As usual, there’s plenty of cowbell. Via Soundcloud.

Released in July 2011, Ghostfunk pairs one of my favorite hip-hop artists, Wu-Tang member Ghostface Killah, with vintage African funk, high-life, and psychedelic rock music. Artwork by Joe Dichiara.

Grab it here. [Thanks GD]

From Sun Araw’s website:

ANCIENT ROMANS is the fifth full-length album from SUN ARAW

Primal Splendour, who sends out innumerable rays, not perceptible by the senses, but collectively thinkable

Heartfelt and marbled, this album is documentation of the slow exit (the triumphal entry): moving the camera back 8 stages along the circumference of the circle to the point where the obverse is reverse, in order to celebrate the building of an edifice and then walk away from it in wisdom, gaining freedom from it.

ANCIENT ROMANS will be available as a 2xLP on white vinyl in a gatefold jacket with an accompanying art book, as well as on CD.

available on SUN ARK RECORDS through Drag City, August 23rd

Check him out this weekend at CoCo 66.

MP3: Crete

From Sub Pop

Washed Out is the operational alias for Atlanta, GA’s Ernest Greene, and on July 12th, we at Sub Pop Records will be releasing the first Washed Out full-length, Within and Without. We are excited about this, to an almost unseemly degree. Greene recorded Within and Without with Ben Allen, who, among a great many other things, co-produced Animal Collective’s Merriweather Post Pavillion, Gnarls Barkley’s St. Elsewhere and Deerhunter’s Halcyon Digest. In 2009 Washed Out released two critically-acclaimed EPs; Life of Leisure (Mexican Summer) and High Times (Mirror Universe Tapes). Most recently, the Washed Out song “Feel It All Around,” from Life of Leisure, was chosen as the theme song for the new and very funny IFC series Portlandia, which features Saturday Night Live cast member Fred Armisen and Sleater-Kinney/Sub Pop alum and current Wild Flag member Carrie Brownstein.

MP3: Eyes Be Closed

We’ve been loving the first single from Ganglians’ new record Still Living, out on Lefse August 23rd. Pre-orders now available.

Sacramento’s Ganglians return after a relatively quiet two years since their dual album dropping in 2009. The aptly titled Still Living hits the streets August 23rd stateside via Lefse, and August 29th throughout Europe via Souterrain Transmissions. Ringing in at just under an hour, the double LP stays true to their psychedelic roots established on their self-title debut and immediate follow-up Monster Head Room (both via Woodsist), they step it up a notch both stylistically and sonically by enlisting the help of producer Robby Moncrieff (who also played a crucial role in the shaping of The Dirty Projectors Bitte Orca).

[via]

MP3: Jungle

It’s almost not warm enough to post this — this is clearly summer music and it’s barely early spring — but what the hell. Grab the single “California Sunrise” from San Diego three-piece Dirty Gold below. The EP, which reminds us of a more sunny Beach House, just dropped on Autumn Records April 12. [via]

MP3: California Sunrise

I can’t believe it’s been three years since we last heard from them, but Fleet Foxes finally have a new record Helplessness Blues, scheduled to drop May 3rd. Sub Pop has been kind enough to release the record’s first single “Helplessness Blues.” The track is exactly what you expect from the band — sun-drenched folk with lovely harmonies to spare — and if you’re as big a fan of Fleet Foxes as we are, then that’s not a bad thing.

Fleet Foxes – Helplessness Blues by subpop

Aquarium Drunkard just posted an interesting compilation of Christian psychedelia from the sixties and seventies:

This is so good. A couple of weeks back the guys at Crescere shot me an email hipping me to their latest creation; a two part compilation of super-obscure, often private press, outsider psychedelic guitar and folk music from the 60s and 70s… all with the underlying theme of the Jesus People’s Movement. From what I can tell a lot of this stuff has yet to be comped (though I’m sure it’s only a matter of time) making this collection all that much more interesting.

I was familiar with 2nd Chapter of Acts (don’t ask) but all of the others are new to me. If you can handle the proselytizing, this is certainly worth a listen and an interesting glimpse into a bizarre movement. Now excuse me while I go rock some some WinterBand.

We posted about this a while ago, but since I’ve been revisiting this great compilation, here it is again. It’s the perfect soundtrack to a mellow weekend.

From Aquarium Drunkard.

The L.A. Burnout comp was mailed to me in November from a longtime reader based in NYC, which coincidental arrived at the same time I was reading two books (Laurel Canyon: The Inside Story of Rock-and-Roll’s Legendary Neighborhood & Hotel California: The True-life Adventures of Crosby, Stills, Nash, Young) chronicling the late sixties-early seventies Laurel Canyon incestuous music scene. The L.A. Burnout mix has since proved to have been the perfect companion piece.
I am now sharing it here, in three parts, with ye Drunkard faithfuls. If you too live in Los Angeles, play this mix around dusk while driving through the hills or Topanga with the windows down — it’s the next best thing to time travel.

Download Part 1
Download Part 2

Get yourself into the Halloween spirit with Omri S. Quire‘s second annual FREE Halloween mix tape!

Click HERE to peep the track list and download the mix with over an hour worth of tunes that will take you on aural journey through the darkest hours of the day!