Sébastien Tellier - Sexuality

2008; 11 tracks

Here is an album that defies all previous understandings of sexuality. Tellier's music is flush with the facets of excitement, combining pure electronica with intimate lullabies. Sexuality is a "taste of fruit - very juicy and full of sugar." Sébastien Tellier is a French singer and song-writer of international fame, and this is his third album. His music is sensual without being vulgar, each track exploring Tellier's idea of sexuality further - he finds women's sportswear to be very sexy, and the only instrumental track, "Sexual Sportswear," is dedicated to that fantasy. This album contains beautiful downtempo / electronica with a mysterious sexual aura that is at once heartbreaking and perfect for dancing.


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The beautiful "L'amour et la violence."




And "Look," another favorite!

Lucy - Wordplay for Working Bees

2011; 11 tracks

This is the debut full-length album of Luca Mortellaro, a very talented young artist of electronic and techno music. His first EP, Open House, was released in 2007, and he has since been featured on numerous mixes and a prominent member of the underground techno scene.

Wordplay for Working Bees is a cerebral album, to be sure, but it is penetrating in its darkness. I've never called the genre of "techno" a favorite, but this particular brand of techno, sometimes edging on idm, is beautiful. This is definitely one of my favorite new albums of 2011, and I'm excited to see what else Lucy creates.

"The album often swings wildly from gorgeous interludes to foreboding atmospheres, where low frequencies bud and spore spontaneously. The beats are rarely predictable, sometimes not even danceable... That's not to say that Wordplay is all downcast weather and ruminative rumblings: The album's pumping midsection can be just as suffocating as it is warmly embracing, particularly the hissing field of locusts that surrounds the floating breakbeat in 'Bein' or the aural cement mixer that grounds 'Lav.'

Wordplay's defining feature is its immense and overwhelming sound design. Texture dominates over structure and rhythm. While definitely not an ambient album, it's easy enough to get lost in what's happening in or around the beats. It's something that anyone who loves electronic music, sound and sound manipulation, can fall in love with; when those microscopic fireworks burst blazing out of the percussion on 'Gas,' no one's going to care about time signatures or genre conventions. As techno continues to suffer through a bipolar identity crisis, fractured down the middle between minimal and, well, not minimal, it's producers like Lucy that prove just how far beyond those arbitrary boundaries the medium can be extended."

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Susumu Yokota - Love or Die

2007; 12 tracks

Susuma Yokota is a highly prolific ambient electronica artist from Japan. Love or Die is his third most recent album. Good music to listen to on the train.

"Love or Die appears to be a mixture of Yokota’s work within the past ten years. Though he remains intent on toying with triple metre structures, he reverts back to a form of piano-based loops and melodies that was demonstrated brilliantly in Grinning Cat. Love or Die is certainly one of the most eclectic albums of his career though, as murmurs of synth pads and touches if IDM are prevalent on tracks like 'A Song Produced While Floating Alone on Christmas Day' and 'A Slowly Fainting Memory of Love and Respect, and Hatred' within his usual accompaniments of strongly layered loops and rhythmic patterns."

"Yokota blends soft keyboard lines, strings, warm padded washes and a busy tempo of beats culled from a host of genres - break beats, techno stomp to the soft lilt that underpins the guitar and piano refrain of track four. This prolific artist has a canny knack of taking key elements from modern electronica and dance and melding them into something accessible and unchallenging."


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Swirlies - Strictly East Coast Sneaky Flute Music

1998; 16 tracks

What an album... Swirlies is an American indie rock band whose lineup seems to be constantly changing, but founding members Damon Tuntunjian and Andy Bernick are here to create a more experimental/noisy side of their usual more shoegaze sounds. Strictly East Coast Sneaky Flute Music features re-mixes of much of their earlier material by various DJs and other artists along with new material.

They're more traditionally recognised as a shoegaze act, and certainly a volume of their earlier material fits that cast very well, but this album is a peculiar hybrid of disjointed electronics, sound-collage, shoegaze and noise-pop. The other album I've heard, They Spent Their Wild Youthful Days in the Glittering World of the Salons, is a shoegaze gem with My Bloody Valentine-esque riffs and spacy drums. This album here, however, is much more experimental and playful. With electronica, hip-hop, and noise, this music is nothing short of intriguing.

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Man or Astro-Man? - Is It... Man or Astro-Man?

1993; 14 tracks

Man or Astro-Man? is an amazing surf rock/electronic/punk group from Auburn, Alabama. Created by college students Birdstuff, Coco the Electronic Monkey Wizard, and Star Crunch, Man or Astro-Man? firmly believes they are aliens sent to Earth from the universe solely to play surf rock. Is It... Man or Astro-Man? is the group's first album, and the only one I've heard so far, but it's so so good.

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Benoît Pioulard - Temper

2008; 16 tracks

Temper is a very mystic album, a glance at the world through the eyes of an outsider.

Benoît Pioulard, an American experimental folk musician/singer-songwriter/writer/photographer, is the pseudonym of Thomas Meluch. This is his 8th release and 2nd full-length album on the Kranky label. Pioulard actually had a new album come out this year, Lasted, which I just ordered!

After two tracks of laid-back folktronica, Temper plunges into an entirely ambient atmosphere saturated with the signs and sounds of new life. Nature-based ambience and soundscapes surround Temper, as the folk/electronic elements weave in and out in a very casual, pleasing way. "Modèle D'éclat" and "Idyll" are my favorite songs atmmmmm. A good descriptive word for this album would be... enchanting.

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Purchase

Le Le - Marble EP

2009; 6 tracks

This is a fun and interesting EP from the popular electronic/techno group Le Le, consisted of Dutch artists P. Fabergé (of De Jeugd Van Tegenwoordig), Piet Parra (the man who designed the cover of this and other Le Le albums, is also a fairly well-known designer/illustrator) and Rimeroni Vumani. It may not be as fully realized as their album Flage but the variety of European funk/techno styles is still present and as entertaining as ever. Woohoo for LE LE *heart*

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Belbury Poly - The Willows

2004; 11 tracks

Strange, interesting, and fun electronic music from UK's Ghost Box label, which "is a record label for a group of artists who find inspiration in folklore, vintage electronics, library music, and haunted television soundtracks." This beautiful album sounds like it was taken straight from a Chemistry titration video or, perhaps, a program on the division of atoms. Definitely one of a kind.

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Air - Talkie Walkie

2004; 10 tracks

I know I've said this before, but this album by French duo Air is one of my all-time favourites. Every track is truly a jewel and a treasure to behold - I hope you enjoy it as much as I did/do. :3

A part of me would like to travel in your veins

Humming Urban Stereo - Baby Love

2007; 15 tracks

Nice South Korean lounge/electropop music.

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Secede - Tryshasla

2005; 11 tracks

Love this album by Dutch artist Secede. It's exactly what I was looking for - a mix between Carbon Based Lifeforms and Hammock, maybe. I really could listen to this album forever.

Listening to Secede's new album 'Tryshalsa' is a bit like watching an episode of Twin Peaks through some bobbly bathroom glass. On your own. In the dark. Oh, and it's raining outside.


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