Black Ends - Pretend 2 Be (Protect Me)
Seattle scene stalwarts, Black Ends describe themselves as "gunk-pop" which does quite well to pigeonhole a sound that pulls the rug out from under post-grunge (hey, Seattle, we were bound to fall into that one) and watches it fall into a menacing, vaguely jointed heap leading into an "anthem for the paranoid and the hopeless".
Dayflower - Florida
Longstanding Leicester dream-pop outfit get washed out in an unexpectedly, almost countrified acoustic-led nostalgic haze with a jangle undertow that takes it into Favourite territory for classic indie earworm potential. Little too late for summer but never mind.
Dogviolet - Violets
"Melodic grunge post-punk from London" says their website, which... well, yeah. Led by the longstanding grunge-folk duo Naz & Ella, their debut single, "a tale of queer awakening and budding young love, drawing on the sapphic symbolism of violets", should appeal to fans of Heartworms' brooding expansionism.
Ex-Vöid - Swansea
With Owen Williams' million other bands it's heartening to find he still has time to rejoin with Lan McArdle and craft more lovelorn jangle-power-pop, cleaner than before but no less crafted to excellence. Second album In Love Again is out January 17th. That's 2025! How did that happen?
Flytrap - Gutted
"The young sound of Penge" says their Insta bio, which doesn't really help. And with the support of the label that released Man/Woman/Chainsaw's debut they're a young band you want to know more about, crackling with the rush of wayward noisy energy led by a vocal and more than likely intensity ringer for Dana Porridge Radio.
Laura Marling - Child Of Mine
If anyone was going to make a good go of a new parent album... Features swirling strings, Buck Meek and meditational profoundness.
Overhead, The Albatross - This Is Like Love
The Dublin post-rock band with a Pink Floyd-derived name released an album in 2016 and have taken until now to follow it up, I Leave You This Out November 15th. Actually we really should also draw your attention to their last single Your Last Breath, an astonishing powerful nine minute string and horn-driven release of personal emotion. This one's great in a different way, built on thrusting, insistent electronic beats, percussion frenzy and cut-up samples.
Perfume Genius - My Place
One of three contemporaneously written new tracks added to the tenth anniversary reissue of Too Bright.
PROPERTY - Lazy Boy
Melbourne trio turn up the discordance on their wiry post-punk in a Pylon/Au Pairs sense.
Sassyhiya - Boat Called Predator
Named after an actual boat called Predator, the South Londoners have a bounce in their step and a way with insistent riffs and spiralling choruses. Their debut album Take You Somewhere is being released on 8th November on Amelia Fletcher and Rob Pursey's Skep Wax label, so score another one up for them.
Trust Fund - The Mirror
A proper return to the album format for Ellis and whoever else, Has It Been A While? out November 1st, is heralded by a melancholic, reticent duet with Radiant Heart's Celia MacDougall.
Monday, September 30, 2024
Monday, September 23, 2024
New sounds (diet version): 23/9/24
Caroline Says - Roses
Fievel Is Glauque - Love Weapon
Fightmilk - That Thing You Did
Lambrini Girls - Company Culture
Mogwai - God Gets You Back
Sophie Jamieson - I don’t know what to save
Tapir! - Nail In A Wooden Trunk
Virginia's Wolves - Issues
Fievel Is Glauque - Love Weapon
Fightmilk - That Thing You Did
Lambrini Girls - Company Culture
Mogwai - God Gets You Back
Sophie Jamieson - I don’t know what to save
Tapir! - Nail In A Wooden Trunk
Virginia's Wolves - Issues
Monday, September 16, 2024
New sounds: 16/9/24
Former Champ - Sorry
From Glasgow, so as we well know by now there's a bunch of members of other bands in here too, the recent Martha tour support deliver snappy Replacements-leaning power-pop.
Jeremy Warmsley - Dancing On The Moon
Just as we start thinking about next year's STN twentieth anniversary, one of our hype OGs returns with an almost stately - we say "almost" as there's plenty of effects and touches to throw it enough off-centre - piano lament.
Lilith Ai - Serial Killers Prefer Blondes
Precision targetd bubblegrunge/emo from the Alldayer alumni's tremendous, long gestating new album of the same name.
