Thee Oh Sees - Ghosts in the Trees

The War On Drugs - Taking The Farm

Hailing from Philadelphia, The War On Drugs blend the harmonic rhythm of Arcade Fire with the hippy/happy leanings of Animal Collective and look set to gain a much wider following by the end of the year, in the US at least. Their debut album ‘Wagonwheel Blues’ is not out until June but several tracks can be found on their myspace and are well worth checking out.

Much of The War On Drugs’ music conjures up images of 1970s-era America with folky song structures inspired by the likes of The Eagles and Bob Dylan. ‘Taking the Farm’ may even be a nod to Dylan’s performance of ‘Maggies Farm’ at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival when he famously went electric.

The track ebbs and flows as it rides the crest of a wave of distorted guitars and filtered effects, similar to 2007s ‘Bros’ from Panda Bear. It’s an ode to standing on your own two feet, a call-to-arms and a modern-day anthem for the American Dream; Fievel goes west and lives happily ever after.

In contrast to the previous post, Portishead’s ‘Machine Gun’ is more suited to post-midnight listening than Summer. It’s not so much a shade darker as a completely different part of the spectrum - the colour of darkness consisting of deep blues and swirling purples.

Two sparse drumbeats play throughout in almost a call and response style with Beth Gibbon’s fragile voice trapped in between. The machine-gun-like percussion elements dominate the track just as on Prodigy’s ‘Spitfire’ only without Juliet Lewis screeching over the surface. The haunting vocals are instead submerged deep down within, creating a sense of dread that surrounds like smoke.

A blissed out summery tune perfect for hot hazy August afternoons with bare feet on grass, eyes closed, mobile phone (and brain) switched off. Just press play and for 3 minutes even rainy April will feel like Summer.

Maybe it’s just me getting older but DJs seem a lot younger these days… Although they do say the earlier you start the better you’ll get, so maybe it’s good news? And as The Who always said; the kids are alright.

Cliches aside, French DJ and wonderkid Surkin is doing better than alright. Active since 2006 he has already remixed tracks for Klaxons, DJ Mehdi and Chromeo among others and is one of the busiest DJs on the Paris scene. Still only 21 years old, the baby-faced maestro looks like he’d struggle to get past the average bouncer let alone take up residence on the decks.

‘Next of Kin’ is a cool slice of House beginning with an ominous opening chord before bursting into an arms-in-the-air anthem as bright as a sky full of neon. Combining chopped-up lyrics, a wailing siren and 80s synth with 21st century beats, Surkin shows that retro can still sound fresh.

Instrumental dance music often gets criticised for sounding repetitive yet last year’s breakout dance act The Field took repetition and ran with it, layering endless 4/4 rhythms to create hypnotic walls of sound.

The relatively unknown Coralcola adopts a similar style, basing Heath Ledger on the ’80s song Life in a Northern Town. The rhythm structure is almost therapeutic, leaving the listener both relaxed and energized - dazed and buzzed as if hit by a tranquilizer dart whilst drinking red bull.

Death may not be the rosiest of titles for an indie pop song but new boys White Lies are steadily building a following with hits to their myspace page gathering pace, setting things up nicely for the April release of their debut single ‘Unfinished Business’. They’ll undoubtedly be popular with moping students plus 30-somethings hankering after sounds from their youth.

White Lies tap into that vein of epic emotive songwriting popular in the UK during the post-punk period before Britpop reared its head. This influence actually results in it sounding a bit dated (’Death’ could have been plucked straight from Joy Division or Echo and the Bunnymen’s stables) yet when it’s as well crafted as this, the lack of originality doesn’t do much harm at all. Bands that wear influences on their sleeve are always more interesting than those who hide them.

Whether White Lies build on their early promise remains to be seen but if they can move away from dirge-filled anthems they’ll start appealing to a lot more than the student crowd and hangers-on from the Hacienda days.