The Weeknd - House Of Balloons
Mp3: Misteur Valaire - Ave Mucho ft. Bran Van 3000
Alright so, hailing from Montreal is Misteur Valaire, a five piece electro band in the vain of Holy Fuck and bands alike which are known to put emphasis towards the instrumental of songs instead of the vocals where as having none at all in some of their songs.
One thing they're also known for is to have offered their second album, Friterday Night, for free on the internet which was digitally downloaded more than 40,000 times and all that even before bands like Radiohead offered their album for free aswell. One might wonder the validity of calling it an album and not a demo as the album itself was possibly made to start the whole hype machine surrounding the band and not to made profit out of it. A concept that is widely used in the hip-hop game as artists releases mixtape by the dozen. So while 40,000 downloads of their album/demo/mixtape is definitely quite a feat, it definitely does not transgress to 40,000 record sales, but does prove that this marketing tool works.
With that said, Misteur Valaire is about to drop, on May 18th, the follow-up of Friterday Night with the release of Golden Bombay which will have a full retail release unlike Friterday Night. And even though Golden Bombay's sales numbers will definitely count this time around, Misteur Valaire are staying true to themselves as they offered the first single of it, Ave Mucho, for free on the internet which features none other than, fellow Montreal act, Bran Van 3000 joining the like of Fanny Bloom (La Patère Rose), Gigi French (Giselle des Hot Springs), Senja Sargent (Ladies of the Canyon) and Béni BBQ on the featuring list of the album.
I don't know what the rest of the album holds, but I personally was expecting something a little bit more eclectic and enthralling. Don't get me wron, the song is definitely listenable, but eclectic and enthrallement is a feat that was only half-achieved as they seemed to have taken a more laid back and mainstream approach with this song to broaden their audience. And to be honest, it's just not as big as I thought it'd be. Finally, while it's nothing extraordinary, you can expect the song to work the charts as it definitely has mainstream value written all over it, so expect to hear alot more from this soon to be emerged band in the near future.