Io Echo At The Ministry Of Love

Io Echo are a stunning duo from Los Angeles who have stumbled upon their (dare I say it,) parents record collection, fallen in love with it, and pilfered as many influences as they could from it. Labeled as an industrial tinged group their album, Ministry of Love is anything but. Instead they sounding more like a Creatures side-side project mixed with bucket loads of shoegazing sheets of noise. The result is something that has this early 90's feel to it and really has more in common with the sort of things that 4AD used to release than anything Einsturzende Neubauten has ever done.

With the vocals of Ioanna Gika sounding like Siouxsie lost within a seemingly endless fog and the reverbed and washed out guitars of Leopold Ross crashing together, the band create this ethereal world that they're obviously absorbed in. The whole thing sounds like a modern update of the Cocteau Twins in an invisible fight with The Heartthrobs, The Creatures, and even the Dum Dum Girls. Packed with loud, gauzy, and gorgeous soaring pop the record is all about being lost in its own little environment and not being able to find its way out. It's riveting stuff that's so rooted in the records I listened to in my 20's it scares me. This record hits home, it pulls at my heart and reminds me of all the cool sounds that blew me away when I was a kid. As if to illustrate that point "Stalemate," at times, sounds so much like The Heartthrobs, "Kiss Me When I'm Starving," it could very well be them circa 1992; it gave me goosebumps.

Ministry of Love is worthy of your heart. It's an amazingly emotional and pretty record that tugs at your ears and soul for 55 minutes. It soars toward heaven on the wings of an angel and is welcomed with open arms when it gets there. This is the sound of a dream you don't want to end. It's the sound of the greatest love. It's the sound of something awe inspiring. Ministry of Love's songs are beautiful and Ioanna & Leopold have truly created something magical here. This is without a doubt this one of the best records of 2013 and might just be my favorite record this year.

Redtenbacher Funkorchestra Are In The Cooker

The rather complicatedly named Redtenbacher Funkorchestra have created one the most seriously groovy funk records you are likely to hear this year with their latest album entitled The Cooker. To put it succinctly the thing is fifteen jazz funk greats played with such intensity and down home funktasticness that if you don't find yourself at least tapping along to the record you must be dead. Overflowing with jazzy vibes, funky grooves and late 70's atmospherics The Cooker is a scorching hot release that knows how to get the heck down.

Packed to the rims with awesome bass lines, guitar runs, and enough B3 organ workouts this the sort of record that shows just how good Redtenbacher Funkorchestra are at letting their musical imaginations get the best of them. Throw in some ridiculous horn work on top of that imagination and you have a record that's just on a whole different level than anyone else right now. These guys can play and play they do on The Cooker and they're so good that they even make Happy Birthday sound like the grooviest thing since polyester. The Cooker is filled with movement and action and the songs are swinging, catchy, and impossible to forget.

There's no denying The Cooker and with a name like that how would that even be possible. This thing rocks, rolls, but never loses its soul. It's the sort of album that's perfect for car chases with Starsky and Hutch or running through the Streets of San Francisco. It's filled with energy, grooves, and a musicality that's hard to ignore. This record had to be called The Cooker because what else could you call something that's filled with so much hot stuff?

Vandana Vishwas' Monologues

Vandana Vishwas is an Indo-Canadian artist who takes the best of traditional Indian influences and blends them with modern techniques in a gorgeous brew of sounds that are both hypnotizing and fascinating. Her album Monologues is the result of a collaboration between her and her husband and reflect the talents of both artists pretty well. It's an meditative, intimate, and beautiful record that uses instrumentation you know and instrumentation you do not to convey its free spirited yet firmly rooted songs.

Monologues is a record steeped in history and custom but unafraid to let other non-traditional sounds permeate it's songs. While sitars and tablas are pretty much the basis for most of the songs here, several songs utilize jazz-like arrangements to give the songs added depth and a modern feel. I found it fascinating and imaginative how the two different worlds mingle simultaneously and co-exist relatively well. Monologues is a record at peace and lost in ecstasy and after a couple of listens it's very easy to become lost in it's world as well. The songs on Monologues cast a spell over your ears with their subtle pace and ambiance. Vishwas' songwriting is as mesmerizing as her trembling voice and the way she's able to hold the listener in a trance is awesome.

Monologues is a great record whose strength lies in it's ability to take the ancient and modern and make them sound unique and fresh. The intertwining of the two influences give the album room to breathe and develop and allows it to be more accessible. This is a simple record that utilizes very few instruments or production techniques and Vandana Vishwas' ability to give it an authenticity and purity is refreshing.

Justin Ancheta Plant's Roots

Justin Ancheta is a busy guy. From being in four or five different groups that aren't his, writing socially aware songs, teaching and creating art, and recording records the guy probably doesn't have very much time to breath. Yet somehow this guy, who probably keeps 5 Hour Energy in business, single handedly has managed to release his own record under the name of Plant. Now, to say Plant is an interesting effort is to discredit it because you are not likely to hear another record like this one this year.