Memory Of Speke - Wife Once
IT'S A BRIXTON WINDMILL BAND, EVERYBODY! So obviously yes, there's six of them, one of them plays sax, they've clearly heard some klezmer, and their songs going by this debut are theatrical and gradually wrap tightly around themselves. They might end up as The Last Dinner Party's evil twins.
Sasha Adrian – Shell
From Copenhagen and despite the lilting, searching nature of the guitars it's not easy going, lyrically dense and smart in its unflinching rawness as she finds herself silent screaming at unwanted sexual attention.
From Glasgow, so as we well know by now there's a bunch of members of other bands in here too, the recent Martha tour support deliver snappy Replacements-leaning power-pop.
Jeremy Warmsley - Dancing On The Moon
Just as we start thinking about next year's STN twentieth anniversary, one of our hype OGs returns with an almost stately - we say "almost" as there's plenty of effects and touches to throw it enough off-centre - piano lament.
Lilith Ai - Serial Killers Prefer Blondes
Precision targetd bubblegrunge/emo from the Alldayer alumni's tremendous, long gestating new album of the same name.
Memory Of Speke - Wife Once
IT'S A BRIXTON WINDMILL BAND, EVERYBODY! So obviously yes, there's six of them, one of them plays sax, they've clearly heard some klezmer, and their songs going by this debut are theatrical and gradually wrap tightly around themselves. They might end up as The Last Dinner Party's evil twins.
Sasha Adrian – Shell
From Copenhagen and despite the lilting, searching nature of the guitars it's not easy going, lyrically dense and smart in its unflinching rawness as she finds herself silent screaming at unwanted sexual attention.
Tuesday, September 10, 2024
New sounds: 10/9/24
bigfatbig - Nothing
Apologies, until the release of second EP Rippin' It last week on Du Blonde's label Daemon T.V. we didn't realise the north eastern straight-talking power-pop-punk powerhouses had spent most of this year releasing singles - this came out in July - and they're not a band who sound keen to be left in the corner.
Caribou - Come Find Me
This is basically the same as Dan Snaith's other identity Daphni now, isn't it. Anyway, an album has been announced, Honey out 4th October.
Field Music - The Waitress of St Louis'
Good Sad Happy Bad - Shaded Tree
Mica Levi and the reconstituted Shapes' new album, which appears to be called All Kinds Of Days, is out November 8th.
Johnny Foreigner - Their Shining Path
Three days to go to the new album!
Melin Melyn - Vitamin D
You'd be surprised how many of their caps were in evidence at the sort of festivals we go to over the summer, which bodes very well for next year's album (and next year's festival bookings, I guess)
MJ Lenderman - Wristwatch
We really hope Jake doesn't think the first two lines are a Quiet Riot borrow.
The WAEVE - Broken Boys
Young Scum - Peach Ice Cream
The powerpoppy, Paisley Underground jangle-adjacent, hooks for days sound of young Richmond, Virginia, from just released second album Lighter Blue.
Apologies, until the release of second EP Rippin' It last week on Du Blonde's label Daemon T.V. we didn't realise the north eastern straight-talking power-pop-punk powerhouses had spent most of this year releasing singles - this came out in July - and they're not a band who sound keen to be left in the corner.
Caribou - Come Find Me
This is basically the same as Dan Snaith's other identity Daphni now, isn't it. Anyway, an album has been announced, Honey out 4th October.
Field Music - The Waitress of St Louis'
Good Sad Happy Bad - Shaded Tree
Mica Levi and the reconstituted Shapes' new album, which appears to be called All Kinds Of Days, is out November 8th.
Johnny Foreigner - Their Shining Path
Three days to go to the new album!
Melin Melyn - Vitamin D
You'd be surprised how many of their caps were in evidence at the sort of festivals we go to over the summer, which bodes very well for next year's album (and next year's festival bookings, I guess)
MJ Lenderman - Wristwatch
We really hope Jake doesn't think the first two lines are a Quiet Riot borrow.
The WAEVE - Broken Boys
Young Scum - Peach Ice Cream
The powerpoppy, Paisley Underground jangle-adjacent, hooks for days sound of young Richmond, Virginia, from just released second album Lighter Blue.
