New Music Recommendations 2012

DeepChord "Sommer" (Field Recording, Techno, Dub Techno, Ambient)

We've been inundated with Echospace releases lately with last months "Silent World" releases, "Sommer" and the upcoming "Summer Night Versions" and lucky for me as this is easily one of my favorite artists. They have yet to disappoint and the bar is set sky high. Rod Modell continues to grow and demonstrate why he is at the forefront of electronic music. His sound is immediately distinguishable with analog warmth, atmosphere and beats that seem to rise and fall from places that only he is capable of pulling from. He creates those rare sonic spaces that transport, that breathe with life and posses a soul.

I'll spare y'all any attempt to describe this record and only offer my absolute highest recommendation. This is a desert island record for me.

Evening Hymns "Spectral Dusk" (Folk Rock, Folk)

Real nice record. Pretty, well played and well written.

Bandcamp: http://eveninghymns.bandcamp.com/

From their Bandcamp page:

Evening Hymns are sung from the cathedrals of tall trees. They capture the spirit of moments, of friends around a bonfire on a foggy beach, the crunching of snowshoes in the silence of a winter night and memories of tribal boys growing up with pellet guns, fishing rods, and handmade forts.

Spectral Dusk covers very personal issues, and takes Evening Hymns to the next level, musically and lyrically, from their acclaimed debut record‚ Spirit Guides (2009). A study of loss, pain, and hope and a pathway drawn out of the dark into the light, Spectral Dusk finds Jonas Bonnetta dealing, through music, with the loss of his father three years ago. This record spills its guts out on the floor, and yet so softly it leaves the listener no option but to reflect on their own mortality. An album as dense as it is spatial, Spectral Dusk moves from droning bliss (Irving Lake Access Road) into anthemic chants (Cabin In The Burn). A record to be experienced more than listened to. An environment to exist in for an hour. A small retreat from the world.

Recorded in a log cabin in Northern Ontario with the band’s closest friends, it features members of The Wooden Sky, Timber Timbre, City and Colour, and more.

Spectral Dusk is being released in Canada on Shuffling Feet Records (distributed by Outside), in Germany on Strange Ways Records and in France on Kütu Folk Records, and will be supported with tours in Canada and Europe later this year.

Forgot Alabama Shakes. Love the raw and soulful sound.

The Brothers Comatose - Respect the Van.

Gene Harris -- In His Hands

Original Broadway Cast -- Ain't Misbehavin' (Fats Waller)