Y's by Yohji Yamamoto Fall 2008 Collection

Avant garde Japanese fashion designer Yohji Yamamoto introduced his latest pieces for his label Y's fall 2008 collection. It is now available at eLUXURY.

Conor Oberst Unleashes Self-Titled Album

Singer-songwriter Conor Oberst is set to unleash a new self-titled solo album on August 5 under Merge Records. He's best known for his work in Bright Eyes.

This is his first release in thirteen years, also his fourth solo effort since 1993's release Water.

A special band was assembled for the recording of this album known as The Mystic Valley Band, which comprise of members of Bright Eyes, Rilo Kiley, among others.

Inspiring folk tunes.

Nike Dunk Gyziro BMX

Nike launched it's new Dunk Gyziro BMX recently. Constructed to increase the stamina of pedaling strokes. Currently available in four different colorways and can be found at their online store.

Aviary Ghost - Memory Is A Hallway

Aviary Ghost is a band from Indiana, USA. It started off during a particularly long Michigan winter, when co-founding members Charlie Crimando and Stephen Kemsley began to record music in a one-room apartment and three years later, an eclectic mix of styles and genres of all sorts were developed.

Memory Is A Hallway was self-released on July 15 and has slowly compiled a flock of interests by critics. As is evident in the title, each song takes a perspective on memory and how it relates to the present and one's identity.

The duo regularly plas energetic, eclectic live gigs and is currently already recording new materials for their future release.

Great melodies. Simply acceptable for a good run on your playlist, songs like Somewhere Else and The Brain Is A House are muchly lovable tunes.

Somewhere Else | The Brain Is A House

The Octopus Project Announce Tour Dates

Texas-based indietronica band The Octopus Project is proud to announce a series of gigs in support of it's 2007 album release Hello, Avalanche.

OP's music is mainly instrumental, combining digital and analog together as one.

Their music video for their single Truck has massively attracted fans from all over the world, closely reaching up to 400,000 plays on YouTube. This has triggered a group of fans and responded with nearly a dozen of fan-created videos featuring tracks by OP. At the mean time, OP unveiled that more official videos from Hello, Avalanche are set to premiere during the band's upcoming tour.



A 7-inch EP was released featuring two new songs, "Wet Gold" and "Moon Boil", through UK-based label Too Pure.

With ragged, furious distorted guitars at one end of the spectrum and the pure, luminescent tones of the Theremin at the other, the members of The Octopus Project mine a staggering variety of sounds in between (via strings, synthesizers, drums, glockenspiel, trombones, etc.), filling their songs with brilliant contrasting colors and cascading waves of sonic bliss. Although Josh Lambert, Yvonne Lambert, Ryan Figg and Toto Miranda each have their instrumental specialties, they spread ideas out on as many instruments as possible, each writing for and performing on any sound-maker they can find.

Tour dates:-
08/02 Chicago, IL @ Schuba’s
08/03 Chicago, IL @ Lollapalooza
08/04 Kansas City, MO @ Record Bar
08/05 Norman, OK @ Opolis
08/06 Lubbock, TX @ Tequila Station
08/11 Phoenix, AZ @ Rhythm Room*
08/12 Tucson, AZ @ Congress Theater*
08/13 San Diego, CA @ The Cashbash*
08/14 Los Angeles, CA @ Knitting Factory*
08/15 Visalia, CA @ Cellar Door*
08/16 San Francisco, CA @ Bottom Of The Hill*
08/18 Portland, OR @ Satyricon*
08/19 Seattle, WA @ Nectar Lounge*
08/20 Vancouver, BC @ Richard’s
08/22 Edmonton, AL @ Velvet Lounge
08/23 Calgary, AL @ Hi Fi
08/25 Salt Lake City, UT @ Urban Lounge
08/26 Denver, CO @ Hi Dive
08/28 Dallas, TX @ Lola’s*
08/29 Houston, TX @ Warehouse Live*
09/28 Austin, TX @ Austin City Limits Festival

(* means touring with Diagonals)

Tracy Shedd - Cigarettes & Smoke Machines

“It's never too late to fight for what you want” -- Tracy Shedd.

