Archive for June, 2010

Posted on June 30, 2010 - by Mark Zonda

From Beatles to Horses

Race Horses: yet another wonder from Wales mixing up brilliant cool psychedelia with beat, colliding Syd Barret with Franz Ferdinand like they were Oblivion Dust pretending to be The Dukes of Stratosfear. “Goodbye Falkenberg”, their debut album coming with a proper psychic cover, was welcomed by the indie tribe as a Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci resurrection. (more…)

Posted on June 28, 2010 - by Mark Zonda

SleepCast #002: No War Allowed

Hi there and cheers everyone, and welcome to this second epidose of SleepRadio. Did you ever bet a chewingum we’d manage to hit Episode number two? Time to eat your socks! This time we took our times to be more frivolous and up-to-date with some new indie hit without renouncing to some past and more recent indiadelic sounds. This podcast turned out to be a pacifist hymn to joy, summer and understanding. Hope you’ll not laugh at that too. Still I’m confident on some cheers up. Have a nice week.

(and come back tomorrow for the whole playlist :) ) (more…)

Posted on June 23, 2010 - by Mark Zonda

Everything takes time and patience: dancing with Linda

At a certain point of her life, Linda Jo Rizzo decided tha being a nourishing expert and model wasn’t enough for her life, so she met Hi-NRG producer Bobby “O” Orlando and decided to form the disco band “The Flirts”. Linda was very relevant for spreading the vogue of Disco Music in Europe and starting the whole Italo Disco stuff. Still very present in the music biz she was so kind to share some words with us in occasion of our Neo Italo Disco project.

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Posted on June 22, 2010 - by Mark Zonda

From Prog to Disco: interview with Silvana Aliotta

It’s quite impressive how first steps on Italo Disco where moved from the foreign ground of Italian Prog Rock Scene. Not only it was interesting to discover Alan Sorrenti was a huge fan of Tim Buckley, still another band called “Le Streghe”, had the front singer Silvana Aliotta being the main voice for one of the coolest Italian best kept secrets form the ’70s: Circus2000. (more…)

Posted on June 21, 2010 - by Mark Zonda

SleepCast #001: Fucking Byrds

Gee! Let’s admit it! I always wanted to do this, despite of my awful English! So here I am, committing the last step toward the depths of my social life suicide! SleepWalKing has now… a podcast! Or better… shall it? Let me have your feedback on the first attempt to collect 45 minutes of music in order to entertain you and make you spend some good time… (more…)

Posted on June 20, 2010 - by Mark Zonda

It sounds better with jam on bread

Every indie bloke knows: ukulele is the new glockenspiel, and especially this year everybody seems gone nut for this ultimate indie instrument. Parties on the beach, secret live shows, ukulele and handclapping have clearly become part of our naivety and pride. That’s why Indietracks Festival 2010 HAD to have its own representative ukulele player. With George Harrison still being dead we found our man on Steve Carlton, also known as Jam on Bread. Here’s some werds with da man. (more…)

Posted on June 16, 2010 - by Mark Zonda

Alan Sorrenti between prog, disco and future

Not anyone in Italy are aware of the name Alan Sorrenti, still there are at least two songs from the ’70s  that anyone can instantly recognise: “Tu sei l’unica donna per me” and the most popular “Figli delle stelle”. Along with “Circus2000″/”Le Streghe”, Alan Sorrenti was absolutely necessary for the Italian music scene to step out from progressive and slowly turn into Italo Disco.  Taking the Neo Italo Disco project as an excuse to look back to those days we got in touch with Alan to talk about his music and life. (more…)

Posted on June 14, 2010 - by Mark Zonda

Give Den Harrow a break

A decade before the Vanilla Ice incident, yet another music hero arising from the vivid scene of poppy Italo Disco, was ready to step out of picture magazines to come alive in our videos. His name was Manuel Stefano Zandri, but we’ll always know the Italian response to Simon Le Bon as Den Harrow. This bad boy was driven by future brains by the mad desire of breaking as many heart as possible with his fashionist songs. Did he build his own destiny? Maybe HIS voice’s got something to say! To expand your knowledge on the Neo Italo Disco project Mark Zonda is interviewing Thomas Barbey, who also had his moment in the Italo Disco scene moonlighting with the name of Tom Hooker. Here’s the interview so far. (more…)

Posted on June 9, 2010 - by Mark Zonda

Italo Disco: it’s all about imagination

Don’t know how many of you are aware of this, but among various musical project I’m involved in, it’s been a while since I’m gathering some indie artists into a modern times reinvention of what was called “Italo Disco” music. First album is on its was to deliver, but we’re already heading to a “Vol.2″ with the original champions of that era. Everything started from a first row of interview ’bout “Neo Italo Disco” to the first pioneers of the genre. First to “start the dances” was Reeds, one of the first Italian singers to give strenght to that musical movement tying to give an “Indepenent” home-made response to the more glorious and expensive in matter of production American bands disco music. (more…)

Posted on June 8, 2010 - by Ellie Crean

Tommy Reilly: exactly how he should

Tommy Reilly supported Justin Currie on his last live. Stepping (or tripping I should say) onto the stage Tommy Reilly looks exactly how he should – endearing, vulnerable, slightly bewildered yet mature all at the same time. His songs, which spawn from the same gene pool as Damien Rice and Paolo Nutini, reveal tales of love and heartbreak that seem impossible yet are sung with such sincerity you have to believe them. (more…)