School of Seven Bells

10 New Tracks You Need to Hear This Week: Grouper, The xx

By Tom Hawking on Dec 21, 2012 2:34pm

It’s Friday, which means that this week is nearly over and it’s nearly time for the holidays — woo hoo, etc. — and also that it’s time to survey the various new tracks that caught our fancy this week. (If you missed our post last week, we’re temporarily replacing our regular MP3 post with a more general roundup of new music, as downloads are few and far between at this time of year.) Anyway, this week we get into the festive spirit with, um, a new track from Grouper. There’s also The xx covering Wham! (you’ll NEVER GUESS which song), a couple of new-ish Burial tracks, rather excellent remixes of Lower Dens and Sky Ferreira, a couple of gloriously misanthropic Christmas anthems, and more. Click through and get listening, gentle readers. … Read More

Music

10 MP3s You Need to Download for Free This Week: School of Seven Bells, Charli XCX

By Tom Hawking on Nov 9, 2012 3:00pm

It’s Friday, which means it’s time for another installment of our regular roundup of downloadable MP3 goodness from around the web. This week’s MP3 landscape is a pretty barren one, to be honest, but never fear, we’ve still found a bunch of stuff that’s worth your time and bandwidth: the return of School of Seven Bells, new tunes from Jonti, Captain Murphy, and Steve Hauschildt of Emeralds, weird soundtrack-y goodness from Yves Malone, Factory Floor remixing How to Destroy Angels, and a couple of cracking mixtapes for good measure. Since all this action costs precisely nothing, what are you waiting for? All the download links await after the jump. … Read More

Music

10 MP3s You Need to Download for Free This Week: Swans, Dirty Projectors

By Tom Hawking on Jul 27, 2012 1:00pm

It’s Friday, and we’re back with another installment of our regular roundup of downloadable MP3 goodness from around the web. This week, we get very excited about a taste of the new Swans album, even if it’s only a truncated edit of a truly epic-sounding track. There’s also a non-album Dirty Projectors track, Thurston Moore’s new band, new work from Crystal Castles and The Mountain Goats, suitably whacked-out hip hop from Flying Lotus and Raekwon, and a suite of Scott Walker remixes. 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: The Magnetic Fields, Andrew Bird

By Tom Hawking on Feb 27, 2012 3:00pm

If you’re anything like Flavorpill, Monday mornings never get any easier, especially if Sunday evening came with a bottle of syrah and an extra serving of existential angst. But! Never fear, because there’s always new music to, um, brighten up the morning. This week’s installment of our regular Monday roundup of new records streaming on the internet for free encompasses an extra dose of existential angst from Magnetic Fields, a compilation of nasty minimal wave, new albums from Andrew Bird and Memoryhouse, and the answer to what School of Seven Bells sound like minus a Deheza twin. Click through and get listening. … Read More

Web

What’s On at Flavorpill: The Links That Made the Rounds In Our Office

By Caroline Stanley on Feb 20, 2012 5:00pm

Today at Flavorpill, we enjoyed Marco Kaye’s hilarious “What It’s Like Being President, Metaphorically Speaking” over on McSweeney’s. We geeked out over this circuit-board skull by Graham Rudge from the Yukon School of Visual Arts. We saw what Nicki Minaj looked like in music videos before she turned into… Read More

Music

Albums to Stream for Free This Week: Guided by Voices, Jónsi

By Tom Hawking on Dec 19, 2011 1:30pm

Since we’re well into the pre-Christmas fallow period for album releases, we’re doing something a wee bit different for our regular Monday roundup of records streaming for free via the web. For those wedded to the LP format, never fear — we’ve got new records by Guided by Voices, Jónsi, and Bear in Heaven (kind of) to stream in their entirety. But since they’re about all that’s out there this week, we’ve also included a couple of noteworthy new singles that are available for your Internet listening pleasure. All this awaits you after the jump. … Read More

Music

Photo Gallery: CMJ 2009

By Caroline Stanley on Oct 26, 2009 11:18am

One week each year New York City is positively glutted with indie music fans, bands, and industry folk for the annual CMJ Music Marathon. It’s madness, and to help you navigate it, we came up with a handy guide of pared down picks. In case you didn’t get a chance to catch the bands we commended in person, we bring you our CMJ 2009 slideshow featuring School of Seven Bells, Vega, the Postelles, and… Read More

Daily Dose

Daily Dose Pick: Warpaint

By Doug Levy on Oct 13, 2009 2:31pm

LA-based quartet Warpaint create dark, ghostly pop, with help from famous friends including Shannyn Sossamon and Chili Pepper John Frusciante.

The band formed in 2007 around the core trio of Emily Kokal, Theresa Wayman, and Jennifer Lindberg. Frusciante, who mixed and performed on “Billie Holiday,” was an early adopter, while screen star Sossamon played drums live with Warpaint, and on three of the six tracks on their debut EP, Exquisite Corpse. … Read More

Music

The CMJ Music Marathon Guide: The Showcase Artists 6 Word Reviews + MP3 Downloads

By Stelios Phili on Aug 19, 2009 2:04pm

New York’s CMJ music marathon is an epic display of music journalism and indie street cred. From October 20-24, over a thousand under the radar bands will perform, hundreds will be blogged about, and a dozen will be become semi-obscure household names (see: Passion Pit) in the aftermath. The 22 initial showcase artist have been announced today, and so we have compiled a guide for your listening pleasure. Six word artist descriptions and song downloads — enjoy!

1. Broadcast
Pensive electro performed by benign fembot.
Sample Song: “America’s Boy” [Download Now] via The Decibel Tolls

2. School of Seven Bells
Easy listening indie pop cures insomnia.
Sample Song: “Conjour” [Download Now] via Stereogum

3. Zac Brown Band
Truckers enjoying cold bear and trucks.
Sample Song: “Toes” [Listen Now] via MySpace

View the rest after the jump. … Read More

Music

Exclusive: School of Seven Bells Sound Off on the Electro/Indie Divide

By Joe Defranceschi on Jan 15, 2009 2:16pm

Photo: Elle Muliarchyk

On Alpinisms, Ghostly International buzz band School of Seven Bells carve out a musical niche somewhere between electro-pop, dreamy shoegaze, and experimental art-rock. The melodic interplay between former Secret Machines guitarist Benjamin Curtis and twins Alejandra and Claudia Deheza (both formerly of On! Air! Library!) is fleshed out by electronic beats, synths and an array of live instruments.

Roughly translated, the band have managed a meteoric rise by dropping popular indie sounds into electronic atmospheres so fluid it makes you wonder, “why didn’t I think of that?” We spoke with Curtis about the band’s combination of electronics and rock and their insistence that the music, not labels or scenes, is what defines them.