Tuesday, August 27, 2024
New sounds: 27/8/24
Du Blonde - TV Star
From upcoming fourth album Sniff More Gritty, the former/sometime Beth Jeans Houghton, who does everything except drums on it, does the radio-ready grunge-pop thing with a lot... what? Yeah, Sniff More Gritty, that's what it says here. Anyway, there's more subtlety and genuine cutting angst alike than most in outlining "the story of who somebody was before and after fame".
Hayden Thorpe - He
You know, him from Wild Beasts. Yes, he still sings like that. His third solo record Ness, out September 27th, is inspired by Orford Ness, a ten mile long shingle spit on the coast of Suffolk that used to belong to the Ministry of Defence for top secret military testing, and is essentially adapted from Robert Macfarlane's book on the same. The jittery backing wouldn't sound out of place on his old band's work while the choral backing and non-standard instrumentation - sackbut! - takes it in a more pastoral direction.
Tindersticks - Always A Stranger
Speaking of unique and recognisable voices brings us to Stuart Staples' bruised saloon croon and one of those elusive but evidently tender late night jazzy considerations where they thrive. Soft Tissue is released on September 13th.
Trust Fund - Leaving The Party Early
Ah, so Ellis Jones has decided to stop fannying around with one-off singles and re-embrace the album format. Has It Been A While? is out on November 1st and opens with acoustic soul-baring folk with strings of an almost unavoidably Nick Drake ilk.
From upcoming fourth album Sniff More Gritty, the former/sometime Beth Jeans Houghton, who does everything except drums on it, does the radio-ready grunge-pop thing with a lot... what? Yeah, Sniff More Gritty, that's what it says here. Anyway, there's more subtlety and genuine cutting angst alike than most in outlining "the story of who somebody was before and after fame".
Hayden Thorpe - He
You know, him from Wild Beasts. Yes, he still sings like that. His third solo record Ness, out September 27th, is inspired by Orford Ness, a ten mile long shingle spit on the coast of Suffolk that used to belong to the Ministry of Defence for top secret military testing, and is essentially adapted from Robert Macfarlane's book on the same. The jittery backing wouldn't sound out of place on his old band's work while the choral backing and non-standard instrumentation - sackbut! - takes it in a more pastoral direction.
Tindersticks - Always A Stranger
Speaking of unique and recognisable voices brings us to Stuart Staples' bruised saloon croon and one of those elusive but evidently tender late night jazzy considerations where they thrive. Soft Tissue is released on September 13th.
Trust Fund - Leaving The Party Early
Ah, so Ellis Jones has decided to stop fannying around with one-off singles and re-embrace the album format. Has It Been A While? is out on November 1st and opens with acoustic soul-baring folk with strings of an almost unavoidably Nick Drake ilk.
Wednesday, August 21, 2024
New sounds in brief: 21/8/24
If you'll excuse us again, we're between festivals with all the transitoriness and weariness that implies, so this and for the next couple of weeks we're reverting to the express service of sticking up a load of tracks and hope you'll investigate further. OK? OK.
Caroline Says - Faded And Golden
Dana Gavanski - Ought To Feel
Dancer - Priority Girl
Field Music - The Limits Of Language (new album on 11th October)
Fightmilk - No Souvenirs (new album on 15th November)
Jemma Freeman and the Cosmic Something - Alien
mo dotti - lucky boy
Nilufer Yanya - Mutations
Silverbacks - Something I Know
Caroline Says - Faded And Golden
Dana Gavanski - Ought To Feel
Dancer - Priority Girl
Field Music - The Limits Of Language (new album on 11th October)
Fightmilk - No Souvenirs (new album on 15th November)
Jemma Freeman and the Cosmic Something - Alien
mo dotti - lucky boy
Nilufer Yanya - Mutations
Silverbacks - Something I Know
Monday, July 29, 2024
New sounds: 29/7/24
EFÉ - 2000SEVEN
Some of the most unimaginative music of recent times has been made by "genreless" "pop-punk"/"shoegaze revival" "bedroom pop" artists, so one might well see that Dublin-based Anita Ikharo has supported both JPEGMAFIA and DIIV, observe the none more Borrowed Nostalgia For The Unremembered Nineties guitar tone and run for their lives. Luckily EFÉ is far more than that, lurching from chiming tentative emotional scene setting into fuzzy power chords without losing the essential hopeful apprehension.
Fat Dog - Wither
There's only nine tracks on Woof, out September 6th, are they going to release all of them in advance? The fifth single is pretty much what you've already come to expect, this one, in terms of electro-punk, industrial techno, gnomic shouting and explosiveness made for the circle pit.
