Music Feeds Faves – 4/09/15

Each week the Music Feeds team hunt down their favourite new tunes, bundle them up in some, often highly legible words and bring them to you. It’s Music Feeds Faves.

Mt Warning – Collapsed Collage

Collapsed Collage is the third single to be taken from Petrified Heart, the recently released EP from Mt Warning, led by main man Mikey Bee who, after leaving home at 16, set up shop in Northern New South Wales, home to the mountain and ancient volcano that inspired his project’s name.

That cinematic imagery is apt here as Collapsed Collage plays out like a dramatic stream-of-consciousness, starting with steady handclaps and soft synths accompanying the Bon Iver-style vocals, before erupting into a stormy, desperate crescendo and then dipping down once more into some sort of cathartic resolution.

Mt Warning just kicked off the Petrified Heart EP tour this week, so if you’re in town do your emotions a favour and go along. / Nastassia Baroni, Editor

Justin Bieber – What Do You Mean

I know, I know, it’s Justin Bieber, noted recalcitrant, petulant turd-monster who has released a bevy of glittery, nonsense pop music for several years now, gaining screaming adoration from teenage girls and detestation and ridicule from pretty much everyone else (myself included).

Jump to recent times though and the newly relaxed and respectful Bieber 2.0 has seemingly gone down the path of contrition, kicking off with his Comedy Central Roast in which he faced down his many, many past indiscretions, and culminating in this new track What Do You Mean, which *gulp* is actually, pretty damn tasty.

Operating as a reverse Blurred Lines in which Biebs openly discusses consent with a lady-friend, the low-key combination of tropical synth-beats and an irresistible metronome percussion, What Do You Mean brings the chill. Guys! I think I like Bieber? / Mitch Feltscheer, Creative Content Director

EL VY – I’m The Man To Be

“I’m peaceful cause my dick’s in sunlight, held up by kites,” goes the chorus of I’m The Man To Be, the latest track from EL VY (pronounced like a plural of Elvis), the new project from The National’s Matt Berninger and Ramona Falls’ Brent Knopf.

Here’s how Mr Berninger explains the track:

“There’s this great Schoolboy Q song There He Go which samples Menomena’s Wet and Rusting.

“I thought it would be funny to re-sample the same sample and do it from the perspective of a pathetic self-aggrandizing rocker alone in a hotel room. Something I know a lot about. That’s how it started but then Brent took the sample out and we wrote an entirely new song.”

Brilliant.

Taken from the pair’s forthcoming debut album Return To The Moon (due out on 30th October), I’m The Man To Be’s lyric video features a SUPER-loose Berringer the likes of which The National’s discography has never seen. The clip is also directed by his top-notch brother Tom, so you know it’s a goodie. / Tom Williams, Staff Writer

Basenji – Can’t Get Enough

Basenji is gearing up for the release of his first EP at the end of this month. He’s already dropped the whimsical Petals and now we have Can’t Get Enough which may just be his greatest output to date. It’s a cute-as-a-button track that sees pop melded with electronica. The result of that is a soundscape of euphoric beats and dream-state vocals. The only thing that brings it back down to earth and places it in the club are those injections of brass which give the track some serious weight.

The aesthetic that he’s created as an artist, from his tracks to his merch, is so on-point that I wouldn’t be surprised if Basenji becomes the Bieber of electronica – he just needs a name for his fan club that will no doubt quickly populate. /Sam Murphy, Staff Writer

Unknown Mortal Orchestra – Can’t Keep Checking My Phone

Unknown Mortal Orchestra are the lucky recipient of my first Feeds Faves selection since rejoining the fold of the Feeds family a fortnight ago, the fittingly cryptic clip for new single Can’t Keep Checking My Phone taking my fancy with its absurd style and infectious tropical disco vibes.

Directed by duo Dmitri Basil and Cooper Roussel, the clip’s wildly incongruous imagery has an exquisite corpse feel about it, which matched with its 16mm film aesthetic and gushing use of panning and zooming makes it feel like what Easy Rider might have come out like if Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda ate even more acid than they already did while filming.

Layered over the dreamy disco track though, you end up trying to match the lyrics to the video, which is hard, as aside from the chorus you can’t really make anything out. If anything though this helps the song, as with life in general, the less you think about things the better, and there’s nothing like lyrics to come along and ruin your day with some conceptual drudgery. /Michael Carr, Staff Writer

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