2 posts tagged “mia”

KILL IT KID
killitkid.com ♥ myspace.com/killitkid

Kill it Kid is a fairly new band from London, formed only about a year ago. I got a note today that they're heading out on tour and then supporting Brandi Carlile in August - just in time for their release of their new 4-track single Burst Its Banks.

With themes on "Heaven Never Seemed So Close", "Burst Its Bank", and "Send Me An Angel Down", I get the impression that they're heavily influenced by religion. Combining a weird blend of southern blues, with rock, and with that struggling vocals from Chris Turpin - this should be an interesting band to watch out as they develope.

There is one song on the EP that's a bit of a gem for me, it's called "Private Idaho" (I'm assuming this was named after the movie?). The acoustic song is short and sweet and sung by, I think, Stephanie Ward. It just really stood out because the other three songs have Turpin on vocals, and suddenly this woman started singing on this song. Which also means this song sounds nothing like their other songs, that it wouldn't be such a great song to represent them.

You can grab their teaser single, "Send Me An Angel Down" on their record label, Indian. Look for Burst Its Bank and forthcoming album in the coming months.

PS, I quite like the cover for Burst Its Banks. I believe the art is by David Gibbons (not to be confused with Dave "Watchmen" Gibbons), whose style reminds me a lot of Paul Pope.

Ze! - I Am Glam Ze! Tour Dates 06/26/09 tbc Berlin 06/27/09 Ghetto Noize (with GoldieLocks) Zurich 06/27/09 tbc Zurich 06/28/09 Kinki Mag interview @ Soul*sol (kinkimag.com) Zurich 07/01/09 @ Villa Berlin 07/03/09 Bangers & Mash @ Proud, Camden (postponed!) London 07/10/09 Hot Cheese Crew ARN Gallery Kassel 07/11/09 tbc Berlin 07/15/09 Fantasio @ Korsakoff Amsterdam 07/17/09 tbc Delft 07/18/09 LoveDance Festival (with Don Diablo, Jessica 6 of Hercules & Love Affair, Wannabe a Star, and more!) Spaarnwoude 11/30/09 Zigfrid Von Underbelly (Art Bar, East London) London

ZE!
zebrainpink.com ♥ myspace.com/zebrainpink

When bands submit one or two songs, we generally just ignore them. We seem to get a lot of demos, remixes, or a random b-side from a 6-track EP (talk about odd). And I would've ignored Ze! altogether, if not for her funky MIA-esque look.

You know that saying, "never judge a book by its cover"? It doesn't apply here, she's what you'll expect, and that's not a bad a thing. I mean it would be awful if it turned out she was singing polka or something (which actually now that I think about it, that would sound cool).

Ze! (pronounced "zay"), according to her biography is influenced by (who else?) MIA, Santigold, Yelle and Peaches (whom, for one year I saw saw her and Gonzales play four times at different dates). Her background is from television commercials, before venturing to rapper then to hip hop/drum 'n bass.

It said she's released a full length, Shameless, in 2005 and an EP in 2003, but those releases sounds very different than her current music. And currently, "I am Glam" and "Hello Disco" are both excellent electroclash dance songs. The lyrics are simple and not to mention catchy ("I am glam, glam is what I am" and "take me to the disco/bring me to the disco") which suits this style of music. You're not really concern with what she's singing, only that it sounds good (however "Disco" sounds deep in some parts).

I think Ze! has a lot of potential, but people might be turned off by the MIA-crazy-outfits-look. You can pick up her latest songs from popcuts.com. She's doing some live dates through the UK.

 12/28/2008 00:47:36  ♥ written by vu ()

I just saw another great Danny Boyle movie called Slumdog Millionaire, the movie I'm sure you have all heard about. It basically about a story of Jamal's life, through a series of questions from his appearance on the Indian version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire". Although I won't go too much into the plot, without giving away too much, it's ultimate a destiny love story between Jamal and Latika.

I will point out some things I didn't like was that most of the movie was in English, which seems kind of weird, being in India. The small parts that did feature subtitles, well the subtitles was done in a way that I haven't seen before. Also, I didn't feel like there was any sense of real danger. I know there are a few realistic horrible scenes (the children league of beggars scene for instance, you'll know what I'm talking about if you see the film), but I was never at any point in fear of what will happen to the characters. It's not grim or gritty and the directing doesn't come off as comedic or cheesy, but it's not "real life", if you know what I mean.

Either way, I did enjoy the film, but not love it. I don't hate it, but considering his earlier enjoyable works such as Sunshine (his sci-fi movie), 28 Days Later... (his fast zombie movie), The Beach (his "I'm not working with Ewan McGregor" movie), Trainspotting (the Britpop druggie movie), or Shallow Grave (the first of the money-bag trilogy movies)... Slumdog doesn't quite have it as a Bollywood movie. And I reckon it's not what he intended the film to be compared to either.

Anyway, like Boyle's Britpop-soundtrack of Trainspotting, the soundtrack to Slumdog fits the film quite nicely between modern and traditional Indian music of A.R. Rahman and the urban world hip-hop style of M.I.A. Although I think Rahman's compositions works well as background music, I felt sometime M.I.A.'s in-your-face music overwhelm her scene. Still, it's hard to ignore the catchy sound of "bang bang bang ka-ching" sound effects in her "Paper Plane" hit song.

My two favorite songs from the soundtrack is Alisha Chinai's vocals on the Sonu Nigam song "Aaj Ki Raat". Chinai is quite famous in India, often called The Indian Madonna. Anyway, the song is actually originally from another Bollywood picture called Don - The Chase Begins Again, but I suppose Boyle love the song so much, he snuck it onto his own film.

Also, of course, the big bollywood dance number, "Jai Ho", was also pretty memorable. Incidentally, if you were wondering the vocals on that track is by Sukhwinder Singh, Tanvi Shah, and Mahalakshmi Iyer.

So I highly recommend you checking out Slumdog Millionaire, if it's still showing at your local movie theaters.