Surprise, surprise, Tim has yet another band to add to his amazingly long list of bands that he has discovered within a week of being able to see them. Little Dragon played Seattle earlier this week, but that didn't stop me from finding out about them through a completely different avenue just days later (this happens to me...allthefuckingtime). Oh well, the Cheetah still deserves to be fed, even if I let it get a little hungry first.
Little Dragon is a synthpop group from Sweden, headed up by a Japanese-Swedish chick singer (I know, it's baller) named Yukimi Nagano. I personally found out about them because they are featured on my favorite track "Empire Ants" from the recent Gorillaz album Plastic Beach. They've released two albums, most recently last year's Machine Dreams. It's hard to put a finger on the sound, because it's super Swedish and completely un-Swedish at the same time, in large part because of Yukimi's distinctive voice. She sounds like a much raspier (and less annoying, at least for me) Karin Dreijer Andersson, and as a result you get some swinging Swede-y pop ballads, but with a lot of soul thrown in. There's a lot to be had from their sound, as the electronic thuds that populate the background of most of the songs serve more as a simple common denominator than anything else that could be more driving. It feels like good music for being driven through the downtown of an empty city at 3 in the morning...and it's always good to have that kind of music to turn to. Check it out!
