As of October 31st 10pm PST, the Fake Science music store is no longer available. We would like to thank everyone for your support of both the store and our artists. If you would like to learn more about why we closed the store, please feel free to read this post about our decision.

Thank you all so much and continue to read our blog as we will continue to post in the future. If you are interested in listening to our Lab Report Podcasts, you can access our entire archive at fakescience.libsyn.com.

Chris, Maer, Josh, Christopher and James
(The Fake Scientists)

As I mentioned in our store closing post, some of the partners wanted to throw out a few of our favorite albums. Here are ten that I really enjoy, in no particular order:

• Nano - Primary
  Minimalistic yet beautiful techno out of the UK. Christopher helped bring Nano in and his music is the kind that fits in a swank lounge or blaring on a huge rig.
• The Feed - The Edible Album (Bon Appetit)
  Hip-hop for the mind and one with a sense of humor. Like the Roots, The Feed play every not themselves with real instruments not Akai samplers. They have a fantastic groove and I spent many a day jogging around Lake Merritt listening to them.
• Cell - Live at Glade Festival [Mixed]
  I first heard Cell via Ultimae’s Fahrenheit Project part 5 which Christopher featured for the Ambient Airlines segment on the Lab Report. His music is rich in depth and texture and I was very excited when we had the opportunity to carry his live set on the store.
• The Harbours - Second Story Maker
  I first heard the band via my then co-worker, Bob, who is the drummer. He was excited about the release and handed me a copy. Within hearing the second track I knew they would be a fantastic addition and since then I have had the pleasure to get to know and work with a lot of the band.
• Dr. Toast - Oz So Late
  Toast is a good friend of mine, an ex-scratch crew member of mine, an expert of toast (as in the bread) and one hell of a great producer. His music is always beautiful and gets you in a way that you want to listen over and over. I love all his work but feel Oz So Late really represents his stellar sound.
• David Last - The Push Pull
  I think this album really helped solidify the Fake Science crew. Christopher brought it in to review for the report and we were all floored by it. “Cat-Silver” is such an amazing track and I find myself picking songs out of the album whenever I am playing a downtempo set.
• dataspirit - Time Shift EP
  I love atmospheric drum and bass… it is by far one of my all time favorite electronic styles and this album is a perfect example of why I love it. Mellow yet aggressive, its just great music. Logan, the man behind dataspirit who is based in France, submitted a remix track for our contest. We all loved his track and after a few emails we were able to get him to release his EP with us.
• Ultimae - Fahrenheit Project part 5 [comp]
  There is so much amazing music to pick from Ultimae so I just had to pick this comp. Vincent and Sunny have been such an amazing supportive force for Fake Science. Their label puts out such solid music you can never go wrong with them. FP5 was a feature on the lab report and really stuck with me.
• The Seedling Escape - Photosynthesis
  Glitch hop brilliance. I have seen them perform a few times over the last two years and they always blow me away. Their album is brilliant and spent many, many rotations in my car at a very very loud decibel.
• DJ Olive - Heap As
  I had a chance to meet Olive when he was in town for a show. Truly a nice guy down to the core and his music represents this. A stunning mix of different styles yet they work so well together. One of our older releases this is one worth really listening to.

It is with a heavy heart that we must inform you that on November 1st, 2007 we will be closing the Fake Science Music Store. Fake Science was originally started as a labor of love by four friends who had an idea to help share music with people like you and has since grown into the online music resource it is today. However, we evaluated the amount of investment that it would take to keep the store running, as well as making necessary upgrades to keep the Fake Science standards high. We came to the realization that none of us could realistically keep the commitment due to the weight other important things in our lives, such as families, day jobs, and even other side projects. With this knowledge, we wanted to provide you with an opportunity to get back into to the store and purchase music that may interest you. Here are the quick and dirty details about the closure:

• The Store will be available until late October 31st / early November 1st
• Gift Certificates are no longer available for purchase, but existing GCs will be honored until we close the store, at that time they are no longer valid. If you have a GC or have sent one to a friend please use them ASAP.
• We will be updating the blog over the next few weeks with this information, our partners favorite albums, and any other tidbits.
• The Fake Science Blog will continue to exist as will the Lab Report podcast.
• Please inform your friends, family, co-workers that this is their last chance to purchase music at FS.

Through your patronage of our store and our artists, you have made the last two years a great pleasure and worth all the hard work!

Regards,
The Entire Fake Science Team
(Chris, James, Maer, Josh and Christopher)

Let me say up front that Radiohead is one of my favorite bands. So naturally I was one of the first people to pre-order the new release that they are selling themselves without a label. I decided to just order the digital download since the physical package was a whopping $80. I really liked the fact that they let the customer set the price for the digital package. I decided to buy for 5 pounds since that’s what we charge in dollars. A little bit on the generous side but what the hell.

