Local music fans who like their Indie Pop noisy and creative need to check out Pop Empire, a new duo featuring Cameron Cochran (of The Sheds, Lions Rampant fame) and Henry Wilson. And, like Cochran's Sheds (which gave away all of its music free online), Pop Empire is recession-friendly. Head to popempire.com and download the band's debut EP, Rainy Child, for free.—-
The duo crafts a unique sound, with slanted but memorable songwriting at the core and a slathering of kinetic drums machine beats and buzzing, scraping electronic noises, topped with slashing, swaggering guitar and slithering melodies. The punch-drunk Art Rock-Pop-Electro approach will appeal to fans of TV on the Radio and former Cincy-based duo Coltrane Motion but it stands in a realm all its own.
The EP will get a hard-copy release party (“with some really nice art work,” according to a blog post on the band's MySpace page) in late February.
