VEGA Live at The Levi’s/FADER Fort NYC

Alan Palomo and friends killed it on the synths at last Saturday’s Levi’s®/FADER Fort, playing as his “other” band – VEGA, since Neon Indian was not available.  Their super-dancey “No Reasons” left no able-bodied person standing still on the dancefloor.   We kind of wanted to dance too, but we had to hold cameras and shit.  Fun Friday fact: in addition to being a cool band, Vega is also the brightest star in the constellation Lyra, the fifth brightest star in the night sky and the second brightest star in the northern celestial hemisphere, after Arcturus!

The FADER Issue 64 Free Download

With domestic issues weighing so heavily on every American’s mind these days, it felt appropriate to focus our sixth annual photo issue inward. We started by selecting two cover stories that represent seemingly opposing factions of this country—the values of small town America via Eau Claire, Wisconsin’s Bon Iver and the hard grind of big city life through South Central Los Angeles’ Dam-Funk—and found more common ground between them than most talking heads and politicians would care to know. For the feature photo story, Peter van Agtmael’s plaintive portraits of widespread citizens and Victoria Sambunaris’ landscapes of geological sites along Interstate 80 create a visual dialogue between man and land and will hopefully leave you asking questions rather than giving answers. And because the future prosperity of the US will depend on the dreams of its newest residents as it always has, we focused our fashion story on first generation Americans and new emigres living in New York’s five boroughs. Not to mention our regular selection of Gen F profiles, including Kris Kristofferson, The XX, Neon Indian, Kurt Vile, Kyle Hall and Warpaint, plus interviews with RZA, Janka Nabay, Andrew Weatherall and tons more. So feel free (because it is literally free) to check it all out, and if you make TheFADER.com your homepage you won’t miss our treasure trove of extras and outtakes from above and beyond the issue.

Get Issue 64 now on iTunes,
subscribe via your favorite RSS reader here,
or download the individual F64 full-issue PDF here.

The FADER Issue 64 Podcast MP3

For our annual photo special, we focused our sights on issues in contemporary America through the stunning domestic and landscape photographs of Peter van Agtmael and Victoria Sambunaris. And who better to reflect the state of the States than Bon Iver, who’s attained cult fame worldwide but prefers to live in the sleepy Wisconsin town of Eau Claire, and Dam-Funk, who resides in middle class South Central Los Angeles but whose music inspires funk utopias. Hence the roster of our latest issue podcast, including Family Band, Volcano Choir, Dam-Funk, Neon Indian, Kyle Hall, Warpaint and Kurt Vile, represents all corners of the USA’s urban decay and rural ramshackleness—with the exception of Fuck Buttons, whose new album is so galactic we think they might be ambassadors from another universe. Download the whole shebang below, and don’t forget to permanently blogline us since we’ll soon be dropping the entire issue on you in pdf form, for free—because in the immortal words of George Michael, you’ve got to give what you taaaaake.

Download the FADER 64 mix as an mp3 (right click, save as)
Sign up for our podcasts on iTunes
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Check the tracklist after jump.

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At The Bar With Southern Comfort: Neon Indian, “Mi Viejo”

It’s episode number five of At The Bar With Southern Comfort, in which we travel to some of our favorite new bands’ hometowns (or as near as we can get) and film them covering some of their favorite bands’ best songs. Neon Indian showed up at the bar in Dallas and informed us that they’d be playing an Argentinian folk song and then busted out with a beautiful melody fronted by Alan Palomo. Stay tuned in the coming weeks as we travel across North America to meet up with other bands while racking up frequent flyer miles and good times.

Au Revoir Simone, “Another Likely Story (Neon Indian RMX)” MP3

New theory: Neon Indian has a rickety old time machine built from ancient Ford Pinto parts. Rather than using it to send himself to, say, the Mesozoic or the beginning of America so he can get all the money, he loads his remixes into the time machine on cassette, sets it to “1982 version of outer space” and blasts them back home. Seriously, there’s no other feasible way his songs sound so authentically like the background music from the language tapes in French class. Guess that fits then that this Au Revoir Simone remix came direct from Le Trippersville, population everyone, its lightweight vocals made gauzier with oscillated Moog-ifying, or whatever awesome thing it is that Neon Indian does. (via GvsB)



Download: Au Revoir Simone, “Another Likely Story (Neon Indian RMX)”

The ABSOLUT FADER Visionary Podcast #1 — Doing

Welcome to the first Visionary Podcast, curated by The FADER and presented by ABSOLUT, as part of our ongoing efforts to advance and advocate the art and music we love. With these words—Doing Things Differently Leads to Something Exceptional—and accompanying awesome visual interpretations of those words by director Rupert Sanders as inspiration, we set about scouring our music libraries for the new songs that are doing it for us the most these days. The first of these podcasts is loosely associated with the word and image for “Doing.” Doing anything basically, but as The FADER is known to do, we decided to make it mostly about having a good time—going surfing, hanging out with friends and romances, and of course, dancing your face off. Below, download the Visionary Podcast #1 with music from Smith Westerns, The Drums, Major Lazer, Washed Out and Hudson Mohawke. Check the tracklist after the jump, and come back in one week for #2, inspired by Things.



Download: The ABSOLUT FADER Visionary Podcast #1 — Doing

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Lefse Records Compilation (Neon Indian, Friend etc)

Neon Indian\’s debut LP, Psychic Chasms, sounds like Discovery-era Daft Punk if they were one awesome kid and had zero money. It’s coming out on October 13th on Lefse Records, and for a time it seemed like he was Lefse’s ticket to ride, but judging by the compilation sent over by the label, they are actually loaded with lo-fi hitmakers of many colors—folky pop, semi-grunge, ambient electronics, you name it. Visit Lefse’s site to get free music from most of the artists on the comp and check after the jump for the tracklist and brief histories of every song included here.

The Silent League – “Here’s a Star” {Neon Indian remix}

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Neon Indian, “Terminally Chill” MP3

This came into our inbox riiight before the holidays, so rather than just throwing it up on the internet minus commentary, we spent the weekend listening to it/thinking about listening to it. Previous Neon Indian songs were office hits based on name alone (”Should Have Taken Acid with You”), but the music was more or less just decent. The band is back with “Terminally Chill,” which is in the same world as Ariel Pink’s AM radio jams, cloaked in a similar worn cassette tape quiver.



Download: Neon Indian, “Terminally Chill”

Freeload: Egyptian Hip Hop, “Rad Pitt” MP3

Here is the latest entry in the “great music, dubious band name” craze that has been perplexing and confusing us with love (see: Rainbow Arabia, Neon Indian, Soft Pack nee The Muslims). We love all you dudes’ tunes but like, your band names are forcing us into the crevices of our brains where we dissect the flippancy of “otherness,” and we’d rather use that mindspace to think about things like the Western op-ed coverage of Iran and whatnot. Anyway, Britain’s Egyptian Hip Hop is apparently a band of high schoolers so they get more of a pass. They are purveyors of moody melodies that have apparently played few shows, but their swaying synths are already warming our hearts.



Download: Egyptian Hip Hop, “Rad Pitt” (via Neon Gold)

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