Already being credited as a new force in R&B, The Weeknd’s House of Balloons mixtape has garnered much praise since it’s March 21^st debut. The mysterious force behind The Weeknd is 20-year-old Abel Tesfaye from Toronto, who as of yet remains unsigned. Critics from Rolling Stone Magazine to Pitchfork have cited The Weeknd as an “Artist to Watch” and fellow Toronto-native Drake is at least partially responsible for catapulting The Weeknd into the blogosphere after tweeting lyrics from House of Balloons and linking the mixtape to his own website shortly after its release.

House of Balloons undoubtedly earns this early praise for its raw, seductive energy and dark, hypnotic beats. The mixtape is layered with samples from diverse artists and genres (Siouxie and the Banshees and Beach House, to name a few) and has drawn comparisons to indie/R&B artist How To Dress Well, Drake, Aaliyah, and another rising star in the R&B world Frank Ocean, of Odd Future fame. Perhaps the most seductive track on the mixtape is “What You Need,” but it’s impossible to outshine the other stand outs on the album, “Loft Music” and “Wicked Games.” The album in its entirety is a beautiful, sensual, quite simply addictive work that I can’t recommend highly enough.

House of Balloons can be downloaded for free from The Weeknd’s official website: http://the-weeknd.com/.

The Civil Wars’ story of how they became a band is pretty interesting.  Certainly not typical.  How many musical blind-dates even happen, let alone produce a dynamic group like this one?  A blend of emotive songwriting with a strong emotional rapport creates really captivating music, which tempts me to make a Swell Season comparison, but as the name might suggest there’s enough Americana infused into the Civil Wars’ debut album Barton Hollow to set them apart from a lot of would-be comparisons and into a category definitively unique.

Regardless, rumor has it they’re pretty terrific live, dynamic emotional connections being what they are.  So if you can’t snag the last few tickets for one of their nights at the Largo, head down to the El Rey on Wednesday to get a taste of The Civil Wars.  I’ll see you there.

UCLA Radio is giving you the inside scoop on an advanced screening of Attack the Block, an official selection from the SXSW 2011 Film Festival. The screening is taking place at 7:30PM on Thursday July 28th at the Arclight Hollywood theatre. To get your tickets, just go to http://bit.ly/oDLsuJ.

Attack the Block follows a gang of tough inner-city kids who try to defend their turf against an invasion of savage alien creatures, turning a South London apartment complex into an extraterrestrial warzone. Set on a council estate in South London on Bonfire night, the film follows a street gang, Moses (John Boyega), Pest (Alex Esmail), Dennis (Franz Drameh), Jerome (Leeon Jones) and Biggz (Simon Howard). While they are mugging nurse Sam (Jodie Whittaker), a fiery object falls from the sky, crashing through the roof of a nearby car. When they investigate, they discover a creature from the meteor and they kill it. Soon more aliens crash land and the gang has to defend themselves and their council estate from the alien invaders. The film has received universal acclaim, even being called the best film of the SXSW 2011 Film Festival by The Examiner.

Attack the Block is in select theaters this Friday – July 29th! [Rated R]

You can watch the trailer here:

Friday, June 10th, at 11am (Pacific), award-winning comedian Christy Murphy brings her comic stylings to the UCLA Radio studios for Scriptcast (A Screenwriting Podcast).

Not familiar with Christy?  Check out ChristyMurphy.com as well as her site: Funny Stuff

Christy will be chatting with Script Doctor Eric and sidekick Matt about screenwriting, writing comedy, and how to “punch up” jokes.

Tune in by clicking the “Listen Live” headphones above at 11am this Friday!

Join the conversation via Twitter – @ScriptDrEric

Or if you’re old school, send an AOL Instant Message (AIM) while we’re on air: UCLAradioLA

Again, that’s this Friday, 11am, right here on UCLA Radio.

Be prepared to laugh.

If you’re looking for a new band unlike anyone else, you have to check out Yelle. This French electronica trio quickly rose to the top of the charts in Europe and now they’re starting their US invasion.

Their goofy and upbeat sound makes you want to groove along with the beats that inspire a strong vibe for each song, like Safari Disco Club- it makes you feel like you’re groovin’ with the characters from “A Jungle Book.” The group’s original name, which was YEL for “You Enjoy Life,” perfectly summarizes their musical mantra; even though you may not be able to understand what Yelle, the female singer, is saying, you know she’s loving whatever it is.

Yelle sticks close to their roots, with most of the titles in their native language and the style inspired by the popular club scene in France. She and her band are definitely worth the listen; the downside is a lot of their songs sound similar, but at least you’ll never wonder who you’re listening to.

