Where's the furthest you've ventured lately?

Starting TODAY, our triumphant new issue, FILTER 48: "Sigur Rós: A Far Off Place” is available on stands everywhere! So if you don't have a yearly subscription yet (why wait longer?), head to your local Barnes and Noble, Bookstar, Waldenbooks, Hastings, B. Dalton, national newsstands, independent music retailers, or wherever your source of choice is, and pick up the new issue. Be sure to let us know what you think of it over at facebook.com/FILTERmagazine; we have a feeling you're going to love it.

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FILTER Magazine’s third annual Culture Collide Festival will return to Los Angeles this October 4-7, bringing four days of incredible music, art, film and more to Echo Park. As one of the most buzzed about festivals of the fall season, Culture Collide will welcome performances by of Montreal (US), Junip (Sweden), School of Seven Bells (US), Clinic (United Kingdom), Penguin Prison (US), Class Actress (US), Dean Wareham Plays Galaxie 500 (US), John Talabot (Spain), Breakestra (US) and Tribes (United Kingdom), American Royalty (US), Moss (Netherlands), The Standards (Thailand), The Kavanaghs (Argentina), and Marit Larsen (Norway), with many more to be announced soon.

This years’ four-day festival will celebrate the convergence of cultures upon Los Angeles by welcoming artists from across the globe. Festival attendees will experience full-band live performances as well as intimate acoustic sets, film screenings, and happy hours featuring free food and drinks from around the world at a variety of venues.

The 2012 Culture Collide Festival will take place on ten unique Los Angeles stages and will wrap up with an all-day block party on Sunday, October 7th.

A limited number of Culture Collide festival wristbands are now available, priced at just $20 at Ticket Web. Wristbands have sold out the past two years, and with many more artists to be announced in the coming weeks, early wristband purchase is strongly recommended.

FILTER Magazine’s Culture Collide Festival is presented by S.O.Terik. Additional sponsors include Slacker Radio, Onitsuka Tiger and Aqua Hydrate. Promotional partners include The City of Echo Park, LA Weekly and KCRW (89.9FM and KCRW.com).

You can get more info about Culture Collide as well as view all participating countries, artists, festival activities and more at culturecollide.com and via the FILTER Magazine Facebook and Twitter.
Be sure to also follow FILTER on Instagram for special on the ground photos, contests and more! @FILTERMagazine.

1:36 A.M. (5/17)—I am at the register inside a 24-hour deli somewhere on 3rd Avenue in lower Manhattan, eagerly anticipating more food than my stomach has any business processing this late at night. My clothes are totally soaked, shoes beaten-down and grey-black. Outside on the sidewalk—unbeknownst to me—my friend Mike is experiencing what he will later refer to as a seizure. Beneath a streetlamp, he has collapsed violently to his bloodied knees and is spastically digging his fingernails into the concrete with the vigor of a chronic beach comber beside a howling metal detector. Do note that Mike is an able-bodied, generally very healthy 26-year-old of remarkable constitution, without trace of any such episodes in his medical history. We are not on drugs (at least not any serious ones). Nor are we drunk, having each consumed a single 25.4 oz bottle of Brooklyn Local 1 (9.0% ABV) much earlier in the night. Logically, Mike’s intense physical reaction can only be chalked up to one precursory stimulus: the mayhem we have just witnessed at Webster Hall.

9:06 P.M.(5/16)—The Men have already begun carving into their set, but still seem on the upswing. (NOTE: For those unfamiliar with it, Webster Hall is a fairly large venue, and tonight the crowd is impressive. At face value, this fantasy bill justifies it, so no huge surprise there.) We begin to weave carefully toward the sound and density. It becomes rapidly apparent that The Men not only hold up against their two furious LPs in a live setting, but can scorch even more profoundly when performing onstage. Seriously. One of the best guitar bands I have seen in a long, long time, and the best opening act in a three-plus act lineup that I have ever seen. I am a little quick to make the foolhardy claim, “This band might be the best we see tonight,” but will prove not far off. By the time The Men have completed their exorcism, we have successfully breached the outskirts of the mosh pit, which is healthy with tide and contains approximately 15% of the audience.

10 P.M.—The Strange Boys’ set represents the only lull in the course of this adrenally charged night. Some others who were in attendance have since attributed it to a venue mismatch, but I contend that they just got plain out-bludgeoned by their billmates. My comments on this set will be brief, though I’ll add that a reasonable smattering of lyric-privy fans were pleasantly engaged during this time.

