The Sunshine Underground

If you're feeling a little sick today, whatever the case may be on this Hump Day, I have a prescription to cure your case of the Hump Days. MORE COWBELL.

I heard about this track "In Your Arms" and was lucky enough to grab one of the first 500 downloads Monday. It starts out with a pretty sweet baseline accompanied by a perfect cowbell beat. I cannot get over how well placed and simple the sound is, but how effective and critical it is to the sound of this song. "In Your Arms" has a very UK sound with the long drawn-out harmonies in the vocals and quick bursts of guitar riffs in spots.

The Sunshine Underground - In Your Arms

The Sunshine Underground is a band from Leeds, UK. They are releasing their second full-length album Nobody's Coming To Save You on February 1st through City Rockers. Pre-order it here. In anticipation of the album, The Sunshine Underground is releasing a free song download (only 500) on their blog on each Monday until the album is released. Both "In Your Arms" and "Coming to Save You" (video below) will be on the release.

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Day 1 'n [Free Gucci]

Well the almost month of Christmas Break is over, time to get back in the grind of reading and going to class. When my alarm went off at 7:15 I found a pleasant surprise in my inbox. The Diplo vs. Gucci Mane mixtape, Free Gucci, was released as promised bright and early on the 11th.

After I heard about this project I got pretty psyched because as you may or may not know, RATATAT, has done this before and were very successful. That is, taking rappers A capella's and creating new, original beats for the songs. I talked about the mixtape a few days ago, here. When I heard "Danger's Not a Stranger", I couldn't believe how promising this mixtape would be. They might have set my sights a little higher than what they delivered. I feel the dj's did the best with what they had to work with, Gucci doesn't spit the most sophisticated or lyrical hip-hop out there. There are however some pretty legit beats by the dj's, which would be better accompanied with an act such as Outkast or Lupe Fiasco."Danger's Not a Stranger" and "Break Yourself" are two of three Diplo mixed songs, and they are definitely the highlights of the mixtape. I'd say that Zomby and Memory Tapes created very good songs ("Boi" and "Excuse Me" respectively) as well. So Free Gucci isn't a total failure. I would recommend giving it a listen because the concept is very intriguing and one I'm sure will be used more often in the coming future.

You can download it here. WARNING: must sign up for newsletter to download...

Boi (Zomby Remix)