Pitchfork

John Legend's André 3000-produced single "Green Light" has a lot to recommend it, but in its original form it's far from perfect. For all its forward-leaning rhythms, space-alien synths, and the solo album-talking OutKast member's chorus chants or charismatic, free-flowing guest verse, "Green Light" overplays its Chris Martin-esque falsetto hook, and the smooth guitars sound a little bit more appropriate for a romantic night in than a wild night out. Great fodder, then, for a remix. There's already a laid-back, reggae-accented "Afroganic Remix" up on iTunes, but as André 3k puts it: "Even Stevie Wonder got down sometimes."

Enter Diplo, mining the sound of late-1980s Miami for his "Diplo Dade County 1988 Remix". The Philadelphia-based DJ and producer emphasizes the "go" in Legend's "Green Light" refrain, puts André 3000's verse right up front, and lets the beats get a little crazier. Oh yeah, there's also a crowd of shouting guys in the background, honking horn samples, trunk-rattling bass, old-school drum-machine snares, and synths that pierce through it all like neon spotlights. Pretty much exactly what this track needed. No offense, Three Stacks. (via Pinglewood)

MP3:> John Legend [ft. André 3000]: "Green Light (Diplo Dade County 1988 Remix)"
[original version from Evolver; due 10/28/08 on Columbia]

"Beg Waves", the overwhelmingly joyous opening track on Ponytail's fine Ice Cream Spiritual, gets a kaleidoscopic video from directors Michael Guidetti and David Berezin. It sometimes looks as though they took as a starting point the cover photo for the Boredoms album Vision Creation Newsun, and you know, I've often wished that I lived inside that picture. Sunlight, shapes, crudely-rendered 3-D graphics of underground caves, colors blowing up like some Missile Command apocalypse-- I think Guidetti and Berezin understand the spirit behind Ice Cream Spiritual.

Pitchfork.tv page with embed code is here.

[from Ice Cream Spiritual; out now on We*Are*Free]

Newly Dipset-sold New York rapper Juelz Santana, like other MCs, doesn't have the greatest taste in weed-carriers. The members of his Skull Gang crew go by names like John Depp and Tobb Cobain, and they usually rap like it, too. Santana does, however, have a pretty good ear for beats, judging by the samples used on his new Skull Gang mixtape, Takeover. Yeah, you've got your recent hits, such as "Got Money", but Takeover also reaches back to some classics, like DJ Premier's faucet-dripping production from Jeru the Damaja's 1994 cut "Come Clean".

On "Relax", the backing is the Ronnie Foster-sampling instrumental from old A Tribe Called Quest favorite "Electric Relaxation", which Diplo revamped this summer as "Brew Barrymore". Over that familiar, soothing acoustic bass line, Santana repeats the Quest track's most familiar line, making a nod to diversity before getting down to the business of talking up his sexual prowess: "Fryin' pan, man, make 'em pop like bacon." Skull Gang pals Depp, UnKasa, and Rabb don't kill the vibe too much, either, whether talking about hanging out in Harlem, describing a pretty Puerto Rican girl, or, um, talking about how a girl has a "coochie like a flood". Wow, that's relaxed. (via Xclusives Zone)

MP3:> Juelz Santana Presents Skull Gang: "Relax"
[from the Takeover mixtape; download it here]

There's a very late-1960s look to the studio set for this video for "Fresh Born", from the upcoming Deerhoof album Offend Maggie, with all its pastel colors and unplugged guitars. It's like a backdrop for a "Monkees" interlude or something. Speaking of which, there's also a crazy chimp wielding a little baseball bat.

[from Offend Maggie; due 10/06/08 in the UK on ATP Recordings, in Australia on Spunk, and in Japan on P-Vine, and 10/07/08 in the U.S. and in Europe on Kill Rock Stars]

There's a new West Coast sound. Swedish slow-disco duo Studio's vinyl-only West Coast, later compiled on Yearbook 1, announced as much. California native Samuel Milton Grawe is one musician bringing that sound back to the most famous West Coast, whether as Windsurf with Sorcerer's Daniel Saxon Judd, or just solo under the name Hatchback. You may have already heard "White Diamond" in the form of Norwegian DJ/producer Prins Thomas' eerie remix, which appears on Ministry of Sound's Nu Balearica compilation. The original version, from Hatchback's forthcoming Color of the Sun full-length, is a nine-minute journey through bright Fender Rhodes electric piano, sun-baked vintage synths, whirring krautrock grooves, and nu-Vangelis ambient spaces. The overall effect isn't so much San Francisco, where Grawe is based. But once you get on Highway One, you can't miss it.

MP3:> Hatchback: "White Diamond"
[from Color of the Sun; due 09/30/08 on Lo Recordings]

The second part of the Futureheads' "Don't Look Down" set is up (we had Part 1 yesterday), and yes, it includes their for-the-ages cover of Kate Bush's "Hounds of Love", below, along with "Walking Backwards" from their new record. And then we added to the archives the video for Hercules and Love Affair's "You Belong", along with an accompanying behind-the-scenes mini-doc about the clip.

