Diiv’s “Frog in Boiling Water” comes half a decade after its predecessor, 2019’s “Deceiver”, and took most of that interval to compose. Made as the band (now in its second incarnation) fretted over its direction and identity, the album drills into melancholy and vulnerability with irradiated guitars that throw off dream-pop sparks. In the fashion of shoegaze’s more maximal strains, an undercarriage of funk and breakbeats helps transmute the angst of Zachary Cole Smith’s lullaby vocals into the ultimate catharsis.
“Fourth album from DIIV might be their best yet and definitely lands at a fortuitous moment.” brooklyn vegan”
The band’s despondently beautiful fourth album pairs songs about a world falling apart with seductive sonics and a little bit of hope.” allmusic
DIIV – “Frog in Boiling Water”, released on May 24, 2024.
Mammoth Penguins are Emma Kupa (guitar, vocals), Mark Boxall (bass, vocals) and Tom Barden (drums, vocals). Reminiscent of the pop melodies of The Beths, the indie dissonance of Land of Talk, and the guitar forward slacker rock of Weezer, Mammoth Penguins marry heart-ache indie pop with spiky guitars and Emma’s frank confessional song writing.
The new record leans into a raw pop-punk power-trio sound more than ever, with a deep growl in layered guitars and bursts of percussion and harmony. The songs and artwork explore themes about finding a place for yourself and familiarity with people and places. Although it turns back towards a classic three-piece sound, the band weren’t restricted by that palette, adding finishing touches of percussion, extra guitars and backing vocals in short bursts in a garden shed, and also bringing in gorgeous strings to sweeten the title track.
You might also be interested in Emma’s solo album
Sugary, joyous indie-pop fun from Cambridgeshire-based Mammoth Penguins, who’ve been one of the most underrated bands in the country for the best part of a decade. Five years on from “There’s No FightWe Can’t Both Win”, they return to the power-pop / pop-punk leanings of their 2015 debut “Hide And Seek” on their fourth album “Here”.
Pip Blom have today announced details of the release of the ‘Bobbie Remixes’ A 9-track EP, which will be available digitally via Friday 23rd May 2024. Featuring reworkings of tracks from their much acclaimed third album, “Bobbie”, which was released in October last year,
Hailing from Manchester, Tom Sharkett is a producer that seeks to blend the weird, wonky and disparate elements of all corners of dance music into his productions. He is also in the band W.H. Lung.
Talking about the remix Tom said: “After meeting the Pip Blom contingent and bumping into them over the past few years of touring (including a particularly late one in Amsterdam at afters Darek put us on to) it was great to finally remix one of their tunes. It was also a nice bit of synchronicity that they recorded the album at the same place we’d made our first two records.
I loved the physicality of the new record and wanted to translate that into a Dark Italo/EBM thumper. ‘Get Back’ felt particularly raw and stood out to me most to remix. I could hear Pip’s vocal over an 1980s Belgium-adjacent bassline, and once I added in some harsh, industrial drum samples and the crunchy guitars from the original stems, we were away!”
Last month Brooklyn post-punk rockers Pamphlets released their debut album, “Take Your Place”.
We have shared a handful of tracks ahead of its release and today show some love to standout single “In Those Eyes.” It’s another perfect demonstration of the bands sharp post punk delivery with an angular blend of new wave inspired instrumentation and punk grit.
Speaking on the track, the band adds: “in Those Eyes” is a self realization of becoming something you fight against. It’s realizing how weaponized hate is cyclical and in so vowing to break the cycle.
Pamphlets · Jeremiah Marquez · Benjamin Griffin · Daniel Pemberton
Pratts & Payne, is a South London pub that sits around the corner from the famed home studio of producer Dan Carey, who has an important place in the history of Royel Otis. When making their debut album with Carey in early 2023, the Australian duo – childhood friends Otis Pavlovic and Royel Maddell – would decamp to the pub to finish lyrics and make decisions on the direction of their frst LP. “Dan would ask us to record vocals,” Royel remembers, “and we’d say, ‘Just give us half an hour, we’re popping to Pratts & Payne’, and we’d have a pint, a few shots, and get some lyrics down.” Eventually, it made such a mark that they named the record “Pratts and Pain“.
Across the debut album, Royel Otis swing between melodic, pop- inspired indie and woozy psych, but it never feels tied to one lane. As soon as one style or mood has outstayed its welcome, they handbrake turn into psychedelic weirdness or dissonant noise, keeping everybody on their toes.