Jopy - Graveyard Romance
The Brighton trio's second single from debut EP Planet Zombie, out September 20th, fits that title all too well. Anyone who remembers the B-movie goth garage of the lost mid-00s band Zombina & the Skeletones would be well advised to give it a go, leader Jo Parnell transcribing "accepting one's own trans-identity as a story about ghosts finding true happiness" through hooky horror-camp with a guitar riff straight out of Ricky Wilson of the B-52s' playbook.
Kim Deal - Coast
Her first fully available solo single, recorded by Steve Albini with Kelley backing, dotted with mariachi brass and the melody of Sunday Girl filtered through her band (either of them)'s more becalmed surf-adjacent moments.
Man/Woman/Chainsaw - Ode To Clio
This moment's big new Windmill thing - Fat Dog were the last moment, keep up - the pocket orchestra have signed to Fat Possum for an EP, Eazy Peazy, in the far-off space year of November 8th. Black Country, New Road comparisons are there if you want them in their build and expansiveness but they still feel like their own thing, as witnessed in the way this is for the first half all heart-holding-on silky vocals and contemplative strings and piano before the nasty stuff bursts right through the middle two minutes in and the strings are there to provide some balance to the furious rush.
Maria Uzor - What U Need
A standalone single by the Norwich electro-avant-pop auteurette containing and about containing multitudes, beats pumping and fading back where required.
New Starts - A Little Stone
He likely wouldn't thank us for this but this is the most like Hefner that Darren Hayman has sounded... well, the temptation to say "since Hefner" is strong given its bottom line of that band's Jonathan Richman slacker jangle, if one dipped in power-pop and Joely Smith (Fresh, adults) playing against type.
Some of the most unimaginative music of recent times has been made by "genreless" "pop-punk"/"shoegaze revival" "bedroom pop" artists, so one might well see that Dublin-based Anita Ikharo has supported both JPEGMAFIA and DIIV, observe the none more Borrowed Nostalgia For The Unremembered Nineties guitar tone and run for their lives. Luckily EFÉ is far more than that, lurching from chiming tentative emotional scene setting into fuzzy power chords without losing the essential hopeful apprehension.
Fat Dog - Wither
There's only nine tracks on Woof, out September 6th, are they going to release all of them in advance? The fifth single is pretty much what you've already come to expect, this one, in terms of electro-punk, industrial techno, gnomic shouting and explosiveness made for the circle pit.
Jopy - Graveyard Romance
The Brighton trio's second single from debut EP Planet Zombie, out September 20th, fits that title all too well. Anyone who remembers the B-movie goth garage of the lost mid-00s band Zombina & the Skeletones would be well advised to give it a go, leader Jo Parnell transcribing "accepting one's own trans-identity as a story about ghosts finding true happiness" through hooky horror-camp with a guitar riff straight out of Ricky Wilson of the B-52s' playbook.
Kim Deal - Coast
Her first fully available solo single, recorded by Steve Albini with Kelley backing, dotted with mariachi brass and the melody of Sunday Girl filtered through her band (either of them)'s more becalmed surf-adjacent moments.
Man/Woman/Chainsaw - Ode To Clio
This moment's big new Windmill thing - Fat Dog were the last moment, keep up - the pocket orchestra have signed to Fat Possum for an EP, Eazy Peazy, in the far-off space year of November 8th. Black Country, New Road comparisons are there if you want them in their build and expansiveness but they still feel like their own thing, as witnessed in the way this is for the first half all heart-holding-on silky vocals and contemplative strings and piano before the nasty stuff bursts right through the middle two minutes in and the strings are there to provide some balance to the furious rush.
Maria Uzor - What U Need
A standalone single by the Norwich electro-avant-pop auteurette containing and about containing multitudes, beats pumping and fading back where required.
New Starts - A Little Stone
He likely wouldn't thank us for this but this is the most like Hefner that Darren Hayman has sounded... well, the temptation to say "since Hefner" is strong given its bottom line of that band's Jonathan Richman slacker jangle, if one dipped in power-pop and Joely Smith (Fresh, adults) playing against type.