On October 9 I got an email from them telling me that i’d be getting my download code the next day and that the digital files were encoded at 160kbps. Um, excuse me? 160? As anyone who has ever ripped an MP3 knows, 160 is considered pretty lo-fi so that was my first disappointment.

October 10 rolls around and I get my download code. I immediately download my new album and load it up. The first thing I notice is that there is no album art assigned to the tracks and that there is no track number of track number set. This is standard that is supposed to be supplied as meta data and it was missing. Humm, who put this package together? Maybe this is a minor detail to many but since it’s my job to release MP3 packages on a regular basis, I thought it odd.

So, on to the bottom line … the music. Song writing and production wise, this is another beautiful Radiohead album. No doubt about it. What I do have issue with is the mastering. I’m sure that the finished, physical release will be mastered properly but the digital download is weak. The levels are not high enough so the songs played next to other current songs sound less loud. The effect this has for me in my car is that the bottom end is low and the high end is brittle because my car stereo boosts the high end when you turn it way up - which you have to do to hear it well. (This is why I always test every track I mix in the car because if the bottom end is right in the car, then it’ll sound good anywhere.)

Overall I rate this release as weak and amateurish. Not at all what i’d expect from Radiohead or Thom Yorke. The great songs do not come across as they should. On the plus side though is that there is no DRM.

As I mentioned last week in the News Roundup, Universal Music Group is planning on trying out DRM-free music on a limited number of services. This trial is to last 6 months and it has been recently reported that the muisc files will contain unique digital watermarks within the file itself. Ars Technica has a great article breaking down why Universal is doing this but most importatly, why this won’t prove a thing.

Universal’s plan appears to be rather simple: sell watermarked tunes to users, then sit back and scan the P2P networks for music files with Universal watermarks. While the data won’t lead them back to pirates, they will be able to detect the presence of watermarked music online. Doing so would confirm for them which tracks have been purchased and then shared online.

So why would Universal do this? One possible goal, if you take the pessimistic approach to large labels, is to “prove” that DRM-free music doesn’t work. Another is that they are legitimately are interested in seeing how fast digital music leaks on the internet and then at what rate it proliferates. Ars mentions the illogical angle to either of these thoughts but it will be interesting to see what the mothership does with all there newly found data.

I had fun writing the last news round up because I could talk about a couple of different topics briefly and not have to find a specific article to editorialize. Aka, I am lazy… but want to keep posting on a regular basis. If you like the format let me know!

• The Universal Music group (who happens to be the largest label in the world) is going to try out DRM-Free music for a bit and see what the market thinks. It sounds like they finally see the potential of DRM-free music but are still very doubtful of the success. This may have been driven by EMI’s success or market pressures. Interesting side note is that iTunes does not appear on the list of trial sites, which in a way makes a little sense because if this is a trial then you want to start with smaller market shares, especially if you are fearful of rampant piracy.
  Music DRM in critical condition: Universal tests DRM free music sales
• AT&T (or their middle men) decided to edit out Pearl Jam’s anti-Bush statements during the live stream of Lollapalooza. AT&T claim it was a mistake due to an over aggressive media firm that was responsible for editing out inappropriate language which was required due to the unrestricted age limit. That’s a pretty weak argument but lets say it was a mistake, it still points out that when you have one main source (especially for the internet) the chance of censorship, even accidental, becomes a major factor. Net freedom is very, very important…
  AT&T Cuts Anti-Bush Lyrics From Pearl Jam Webcast
  update: AT&T May Have Censored Bands’ Political Speech in the Past
• Portability vs. Quality. This is a big debate going on with consumers and producers and how audio quality is being thrown out the window with MP3s. The SF Chronicle has a great article talking about why we are where we are and what we are missing.
  MP3 music - it’s better than it sounds

This show, we sit down with Evan Marc aka Bluetech to talk about his new dub techo/tech house release Emotional Ecology out on PsyBooty Records, other recent projects, and the pitfalls of becoming a ubiquitous force in the underground music scene.  (Okay, we made that last part up…)

The interview is presented in three parts interspersed with songs from the new album: Centigrade, Divide By Zero and Ekoshok.

Download the show or listen now:

Show links:

Emotional Ecology @ Fake Science

PsyBooty Records
Native State Records

So I have been a little obsessed, um… correction ALOT obsessed with St. Vincent (Annie Clark) since I first heard “Now, Now” on Gorilla Vs. Bear. One benefit of working with Fake Science and being a dj is that I hear a lot of new music all the time; sometimes its uninspiring other times it is quickly added to my collection. Rarely will a piece of music grab me and force me to listen to it over and over and then hunger for more by that artist. This is exactly what happened to me with St. Vincent.