After the table was laid on the two EPs, “Pratts & Pain” brings everything from the band’s history together on a record that’s reverent towards their beginnings but unafraid to push forwards into new sounds. This loose, open formula for what makes a Royel Otis song is written all over “Pratts & Pain”, an album defined by its sense of fun and adventure.
Jordan Lehning has been a musician I’ve admired since I was a teenager so when he asked me if I wanted to make music together I jumped at the chance. I try to write everyday as an exercise and the songs for this came quite fluidly. The whole project came together in a short amount of time and was recorded at The Duck in Nashville, TN. In this past year I came into a new sense of fierceness within myself and I think the music is reflective of it in tone.
In “A Little Longer” Samuels captivates with her signature tender melodies and observations of everyday truths so astute it makes the mundane, poetic and worthwhile. The first single from her forthcoming EP, “First and the Last”, reminds us of the excitement and curiosity that uncertainty can bring when we don’t focus on the fear. “A Little Longer” is a big light in the darkness.
“I was lucky enough to make the music video for this with the multi-talented Paige Starke. She shot it on super 8 film on a day of adventuring. This day of shooting was such a perfect one… full of laughter, playfulness and experimentation. I think she captured the song’s energy perfectly and that though it’s a lighthearted video, a lot of tenderness and emotion is conveyed in it.” – Johanna Samuels
The recordings were also extremely joyful to create. There was a profound amount of laughing and hamming in the studio and I can only hope that comes thru to its listeners in this collection as well. I felt lucky to have my old friend and incredible drummer Dom Billet on the EP. I hope that these songs are interpreted with a sense of levity and joy as they explore the more nuanced elements of love and self.
Youth Lagoon is back with another new song out now on Fat Possum Records, Youth Lagoon is the prized moniker of Idaho-based songwriter Trevor Powers who returns with a new single/video, “Lucy Takes a Picture.” A portrait of “salvation hiding in our wounds,” the song is a soul-stirring chronicle of love and narcotics…a triumph of American gothic imagination. “Once in a while there’s a song that feels like I’ve been trying to write it my whole life,” says Powers. “Lucy is one of those.” With a bent toward rural noir, Powers has found a home in a world where his personal journals and poetic confessions are indistinguishable from the twisted mythologies of habitual sinners and devout barflies. “My only concern now with music is bringing the inner world to life,” says Powers. “It’s not about making something better — it’s about making something true. Songs were a lot harder to write when I hated myself. When my soul changed, my music did too.”
“Lucy Takes a Picture” takes Powers’ devoted articulations of struggle and redemption to a new frontier. Written at Powers’ home in Idaho and recorded in Los Angeles with co-producer Rodaidh McDonald (Weyes Blood, The xx, Gil Scott-Heron), the song is guided by a choir of pizzicato strings, a bed of synth pads played through a shoebox tape recorder, and Powers front and centre singing about darkness, deliverance, and love with the ghoulish timbre of an apocalyptic lounge singer.
In 2023, Powers released the acclaimed “Heaven Is a Junkyard”, an album of warped Americana that brought his focus back home. He also reunited with his long time creative partner Tyler T. Williams for its music video.
After an eight-year hiatus from the project, Powers released his most recent Youth Lagoon album, “Heaven Is a Junkyard“, in 2023. It served as his fourth Youth Lagoon LP and the follow-up to 2015’s “Savage Hills Ballroom”.
Horse Jumper of Love have announced a new album: “Disaster Trick”, the Boston slowcore band’s fourth full-length LP, arrives August 16th through Run for Cover Records. Featured on the LP are “Gates of Heaven” and new song, “Wink,” The single, featuring Wednesday’s Karly Hartzman, leads the Boston band’s fourth full-length LP
Singer-guitarist Dimitri Giannopoulos was inspired by Russian author Dmitry Bakin’s short story “Leaves” while writing “Wink.” “The story is partly about people leaving their home for something better, but when they return they are back to the same place they started,” he explained. “The story shed some perspective on my own life and the ebb and flow of pushing forward for something better and going back to your old ways.”
“Disaster Trick” will be Horse Jumper of Love’s first full-length album since 2022’s “Natural Part”. Additional contributors to the new album include Wednesday’s MJ Lenderman and Squirrel Flower’s Ella Williams. Last year, the trio released a mini-album “Heartbreak Rules”, that included two reimagined tracks from “Natural Part” and a cover of the Smashing Pumpkins’ “Luna.”