Monday, July 15, 2024
New sounds: 15/7/24
Cold Specks - How It Feels
There's no point noting it seems to have been a while since we heard from Toronto's Ladan Hussein (who seems to have dropped the Al Spx identity of yore) because it absolutely is, the first Cold Specks track in seven years after a period of mental health issues and manic episodes still exhibiting her extraordinary, raw "doom soul" voice, trembling with emotion on a spare but ultimately triumphant in the wreckage piano ballad reminiscent of the approach on last year's substantial Corinne Bailey Rae album, augmented with Owen Pallett composed strings and Terry Edwards adding yet another name to his attempt to provide brass for every act that has ever existed (OK, you name another direct link between Madness and Lydia Lunch)
Delivery - Digging The Hole
After a debut album last year that found a big fan in Henry Rollins, the Melbourne five-piece just got signed to Heavenly, also hope of compatriots King Gizzard & the Lizzard Wizzard and Confidence Man - quite some chasm musically between those two. Delivery are much on the left hand side, synthesising that strain of garage rock that Australians seem much better at than most with more than a hint of the Flying Nun house sound and just small enough a classic rock influence, coming out somewhere adjacent to Parquet Courts. They're over for some dates in late July/early August including Latitude festuval (and Tramlines, where they'll stand out a mile)
Hello Mary - Three
We were introduced to the NY trio about a month ago where we noted their switch from obtuse post-punk to sunny guitar pop suggested they had plenty of stylistic interest to offer on upcoming album Emita Ox, out on September 13th on Frenchkiss. Now they're something else again, an unspooling quasi-epic that subtly shifts from daydreaming in the melodic glow not unlike the other latter Mary we've taken a shine to, Mary In The Junkyard, then dissolving into dissonant fuzzy noise for a bit. And they're coming over at the turn of the seasons for End Of The Road, Manchester and Edinburgh Psych Fests and somewhere that may well take them to their bosoms more than most, the Windmill.
julie - clairbourne practice
TikTok shoegaze is usually shit, so finding julie are an LA shoegaze band with an atypically large amount of streams might have made us turn back. Luckily we saw them last year so knew better, and the first single from forthcoming album my anti-aircraft friend, with its quiet-loud dynamics where the "quiet" bits are coiled and harmonic whereas the loud bits are surging... well, coupled with general wooziness and drumming that lapses into the arrythmic it's all quite MBV influenced but that's no bad thing, though with the untutored male/female voices and melodic sense they also make us think of a disortion pedalled bar italia. Even look a tiny bit like them.
THE NONE - Pigs Need Feeding
Comprising people who used to be in Youth Man, Cassels, Frauds and, well, Bloc Party (bassist Gordon Moakes), THE NONE are noiserock as all out, bringing Jesus Lizard-recalling earthquake frequences and overarching blistering guitar outbursts to Kaila Whyte's laser focused energies. MATTER EP is out August 29th.
There's no point noting it seems to have been a while since we heard from Toronto's Ladan Hussein (who seems to have dropped the Al Spx identity of yore) because it absolutely is, the first Cold Specks track in seven years after a period of mental health issues and manic episodes still exhibiting her extraordinary, raw "doom soul" voice, trembling with emotion on a spare but ultimately triumphant in the wreckage piano ballad reminiscent of the approach on last year's substantial Corinne Bailey Rae album, augmented with Owen Pallett composed strings and Terry Edwards adding yet another name to his attempt to provide brass for every act that has ever existed (OK, you name another direct link between Madness and Lydia Lunch)
Delivery - Digging The Hole
After a debut album last year that found a big fan in Henry Rollins, the Melbourne five-piece just got signed to Heavenly, also hope of compatriots King Gizzard & the Lizzard Wizzard and Confidence Man - quite some chasm musically between those two. Delivery are much on the left hand side, synthesising that strain of garage rock that Australians seem much better at than most with more than a hint of the Flying Nun house sound and just small enough a classic rock influence, coming out somewhere adjacent to Parquet Courts. They're over for some dates in late July/early August including Latitude festuval (and Tramlines, where they'll stand out a mile)
Hello Mary - Three
We were introduced to the NY trio about a month ago where we noted their switch from obtuse post-punk to sunny guitar pop suggested they had plenty of stylistic interest to offer on upcoming album Emita Ox, out on September 13th on Frenchkiss. Now they're something else again, an unspooling quasi-epic that subtly shifts from daydreaming in the melodic glow not unlike the other latter Mary we've taken a shine to, Mary In The Junkyard, then dissolving into dissonant fuzzy noise for a bit. And they're coming over at the turn of the seasons for End Of The Road, Manchester and Edinburgh Psych Fests and somewhere that may well take them to their bosoms more than most, the Windmill.
