HAIM

Any takers?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEwM6ERq0gc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dtIjyG9gTg

I love this band.

Just about my favourite live band of the year. Be interested to see if they've got a good whole album in there. One thing that makes me think they do is that they were signed by Jim Chancellor.

Lindstrom remix is great imo http://soundcloud.com/feedelity/haim-forever-lindstr-m-prins

live on lauren laverne (who pronounces their name wrong) -

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p011jm4m

in this mutant-80s-RnB world we now live in, i like that haim seem to be mining the rockier side of that, the strutting, jagger/michael jackson side. so far it seems to MOSTLY be a kind of stored-up potential (i can imagine live shows being more... kinetic?) but by my lights it's a good sign that they're starting simple

Really like them. This is kind of amazing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gtP0dQV0Rlg

This their best song, I think:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K936dIhm05Q

The songs are actually pretty enjoyable but they feel so derivative without really bringing very much personality to the table that I can't imagine ever really loving them. The L&PT remix is terrific though.

brilliant remix material almost seems like their destiny? :/

There's a definite feel of 2006-era Bigstereo band to them.

Don't Save Me video just popped up today...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiqIush2nTA

I'm liking them pretty well. They're like Warpaint's younger cousins who still get out during the daytime. I do get the complaint about not "bringing very much personality to the table"; the lead singer is a too restrained too much of the time. She sorta reminds me of Bob Weir in that way, if that makes sense.

I watched the little mini-doc on them yesterday: http://youtu.be/ZE_Kgk7w4f8

Like most sibling acts, it seems like one or more parents are living vicariously through their experiences. Not that their dad is taskmaster or a glommer—he actually seems really nice—but HAIM the band probably wouldn't exist if left up to chance.

There's a definite feel of 2006-era Bigstereo band to them.

― Matt DC, Monday, November 26, 2012 6:36 AM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

What are some Bigstereo bands from 2006 that you are thinking of? I found that blog and the few things I checked out either sounded way dancier than this or more like Franz Ferdinand or the Interpol or whatever.

Haim have been really mis-sold by the whole Fleetwood-Mac-play-R&B thing. There's nothing R&B about them live. And not a lot that's Fleetwood Mac either. They're a good American pop-rock band. One thing that seemed odd to me is that both times I saw them the set was no more than seven songs, including covers, and the best of them had been knocking around for a while. Which made me winder if there was definitely a while good album in them.

this will surprise nobody who's ever taken even the most cursory of glances at the Lindstrom thread but I completely love the L&PT remix. probably listened to it twenty times over the long weekend.

The first single sounds very Phoenix to me - something about the vocal mannerisms.

Something about them still sounds a little too "we live in a nice suburb and our parents helped us put up the money for a good producer." Talented though. Maybe in a couple of years.

Is it really any wonder, I reject you first
Haim, Haim, Haim, Haim

Even though I find them slightly annoying, it's pretty hard not to like "Don't Save Me"

winners

http://www.bbc.co.uk/soundof2013

someone has already tweeted "i thought they were the sound of 1984!" haw haw

I like this Cyril Hahn remix of "Don't Save Me".. It comes across a bit Benoit and Sergio

woah! hold your horses! going out on a limb there beeb

I thought restating what everyone in the industry already thought was the point of this list?

Don't Save Me is great, not so sure about the rest yet.

"don't save me" is better than anything on that chairlift album - which i liked a lot

the big, clacking, off-kilter drums are incredible

Even though I find them slightly annoying, it's pretty hard not to like "Don't Save Me"

― UnderControl, Monday, November 26, 2012 6:21 PM

yep

is that the current single? accidentally heard haim on the radio the other week and thought it was something dredged up from the actual 80s

on that tip, here's some actual west-coast girl-group pop-rock dredged up from the 80s:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOKP3n6l0r4

and here's haim's new single -

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01374g9

just listened to "Don't Save Me" for the first time and I really, really, REALLY love the lead singer's voice

the song itself is a little on the whatever side

she ENUNCIATES very well

for reasons I can't quite explain they remind me a bit of Lone Justice.

my first reaction while listening was "I wonder if I'd be able to deal with Lana Del Rey's songs if Danielle Haim was singing them instead" and then I remembered that I've hated every iteration of "Video Games" that I've heard

xp Going out on a limb is pretty much the polar opposite of what the BBC poll is about.

