Indie Indie, Yeah Yeah

GANG GANG DANCE
ganggangdance.com ♥ myspace.com
Gang Gang Dance caused quite a stir on last year's CMJ. I know for a fact that they left a great impression on all the people that went to see them. Their music is best described as "experimental", if not world primitive or tribal rhythm (see Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Apache Beat).

Saint Dymphna is their fourth album, having already established themselves in the New York scene. If you listen carefully to the album, each song flows into the next with background noises and such.

Among the songs that stood out, I did enjoyed the rap-ish song "Princes", which is sung by Tinchy Stryder. He's from London, so you can hear the distinctive accent in his lyrics. Although this could easily be their stand-out-track, I felt it wouldn't represent the band's sound as it sounds pretty different from the rest of the album.

While as much as I enjoy the occasional, as Lara puts it, "Weird Crazy Things That Sound Like Woodlawn Creatures and Kitchen Utensils", Saint Dymphna does an OK job on balancing this sound with more pop-friendly tunes like "House Jam". "House Jam", along with "First Communion" and "Princes", really made the album worth checking out, even if you don't like that sort of thing.

So find out why Fact Magazine thinks "one of the best albums we've heard all year." You can pick up anywhere, including amazon and itunes.

They will be heading out to do a massive world tour:

02/13/09 Paradiso Amsterdam
02/14/09 AB Club Brussels
02/15/09 Uebel + Gefahrlich Hamburg
02/16/09 Schauspielhaus Leipzig
02/17/09 Volksbuhne Berlin
02/18/09 Karlstorbahnof Heidelberg
02/19/09 Generiq Festival Dijon
02/20/09 Point Ephemere Paris
02/21/09 Route du Rock Festival St. Malo
02/22/09 Grand Mix Tourcoing
02/25/09 Roadhouse Manchester
02/26/09 Dingwalls London
02/27/09 Fleece Bristol
02/28/09 Audio Brighton
05/30/09 Primavera Sound Festival Barcelona

TAPES 'N TAPES
tapesntapes.com ♥ myspace.com
I'm not qualify to write this review, but since I couldn't actually convince my local writers here to do an article on their second album, Walk It Off, because they actually paid real-life money for it...

I don't know what all the fuss is about this band. I think sometime in 2007, I started hearing this band a lot from friends and not-so-friends. So definitely, there's some huge buzz and they're known in other parts of the world - not just in Minneapolis.

Andrew reckons that the band got so massive that they basically left Darren (from Kid Dakota) on his own for his just-released The Hopefuls' album (someone, not me, is supposed to review this one).

Anyway, my expectation for Tapes 'N Tapes' Walk it Off is that it's supposed to be fun and bouncy and dancey. It's not. The album failed on all three accounts. Maybe I'm just not listening to it right?

The most exciting song on the album is possibly "Le Ruse", all the other songs, including their single, "Hang Them All", did not did not impress me.

Hey, but if you're looking for a cool indie band, you should check out Tapes 'N Tapes, everyone else seems to love them. Hopefully Lara & Kate will have some favorable things to say about them on February 6^th, when they are stopping back home with what the LA Times are calling "2009 Artist to Watch", Wild Light.

The tour dates:

