Track Reviewz: The Sounds "No One Sleeps When I'm Awake"

Ah. The Sounds. 

When I first heard their straightforward-rock-dance music it was blaring out the windows of a now defunct club on Sixth Street in Austin during a SXSW festival. 

Luckily, I was able to use my platinum Artist badge to sneak in and I've been a fan ever since. 

It doesn't hurt that their lead singer, Maja Ivarsson, is gorgeous as hell (tattooed forearm and all) and a dead ringer for Debbie Harry. 

The band recently dropped "No One Sleeps When I'm Awake," the lead single off their new album (out June 2) which sounds like the mantra of my last coked-out girlfriend. 

Sounds fans fret not: the song delivers. It's another mid-tempo rocker with synths and repetitive guitar leads that carry the instrumental parts.  

The catchy single just dropped on iTunes to hype the new record: "Crossing the Rubicon."

Check it out on their myspace, here.

There's also a lot of great new HD videos of the group performing new songs live on their page.

Doesn't that bleach-bloned beauty sound great? Uh, I mean the band's good too. Yeah. 

Starfucker: Greatest Band Ever?

If you were at SXSW this year, then you either heard about or caught a live show by Starfucker —easily the most talked about act of the festival. 

The trio, hailing from Portland, mixes beats, blips, monologues and catchy melodies that are reminiscent of some of the greats. Check out their myspace page here. 

You may or may not be into fuzzy keyboards (of which I am an adamant supporter) but I'd wager a case of PBR that you'll be humming  "Pop Song" or "Medicine" within minutes of finishing either. 

They just dropped a new album today — Jupiter — that packs a party's worth of dance numbers into eight tiny tracks. Though the band never really touches on topics deeper than love and tongue in cheek 1980s references, if you're looking for this generation's disco equivalent to Weezer, look no further. I have been spinning their last record (which can be heard on LaLa) non-stop poolside since the sun started making it's presence known last week. It has stronger songs in my opinion, but Jupiter is still good for a good time.  

I have a strong feeling this record will be on everybody's Summer Jamz playlist. 

---

Check out the band's latest video for "Medicine," here.

ACL Announces 2009 Lineup

The Austin City limits festival, that crazy time of the year when the city gets flooded with modern hippies and enthusiastic pedestrians, has released the official lineup for it's 2009 fest — slated for October 2 —4 in Zilker park. 

1990s grunge staple, Pearl Jam, are topping the bill as this year's headliner along with Dave Matthews Band, Beastie boys, Kings of Leon, Ben Harper and John Legend? 

Check out the full lineup here. 

Jack White is bringing his new group, the Dead Weather, along for the ride and NYC art-rockers, The Virgins, will be in tow as well. 

Other notables include The Ravonettes, The Walkmen, Grizzly Bear, White Lies, Daniel Johnston and the Artic Monkeys, to name just a few.  

With these acts and more, it looks to be a great ACL this year, and hopefully with it falling in October, it won't be the unbearably hot dust storm that we've experienced years past. 

Trent Reznor plays April fool's joke on world

When I got into work today, everything on my desk was turned upside down. 

All of my pictures, my keyboard, even my chair. Not bad. 

But that pales in comparison to Trent Reznor's fantastic April fool's prank on the world — a new fake album, "Strobelight."

Reznor announced the new release on Twitter today and fans quickly flocked to the Nine Inch Nails Web site where they were greeted with a funky drum loop and awesome Kanye West-esque album cover, seen here.  

The Web site asks fans to enter their email to recieve the new full length — produced by Timbaland, of course — after which their credit card will be charged $18.98 plus a $10 "digital convenience fee." Brilliant. 

Unfortunately after entering an email address you are greeted with a faux fatal error prompt with the words APRL_FLS. 

Too bad, with tracks like "Pussygrinder" (featuring Sheryl Crow) and "Laid, paid and played" (featuring Fergie), it would have been an amazing record. Kudos Trent. 

---

Check out NIN's myspace while you're at it, here. 

Kasabian releases free single and video

To hype their next release —West Rider Pauper Lunatic Asylum — due out in June, UK dance-rock saviors, Kasabian, have released a new video for their single "Vlad the Impaler", and until midnight on April 3rd, you can download the song for free on the band's Web site, here. 

Click the link to get the song, and then watch the video featuring a moustached Vince Noir aka Noel Fielding, of Mighty Boosh fame. 

Vince scours the countryside, preys on young hotties and pretty much wrecks havoc on a very 1970s-looking English countryside. It's really great and makes me hungry for blood...

Bob Dylan drops new free song

Gearing up for his 46th release, Together Through Life, Bob Dylan dropped off a little preview today on his official web site, Bobdylan.com. 

Check out the song, Beyond Here Lies Nothin', right here. 

If you haven't heard his last record, Modern Times, you need to. Don't write the old man off, he can still write the hits. His last video, featuring Scarlett Johansson, seriously brought me to tears. It was like the life I never lived in the early 1960s. Check it out here. 

His newest track — although not as breathtaking as some of his other bangers — is infectious enough and might make several repeats on your shuffle. It's got a Zydeco vibe, which feels like ole' Bob is playing a late night crawfish boil into the wee hours. Yum!

TI gets year and a day in prison

TI finally got his day of reckoning. 

The rapper and recent MTV reality star earned himself a year and one day in prison and was ordered to pay $100,300 in fines on Friday by a Federal judge in Atlanta.

Apparently the dude tried to buy machine guns and some silencers off  FBI agents awhile back and they weren't too happy about it...   

His ongoing TV show — "TI's Road to Redemption" — in which he mentors at risk kids and tries to teach them to stay off the streets, apparently didn't have any affect on prosecutors. He's gonna do some time. 

"I would like to say thank you to some, and apologize to others," said TI, whose real name is Clifford Harris (sounds menacing). "In my life I have been placed in the worst case scenario and had to make the best of it."

Well, let's hope he makes the best out of Federal prison. They might have a decent gym? 

Just listen to the age-old prison rule: don't drop the soap. And if you do, clench & twist. 

---

Check out the rest of the story on Cnn.com or listen to TI's myspace page here.