free music friday: the pains of being pure at heart / saint etienne

NYC-based indie-pop quartet The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart released one of the early contenders for album of 2009 in the shape of their self-titled debut back in February, and followed that up in September with the swoon-worthy EP Higher Than The Stars containing four new songs and four remixes, one of which was this retooling by UK pop legends Saint Etienne. The Pains’ keyboardist / vocalist Peggy Wang-East has become something of an indie pin-up in the process, but aside from being a rad and very pretty musician, she’s also a blogger for the viral real-time site Buzzfeed, a role she meets in tandem with the band. Her vocals were all too often buried in the mix on the album, deferring slightly to the dreamy tones of frontman Kip Berman, but this remix puts them on equal pegging. While the identity of the mysterious Lord Spank is never quite explained, the Saint Etienne tag is all you need to know to get a sense of this track’s dreamy, dance-pop quality.

Catch The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart on tour at the end of this month:

28.11.o9 ICA, London
30.11.09 Thekla, Bristol
01.12.09 Academy 2, Liverpool
02.12.09 Academy 2, Newcastle
03.12.09 Stereo, Glasgow
04.12.09 Academy 2, Manchester
05.12.09 Academy 2, Birmingham
06.12.09 ATP Festival, Minehead
08.12.09 Scala, London

FREE MP3: The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart, ‘Higher Than The Stars’ [Saint Etienne Visits Lord Spank remix, via RCRD LBL]

visit The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart on Myspace

Written by: Charlotte Richardson Andrews

Tags: saint etienne, the pains of being pure at heart

This entry was posted on Friday, November 6th, 2009 at 11:19 am and is filed under All A/V, free music friday. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.