Aside from being pretty good at this whole electropop thing they’ve got going, Royksopp spark a key query with their most recent album. Is there a type of music in this world Lykke Li’s voice can not compliment? Drake songs, this and vampire soundtracks, homegirl is a chameleon. Anywho, the Norwegian duo will be coming over to the states (or at least, the coasts) to play for the first time in four years. And at least one famous meme-inspiring rapper is a known fan. Maybe you’ll see him at one of these dates.

11.18 Los Angeles, CA @ Club Nokia
11.19 San Francisco, CA @ Regency
11.23 New York, NY @ Webster Hall
11.24 New York, NY @ Webster Hall

Twi-hards, rejoice: the soundtrack for the latest film in the Twilight series, New Moon, will be released this Friday, as “overwhelming and unprecedented demand” prompted the release date to be pushed up by four days. The album will be hitting stores more than a month before the film is released on November 20, so the Twilight faithful can comfort themselves with the musical musings of Death Cab for Cutie, Thom Yorke, Muse, the Killers, OK Go, Grizzly Bear, Lykke Li, Bon Iver, St. Vincent, Sea Wolf, and the Editors, among others, until their cinematic dreams become reality.

MTV has the full scoop on the most recent Twilight developments, of course, and is featuring an interview with OK Go and Lykke Li about their involvement with the soundtrack; check them out here and here. Stream the video for Death Cab for Cutie’s contribution to the soundtrack, titled “Meet Me on the Equinox,” here.

If we had to guess how Mark Ronson, Pharrell and Justin Timberlake have all been using up their spare time for the last few months, home-fried Southern rock remixing wouldn’t have been it.
But even before an official Kings of Leon album was even in the mix, Timberlake and Pharrell were allegedly reworking the Tennessee-based band of brothers’ tunes. And while it’s often been more of a question as to what Pharrell’s not into than what he is, it’s still sort of fun to imagine him listening to say the seven-plus minute epic that is “Knocked Up” and decide where it could use more space drums. Drummer Nathan Followill told Billboard Ronson, Kenna, Lykke Li and Linkin Park will also contribute tracks to the album. The band also just shot footage for an upcoming live DVD in London. Neither of these projects have a slated release date.

Domestic life with artificial intelligence and a white bed dominate the screen for Röyksopp’s new single “The Girl & The Robot,” which also stars Swedish singer Robyn.
Read the full story

To what degree is it absurdly patronizing that I didn’t take Laura Marling seriously because she’s a 19-year-old British female-folk/pop singer? Let’s call a spade a spade here: if you’re a young artist, you’re afforded little respect. If you’re a young woman, you’re afforded even less. These are entrenched stigmas in critical culture. It doesn’t help Marling’s cause that her songs are anchored on tales of failed or unrequited love. To sum it up: good-looking blonde teenager sings songs about her ex-boyfriend. Play coy all you want, but we both know transcending that persona on a critical level is pretty fucking tough. But we’re not talking about the Jonas Brother or Miley Cyrus here — we’re talking about Marling, who exudes a unique maturity in interviews; she is comfortable in the spotlight and admirably reticent. She doesn’t play to the camera; she plays to herself. She dismisses compliments about her maturity saying such self-analysis is unnecessary. And truthfully, she has little to nothing to do with her youthful contemporaries, but more with accomplished artists like Leslie Feist or Lykke Li.
Read the full story