I've posted some of Seth's work before from "Floating Action." This guys sound is so earthy. Its real music. This album has a unique sound I find refreshing. It's a real musician playing real music. This album reassured me that there are people who still know how to make music out there.
The Chapel Hill, NC-based Seth Kauffman first came on the indie rock scene in the late '90s as a member of the roots soul group the Choosy Beggars. Lo-fi, ramshackle, and raw, the Beggars were everything Kauffman loved, but his musical life wasn't always this unrefined. Classical violin lessons began at the age of four, but when he took up the guitar at the age of 15, the blues came into his life, as did a love of groove. Clueing into the feeling of the music he was coming to love, Kauffman "de-learned" his classical training and began to attack numerous new instruments. With Bryan Cates he formed the Choosy Beggars, playing countless shows and releasing four albums. Outside of the band he was taking solo adventures to the African bush, the Swiss Alps, and Jamaica, enjoying the rhythms each journey offered. Back home, he combined ska, mento, blues, Latin jazz, and blues and began recording an album he classified as "lo-fi North Carolina funk." Writing, producing, and playing every instrument, Kauffman gave listeners their first taste in February of 2006 when he released the Powder EP exclusively through iTunes. Beck, G. Love, Tom Waits, the Wailers, the White Stripes, and others were names used to help describe his sound, but each only touched upon one small facet of this complex yet pure music. A month later he made his full-length debut on the Hightone label with Ting, named after a grapefruit soda Kauffman enjoyed while in Jamaica.
Friday, November 9, 2012
Thursday, November 8, 2012
JD McPherson - North Side Gal (Live on 89.3 The Current)
Love this version of North Side Gal....J.D. McPherson ...you're sick bro! Wow....
Check it out!
Friday, November 2, 2012
Poolside performing "Take Me Home" Live on KCRW
Check out this awesome version of
"Take Me Home", by Poolside that was done live on KCRW. I dig the sound
of these guys. Feel good, dancing music...Enjoy!
Thursday, November 1, 2012
Bomba De Luz - Howl At That Moon (Live on 89.3 The Current)
From St. Paul, Minnesota comes "Bomba De Luz." The first album from Bomba de Luz, a mixture of folk, rock, and jazz. From tender love songs to moments of heavy rock, Bomba de Luz's first release has elements of all genres, every mood and countless influences. Lydia Hoglund's vocals from this album would be "positively mesmerizing live."
Notice how young these musicians are. I love it!
Check out Bomba De Luz performs "Howl At That Moon" live in the studios of 89.3 The Current.
Very good version.
Very good version.
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
The Shore - Waiting for the Sun
The Shore is an American rock group founded in Silver Lake, CA by frontman Ben Ashley. The Shore are heavily influenced by psychedelic bands like The Byrds, The Beatles, Coldplay, and The Beach Boys as well as Britpop groups Oasis and The Verve. They remind me a bit of Stereophonics too. Good sound, hope you enjoy!
Monday, October 29, 2012
Absynthe Minded - Envoi
Absynthe Minded is a Belgian rock
band, around frontman, vocalist and guitarist Bert Ostyn. Their tracks
contain a mix of thirties jazz, with a touch of funky soul, Balkan beats
and Merseyside pop. Here they perform "Envoi", for WatchListenTell.
Thursday, October 18, 2012
Floating Action - To Connect
Please go out and buy this album. You will NOT be disappointed. This is a band that is coming up right now. I have had their album on repeat for the last few days. I absolutely love their music.
Floating Action is a band from Black Mountain, North Carolina. The touring version of Floating Action is Seth Kauffman (lead vocals, guitar), Michael Libramento (bass), Josh Carpenter (drums), and Brian Landrum (guitar, organ). The studio version of Floating Action is solely Seth Kauffman, who writes, records, and produces all Floating Action material himself.
This song comes from their recently new album titled, "Fake Blood". Go here to buy it, http://www.floatingaction.com/music/
Named after a vintage Gretsch bass drum pedal, Floating Action is the pseudonym of Black Mountain, North Carolina-based musician, songwriter, and producer Seth Kauffman. Following the 2007 homemade gem Research (released under his own name) and Floating Action's gorgeously understated self-titled follow-up from 2009, Park the Van is proud to release Desert Etiquette, Kauffman's third full-length with the New Orleans based indie label.
Taking its title from a legend told to Kauffman by his sister (in the Middle East, it is proper etiquette to leave a drinking vessel for the hypothetical next traveler near a remote oasis) Desert Etiquette is the most stripped-down Floating Action affair to date. Aside from one pedal steel recording on the closing track, every song on Desert Etiquette was written, performed, produced, and recorded by Kauffman himself. His d.i.y. approach is the result of his insatiable searching; chasing the ultimate musical moment: "When an idea comes in directly from above, you can often capture it in it's pure state by eliminating the middle man. Sometimes bottling it at the source is just easier, and nothing gets lost in translation"
There's no such thing as a "typical" Floating Action song. Folk, soul, southern-rock, gospel, surf, and bedroom lo-fi somehow coexist and cohere in the same record—even the same song. There is, however, a distinct Floating Action sound. Kauffman's warm recordings and lushly anachronistic sound is uniquely his. The attentiveness given to production quality is palpable; you can all but hear the vinyl crackle in gently graceful tunes like "Please Reveal" or "Rincon." Like Dr. Dog keyboardist Zach Miller said in a recent interview, "His songs are timeless, effortless, and instantly memorable."
