[BUZZ] Gotye

Wouter De Backer, otherwise known as his stage persona Gotye, is a Belgian multi-instrumentalist based in Melbourne.  Somebody That I Used To Know is the second single released off the upcoming album Making Mirrors due for release August 19. The song harkens back to the vocal stylings of a young Sting of The Police. The song features New Zealand singer/songwriter Kimbra. The above film for the song was directed by Natasha Pincus. The music video also features body art by Emma Hack - which took 23 hours to shoot the stop-motion animation. With the album launch Gotye will perform at the Sydney Opera House as part of the Graphic Festival–which will feature animators and a 10-piece orchestra as part of his performance. www.gotye.com

[MUSIC VIDEOS] Pure X - Easy

...Video for Pure X's "Easy," the first in a series from Pleasure that visually explore the record's themes of pain/pleasure and agony/ecstasy. In collaboration with director Malcom Elijah the band works with images of numbness and the pleasure of control. These images, in the context of a traditional music video, reflect bleak lyrics in the context of a semi-traditional bright-sounding pop song. Director: Malcolm Elijah.

FOOL’S GOLD “WILD WINDOW”

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Fool’s Gold are gearing up for the release of their sophomore album, Leave No Trace, out August 16 on IAMSOUND. You’ve heard album track, “Street Clothes,” and now they are sharing with you one of Leave No Trace’s brightest and most “LA” tunes, “Wild Window.” Like a tightly coiled spring, the song bounces along, showcasing singer Luke Top’s passionate vocals and guitarist Lewis Pesacov’s signature tone and playing style, equally influenced by African guitarists as well as the likes of Johnny Marr and Robert Smith.

Fool's Gold - Wild Window by iamsoundrecords

Geoffrey O'Connor "Vanity is Forever"

Vanity Is Forever, being released September 27th via Chapter Music, is Crayon Fields frontman Geoffrey O’Connor’s first album under his own name, and his most ambitious, dynamic and sophisticated work yet. O’Connor’s fractured romantic reflections and lustful tributes play out over vast synthscapes, colossal stadium drums and flanged orchestral sweeps, creating a world that is at once ethereal and strikingly vivid.With a combination of restraint and fearless abandon, O’Connor embraces the conflicts of modern love in a manner as ambiguous as it is blunt, and as shameless as it is generous. His songs indulge in ecstasy, love, pride, failure and all the glamorous contradictions they become. He is both an adult with a juvenile mind, and a geriatric in the body of a young man. Painstakingly refined over two years, Vanity Is Forever is O’Connor’s most fully realized album to date, an epic pop melodrama that shifts seamlessly between seductive high-production dance hits, suave funk joyrides and modern synthetic power balladry. Recently, O’Connor has mesmerized audiences with an extravagant live show of dueling synthesizers, lasers, light sculptures and hypnotic projections. His diverse solo output – under both his own name and previous solo moniker Sly Hats – has seen him handpicked to support the likes of Fleet Foxes, Jens Lekman, School Of Seven Bells, Andrew Bird and First Aid Kit. In addition, O’Connor will release a series of steamy clips to realize his soap opera dreams. View a taste of what’s in store with a trailer for Vanity Is Forever.

Listen to a New Track by Gardens & Villa

In the year of the saxophone, Santa Barbara's Gardens & Villa give us the flute. And along the way, Gardens & Villa effectively wipe clear the vaseline from the murky bedroom funk of recent days. Gardens & Villa bang out instant classics — each crystal clear and immaculate, but no less sweeping or languid. Their debut is a youthful exploration of just how opulent and pop starkness can go." Gardens & Villa continue on their North American tour as they wrap up dates with Foster The People and head out with Generationals, followed by shows with Craft Spells. Gardens & Villa’s debut LP is out July 5 on Secretly Canadian.

Listen to HTRK's 'Eat Yr Heart'

HTRK’s Ghostly International debut 'Work (work, work)' is a flat-lined study of desire and submission, sentimentality and dysphoria. The London by way of Berlin and Melbourne art-rock duo (pronounced “Hate Rock”) finished the album’s production while grieving the sudden loss of founding member and bassist Sean Stewart to suicide in March ‘10. And while that tragedy has certainly found its way into the music’s bottomless sonic void, 'Work (work, work),' written from 2006-10 in Berlin and London, is about much more than abject darkness. Much, much more.

Rude and Reckless: Punk/Post-Punk Graphics

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Rude and Reckless: Punk/Post-Punk Graphics, 1976-82 is the first New York exhibition surveying the extraordinary diversity of Punk and Post-Punk graphic design. The exhibition showcases a wide range of American and British artistry, with influences that include the Bauhaus, Futurism, Dadaism, Pop Art, Constructivism and Expressionism. The exhibition presents features over 150 rare posters, along with fanzines, flyers, clothing, badges and stickers. Rude and Reckless: Punk/Post-Punk Graphics, 1976-82 will be on view from July 14th through August 19th, 2011 at the Steven Kasher Gallery.