sean has written the following articles:
In case you missed the mention on the boards this weekend and don't subscribe to our Mixcloud then you might have missed the return of DiS Radio. Some of you may remember the show from a few years back, before various 'official' music industry bodies introduced a royalty rate which prohibited us from continuing doing the podcast, without bankrupting ourselves. »
Wendy's away writing a book, so here’s DiS founder, Sean Adams' round-up of the week’s releases, vaguely filed in order of preference. You can just bash the play buttons if you don’t want to read his wafflings... »
DiS does Liverpool SoundCity for the first time, with three nights at the Kazimer and we're chuffed to bits to announce our line-up...»
in a pathetic attempt to discover whether popular things are popular and to see if there is much agreement amongst our readership, we bring you DrownedinSound's very first Facebook poll, to try to discover which are YOUR favourite releases of the year so far. It's Friday, it takes seconds, and it is in no way scientific, so hop over to http://facebook.com/DrownedinSound and place your vote.»
Earlier this week, DiS founder Sean Adams, got a sneaky first listen of Pala, the forthcoming album from Friendly Fires..»
Just look at the acts tagged above, there are few truly great bands that Jim Sclavunos hasn't been a member of. With an ability to cherry-pick like that, you sure as hell can bet he knows the best stores to crate-dig around. With Record Store Day coming up on the 16th of April, we had a theory that he's a well-travelled man who knows all the very best record emporiums, and asked Jim what his 10 favourite stores are, and why... »
T'other week, DiS was invited along to the legendary-doesn't-quite-cover-it Abbey Road studios, to see and hear the filming of a new TV show called Abbey Road debuts. And not just any ol' TV show that throws together a bunch of 'new' bands that no-one will give a toss about in 3months time (hello Delphic!) but a show that cherry-picks acts that are intriguing and genuinely special. The recording I bobbed along to was with Mount Kimbie and to say it was a 'bit good' is like saying an ice cold pint of bitter shandy is 'alright' on a sweltering day.»
It is Friday. It is the end of a fantastic week. Here is our Spotify playlist which soundtracks all of what has been on the site this week... »
Tonight, in East London, DiS-favourite Emmy the Great and hero-just-about-covers-it Tim Wheeler of Ash will be playing a JD Set show, celebrating the joy of Pixies. A DiS competition winner will be in attendance and the Jack Daniels will be flowing. »
This is an ‘urban’ ‘pop’ record made to fade in the background in lobbies and cafes, and, yeah, mandem-mandem, squawk, squawk. Whateverz.»
Electro-spaniards Crystal Fighters have made us a mixtape of some of their favourite tracks, ranging from Spanish punk to whirring electronica...»
Aaah, the morning after the Guinness the night before. Don't know about you but I'm in the mood for some nice ambient 'jams'. It's the end of the week, it's the playlist (here) of what we've covered on DiS over the past seven days and yeah, it's rather 'chill'... »
Drowned in Sound returns to Brighton for the Great Escape festival for three nights crammed with music we love. Kicking off on Thursday night is a somewhat 'electronic' bill that draws as much from the ambience of Aphex, Burial and Eno as it does from the throb of Daft Punk and The Field.»
On Friday, as part of the Southbank Centre's Women of the World Festival and the annual Bird's Eye View film festival, a veritable feast of some of DiS' favourite female artists will be performing live soundtracks to a range of films. The night's entitled Sound & Silents and is headlined by Grammy and Ivor Novello Award-winner Imogen Heap, who'll be performing with the world-renowned Holst Singers, the soundtrack to French surrealist director Germaine Dulac's The Seashell and The Clergman (1928). Also re-soundtracking films will be Micachu, Seaming and Tara Busch.»
Presented without comment... (DiS)cuss it on the DiS boards here. »
Every Friday, DiS does a Spotify playlist to reflect the week's content. Here's Spotifriday number 79»
Most major cities in the UK now seem to have their own multi-venue festivals and Liverpool's Sound City is in the running to be one of the best this year...»
Apropos of nothing Mogwai at all, watch this nice and xenophobic video and don't think for a minute that even though the tone is comical that the intent is not nasty. »
This week, not only have Mogwai taken over DiS, sharing with us all sorts of insights into the machinations which lay beneath their colossal rock, they've also released their seventh studio album.»
Vessels have been much-loved by DiS for quite some time now, and if you've never checked out their brand of post-ginormous fluttering rockness, then let this free download from their forthcoming album act as an introduction...»
A new irregular feature on DiS where we ask an artist we like to make us a mixtape.»
DiS' first monthly round-up of the headlines by the brilliant TwentyFourBit blog.»
Love Remains is an album at odds with itself. On the one hand, it’s a gentle voyage into a land of elegant dissonance where barely there beats are swept away by warm washes of sound installation-ish noise. On the other, it’s a conflicted record that asks more questions than it answers. Krell ponders whether the only place indie-rock/chillwave has left to go is inward, to the depths of ambient or whether to embrace a world of soul or climb to the heights way beyond The Neptunes or Kayne. Yet, in an age of choice, why pick one answer? What if both answers are right? ...At first, this is a harsh, uninviting record with all the gloss of R&B replaced by the sand-papery texture of a cat’s tongue. If you could imagine Jodeci’s second album with the same musty are-my-speakers-broken haze as Pinkerton and Person Pitch, it helps to reveal what’s behind this dense production fug.»
Some new acts that we like, that we think many of you might like too...»
Yesterday DiS reviews editor Andrzej Lukowski revealed the 11 albums he’s most looking forward to in 2011. In part two DiS founder/editor reveals his eleven... »
Before Christmas, we ran a six week mix-makers competition in conjunction with BlackBerry Torch and Mixcloud. And here's who won... Firstly, the "mix lovers" competition, whereby we randomly picked someone who shared one of the entries, was won by Alber»
A frustratingly competent listen.»
To celebrate the 4th February release of Brighton Rock, we are giving one lucky reader the chance to rub shoulders with the stars at the films’ Brighton premiere.»
...mention melodies that sound bound for daytime radio, so surely Finn Andrews will finally find his rightful throne as one of the finest songwriters of our generation.»
DiS' records of the year twenty ten. After a week of teasing, confusing and enraging some of you, our countdown of the albums we have loved the most in 2010 concludes with this top 10.»