10:52 P.M.—Tim Presley and White Fence continue to redefine my admiration by surprising me at every turn. They did it in support of Is Growing Faith by blowing out a smaller venue, and are able to transfer to the notched volume/space of Webster swimmingly. Also, Presley is a really good songwriter—probably the best to take the stage tonight, if you ask me. Ty Segall’s bassist, Mikal Cronin, joins up for their set. Slower songs such as “Balance Yr Heart” are able to find a welcome home in the blaring swirl, while the more voracious likes of “Swagger Vets and Double Moon” incite added fury. The mob (now at approx. 22.5% total audience) has been reinvigorated after a brief inhale during set two, and crowd surfers begin to surface. A few central moshers (ourselves now included) make it an unspoken game to heave them as far as possible as they pass overhead.

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The Union Park, Chicago based, three-day festival has just gotten even better. Artists Japandroids and the Chromatics have been added to the large array of artists already set to play. Japandroids will be playing on Friday, July 13, 2012 and Chromatics will be performing Saturday, July 14, 2012. Check out the rest of Pitchfork Music Festival's lineup below and get your tickets here.

Friday, July 13:

A$AP Rocky


Willis Earl Beal


Big K.R.I.T.


Clams Casino


Dirty Projectors


Feist


Tim Hecker


Japandroids


Lower Dens


The Olivia Tremor Control


Outer Minds


Purity Ring

Saturday, July 14:

The Atlas Moth


Atlas Sound


Danny Brown


Chromatics


Cloud Nothings


Cults


Flying Lotus


Godspeed You! Black Emperor


Grimes


Hot Chip


Nicolas Jaar


Liturgy


Lotus Plaza


The Psychic Paramount


Schoolboy Q


Sleigh Bells


Wild Flag


Youth Lagoon

Sunday, July 15:

A Lull


AraabMUZIK


Beach House


Chavez


Dirty Beaches


The Field
Iceage


King Krule


Kendrick Lamar


The Men


Milk Music


Thee Oh Sees


Oneohtrix Point Never


Real Estate


Ty Segall


Unknown Mortal Orchestra


Vampire Weekend

For more info, and tour dates for Japandroids check out their website.

For more tour/band info on the Chromatics click here.

After Tuesday’s show at the Echoplex, I’m convinced that Light Asylum’s music is what Orwell would’ve imagined as the soundtrack to the Two Minutes Hate. The sinister and aggressive attitude of the duo’s self-titled full-length was magnified the moment Shannon Funchess and Bruno Coviello appeared on stage and synced the thunderclap intro of their first song, “Shallow Tears.”

Through the tangle of overlapping drum beats and pulsating synths, Funchess danced on stage in her militant Fly Girl fashion and it seemed as though her intensity was increasingly affecting the crowd below.

The audience itself was mixed from the gothic Pinocchio to the sketchy Australian couple who kept asking to buy “anything” from “anyone,” yet regardless of their differences, everyone's attention was fixated on the stage. But then there was the fully loaded Dennis Quaid look-a-like who had spent all of “Pope Will Roll” trying to catch Coviello's electrostatic effects with his hands until the severity of “IPC” somehow inspired him to lunge himself into a group of dancing girls. A pushing match ensued and people nearby suddenly found themselves involved in the melee. However, it was while Funchess was flexing and growling the lyrics, “Fight girls! / Get tough! / Fight cops / Who try to rape us!” that one of the girls snapped and finally decided to strangle her Ecstasy-crazed menace. But despite the violence on the floor, Funchess demanded the crowd to dance and sing, which suggests that her sonic assault was geared more towards revelry than brutality. 

Fortunately, the show carried on strangle-free as the crowd adhered to Funchess' orders by dancing and singing along to every song they knew the words to. Light Asylum ended their set with “A Certain Person” which shook the venue with its cascading synths and anthemic chorus, and after the song ended, the duo said its goodbyes while most of the crowd stayed behind hoping for an encore. 

The girls from the melee were amongst those that stayed and they were the ones who started howling like wolves for Light Asylum's return. Suddenly a howling Funchess walked on stage and declared, “This is for the little wolves!” An electric hum rose over the speakers as the industrial hammering and synthetic screams of “Knights and Week Ends” ended Light Asylum's 60 minutes of Two Minutes Hate.