julie - clairbourne practice
TikTok shoegaze is usually shit, so finding julie are an LA shoegaze band with an atypically large amount of streams might have made us turn back. Luckily we saw them last year so knew better, and the first single from forthcoming album my anti-aircraft friend, with its quiet-loud dynamics where the "quiet" bits are coiled and harmonic whereas the loud bits are surging... well, coupled with general wooziness and drumming that lapses into the arrythmic it's all quite MBV influenced but that's no bad thing, though with the untutored male/female voices and melodic sense they also make us think of a disortion pedalled bar italia. Even look a tiny bit like them.
THE NONE - Pigs Need Feeding
Comprising people who used to be in Youth Man, Cassels, Frauds and, well, Bloc Party (bassist Gordon Moakes), THE NONE are noiserock as all out, bringing Jesus Lizard-recalling earthquake frequences and overarching blistering guitar outbursts to Kaila Whyte's laser focused energies. MATTER EP is out August 29th.
Thursday, July 11, 2024
New sounds: 11/7/24
Cornelius - MIND TRAIN
Last month Keigo Oyamada released his eighth album Ethereal Essence, an inessential extension of the ambient/minimalist path he's been going down in recent years. This soon after he also released a new single that sounds nothing like it, which you have to say is a flex. Instead, nine minutes of Neu!-level motorik, pulsing slow build synths, looping guitar figures leading up to a coruscating solo, incidental sound effects and a spacey intermission. He's popping over for End Of The Road (yay!) and the Barbican in September.
Hamish Hawk - Men Like Wire
More classier-than-you dramatic roar excavation of the psyche and lost opportunity from Hawk's third album A Firmer Hand. Contains the lyric "an uncanny Frankie Valli".
Laura Marling - Patterns
Sort of title track from Patterns In Repeat, the still somehow only 34 years old Marling's eighth album, first in four years and first as a mother (of a daughter, premonition fans), retreating a little to her sublimely woody folky inclinations.
Loose Articles - Are You A Welder?
First of all, incredible title. The Manchester outfit who recently opened for the Foo Fighters at one of their stadium gigs (as did our old pals Chroma, and the two toured together as a warm-up) have been on the fringes of our radar for a while for their early 80s Fall-inspired attitudinal sardonic socio-political oblique punk, finally getting an actual mention as Alcopop! picked up their debut album Scream If You Wanna Go Faster, out 26th July, from which they disassemble gender roles and expectations over a repetitively insistent burrowing riff that, has to be said, sails close to the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion's Wail.
Nightshift - Sure Look
We wrote about the Glasgow not-actually-supergroup-except-maybe-in-reverse the time before last; the latest track previewing Homosapien on 26th July wears its heart on its sleeve, its tempo knowing when to hold back and when to tumble down the proverbial hill (Ray Aggs' fiddle once again helping set the tone) and its guitar power chords set to stun.
Public Service Broadcasting - Electra
And this fifth time of asking it's... Amelia Earhart's final, failed, attempted solo round the world flight! The Last Flight, in fact, out 4th October, the first taster named after her trusted Lockheed plane which links their electroKrautsample origins - more than a hint of the Everest construction about the effects, we think - to the synth-funk groove of Bright Magic, from which EERA returns on guest vocals.
Screensaver - Permanence
The Melbourne dark post-punks are already two albums down, this being a stopgap ahead of some debut August UK and Europe dates that ratchets up the intensity that accommodates a chorus that sounds ripped from Siouxsie and the Banshees amid racing drums, sci-fi synth and art-guitar noise.
Supermilk - Many Thanks
Another part of that sprawling ME REX/Fresh/cheerbleederz family tree have a third album impending, leader Jake Popuyra laudably not letting his ALS diagnosis get in the way at all. High Precision Ghosts (ooh, Prefab Sprout reference!), out on Specialist Subject come 9th August, has as an advance party 110 seconds or so of jagged riffage and Futureheads/Field Music offbeat vocal arrangement, as if - apologies in advance - they've realised they might not have long left to get all this out here.
