Summer Camp - "Better Off Without You"

Summer Camp have a debut full-length en route with production by Pulp's Steve Mackey, but the record still needs a bit of a push in the fund department. You can help support its release, which the band is putting out on their own Apricot Recordings, by heading over to Pledge Music now and donating what you can. If you need convincing, try out the new "Better Off Without You"—a typically grand and lovely bit of 1980s-tinged pop fun from the London duo.

Summer Camp - Better Off Without You

Summer Camp - "Nobody Knows You"
Summer Camp - "I Want You"

Summer Camp - "Nobody Knows You"

One of last year's biggest blog sensations, Summer Camp, have dropped a new track via Pledge Music, a fundraising site geared towards helping bands release records. "Nobody Knows You" finds the London-based duo in typical top form: catchy vocal melodies, buzzing synths, and big sweeping choruses all intact. Download the track below and make sure to follow the band either on Facebook or via Pledge to keep track of news on their forthcoming full-length.

Summer Camp - "Nobody Knows You"

Another Stupid List: Best EPs of 2010

Harlowe and The Great North Woods - Harlowe and The Great North Woods 
Recorded in a Portland apartmment, Los Angeles home, and a woodshed studio amongst the orchards of Northern California, this debut's soaring vocal harmonies all drip with the resonance and reverberations of their recording spaces. It's a sound both intimate and wide open.
Sample: "Roses"

Twin Sister - Colour Your Life 
Buzz is the word and its in large part to the wholly unique voice of singer Andrea Estella whose husky whisper lends an otherworldly charm to the psychedelic funk and haze of songs like "Lady Daydream" and "All Around And Away We Go."
Sample: "All Around And Away We Go"

The Best Songs of 2010 :: 30-21

Dead Models - "Tonight"
Straightforward, fuzzy and 1960s-tinged garage rock with a killer, repeatable guitar riff. Sometimes that's all you need.


Broken Social Scene - "Texico Bitches" 
Forget Cee Lo. The year's best "fuck you" belongs to a couple of Canadians who recorded a timely middle finger to the oil industry.

The New Pornographers - "Crash Years"
Melodically, the opening verse of "Crash Years" is so good it almost makes the rest of the song irrelevant. To put it in layman's terms, Neko Case owns it.

Magic Kids - "Summer"
The fact alone that singer Bennett Foster has the chutzpah to convincingly pull of a cutesy and cliched line like "summertime is for sweethearts" and then pull it off makes this one of the best songs of the year. But then Foster and company make you believe it too with a piano, strings and a Harry Belafonte-worthy choral conga line.

The Arcade Fire - "Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)"
Régine Chassagne's five-and-a-half-minute love affair with Blondie is one of the more interesting musical turns of The Suburbs, taking the band into an unexpected territory that one can only hope they'll return to.

Summer Camp - "Round The Moon"

Londoners Jeremy Warmsley and Elizabeth Sankey of Summer Camp are set to release their Young EP on September 6th via Moshi Moshi. The song "Round The Moon"—one of the many bright spots on this John Hughes, 80s-obsessed voyage (please also see track "Jake Ryan" named after this guy)—is now paired with equally retro footage taken from the 1970 Roy Andersson film, En kärlekshistoria (A Swedish Love Story). Preorder the Young EP here.

Summer Camp - "Jake Ryan" (from Young EP)
Summer Camp - "Ghost Train" (from Young EP)

Summer Camp - "Ghost Train"

Jeremy Warmsley and Elizabeth Sankey of London duo Summer Camp channel a wash of first love-inspired butterflies and John Hughes melodramatics in their first single "Ghost Train"—a crazily addictive song whose fuzzed-out hooks only sink deeper with each repeated listen. Look out for a 7-inch from Summer Camp due this April on Moshi Moshi.

Summer Camp - "Ghost Train"