Jack Penate

I never thought i'd get THIS excited about the return of Jack Penate.

His new track is called 'Today's Tonight'

To me it sounds very much like something off an Ibiza chillout album. It has a fantastic sing along hands in the air chorus and Hawaiian (ish) guitar riffs.

You can listen to it here.....

Get involved.

Frankmusik

Frankmusik is Vincent Frank from Croydon and is apparently one to watch in 2009...so me working in the media industry and being at the forefront of cool, (cough)... i'd obviously never heard of him.

So I decided to have a little listen to Mr Musiks output so I can claim to have been a fan from before he'd even written his first track.

He sways on the right side of Mika (without the crap bits), new rave, a bit bloc party, a touch Killers, a bit Buggles, a hint of Nintendo, a tad Hoxton and a little Goldfrapp with Top Gun highnotes.

All in all, yes, promising and pleasing sounds in abundance. Deff someone I'd like to see live.

Have a look at the video for his track '3 Little Words' with hints of 'Piano from Big'...loving that

Lily Allen

Now, i've always had a bit of a soft spot for Lily Allen. I like her slight obvious quirkiness and the fact that she knows she is a total chancer.

Her music too has this oddly endearing quality to it and I was really sucked into the buzz and freshness of 'Alright Still' upon its release in 2006.

So it was with trepidation when I heard that she had been working with Mark Ronson on her new material. How the hell would that work? Well...it does.

There are no trademark Ronson horns and live drums and instead a pleathora of synths and plinky piano bits. Check out the 'The Fear' below.

808's and Mr Hudson

Have you had a look through the inlay card of '808's and Heartbreaks'?

It looks like Mr West has a bit of a 'thing' for Birmingham artist Mr Hudson. Not only has he just signed him to his G.O.O.D.Music label but Mr Hudson has written, produced or provided backing vocals on no less than eight of the tracks on '808's and Heartbreaks'... this is surely the weirdest musical pairing since Calvin Harris and Dizzee Rascal.

Mr West said...
"He’s an incredible artist,” West revealed to MTV backstage at the recent EMAs. “I believe Mr. Hudson has the potential to be bigger than me, to be one of the most important artists of his generation. He’s playing these songs, he’s playing them back-to-back-to-back — ‘Dude, I’m telling you, your problems are not going to be getting hit records, blowing up and being a big star — your problems are going to be living real life, and dealing with real life, so just prep yourself.’ Everything I hear from him is a smash!”

Also click here to go to Mr Hudsons website. Its interesting in that it appears to be a huge advert for Kanye West rather than include any information on Mr Hudson....

Kanye is exec producing Mr Hudsons new album which is due out in March 09. Check out the first West/Hudson pairing 'There Will Be Tears' below.

Little Boots

I went to Annie Mac Presents at Digital in Brighton on Thursday (amazing) and Little Boots was one of the warm up acts. An interesting choice considering she was the only live act of the night, sandwiched between DJ's.

Now this isn't a review of said performance, as to be fair, I paid little attention to her overall show and was instead waving like a twat at Annie Mac who was filming outside the venue. However, during Little Boots' time on the stage there was one thing and one thing only that caught my attention and that my friends is the wonderous device in the picture to the left...

It's called a Tenori On and is made my Yamaha. I've been aware of it's exsistence for about a year and indeed of it's potential but have never seen it used in a band situation to full effect in the way that it was used by Little Boots.

The Tenori On is basically difficult to explain, and I certainly can't be arsed so watch this video instead. This is Little Boots using the instrument to re-create Hot Chips 'Ready For The Floor'.

Anyone got a spare £600 please?

Britney Leaks...

Horrible title...but true. After a little scout around the net today looking for new Britney news (yes, I'm that exciting) I stumbled across this little gem.

It is apparently a new track called 'Kill The Lights' from Britneys album 'Circus' and (luckily) it is very very good.

It sounds like it would belong comfortably on 'Blackout' which is in no means a bad thing and has a very different sound than that of 'Womanizer'. To me, the beat and production sound like 'Maneater' from the Furtado camp which makes me wonder if Jim Beanz or Danja have had something to do with this.

It is synthy, bassy, drummy and has a chorus consisting of the lyrics, 'I Kill The Lights' which has managed to embed itself in my head after approximately 2 listens.

The whole album has apparently leaked somewhere online. If this and Womanizer are representatives of the whole album then...
GIVE ME NOW!!!

New Timberlake

Justin keeps going from strength to strength with his solo material. 'Futuresex/Love Sounds' was such a fantastic example of exactly what a solo 'pop' male can achieve, so it was with trepidation and 'lets hope he hasn't done a Kanye' when his new track 'Magic' popped into my inbox the other day.....

And luckily, its ace! It sounds like a step forward from his last album's sound and still has that cheeky,sexy, soulful edge that makes Mr JT. Its rumoured that this might have been a demo left over from Britney's album (which makes me raise my eyebrows) but whatever, its a fucking tune!

I still don't know how to link to downloads so here is a youtube clip. If you want the full track, head to hypemachine