Pitchfork.tv page with embed code is here.

Where we're going, we don't need Rhodes. Or guitar. Not everything will automatically be beautiful and a few things might even hurt. That's because Telefon Tel Aviv have apparently scrapped their forthcoming third album's previously reported title, Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt, in favor of the more inflammatory (sorry) Immolate Yourself, at the same time tossing aside their usual instruments-- and signature attention to micro-edit detail. Now signed to Ellen Allien's Bpitch Control label, the Chicago-based New Orleans transplants instead find beauty in imperfection on new song "Helen of Troy", sure to launch a few ships (or bedroom recording projects) with its grainy, textured synth-pop. 

Telefon Tel Aviv's music has generally been melodic, but even so, "Helen of Troy" is an unusually direct, warm-- almost romantic-- offering from this duo of Joshua Eustis and Charles Cooper, evoking favorable comparisons to M83 and making the Killers look like knuckleheads. Not the jazzy liquid post-rock of 2001's Fahrenheit Fair Enough, nor the swooping orchestral electro-soul of 2004 follow-up Map of What Is Effortless, the song floats along on a current of wavy, vintage synth sounds, a driving bass line, and cascading drums that show they haven't quite lost their knack for intricacy. "Follow me, in the car, off a bridge," goes a modest tenor vocal, encircled by ahhs. Well, since you asked nicely, and since I'm trying to dodge Agamemnon's draft...

MP3:> Telefon Tel Aviv: "Helen of Troy"
[from Immolate Yourself; due 01/20/09 on Bpitch Control]

It sounds way too fascinating to be true, but apparently kids from New York to London are holding events called "silent raves," where hundreds of people each dance to the sound of their own iPods. In other words, it's you, it's me, and there's dancing-- only in this case, we're all together alone. That's how we find Los Campesinos! on the title track from We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed, the unexpectedly quick follow-up to their full-length debut, Hold on Now, Youngster..., already one of the year's best-loved albums. Three songs from the forthcoming LP are now up on MySpace. So far, so not a sophomore slump.

"We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed" has the flush arrangement and wittily diaristic lyrics of its predecessor, only the enthusiasm of youth has now worn itself Wowee Zowee-ragged. There's a rough grain to the fuzzy keyboard tones, blustering guitars, and surging strings that isn't present in the band's earlier work. Lead singer Gareth Campesinos! still lavishes writerly detail into his half-spoken verses, but the charming romantic of past songs has given way to a man full of fear, loathing, and outright threats. Before the ensuing squall is done, crisps have been puked, hearts have caught on fire, and Campesinos! has offered one cynical suggestion on how to improve your love life. When at last he raises his voice to a shrill shout, it's one not of giddy exuberance, but fucked-up catharsis. Los Campesinos! may still be developing-- they may even be ignorant-- but they're definitely not happy. You should be. Especially if you're seeing them on tour with No Age and Times New Viking, you lucky fucks.

Stream:> Los Campesinos!: "We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed"

[from We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed; due 10/13/08 in the UK on Wichita and November in the U.S. on Arts&Crafts]

Chris Dahlen described TV on the Radio's Dear Science the band's "slickest, catchiest, and potentially most popular LP," while also noting that "it nevertheless reeks with dread." Times being what they are, the 11-track album is also being sold in a 16-track Deluxe Version, with remixes from Prefuse 73 (of "Dancing Choose") and Brooklyn pals Telepathe (of "Crying"), along with two new songs that didn't make the record. Of these, "Make Love All Night Long" certainly adheres to the slick and catchy that Chris described, with a flute that seems to have drifted over from Van Morrison's "Moondance", more punchy horn charts, and a chorus refrain about guess what? Last.fm is streaming all the bonus material right now, but bad news-- it looks as though you only get a few full plays of each track before they revert to 30-second previews. Not nearly enough to go all night long, in other words, so enjoy it while it lasts.

Stream:> TV on the Radio: "Make Love All Night Long"
[from the Deluxe Version of Dear Science; out now on Interscope]

A lot of things about this post should seem pretty familiar to you. Like, I remember I used to read a website that had this short-lived feature called "Infinite Mixtape"; new Michael Cera-Kat Dennings movie Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist has a soundtrack full of bands that the demographic that might also read said website might also totally like. And I remember a fresh-faced young guitar-pop group called Vampire Weekend singing the words, "This feels so unnatural, Peter Gabriel, too"; on new song "Ottoman", from the Nick & Norah soundtrack, Vampire Weekend sing the words, "This feels so unnatural, Peter Gabriel, too". Trebly guitars, an appropriately posh string section-- all there. Vive le difference, though: this time out, Devo mastermind Mark Mothersbaugh produces.

[from the Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist OST; out today on Atlantic]