English alternative rock/shoegaze band Pale Saints were formed in 1987 in Leeds by singer-bassist Ian Masters, guitarist Graeme Naysmith and drummer Chris Cooper. Initially influenced by Primal Scream’s early sound. But by the time they recorded their first EP, “Barging Into the Presence of God”, released in 1989, the band went into a direction that displayed a mix of Ian Masters’ ethereal, choirboy-like vocals along with dark and atmospheric and noisy pop. As the band developed, their unique strain of dream pop by synthesizing elements of connected bygone movements such as West Coast psychedelia, the paisley underground, and the C-86,movement applying avant-folk, pure pop, and spectral post-punk advancements.
The band was signed to 4AD Records after their first London show by the label’s chief Ivo Watts-Russell. Their three albums of increasing scope and sprawl, “The Comforts of Madness” (1990), “In Ribbons” (1992), and “Slow Buildings” (1994), left lasting imprints.
That July, the trio, joined by the Edsel Auctioneer’s Ashley Horner on second guitar, recorded a BBC session for John Peel’s program.
Barging Into The Presence Of God EP
The first release by Pale Saints making their 4AD debut was the “Barging Into The Presence Of God” EP from September 1989 and two songs from this EP ended up in the Peels Festive Fifty. “Sight Of You” a heartsick ballad showcasing Masters’ chorister-like voice is a mid tempo throbbing monster, so simple yet very powerful, guitars arpeggiate around two chords and there’s an element of uncontrolled chaos. And above it all, Ian Masters sings like a heartsore angel, lyrics which cut to the teenage condition of love so perfectly.
“She Rides The Waves” is faster, just as simple musically, only a few chords, but crashes like the titular waves – guitars spit and rage, drums are hammered, and it’s a speedy rush of joy. The third song on the EP can’t compete and settles for atmosphere over melody, but two classics out of three songs isn’t too bad a start to a career.
The Comforts Of Madness (30th Anniversary Remaster)
Signed to 4AD Records by the label’s chief Ivo Watts-Russell. The group’s first album, “The Comforts of Madness”, released in February 1990, On the eve of a post-Thatcherite Britain, the Pale Saints, alongside the likes of Lush, Ride and Slowdive, were ushering in a new wave of British indie. And in 4ADRecords, they found a perfect home for their music – an exciting & undeniable meld of noise and dream-pop.
Their debut album, “The Comforts of Madness”, didn’t disappoint, now standing as one of the best of its era. Pitchfork placed it in their Best 50 Shoegaze Albums Of All Time saying, “There’s a restless urgency, particularly when the volume swells and the rhythms intensify. That energy not only keeps (it) vital, it emphasizes Pale Saints’ inventiveness, how they channelled softness and rage into something distinctive.”
That rare thing, a debut so perfectly formed that anything else the band releases pales in comparison. Every song is a gem, there isn’t a moment wasted across the forty one minutes, even the silences between songs are filled with little noises and extracts of melodies (an idea stolen by My Bloody Valentine a year later on Loveless). And the songs are wonderful, each and every one. From the powerful one two opening punch of “Way The World Is” and “You Tear The World In Two“, through the dreamy atmospherics of “A Deep Sleep For Steven” and “Sea Of Sound“, across the perfect guitar pop of Language Of Flowers and Insubstantial … Even the sped up cover of Opal’s “Fell From The Sun” fits the album neatly.
“Time Thief” closes “The Comforts Of Madness” perfectly – sometimes slow, quiet and foreboding, other times loud, fast and melodic, the tempo speeds up and slows down as the tension rises, guitars and drums hammering to a noisy climax. The song is like a microcosm of the whole album – the off kilter sound the band make, the shifts in tempo, dropped bars, the stops and starts, the swerves into dissonance, the peculiar logic that makes these songs so special. And over it all Ian Masters continues to sing odd words in his high choirboy-like voice, slightly disturbing words. The album hangs together beautifully and should be in any self respecting indie rock fan’s record collection.
The album includes the Opal cover version of “Fell from the Sun” . The Sunday Times called it “an unintended indie manifesto: music that is at once wayward and concise, dissonant and beautiful.”
The debut, a Top 40 U.K. hit upon release, is particularly well-regarded, and was expanded and recirculated by 4AD records in January 2020, 4AD released a remastered and expanded 30th anniversary edition including the Peel session and an album’s worth of demos.
Half Life EP
The EP of four new songs the Chris Allison produced, “Half-Life”, came out that October, by which point the band was a quartet with the addition of Meriel Barham, An original member of Lush strongly recommended by that band’s Miki Berenyi.Barham not only contributed to Pale Saints’ song writing process but also shared lead vocal duties with Masters, Barham contributed backing vocals and guitars to “Half-Life” EP, then joined permanently for the Nancy Sinatra cover “Kinky Love”, which gave the band a minor hit single as part of “Flesh Balloon” EP.