It seems as though every country champions its own electronica duo as The Best. England has The Chemical Brothers, America upholds The Crystal Method, Canada claims MSTRKRFT, and France’s baby is undeniably Daft Punk. But what about Germany? After all, Germany is the birthplace of Krautrock which produced a team of seminal electro-experimental groups such as Can, Neu! and the venerable Kraftwerk. But who do the Germans regard as its best electronica duo? Some of you may already know the answer, but just in case you don’t, I’d like to introduce you to one of Germany’s best: Pan-Pot.

From the moment Mobilee Records released the duo's first single “Popy & Caste,” Pan-Pot has headlined the label’s roster while steadily dominating the German club scene. This year, Mobilee Records is celebrating the group’s achievements with Mobilee Back to Back Vol. 6, a musical compilation spanning Pan-Pot’s career and a DVD documenting the group’s international tour.

FILTER caught up with Tassilo Ippenberger and Thomas Benedix, the men behind Pan-Pot, and talked them about their initial venture into the world of electronica and how they made it to the top of the German club scene. Find out what the group had to say and after you’re done, go check out the trailer for Mobilee Back to Back Vol. 6 - Presented by Pan-Pot, which is out now!

What was it like meeting each other for the first time?
Tassilo: Thomas and I studied music engineering at the same school, the [School of Audio Engineering] in Berlin and he was always a very fun person to talk to. And we were mostly talking about, of course, music but also specifically techno because we already had quite a similar taste back then.
Thomas: Tassilo was (and still is) very focused, inspiring and great fun to hang out with. That's why we started making music together.

Can you talk about your first collaboration with each other and what those songs sounded like?
Tassilo: We started working together when the “minimal” genre just started to get interesting and so we were doing a lot of experimental stuff and a lot of sound searching. Our first "tracks" didn't really have a common structure. It was more a collection of sounds and sound effects combined with techno beats and percussive elements. Big fun, though [laughs].
Thomas: The first songs were for a lesson at school where we had to do a MIDI song and then we had another project called Superspencer, which was a lot of fun because we had a singer, keyboardist and were touring in Berlin gay clubs [laughs].

How did you decide on calling yourselves "Pan-Pot" and what significance does that name have for you?
Thomas: We wish there was a great story behind our name, but there isn't really [laughs]. One day, we were sitting in the studio and thinking of a cool name to use for our project.
Tassilo: We were searching for terms and names in our audio engineering dictionary, and after some tries we hooked up "Pan-Pot" which is the short form of “Panorama-Potentiometer.” It just worked immediately on both of us, especially as it contains two parts for two people.

Can you describe your songwriting process? Are all your songs written collaboratively, 50/50?
Tassilo: Yes, you can say that each of us contributes about 50% to our productions. Most of the time, one of us has an idea and sometimes we work on them on our own but then we bring them together and finish off the tracks together. Actually, we do spend most of our time in the studio working together.
Thomas: It is great to be two people being creative. Of course, our tastes are not always exactly the same, but luckily quite similar, so we always find a good middle ground and are both happy with the results. I have never played in a band, but imagine that is how it works for them, also.

How does performing live influence the way you write music?
Thomas: Well, we are DJs and produced music before playing our first live set, so it hasn't really influenced us. Now, we still see ourselves as DJs rather than a live act, but we include live elements such as Native F1 controllers and an iPad in our sets. And we are taking a closer look at the F1 controllers, which really give us the chance to separately use the different elements of our tracks.
Tassilo: And now with this background and knowing what we can do with the new controllers, we do take a little bit of a different look into the production side of the different stamps now and how they sound. 

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Yes, it's true. After The Handsome Furs cancelled their European Spring tour in March due to health issues, the duo have announced that the band will no longer be playing together. Check out the band's personal message to fans posted on their website yesterday:

"With a heavy heart the time has come to let all of you know that Handsome Furs are no more.

The most important thing that needs to be said right now is how extremely grateful we are to all the fans all over the world that showered us with love and support over the years. Thank you for everything! It's been an incredible 6 years and we owe it all to you.

xoxo

HF"

Not sure if the breakup is related to the health issues causing the band's tour cancellation, but what is certain is that the Canadian electro-pop duo will be missed.

New York locals Antony and the Johnsons are set to release a symphonic live album on August 6, 2012 via Rough Trade and August 7 via Secretly Canadian. The album Cut The World will feature live perfomance recordings of songs from all four previous full-length albums as well as the album-titled new track "Cut The World." Musical arrangements by Nico Muhly, Rob Moose, Maxim Moston and Antony himself.