“Now, Now” was the first track made public, back in April or so, and it was such a tease. I wanted to hear more, I wanted the album NOW, damnit. The last time I was this obsessed with a new artist was when I heard Alanis Morissette’s first single back on the 94.5 the Edge, freaking eons ago. It was haunting, I wanted more and the wost part you couldn’t get it yet because the album wasn’t released.

While waiting for the album, I read that St. Vincent was going on tour with John Vanderslice. One of the benefits of living in the Bay Area is that everyone comes through here… but not this time. The closest she was coming was San Diego; that’s not fucking FAIR! So I moped and whined and then Xina recommended we fly out to see one of her shows. It was tempting, so tempting and then I by chance read that she was playing Cafe Du Nord solo. Perfect. Not only that, but Ferraby Lionheart was coming up from LA to open. Even Better.

Xina and I got to the venue around 9pm to make sure that we would catch Ferraby play. I saw him in Austin for the SXSW show and was pleasantly surprised by his performance there. At Du Nord, he was by himself with a guitar and a keyboard and he played a wonderful solo set to the early crowd. It was interesting to see him open, when I felt he really should have been the second act before St. Vincent.

The second Act was Death Vessel, another solo acoustic act, but the presentation was very different. The singer looks like your typical metal/rocker with long hair, black clothes… but his voice is this near falsetto tenor with a bluesgrass-southern feel. I honestly don’t know if I liked him or not, I had such a hard time putting the look with the voice that it distracted from everything else.

Finally, at nearly Midnight, St. Vincent took the stage with a full band. Previously, her shows have been solo and only recently has she put a whole band together. The band was made up of a drummer on a click track (for fills/backing vocals), a bassist / keyboard player player, and a violin player. After seeing the DUMBO Sessions I had an inkling into what to expect from her but seriously, being two people back from the front row watching the band work the set, truly let you see how talented Annie really is. Her ability to stay focused on her singing while playing some incredibly complex patterns on the guitar was memorizing. The backing band was tight & talented and Annie had a great interplay between the violin and her guitar parts.

The track selection was mainly from her album but she did have a few tracks that I had never heard before. She did a solo song half way through the set… I don’t know the name but the refrain was “Bang, Bang” and it was about a how a women had to kill her old lover. The great thing about all the tracks she picked was that even though I knew most of them from the album, each were changed either by pacing or style to give each a unique twist. At the end of the set the crowd went nuts and Annie came back for two encores before she announced that she was out of songs. I think Xina’s quote kind of sums up the night: “I knew she was going to be good, but not that good.” Read the rest of this entry »

I just spent the last 30 minutes trying to find a decent topic to focus on and honestly nothing particular grabbed me enough to rant/dissect, so here are a few interesting tidbits from around the web…

• Vivendi aka parent company of Universal Music Group aka largest label in the world announced their Q2′07 numbers and CD sales are down again (duh) but their digital music sales are up 49%. As predicted the music buying audience is focusing more and more on digital sales.
  Earnings: Vivendi’s Q2 Sales Up; UMG Down; Digital Music Up 49 Percent
• Russian authorities are pursing the head of AllOfMP3.com’s founder. The issue with AllOfMP3.com is based around was the site doing anything technically illegal. Many say no they weren’t according to Russian law and it was the American pressure that caused this issue. My big issue with AllOfMP3 was an ethical point of view about how they were not treating the artists fairly. As this article points out the “‘we’ll hold your money until you give us a call’ attitude” is the same for both AllOfMP3.com and SoundExchange, hmmm….
  AllOfMP3.com: Let The Prosecution And Persecution Begin!
• Music blogs… I am kind of getting obssed with them because they continually introduce me to new music. My current musical flavor of choice is Indie Rock, which we really, really want more of on FS. Right now one of my favorite blogs is Gorilla vs. Bear based out of my old hometown of Dallas. Niki introduced me to them when I was looking for new blogs and I love them because they helped me discover the brilliance that is Annie Clark (aka St. Vincent). I have tix to see here in August and I plan to do a full review of the show. Mmmm… guitar, make sure to watch the video!
  St. Vincent: “These Days” video and Sirius Blog Radio

That is all…

	Released: July 2007 buy: Evan Marc - Emotional Ecology @ Fake Science [$5]

PsyBooty Records has just released the first album from the dub/techno/ambient entity Evan Marc, also known as Bluetech. Evan has spent the last several years branching out into minimal techno, tech house, and deep ambient. Emotional Ecology features 11 beautiful and deep pulsing tracks that display a distinct new twist to Evan’s signature click/glitch dubbed out sound techniques.

Evan is known worldwide through extensive touring and his own artist-run label, Native State Records. He is constantly updating and revolutionizing traditional forms of electronic expression (dub, ambient and techno) through his intense embrace of music in its rawest form as well as meticulous sound design. Emotional Ecology gives a fresh lacquer to minimal techno (or dub techno) with the aide of compelling melodies that snap to the pulse of the bass and drum tracks.