Bleep Update 5th April

April New Release Round-Up
2007 continues to shape up to be a vintage year for new music on all fronts from skewed psychedelic pop to menacing grimey beats. This week we round up some of the latest releases that have been putting in some serious time on the Bleep stereo in recent weeks including Panda Bear's brilliant Person Pitch, already a strong contender for album of the year and the long awaited debut single from Dan Le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip. All of these releases come in standard MP3 encoded at the maximum quality of 320kbps. Clicking on a release will take you to Bleep where you can listen to the whole thing in full.

As the lead singer with Animal Collective, Noah Lennox aka Panda Bear already has several classic albums under his belt but with his third solo effort Person Pitch he's possibly topped them all. 7 tracks of psychedelic whimsy and experimentation that however weird and wonderful they get are still firmly rooted in a pop tradition and have received near universal praise from everyone from The Observer to Pitchfork to the bloke behind the counter in Rough Trade. Expect this to clog up the end of year charts come December and till then bask in it's glorious sunshine rays.

Having been all over the airwaves and decent dancefloors the last few months Dan Le Sac and Scroobius Pip's incendiary 'Thou Shalt Always Kill' finally gets released on Lex Records. The original should be familiar by now a righteously funny tirade that sounds like LCD Soundsystem, LFO and Gil Scott Heron all thrown into the mix. Slaughtering sacred cows left, right and centre it's one of the most anticipated tracks of the year and is a startling debut from a genuine new talent. Completing the package is a tough 4/4 remix from Tigerbeat6 associate Knifehandchop and another startlingly original track Angles.

A gorgeous ambient album of subtle tones and harmonics from Kranky's Stars of the Lid, 'And Their Refinement of the Decline' bathes the listener in sound, immersing you in it's quiet hazy beauty. Amassed from five years of recordings and clocking in at nearly two hours, this is the kind of album you just assume isn't made anymore, slow, luxurious and utterly mesmerising it takes it's time to slowly build up each tune and draw the listener into the velvet folds of it's melodies.

The first new material from Battles on Warp kicks off with a heavy martial drumbeat that hovers somewhere between Berlin and the Glitter Band and then piles in with a Moroder-esque bass line and Tyondai Braxton's helium vocals. It's a strange, slightly unsettling and yet totally irresistible 4 minutes of music that sounds like nothing else you've heard this year. There's also a remix courtesy of DJ Koze, who transforms the track into a rumbling, sparse, metallic tasting electro number that will be menacing all the right soundsystems.
Also available in FLAC Here

New album from Berlin based New Yorkers and former Warp artists Shadetek on Sound Ink. Having spent the last couple of years building up connections and working with the cream of the UK grime/hip-hop scene, Pale Fire sees them unleash an album of collaborations with heavy hitting MCs from both sides of the Atlantic including Antipop's High Priest, Jammer and Red Dragon. Dark and claustrophobic Shadetek have captured the feel of the streets perfectly with these 16 tracks that fuse grime, crunk and dancehall to jump up effect.

Gronland's Dextro makes pastoral sounding electronica that shimmers and shines and on Hearts and Minds slowly builds to a dense My Bloody Valentines-esque wall of sound. This high quality EP features the original plus choice remixes from Arkham, Anticon's Alias and an exclusive to Bleep remix from Warp's Clark that starts off with chiming guitars and ethereal wisps of noise before his trademark fractured electronica kicks in with a barrage of distressed drum beats and distorted bleeps.

The highly anticipated second album from Maximo Park takes off where it's gold selling, Mercury award nominated predecessor left us hanging. The spiky synth driven new wave pop is as polished as ever and thanks to Gil Norton (producer of the Pixies and Foo Fighters) the band have a weightier, fuller sound behind them that demands attention from the listener. Sure to build upon their existing fan base Maximo Park have survived the notorious 'difficult 2nd album' test with honours.
Also available in FLAC Here