Cut The World Album Tracklisting:

1. Cut The World
2. Future Feminism
3. Cripple and the Starfish
4. You Are My Sister
5. Swanlights
6. Epilepsy Is Dancing
7. Another World
8. Kiss My Name
9. I Fell In Love With A Dead Boy
10. The Rapture
11. The Crying Light
12. Twilight

With all the news, videos, .MP3s and other good stuff we’re delivering to your virtual doorstep on a weekly basis, it’s easy to miss FILTER’s two cents on releases, from debuts to reissues. So, here they are, from us to you in one place: FILTER’s renowned reviews, straight from the printed page to your screen. Check out what you missed out on and get down to the record store for further investigation.

FILTER Faves

► Beach House
BLOOM
SUB POP

Reviews

Best Coast
The Only Place
MEXICAN SUMMER

The Cribs
In the Belly of the Brazen Bull
WICHITA

Gravenhurst

The Ghost in Daylight
WARP

Here We Go Magic
A Different Ship
SECRETLY CANADIAN

Keane

Strangeland
CHERRY TREE/INTERSCOPE

Lower Dens

Nootropics
RIBBON

Norah Jones

Little Broken Hearts
EMI

OFF!

OFF!
VICE

Reptar

Body Faucet
VAGRANT

Santigold

Master of My Make-Believe
DOWNTOWN/ATLANTIC

Simian Mobile Disco

Unpatterns
WICHITA

Violens

True
SLUMBERLAND

White Fence

Family Perfume, Vol. 1 & 2
WOODSIST

North America is in the midst of a Destroyer take-over! As we reported earlier, Daniel Bejar’s melodic indie rock band has already kicked off a tour (starting with two weekends under the Indio sun in April), but to the delight of North American and European fans alike, the Vancouver outfit will all over the map for the rest of this year. The tour picks up again on June 3rd in Seattle and concludes in November 28th in Copenhagen. Destroyer Thanksgiving show in Oslo anyone?

Check out all of Destroyer’s tour dates below:

Tour Dates

June
03 Seattle, WA - The Showbox *
04 Portland, OR - Aladdin Theatre *
05 San Francisco, CA - The Fillmore *
06 Los Angeles, CA - El Rey Theatre *
07 Phoenix, AZ - The Crescent Ballroom *
08 Albuquerque, NM - Launchpad *
09 Denver, CO - The Bluebird Theatre *
10 Lawrence, KS - The Granada *
11 Iowa City, IA - The Blue Moon Tap House *
13 Milwaukee, WI - Turner Hall *
14 Grand Rapids, MI - The Ladies Literary Club *
15 Cleveland, OH - Beachland Ballroom *
16 Washington, DC - 9:30 Club *
17 Philadelphia, PA - Union Transfer *
18 Brooklyn, NY - Brooklyn Masonic Temple *
19 New York, NY - Le Poisson Rouge &
20 Boston, MA - Paradise *
21 Montreal, Quebec - Rialto Theatre *
22 Ottawa, Ontario - Ottawa Jazz Festival
23 Toronto, Ontario - The Opera House *
24 Chicago, IL - Metro *
25 Minneapolis, MN - Cedar Cultural Center *
28 Victoria, British Columbia - Club 9one9, Strathcona Hotel
29 Vancouver, British Columbia - Vogue Theatre

July
11 Paris, France - Nouveau Casino
12 Brighton, England - The Haunt
13 Suffolk, England - Latitude Festival
14 Dour, Belgium - Dour Festival
15 Gräfenhainichen, Germany - Melt! Festival
17 Lisbon, Portugal - Musicbox
19 Madrid, Spain - Teatro Lara
20 San Sebastian, Spain - Jazzaldia
21 Cartagena, Spain - Mar de la Musique
23 Bordeaux, France - Open Air Festival
25 Basel, Switzerland - Festival in Fluss
26 Feldkirch, Austria - Poolbar Festival
27 Bolonga, Italy - Bolognetti Rocks
28 Padova, Italy - Radar Festival

November
13 London, England - Village Underground
14 Bristol, England - The Fleece
15 Dublin, Ireland - Whelan's
16 Manchester, England - Sound Control
19 Hamburg, Germany - Uebel & Gefährlich
20 Aarhus, Denmark - Voxhall
21 Gothenburg, Sweden - Pustervik
22 Oslo, Norway - Parkteatret
23 Stockholm, Sweden - Hornstull Strand
25 Helsinki, Finland - Tavastia Klubi
28 Copenhagen, Denmark - VEGA

* with Sandro Perri
& with Sophia Knapp