At the risk of Great Gatsby fatigue, the video for Lana Del Rey's musical contribution, Young & Beautiful, was just released. (Oh, did you forget the film also opens in US theaters today?) Directed by fashion filmmaker Chris Sweeney, the deceptively dramatic video demonstrates her ascendant tragic-heroine goddessness and descendant pouty-teenness—a cross between Marianne Faithfull, Marina Abramovic, and Liv Tyler. And if it wasn't clear before that the songstress was warbling to a full orchestra in silhouette, Fantasia-style, there's no mistaking it now. Although, it seems like those diamond paperweights dangling from her ears could have sparkled a little more were it not for that fuzzy, end-of-Camelot Polaroid look...
The soundtrack for Baz Luhrmann's highly stylized, pre-Depression epic The Great Gatsby is being pre-released in dribs and drabs, first as 30-second snippets, then as full versions. Ranging from jazzy to haunting, so far we've been treated to The XX, Florence + The Machine, Lana Del Rey, will.i.am, Bryan Ferry, and Jack White.
Then today, East Village Radio debuted Andre 3000 and Beyoncé's cover of the late Amy Winehouse's Back to Black. While tagged with the radio station's name throughout—which pretty much ruins it—the moody duet makes one thing clear: Baz Luhrmann would really like the film to win an Oscar for Best Song—or Best Score, perhaps? The jury is still out as to whether the update "brings nothing" to the original, as Winehouse's father has said. At least he and the estate are being paid handsomely for the privilege: "I can't tell you how much it is, but it's a lot of money."
Andre 3000 and Beyoncé — Back to Black
The XX — Together
Florence + The Machine — Over the Love
Lana Del Rey — Young and Beautiful (Den Heath Remix)
Sia — Kill and Run
After seven agonizing years, The Knife is finally back with a new album, Shaking the Habitual. The Swedish siblings—Karin Dreijer Andersson, aka Fever Ray, and her brother, Olof Dreijer—have once again brought together their unorthodox trademarks: tribal percussion, early techno rhythms, atonal vocals, and lyrical social commentary. That's what happens when you build an album from a zither and a bedspring...
We don't even know where to begin describing the video for Midnight Juggernauts' latest track, Ballad of the War Machine, so we won't—except to say it's a little like Borat meets Queen. Instead we'll show you the video, then quote the band...
“We actually leaked different versions of this video out there over the last couple of weeks, but the videos were untitled and with no association to Midnight Juggernauts. For some reason we liked the idea of being an anonymous soviet art-pop band from decades ago, so we shot a video with this premise on the streets of Russia. Then we made it look like the clip was presented within an old Russian music program from 30 years ago.
Then some Russian friends spread them around various sites/blogs/discussion boards. We’ve been watching the response to the secret video on these sites over the last few weeks. Which has been interesting and amusing.
Most non-Russians think that it must be some bizarre soviet-pop band rediscovered from behind the iron curtain. Some people thought it was Space. Someone else pondered it’s comment using religious iconography within a communist context. someone said it was meaningless eye candy and not as good as I am the Walrus. Russians generally thought it’s too weird that they’d be singing in English so must be some foreign band touring at the time. Some kid on a gaming site said we dance like drunk morons.
Has been fun releasing it this way. I guess we’ve always been into Russia plus we’d been watching lots of Tarkovsky films while making the album.”
Kitsuné's newest signee, Pyramid, is a mere 22 years old, and a college student—clearly of the more industrious kind. On the French record label's latest compilation, consisting of 14 French-only tracks, Pyramid's voiceless contribution Wolf howls, grinds and soars with cum-laude confidence. The third in a series, Kitsuné Parisien 3 will be available for download beginning February 14. That would be Valentine's Day, for those who into that sort of thing...
Hailing from the eurozone-wannabe country of Bulgaria and clearly going for the geeky kid-sister look, Dena appears to be all elbows and knuckles. But the lethargic awkwardness she displays while rapping about diamond tings and mingling with quizzical babushkas in a faraway swap meet has just landed her a record deal with Kitsuné. Now a resident of Berlin, she's only one amazingly styled video away from fashion-world obsession. (In case you were wondering, the equally gawky guy in the blue shirt is Erlend Øye, from Kings of Convenience and The Whitest Boy Alive)...
A garage producer if ever there were, for years the veteran Chicago DJ Tevo Howard has been crafting obscure-inspired house under his own label, Beautiful Granville Records, and rethinking pop classics under his side project, The Black Electro Orchestra. These pop rethinks—ranging from Joy Division to Madonna—amount to low-fi, beatbox, instrumental-only remixes that you wouldn't be able to identify, most likely, if it weren't for the title. But don't let the muzak-like, tinny quality fool you; it's pretty high-concept stuff, stripped of emotion and nostalgia. For his latest retooling, he points his gimlet ear to golden oldies from the Pet Shop Boys...
Miss Kittin, she of ice-cold delivery ("You know Frank Sinatra? He's dead."), returns in a new single from Kris Menace. Called Hide, it's the first from the German producer's Features album, which, as you might have guessed, features feature vocals by an array of guests. Miss Kittin turns out an actual melody—her first?—and the synths are deep and layered enough to keep you interested. Where the music lacks in dark irony, the video makes up for in sheer trippiness, a kooky mash-up of M.C. Escher and Spy vs. Spy...
With a sound reminiscent of B-side Depeche Mode—but more lethargic, amorphic, and dark-wave—the French synch band Trésors are launching their debut album, Missionaires. Speaking of missionaire, the entire six tracks would make excellent mood music (read sex music), except for the first one, obvsies...
