The artist Ty Lettau have taken 20 classic album covers and redesigned them in a minimalistic style. We rather like it! Check out the covers below, and tell us what you think?

See more minimalistic album covers over at Fubiz

If anyone want to try it out, follow the step by step guide and please let us know how it sounds!

(via MAKE, Yvynyl)

Check out all the animated album covers at animatedalbums.tumblr.com

To Have & To Hold – Taster Tape from Jony Lyle on Vimeo.

To Have & To Hold is a upcoming ‘musicmentory’ to celebrate the age of vinyl records… Looks exciting!

(via Gizmodo)

If this wet your appetite, you’ll find the Pixies’ Minotaur box set right here

During 60s and 70s communism in Poland, at a time when vinyl records hard to get, sounds postcards became extremely popular. They looked like standard postcards on the back, but on the front an analogue recording was engraved in a thin layer of laminate.

Sound postcards were usually made by tiny firms, and the recording quality was low, but very often they represented the only available possibility of having access to hit songs from The West. In the late 70s, the cards were replaced by cassette technology. The designs on the front of Sound Postcards ranged from the primitive and weird, to the very beautiful.

Designer Rui Silva and Unsound director Mat Schulz have collected hundreds of cards, to curate an exhibition, which has previously appeared in Krakow and London. This exhibtion not only reveals the forgotten artistic merit of thes cards, but allows the public to listen to songs on the cards transferred into mp3 format, drawing attention to the way that sound recording technology changes across time.

The exhibition at Devotion Gallery in New York opened on February 7 and is on view until February 12. More info here

Cat Stevens – Morning Has Broken (Sound Postcard)

Found via Adam Varga/fascinated/yvynyl

Something that always turns us on here at Nylvi is people with dedication and passion. People like the great guys at Secret Stash Records who have just released the first volume of Soviet Funk, a compilation of funky rarities recorded in Soviet between 1971 and 1976! Here they have, together with Pavel Sysoyev, dug up some really fascinating stuff.

Check it out for yourself below:

This collection of SOVIET FUNK was all recorded by Pavel Sysoyev in Abakan, the capital city of Khakassia between 1971 and 1976. Sysoyev was an employee of the USSR State Committee for Television and Radio Broadcast (state controlled media). He ran a recording studio intended to create content solely for the government media entity. However, Sysoyev frequently brought in his friends and run late night recording sessions when no one else was around.

In spite of the loosened restrictions on art and music during the 70s, most Soviet citizens had very limited access to essential American funk records. Sysoyev acquired a small collection of U.S. R&B and Jazz albums in ‘68 from a friend, but that was about it for him and his friends. Yet somehow, this small group of classically trained musicians was able to forge a funky sound of their own. Rooted much deeper in the jazz quartet tradition than the R&B styling of James Brown and The Meters, they tapped into a way of playing jazz with a relentless groove that we endearingly refer to as funk.

Secret Stash Records was contacted by Sysoyev himself in mid 2009. In a matter of weeks a deal was reached granting the label rights to release these funky rarities. Hundreds of hours have been spent digging through stacks of dusty old master tapes to find the best of the best. Soviet Funk Vol I is just a small sampling of the vast catalog of recordings produced by Pavel Sysoyev and his friends, and is just a little glimpse of things to come (more volumes). Listen closely and from time to time you will find elements of Russian classical music in the precision execution of oddly metered unison parts, complex poly-rhythms, and the use of time signatures other than 4/4 (so commonly found in most American funk).

TRACK LIST
SIDE A
01. pavel sysoyev: gostiny dvor
02. pavel sysoyev: zapovednik
03. pomogite: avantyurist
04. pomogite: snokhachestvo
05. pomogite: izvinite

SIDE B
01. victor chizhova & boris baykov: agentura
02. victor chizhova & boris baykov: chernosotenec
03. da/n’et: vyrodok
04. da/n’et: demagogiya
05. pavel sysoyev & victor chizhova: kak vas zovut

You can order the record directly from Secret Stash Records here

Graphic designer Michael Deal has a great project going visualizing and exploring The Beatles music through infographics. Through his amazing visualizations (see below) you can track things like The Beatles’ work schedule between 1963-66, song keys, authorship and collaboration and The Beatles’ use of self referential lyrics.

This is just some examples of a larger open collaborative project currently in the works for chartingthebeatles.com. Also check out the Charting The Beatles flickr group for more information.

The top ten best selling artists on vinyl in 2009:

1. Radiohead – 45.700
2. The Beatles – 38.800
3. Michael Jackson – 30.400
4. Metallica – 30.200
5. Wilco – 29.600
6. Bob Dylan – 24.500
7. Animal Collective – 20.600
8. Pearl Jam – 19.900
9. Bon Iver – 17.100
10. Iron & Wine – 16.600