Indie Music Universe

BROADCAST STAGES TO BENEFIT INDIE STATIONS IN

ALL POINTS WEST INTERVIEW AND PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE BELOW

In its third year Toyota’s Free Yr Radio brings music to the masses hosting the Free Yr Radio Broadcast Stage benefitting independent stations at All Points West, Outside Lands, Bumbershoot, CMJ and Voodoo Festival.

Launched in 2007 with a mission to support independent radio stations Free Yr Radio has equipped over 20 partner stations with tools to increase exposure and listener support. Those stations have included KEXP (Seattle an NY), The Current (Twin Cities, MN), KUSF (San Francisco) and KXLU (Los Angeles) among others. In previous years the campaign hosted shows featuring top indie talent in Urban Outfitters stores across the U.S. Partner bands have included Sonic Youth, No Age, Mudhoney, Dinosaur Jr., King Khan, !!!, Dan Deacon, Grizzly Bear, Yeasayer and others.   In addition to generating awareness and support through the free station-hosted concerts, participating radio stations were also given the opportunity to award a brand new Toyota Yaris to a listener to help boost fundraising or listener appreciation efforts.

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Popularity: 23% [?]

By Kristin Anderson

You can run and you can hide but Venus Infers will find you.

The Orange County-based band comprises frontman Davis Fetter, drummer Steve Wilmot, guitarist Hiro Makino and bassist Richard Marion.  Although this band is technically an indie rock band they do not make reference to themselves as such..Venus Infers stands by the motto that "music is for all ears". "When composing the art, artists should be discriminating," Fetter said, but "not when choosing their audience." And the world, mainstream and otherwise are most certainly in agreement.

I was sure that all the wonderful reviews meant that the band was enough like other popular bands to have the general public in a tizzy of lemming like agreement. But sometimes, just sometimes the masses are on to something. Venus Infers is remarkable. They have single-handedly taken all the things that you love about music and executed a sound that is so natural, so precisely its own flavor of rock genius, I am completely smitten. They move you the way bands like Coldplay, Radiohead, and The Killers do, with a grasp on what connects people and the common thread that bonds how we feel and the choices we make. All this and they make it seem effortless.

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Popularity: 18% [?]

Hightide Blues took the stage for the first time in 2006 and has been gracing hundreds of stages for thousands of fans ever since. Their sound is a throw back to southern rock with a modern twist and an original delivery that's in a category of it's own. With their high-energy performances and huge fan base it's no surprise that Hightide Blues has shared the stage with national acts such as Sara Bareilles, JJ Grey & Mofro, Delta Spirit, Graham Colton, Jason Isbell, Matt Costa, Donavon Frankenreiter, Sister Hazel, The Whigs, Zac Brown Band, Karl Denson, and many more.

Their delivery of acoustic and electric guitars with a hard-hitting rhythm section has lead to sold out shows all over the Southeast and won't be stopping there. Hightide Blues played Bonnaroo 2008, and are expanding their touring with shows all over the US of A.

In February 2008 Hightide Blues recorded their second EP "Love Come Easy" with producer Richard McLaurin at House of David Studios in Nashville, where music legends Elvis, Neil Young, B.B. King, Joe Cocker, and Roy Orbison recorded some of the most influential albums in music history. The highly anticipated "Love Come Easy" is generating excitement from fans and major record labels alike. Being labeled the fastest up and coming band in the Southeast, Hightide Blues is following in the footsteps of the many music legends who graced the very same studio, and anything is possible for this band as they tour the country picking up momentum and fans along the way.

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Popularity: 17% [?]

"Smells Like Teen Spirit was my first favorite song by any artist of all genres," says hip-hop artist Stix in response to his claim that he is the black Kurt Cobain. "He was a huge influence for the youth as far as music is concerned. He had a interesting following, and that’s where our similarities are."

While he sounds more like Jay Z than Kurt Cobain the musician born and raised in Watts is hoping to influence another generation of youth with his own musical stylings. Stix has made it a point to reach out to today’s youth and has played small tours of inner-city schools, keeping it real and letting them know that anybody can be anybody if they work at it.

