Liars – I Saw You From The Lifeboat – new video

Download Chance The Rapper’s ‘Acid Rap’ mixtape

Chicago rhymer, Chance The Rapper has just released his second mixtape, Acid Rap. In just over 4 days the album has been downloaded over 32,000 times, and it’s easy to see why he’s being talked about as one of the most exciting up and coming rappers around.

19 year old, Chance hails from Chicago’s South Side. In his senior year at college, rumour has it he was suspended after getting caught smoking weed, and spent the ‘free time’ working on his debut mixtape 10 Day.

And that’s where it all started. 10 Day, came out to great acclaim last year, got well over 25,000 downloads on Dat Piff and started arousing the interest of major labels.

His new Acid Rap mixtape lays his credentials firmly down and should send him stellar. One look at the guest list on the tape certainly vouches for this – Childish Gambino, Action Bronson, Ab-Soul and Twista all collaborate with Chance – so he’s got some pretty influential friends.

Style wise there’s a real melting pot of influences from the dirty psych-soul of Andre 3000′s Outkast offerings on The Love Below, through to the squeaky voiced sing-rap style of Lil’ Wayne‘s better work – there’s also a real sense of fun akin to the golden days of Native Tongue hip-hop. It’s niiiice.

Best of all it’s free to download – get a copy here – and enjoy.

BLKHRTS – BRK T M (Bark At Me) – new free download

Denver hip-hop trio, BLKHRTS have premiered a new track called, BRK T M (Bark At Me) over at the SYFFAL site (it’s also available to download for free). Visit the site and check out the tune here.

BLKHRTS, known individually as King F.O.E, Karma The Voice, and Yonnas, have delivered another stonker. Sampling The Stooges, I Wanna Be Your Dog, BRK T M (Bark At Me) bounces and thumps it’s grizzly nastiness straight down your lugholes and doesn’t rest for a second. It’s a perfect hip-hop / punk-rock hybrid.

Go get some…

New TNGHT mixtape

Late last month the collaboration between Hudson Mohawke and Lunice, TNGHT released their awesome self-titled debut EP. Now a few weeks on there’s an uncensored version of the mix they premiered on the BBC last week available to download for FREE (visit the soundcloud page to download).

A ‘Mission Statement’ of sorts, the mix contains tracks by amongst others SpaceGhostPurrp, Snoop Dogg, John Carpenter, Chief Keef, Zebra Katz, and Waka Flocka Flame.

Check it out below – it’s absolutely belting:

The Orb feat. Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry – Hold Me Upsetter – new video

I love a bit of Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, even if it’s just him babbling over a trippy groove pieced together by London tripsters The Orb – check out new video, Hold Me Upsetter below:

Hold Me Upsetter is available as a free download from The Orb website here - and it’s the first track taken from the brand new album The Orb featuring Lee Scratch Perry presents “The Orbserver In The Star House.” The album will be released on Cooking Vinyl on 3rd September.

Download new Aesop Rock tune, ‘Zero Dark Thirty’

Fans of Aesop Rock have been waiting for five years for a new album and this July (10th) the wait is finally over.

And if you’re craving a bit new stuff from the man born Ian Matthias Bavitz, but can’t wait till July, well, I’ve got some good news for you – the first track to be released from, Skelethon, is Zero Dark Thirty and it’s available to listen to and download for free below – enjoy:

Worth the wait? You betcha…

What did Justin Vernon do pre-Bon Iver?

This Sunday the GRAMMY Awards take place Stateside and one of Slacker Shack‘s favourite acts, Bon Iver is up for four awards. But what exactly did their frontman, Justin Vernon get up to pre-Bon Iver? And is there anything worth hunting down and unearthing?

Well, in the late nineties / early noughties, Vernon founded two bands – Mount Vernon and DeYarmond Edison in his native Eau Claire, Wisconsin (where he still resides).

