Just when I thought it couldn’t get any better…

Reggae summer! Today brings a new stash from Lee’s records, including one of the greatest reggae singles ever recorded, so here’s a quick roundup of what’s worth it.

“I don’t give a damn ’bout my bad reputation!”

A few fantastic titles turned up on the site over the weekend, so I wanted to take a few minutes to point ‘em out. Before I do, though: your day will not be complete until you download tracks 17 & 18 from Life Goes in Circles. I re-discovered these two over the weekend. [...]

Seeing is believing. This is Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, sitting down outside Bob Marley’s house and joining in with a Rastafarian drum circle whilst on a royal tour of Jamaica. In the flesh-crawling-skin-shrinking-wince-wince-help-cringe stakes it’s up there with your dad trying to dance in front of your friends.
Royal tours are often the [...]

I’ve always been a fan of location listening. Standing on a bridge over the railway at Macclesfield station, the sound of Joy Division just seemed right, it matched the rise and fall of the hills, the left-over Victorian industrial buildings and repeated rows of suburban houses. Driving up the motorway to Birmingham with Black Sabbath [...]

Stop the presses! Big new arrival for reggae fans today that I somehow missed until just now: Cedric Im Brooks & the Divine Light, From Mento to Reggae to Third World Music. Cedric is a master, and the bulk of his catalog is the real deal music — maximum dread for fans of that [...]

So not to distract from the fantastic Breathe Owl Breath and High Places, but thought I’d give a shout to some other new arrivals I’ve been enjoying.

So much to talk about. Let’s do this:

A great day for new releases, with fantastic new material from Akron/Family, Shout Out Louds, Besnard Lakes, Dirty Projectors and a host of others.

I’m generally pretty averse to singer-songwriters; there’s only so much acoustic guitar I can take, and I try to restrict my weekly intake of sorrow and longing to the hefty spate of emo bands I guiltily enjoy. The one huge exception to this rule is Mark Heard.

The new M.I.A. record, Kala (out in the US Aug. 21, Aug. 20 in the UK), is
a) absolutely ridiculous
b) some crazy-ass back-to-the-future-music time-warp kinda deal
c) a country mile better than the already-great Arular
d) the smartest/sickest/slickest pastiche/homage/collage/mélange of pop music I have ever heard

Today is National the National Day, and we couldn’t be prouder to host it. It’s an essential for the indie rock set. But there’s lots more to recommend today, including a great compilation of New Zealand rock, Tim Armstrong, Parts & Labor, Wheat and the Gourds discography.

At some point yesterday the Makasound label arrived on site. I know that today is going to be a download-taxer, what with the National and Parts & Labor and Wheat, but I’d urge you to set a few aside downloads to sample Makasound. Here’s why:

Seems like it’s been a while since we’ve had a new arrival worth raving about, but a new album from Colleen and a stellar rockabilly collection from Eddie Bond have put us back on track.

New Animal Collective and a comp of forgotten King Tubby classics…

A wonderful house single, some more electronic stuff and a ton of Bob Wills.

(photo by megan tharpe)
A few months ago, I was supposed to go see one of my all-time favorite artists, Cedric “Im” Brooks, in concert in Brooklyn. Just as exciting to me, though, was the fact that the DJ who was spinning before and after Brooks would be mixing dub live, on-site. Naturally, life intervened and [...]

Photo by illenion
Here’s a look at the six best albums that arrived on eMusic this week, according to this man’s slightly informed opinion.

Some really, really spectacular stuff today, including an incredible Southern blues album, a horrific electronic record (horrific being a compliment!), Canned Heat, Keith Hudson, Frank Black and a baseball classic just in time for opening day!