During the process of making his previous records, Kauffman would write and record quite sporadically, usually over several months. With Desert Etiquette, he challenged himself to do exactly the opposite: to write feverishly—literally—and then compress recording and mixing time dramatically.
Heeding Dylan's advice that there's no better time to write than when sick, Kauffman wrote the lyrics for the Desert Etiquette in two days, then recorded the album over a concentrated period of 48 total hours. The process was sudden, pure—an explosion of inspiration that dictated being harnessed in real-time. Kauffman's friend and collaborator, Band of Horses bassist Bill Reynolds, mixed the record in a similarly off-the-cuff vein—live and spontaneously over two days, using a vintage Trident console.
This new batch of songs is his most focused effort yet. These dedications to stillness and solitude transcend into repeat-listens rather comfortably. Desert Etiquette's lonely, shimmering songs were recorded without ornamentation or embellishment—often using less than eight tracks per song—and the imagery of Kauffman's lyrics shines through. Kauffman likens the stark result to Floating Action's version of Dylan's John Wesley Harding. With its pared-down instrumentation, Desert Etiquette is distinctly human-scale, a melancholic elegy to the sublime, violent beauty of the American landscape that aims to "capture the feeling you get when you're in Big Sur." Floating Action is certainly a southern band—tinges of blues, gospel, and country lace most of their songs—but as Kauffman says, "We're southern band whose hearts are in the west coast."
Floating Action is a band from Black Mountain, North Carolina. The touring version of Floating Action is Seth Kauffman (lead vocals, guitar), Michael Libramento (bass), Josh Carpenter (drums), and Brian Landrum (guitar, organ). The studio version of Floating Action is solely Seth Kauffman, who writes, records, and produces all Floating Action material himself.
This song comes from their recently new album titled, "Fake Blood". Go here to buy it, http://www.floatingaction.com/music/
Named after a vintage Gretsch bass drum pedal, Floating Action is the pseudonym of Black Mountain, North Carolina-based musician, songwriter, and producer Seth Kauffman. Following the 2007 homemade gem Research (released under his own name) and Floating Action's gorgeously understated self-titled follow-up from 2009, Park the Van is proud to release Desert Etiquette, Kauffman's third full-length with the New Orleans based indie label.
Taking its title from a legend told to Kauffman by his sister (in the Middle East, it is proper etiquette to leave a drinking vessel for the hypothetical next traveler near a remote oasis) Desert Etiquette is the most stripped-down Floating Action affair to date. Aside from one pedal steel recording on the closing track, every song on Desert Etiquette was written, performed, produced, and recorded by Kauffman himself. His d.i.y. approach is the result of his insatiable searching; chasing the ultimate musical moment: "When an idea comes in directly from above, you can often capture it in it's pure state by eliminating the middle man. Sometimes bottling it at the source is just easier, and nothing gets lost in translation"
There's no such thing as a "typical" Floating Action song. Folk, soul, southern-rock, gospel, surf, and bedroom lo-fi somehow coexist and cohere in the same record—even the same song. There is, however, a distinct Floating Action sound. Kauffman's warm recordings and lushly anachronistic sound is uniquely his. The attentiveness given to production quality is palpable; you can all but hear the vinyl crackle in gently graceful tunes like "Please Reveal" or "Rincon." Like Dr. Dog keyboardist Zach Miller said in a recent interview, "His songs are timeless, effortless, and instantly memorable."
During the process of making his previous records, Kauffman would write and record quite sporadically, usually over several months. With Desert Etiquette, he challenged himself to do exactly the opposite: to write feverishly—literally—and then compress recording and mixing time dramatically.
Heeding Dylan's advice that there's no better time to write than when sick, Kauffman wrote the lyrics for the Desert Etiquette in two days, then recorded the album over a concentrated period of 48 total hours. The process was sudden, pure—an explosion of inspiration that dictated being harnessed in real-time. Kauffman's friend and collaborator, Band of Horses bassist Bill Reynolds, mixed the record in a similarly off-the-cuff vein—live and spontaneously over two days, using a vintage Trident console.
This new batch of songs is his most focused effort yet. These dedications to stillness and solitude transcend into repeat-listens rather comfortably. Desert Etiquette's lonely, shimmering songs were recorded without ornamentation or embellishment—often using less than eight tracks per song—and the imagery of Kauffman's lyrics shines through. Kauffman likens the stark result to Floating Action's version of Dylan's John Wesley Harding. With its pared-down instrumentation, Desert Etiquette is distinctly human-scale, a melancholic elegy to the sublime, violent beauty of the American landscape that aims to "capture the feeling you get when you're in Big Sur." Floating Action is certainly a southern band—tinges of blues, gospel, and country lace most of their songs—but as Kauffman says, "We're southern band whose hearts are in the west coast."
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