mixtape maestro (2.0)

A London indie four-piece who re-located to Louisiana to help give their self-described “swamp pop” sound some authentic Southern swagger, the Scoundrels pull this musical feat off well on “Just Can’t See It Through”, an energetic rocker built on catchy vocal hooks and swinging, blues-guitar spark.

“You’ve got your suitcase packed and you’re gonna use it/ As you scream your goodbyes on the telephone,” belts frontman Ned Wyndham with a tinge of soul grit embedded in his pipes. But no tears will be shed on his axe at the arrival of this long-distance announcement, as the singer simply shrugs off her dumping (“I can’t settle down for long,” he explains, “So I’m not gonna play with you no more”), opting to continue down his “road to ruin” instead.

Hey, if this partner-less “road” includes more excellent jams like these, we say to Hell with her then.

Look for the band’s self titled debut, to be produced by Steve Albini (Nirvana, Pixies, The Breeders), later this Summer; first single “Hangman’s Lament” (stream-able here) drops July 19th on One Fifteen Records.

DL: “Just Can’t See It Through” (alt)

After experiencing heartache at the hands of a compulsive liar on her infectious debut “My Baby Left Me”, London-born soul newcomer Rox opts to keep that whole “can’t find a good man” shtick alive on the equally likable follow-up “I Don’t Believe”.

Set to a sunny, acoustic guitar and handclaps soul-pop shuffle that lead one to nearly mistake the track for being another happy-in-love R&B number, “Believe” finds Rox relating the inner frustrations in still carrying a flame for a lame former partner. Yeah, she knows he’s a dog, but damn if even thinking about his “dangerous smile” doesn’t leave her all aflutter.

“I better get a grip on myself”, she internalizes, before launching into an irresistibly upbeat chorus of self-lambasting (“I don’t believe that you did it to me once again”) that brings to mind the best of The Noisettes’ last album.

Check out the “I Don’t Believe” video below, followed by a live clip of Rox pulling off an amazing reggae-fied rendition of Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams”.

Rox’ debut, Memoirs, drops in June.

BONUS DL: Rox “I Don’t Believe (Don Diablo Remix)” (alt)

BONUS DL: Rox “My Baby Left Me (Terror Danjah Mix)” (alt)

The fourth release lifted from The Noisettes‘ excellent (and nowhere near as big as it should be) Wild Young Hearts album, “Every Now & Then” sees the London band staying in line with previous singles “Wild Young Hearts” and “Never Forget You”, doling out another magnificent fusion of ex-lover nostalgia with a ’60′s soul-pop-inspired musical frame.

But whereas those tracks hid frontwoman Shingai Shoniwa’s regrets over past romances behind perky arrangements, illustrating a sensibility that she had for the most part healed with the passing of time, “Every Now & Then” follows an opposite route, finding her still handicapped by an enormous heartache with moody guitar and swirling strings depicting her inner despair with a moving dramatic flair.

“You see we were never through/ I never said I loved you/ Even when we said goodbye/ I never thought it was the last time,” a down-in-the-dumps Shingai recalls, a single moment of solitude or a certain song being played on the radio instantly filling her mind with tearjerking memories of secret kisses in a certain former love’s bedroom and the postcards he would send inked with “stories (that) would excite me”.

With her yearning for a gust of wind to bring him back into her life and light up “this empty room” she dubs her current depressing existence, Shoniwa’s sorrow cuts so deep, you can’t help but be pulled into the doldrums alongside her, especially once the arrival of a stunning Bond theme song-like climax of swollen orchestration and piercing cries of being “down, down, down” come into play.

Catch the song’s music video below, then take a listen to one of our favorite cuts from Mick Boogie and Terry Urban’s must-have Noisettes vs. Kanye West mash-up mixtape Wild Young Heartbreak: “Saturday Night Paranoia”, Chicago production duo Christian Rich‘s metallic-sleek marriage of the Noisettes’ revenge fantasy “Saturday Night” with West’s whip-crack heavy, new wave jaunt “Paranoid”.

