Michal Menert is the producer/protege of Pretty Lights.  He sounds like PL without the womp/dubstep sounds.  I think I like him even more than PL.  When PL kills it, he cannot be topped, but he is rather inconsistent due to his tendency to go off the deep end with the womp sound.  Menert has a more hip hoppy sound.  He plays with the beat and continuously introducing and ending different loops.  Each song is more of a sound evolution than a traditional song structure with repeating choruses/verses.  Like PL, Menert relies heavily on samples featuring horns, strings, thumping drums and base synths, great synth hooks, and washed out synths as beat enhancers.   He tops it off by scratching/glitching the drum beat often to give it that fresh feel.

Best Songs: Tomorrow May Never Come, Sun/Shadow, Where Do You Go?

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Last.fm

From an online review: Nottingham DJs Damien Stanly and Ged Day are the Deadbeats, and together they are making dark, smoky beats that sound like hazy, bass-heavy memories. Their new album Made in the Shade is a soundscape of ambient, down-tempo electronica from a slower dimension.

Best Song: You Never Know.

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Last.fm

If you haven’t heard of Pretty Lights, he’s a dj/beatmaster/live-music god out of fort collins, CO, who hand crafts his beats from so many copyrighted samples he has to give away his music for free.  His beats often use souful vocal samples with a strong thumping beat, overly distorted synth, horns, and strings but have a tendency to wander into the whompy/dub-steppy category, which can get old rather fast.  You can’t just listen to PL hanging out though, it’s best to listen to it running/biking etc…it’s amazing live, as he constantly improvises, and the energy of the show tangible and epic.  He is most famous for slowly, teasing and building to epic beat drops.

best song: Forever Lost

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We found these guys on an awesome podcast from a great local independent radio station out of Seattle (here, podcast). It’s just a 2 song EP, but the song “I Was Thinking…” literally grabbed me by the balls and said “Listen here, kid. And listen good.” So I did.

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Last.fm

Soulful, Indie Folkie.  Eddie (pseudonym) has a deep, soulful voice reminiscent of Roy Orbison.  These songs have a strong folk sensibility, and stay slow and contemplative, but manage to use the tradional folk elements in more modern, layered indie fashion.   If you’ve seen a commercial/youtube vid/movie in the past year with a nostalgic with song that almost brought a tear to your eye at “HOOOOOOME…/Home is whenever I’m with you,” congratulations you’ve heard their best song, and if you liked it, you’ll like this album.

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Last.fm

One of Hazen’s favorite songs of this summer “Collector” resides comfortably on this album. LastFM says:
“…Here We Go Magic is a remarkable departure from his [Luke Temple's] signature singer-songwriter material.
Luke recorded the album at home using analog synths, a cassette 4-track, and his trusty SM-57
mic, coloring the sound with warmth and creating textures you want to wrap yourself in.”

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Last.fm

Great summer surfer indie hand-claps and whistles band, check out the song “Let’s Go Surfing.”

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Last.fm

Bolaphone is a Czech Republic band focused on dark beats, described as meant for indie hip-hop enthusiast’s ears. It’s a bit reminiscent of DJ Shadow, focusing on lo-fi record-fuzz addled drums.

Last.fm

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Bonobo’s new album! Kiara, track 2, leaves me speechless every time.

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Colourmusic – Yes! [2009]

Dope “alt rock” that I found from watching Meathead Films‘ new movie “Wild Stallions” ski movie.

I hate labeling anything as rock now, but this is some fresh shit. LastFM says “Colourmusic began in Stillwater, Oklahoma by composing music based on Sir Isaac Newton’s theories of sound and colour.” Sweet.
Myspace: http://www.myspace.com/colourmusic