Video: Pearls Negras - "Guerreira"

Pearls Negras, hip-hop trio from Vidigal (a favela located in the south of Rio de Janeiro), managed to gather some international attention late last year with Biggie Apple, a highly unpredictable, tastefully produced short mixtape made up of electronic dance beats that would have made a perfect fit among the Mad Decent catalog. Their new song “Guerreira” isn’t a deviation from their established sound, the beat has the epic build-ups of any recent club stomping trap anthem, yet instead of a destructive drop you get a ghostly piano part. The production remains off-kilter, but it’s the MCing that really shines here. Although the tempo is a little too high for us to be able to distinguish more than just a few words, the girls’ flow is raw, enticing, and catchy enough to fulfill its purpose of making you want to fuck shit up. Yet the girls are so charismatic that instead of feeling intimidated by their warrior posture, you really just wanna start a block party with them. For now it seems that these three girls from Brazil might be Danny Brown’s only rival when it comes to hyper-aggressive flow and oddball beat selection.

Panty Pantera - "Cocodrilo" / "Apestoso"

While I was preparing an album review for Russian Red’s latest record Agent Cooper (which let’s just say is as pompous as The Great Gatsby), I realized I’d rather be writing on something less postured. Fellow Spaniard newcomers Panty Pantera have that cleansing quality of brightening your day. While they could easily carry the title for the “latest twee indiepop act from Spain,” Panty Pantera seems to have nursed from the same understated grunge that makes Carmen Sandiego and Piyama Party house favorites. Their demo for relative hit single “Cocodrilo” sneaked into our Best Songs of 2013 countdown, where we celebrated the track’s ability to sound “grandiloquent and equally small.” The track has now been published on 7’’ via Discos Humeantes and Discos Alta Fidelidad. It seems the band has kept the demo edit of the single for this track –if they follow the tradition, they’ll eventually polish it for mass appeal in the future, that is, assuming Elefant Records takes them under their wing. The album comes with “Apestoso” as a B-side, which is like the anti-thesis of Antonna’s “Tu Hueles Mejor” and reminded me of this guy. The single is available for name-your-price via Bandcamp.