New This Week: Frightened Fossil Pandas Clash with Veronica's Elephant

Happy Valentine's Day, KXSCers and Friends!

On this very special (and disdainful) day, we give you the latest and greatest in new adds, straight from the Minestrone of Music itself.

Enjoy these tunes before and/or after you swing by Tommy's Place on Friday 2/15 for KXSC & SPECTRUM PRESENT: I'M SINGLE AND I HATE YOU, A NIGHT OF LOCAL LA PUNK.

Frightened Rabbit - Pedestrian Verse: Frightened Rabbit's brutally honest second album, The Midnight Organ Fight, spoke profoundly to my frustrated existence as a lonely & fragile 16 year old. My old friends return with a record far more consistent than 2010's The Winter of Mixed Drinks, characterized by a maturation of both lyrical content and production. Lyricist Scott Hutchison broadens his scope to include scathing societal portraits, as on opener "Acts of Man": "Let's promise every girl we marry/We'll always love them, though we probably won't/While a knight in shitty armor rips a drunk out of her dress". Yet in the same song he still manages to tie in the emotional specificity he's known for: "I have never wanted more to be your man/And build a house around you/But I am just like all the rest of them/Sorry, selfish, trying to improve/I'm here, I'm here/Not heroic but I try". The band, energized by the stellar drum work of Scott's brother Grant, rallies around twisty guitar lines and avoids the dusty, ramshackle feel of previous records. This lonely & fragile 20 year old approves. - ZN

Recommended Tracks: "Acts of Man", "Oil Slick", "Holy"

Beach Fossils - Clash the Truth: Clash the Truth is like the perfect music for a movie montage - but from a good movie andin a good way. The album is like a blend of post-punk, new wave and a slice of dram pop. The album makes you feel as if you're driving tothe beach; even if you're not really "into" the beach, the album will make you believe that you are. However, this album isnt just another garage style record - rather, the looping instrumentals and familiar melodies make for a lo-fi sound that is as emotive as it is energizing and nostalgic. Oh, and it has Kazu Makino of Blonde Redhead on the last track!! - JH 

Recommended Tracks: "Clash the Truth", "Taking Off", "Crashed Out"

Gold Panda - Trust: British producer Gold Panda continues to lean heavily on woozy electronics in this latest release for Ghostly International, but his sound palette has expanded to allow for greater tonal shifts. The title track immediately establishes a chilled-out lounge groove, complete with bubbling synth textures and a smoky sax sample. This segues into "Burnt-Out Car in a Forest", an insistent slice of microhouse that pulsates with unease; an 808 clap slides in and out of the mix, stuttering along to create an intricate polyrhythm. There's only 15 minutes of music on this release, but it's a well-crafted slab of electronica that deserves to be listened to in one sitting. - ZN

Recommended Tracks: "Trust", "Casyam_59#02", "Burnt-Out Car in a Forest"

 Veronica Falls - Waiting for Something to Happen: Veronica Falls has taken on a sunnier sound with Waiting for Something to Happen.  The female/male vocals are perfectly in sync with one another as the dueling guitars compete with one another to an upbeat drum pattern. Still true to Clifford's "horror rock" musical philosophy, this album is a nod to the songs of the 1960s. Waiting For Something To Happen is an echo of the rock groups of decades past... The songs are romantic and appropriately poppy - and yes, okay, it's a good "Valentines Day" album if that's what you really want to know. - JH

Recommended Tracks: "Buried Alive", "Waiting for Something to Happen", "Falling Out"

 Elephant Stone - Elephant Stone: Fronted by Black Angels’ sitar shredder Rishi Dhir, the band harks back to the days when fuzzed-out guitars and LSD fueled the airwaves (last Tuesday?). Following in the 1960’s psych revival by foreign groups like Tame Impala and Dungen, Elephant Stone blend their throwback influences with modern fidelity and solid songwriting. They even take their name from a song by cult Brits the Stone Roses (Coachella, anyone?). With a sound landing somewhere between indie and Indian, Dhir’s self-proclaimed “Hindie rock” (PUN POINTS!) is a must for anyone who considers themselves a defender of the psych or just a far-out dude. For fans of Tame Impala, Yuck, The Doors, and Pink Floyd. - NA

