies has a very interesting story behind it — a story of real honesty and brokenness, and yet it’s also a story of hope and joy. In the words Metric:

Haines had an epiphany during [a] Phoenix show — she didn’t want to be sad anymore. And she didn’t want to play those songs. So, about 40 minutes into the show, she stopped “Dr. Blind” mid-verse and said just that: “I don’t want to play these songs anymore.”

This album is anything but sad. It can be a bit dark, but never sad. Haines was so sick of the hipster indie scene, that she decided to head to Buenos Aires, and the band later decided to hang out and play in the woods to escape it all.

The video below is a bit of Haines from Buenos Aires discussing Fantasies and why she left North America to get it done. If this video sparks your interest, then you’ll love their bio. As always, a few of my favorite tracks are below, and you can listen to the whole album on the site! And it’s only $7.99 on Amazon, so go buy Fantasies!

Metric – Fantasies – Help I’m Alive
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Metric – Fantasies – Sick Muse
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Metric – Fantasies – Gimme Sympathy
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As Pitchfork notes, “Merriweather is the kind of album on which any song could be someone’s favorite” and I have to agree (Read the full article, it’s great). My favorite tracks are In the Flowers, My Girls, and Bluish (all of which are posted to the music is for lovers mixtape). All absolutely amazing and intricate songs which require multiple listens — each listen revealing something different.

Not only is the album amazing, Animal Collective produced a sick little video for My Girls and made it highly shareable by adding it to its own URL. You visit MyAnimalHome.net and all you see is this amazing video — nothing more, nothing less. I received multiple emails from friends with this URL and the words “soooo good”. Check it out:

Listen to the entire Merriweather Post Pavilion album by Animal Collective – top right.

The first track Little Bribes is an up-beat, if not a bit rock-a-billy, and highly accessible track. I like it right now, but I worry it might get old fast.

The next track, A Diamond And a Tether, is for those you who enjoyed Cath…. It’s got that same style and feel, with a more melodic chorus.

Third track is My Mirror Speaks. The intro almost reminds me of We Looked Like Giants, but it never quite picks up. A groovin’ bass line, and the same dirty guitar tone. They even bring back the classic Death Cab Clap.

I Was Once a Loyal Letter is another more rockin’ track and could be my favorite. It’s perhaps the closest to a Transatlanticism track I’ve heard since that album.

The last track is a demo of Talking Bird and I’m not a big fan of the original, and the demo doesn’t do much to change that.

Here you go! Have a listen to I Was Once a Loyal Letter and A Diamond And a Tether, and don’t forget to buy The Open Door EP on Amazon.

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Check out the the Death Cab MySpace & Last.FM pages for more tunes.

Thirteen Senses has been picking up steam ever since their inception in 2002. The album The Invitation reached 14 on the UK Album Charts, and their second album, “Contact” launched the band into the UK Top 20. Their third album, slated for release sometime in 2009, should move the band even further away from their ‘beautiful’ and ‘wafty’ roots, to a full on British rock band.

“When we toured the songs,” says Will, “that’s when I actually did think ‘god these songs are a bit wafty aren’t they?’. You got sick of not being able to get into it that much because it’s a beautiful moment and whatever.” “At the beginning of the set we’d start on ‘Into The Fire’,” adds drummer Brendon James, “so we’d come on strong and end strong and it just dipped in the middle.”

For the reasons stated above, I don’t find myself returning to The Invitation very often. It starts strong, but makes a dip and never quite returns to the promising start of the first two tracks. Because the songs are fairly straight forward, they lose their replay-ability rather quickly. Nevertheless, their new preview “Crystal Sounds” sounds excellent! All these signs point towards a mature and rockin’ third album.

Their latest release, “Contact” seems more attractive than The Invitation and I’ll be picking that up soon. You can listen to a few of those tracks on the Thirteen Senses site and I recommend “Follow Me.”

But why not make up your own mind!

Listen to “Into the Fire” from “The Invitation”

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Listen to “Thru the Glass” from “The Invitation”

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If you like it, buy it!

Hailing from Copenhagen, Denmark, Mew first broke onto the scene in 2003 with their album, Frengers which won the “Album of the Year” and “Band of the Year” at the 2003 Danish Music Awards (DMA). Frengers made my favorites of 2008, and here is a video of Mew performing Snow Brigade from Frengers at the DMA’s. In 2005 they released And the Glass Handed Kites in Denmark, dropping in the UK a bit later, and finally in the US in July of 2006.

Spin magazine had the privlidge of interviewing what I would call the weirdest band I know, and here are a few snippets:

The band also moved away from the continuous manner in which Kites was mixed, where one song basically bled seamlessly into the next. “The last record we did was like one long thing, and I love that about it,” Bjerre says. “We didn’t want to do that again, we wanted to have separate songs. I think it’s like a counter reaction to what we did last time.”

In 2006 the bassist Johan Wohlert departed the band to hang with his lady friend Pernille Rosendahl from the now-disbanded band Swan Lee and they then formed The Storm. Mew fanatics are of course wondering if this will change the Mew sound, but only time will tell. Regarding the tone and feel of the album, Bjerre says,

“Oftentimes, even if the song’s not happy, the lyrics are,” he explains. “I think that this record’s probably a bit weirder in some ways, but also there’s some really very clear stuff.”

The band has been eerily quiet about the new record with only a few interviews popping up here and there, a few comments on the Mew forum. The only real communication from the band has been in the form of their rather outdated video diaries — which mark them as the weirdest dudes in music. Some indie bands feel the need to don the facade of weirdness because…well…that’s just cool. I’m pretty sure these guys aren’t acting. Have a gander below.

You can pick up Frengers as well as read others reviews at the music is for lovers Amazon store. Also, Purevolume has a great bio and a few streaming tunes, as does Last.fm and MySpace.