Wunderkind composer Nico Muhly was the focus of a rather glowing New Yorker article a few months ago. Muhly was portrayed as a new kind of classicist; he is deeply respectful of traditionalism while still being completely open to experimentation with familiar form while still providing familiar musical touchstones to anchor the listener. His compositions have been performed by choirs, orchestras, and chamber ensembles; in concert halls, small theaters, and MTV2; nd to top it all off he's even provided orchestration for Björk. Yeah, we guess you could call him a classical composer. more ›

We've swooned to Doveman before, but we're admittedly familiar with the collective's frontman, Thomas Bartlett, thanks to collaborations with a wide-range of other groups (The Swell Season, The National, Antony & The Johnsons). And now Bartlett has given us another reason to swoon: a free cover record of songs from the movie Footloose. But this is not merely a toss-off collection. Gabriel Greenberg, Doveman cover artist and childhood friend of Barlett's, gives the full explanation:

When I was very young, my half-sister Jenny died tragically. She was a teenager, and it was the 80's. She left behind a wardrobe of brightly colored clothes, rainbow stickers, life-size paintings, doodles on lined paper, and hundreds of tapes. These constitute most of my memories of her. It's sad for me to look at these things, and usually I don't. But a couple of summers ago I found a tape of hers with a startling cover photograph - this was Footloose. I couldn't stop listening: it was a portrait of 80's love, desire, pain, freedom, and frenzy; of being a teenager in a time of change. By listening, I could step into Jenny's shoes, see things from her vantage point. I could be emancipated by rock and roll and walkmen, just as she had been. We could listen together. more ›