The title track, “Half Life Remembered”, pounds along on a rhythm section slightly derived from Soon by My Bloody Valentine, with a vocal melody slightly derived from Joybringer by Manfred Mann’s Earth Band (itself derived from Gustav Holst’s Jupiter from The Planets). Regardless of the derivation, its a rattling little song, and the rest of the EP showed new directions too. “Two Sick Sisters” was pure uneasy atmosphere, crackle and noises too dim to ascertain. “A Revelation” was a skewed pop song with waves of guitar noise, but best of all was “Baby Maker“. This was Pale Saints in excelsis; guitars as loud as bombs, drums crashing here and there, a chord sequence which swerved when it should go straight, a song with so many twists it’s hard to keep up, and where the hell did those tympani drums in the middle eight come from? And somewhere within, Masters sings “The only way is down” as if he’s secretly relishing the prospect of imminent failure.
Ian Masters left the band in 1993, citing his lack of enthusiasm for touring, unlike the remaining members of the band and their record label 4AD. Former Heart Throbs bassist Colleen Browne joined afterwards.
The Flesh Balloon EP
This would be their only release of 1991, “The Flesh Balloon” EP. It starts with six and a half minutes of pure unrest named “Hunted“, a song in 5/8 time just to confuse anyone who may be attempting to dance to the song. That’s unusual enough, but Masters’ lyrics are dark too – threats, strange laughter, nothing is clear but it’s not happy. And the band match that feeling, leading to a second half where Masters sings peculiar harmonies in the middle distance while a synth plays a forbidding melody and the drums turn martial until the song fades into a sea of echoes.
Next was “Porpoise“, an instrumental which builds on a simple drum machine and bass guitar loop, adding insistent drums, chiming keyboards and rocking guitars – but while it progresses, it doesn’t seem to resolve in any way. Then there’s “Kinky Love”, a cover of a Nancy Sinatra song sung by Barham
Meriel Barham, joined the band permanently for the Nancy Sinatra cover of “Kinky Love”, which gave the band a minor hit single as part of “Flesh Balloon” EP.
Finally the EP closed with a demo of a song called “Hair Shoes” which did have the tension and edge lacking in “Kinky Love”. A phalanx of hovering mandolin styled guitars, another guitar like a two note siren and Masters singing quietly and scared.
In Ribbons (Expanded 30th Anniversary Reissue)
The band recorded their second full-length album, “In Ribbons”, A farther-ranging set with some of the band’s most powerful, wraithlike, and hypnotic songs. Released in the U.K. in March 1992,
Having previously worked well with producer Hugh Jones (Echo and The Bunnyman, Modern English, The Sound), he did a brilliant job recording their second album, “In Ribbons” despite some studio tensions. Brooklyn Vegan said in a recent celebration of the album that it was the “push and pull between Masters’ outsider tendencies and (the rest’s) commercial interests that makes “In Ribbons” so good. If some of the wild, ragged edges of “Comforts of Madness” have been smoothed off, the album makes up for it with scope and beauty. And there’ still no shortage of weird.”
squealing guitars and the linking pieces between songs have disappeared. There’s also still plenty of odd time signatures, dropped beats and off kilter rhythms, not least in the assured album opener “Throwing Back The Apple” which can’t decide which direction to go in, but still packs a punch, as does Ordeal. Then, “Thread Of Light” derails the train. It is Barham’s first lead vocal on the album and while the song is pleasant enough, it lacks the twists and turns which had made the previous two songs so thrilling. This happens over and over; a string of songs set up a dark mood then it is spoiled by a Barham song. There’s nothing wrong with her songs, but they stand out amongst the main album and they jar the flow of the record. But when the record is good, it is fantastic. “Shell” is a ballad that makes the nerves tingle, cellos and acoustic guitar and xylophones and chord sequences that swerve in all the right places.
The closing three songs work beautifully together – “Never Ending Night” sounds like a tribute to Fleetwood Mac’s Albatross, “Featherframe” is a Barham song which fits in well with the album, more martial drums and a return to noise, while “A Thousand Stars Burst Open” is a glorious closer, as richly textured as Cocteau Twins, euphoric yet melancholic too.
During the late 80s and early 90s there was a trend amongst indie bands to include a free 7 inch single with their vinyl albums, and Pale Saints were no exception to this. However they made a slightly different free single – rather than recording two more songs, they asked the Tintwistle Brass Band to arrange and record two Pale Saints songs. These versions of A Revelation and A Thousand Stars Burst Open are really rather special – they highlight the melodic beauty of Pale Saints’ songs but also give a glimpse of an alternate universe, where shoegazing meets traditional Yorkshire music. A unique record by a unique combination of talents.