DL: “Saturday Night Paranoia (Christian Rich Remix)” (alt)

Few will balk if you happen to surprise them with a random spinning of The Specials’ spook n’ ska classic “Ghost Town”, but try pre-warning the same crowd with an announcement that you’re going to play a cover of the song that’s completely sung in Portuguese and draped in a Brazilian folk sound, and the reaction might not be as immediately positive (Odds are, you’ll be met with a couple seconds of confused stares and uncomfortable silence).

Still, if only for curiosity’s sake, we’d recommend you give this remake, handled by London male/ female duo Zeep (formerly known as the “Underwater Love”-producing Smoke City) a listen: Yeah, vocalist Nina Miranda’s breathless purrs are seducing, temporarily fooling you into believing she’s trying to romance a boy toy rather than sing of her neighborhood’s ills, but it’s the jaw-dropping way they recreate the original’s familiar musical elements in a breathtakingly dreamy Tropicália context that’ll truly woo you in.

One of many great world music-inspired treasures to be found on their stellar new album, People & Things.

DL: “Ghost Town (The Specials Cover)” (alt)

Just when you think pop music has exhausted all of it’s best tricks, that all we’ll have left is a billion regurgitations of “Boom Boom Pow” or some other ridiculous catchphrase, something comes along that smacks you across the foreheard so damn right, you once again begin to hold out hope for what the genre has to offer around the corner.

“New York”, from East London-born singer/ actress Paloma Faith, is one of those “somethings”.

Opening as a stately pop ballad slightly modernized by a subtle hip hop percussive swing, “New York” won’t instantly grab you as anything all that extraordinary. Yeah, Faith’s crisp, soul-tinged voice is nice, and the lyrics’ “cheated-on” sorrow theme bears an appreciable grown-up singer/ songwriter text (“The days were long and the night so cold/ The pages turn and the tale unfolds/ He left me for another lady”), but for nearly a minute you’re left with the ho-hum idea that Paloma is just another in a long line of less-frazzled Winehouse soundalikes (or the “new Lisa Stansfield”).

Then, assisted by a theatrical instrumental soar through the skies, that breath-halting chorus arrives: “Her name was New York, New York/ And she took his heart away from mine”, a clever switcheroo reveal (Whoa! She’s talking about a city!!) that instantly re-positions one’s perspective on everything that came before that moment (“She stood so tall and she never slept/ There was not one moment he could regret…”) and what will arrive afterward (“The newfound friends she introduced you to/ I don’t want to know them/ I just want to be with you”).

Great lyrics. Commanding vocal performance. A rousing, knot-in-throat climax aided by a gospel choir and ascending strings. Yeah, we smell a future standard with this one.

The single officially arrives September 13th; Pre-order Paloma’s debut, Do You Want The Truth or Something Beautiful, dropping Sept. 29th, here.

The past decade-and-a-half has seen so many classic pop and rock favorites sampled, interpolated or chopped up for some brand new pop, hip hop or R&B creation that we probably shouldn’t be too stirred that someone would think of messing with Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit”. But when we heard London-born R&B tart Cherri V‘s “Til The Sun Comes Up” and instantly recognized it’s utilization of both the ’90′s grunge-pop behemoth’s vocal and guitar melodies, we must admit we were floored: on one hand intrigued by such a ballsy move; on the other, ready to cry out “blasphemy” over someone actually daring to go through with the idea.

To it’s credit, “Til The Sun Comes Up” isn’t a complete nightmare: the combination of it’s “borrowed” rock “edge” and bubbly percussive jubilance generates a lively urban-pop kick that wouldn’t sound out of place supporting a manic Amerie wail or epic-sized Beyonce yowl. But thanks to flat lyrical boasts (“I’ll break you off/ You’ll never find another star shine like me”) and Cherri V’s underwhelmingly mixed vocals, which kind of simmer within the groove when they should be exploding like fireworks atop it, “Sun” lacks the over-the-top fire you would expect from a record made up of a such bold musical foundation, ultimately rendering it this anti-climactic letdown.

Surely the track’s Nirvana bite will attract some major attention Cherri V’s way (precisely the effect her and her handlers are banking on), but it’ll be interesting to see whether the response will ultimately skew positive (and make her pop’s hot new thing) or negative (and force her back to the drawing board to come up with an alternate introductory gimmick) as more and more ears catch whiff of it.

Cherri’s debut, Fast Cars, Silk Sheets and Favourite Guys, is slated for a late ’09 release.