I love what I've heard so far - Forever was one of my singles of the year - and I hope they don't botch the album because ones-to-watch culture has become so overheated in recent years that it practically guarantees backlashes.

I think Haim are probably better at nailing a certain bittersweet rushiness that you get in that kind of 80s teen movie pop than a lot of acts who are striving for that sound. I listened to the Chairlift album a bit last year and couldn't connect with it at all.

unsurprisingly they sound great when they harmonize together (there's a whole interesting sideline thing about genetics and how people who are related tend to have naturally-matching vibratos that ties into why so many family-based singing groups sound awesome together)

posted this already at the start but its a cracker so..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onsJ1MFpKxQ

I feel a bit sorry for Chairlift. I Belong In Your Arms is one of those great recent pop songs, like Zero/Heads Will Roll, which feels like it should have been Top 10 but didn't get anywhere near the charts because radio wasn't interested. I think Haim are going to benefit from a more open-minded mood at Radio 1. Strictly UK perspective of course - I don't understand how US radio works.

that's okay, neither do we

I don't understand how US radio works.

It doesn't.

http://www.svfreya.ca/photos/fiji3/radio_fix.jpg

I can't let go of this absurd, meritocratic, utopian ideal - which never existed - of radio programmers hearing a really good catchy song and playlisting it without worrying about where it fits in. It's the poptimist Brigadoon.

Has anyone won/appeared high up on the Sound Of... poll and NOT found themselves immediately playlisted on Radio 1? That'd be like the BBC admitting they don't have faith in their own poll.

Pretty sure 'Zero' made the R1 playlist as well.

recently i had to spend about 5-6 hours in one day listening to radio 1 and it was an entirely dreadful experience. in that entire time ONE song i enjoyed was played (kelly clarkson's "stronger", i nearly wept with gratitude) but even the shit songs were a relief because it meant the intolerable presenters shut the fuck up briefly

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/playlist/

^^^ I mean this basically looks like a mashup of things that have been on the 6music playlist for ages, things that have been on the 1xtra playlist for ages and yr obvious massive pop acts that go straight on there anyway. I'm not really seeing anything different to how it's been for years.

good fucking god, that playlist

None of the Top 5 are currently on the playlist - only Peace and Tom Odell from the longlist. Although Everything Everything, alt-J and Foals are all on the A-list, which surprised me. I don't have an archive of old playlists to compare but I'm sure it's opened up recently.

I'm not really viewing the presence of those three bands as opening up, they're all reasonably well established acts at this point and you'd have seen, I dunno, Friendly Fires or Noah & The Whale or whoever on the R1 list in the recent past. It looks like box-ticking rather than open-mindedness really.

https://www.stereogum.com/2300030/haim-relationships/music/

that's pretty good

this is fine but nothing to be excited about

the end is really quite nice though

bass at the end sounds like a “let’s groove” interpolation

I do love how effortless they make it sound

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=asma6AX62io

New album in June produced by Rostam 'n' Danielle.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ij-4Ztrp6E

unfortunately delves into grocery store commercial music for a bit but i love the sax

They seem to be favourites to be the secret set at Glastonbury billed as "Patchwork" (There's a German book of that name by an author called Sylvia Haim)

Slightly surprising to be me as would think they're nowhere near as widely known as 2023's "surprise" band Foo Fighters.

have any bands smaller than the Foo Fighters ever played surprise sets at Glastonbury?

Definitely but on smaller stages and different times.

"Patchwork" are third billing on the Pyramid Stage on the Saturday night so a pretty mainstream slot. Rumours that it might also be Pulp which would seem more of a fit for me.

I saw a surprise Portishesd set in a tent back in the 90s. This was the one where the start of the gig was delayed by about 90 minutes, and Evan Dando volunteered to play an acoustic set while the crowd waited, only to get booed off

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YusF9AaQuks

i did not expect the sample on this lmao

album is good but this is just baffling

It workrs.

it really doesn't get away with it, it just makes me want to listen to the original

it's also just bizarre as the closer, the sequencing is really weird overall

the album's still pretty good although not as strong as the last one. i love "lucky stars" and "million years"

Lol I thought the sample was “teenage dirtbag”.

Her vocal melody and the piano part sounds straight from a vampire weekend song.

and "Gone" samples "Freedom '90"?

“million years” is a great song about how i’m still in love with my ex

love “spinning around” and “cry” too. much like something to tell you this functions as a more polished sequel to the previous record. not mad about it

omfg. omfg i just got to the “numb” sample on the closer. HOLY SHIT

you're welcome!

