DARREN HAYMAN & THE SECONDARY MODERN - ALBUM PREVIEW
Here's a special treat for you, a sneak preview of a track from the forthcoming album Essex Arms by Fortuna POP!'s latest signings Darren Hayman and the Secondary Modern, accompanied by this beautiful Super 8 video. Enjoy.
SUMMER OF PAINS - NEW SINGLE + UK & SPANISH DATES
The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart release a brand spanking new 7" single (on sea foam green vinyl!) "Say No To Love" b/w "Lost Saint" through Fortuna POP! on July 5th. In singer Kip Berman’s words it's “a perfect summertime single full of fuzz and feelings”, adding, “The song is about rejecting hyper-serious adolescent romance that imprisons you and inhibits your ability to become the person you want to be and do the things you want to do. It's about a girl telling an emo boy to go grow a pair.” On the B-side is another new track, Lost Saint, which is “about growing up, going to Catholic School and insubordination.”
You can watch the great new video for "Say No To Love" below, after which you'll probably want to go to our shop and and buy the 7" which comes with a free MP3 download of both tracks.
The band follow the release of the "Say No To Love" with a string of dates in the UK and Spain in July, including an appearance at the best festival of all and surely the Pains spiritual festival home, Indietracks.
Sun 18th July Latitude Festival, UK tickets
Tue 20th July Playa Club, A Coruna, Spain
Thu 22nd July Teatro Lara, Madrid, Spain
Fri 23rd July Contempopranea Festival, Alburquerque, Spain tickets
Sat 24th July San Sebastian Festival, San Sebastian, Spain tickets
Sun 25th July Indietracks Festival - Midland Railway Centre, UK tickets
Wed 28th July Brighton, UK – Concorde 2 tickets
Thu 29th July London, UK – Heaven tickets
Sat 30th July mFEST, Stirling, Scotland tickets
The Pipettes release the second single from their eagerly awaited second album "Earth Vs The Pipettes" on July 19th and it sees the now London-based six-piece in full-on disco-tastic power pop overdrive. ‘Call Me’ has as catchy a refrain as anything we have heard so far from The Pipettes, which is really saying something, given their knack for serving up slices of utterly infectious pop perfection. Watch the great new video below.
Hot on the heels of the band’s ebullient comeback ‘Stop The Music’ (“the sort of chorus that makes you go a bit wobbly and misty-eyed” - Popjustice) this disco-tinged follow up is undeniable proof that there’s something different about the Pipettes. Thanks to a change of line-up and a hop, skip and jump into 2010, they’ve reinvented themselves as a big shiny pop group, leaving behind the realm of the three female harmony girl-group and moving towards the sounds of Chic-inspired seventies disco and eighties chart music.
The single will be available as limited edition blue vinyl 7" with an exclusive B-side "Over Heels" and as a digital download with a bundle also including an Operator Please remix of "Call Me" and "My Heart's A Bomb". You can pre-order the vinyl 7" now here.
Don't forget too that The Pipettes will be playing at The Lexington in London on the 19th July, with support from The School and A Little Orchestra, a 13-strong, well, orchestra led by The Pipettes's very own Monster Bobby. Tickets here.
TENDER TRAP - NEW SINGLE + ALBUM, UK TOUR DATES, GENERAL ROCK'N'ROLL MAYHEM
Tender Trap release their new album "Dansette Dansette" as a CD digipak and a vinyl LP + MP3 download on July 12th. Their 6music smash 7" single "Do You Want A Boyfriend?" is also available on limited edition white vinyl. You can pre-order both from us now. Trap fans in the US of A and Canada are directed towards that damn fine label Slumberland Records to make their purchases.
Title track "Dansette Dansette" kicks of the long player in fine fashion, morse feedback bleeps leading into a melodic ode to the bedroom record player. "Girls With Guns" and "2 To The N" are more punk-inspired, hearkening back to Amelia's Talulah Gosh roots, while single "Do You Want a Boyfriend?," celebrates the girl-pop phenomenon, but deconstructs it, too. Slower tunes like "Suddenly" and "Counting The Hours" give plenty of room for Amelia's vocal interplay with Elizabeth and Katrina, and "Capital L" wraps up the album in epic fashion, a tambourine-driven slow-dance which builds to a glorious crescendo. With two extra girl voices the band now combines the harmonies, oohs, ahs and sha-la-las of classic girl-pop with the stripped down beats and dirty guitars of the Shop Assistants and The Vaselines.
The band have some UK shows coming up in July to coincide with the release of the album:
Jul 3 The Hope, Brighton tickets
Jul 9 The Library, Leeds
Jul 10 Mello Mello, Liverpool
Jul 13 The Wheatsheaf, Oxford tickets
Jul 14 Rough Trade East Instore, London
Jul 22 Jamm, London tickets
ALLO DARLIN' RELEASE ALBUM, BREAK AMERICA, PLAY GIGS
It's the news you've all been waiting for, the album of the summer is finally released. No longer will your so-called-friends who picked it up at a gig be able to taunt you, now you can have a copy of your very own. And not only is it released as a CD digipak but it also comes as a Vinyl LP + MP3 download, a technological marvel few would have thought possible. It runs the spectrum from joyous, breezy, punky, jump-around pop with fabulous harmonies to sparse ukulele and steel guitar heartbreakers and contains among its ten amazing songs the singles "The Polaroid Song" and "Dreaming". Snap up your copy now.