01/15/09 The Waiting Room Omaha, Nebraska
01/17/09 Fox Theater Boulder, Colorado
01/19/09 Neurolux Boise, Idaho
01/20/09 Neumo’s Seattle, Washington
01/21/09 Doug Fir Portland, Oregon
01/23/09 Great American Music Hall San Francisco, California
01/24/09 El Rey Theater Los Angeles, California
01/25/09 The Casbah San Diego, California
01/27/09 Sante Fe Brewing Company Sante Fe, New Mexico
01/29/09 Parish Austin, Texas
01/30/09 Club Dada Dallas, Texas
01/31/09 Opolis Norman, Oklahoma
02/02/09 Jackpot Music Hall Lawrence, Kansas
02/03/09 Mojo’s Columbia, Missouri
02/04/09 Maintenance Shop @ Iowa State Ames, Iowa
02/05/09 Nutty’s Sioux Falls, South Dakota
02/06/09 First Ave Minneapolis, Minnesota
02/20/09 Legends @ Notre Dame South Bend, Indiana
02/21/09 The Basement Columbus, Ohio
02/22/09 Brillobox Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
02/24/09 Paradise Boston, Massachusetts
02/25/09 Bowery Ballroom New York, New York
02/26/09 Music Hall of Williamsburg Brooklyn, New York
02/27/09 Rock & Roll Hotel Washington DC, Washington DC
02/28/09 Johnny Brendas Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
03/02/09 Cat’s Cradle Carrboro, North Carolina
03/03/09 The Earl Atlanta, Georgia
03/04/09 Bottletree Birmingham, Alabama
03/05/09 Mercy Lounge Nashville, Tennessee
03/06/09 Phoenix Hill Tavern Louisville, Kentucky
03/07/09 Metro Chicago, Illinois

PAS CHIC CHIC!
paschicchic.com ♥ myspace.com
Pas Chic Chic! (which means "not smart"?) are a band based out of Montreal, Canada. Their debut album, Au Contraire was released last year on Semprini Records... and it's entirely in French.

The songs are mostly sung by Eric (?), with the exception of a few songs by Marie-Douce ("Se Mirer Mare", "Mlle Mille" and "Brise Méprise") which comes off as very 60s girl pop. Eric's songs sounds like it's trying to be sexy, and maybe it is to girls swooning over his sex Canadian French accents.

There's a few brilliant pop songs on the album that I really enjoy, including "Mlle Mille" and "Tesclichés Déclenchés". My favorite is "En Chaine et en Vogue", which is a good example of their sound because the boy-girl vocals works very well here.

Apparently the band caught the attention of Julian Cope (who apparently when not being a musician is also a music critic):

I've also been hugely impressed by AU CONTRAIRE, the debut album by Montreal's Pas Chic Chic, whose urgent, disorientating and eloquent experimental psychedelic pop inhabits a bizarre hinterland somewhere between Alan Gill's beautiful early Dalek I Love You COMPASS KUMPAS sound, The Teardrop Explodes circa ‘When I Dream’ and ‘Thief of Baghdad’, and Dave Balfe and Bill Drummond’s Lori & the Chameleons project as played by Stereolab. Whirling ice-rink string synths, uppity toy soldier snare drummers and clamorous tragic male’n’female French language vocals conspire to create a sound of huge tragedy and loss...

Look for the band coming up on "Canadian Music Week" on March 12^th in Toronto. You can find Au Contraire digitally (itunes or emusic) or CD via amazon.

PEE-PEE
myspace.com
Possibly one of the worst name for a band, and equally "catchy" album name, is Pee-Pee's Castile Jackine is Vooded at Broonus Mousin: Volume 1. If you can get past the name(s), this is a pretty interesting and developed band, from the strange non-sense improv of "Freakout Jam" to rock funk of "I Love U 2 Much" to the melodic folk "I Hope My New House Feels Welcoming For You".

There's a lot of layers in their music, with a lot of instruments that you would find in bluegrass or Americana band: a saw here, an accordion there. I'm not sure if I hear the banjo, but I wouldn't be surprise if they incorporate that in their music.

What sets them apart from traditional Americana bands is that they seem to really enjoy using technology to make them sound warp. For example, check out the sound from the acoustic guitar on "Love needs a Quivering, Restless, Aching, Fire to Lay its Head On" and vocals on "Madness Song (remix)". The different shifts in style and tone of their songs makes the album all over the map. I'll only recommend the album if you enjoy different genre of music, but fans of Animal Collective and Of Montreal to 60s psychedelic rock should like this band.

Be on the look out for Volume Two of Castile Jackine..., as the album is actually already "in the can" as they say. Apparently in recording of their album, they had enough material to be split on two albums. You can get Castile Jackine..., released last November on the Helmet Room Label, at most online stores (emusic), physical CDs can be found on cdbaby.

PS, bonus points for utilizing "Hey Jude" on "O, Little Boy".