As we delve further into the HD age, where the unplucked hairs on a famed celebrity’s face are readily visible on TV screens and radio and TV stations will be going all HD in the next year or so, there seems to be a sort of counter-revolution going on.

Flying in the face of all this fidelity and high-tech precision reproduction of everything we experience, there seems to be a corresponding backlash, yearning for sounds more pure to the artist’s intent and era. In this vein, I recently acquired this Mono edition LP of one of rock’s seminal albums, and a personal favorite, The Psychedelic Sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators. Read the rest…

Pitchfork.tv continues the Bmore love-in this week. Wham City member and all-around unitard-sporting fun guy Benny Boeldt aka Adventure just released this new music video to accompany “Ultrazone,” the lead single off his excellent self-titled Carpark debut, dropping in September.

He plays with EAR PWR tonight at DC’s Velvet Lounge.

Video below, our free audio and interview here and here.

Email us at auralstates@gmail.com or comment this post for a chance to win a Caverns prize pack featuring a bunch of new merch (shirts, lighters, stickers, buttons etc). Winner drawn next week.

Two of our DC favorites, Imperial China and Caverns, are playing a show with True Womanhood tomorrow night at the Black Cat Backstage. And it seems DC is starting to pay attention, with this DCist Three Stars interview feature.

To whet your whistle, here’s a slew of A.S. exclusive downloads, “Radhus”(an old fan-favorite) off Imperial China’s Methods: EP and a few older ones from Caverns:

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MP3: Imperial China – Radhus

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MP3: Caverns – The Family that Slays Together Stays Together

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MP3: Caverns – Turkish Bathhouse Armageddon

While you are listening, read our interview with Kevin from Caverns, our review of Imperial China’s EP, our live review of their show at the now-defunct Lo-Fi…or just check out all of our previous coverage on Caverns or Imperial China.

Caverns are working on their first full-length album, Silk Scorpion. You can check out the progress on their blog. They will be heading into the studio over Labor Day to throw down some new tracks for you, dear listener.

Imperial China are busy honing their live show, shopping up some new material and making daytrips up to Baltimore to check out all the cool shit we have going on.

Beach House seem to be making the e-rounds as of late.  Their latest appearance: Pitchfork.tv‘s in-house series “Juan’s Basement.”  They star in a 3-parter this week, part one pairs a live performance of “Gila” lovingly shot in vintage soft focus with an interview on Devotion.

We have two copies of this Fiery Furnaces album, Remember, to give away to two lucky winners. Just leave your name and email as a comment on this review or shoot us a line at auralstates@gmail.com. We will announce two winners in 2 weeks.

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MP3: The Fiery Furnaces – Navy Nurse from Remember (Disc 2)

I have some news for all you Furnaces fans out there: the Fiery Furnaces have released a 2-disc live set from Thrill Jockey Records this week. That either made you cringe, jump for joy or raise an eyebrow high asking “how the hell does that work?”

The main source of contention/confusion: the nature of a live Fiery Furnaces show. Read the rest…

Hot off the heels of this post on the Secret Machines’ latest plans, we received two tracks from the wayward Curtis sibling’s (Ben) project, School of Seven Bells. Sample, download and judge the merits for yourself.

They open for M83 at the Black Cat this November. Save the date, keep your calendars marked.

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MP3: School of Seven Bells – Connjur

All photos: Robert Jacobs

Get Ponytail’s entire set at Beatbots A/V Club!

Compression have been around for a while (1993 to be exact). To quote front-man Greg Scelsi “probably before most of you could drive.” They started the night on a solid, forceful note. Being the first somewhat hardcore (with plenty of metal flavorings) band I’ve probably seen in about a year, I can say they have a fury about them. Their sound is a truly percussive, gale force wind that knocks you off your stride and takes your breath away…often by brute strength. Muscular riffs tear through each song like a prize-winning thoroughbred, awe-inspiringly powerful yet exceedingly graceful. Read the rest…

The duo of pianist Irina Nuzova and cellist Wendy Warner packed every available seat this Saturday. While late arrivals missed out on the CityPaper’s Best-rated chairs, no one sighed from discomfort. These ladies first whipped out an eloquent Myaskovski Sonata in A minor – offering daring bliss to rapt listeners.

Warner is a Rostropovich competition winner who debuted under the baton of the maestro himself, so the Myaskovski – dedicated to Rostropovich – was the apt choice. The first movement opened the soul, ending with the cello’s notes sounding alone.

Read the rest…

Electronic Dance Music was not the first music I fell in love with. My first aural affair began at an early age with the music I was playing on the piano and cello–classical (my favorite composer was Bach). As I grew older my taste diversified, though I still maintained a love of art music. However, I just wasn’t as into punk as all my friends were. In fact, I just wasn’t into the whole live band experience.

A bunch of factors led me to EDM, mainly the fact that it could still be heard on WHFS at the time. My taste matured from the near-rock of Prodigy, to drum and bass, and finally to that purity of sound of techno (mainly the Detroit, acid, and minimal kind). I began frequenting parties, club nights, “raves,” anything with beats coming out of a sound system. I began DJing with kids at school, then organizing our own nights in high school and college (though they where never heavily attended).

Techno was one of the passions of my life. I read, and re-read Techno Rebels: Renegades of Electric Funk. I spent way to much money on vinyl, and mixed instead of doing work. But slowly, I lost interest in that music.

My tastes became more inline with that of the indie trends. This is most likely due to the death of the EDM scene around these parts, and the astounding emergence and quality of Baltimore’s indie scene. The new indie electronic acts, though technically electronic, didn’t fit into the old paradigm. Dan Deacon is electronic, and he does make dance music, but not in the same way that Jeff Mills does.

The end of an era came for me when I packed away my second turntable, because I wasn’t using it, and it was taking up space. I sold much of my vinyl on ebay.

However, the electronic music I have experienced live over the past few weeks has re-invigorated my interest in the music that was once the sole pursuit of my life. Read the rest…

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MP3: The Faint – Conductor (Thin White Duke Remix)

All photos: Faith Desired

The Faint are always a good prospect for a fun night and great show.

Unfortunately, the past two times I saw the Faint, their opening spots weren’t filled with the creme de la creme, and the trend continued here.

Jaguar Love, on paper, should be a fairly interesting project. Comprised of remnants of Pretty Girls Make Graves and Blood Brothers, the result is less than spectacular. In fact, it turned downright painful. I won’t say much else since I’ve already had my share of negativity earlier this week. In short, the performance was a muddied mess fronted with vocals from a guy who sounds like he has a bit too much love for Angus of AC/DC or hair metal in general. Read the rest…