More Free (and not quite free) Stuff To Listen To!

I'm going to be taking the weekend off because I'm exhausted and there is some utter stupidity going on in my corner of the world. That said, bright spot might be the arrival of my vinyl copy of the new J. Rocc record tomorrow, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that priority mail gets it here as promised. Too bad my bank can't make such promises. Ever had them promise to send you a new debit card when your old one was about to expire only to have it never arrive? I called and they told me there was plenty of time, only to later tell me that was a mistake and now they'd have to deactivate my card early so a new one could be issued. Generally speaking I don't bitch too much about my bank, but I know I'm not the only one who lives day to day on the ability to use their debit card.

Anyway, my crappy attitude and shitty worldview aside, I've gotten a lot of e-mails from people recently about interesting music that is either being made available for free or can be checked out prior to purchase and I wanted to let you guys know about some of it.


Eskimeaux - Two Mountains



I got an e-mail from Gabrielle Smith telling me about her band's new album which is available for free download via their bandcamp page. Eskimeaux's sound is trippy bedroom folk/pop and has a haunting quality to it, what with the dreamy vocals and beautiful instrumentation. It reminds me a bit of Twin Peaks, albeit in a different way. It's hard to describe properly but it's not as haunting in the same way as Badalamenti, Lynch and Cruise's works are, rather there is a peaceful nature throughout the music, but there is something dark about it too, hiding behind the beauty.

Hit Eskimeaux's bandcamp page and download the album or listen to it on their soundcloud page. They also have an official site which you can visit here. Very cool stuff!

Whipped Cream Waterfalls (Don't go chasing them, you might get sticky) by eskimeaux



Galactaron - Galactaron



I also received an e-mail from a fellow named Owen Dennis that gave me a link to his soundcloud page where he has an album streaming from his group/project, Galactaron. It's pretty cool stuff, filled with lots of synths and vocodered vocals. There is a story running throughout about aliens that come to earth and meet a young lady with whom they collaborate. Actually, the young lady's vocals are probably the least interesting part of the album to me, reminding me of an overly mellow Nancy Whang from LCD Soundsystem and The Juan MacLean, although her vocals are pleasant nonetheless. On the other hand, the vocodered alien vocals are trippy in the way that older electro-themed records (think Neil Young's Trans) often sound, although the overall vibe is less "run you over with my jet cruiser" and more "let's explore this wonderous universe". I'm feeling this and I think a lot of you will as well, so check out Galactaron's soundcloud page and if you like what you hear you can purchase the album on iTunes. You should also check out Owen's site which has more images from the album. He's teaching English in China right now which is very cool! I'm sure he'd appreciate any support you can give him, especially financially.

Galactaron - The Synthesizer by galactaron



The Weeknd - House Of Balloons



If you haven't heard about The Weeknd yet, don't worry, I'm sure you'll feel overwhelmed soon enough. That said, it's worth going overboard about these guys because the album is great! It's been a pretty well kept secret until recently who the people involved were, but now the identities of vocalist Abel Tesfaye and producers Doc McKinney and Illangelo have been revealed. You might know Doc better for producing the dark and dreamy grooves of Esthero's Breath From Another, and it shows here with he and Illangelo creating a sexy, druggy mood for Abel's wonderful vocals. Massive Attack and Sade are easy comparisons, though the mood here seems to get darker throughout. I don't want to say the whole record is a slam dunk but I'm sure you'll find yourself fully enamored by The Weeknd's charms.

House Of Balloons is available for free download via The Weeknd's official site, so go and grab it. I'm sure someone is trying to snap these guys up for some major label as I write this.

The Weeknd - High For This by The_Weeknd



Mondo Vanilli - Love Is The Product / Thanks



Mondo Vanilli, aka MV Inc., is the long-abandoned band that R.U. Sirius, of Mondo 2000 fame, formed in the mid-nineties and recorded an album for Trent Reznor's Nothing Records. Due to a number of unspecified issues, despite Nothing/Interscope providing full funding for the recording of the album, no contract was signed and the album remained unreleased. At some point, Sirius decided to put the album up for free download on one of his sites, but that was a long time ago and the links have gone cold. I've wanted to hear the full album for a long time and still haven't had the chance to do so, which is kind of incredible since things never seem to fully disappear on the net, though two tracks from the album have been placed on Mondo Vanilli's bandcamp page which can be downloaded for free. This stuff is kind of dated sounding but it's still quite cool, so check it out and wonder what was going on. And if anyone reading this has the full album, drop me a line as I'd LOVE TO HEAR IT!





Tyler, The Creator - Bastard



I'm sure everyone has heard about Tyler and the Odd Future crew by now, but I'm surprised how many people haven't heard this album yet. Of course, it doesn't help that Tyler's download links seem to go down regularly and the Odd Future site uses limelinx as their link provider. That said, since the album is free I didn't think it would hurt to throw this up for download. And yes, I know, it's kinda violent and Tyler says a lot of things that will make your mother cringe, but it's legitimately good music and we should all expect great things from the Odd Future crew. Visit their site and get more goodness!