Taking the strange bedfellows of reggae and klezmer music and making them work together and sound good is an accomplishment in and of itself. The fact that Plant not only does that but throws in hip hop vibes and indie rock drama to the mix and you suddenly have one culturally and musically diverse affair. Plant is filled to the rim with a crazy combination of sounds that shouldn't work in any way shape or form but somehow Ancheta makes them functional and cool. He establishes awesome rhythms that are a perfect blend of his influences and just happen to have a clarinet of the klezmer variety sitting on top. It's really hard to describe effectively and it's something you truly have to hear to believe but Plant really is a very cool listen. The whole thing has political leanings and message driven songs but it's all wrapped up with this unique blend of tunes that are appealing and aurally mesmerizing...or should I say klezmerizing.

Plant is the sort of record that proves reggae's message of one love eleven times over. This is a globally influenced and aware record that has a message but knows that the music comes first. Ancheta's ability to mix all these sounds into something that makes sense is not only a reflection of his songwriting ability but his never ending workload and ethic. Say what you will but his constant on the go lifestyle has paid off here with these influences living together in musical harmony. Unusual but good, Plant is the sort of record I imagine John Zorn listening to while on vacation.

No Hay Banda Wow And Flutter

Danish dynamic duo No Hay Banda are a seductive synth group who are clearly in love with the classic sounds of the 80's and see no problem with bringing them into the 21st century by any means necessary. Their album Wow and Flutter is a lush experience that's by far some of the coolest music to come out of Denmark ever. With a darkly delicious palette of synthetic sounds, driving beats, and ditties that are depressingly danceable these guys are operating on a Teutonic dance floor straight out of the Cold War.

Wow and Flutter is an ultra cool record that takes Berlin's synthetic detachment and rams it into chillwave at high speed. The result is a record that's smoky and at times gauzy while finding itself lost in a hangover. Wow and Flutter is sexy and it's dark detachment is alluringly hypnotizing and comes complete with sirenesque vocals that could lure men to their doom. This is the sound of electronic seduction that wraps huge hooks around your ears, sucks you in and never lets go. They might only be a duo but No Hay Banda find a way to make this record that sound as if there were a 100 musicians assisting them. Synths wash over you, guitars crunch, beats sweep you off your feet and the vocals make you fall in love and there behind it all are just two people.

Wow and Flutter is impressive effort that very rarely falters. From the, "Riding on the Metro," vibe of, "Inventing A Machine," to the potential hit of, "Neurotica," Wow and Flutter is packed with stark, cool, and beautiful tunes that sound larger than life. No Hay Banda have done an excellent job here of channeling the ghosts of the past into something that's minimal, modern, and very very good.

Paperhaus Go Lo Hi Lo

Paperhaus are an interesting band simply because they seemingly pick a genre to work in and then record a record within that genre. A strange approach, I agree but it seems to work out for them. While their debut EP was an alt-country sort of affair, their latest EP Lo Hi Lo is well informed by their Smiths collection. Sounding alot like The Smiths at times, Lo Hi Lo is moody, jangly, and very easy to latch on to. The lead off track "All Through The Night," is the kind of song that would make Johnny Marr blush or Morrissey run out and get a lawyer if he should hear it. It's that good and it's kind of scary how they may have inadvertently out Smiths'd the Smiths.

Lo Hi Lo is moodily brilliant and while depressingly short at four songs they do make a rather deep impact rather quickly. If the dizzying Marr influences aren't enough then the second and third songs, "Helicopters," "Corazon," have even more of an 80's and 90's British pop influence running through them. With enough jangly riffs, gauzy feedback, dramatic vocals and a shyness that is criminally vulgar the songs hark back to much cooler time in music. Even the EP closer, "Twisted Tumble," has this vintage feel to it that harks back to a much better time. Lo Hi Lo is an impressive effort that makes you wonder why they even bothered with trying their hand at alt-country; it's so good it makes me want to force Paperhaus to record 100 more songs like these and never let them never utter the words alt-country ever again.

Joanna Borromeo's Kaleidscope Of Sounds

Another day another neo-soul singer. There are so many at this point I'm beginning to wonder if they're not grown in a vat somewhere and then released as older ones burn out. As the great pop conspiracy grinds on without us knowing about it, Canadian singer Joanna Borromeo is the latest artist to discover her parents old records and be influenced and guided by them. Her rather cool looking album Kaleidoscope is a jazzy, chilled and soulful record that's a bit more mature than many of her peers.

Joanna Borromeo is soulful for sure, but there's this jazzy undercurrent throughout each of her songs that kind of veer away from being R&B or neo-soul and kind of take her more into being a chanteuse of some sort. Kaleidoscope is the sort of record that would find a perfect home on a contemporary jazz station with it's horns, superb drumming, and stirring vocals. While she may be part of the whole neo-soul thing this girl clearly has aspirations to leave that behind and move into more "adult" territory. Borromeo can sing either genre pretty well, but the songs on Kaleidoscope tend to lend themselves to her more jazz inflected vocals and one can't help but wonder if that's where her heart lies. There's very little diva-tastic wailing to be heard. Instead there's deeply emotional lyrical play and even when she has fun on a song like, "Your Shoes," she still lets the jazzy influences shine through above and beyond the soul-funk.

Joanna Borromeo is far from a cliche neo-soul chick. Oh no, she's too powerful, to mature, and has songs that are stronger than steel to come from an assembly line. Borromeo is diverse and entertaining and while I'm not the biggest fan of the genre she's entertaining enough to make me want to listen to her sing.