Here’s what we had for you over the Thanksgiving holiday. For an MP3 of the show, right click

Q: Who likes math-rock? A: Me! And apparently normal folks now, too, judging by Battles’ sudden comparative fame that makes them the biggest math band ever. But the point is not Battles or normal folks, the point is two albums: French Miami, who we love, and Three Trapped Tigers, who we newly love. Of the [...]

(photo by Rodrigo Costa)
Lots of interesting new releases today, so without further ado —

New on eMusic today is a record that’s particularly close to my heart — mostly because it’s a record I worked with the Arena Rock label to get reissued. It’s one of my favorite records of all-time: Darn Floor — Big Bite by the group Daniel Amos. We’re giving a track away free, and I’ll [...]

(photo by emmedibi)
Some odds & sods in the last few days of new releases. Here’s a quick rundown of stuff that seemed exciting:

(Photo via Spiffae)
Here is my first stab at an EVR show. I wanted it to be a “Fall Show,” all breezy, blustery kinda songs — it’s mostly gentle rock and folk, then gets a bit ambient-y/bleak towards the end (winter’s comin’!). I’m kicking myself hard for not including some Benoit Pioulard now, since I’ve been [...]

Looks like it’s Video Day on 17 Dots. I subscribe to the daily culture newsletter Very Short List (it’s pretty great, I highly recommend!) and today’s was particularly rewarding. Here’s the backstory:
Thirty-nine years ago, a 14-year-old named Jerry Levitan managed to talk his way into John Lennon’s Toronto hotel room. Impressed by the kid’s chutzpah, [...]

New single from Stricken City. Allow us to repeat: we love these kids.

(photo by HiCe)
A new day, new arrivals — nothing as awesome as yesterday’s haul, but still a few choice finds:

I was groggily sitting on the subway a few days ago when I noticed that the woman sitting across from me was crying. I felt sorry for her and tried to avert my eyes until I realized that she was reading a book. Then I was intrigued. Which book could possibly evoke such raw emotion [...]

So obviously the massive, massive news from today is the arrival of the Black Saint and Soul Note catalogues. There are, so far, about 350 titles to choose from. By tomorrow afternoon, there will be upwards of 500.
We’re holding off on posting our guide to essentials from the two catalogues until tomorrow — and this [...]

We’ve been very quiet today, mainly because we are doing some heavy prep for a very big day tomorrow, across all sites. A certain jazz motherlode — a motherlode so big I don’t even think we will be able to get it all up in one day! — as well as new records from Ladyhawke, [...]

I dunno how useful this will be, if at all, but this now exists: http://twitter.com/17dots. Are you on Twitter? Let’s do whatever it is Twitterers do.

So last night at the Barbican there was a performance of songs from the last two Scott Walker records, Tilt and The Drift entitled, appropriately enough, Tilting & Drifting. Inexplicably, I was in New York and not in London last night for this performance. Why? Because I’m an idiot.
Short form: since Scott is notoriously [...]

I had the honor of manning our ninth EVR show, one I subtitled (in my head) “In the Bleak Midwinter.” You can hear the show here. Here’s what I played:
The Velvet Underground, “I’m Waiting For My Man” (Live in Paris, 1972)
Shearwater, “Rooks”
Scott Walker, “The Old Man’s Back Again (Dedicated to the Neo-Stalinist Regime)”
Wu-Tang [...]

For the past two weeks or so, I’ve listened to the above song at least two or three times a day. It’s perfect. Such a big singalong thing, so Spaceman 3, so — again — perfect. We tried to get Girls for Selects way back in the spring (Alex loved ‘em first), but never got [...]

Reverb is so in right now. Vivian Girls, Crystal Stilts, Grouper, everything Bradford and countless more. It never really went away, sure, but there’s something drawing people to small-songs-that-sound-big right now. And it ain’t just the weather.
No shame, no excuses: I first heard about Olympia, WA’s Desolation Wilderness from Pitchfork. The barrage of Forkcast’d items [...]

(photo by Neumos)
Huge day at eMusic today — two new Selects bands, plus new arrivals from Stars, Love is All, Deastro and many more!

It’s eMusic Selects Day! That’s how we’ve come to view these debut days for new Selects artists. So much work goes into preparing every piece of this, both on our part and the artists’ part, and now they get sent out into the wild. Every time we are nervously excited.
And so yeah, this month! This [...]

Did you miss us?
Yes, 17 Dots has been down again for the last few days but we’re back and, as Gene once put it, fighting fit.
First things first: last Thursday was the eighth (!) installment of our East Village Radio Show and, to complement our Afrobeat hub we decided to focus exclusively on African music. [...]