i'm not a soulseek person. i just want to thin out my "check out" list.

bark psychosis – codename: dustsucker
Caribou – the milk of human kindness
Cyann and ben – spring
dead Texan – s/t
Dungen – ta det lugnt
Ellen alien – berlinette
Excepter – ka
Fennesz – Venice
fieldwork – simulated progress
Hard-Fi –'Stars Of CCTV'
Isolee – we are monster
KT Tunstall – 'Eye To The Telescope'
Manitoba – up in flames
max richter - the blue notebooks
Menomena – I am the fun monster
monolake – polygon cities
Ms. John soda – no p or d
Mu – afro finger and gel
Need new body – ufo
Philip jeck – 7
Polysics – neu
Shining – in the kingdom of kitsch you will be monster
Soft pink truth – do you party?
sunburned hand of the man – headdress
Supersilent – 6
The books – the lemon of pink
The plastic constellations – mazatlan
Vitalic – ok cowboy
Wilderness – wilderness
William basinski – the disintegration loops

RIYL: Daft Punk, Alan Braxe etc.

Comibnation of electronica/ambient with classical

RIYL: Phillip Glass, Eno

haven't actually heard this, but I have heard Happy Like An Autumn Tree, so..

Mogwai/Godspeed style post rock combined with a bit of M83 style electronic dream pop

RIYL: shambolic, keyboard lovin,' good-drummin' Northwestern band with website that causes seizures in a significant portion of the population. With saxamaphone, nonetheless.

i think i remember this was horrible generic indie pop rock

RIYL: disjointed phrases of misheard conversations, screwed & chopped cello, with some light, airy acoustic guitar scrim laid on top.

Chuck D's good at this.

Thumbs up for:

Menomena
Fennesz

lali puna - 603 (another notwist offshoot)
american analog set - promise of love
kreidler - appearance and the park (krautrock)

someone please tell me....

i REALLY like rilo kiley.
so, what else should i check out.
can anyone help?

i'm thinking The Band, from that description.

I want this really bad.

It's great - one of the best albums of last year, and definitely something you'd like

mellow post rock not really as guitar based as Mogwai et al

RIYL is kinda hard - Pygmalion era Slowdive maybe

the only thing it sounds like is Hex, Bark Psychosis' other album

a great band instrumentally, but many people can't get passed the vocals - the guy sorta sounds like PIL era John Lydon.

I've heard it compared musically to the first track on Interpol's TOTBl - Untitled. That sounds about right - alot of delay/reverb on guitars etc.

thanks splates.

if you have more, please continue.

bark psychosis – codename: dustsucker
- splates had it about right
Ellen alien – berlinette
- pounding bass techno, but a lot more listenable than dance crap...can't really think of a RIYL
Fennesz – Venice
- experimental ambient
Menomena – I am the fun monster
- I wanna know the answer to this one, too -- I keep seeing the cover and liking it
Soft pink truth – do you party?
- We just had a thread about this -- "do you want new wave, or do you want the soft pink truth?", or something like that

Someone else should do Manitoba and/or Caribou (same band, BTW, so you'll like one if you like the other)...Four Tet? Prefuse 73 w/o the hip-hop influences?

Sorry, I guess I'm kinda sucking at this.

If you've heard Endless Summer it's sorta similar.

If you haven't then it's sorta hard. It's ambient, but doesn't really sound like any other ambient artists. He's a guitarist, but you often wouldnt recognise the sounds as coming from a guitar. Anyway, he's great and no one has warmth like Fennesz. But start with Endless Summer.

The Elected

answers the quesiton 'what would a trip-hop album by the Polyphonic Spree sound like?'

these are the only worthwhile releases in your list IMO.

The Band, from the year 3030, on Quaaludes, at the bottom of a well.

i can hahdly wait

Just to elaborate/reitorate or touch on the ones that haven't been discussed:

Bark Psychosis – Codename: Dustsucker
• Good record, good descriptions so far. A nice post-rock/shoegaze hybrid.

Caribou – the milk of human kindness
• Psychedelic electronic pop. Elements of Krautrock and latter period Boredoms (Vision Creation Newsun) with fairly dense textural flourishes.

Dead Texan – s/t
• Would consider them more post-rock than ambient, but definitely on the quieter, prettier side.

Dungen – ta det lugnt
• Throwback psyche-prog. Like '70s playing with '90s production, but better than that looks on paper. A lot of strong melodies, but the songs are in Swedish so who knows what they're about.

Excepter – ka
• Throbbing, kinda dubby noise. Fairly pleasant for a "noise" record. Not very melodic, RIYL Black Dice, maybe Gang Gang Dance, Animal Collective - Here Comes the Indian.

Fennesz – Venice
• IMO, this is as good a place to start as Endless Summer. ES is a little more like Oval-type electronics which is how Fennesz's earlier stuff is. Venice is more organic, and the guitar is more overt and less processed in spots.

Manitoba – up in flames
• See Caribou, without the Kraut/Boredoms propulsion. Almost shoegazey by comparison. Still dense and psychedelic, upbeat and reasonably catchy.

Max Richter - the blue notebooks
• Very mellow, almost new-agey, but in a very restrained way. Nice, but I'm not crazy about it.

Need new body – ufo
• Awesome, crazy, fun record. I'm always putting songs from this on mixes and party playlists. Excellent drummer with a bunch of dudes who sound like art school dropouts who can't play anything. They're first two albums are crammed full of ideas and very spontaneous-sounding. A little hit-or-miss, but the hits make the misses more than bearable. Imagine the entire works of Frank Zappa and Captain Beefheart compressed into a party album.

Sunburned hand of the man – headdress
• Shambolic, rambling, neo-hippy art-jam band hitting some great grooves. Some kinda off-putting pseudo-Indian chanting going on in spots, but overall a very solid record. Probably their most accessible. RIYL No-Neck Blues Band, Jackie-O Motherfucker.

Supersilent – 6
• Freeform avant-something. Sort of free jazz with electronics.

The books – the lemon of pink
• Fun, sample heavy cut-and-paste. Very atypical use of voice and instrument sample, conveys a very light, airy mood. This and their first album are great. Difficult to do a RIYL.

Wilderness – wilderness
• Grandiose guitar (think Explosions in the Sky) with near-spoken vocals. As said above, the singers cadence is similar to John Lydon while his voice sounds more like Craig Finn of The Hold Steady/Lifter Puller. Vocals take some getting used to, but the band makes it worthwhile.

It sounds like what Prefuse 73 would make if he were more influenced by 80s/house music than hip-hop.

Do You Want New Wave is great too, but it's completely different. If you hear clips of Do You Party, "Make Up" will give you an idea of how their second album sounds.