MellowHype - BLACKENEDWHITE



More Odd Future stuff that isn't available from their site for some reason. This is probably going to be getting a physical release at some point so I'll be deleting this when that happens, though get it now because it's frickin' insane! Hell is the track!





Self - Could You Love Me Now?

This ISN'T free at all, but it's great and it means Matt Mahaffey is back! You buy this track at Amazon but check it out first and tell me you're not diggin' it! Seriously, this is great stuff!

Self - Ornament & Crime: Demos Mixes

I received a special request for an update to a previous post on the blog, so today I'm featuring that item. This is the initial leak for Self's Ornament & Crime. These often get listed as demos but they are far more polished than demos. Demo Mixes though, that sounds more like it, as these sound far from finished. There are a lot of interesting differences between these and the final mixes that I posted earlier, so if you're really feeling those you should grab these too for a detailed comparison. I still say this album would have been too much of a compromise to Dreamworks as it is way too squeaky clean compared to many of Mahaffey's other releases, but there is still some great material here. Anyway, you can check out my post of the final mixes here if you haven't grabbed them already.

Self - Ornament & Crime: Demo Mixes

01 LA Radio
02 Hellbent
03 Emotional
04 Insecure Sober
05 How Can I Make You Happy
06 Can't Go On
07 Coming Over
08 Out With A Bang
09 The Pounding Truth
10 Potential
11 No One Knows You

PS-Any problems with the sound of the tracks were already there to being with. The only thing I've done was to update the tags. The files ARE NOT re-encodes.

Self - Ornament & Crime

Matt Mahaffey is Self. That's not to say that other people don't contribute to Self or that the band doesn't consist of others at times, but without Matt, Self would not exist. Sadly, at this point, Self barely does exist, and while that has to do with personal issues a lot of it also stems from the non-release of their fifth proper album.

Mahaffey and Self originate from Murfreesboro, Tennessee and were signed to independent label, Spongebath Records. Their first full length, "Subliminal Plastic Motives", was released in conjunction with Spongebath and Zoo Records, though they began releasing albums through Spongebath independently, posting free collections of unreleased songs and providing music for film and commercial work. Eventually, Dreamworks Records came calling and a deal was made leading to Self's first major label release, "Breakfast With Girls". The album wasn't a big seller and there was pressure from the label to deliver a hit, so Matt moved to LA to be closer to Dreamworks. He began working very closely with his A&R and other label people to choose the perfect songs for his pop masterpiece even though it was a compromise that he didn't want artistically. Nonetheless, he knew how great this could be for the band if this got him radio and video play and finished the album.

The story, as Matt told it, is the day he went to turn the final album in to the label he entered the building to find that Dreamworks had just announced it was closing the music distribution end of their organization and would not be releasing any new albums at this time. Dreamworks Records was part of the Universal Records family of labels and select bands and artists had their contracts transferred to other labels immediately. Self was not one of those bands and Universal would not relinquish the rights to the album without a significant payment which Matt did not have. As if this wasn't bad enough news, in 2005, Mike, Matt's brother and a regular contributor to the band, died unexpectedly.

Grieving and frustrated with his album's non-release, Matt started working with Jeff Turzo, previously of God Lives Underwater, as a production duo and band under the name Wired All Wrong. Matt considers the group to be an artistic rebirth, especially since his involvement in the band, unlike Self, is a partnership and he doesn't handle the production or songwriting duties on his own. Also, in Jeff Turzo he has a partner who has gone through a similar situation with the death of his friend and fellow GLU-bandmate, David Reilly.

Regardless of the success of Wired All Wrong, Self is still Matt's band and he would like to see their fifth album, "Ornament & Crime", receive a proper release. He has also tried to release a dvd of Self concerts from recent years but that has suffered similar setbacks as well. Understandably, Matt would like to see these Self-related projects released, but it looks more unlikely as time goes by, especially with Wired All Wrong becoming more successful along with his other film, television and production duties.

"Ornament & Crime" has had two leaks, the first being a collection of early versions and rough mixes, and the second being the finished album. I'm posting the finished album here today, but it should be noted that it's not believed to be mastered and the sequence may not be finalized. On top of that, if you enjoy the album as it is you should definitely download "Porno, Mint & Grime", the companion collection of outtakes and unused tracks from the O&C-era which is available for free at the EXCELLENT Self fan-site, Selfies.

It's been said on several occasions that Matt wishes the album hadn't leaked as he still hopes for it to be released in one way or another, but the longer the wait the less likely it becomes that this will happen. Nonetheless, you should definitely support Matt if you can by buying Wired All Wrong's releases or Self releases when they are available. Most Self releases are out of print, but some of them may see reissue soon, at least digitally, as two of them, including the amazing "Gizmodgery", were independent releases via Spongebath. Who knows, if there is enough support behind Matt's current releases, "Ornament & Crime" may eventually see release as at least a digital download!


Self - Ornament & Crime

01 LA Radio
02 Hellbent
03 Emotional
04 Insecure Sober
05 Pathetic
06 How Can I Make You Happy?
07 Can't Go On
08 Coming Over
09 No One Knows You
10 Grow Up
11 The Pounding Truth
12 Out With A Bang