In case you get the idea that Stix is only playing school gymnasiums, he has cut his chops with six years of roadwork from coast-to-coast and around the world. These gigs include playing his favorite venue – the Staples Center and "performing on stage with Doug E. Fresh at the Aruba Jazz Festival." Playing to a crowd of more than 60,000 on a beach was an experience that Stix describes as, "Insane!"

But that was then, this is now and I’m Fly is the first single off his upcoming Late for Soundcheck CD that drops on August 18. "I kept the featured musicians limited because I wanted the listener to focus on me," says Stix with regards to the recording process for Soundcheck. "So really, the only big name featured on my album is Tyrese."

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Popularity: 12% [?]

Riceboy Sleeps by Riceboy Sleeps

Jon Thor Birgisson (Sigur Ros) and Alex Somers (Parachutes) have been exhibiting artwork and staging exhibitions under the name Riceboy Sleeps for a few years now. Their track "Happiness" was featured on the "Dark Was The Night" compilation. This record is more active than its antecedents in the ambient output of Brian Eno and other deliberately low-impact works.

I’m Going Away by The Fiery Furnaces

Their eighth album and first studio record since 2007’s "Widow City". CD presented in a 4-panel mini-LP style jacket. LP limited to 1,500 copies and pressed on HQ 180 gram virgin vinyl at RTI. Presented in an old-style tip-on gatefold jacket with MP3 download coupon.

The Satanic Satanist by Portugal. The Man

Alternative Press (p.110) – 4 stars out of 5 — "[T]he band deliver a powerhouse of pithy Motown and funk-inspired classics, with hints of ’60s anti-war folk, ’70s soul and ’90s alternarock….The songs themselves are rock solid…".

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Popularity: 17% [?]

SEE 2. HEAR 5. We are a power duo. A whirlwind of sound and energy. An explosion of psychedelic blues and rock. Jamie plays guitar and sings while Danielle plays drums and keyboard simultaneously.

We met during our freshman year at college in 1996 and have been together ever since. In October 2005, we started our band on a whim for a Halloween party and played our first show in our basement. We recorded our first song, which made it onto an in-store CD compilation for retailer Anthropologie.

Our first demo was reviewed as “…a cross between the Stones and The Stooges” by Compendium Magazine. In March 2007, we played our first New York City gig, headlining the show. Last July, we were a featured act at Philadelphia University (our alma mater). This year, we won Philadelphia STYLE Magazine’s 2008 Best Unsigned Band competition.

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Popularity: 14% [?]

New music marketing service pays fans to hear latest song releases, connects talented artists in all genres directly with music-buying public

Warrenville, Ill. (PRWEB) July 14, 2009 — Executives of JamBuzzer.com, a Warrenville, Ill.-based technology start-up, today announced the launch of AdJams, a novel online music marketing service that enables both artists and fans to share music-generated revenue and profits.

"AdJams paves the way for a revitalized global music industry that will provide fans with free access to a huge selection of high quality songs by thousands of talented artists," said JamBuzzer.com president Aaron Bradley.

"A novel economic model based on a music currency called the JamDollar (j$) will, in essence, enable listeners to obtain free music," said Bradley. "Fans will be able to ‘earn’ their music, without cash, while artists will realize increased opportunity for a lucrative music career doing what they love," he said.

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Popularity: 9% [?]

Isabel Valencia was born in 1984, in Medellin, Colombia, in the valley between lush green mountains and the river Medellin. Pablo Escobar came to prominence when she was a young girl, and war soon broke out between the Colombian Government and the drug lords. Bombings and violence rocked Medellin in the late eighties and the economy suffered. Isa's father moved to the United States to look for work. Isa's sisters soon followed. Isa, the youngest, was left behind in Colombia with her mother. She became lonely and depressed. Her grades dropped. Her spirit faded. Then she found an old nylon string guitar beneath her bed one day. It changed her world.

Isa still has no idea where the guitar came from. After she learned her first chords and began to write songs, it became clear she had found a way to channel her sense of loneliness, isolation and abandonment into music. Rock music.

Isa's gift for songwriting was almost immediately apparent. By the time she was fourteen, she was writing the songs that the seniors at her high school performed at the closing ceremony of their graduations. The Nuns at her Catholic school, the same Nuns who only a year earlier had scolded her for losing focus in her studies – were now relying on Isabel to compose religious tunes for their Church services. Isabel formed her first band when she was only 15 years old, and she never looked back.

