Tuffing Out The Wild Desires

King Tuff has had a pretty big first half of 2012. First of all they sold out their Wild Desire 7" on Suicide Squeeze, whose title track slays in so many ways. Kyle Thomas's vocals are perfectly laconic, his guitar solo is insanely awesome, and he manages to capture elements of 60s Kinks, 70s Clash and T-Rex, throw it all into a reverent blender and spew forth one of the best singles of the year. The crazy thing is that he doesn't blow his wad here - Wild Desire is only foreplay.

King Tuff - Wild Desire

King Tuff, his second LP after 2008's Was Dead and first for Sub Pop, is overflowing with charm, charisma and riffs that it's hard not to throw out all other albums and mold this permanently to the turntable. This is distilled garage pop brilliance, albeit with a better guitarist than usual at the helm, yet the solos (and there are a few - all amazing) never overshadow the innate positivity that emanates from Thomas throughout the recording. Sometimes it may have benefited from a bit more edge and bite to take away from the giddiness felt throughout - but then that never hampered last year's excellent album Goodbye Bread from SF god Ty Segall, did it? Also, has an amazing cover sleeve. Always an attractor...


King Tuff is out now on Sub Pop. This too is hard to get on vinyl - it's been selling better than even Sub Pop predicted - but you can still grab it (also in a bundle with the excellent bat logo T-shirt) here.

King Tuff - Bad Thing
King Tuff - Keep On Movin'

Play Father John Misty For Me

Father John Misty isn't the new cult leader on the blocks, although from his sounds his would be a killer cult to get tied up in. No, it is the new name for J Tillman, one time Fleet Fox and now chillin on his own dime. He has a record coming out on Sub Pop called Fear Fun. Now, I never hated Fleet Foxes - I thought their last two albums were OK, and they still go down as the first band I ever saw at a Glastonbury, and I was stoned, and they delivered - but I've never understood the avid fandom that surrounds these guys, nor other of their ilk (that said, I'm a Bon Iver sap, but whatcha gonna do?). Tillman stepped away from the skins of Fleet Foxes, which some may gawk and scratch their noggins over, but this moniker he has given himself surely has done wonders. Not that it's exactly an inexplicable notion that Fear Fun is great - Tillman has released seven previous albums under his own name, and his four year tenure in a band renowned for intricacies and massive-scale harmonies would have given him new ideas. No, the real surprise on this album is how much fun it all is - which then points to the album's title. There really is nothing to fear when tracks such as the great 'I'm Writing A Novel'. Also, the film clips for the singles off this album are pretty amazing - expect another in our next Video Vacuum, but I just couldn't resist the Aubrey Plaza starring 'Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings', of which you can download at your leisure below. God she's awesome. Lucky it's a brilliant song too.


Fear Fun is available here in sexy pink vinyl and with a rad tee too - get in there!

Father John Misty - Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings
Father John Misty - Nancy From Now On

Arab On Radar's Eric Paul Sleeps Amongst The Bones

It's been a while since I focused on something that wasn't directly music related, and even longer since I checked out some spoken word. I think the last thing I talked to y'all about in this vein was about the ever-cool David Cross' live album Blacker Than Black. Well, here is another spoken word performance, albeit on cassette, and via Bathetic Records. But self-serving Rollins this ain't. Ex-Arab On Radar and Chinese Stars main man Eric Paul has given birth to I Sleep With Their Bones, a literary maelstrom that focuses solely on his twisted, evocative lyrics, taken predominantly from his books such as I Offered Myself As The Sea (published by Heartworm Press). It's raw, surreal, heartwrenching, mindbending, and whithoulds nothing. Whilst the bent genius of AOR and to a lesser yet no less relevent extent Chinese Stars aren't with us, Paul still kills in his band Doomsday Student which features 3/4 of AOR anyway, so Im hunting them down as we speak. And now we have this.


Get I Sleep With Their Bones here.

Eric Paul - I Offered Myself As The Sea
Eric Paul - Hard-On Of Iwo Jima
Eric Paul - I Have Nothing Left To Love Her With
Eric Paul - Wastebasket Of My Ways

Dispelling Beach House Myth

I never thought I would be posting about Beach House again. I saw them at last year's Laneway festival in Brisbane - and it was a little...meh. The Baltimore duo smashed everything with their debut Teen Dream, yet there is only so much dream pop that I could take. Since then I haven't paid them much mind...until last week, when they dropped new single 'Myth' from their upcoming album Bloom. Sure, it's been out a while, but it's taken this long for it to really sink in. It's pretty damn good. Bloom is out through Sub Pop mid-May - enough time to start caring for these kids again...

Beach House - Myth