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10 Albums Guaranteed to Make Your Ears Hurt

By Tom Hawking on

We’ve been listening a lot to the new Crystal Castles album III, which is out this week, here at Flavorpill, and while we’ve been enjoying it a lot more than we thought we would, we do rather miss the days when they sounded like someone taking a sledgehammer to a Commodore 64. Clearly, you have to be in the mood for such things, but when you are in the mood, there’s nothing more viscerally thrilling than some nasty, nasty noise music. We thought we’d share some of our favorite albums for inducing earaches. What are yours? (Incidentally, we mean albums that make your ears hurt in a good way — which means: sorry, Hadouken!/Enter Shikari/BrokenCYDE/etc, you don’t qualify.) … Read More

Music

10 Free MP3s You Need to Download This Week

By Tom Hawking on

It’s Friday, and we’re back with another installment of our regular roundup of downloadable MP3 goodness, both from around the web and from our own servers. This week there’s everything from a 20-minute head melter from Lightning Bolt to some live Radiohead action and a sinister minimal techno deconstruction of a track by Warpaint, of all people. In other words, there’s plenty of interesting sounds awaiting you after the jump, and since they won’t cost a penny or land you an RIAA lawsuit, as your attorneys we advise you to start downloading immediately. … Read More

Music

5 Albums to Stream for Free This Week: Beirut, ‘Watch the Throne’

By Tom Hawking on

Every Monday morning, we rope together five of the most noteworthy, interesting, and (hopefully) enjoyable albums streaming for free on the web over the course of the week. This week is shaping up particularly well — there’s the hype-laden Jay-Z and Kanye album, as well as an early (legal) listen to the new Beirut album, along with a Blood Orange’s late-night drag queen neo-funk, The Flaming Lips and Lightning Bolt wigging out together, and YOB making a Bhagvad Gita-inspired doom metal record. It’s all after the jump! … Read More

Music

10 Awesome Muppet Mash-Up Music Videos

By Margaret Eby on

Despite the recent release of Kanye West’s official music video for “Monster,” one intrepid internet mash-up artist crafted his own version out of — what else? — clips of Muppets. It got us thinking about the gems of Muppet mash-up past. With enough ingenuity and some timing you can get those little felt critters to mime singing almost anything, from U2 to gangster rap to Lightning Bolt. Our selections for the most awesome and strangely appropriate Muppet mash-up music videos, after the jump. … Read More

Design

Photo Gallery: The Art of the 7-inch

By Judy Berman on

The 7-inch record is, first and foremost, a way of distributing music, a few songs at a time. While it isn’t nearly as popular as it was a few generations ago, when the weekly trip to the record store to snap up your favorite single was a sacred ritual, it remains an important mode of distribution on the underground circuit. And the 7-inch isn’t just a vessel for music — often, it’s a thing of beauty unto itself.

In Touchable Sound: A Collection of 7-inch Records, editors Brian Roettinger, Mike Treff, and Diego Hadis — a graphic designer, former label manager, and writer, respectively — celebrate the visual aspect of 7-inches. Featuring thoughtful contributions from Chunklet magazine founder Henry H. Owings and a slew of designers and indie label types, the book breaks down the American underground music world into seven regional scenes and reproduces some of the strangest, coolest, and most beautiful 7-inch packaging from the past 25 years. … Read More

Music

Video: Whartscape 2010 in Two Minutes

By Patrick Letterii on

Last weekend in Baltimore, the city’s young and energetic population was treated to Whartscape, the annual independent music festival put on by Dan Deacon‘s multi-disiplinary crew Wham City. Lacking the huge lines and other inconveniences that usually characterize similar Brooklyn events, Whartscape was a refreshingly stress-free weekend in what was essentially a parking lot with some very clever stage setups (the smaller stage was literally in an alley). Sunday’s performances, which included Beach House, Future Islands, and Celebration were unfortunately delayed and moved inside because of rain, leaving us New York-bound and wanting more. But that didn’t stop us from getting some excellent video footage of the festival. Check out our two-minute Whartscape roundup, featuring music by Smart Growth, after the jump. … Read More