There may be “dark times ahead”, as frontwoman Ali Howard so delicately coos at the beginning of “Woah Billy”, but not even her edge-of-suicidal, teenybopper longing for the titular heartthrob can disrupt the sugar-high that this new Lucky Soul single produces.

The track’s glammy stomp and handclap-laden girl group giddiness damn near emits rays of sunshine through the speakers, showing little compassion for Howard’s depressed diary entries (“I’m like a flower in the shade,” goes one whine); throw in a sudden gear shift when the production makes a pit-stop at the Studio 54 and briefly get it’s “Hustle” on, sending disco lasers every which way, and you’ve got yourself one of the best pop confections of the year.

It’s only too bad that we’ll have to wait all the way until October to snatch up the rest of these London lads’ much-anticipated sophomore collection.

DL: “Woah Billy” (alt)

A trippy, world-pop excursion through tantalizing Afro-beat and house influences, “Tonight’s Today”, the new single from London singer-songwriter Jack Peñate, makes a helluva leap away from the sprightly, guitar-pop that defined his 2007 debut, Matinée, in turn launching all kinds of excitement for what other strange cookings he and producer Paul Epworth (Bloc Party, Sam Sparro, Kate Nash) have planned for his upcoming sophomore set.

It’s dense, yet loose-flowing, groove mastering an exotic beauty, “Tonight’s Today” is one of those records you can easily get lost in, inspiring a need to place it on loop just so you can try to figure out in what loony mind one must have been in to ever think of pasting it’s oddly attractive elements together.

Helpfully, Peñate gathers some meaning out of the mesmerizing arrangement’s mystery, using it as an effective illustration to a man’s post-party, zombie-like traipse through the streets as the night sky slowly gives way to daybreak. “The thought has just started dawning/
That there’s still so much more that I can do,” he explains, either unaware or without care of how much his dead-eyed demeanor is freaking out passersby.

Forewarning: After one spin, you probably won’t be able to get this creepy tune out of your head.

Jack Peñate – Tonight's Today

Wanna briefly trick folks into believing that Duffy’s inescapable “Rehab”-wannabe retro-exercise “Mercy” was in actuality a remake of some obscure ’60′s soul number? Send them a link to this cover of the 2008 original by South London production outfit The Third Degree via indie label Acid Jazz Records.

An ever-moving groover spiked by blaring horns, hyperactive drum work and a gritty lead male vocalist who sounds like he’s in the midst of a spiritual fit as he begs to be released from up under his lover’s spell, The Third Degree’s sweaty reading oozes old-school, vinyl-spinning authenticity right down to it’s “so-thick-sounding-it-must-be-ancient” haziness.

Look for it’s 7″ inch release March 9th.

Ska/ reggae-loving London singer-songwriter Nick Harrison offers something feel-good and bright in these shivering cold months with new single, “Something Special”, a sunny indie-pop romp with a pulsating disco groove about sad-eyed nightclub beauties.

Tucked beneath it’s happy rhythmic galore, Harrison’s lyrics hone in on a girl whose forlorn demeanor isn’t completely hidden by the strobe lights that flash around her. “Tragically dressed she arrives/ Holding her head off the dance floor,” notes Nick, his every taunting wail ending in a trail of quivers. Anxious to pull the slut-uniformed gal out of her doldrums, Harrison steps to her with the self-esteem-building advice: “You’ve been given something special/ When you put it to good use,” adding with a tinge of doom that if she doesn’t at least attempt to recognize those attributes and follow a different life path, she’ll surely “pay the price”.

Alas, his words end up falling on deaf ears (“You said you couldn’t change for me”), but that doesn’t stop Nick from recanting his good will urgings as she disappears back into the crowd or make the gleeful dance chug he’s pieced together feel any less infectious.

Nick Harrison – 'Something Special'

Head on over to Harrison’s MySpace and check out other mood-raising offerings like the breezy “Honey” or ska-loping delight, “Oi Rude Boy”. Below, snatch up a quite genius mash-up of “Something Special” with The Specials’ “Ghost Town”:

DL: “Something Special (Ghost Town Mash-Up)” (alt)

Nick’s debut, One Drop, is set for release in 2009.