What do UCLA, cinema, and the Greek culture have in common? At first glance you may think very little, but the answer is Alex Kalognomos, a UCLA alumni who has been presenting Greek films at Los Angeles Greek Film Festival since 2009. Kalognomos was kind enough to grant me an interview this past week to discuss everything from his personal pursuits to his executive position as the leader of Los Angeles Greek Film Festival. (more…)

Just when many of you had barely recovered from post-Coachella 2011 stress syndrome, it struck. The headline read: Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival 2012 will be held over TWO WEEKENDS. You heard it right, folks. I’ll give you a moment to wrap your brain around this news.

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June 20 & 22, 2011 – Kid Cudi will be performing at Nokia Theatre on June 20th and 22nd, with special guest Chip Tha Ripper. You can purchase tickets at Ticketmaster.

He used to make funny faces in the mirror and rap to himself growing up. Weird? Maybe, but consider it practice for the place Scott “Kid Cudi” Mescudi finds himself now. Cudi slept on a couch while juggling retail jobs at stores like American Apparel and A Bathing Ape and clocking long hours at the recording studio every night with his managers Plain Pat and Emile. Cudi fell into the typical MC grind until tragedy struck in 2006: His uncle suffered the same fate as Cudis father and passed away. Cudi went back to Cleveland for the funeral in a emotional funk which inspired “Day N Nite”the song that would change his life forever. Before long, the kid from Cleveland was beginning to creep into the mainstream. With hype (and Kanye) behind him and a Billboard hit with “Day N Nite,” Cudi inked a deal with Kanye’s G.O.O.D music label. Soon after, he parlayed that into a major deal with Universal Motown.

On September 15, 2009, Kid Cudi released his debut album Man On The Moon: The End Of Day, a genre-bending concept album that took people through Scott Mescudi’s dreams, nightmares, and unique views of the world. The album’s reception, both critical and commercial, proved Universal Motown President Sylvia Rhone’s assertion that Cudi was a  ”game-changer in hip-hop”. And a game-changer he has been. As the stats go for Cudder, to date he’s sold over 4.6 million digital singles, 1.3 million mobiletones, and according to The Hype Machine, he is among the top ten most blogged about artists of all-time.

His highly-anticipated sophomore album, Man on the Moon II: The Legend of Mr. Rager is set to release November 9, featuring Kanye West, Mary J. Blige and GLC, with production from Emile, Plain Pat, Jim Jonsin, Diplo, Dot Da Genius and others. Its first single, “Erase Me,” debuted at #22 on Billboard’s Hot 100 when it released on iTunes this past August.  Cudi promises that the album will be darker than its first, and will build on the cinematic theme that he prides his music on. There’s no question that the album will be well-received by critics and fans alike, so the only question that remains is: where will you be for the revolution?

Info courtesy of Goldenvoice.

Friday May 20, 2011 – A couple of weeks ago the Uclaradio sports department was lucky enough to cover the NFL Players Premiere League Flag Football Game held on the North Athletic Field at UCLA.  The teams for the flag football game included former NFL Stars and Hollywood actors, and their supporters included many of the 2011 NFL draft picks who were in LA for the NFL rookie “Premier Weekend”. The event was a lot of fun for all involved, as fans got to watch a tightly contested flag football game, officiated by number one draft pick, Cam Newton.  Jaguars’ Running Back Maurice Jones-Drew, 49ers’ rookie Quarterback Colin Kaepernick and Actor Donald Fasion (best known as Turk from Scrubs) were nice enough to talk with us about a variety of sports and non-sports related topics.

Jones-Drew explained about how the lockout was affecting him personally, and how he felt UCLA Football would fare in the 2011 season. Maurice Jones-Drew Interview

Kaepernick talked about his relationship with Coach Harbaugh, as well as how he plans to deal with the enormous expectations the 49er’s fanbase has placed upon him. Colin Kaepernick Interview

Fasion talked about a variety of topics, from what his top college choices were, to the  new  television series he’s working on.  Donald Fasion Interview

Like our Facebook page to check our pictures from the event!

Ghost Pal (Oliver Ignatius of Brooklyn) has just released a new track called “Akhenaten.” Highly recommended if you like psychedelic, pop, rock, or soul in any shape or form. Or if any of those things sound intriguing to you.

From Ghost Pal: “The recording features a sample from Sly and the Family Stone’s “Poet,” off their 1971 opus THERE’S A RIOT GOIN’ ON, a strong contender for greatest album of all time. Thanks, Sly and Family!”

Free download here:

http://ghostpal.bandcamp.com/track/akhenaten

Not a lot of band can pull off what Septicflesh manages to do. Following their successful 2008 release Communion, Christos, Fotis, Spiros, and Sotiris have created a work of art that can only be called a masterpiece, The Great Mass. Everything works perfectly in this album: the album flows with water-like fluidity, the band members’ technical skills are at their best, and the band’s compositional skill have improved tremendously.