Allo Darlin' recently finished a tour of the US of A including an appearance at New York Popfest which led to them being reviewed on the front page of the NY Times website no less as "terrific, witty and heartfelt, like a less moody Belle & Sebastian". The band's next London show is an Indietracks warm-up on July 21st at The Luminaire with The Smittens and Antarctica Takes It!, followed by Indietracks itself and a European tour.
21 July The Luminaire, London tickets
23 July Indietracks Festival, Derbyshire tickets
27 July L'Internationale, Paris, France
28 July Das Weltempfänger-Café, Cologne, Germany
29 July Astra Stube, Hamburg, Germany
30 July Ostopol Dresden, Germany
31 July Copenhagen, Denmark
1 Aug Malmo, Sweden
2 Aug House of Win-Win, Gothenburg, Sweden
3 Aug Maja's, Varberg, Sweden
4 Aug Jonkoping, Sweden
5 Aug Cosy Den Festival at Landet, Stockholm, Sweden
Fresh from their upcoming long player, “Girls With Guns” demonstrates the newly propulsive, harmony-heavy edge that Tender Trap have acquired with the addition of Elizabeth Morris of Allo Darlin’ (fuzzy guitar) and Katrina Dixon (stand-up drums). It's a riot-grrrl-esque tale of sisterhood and revenge that wouldn’t be out of place among the punkest moments of Amelia Fletcher's previous outfits. While guitars and drums rush by in a blur, Amelia and her new girl crew swear a cold-hearted vengeance on the unreliable and untrustworthy menfolk of the town.
Despite being busy taking the UK by storm on tour with The School, wowing SXSW, having a song used in 90210 and single-handedly saving BBC 6music, Allo Darlin' have somehow found time to release another single from their upcoming debut album.
Probably the only disco song in the world to feature ukulele and lap steel, “Dreaming” is a melancholy toe-tapper of a duet with Monster Bobby of The Pipettes, who turned in a guest vocal so bass-worryingly low that he lost a filling. A paean to going out dancing and falling in love in a cold climate it’ll make you almost nostalgic for the sub-Arctic conditions of the last British winter. Flip it over and B-side You Still Send Me is a total heartbreaker, recorded absolutely live in the studio, vocals and all, with every breath and creak audible.
In short it's an absolute cracker, which is what Jarvis Cocker, Hooky from New Order and DJ Huw Stephens thought when they made it Record of the Week on Steve Lamacq's Roundtable show a few weeks ago, beating Kate Nash, MGMT and The Radio Dept in the process. Amazingly, you can download it for FREE here
The title track of the new EP from The Loves "Sweet Sister Delia" is taken from their latest album "Three" and was written for doyen of the London indie scene Miss Delia Sparrow, ex of Mambo Taxi, The Action Time, Baby Birkin & Manic Cough, now to be found helping run London’s finest venue The Lexington. It's a spiky garage number replete with handclaps, new wave organ & Johnny Thunders lead guitar. “We always stay at her house when we’re in London so I thought we’d show her our gratitude with a song…I’m sure she’d have preferred money or booze or something though”, says lead singer Simon Love. The other songs are "Low" which is taken from Simon's extensive collection of songs that will never see the light of day and "God Saves Our Souls" the first tune to be made available by Simon's side project Simon Love & The Turkeys
Download all three songs from the EP + artwork for FREE here
Check out The Loves' Rock'n'Roll Circus live at How Does It Feel To Be Loved?'s night at Jamm in Brixton on Thursday 25th March.
The Polaroid Song is the first fruit from Allo Darlin’s soon to be released debut album. A breezy, bouncy, eighties-style pop song that could have come straight from the soundtrack of a John Hughes movie, it was inspired by Polaroid’s decision to stop manufacturing the iconic film, a move that prompted Elizabeth of Allo Darlin’s photography-obsessed boyfriend to start his own stockpile. B-side Will You Please Spend New Year’s With Me? possesses a childlike naivety and emotional directness that conjures up the anti-folk lullabies of Kimya Dawson. As an added incentive to buy the record 100 of the 7” singles will contain a unique, individually-taken Polaroid which entitles the lucky finder to enter a competition to win a special Allo Darlin’ gig live in their own living room!
Download both songs from the 7" + artwork for FREE here
Not content to rest on the laurels of having one of the best and most talked-about albums of 2009, The Pains of Being Pure At Heart are back with Higher Than The Stars, four brand-new songs that do what the band does best – breathe fresh life into indiepop with exuberance, charm and of course quality tunes.
From the New Wave-flavored bliss of "Higher Than The Stars" to the crashing power-pop of new live favorite "Twins," this EP is both a perfect summation of what The Pains are all about and a signpost to the future. Fizzy noise-pop is present and correct in the form of "103," and the band switches gears a bit for the brooding 80s-esque "Falling Over." Capping things off we have a series of remixes from Saint Etienne, DJ Downfall, Skanfrom and Others In Conversation. We were thrilled to hear how these producers remodeled the Pains' originals and hope you will be too.
The release comes in four formats - 7" Single, CD EP, 12" EP and 12" Remix EP - and is in the shops or available to order direct from us now.
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