It might be because I'm a closet Numanoid but the buzzy guitar and drums reminded me a heck of a lot of "Films":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HbIGk6zH_k

Oh, I see. It's literally a sample from U2's "Numb". Were U2 secretly Numanoids? The drum pattern is the same - dah dah, dah-DAH - and the phased, distorted guitar/moog is very similar.

Is this the first time U2 has been sampled (Negativland aside)?

No.

Dang I was hoping they’d sampled Linkin Park

Of the millions of songs and artists to sample…

Has U2 ever sampled Haim?

“numb” is such an amazing song to sample. sorry. i’ve been obsessed with zooropa for most of my life

Were U2 secretly Numanoids?

The track was built by Flood using that guitar line and some drum sounds from an abandoned Achtung Baby song, then Eno added keyboards and samples.

Has U2 ever sampled Haim?

well, interpolated

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Akb2KQUDFgE

Just say no to Zionist bands

What’s this based on?

Dummies online found out their father was born in Israel. Seems a bit antisemitic of our ol’ Kurty.

Zaroopa auto corrects to “oops” lol

songs are whatever, but I really like Dave Fridmann's bold mix.

I don't understand this album. But it has some great songs (today "Lucky Stars")! And some terrible ones (today "Gone")!

Their weakest album. Most songs boast an interesting passage undermined by a lyric or an instrumental run of unexpected banality.

The album has grown on me after a couple of listens, but it definitely feels like a step down from the previous one which has become my favourite of theirs. I'd rate it much higher than Something To Tell You which is still one of the most disappointing second albums of recent (ish) times.

Totally agree with seandalai about Gone. Those Freedom 90 samples are so clumsy and it doesn't work as an opener at all.

it's so goddamn obvious, that sample

The samples smell like private equity to me!

again, no idea what that actually means

Private equity — the industry responsible for bankrupting companies, slashing jobs and raising the mortality rates at the nursing homes it acquires — is making money by gobbling up the rights to old hits and pumping them back into our present

yeah the sample on "gone" is just pointless

i do not think haim are making bad sampling decisions due to private equity somehow influencing their creative process, that's not what that article is about

i do think haim are making bad sampling decisions due to private equity encouraging labels to incorporate these samples into new releases (i think a lot of artists are doing it, not just haim -- but it was my very first thought when i pressed play on the album today.) anyway probably a topic for another thread.

for one george michael’s catalog is owned by warner chappell not private equity. radiohead have not sold their publishing

secondly if labels are going to encourage artists — and they would be encouraging producers, very very few major label artists who don’t also produce are coming to the table with specific sample ideas — to incorporate samples into their music for the label’s benefit it would be with songs owned by the labels themselves. universal, sony, and warner all have their own publishing arms, there is no coordination between hedge funds and major labels on this matter for this reason. major labels aren’t in the interest of making money for other people

now whether hedge funds are going directly to producers and asking them to sample songs they own, that might be happening. most music publishing companies have producers signed to them and likely at some point ask those producers to try sampling songs the company owns, so it wouldn’t be a shock if hedge funds were doing similar reach outs to producers. but my sense is that this practice from music publishing companies has if anything slowed down in recent years as sampling in pop became oversaturated and then fell out of favor

in working in this space, i don’t think that hedge fund involvement is very prevalent in the creative process. trying to make money off a catalog by engineering samples is a very inefficient way to make money — 9 out of 10 beats are never recorded on, an even smaller number are demoed, released, become hits, become huge hits etc. i would worry way less about insidious stuff like this and more about plainly lame shit like super bowl commercial syncs, sanitized biopics etc

thank you for this!!

in working in this space, i don’t think that hedge fund involvement is very prevalent in the creative process. trying to make money off a catalog by engineering samples is a very inefficient way to make money — 9 out of 10 beats are never recorded on, an even smaller number are demoed, released, become hits, become huge hits etc. i would worry way less about insidious stuff like this and more about plainly lame shit like super bowl commercial syncs, sanitized biopics etc

― slob wizard (J0rdan S.), Tuesday, June 24, 2025 2:59 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

At an aesthetic level I kinda enjoy how payola-esque conspiracy theories tend to pay fat cat moguls (private equity or otherwise) the odd implied compliment of assuming they're working at the same level we are in consuming/critiquing the product, as if the entertainment industry really was operating just like an episode of The Other Two.