The first of these two bands, Mount Vernon, only lasted for a short while. The band’s only album, All Of Us Free, has a jazz-influenced and upbeat sound (and two singers!) and various versions of the live band had as many as 10 members, one of whom was Sara Jensen, a saxophonist and singer who was Vernon’s first love (and who many believe is the real “Emma” from Bon Iver‘s debut album, For Emma, Forever Ago). Their music is hard to come by, but here’s a song called, Breathe, from their only album – with Jensen and Vernon both singing on it:

Vernon’s second band, DeYarmond Edison consisted of Vernon, and Brad and Phil Cook, and Joe Westerlund (who later went onto form Megafaun). The band, were named after Vernon’s two middle names and gigged extensively in the 5 or 6 years they were together, releasing two albums - their eponymous debut in 2004 and the follow up, Silent Signs in 2005. They also released an EP of unreleased material in 2006 before splitting amicably.

If you’ve not heard anything by them previously, check out First Impression from their Silent Signs album below. It’s lovely stuff and clearly not a million miles away from the Bon Iver sound:

During his time with DeYarmond Edison, Vernon also recorded two solo albums, Self Record (2005) and Hazeltons (2006). Both albums share obvious similarities to Bon Iver but interestingly contain hardly any falsetto singing and more forays into instrumental songs.

If you’d like to get copies of them, you can download Self Record here – and Hazeltons here.

Check out the video for Hazelton (from Hazeltons) below:

Then in 2008 came Bon Iver’s debut, For Emma, Forever Ago – and since then albums with Volcano Choir (Unmap – 2009), Gayngs (Relayted – 2010) and collaborations with Kanye West and Megafaun.

So what’s next for Justin Vernon, now he’s a GRAMMY nominated star?

Well he’s got a new record label called Chigliak Records, which launched last month. There’s also rumours of a future collaboration with R&B lovely, Alicia Keys and a track that’s been recorded with the Flaming Lips as part of their collab album, due for release on 21st April (aka Record Day 2012).

Finally, Vernon is also planning on launching a new band called, Shouting Matches, which he refers to as, “sort of a blues-gospel band”. There’s also going to be another Volcano Choir album at some point too.

And as for Bon Iver? Well, fans may be waiting awhile, as Vernon has revealed recently that he doesn’t have any songs written yet - stating that it’ll be sometime between 3 and 5 years until another album appears.

Plenty to be getting on with in the meantime though it seems…

First Serve – the new project from De La Soul’s Trugoy and Posdnuos

Two of the three founding members of De La Soul, Trugoy and Posdnuos (or Dave Jolicoeur and Kelvin Mercer, if you want to refer to them by their birth names) have started a new project called, First Serve.

And they’ve given birth to some new character names for their new project too, namely Jacob “Pop Life” Barrow and Deen Whittier.

The duo are working on an album due for release in April, but in the meantime they’ve made a mixtape called The Goon Time Mixtape – which you can download over here at Soundcloud.

Finally, here’s a video skit from the Plugs 1 and 2:

New Discovery – Lushlife

Here’s one to file alongside the plethora of great young rappers currently reinvigorating America’s underground hip-hop scene – Lushlife.

The Philadelphia-based rapper/producer, describes his take on hip-hop as follows,  “I wanted to explore different sonics – to take hip-hop to different places. The major conceptual basis was classic hip-hop – I wanted that sentiment – but I also wanted a record imbued with the spirit of indie experimentation, as well as pop accessibility.”

With guest spots from amongst others, Cities Aviv, QuESt, Dice Raw and Das Racist rapper Heems, Lushlife‘s October released album, No More Golden Days, is a cracker and as an added bonus it’s free to download over at Bandcamp – click here to get your hands on it.

Diplo set to release new Express Yourself EP

Are you looking to bring the new year in with bone crunching beats and nipple quivering bass lines? If so, Diplo may have the answer.

The electro DJ superstar is set to drop his latest booty-trembling EP, Express Yourself in the next few days (it seems he’s being purposefully vague) and the release will feature guest spots from Datsik, Sabi, Elephant Man, GTA, Excision, Nicky Da B, LAzer Disk, and Billy the Gent.

To ramp up the hype, yesterday Diplo posted up a downloadable soundcloud link to a three and a half minute sampler of the EP. Check it out below – it sounds mighty and it looks like it’s going to be FREE to download too: