Cool Accidents faves Portugal. The Man are currently in the midst of an Australian tour which has been kindly brought to us by the good people at Corona as part of their From Where You’d Rather Be series.

Basically John, Zach, Kyle & Jason have been living the dream in this fine country of ours, playing gigs in all the best spots, drinking copious amounts of booze and just generally getting turnt up down under… so the whole From Where You’d Rather Be thing is pretty much BANG ON.

Up until now our TGIF series has predominantly focused on party JAMS, handpicked by the likes of Little Dragon, Royal Blood & Dune Rats that have all done their bit in helping kick start our weekends BUT every now and then a more chilled 2 day break is what the doctor ordered.

So far this year (2014) hasn’t excited us enough with new releases. There have been some with good first songs like TuneYards, but not enough that follow all the way through (SOHN being an exception). We anxiously hope that one of the acts we liked a lot last year – Alt-J – might change that.

A bit ago we were in love with this record by the Portico Quartet from England.

 

[via Noisey]

For their most recent album Evil Friends, Portugal. The Man enlisted legendary producer Danger Mouse to add a little of his signature gloss to their already dreamy sound—which is on full-display in their single “Modern Jesus.” But here, we’re happy to get even more glossier, as Thom Green from England’s Alt-J gets in the mix, offering a wobbling take on the already wavy track.

You can stop looking everyone, we’ve found your new fave intellectual indie pop dance foursome and they go by the name Clean Bandit.

Their stock is on the rise thanks to support from key tastemakers at BBC and after sharing stages and remix duties with the likes of Alt-J, Disclosure & Rudimental it’s only a matter of time before they blow up well and proper.

Nylon recently caught up with Grouplove’s first lady/vocalist/gangster princess Hannah Hooper ahead of the groups American tour to talk thrift store shopping, Alt-J, the Whitney Houston groove, her current jazzercise prom queen vibe and to find out what life is like on the road with 10 men.

via The Telegraph

This years nominees for the prestigious Mercury Prize have been finalised and when you see who’s got a look in you realise it’s been a pretty damn strong year for music in the motherland.

Below are our personal faves from the list but if we had to choose, our money’s on the ill manored Plan B to take out the trophy and £20,000 large.

Click on the names for a taste of each record and let us know who’s your $ is on in the comments.

PLAN B