Weekly Wrap: Fire & Smoke.

Short and sweet (unlike the actual week)… new photos added to various galleries, available for viewing here. ¶ Long live vinyl! Record store day took place on April 17th; see the official site. ¶ The world’s first street art disaster movie: Banksy’s movie starts screening over the next few weeks in a small number of theatres in the USA, hopefully a wider (worldwide?) release soon. ¶ Is anyone else worried about the increased number of natural disasters lately? Numerous earthquakes, Iceland’s volcanic eruptions cripple air travel across the UK (currently in it’s 4th consecutive day), and massive fireballs in the sky. Is the end near?

Musically: re-visiting Sven Weisemann’s Xine project.  Xine Rising is modern classical / ambient / house music to zone out to. ¶ Hollie Smith at Sale Street on Wednesday was an interesting event; read more here ¶ Looking forward to The Black Dog album “Music For Real Airports”.  Interactive artist Human have created the following teaser: (more…)

Artistic Contrasts.

Hollie Smith, back on the road, showcasing “Humour and the Misfortune of others” at Sales St on Wednesday 14th April.  If I had to pick one word to describe it: contrast.

It’s well known by now that Humour is a massive departure from her debut in terms of mood and style.  Both are philisophical and show extraordinary depth and talent for someone of her age, but the cathartic and intense nature of Humour is a million miles away from the laid back Long Player. Contrast. (more…)

Weekly Wrap: Brought to you by the letter B.

What a musical month March was… The Miami Winter Music Conference once again saw DJ’s & Producers from around the world come together to party and showcase, well, something.  So far, lots of interviews – including Seth Troxler on drugs and umm, bats (“bats! fucking bats!”) - but as of yet it has failed to deliver “this year’s hottest track” – unless I’ve completely missed the announcements, which is possible considering I’ve been swept away with a fantastic Massive Attack concert [review] plus new albums from Hollie Smith [my review @ Amplifier] and Erykah Badu [review] … My hits, misses and other moments from the past week or so: (more…)

Hollie Smith Amplified.

My review of Hollie Smith’s sophomore album, “Humour and the misfortune of others”, went up on Amplifier today – which also happens to be the best place to find your digital copy.  Read here.

Weekly Wrap: True silence is impossible.

Massive Attack continue their series of Heligoland short films – the latest is for “Saturday come slow” featuring Damon Albarn on vocals. Directed by Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin who transform the song into a beautiful but horrific piece that explains high-volume interrogation tactics used on a former Guantanamo Bay detainee, Ruhal Ahmed.  View here, and visit zerodb.org for information on music against torture. ¶ “Incense and Poetry” 60-minute deep house mix from Osunlade available here.  He will be playing at Development’s 4th birthday party in Manchester at the end of March, who have an exclusive interview and deep soul mix available. ¶ David Alvarado’s special blend on “One:2010″ keeps it deep and techy with the right amount of soul. Solid house music. Listen on SoundCloud or download/subscribe to his podcast. ¶ Anti-folk singer Jeffrey Lewis performed at Tabac last night (March 20), much to Bob Daktari’s excitement.  Photo’s here.  ¶

Last but not least, congratulations to Hollie Smith whose sophomore album, “Humour and the Misfortune of others”, shot to number 1 on iTunes shortly after it’s release on Monday 15th March, 2010.   A truly useless piece of writing came from Simon Sweetman – a blogger on NZ news site stuff.co.nz.  Despite having the album over 1 week before it’s release, he listened to it once before lazily putting together a post that: (1) over half of it was a re-post of old information pertaining to Hollie Smith’s first album, (2) using those criticisms as a leaning post to degrade the new album, and (3) couldn’t even deliver a decent title for the post.  I openly criticized his lazy efforts, to which he replied and hid behind the excuse that it was “a blog, not an article”.  While that’s true, it’s a blog that is on a professional news publication and should therefore have much higher writing quality.  I would have no problem if there was some decent writing there, but all of his work appears to be full of weak put-downs and questions posed to readers in a way that sounds like he doesn’t have the ability to make up his own solid opinions.  I’d be embarrassed to have his work appear on such as site.

The return of Hollie Smith.

It’s incredibly tragic what record labels have turned into these days.  Unable to keep up with the massive change in consumer habits for acquiring music via the internet, the last 15 years have turned multi-billion companies into hypersensitive budget-conscious messes where there appears to be no room for any shred of artist integrity.  Sell, and sell by the millions – or major labels don’t want you.

Hollie Smith’s “Long Player” seemed like a perfect fit for the legendary Blue Note offshoot Manhattan recordings.  It was a jazz-infused, bluesy piece of work marinated in Smith’s soulful and husky tones, but once again, it appears the mighty dollar and mass-appeal suits got in the way.  Read more details at Peter’s excellent Dub dot dash or a full interview here (NZ Herald).  Thanks to Bob Daktari for the link.

The video for Hollie’s new single, “Mamma”, can be viewed at MoFresh, and her sophomore album “Humour and the misfortune of others” is released on March 15, 2010.