Tracy Shedd's helpful reminder on the opening track Never Too Late from Cigarettes & Smoke Machines, her latest album of smart, pointed pop is a direct and economic assertion backed by sharp musicianship and just the right amount of reverb. Cigarettes & Smoke Machines is Shedd's most accomplished record in a career that has now spanned four full-lengths.

Raised in a music-friendly home -- growing up with piano lessons and a public address system in the living room to practice Patsy Cline on --Shedd found punk rock as a teen and morphed into a singer-songwriter wrestling with a love of distortion. Also a fan of artists that drape their vocals in various shrouds (My Bloody Valentine, Cocteau Twins,The Jesus & Mary Chain), Shedd decided that she never really wanted her vocals up front, an edict that permeated her previous recordings. Now, with Cigarettes & Smoke Machines, Shedd lets go and we benefit from vocal performances that establish the arresting emotional core of her latest record.

The album comes at just the right time, too. Now that declarative female songwriters like Liz Phair and unheralded classics such as Bettie Serveert's Palomine are finally being celebrated, Cigarettes & Smoke Machines appears just when its audience is ready to identify with it. "What ever it takes, don't let them break you down," Shedd sings on Whatever It Takes. What's the hardest part of goodbye? Shedd makes you wait for the answer on that track. When we find out that it's "why," we nod our heads. Remember The Time We Set The Highway On Fire takes the record in a different direction where the guitars take over and Shedd's connection to The Cure's nine-minute moments are more evident. Shedd's co-existing vulnerability and strength make for convincing, winning and relatable songs that you’ll need to hear again and again.


It’s been a long road to this level of compositional confidence for Shedd. Letting go of a lifetime of music theory made it easy to write a batch of songs within weeks of first picking up the guitar and Shedd's first album Blue was quickly produced in her then-home of Boston. Counting the infamous DC band Unrest as an influence (the Sarah Records oeuvre and The Softies come to mind as well), Shedd had aspirations to be signed to Unrest leader Mark Robinson's label Teenbeat Records though she knew that he only signed DC-based groups. She decided to give it a shot anyway.

Robinson was convinced and Shedd was signed to Teenbeat which released her debut in 2002. In 2003, Robinson went on to produce Shedd's second album, Red and a third LP, Louder Than You Can Hear appeared on the Devil In The Woods label the next year. Shedd then “got domesticated,” and moved to Tucson where the heat “slowed her down” and provided the time needed to craft her most inspired album.
Cigarettes & Smoke Machines brings Shedd back home and is now her third album for Teenbeat. Shedd's place on the Teenbeat roster has obviously grown stronger throughout the years and it's an immense pleasure to see that at a time when the record industry is in a state of "huh?" a record as worthwhile as Cigarettes & Smoke Machines can appear on a label as true to itself as Teenbeat.

Teenbeat’s beautifully packaged releases are often as of note as the musician’s work that they house and Cigarettes & Smoke Machines’ jacket is yet another in the long line of meticulously crafted Teenbeat sleeves. The photo of a blindfolded girl in profile that graces the cover is that of one of Shedd's best friends during her upbringing in Jacksonville. Shedd has had the photo since 1996 and held on to it thinking she would one day use it in relation to her music. It spoke to her twelve years later and is now the stark and stunning image that represents her latest and greatest.

This time around, it’s not about being the next best thing to Shedd. Cigarettes & Smoke Machines is her most definitive and easy to climb into statement to date. It truly isn’t too late to fight for what you want and this time Shedd really got it.

Cigarettes & Smoke Machines featuring guest appearances by John Girgus, Brian Espinosa, Richard Dudley, James Tritten, Craig Schumacher & Joey Burns and produced by Craig Schumacher will be released by Teenbeat Records on 09/23/2008. Shedd is also available to chat about her involvement in organizing the Pot Luck Conference (www.potluckcon.com), a yearly gathering of engineers, producers and musicians passionate about signals, sounds, music, and recordings.

Fred Perry Autumn 08' Collection

Fred Perry's spring sales just passed a couple of days back, and most of the items were sold out the last time we checked. Now they recently updated their online store with a whole new collection from their Autumn 2008 release. Dive in to see what's hot now!