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Popularity: 19% [?]

We Were Promised Jetpacks by These Four Walls

Like fellow Scotsmen Frightened Rabbit and The Twilight Sad, We Were Promised Jetpacks bring emotional intensity to the forefront in their immensely appealing rock anthems. Adding nimble, driving rhythms and bristling tension to the mix, they unfold their songs into effortless-seeming choruses imbued with romanticism and pop sensibility

Civilized by Stellastarr

Coming off a break-out trip to SXSW 2003, this unsigned New York-based band was immediately booked personally by Carson Daly and was the first unsigned band to perform on his Last Call With Carson Daly show. Other media and industry influencers, from Nic Harcourt, to NME, to a host of blogs and tastemakers, soon took notice of this bands distinctive sound and energetic live show, and within the year, Stellastarr had been signed to RCA Records. Stellastarr released their self-titled debut album in 2003. Support surged in from mainstream press outlets such as Rolling Stone, Spin, MTV News, Vanity Fair, New York Magazine, The New Yorker, LA Times, and the crème de la crème of the indie world. They continued to grow their following with their 2005 sophomore album, "Harmonies for the Haunted", and by touring the country and the world with artists such as Jane s Addiction, Joe Strummer, Placebo, Editors, DEVO, The Killers, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Following their two records with RCA, the band decided to branch out on their own. Their 3rd album, ‘Civilized’, which was produced by Tim O’Heir (who also produced their debut), is released on Stellastarr’s own Bloated Wife Records, through Warner’s Independent Label Group.

Upper Air by Bowerbirds

UPPER AIR, the Bowerbirds’ second release, finds the band continuing in the vein of their first effort; this is rustic, cerebral, ramshackle music. One could call it "beard rock"–it’s the kind of backwoods, wild-poet-of-the-mountain sound that …    Full Descriptionnods to Bon Iver, Bonny Prince Billy, and Iron & Wine. What makes the Bowerbirds just a touch different lies in how manipulative (in a good way) their songs can be. "House of Diamonds," with its stormy percussion and piano chords, and blocky guitar riffs, is simply electrifying. But the Bowerbirds really are at their best when they call up the quietly fiery side of their sound. "Ghost Life"’s wordless chorus (a series of triumphant "ohs") shouldn’t be as convincingly uplifting as it is; it’s a testament to the Bowerbirds’ creative chemistry and pop sensibilities that it works as well as it does. UPPER AIR only runs into trouble when the Bowerbirds get a little too introspective; some of the slow, meandering tracks here tend to get muddily dirge-like ("Chimes"). But this is a small issue in the wake of all the twisting, strangehearted stuff this disc has to offer.

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Popularity: 16% [?]

Nive Nielsen is an Inuit singer/songwriter from Greenland. Yup, North Pole! She is currently mixing her debut album "Nive Sings – as played by Nive Nielsen & The Deer Children." The result is nothing short of amazing, both in scope and vision. It's not every day we hear a record from the High North, let alone one with an all-star cast of indie music contributors including John Parish (who also produced the majority of the album), Howe Gelb & Giant Sand, Ralph Carney, and musicians from Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Evangelista, Clues/Unicorns, Black Keys, Eric Matthews and many others. Influences are as broad as Bessie Smith, Arthur Russell, Americana, old dusty 78s, Cat Power and Townes Van Zandt.  Arctic folk? Snow songs? Ukulele-wielding Eskimos? All of that and more. Do check it out!

Nive:

"I never aimed at making a record, let alone having other people hear my songs. I just got bored, my boyfriend gave me a uke, and songs started spilling out. They're very personal songs, heartfelt and simple and honest and basically just me. To actually record them, that was just a game, nothing serious at first. Just fun, yknow. Then we got into it, into the actual recording process. Jan started to focus on arranging what I was playing and singing -and things started to move, it became actual songs. And now, all of sudden, people are writing to me, asking for a record, wanting me to perform… it's real cool, but also kinda surreal. I 'm really really happy with the record – it took a while, cause we did everything ourselves, with no financial support -but it's here, and it's really good!

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Popularity: 18% [?]