John Payne

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DJ Shadow

John Payne
Josh Davis, aka DJ Shadow, blew up the game in 1996 with his debut album, Endtroducing, an influential slab that helped put instrumental hip-hop on the map with its orchestral galaxy of all-sampled tracks mostly of the extremely eclectic and obscure variety. A natural-born trailblazer, he moved on up to......
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Russian Circles

John Payne
The Chicago trio's recent LP Memorial is a brontosaurus-heavy rock stomper guaranteed to bum you out in the most righteous ways. Misery: Our ugly times seem to call for it, and there's nothing fancy about the brutal way Russian Circles dole out their dark, unforgiving sonic punishment. Memorial is like......
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Four Tet, Nobody, ?Anthony Naples

John Payne
You might call Kieran Hebden, aka Four Tet, a DJ, but that doesn't quite cover it. The London multigenre-ist takes leaps from project to project, having graced us with everything from pastoral acoustic ambiance to funky blends of house raveups and backpack-hiphop grooves. He has teamed with jazz drummer Steve......
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The Orb

John Payne
The rather legendary electronic duo of Alex Paterson and Thomas Fehlmann specialize, for one, in ambient dub mixes that work on headphones to near head-poppin'-off effect. Perhaps even better is to experience the magic in a vast open space, as the masses did at The Orb's recent Glastonbury performance. Better......
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The Sea & Cake, Matt Friedberger

John Payne
Chicago veterans The Sea and Cake are the Steely Dan of indie rock, crafting a breezy, clean-lined pop that follows its catchy muse onto edgier, jazzier turf. The Chicago crew's eighth album, Car Alarm, is another sweetly modernist set of deliciously dreamy auras interlaced with gently experimental electronics, Brazilian-tinged harmonies......
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10-Year Anniversary of Light in the Attic Records

John Payne
Hats off to the ever-righteous reissue kings Light in the Attic, who celebrate their 10-year anniversary by digging in the vaults for the most supremely obscure golden nuggets we failed to appreciate sufficiently the first time around. This stalwart and way-eclectic crew has chosen its artists wisely and farsightedly; the......
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Bill Morrison/Johann Johannsson

John Payne
Filmmaker Bill Morrison specializes in artful reconstructions of ancient footage that's usually in a bad state of decay. The mere look of his films is captivating, with a dark, damp atmosphere that will be enhanced at tonight's L.A. premiere of The Miners' Hymns by the addition of Icelandic electronic composer......
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Johann Johannsson

John Payne
Icelandic composer-musician-sound artist Jóhann Jóhannsson proffers a stately brand of not-rock that merges electronics and symphonic orchestrations channeled through the last 50 years' history of minimalism and other new-music conceptions. He's made several recordings for the likes of the Touch, Mille Plateaux and Mego labels, and scored a number of......