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This Friday, June 3, from 7-8 P.M. Ben Howland, head coach of UCLA’s men’s basketball team, will be on the show with us.  Tune in for this exclusive interview, which also happens to be the last show of the quarter, so you definitely do not want to miss this one!

If you have any questions which you would like us to ask Coach Howland on air, you can do so by following us and tweeting at our show’s page at twitter.com/uclaradiosports.

We hope you all tune in and enjoy the show!

- Ben Caplan (All About Sports, Fridays 7-8 P.M.)

Cinemetropolis, the highly anticipated third full-length album from the Seattle duo Blue Scholars was released 2 weeks before the planned official release date of June 14^th. In an effort to connect directly with fans, Blue Scholars made the decision to independently release Cinemetropolis with the reasoning, “No record label. No marketing and distribution deal. No middlemen. No bullshit.” They explain the relation between their creative production and the music industry as an incompatible, even unnecessary pairing. Instead, Blue Scholars utilized the online project funding system Kickstarter, through which dedicated fans were encouraged to pledge to the cause with the promise of the digital album weeks before the official June release. The final total of $62,000 significantly eclipsed the original fundraising goal of $25,000.

The album takes inspiration from cinema and its vast influence on modern life. Many track titles represent esteemed individuals, some directly tied to the film industry. (Full track list available below.) Vocalist Geologic explains that the moving image has formed our “real” world so much that it often actually feels more real. The Scholars have plans with directors and filmmakers to create corresponding music videos, short films and multimedia projects, rendering Cinemetropolis a multidimensional, reverse-soundtrack of sorts.

As the third full-length album from Blue Scholars, Cinemetropolis is comparatively more sophisticated than previous albums and EPs, especially the more substantive, potent contribution from the remarkably skilled DJ/Producer Sabzi.  While Cinemetropolis brings Sabzi out from the background, it still showcases Geo’s smart, biting lyrics. Ultimately this makes the album an undeniably equivalent effort that displays a wide range of sentiment, from the sparkly 8-bit in “Cinemetropolis” to the grandiose, dark musing of “Anna Karina” to the tricksy synth and chill beat of the marijuana anthem “Tommy Chong.”

Still, even with the film influence and growth of the duo, the signature Blue Scholar flavor lives on. There remains a clear motif of social commentary, and as always, a rampant Pacific Northwest pride.

The Blue Scholars’ talent and profound motivation to make strong, relevant music for fans justifies high regard, and the skill in Cinemetropolis deserves applause for being an album that can irrefutably be called a work of art.

Track List and Details

Cinemetropolis

Hussein

Fou Lee (Seattle grocery store)

Lalo Schifrin (Composer)

Seijun Suzuki (Film maker)

Anna Karina (Actress)

Marion Sunshine (Actress)

Slick Watts (Basketball player, public figure)

George Jackson (Political activist)

Oskar Barnack ∞ Oscar Grant (Inventor, Martyr)

Yuri Kochiyama (Human rights activist)

Rani Mukerji (Actress)

Tommy Chong (Comedian)

Chief Sealth (Public figure, namesake of Seattle)

Fin

UCLA Radio is hooking you up with movie tickets valid throughout the month of June to see the Bloody Disgusting Selects release of Yellow Brick Road. The film is playing every Wednesday and Friday of June at the AMC Burbank 16 theatre!

Yellow Brick Road is about the people of Friar, New Hampshire in the fall of 1940 who abandoned their homes, their possessions and their lives to walk up an ancient trail, never to be seen alive again.  Their fates remained a mystery for over seventy years, until a team of researchers discover the trailhead and attempt to retrace the path the doomed citizens of Friar took. A few among them believe they will find something terrible in the forest. But it is the forest that will find something terrible in them.

The film was an official Slamdance selection, and played at The Atlanta Film Festival and Screamfest to critical and audience acclaim, and won best feature at the New York Horror Film Festival.

To win you pair of tickets to see the film, all you have to do is LIKE us on Facebook (facebook.com/UCLARadio) and follow us on Twitter (@uclaradio)! There, you will find more information about all of our giveaways and how you can enter to win.

You can see the trailer for the film: here!

There’s a few reasons why, if you haven’t already heard of and/or listened to Okkervil River, you should go check them out right now. (seriously, right now.) I’m going to do this in bullet point form.

• They’ve been going strong since 1998, which means they’ve had no less than 13 years to develop their sound and figure out the best ways to collaborate
• They’re signed to Jagjaguwar Records, which is also home to artists like Bon Iver and Volcano Choir
• They take their name from a Russian short story, which is cool
• Their lead singer looks like this
• They’re releasing their new album TODAY, so you can listen to their very current work as well as some of their older stuff
• They’ll be at the Wiltern Theatre on Wilshire Blvd on June 23, so there’s still time to listen to them, love them, and buy tickets!

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