Last month Keigo Oyamada released his eighth album Ethereal Essence, an inessential extension of the ambient/minimalist path he's been going down in recent years. This soon after he also released a new single that sounds nothing like it, which you have to say is a flex. Instead, nine minutes of Neu!-level motorik, pulsing slow build synths, looping guitar figures leading up to a coruscating solo, incidental sound effects and a spacey intermission. He's popping over for End Of The Road (yay!) and the Barbican in September.
Hamish Hawk - Men Like Wire
More classier-than-you dramatic roar excavation of the psyche and lost opportunity from Hawk's third album A Firmer Hand. Contains the lyric "an uncanny Frankie Valli".
Laura Marling - Patterns
Sort of title track from Patterns In Repeat, the still somehow only 34 years old Marling's eighth album, first in four years and first as a mother (of a daughter, premonition fans), retreating a little to her sublimely woody folky inclinations.
Loose Articles - Are You A Welder?
First of all, incredible title. The Manchester outfit who recently opened for the Foo Fighters at one of their stadium gigs (as did our old pals Chroma, and the two toured together as a warm-up) have been on the fringes of our radar for a while for their early 80s Fall-inspired attitudinal sardonic socio-political oblique punk, finally getting an actual mention as Alcopop! picked up their debut album Scream If You Wanna Go Faster, out 26th July, from which they disassemble gender roles and expectations over a repetitively insistent burrowing riff that, has to be said, sails close to the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion's Wail.
Nightshift - Sure Look
We wrote about the Glasgow not-actually-supergroup-except-maybe-in-reverse the time before last; the latest track previewing Homosapien on 26th July wears its heart on its sleeve, its tempo knowing when to hold back and when to tumble down the proverbial hill (Ray Aggs' fiddle once again helping set the tone) and its guitar power chords set to stun.
Public Service Broadcasting - Electra
And this fifth time of asking it's... Amelia Earhart's final, failed, attempted solo round the world flight! The Last Flight, in fact, out 4th October, the first taster named after her trusted Lockheed plane which links their electroKrautsample origins - more than a hint of the Everest construction about the effects, we think - to the synth-funk groove of Bright Magic, from which EERA returns on guest vocals.
Screensaver - Permanence
The Melbourne dark post-punks are already two albums down, this being a stopgap ahead of some debut August UK and Europe dates that ratchets up the intensity that accommodates a chorus that sounds ripped from Siouxsie and the Banshees amid racing drums, sci-fi synth and art-guitar noise.
Supermilk - Many Thanks
Another part of that sprawling ME REX/Fresh/cheerbleederz family tree have a third album impending, leader Jake Popuyra laudably not letting his ALS diagnosis get in the way at all. High Precision Ghosts (ooh, Prefab Sprout reference!), out on Specialist Subject come 9th August, has as an advance party 110 seconds or so of jagged riffage and Futureheads/Field Music offbeat vocal arrangement, as if - apologies in advance - they've realised they might not have long left to get all this out here.
Monday, July 01, 2024
New sounds: 1/7/24
Fightmilk - Summer Bodies
Hey, they're back! Actually they came back a couple of weeks ago with a cover of Springsteen's Darkness On The Edge Of Town for Bruce-as-queer-icon podcast Because The Boss Belongs To Us, but approaching third album season - coming via Fika now - this is one of our stroppy favourites further approaching the nexus, some say nucleus, power-pop, arranging harmonies, backing vocals, hooks and power chords in service to... Lily? "It's about how women and femmes are constantly bombarded with media telling us how to be our best and most beautiful selves, or, bluntly, how to bully your mind and body into an image set by constantly moving goalposts — straight teeth, white skin, feminine but not girly, cool but not threatening, skinny waist, snatched jawline. Products that promise to shrink you in the guise of 'wellness'. And if you don’t look like that, you’re supposed to hate yourself until you do. No thanks. Our favourite bit in this song is where we all take turns unleashing a big scream." Furthermore it's got a vibraslap on.
A Ghost Column - Resistance
A Ghost Column is Victoria Hamblett, who has been around for a while in the orbit of the likes of Crack Cloud and Ulrika Spacek and now goes solo with a dreamy, gauzy sound reminiscent in its haunted introspection of the Birmingham retro-futurists of the 90s (Broadcast, Pram) as much as the drifty end of shoegaze.
