March 12, 2010

Francois & the Panda...

Stumbled upon a promo mail from Peruvian/Argentinean/French (now in London residing) singer-/songwriter Francois Peglau the other day, in which he claimed that “You will not a find a more independent project than this”. Taking into consideration some of the artists I’ve previously featured around here that’s quite a bold statement, as I sometimes feel a need of inventing a word that describes music that’s more underground than “underground”. But I always find the DIY approach to music appealing, though his true selling point was his apparent liking of Northern Portrait, which sort of erased any excuses I had for not giving the promo track One Minute to Midnight Dream (so sad) a closer look. Mr. Peglau himself calls his music “"socio dramatic Peruvian pop" which is a sort of lo-fi pop with socialist taints”, and though I haven’t checked the lyrics for any political contents, the lo-fi (and pop) label definitely fits this recording perfectly. The trained ear (not mine) will probably hear inspirations ranging from everywhere between the 60’ies to Twee pop, but as always the real important thing (to me) is the quality of the songwriting, as I’m hopeless at describing music, much less discussing the production. So basically it comes down to; do I like the song or not? Well, it’s infectiously catchy, instantly charming and it even has violins in it; so yes - of course I like it.
+ One Minute to Midnight Dream (so sad)

Panda Riot has mailed me a copy of the band’s forthcoming EP Far & Near, which will be out on May 10 (read more). With the drum machine beats, the distorted guitars and the angel-like female vocals the six fine tracks sound like Panda Riot squared (with the short and ambient instrumental Parallax View being the one exemption). So Far & Near won’t really take you anywhere new, but for any fan of pure shoegaze/dream pop it won’t be a disappoint either.
+ Motown Glass

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