ATTN hipsters: vinyl is losing its obscure indie points

The word is out ... according to Time Magazine: vinyl is actually cool again. Since this is Time Magazine that we are talking about, it is no longer obscurely cool to buy new vinyl and steal your parents' old records. This is a big problem for all us hipsters. I guess we'll have to do the 8 track thing for a while, and when that wears out ... Edison wax cylinders? This semi-joking drift aside, definitely check out the article ... by the sound of it, the world of vinyl is on the rise. I say that's a good thing. (The picture is an old attempt at a header for the blog).

[link] Time Magazine: Vinyl Gets Its Groove Back

beach house and high places @ the sugar tank

Well, Lancaster is half decent again as of Sunday the 6th, thanks to a new artist collective/warehouse space called The Sugar Tank. (The Chameleon Club stopped having good shows years ago ... if you're not from central PA, ignore these first 2 sentences.) If you don't know Beach House ... you'd better get on that, and see them live ASAP too. I've linked to "Gila" below which is on their new (and really good) album Devotion out February 26. As far as High Places, they are from Brooklyn and you can tell ... in the best way possible. They put on a really fun live show complete with constant, pounding bass, multitudes of percussion, and bounding melodies - whether it be on recorder or synth. Oh, and my top album list for 2007 ... still coming soon ... lists are so overrated.

[mp3] Beach House - Gila
[link] Beach House on myspace

[mp3] High Places - Shared Islands
[link] High Places on myspace

Neal's Top 21 of 2007

ok kids, so its that time of year. What time of year is that do you ask? Well, Top 10 time of course! And not to be left out this is my top 21 of 2007.

Note: this top 21 is NOT of albums that came out in 2007, nor are they in order from most favorite to least favorite, although they may be. It is more of a list of awesome music I have been listening to in 2007...

21.)ecstatic sunshine - living

20.)the arcade fire - neon bible

19.)the talking heads - sand in the vaseline jar

18.)television - marquee moon

17.)the misfits

16.)low - drums and guns

15.)boredoms - seadrum/house of sun

14.)mount eerie - pts. 6 & 7

13.)tim hecker - harmony in ultraviolet

12.)soft circle - self titled

11.)panda bear - person pitch

10.)deerhoof - friend opportunity

9.)tara jane o'neil - after a dark seven

8.)the besnard lakes - are the dark horse

7.)raccoo-oo-oon - behold secret kingdom

6.)animal collective - strawberry jam

5.)battles - mirrored

4.)lucky dragons - dark falcon

3.)casanets - in the vines

2.)akron/family - love is simple

1.)dirty projectors - rise above

anatomy of a leak

There was a really cool article in New York Magazine earlier this week with a brief inside look at advance CD leaks and also comments on the evolving nature of the music industry. Take a look:

[link] New York Magazine - Ripped to Shreds