If Pale Saints were one-step-ahead they might’ve been coping 91’s ‘loveless’, but instead they were returning to the icy dream pop landscapes of 88’s ‘isn’t anything’. somewhere between Sarah Records jangle-pop and Sonic Youth noise pop, ‘In Ribbons’ offers a buffet of the sleepy, gasoline-huffin’ rock. songs like ‘shell’ and ‘hunted’ are delicate and haunted, yet contain a great hook to keep your interest and keep you coming back, much in the same way of the Breeders.
Missing its original release date last year due to Covid delays and a production plant in meltdown, “In Ribbons” finally gets the 30th Anniversary celebration it deserves with a special double LP / CD release – the first disc being the UK version of the album, the second a bonus disc of never before heard demos (including their first attempt at Slapp Happy’s ‘Blue Flower’ and Ian’s 4 track recording of ‘Kinky Love’) and two brass band versions by The Tintwistle Band.
Coming in a beautiful gatefold sleeve, the limited double LP edition is being pressed on unpigmented vinyl by The Vinyl Factory in West London. A single disc, black vinyl version is also released.
After a perfunctory release of “Throwing Back The Apple” as a single (featuring a cover of Slapp Happy’s “Blue Flower” which the band had been playing live for over a year), Pale Saints disappeared.
Dissatisfied artistically, Ian Masters left the band in 1993, citing his lack of enthusiasm for touring, unlike the remaining members of the band and their record label 4AD. The Heart Throbs’ Bass player Colleen Browne joined shortly afterwards. effectively replaced Masters on bass, while Barham stepped to the fore.
Fine FriendEP
Sticking with producer Hugh Jones, the group released the “Fine Friend” EP in mid-1994, followed by their third album, “Slow Buildings”, Pale Saints’ final LP, alternated between succinct, driving pop and sprawling balladry.
There have been few calls for Pale Saints to reform, but you never can tell these days. In the meantime, their music is still available, still likely to shock (you will never forget your first listen to “The Colour Of The Sky”, an uncredited fifth song on the “Half-Life” EP) and still thrilling to hear.
The last Pale Saints concert was on June 14th, 1996 at 9:30 Club in Washington, D.C., United States.
Check out the “Mrs. Dolphin” A Japanese release containing “Barging Into the Presence of God” and the “Half-Life” EPs with the tracks “Colours and Shapes” and “A Deeper Sleep for Steven”
Their final studio recording was a version of Tom Waits“Jersey Girl” released on the tribute album “StepRight Up. Meriel Barham departed in September 1995, and the group eventually disbanded in 1996.
Mrs. Dolphin (10 Jan 1991), A Japanese release containing Barging Into the Presence of God and the Half-Life EPs with the tracks “Colours and Shapes” and “A Deeper Sleep for Steven”
Singles/EPs/demos
“Children Break” (1988)
Barging Into the Presence of God EP (September 1989)
Half-Life EP (October 1990), 12″ contains a bonus spoken-word track “Colour of the Sky”
Kinky Love (1991)
Flesh Balloon EP (June 1991)
“Porpoise” (1991)
“Throwing Back the Apple” (May 1992)
Fine Friend EP (August 1994)
“Fine Friend” (1994), US promo including “One Blue Hill” live acoustic @ KCRW
Los Angeles-based rock duo Slothrust have kept busy since they released their “I Promise” EP back in October. Leah Wellbaum and Will Gorin set off on an extensive month-long US tour to promote the album after its release, playing shows alongside The Front Bottoms and Pronoun—and not long afterward they hit the road again in January to celebrate 10 years of their breakthrough 2014 album “Of Course You Do”.
With a month-long respite in this second US tour, the band seems to be feeling nostalgic for their “I Promise” shows, as evidenced by their new video for the single “Maybe Maybe” from that release.
The clip compiles footage of the band’s impassioned performances of the tune, as well as plenty of backstage antics—including some interesting outfits they put together for their Halloween show in Nashville. “Since we always wait until the last minute to sort costumes, the pickings were slim, but I managed to snag a matching Bert and Ernie costume for myself and our bass player,” Gorin shares. “I do have a competitive edge, and when our crew was making bets on how many songs until I take off the mask, well, I took that as a challenge and ripped the entire set in character. But the behind-the-scenes character you didn’t get to see is someone we call ‘BDSM Bert.’ Perhaps he will make an appearance in the future…”
From the EP, “I Promise”, available now on Dangerbird Records. Released October 20th, 2023
The Fat Angel Sings 