Tartufi, ‘Underwater’ – Free MP3 Download

This month, San Francisco pop experimentalists Tartufi release their first album since expanding from a duo to a trio with the addition of bassist Ben Thorne. The group's ever-evolving sound is endearing, and their setup is enviable: As an outsider, it appears their mission is simply to be creative. They don't seem to prefer a specific style of music, nor do they mind if they're a duo, trio or larger unit. They simply persevere as a creative force, adding beauty to the world and stimulating the arts community in San Fran (the band even founded a rock 'n' roll school called Rock Band Land for children aged 4 through 7) as they please.

The beautiful loungy pop tune 'Underwater,' today's free MP3, comes from their first album since welcoming Thorne (Red Low Land, Minot) into the fold. Lynne Angel, who founded Tartufi 13 years ago, told Diffuser.fm about how the bassist's arrival influenced the song.

"'Underwater' was the first song we wrote as a trio after being a duo for six years," she says. "Needless to say, Brian [Gorman] and I were pretty protective of our sound after taking so long to establish that a duo could, in fact, take up more room onstage than a 12-peice and also make your ears bleed through a combination of high volume and steady vibration. Success. Then, we began to realize that there might be more to life than acquiring rad gear and passing out earplugs before every show. I'm not sure when the shift occurred, but I am thinking sometime in 2010. It went from me playing the music to the music playing me. I was overly entranced with [pedal] stepping patterns and what was next. I was playing in the future and not in the now."

"'Underwater' was us dipping our toes in the river of collective sound," Thorne adds. "It was us relearning how to write, play and swim in our combined creativity. It was us depending less on loop stations and more on each other to fill in the sound. 'Underwater' defined the direction the album, and the band, would take. It was then, and remains to be, our jumping-off point."