Recommended Tracks: "Heavy Moon", "Looking Thru Baby Blue", "Masters of War"

New This Week: My Bloody Hummingbirds from Nowhere

My Bloody Valentine - m b v: FROM THE MOMENT I PRESSED PLAY, I KNEW...jk

Recommended Tracks: "New You", "Only Tomorrow", "In Another Way"

Local Natives - Hummingbird: Some folks may dismiss the Natives' sophomore release because there's nothing quite as bombastic or immediately electrifying as, say, "Sun Hands" from 2010's Gorilla Manor. However, I think this album is fairly brilliant in its subtleties; producer Aaron Dessner of The National gives a remarkable sense of space to these compositions, and Taylor Rice offers his best lyrical work to date.

Recommended Tracks: "Colombia", "Breakers", "Heavy Feet"

Darkstar - News from Nowhere: Disclaimer: I'll add anything Warp Records puts out.  With that being said, we have a very solid 2nd release from an English electronic trio that began with dubstep experimentation before transitioning into synthpop on their first album for Hyperdub. Here, the group tries psychedelia on for size and ends up with something in the vein of Animal Collective.

Recommended Tracks: "Timeaway", "Armonica", "A Day's Pay for a Day's Work" 

Unknown Mortal Orchestra - II: I always confuse this band with Manchester Orchestra. I'm pretty sure this is the good one. The follow-up to UMO's self-titled debut expands on that record's psyched-out soul and places a heavy emphasis on Ruban Nielson's exceptional guitar chops. Some of the noodling gets a little tiresome, but the hooks hit hard despite complex chord changes. A slight yet engaging evolution from a group that will be very interesting to hear develop in the coming years.

Recommended Tracks: "So Good at Being in Trouble", "Faded in the Morning", "Swim and Sleep"

New This Week: True Elements of the 21st Century

Pantha Du Prince and the Bell Laboratory - Elements of Light One of my absolute favorite producers contrasts his minimal techno stylings with a live orchestra of marimbas, xylophones, chimes, and this monstrosity (known as a bell carrion).  Pantha has always employed bell sounds as a prominent motif in his compositions, but the live instrumentation adds a real sense of expansiveness and depth here.  You can feel an outright humanity running through this album as the players command different timbres, weaving around and brushing up against one another in pursuit of a singular musical idea.  Some of these tracks are quite long but very much worth the wait if you let them breathe on your show ("Spectral Split" in particular).  Otherwise, "Photon" should be the go-to for the majority of you.

Recommended Tracks: "Photon", "Quantum", "Spectral Split"

Foxygen - We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic - I'm sure you can understand why I was leery when this one arrived in our inbox.  Against all odds, this duo from LA has crafted a collection of slinky, hooky pop that actually makes the name Foxygen tenable.  This is a record that bursts with energy, bounding gleefully from genre to genre to see what fits (sometimes within the same track).  The shapeshifting "Shuggie" and "On Blue Mountain" ingeniously stitch together wildly diverse ideas, while "San Francisco" doubles down on its impossibly catchy yet puzzling chorus: "I left my love in San Francisco/(That's OK, I was born in LA)".

Recommended Tracks: "San Francisco", "Shuggie", "We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic"

Solange - True - Slowly but surely, Solange Knowles is hammering out her own artistic identity away from the towering shadow of her older sister.  After trying her hand at uptempo R&B and dusty Motown on her first two records, Solange began to show a greater interest in our sort of music, bringing Hov & B to a Grizzly Bear concert in Williamsburg and performing "Stillness Is the Move" with the Dirty Projectors.  On her latest EP, the 26 year old works with producer Devonté Hynes to create accessible electronic-tinged pop with a Madonna vibe circa 1986.  Bolstered by Knowles's strong vocals, these songs simmer with yearning, doubt, and resentment.

Recommended Tracks: "Losing You", "Lovers in the Parking Lot", "Locked in Closets"