MJ Lenderman - She's Leaving You
We loved Wednesday's album from last year Rat Saw God, so why has it taken until now to register their guitarist's just as acclaimed solo project, last seen on 2022's Boat Songs? Because we're lazy shites, that's why. The first single from September 6th's follow-up Manning Fireworks is slacker countrified in a vaguely Evan Dando/Built To Spill way with a love that's fortunately far from overwhelming of classic rock leading to a stratospherising finish partially involving Wednesday's Karly Hartzman. And a beautiful passing Clapton diss.
Scrunchies - The Empire
We came across Minneapolis' Scrunchies with their blazing 2022 album Feral Coast; its successor Colossal, out August 23rd, was recorded by Steve Albini, which makes sense given their sub-two minute surge bisecting Muffs-like power-pop and grunge's entrails.
The WAEVE - You Saw
The second Coxon/Dougall collection City Lights is out 20th September; the second single can feel misleading switching from Rose going all Slowdive on the intro and then plunging into choppy electronics but give it time to grow and manifold touches blossom, underlined by strings, top-lined by neon-lit dramatics.
WUT - Talking To Strangers/Mingling With The Thorns
Vancouver's WUT describe themselves as "riot twee", which we're pretty sure is an Amelia Fletcher invention but regardless. They're certainly coming from a similar point, as the two tracks released from second album Mingling With The Thorns, due August 23rd, are harmonic gems of classic indiepop that variously recall Flying Nun records' golden age, Marine Girls and, yes, Heavenly.
Hey, they're back! Actually they came back a couple of weeks ago with a cover of Springsteen's Darkness On The Edge Of Town for Bruce-as-queer-icon podcast Because The Boss Belongs To Us, but approaching third album season - coming via Fika now - this is one of our stroppy favourites further approaching the nexus, some say nucleus, power-pop, arranging harmonies, backing vocals, hooks and power chords in service to... Lily? "It's about how women and femmes are constantly bombarded with media telling us how to be our best and most beautiful selves, or, bluntly, how to bully your mind and body into an image set by constantly moving goalposts — straight teeth, white skin, feminine but not girly, cool but not threatening, skinny waist, snatched jawline. Products that promise to shrink you in the guise of 'wellness'. And if you don’t look like that, you’re supposed to hate yourself until you do. No thanks. Our favourite bit in this song is where we all take turns unleashing a big scream." Furthermore it's got a vibraslap on.
A Ghost Column - Resistance
A Ghost Column is Victoria Hamblett, who has been around for a while in the orbit of the likes of Crack Cloud and Ulrika Spacek and now goes solo with a dreamy, gauzy sound reminiscent in its haunted introspection of the Birmingham retro-futurists of the 90s (Broadcast, Pram) as much as the drifty end of shoegaze.
MJ Lenderman - She's Leaving You
We loved Wednesday's album from last year Rat Saw God, so why has it taken until now to register their guitarist's just as acclaimed solo project, last seen on 2022's Boat Songs? Because we're lazy shites, that's why. The first single from September 6th's follow-up Manning Fireworks is slacker countrified in a vaguely Evan Dando/Built To Spill way with a love that's fortunately far from overwhelming of classic rock leading to a stratospherising finish partially involving Wednesday's Karly Hartzman. And a beautiful passing Clapton diss.
Scrunchies - The Empire
We came across Minneapolis' Scrunchies with their blazing 2022 album Feral Coast; its successor Colossal, out August 23rd, was recorded by Steve Albini, which makes sense given their sub-two minute surge bisecting Muffs-like power-pop and grunge's entrails.
The WAEVE - You Saw
The second Coxon/Dougall collection City Lights is out 20th September; the second single can feel misleading switching from Rose going all Slowdive on the intro and then plunging into choppy electronics but give it time to grow and manifold touches blossom, underlined by strings, top-lined by neon-lit dramatics.
WUT - Talking To Strangers/Mingling With The Thorns
Vancouver's WUT describe themselves as "riot twee", which we're pretty sure is an Amelia Fletcher invention but regardless. They're certainly coming from a similar point, as the two tracks released from second album Mingling With The Thorns, due August 23rd, are harmonic gems of classic indiepop that variously recall Flying Nun records' golden age, Marine Girls and, yes, Heavenly.
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