PurrView #2 - Crystal Castles

Crystal Castles....
Yet another band that makes me think to myself time and time again, "...Am I gonna have to move to Canada to hear the best tunes sooner?" Some fabulous, fresh acts have emerged from the great land to our North in recent years (i.e. Arcade Fire, Broken Social Scene, Metric...). Despite the fact that we are directly below the great nation of Canada, the trickle effect seems to trickle from Canada all the way over to the UK and other parts of Europe first, then it trickles its way into the waters of the U.S.  I guess I point out this fact merely because I wonder what took me so long to discover Crystal Castles!

Crystal Castles is a duo from Toronto comprised of Ethan Kath as producer and the beautiful Alice Glass, vocalist. Her electric eyes seem to go hand in hand with her hypnotic vocals, commonly trademarked by distortion/lo-fi sounds as well as a champion scream indicating definite punk/metal roots.  The warped sound that producer Ethan Kath pumps out is tantalizingly electronic and marked by thumping bass and, at times, old "Nintendo-ish" sound clips. As playful as this might sound, the final product brings a much-needed grime; a darker alter ego to this genre; for example, check out"Alice Practice" and "Untrust Us".
They've played far and wide at events such as Coachella, Bonnaroo, and other European festivals, as well as touring for a minute or two with NIN, and just recently they blew up the spot at Ultra Music Festival in Miami for yet another year. Crystal Castles' track "Not in Love" features, none other than our dark friend himself, Robert Smith of The Cure.

"Crimewave" was the first Crystal Castles track that I checked out. There's nothin' like a band that plays under freeway overpasses. I'm sure Crystal Castles would understandingly approve if I were to simply sum their sound up as "just dope". PS - These tracks are great to hear while running.
      


~Meow~
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